Cassidy Jones and the Luminous (Cassidy Jones Adventures Book 4) (17 page)

“Okay, you can go,” I conceded. “Now I’ll have two of you to protect! Great! And don’t tell Nate—
or
my parents. With you and Emery, my hands are full enough!”

Jared pretended to zip his lips. “You won’t regret this.”

“I already do!”

~~~

As predicted, Emery wasn’t happy with me. At school, when Nate and Miriam ambled off to their lockers and Jared didn’t, Emery shot me a frustrated look. He didn’t have to ask why Jared had hung behind. He knew me well enough to figure it out.

I opened my mouth to defend myself, but before I could get a word out, Jared stepped between Emery and me.

“I’ve scuba dived since I was nine, my dad moors a 39-foot yacht, and you can take a look around his place while I borrow the keys,” Jared stated in a low voice.

Emery nodded, impressed.

“Welcome aboard,” he consented, giving Jared’s upper arm a firm pat. Then he motioned for us to leave.

I followed the boys out of Queen Anne High, flabbergasted that Emery had given in without a fight. It wasn’t like him. But then again, the yacht made a compelling case.

~~~

Mr. Wells’s luxury apartment overlooking Elliott Bay was our first stop. Contemporary furnishings, with lots of horizontal and vertical lines, graced the large, open interior. There were floor-to-ceiling windows, tile floors, and dark, richly colored walls. Jared’s father’s minimalistic taste was a far cry from his mother’s warm, eclectic antique finds. In other words, it was cold and sterile—an accurate reflection of its owner.

“Nice place,” Emery remarked, scanning the living/dining room and kitchen combo. He wasn’t checking out the décor. He was looking for a computer.

“He calls it the ‘
chick magnet
.’” Jared made quotation marks with his fingers and rolled his eyes. “Do what you gotta do,” he told Emery. “His home office is the first door on the right.”

Jared had made no attempt to hide his disgust with his dad. For some reason, that made me sad.

Needing no further encouragement, Emery headed for the hall. In the foyer, Jared flipped over a black-and-white print of old Seattle in a black frame. A key organizer was concealed behind it.

“That’s clever,” I commented.

“Uh-huh.” Jared snapped a set of keys off a hook.

“Does he keep his car keys in there, too?”

“Not usually,” Jared replied. He was rearranging the keys to make it less obvious that a set was missing.

“
Sooooo
—” I turned on my heels to the living area. “This is the
chick magnet
.”

Jared slammed the key organizer’s door.

I winced, expecting to hear the glass shatter.

“In other words,” Jared approached me from behind, “a bachelor pad for a wealthy middle-aged man on the hunt for women half his age. Women who like shiny, sparkly things.”

“Oh.” What else could I say?

“Sorry,” Jared apologized. I glanced at him sidelong. He scanned the opulence with distaste. “It’s just hard to be here right now.”

“I understand.” And I did. If I were him, this would be the last place I would want to be, too.

I smiled and rubbed his lean arm. His muscles were tense. “How’d you turn out so well?”

“Trying not to be like him.” Jared turned away and stalked to the open L-shaped kitchen, anchored with a huge island. He opened a black-stained pantry cabinet that flanked a stainless steel refrigerator. His fierce expression tempered into surprise.

“I wasn’t expecting this.”

“What?” I asked, stepping up next to him. The food items were neatly organized on the laminated shelves.

“No Luminous,” he pointed out. “I thought it would be packed in here.” Relief rolled off him in waves. I realized in that moment that fear had sparked his cutting mood. He was scared for his dad.

“Maybe he stopped drinking it,” I encouraged.

“Could be.” Jared opened the refrigerator.

I smiled when I saw there were no Luminous bottles in there, either.

“Maybe he figured out there’s something wrong with the water,” I suggested with a note of hope, just as Emery called for Jared to come to the office.

Jared shut the refrigerator and didn’t respond to my remark. It was frustrating not knowing what was going through his head.

We found Emery in the office, studying a wall safe. He held an oil painting that had been hanging in front of it.

“Whoa,” Jared gasped.

“That answers my question,” Emery said. He propped the painting against the wall. “You don’t know the combination. Fortunately, it’s a dial lock. Cassidy, come here.”

I did as he asked. Emery turned the dial around twice to the “0.”

“Tell me when you hear a click,” he instructed.

Jared barely breathed as Emery slowly turned the dial and I listened for clicks. Within seconds, we had the safe open.

“Remind me to bring you to all of my safecracking jobs,” Emery teased. He removed a black satchel from the safe and handed it to Jared. “Look through this,” he ordered. Then he extracted a stack of files, and fingered through them.

I watched as Jared dug out a variety of velvet jewelry boxes from the bag. The fabric on most of the boxes was faded and worn.

“Family heirlooms?” I asked as we opened the boxes, revealing antique-looking jewelry.

Jared shrugged. “Got me.” He opened a black ring box and stared at it.

“What is it?” I shifted so I could see, too. Inside was a tear-shaped diamond ring. Two gold wedding bands lay on either side.

Emotions warred in Jared’s eyes. “My parents’ wedding rings, I think.”

My heart broke for him.

“Your dad kept them?” I murmured.

“Yeah, he kept them. They’re worth money.” Jared snapped the box shut and tossed it into the satchel, as though the contents were meaningless.

“There’s nothing of use for us here,” Emery announced. From his tone, one would have thought he hadn’t overheard us.

Did his dad keep the rings for sentimental reasons?
I watched Jared as he returned the boxes to the satchel. His face had become an impassive mask, which I knew hid pain.
Maybe Mr. Wells kept them as a reminder of all he’s lost.

Emery put the files back inside the safe, arranging them the way he’d found them. Jared handed him the satchel in silence.

Once Emery had replaced the picture, we moved to the guestroom, where Jared slept. Seeing it was only a guestroom was gut-wrenching. Why wouldn’t Mr. Wells set aside a room for his son? I didn’t have the stomach to follow the boys into the master bedroom, opting to wait in the entry instead, where I spaced out on the picture of old Seattle. I couldn’t wait to get Jared out of there.

“Any luck?” I inquired when the boys joined me a couple of minutes later.

“Nope,” Jared said without making eye contact.

Emery looked at me, though.

I raised my eyebrows at him as Jared unlocked the door. He gave me his easygoing smile. It wasn’t an answer to my unspoken inquiry. It was a “Don’t ask.”

~~~

“Nice yacht,” Emery remarked, as indifferent about Mr. Wells’s expensive toy as he had been about his swanky apartment. His eyes scanned the cabin, cataloguing where everything was.

“Where’s the gear?” he asked Jared.

Mr. Wells’s wet suit, fins, surf boots, and mask fit Emery. Since Jared had his own, we just needed to rent equipment for me, along with scuba tanks. Emery didn’t want to use Mr. Wells’s.

We walked down the street from the marina to a dive shop.

“You’re sure an employee won’t recognize you?” Emery asked Jared for the second time.

“I haven’t been in there for years,” Jared reassured him.

“Everything okay, Emery?” I asked. He appeared at ease, but I could sense his alertness, which had greatly increased in the last thirty seconds or so.

He smiled at me. “Of course.”

I started to turn my head to look around, but Emery slung his arm over my shoulders to stop me.

“I can wait outside if it makes you feel more comfortable,” Jared was saying as he opened the door, the words trailing off when he saw Emery’s arm around me.

Bewildered, I shrugged at him. I had no idea what Emery didn’t want me to see.

“It wouldn’t,” Emery replied and pushed me toward the door. He took the door from Jared and lifted his chin for him to go in, too.

“What’s going on?” Jared asked quietly as Emery followed us in.

“Do as I tell you,” Emery whispered. Then he said to Jared, loudly enough for the store clerk to hear: “Pete, would you help Claire get what she needs? I’ll be right there.” He strolled over to a rack of Seattle apparel in front.

“Sure.” Jared narrowed his eyes on the front window.

I patted his arm to urge him forward.

While Jared ordered our gear from the clerk, Emery browsed. I kept a sharp eye on him. He stayed at the front of the store, as though he were waiting for someone. When it came time to pay, Emery moseyed back to us, wearing a pair of sunglasses he’d plucked off a display.

“These, too.” He handed them to the clerk. “Can you hold our gear for us?”

I spun around to the front. We had planned on taking the gear to the yacht. Why had Emery changed the plan?

Emery cleared his throat. Understanding his cue, I faced the register again. He wanted our backs to the door. Why?

“No prob, man,” the guy answered, adding the sunglasses to the sales receipt. “We close at six.”

“We’ll be back in an hour or so.”

Jared took a step away from the counter.

“Pete,” Emery stopped him. “Check out the longboards.”

Complying, Jared walked to the longboards stacked along the left wall, sliding glances at the door. My heart hammered. Who was outside the store?

“Claire, I’ll be right over,” Emery said as he handed the clerk three hundred-dollar bills.

I stared at him, torn. He wanted me close to Jared to protect him from whomever he’d spotted out there. But what about him?

I’m taking care of this now
. I glared at the door, my hands rolling into fists.
I’ll pound whoever’s out there into the ground!

“Go ahead, Claire.” Emery smiled. He tilted his head toward Jared. “I’ll be right over.”

I jerked a nod and chose a route to Jared around racks that put me closer to the front. If anyone came through the door, I would take him down before he even knew what hit him—or them.

“Hey,” I said to Jared, eyeballing the door.

“Who’s out there?” He held himself tensely, ready to spring into action.

“Don’t know.”

“Thanks,” Emery said to the clerk, pocketing his change. “We’ll be back soon.” He sauntered toward us, appearing relaxed.

“Sweet boards, huh?” he said. “Ready to go?”

“Yeah,” Jared and I agreed in unison.

The store phone rang.

“As you’ve already guessed, Jared is being followed,” Emery whispered as the clerk answered the call. “Here’s the plan. Cassidy, we’re a couple. When I signal you, run outside with the sunglasses, laughing, like you’d just taken them from me. I’ll come out after you. Put the glasses on and pose for a picture, with your back to the street, angle south—”

“Which way’s south?”

“Right. There are two men parked in a silver Acura across the street. Do not look in their direction. I’ll pretend to take your picture, while actually taking theirs. Laugh, smile, flirt, be goofy—we’re having a good time. Jared, you come out twenty seconds after us. Do not react to anything I do. In fact, look annoyed with me. That shouldn’t be difficult to pull off.”

Emery shoved the bag into my hands and opened the door. “Showtime,” he said, pushing me out.

I stumbled onto the sidewalk, almost smacking into a pedestrian, and let out a howling laugh. The woman shot me a dirty look. The laugh caught in my throat.

“Sorry,” I apologized, blushing.

She shook her head and continued on her way.

Emery came barreling out the door, not looking like himself at all. Wolfish grin, shiny, infatuated eyes—he drank me in with the same unnerving stare I had caught Chad giving me before. Taken aback, I forgot what I was supposed to be doing.

“You think you’re funny,” he shouted loudly, scooping me up into his arms. “You look terrified,” he said into my hair. His calm voice didn’t match his feverish expression. “Play along or we’ll arouse their suspicion. Squeal—you’re having fun.”

I squealed, as ordered.

Emery set me on my feet with my back to the Acura. “I’m going to put the glasses on your face,” he said through his grin, shaking them loose from the bag that I clutched. Obviously, due to my ineptness, he had contrived a new plan.

As Emery slipped the glasses onto my face, I glanced at Jared, who had just come out of the shop. I had to hand it to him. He appeared extremely annoyed.

“You’re
so
hot!” Emery declared, stumbling backward as if stunned by my beauty. He whipped his phone from his jeans pocket. “Say cheese.”

“Cheese.” I struck a pose, which I was sure looked absurd.

Emery snapped picture after picture, angling the phone in different directions, while I did my best to ham it up. I must have done a fairly decent job, judging by the looks passers-by were giving us.

“They’re getting suspicious,” Emery said through grinning teeth. He was watching the men on his phone screen. “We’d better stop before they decide to get out of the car.”

He put away the phone, then hooked my neck in his arm and dropped a lavish kiss on top of my head as he pulled me down the sidewalk. My face burned several shades of red.

“I want to deck you,” Jared informed him when he’d caught up with us.

I peeked at him. His deadpan expression proved that he was a better actor than I was. But then again, he wasn’t trapped under Emery’s armpit.

“I’d want to deck me, too,” Emery admitted, beaming for the goons. “We don’t want them to know how you feel about Cassidy, since they know where she lives.”

“What are you talking about? They followed us from my dad’s.”

“No. They followed us from school.” Emery grabbed my waist and swung me onto a small bench outside a bookstore. “Cassidy, keep your face angled down, like you’re listening to me. Don’t stop smiling.”