COLE (Dragon Security Book 1) (46 page)

He was his mother’s child that way.

“Abigail knew who I was. She accepted that I wasn’t the best man in the world. But she also embraced the fact that I was there, that I was the best husband I could be. She loved me enough for both of us, and I will forever be grateful to her for that.”

“She deserved better.”

“She did. And I told her that. But for better or for worse, Abigail chose me.”

Ian glanced at me. “It just feels like an insult to her memory, you with this woman.”

“Abigail would want me to be happy. And Cassidy makes me happy.”

Ian couldn’t argue with that, but he still wasn’t ready to accept it, either.

We boarded the plane, both of us lost in our thoughts. Killian didn’t ask and that was appreciated. I stared out the window and thought about the last time I was on this plane. Cassidy sat beside me, her hand tucked into mine. Before everything became so crazy, before I knew I had a daughter, before I knew there was danger lying in wait for my entire family.

Before I was rushing to save the one thing that was most precious to me.

Cassidy

The plane was crowded, some man with heavy thighs beside me, his body pressed tighter against mine than Brian’s had been hours ago. I shifted, staring out the window at the clouds, willing the plane to move faster. I wondered if Brian had found the phone, if he knew where I was headed by now. I hadn’t wanted to leave the phone. I’d wanted to call Brian, to tell him, to ask him what I should do. But the kidnapper had been clear in his instructions.

Leave the phone. Let him follow. I want him to see.

Was I leading Brian into a trap? What about Brianna? Was she really…no, I couldn’t let my thoughts go there. She was going to be okay. I had to believe that, or all this was for nothing.

I closed my eyes and willed the fear burning in my throat to die down. I couldn’t believe this was happening. I needed it not to be happening. I needed my daughter to be safe. I needed to be in Brian’s arms, safe from the dangers in the world. Why couldn’t I have that?

The plane suddenly dropped as we hit a pocket of turbulence. I cried out.

“It’s alright,” the guy beside me said. “Plane crashes are so rare that our chances of going down are one in a million.”

“Thanks.”

Thanks for that image. For that thought. For another thing to be worried about.

I opened my eyes and stared out the window again.

There was a burner phone in my pocket. The kidnapper had informed me that I would find it in my purse. How or when he put it there, I didn’t know. But the idea that Brianna’s kidnappers had someone close enough to me to put a phone in my purse took away any sense of security I might have had.

Ian was right. Someone was watching me.

The phone buzzed almost the second the plane landed. I tugged it out of my pocket and read the text message as I quickly followed the other passengers off the plane.

There’s a car waiting for you out front. Green sedan.

Was I about to be kidnapped, too? Why would these people want Brianna and me, too?

I followed the signs, walked quickly, wondering if maybe Brianna would be in the car. But that would be asking too much, wouldn’t it?

The sedan was at the curb. Empty. There was no one else in sight, just other passengers talking excitedly with their family members, rushing to get to wherever it was they were going. I climbed into the car, searching for the keys. They were in the console, under a GPS device.

I turned the device on, and it quickly lit up, showing a menu that indicated it had pre-saved destinations. I touched that button and discovered that the kidnappers had programmed the machine to take me to a specific place on the other side of the city. With a deep breath, I started the car.

I hate driving in the city. I hate the aggressiveness of the other drivers. I was nervous enough as it was, but the traffic—rush hour traffic—was making it even worse. The last time I’d been here, I’d taken a cab. I told Brianna that I couldn’t rent a car because I would never survive driving on the interstate. She’d laughed and reassured me that once I was moved in, I wouldn’t have to drive. There were buses and taxis. Not only that, but the businesses I would want to frequent were within walking distance of our condos. It’d be okay.

It wasn’t okay. But I’d do anything for her.

The GPS took me to a deserted area not far from the Los Angeles Zoo. There was a little park surrounded by trees. Beautiful, really. But I didn’t understand why I was there.

Wait by the green bench.

I got out and went to sit on the only green bench in the little park. My hands were shaking.

I’d only been there a minute when a hand wrapped itself around my mouth. Whoever it was pulled me back and pressed the cold blade of a knife against my throat.

I closed my eyes and prepared to die.

Brian

We landed in Los Angeles before Cassidy’s plane was due to land, but we were too far to get to LAX before she could leave. I’d called Kevin and instructed him to wait for her, but he couldn’t find her.

“There were just too many people, Pops. And she could have left the airport through any number of avenues. I couldn’t get past security…”

Excuses. The boy was my favorite, but he wasn’t always the brightest in the damn bunch.

“You should have bought a ticket. You should have been waiting at the gate when she got off the plane.”

“I’m sorry, Pops. I thought—”

“That’s the problem, Kevin.”

Ian shot me a look and Killian took the phone. “Meet us at the condo,” he said.

We climbed into an SUV that was waiting for us, rushing across town to the condo that Brianna owned. I found myself idly wondering which one was the condo Cassidy was due to move into before Brianna’s kidnapping.

Kevin unlocked the door when he arrived nearly a half an hour after us. There was no sign of Cassidy.

“Is she a neat freak, or something?” Ian asked as we walked through the door. The place did, indeed, look very clean. Everything in its place. And there was no dust. Not even on the bookshelves that were near the windows. I walked slowly around, running my finger over the shelves. There should have at least been a little dust. Brianna had been missing for over a month.

“Someone’s been staying here,” I said.

I went into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. There was milk, condiments, but nothing else there. And the milk was still fresh.

“Check the bedrooms.”

Killian pulled his gun as he headed up the stairs. Kevin—he’d never been part of our illegal activities—stood back and watched, his eyes wide. Ian followed his brother, his own gun—a small caliber pistol—in his hands. We could hear their footsteps above us. I waited, holding my breath, wondering what the fuck was going on here.

Killian came back downstairs, a wet towel dangling from his fingers.

“You’re right.”

“Does she have a boyfriend? A girlfriend?” Ian asked.

“Not that I know of.” I focused on Kevin. “Have you talked to the management here at the complex? Cassidy had a condo here, too. Maybe that’s where they’re holding her. Maybe they were using this place and holding her there.”

“That’s brilliant,” Ian said, almost admiringly. “It would be perfect. No one would wonder about people going in and out of a condo they’d just sold. And that wall…” Ian walked back into the living room and pointed at the wall where Brianna had hung her flat screen television between an array of pictures of her mother and her. “If the condos are all similar, that wall could be the one they filmed the videos in front of. Without the pictures and stuff, it would be the right dimensions.”

I turned to Kevin. “Call the property manager.” I pointed to Killian and Ian. “Go out and look for anything unusual. Cassidy’s condo would be close, but not too close. Maybe across the parking lot.”

They headed out, stowing their guns so they wouldn’t attract attention.

I watched Kevin make the call, his expression tight as he did.

“Number seventeen,” he said when he hung up.

Cassidy

My heart was pounding. The pain that rushed through me was more emotional than the physical pain of the blade against my throat. However, it was enough to make my heart skip a beat and cause my stomach to clench.

Whoever was standing behind me didn’t say a word. He simply held me there, unable to speak, afraid to move. I closed my eyes, sending up a silent prayer to anyone who might be listening.

Please, let my daughter be okay.

That was all I cared about. They could kill me if they had to. But I needed my little girl to be okay.

Other hands were suddenly there, wrapping something around my eyes. Then they were lifting me off my feet. They tossed me into the back of some sort of vehicle, someone slipped cable ties over my wrists and ankles. I was bound, blindfolded, and a gag followed, lying on the metallic bottom of some sort of vehicle, a utility van most likely. We were moving before I was completely secured, rushing through the city streets. I heard the horn honk multiple times and felt the van turn wildly right and then left, then right several times more. I lost track after a while.

They hadn’t killed me. Maybe they were taking me to Brianna.

Maybe they were going to kill us together.

My heart should have been pounding out of my chest, but it wasn’t. I was surprisingly calm. I was still alive, and that meant that they had a plan for me. What that plan entailed, I didn’t know. But I was still alive.

I heard voices, but I couldn’t understand what they were saying.

I tugged at the hard, plastic ties around my wrists, trying to work my hands out of them. But they were too tight. The ones on my ankles were looser, but it would be too obvious if I tried to work my way out of them. I wondered if Brianna had been tied up this way. Was she still tied up? Had she spent the last month tied up on the floor of some room? Was she hurt? Did they do things…again, I couldn’t let my mind go there. It was okay whatever they wanted to do to me. But if they’d hurt her, there was nothing on Earth that could protect them. I would kill them myself.

I was not a violent woman, but she was my only child.

The van stopped. I waited. Listened. But nothing happened. They didn’t come for me. They didn’t get out. They were waiting for something, but I had no way of knowing for what.

Was I about to die? Or was I about to be reunited with my child?

Brian

I rushed out the door and headed across the parking lot to the building marked with the appropriate number. Seventeen was within sight of Brianna’s condo, but far enough away that both ladies would have a sense of privacy. Killian was standing on the corner, watching, when I came running out. He intercepted me and led the way, his gun drawn discreetly.

The windows were covered so we couldn’t see inside. And the door was locked.

“The manager’s on the way with the key.”

I didn’t know if we had long enough to wait. I walked around the building to the back, jumped the wood fence that designated the small yard behind the condo. There was a sliding glass door opening onto a porch. I walked up to it, trying to see past the blinds that hung there.

I couldn’t see anything. And there was no sound.

If Brianna was in there…

I looked around, grabbing a brick lying discarded on the ground near the porch. I hadn’t pitched since high school, but it was a good throw. The door shattered, raining glass everywhere over the narrow porch. An alarm sounded, a high-pitched scream that hurt my ears. I ignored it, rushing inside. The house was clearly occupied by someone, but there was very little furniture. A small card table in the kitchen. A chair set in front of the wall Ian thought might have been the set for the videos. And a small cot on the other side of the living room.

I rushed upstairs, taking the steps two at a time. The master bedroom was completely empty, as was the spare room. Back downstairs. There was a small den behind the stairs. The door was locked.

I could hear Killian pounding on the front door. I ignored him, as I raised my foot and slammed it against the doorknob. It crumpled instantly and the door opened.

She was lying on a narrow cot like the one out in the living room, her hands bound behind her, her ankles held together with a single cable tie. She was unconscious, but she was breathing, I could see the slight movements in her narrow chest. I quickly grabbed her, carrying her in my arms the same way I might have done a baby. I could hear sirens as I burst out the front door.

Ian took Brianna from me as Killian rushed across the parking lot to the SUV, opening the back doors. We ran even as Kevin moved to intersect the property manager. I could hear him talking calmly, saying something about his ill sister, as the property manager looked on with an expression of overwhelming confusion. Kevin jumped into the SUV as Killian pulled out, nearly turning the top-heavy vehicle over as he turned out of the parking lot.

I touched Brianna’s forehead lightly as I tugged the gag away from her mouth. Like Conor, she had a cloth in her mouth covered by a piece of duct tape. The tape left a raw mark on her lips above sores that indicated this wasn’t the first time she’d had the tape on her mouth. Her wrists were raw, too, where the cable ties had been left too tight. I cut it away, shifting to get to her ankles, too.

“Drugs?”

Ian shrugged. “Could be anything. Dehydration, low blood sugar, drugs, fear…almost anything.”

“The nearest hospital is about ten miles,” Killian said.

I nodded, running my hand slowly over the top of Brianna’s head. She had my coloring, my red hair and green eyes. But she looked so much like her mother that it physically hurt to look at her. She had Cassidy’s high cheekbones, her slight shoulders, her full lips.

Where the hell was Cassidy?

She stirred slightly, moaning as she turned into Ian’s chest. He held her closer, the expression on his face softening as her hand moved over his arm. Maybe he’d find some love in his hardened heart for his little sister after all.

I wanted to carry her into the hospital, but Ian wouldn’t even give me the chance. We walked through the emergency room doors, a ragtag group. Killian and I dressed in suits, Ian in jeans, and Kevin in workout clothes. Brianna wore a long sweater and a pair of shorts, her hair falling in a cascade of tangles over Ian’s arm. A nurse came over immediately and directed us to a room behind the triage area.

Ian didn’t put her down until the nurse insisted, finally setting her on the gurney. She shooed us out of the way as she set about inserting an IV into Brianna’s arm. Others came into the room and blocked our view, finally forcing us out into the hallway. I wanted to know what was happening. It made me nervous as more and more people rushed into the room, only a few coming out and returning with more supplies. Kevin took my arm and drew me down the hall.

“We need to let them do their jobs.”

The four of us waited in a small room just off the trauma area, Ian leaning nonchalantly against a wall, Killian sitting in a chair, leaning forward against his knees. Kevin was staring out a small window that looked out on the parking lot. I was pacing.

This bothered me. Everything about it bothered me.

“Why was it so easy? Why did they let us find her so easily?”

“What makes you think they let us find her?” Ian asked.

“There was no one there watching over her. They wanted us to find her.”

“You think we played into some plan they had?” Killian asked. “How could they have known we would come here?”

“After that message at the warehouse and the texts on Cassidy’s phone? What else would we do?”

“But why not just let her go?”

I shook my head. “To keep us off track?”

“To play with you,” Kevin said.

I had to agree with that. “This is all about getting back at me for something. They wanted me to have to break into that condo to rescue her.”

“Why?”

That was the question.

“To buy time,” Ian suggested.

“It’s about Cassidy. Or Stacy. Or both.”

Killian stood. “I’ll go to New York now.”

“And you go back to the condo complex. See if you can find anything,” I said to Ian.

“What about me?” Kevin asked.

“Stay with Pops,” Killian said immediately. “He needs your support.”

Kevin came to me, as Ian and Killian left, touching my arm as I stood watching. I moved back into my pacing pattern, staring at the floor as I tried to work the puzzle out in my head.

“If they hurt either Cassidy or Stacy…”

“Why would someone want to hurt them? How would they even know about Cassidy?”

“They knew about her relationship to me. They knew that taking Brianna would get Cassidy to come back to me, that it would drive her to do anything they asked. How did they know that?”

“Mothers are like that. They fight for their children.”

“It has to be more than that. And how did they know about Cassidy’s relationship with me? No one knew about that.”

“Mom knew.”

I glanced at Kevin. “How do you know that?”

“Like Ian, I heard her say the name Cassidy a few times when you fought.”

I could only remember once or twice when Abigail brought up Cassidy during an argument. And that had been years ago, when Kevin was too young to remember much of anything.

“Are you sure you didn’t just hear Ian mention her?”

“Maybe.”

“Mom didn’t throw my past into my face that often. Especially not the last ten years or so of our marriage.”

“But it hurt her. She never forgot.”

I was a little confused. I studied him, wondering what he knew about it. He’d spent time alone with Abigail those last few days, but she wouldn’t have…would she?

“Brianna Myers family?”

A doctor in blue scrubs approached us. I held out my hand.

“I’m Brian Callahan. Her father.”

The doctor shook my hand. “Your daughter is suffering from dehydration and a drug overdose. We gave her a medication that will clear the drugs from her body.”

“What do you mean, drug overdose?”

The doctor cleared his throat. “Your daughter had lethal levels of Percocet in her body. If you hadn’t brought her in when you did, she would have been dead in a matter of moments.”

I glanced at Kevin. His expression was as shocked as I felt.

“Your daughter has curious marks on her wrists and ankles. Has someone been holding her hostage?”

I didn’t like the implication in the doctor’s words. He clearly thought we’d been holding her for some reason.

“She was kidnapped.”

The doctor looked skeptical. “We’ll have to call the police.”

“Of course. But can we see her?”

The doctor hesitated, but then he nodded. “She’s still in bay three.”

Kevin followed close behind me. She was alone when we walked through the door, but a nurse quickly followed, moving around the bed to check her IV line.

“She needs rest,” the nurse said. “They’ll probably take her upstairs in a little while.”

“How long will she need to stay?” Kevin asked.

“A few days. Just until the drugs are clear from her body and she’s no longer dehydrated. I think the doctor also wanted to give her antibiotics for these marks on her wrist,” she said, shifting the sheet so that we could see her wrists were wrapped in bright white bandages.

I went to the bed and touched Brianna’s cheek lightly. The nurse watched me, curiosity in her eyes. Then she left, hesitating at the door.

“I’ll be back in about ten minutes.”

“Thank you.”

The moment she was gone, I said, “Go find a car. I’ll meet you out back in five.”

Kevin didn’t say a word, just slipped out the door to do as I’d asked. That was the thing about my boys. They were well behaved and knew not to question their father.

Thank you, Abigail.

I searched through the drawers to find some gauze. I’d been cut, stabbed, shot…I knew how to take care of a wound. I took a wad of gauze and carefully slipped the IV from Brianna’s arm. They’d taken her clothes, but she was dressed in a long hospital gown, her curves properly covered. Just the same, I grabbed a blanket and wrapped her up like a baby. Once again, I was carrying her like a baby in my arms, experiencing one aspect of her childhood that I’d missed and would never get back.

There was an exit door not far from where her room was. I knew an alarm would sound, so I waited, counted to fifty as slowly as I could while my ears strained to catch the sounds of someone coming. Then I pushed through, relieved to see Kevin in a small, dark sedan at the end of a narrow alley. We were in the car, speeding back toward the parking lot before the alarm alerted anyone.

“Who the hell are you?”

Brianna was awake.