Lost With Me (Stark Trilogy 5)

“You hacked into a security feed,” Damien says, his voice low and tight, trembling on the edge of control.

“Not me. But I hire the best.” He meets Damien’s eyes, his own deadly serious. “Actually, you hire the best. This is why. Denise.” He lifts his wrist, speaking into some sort of wrist unit. “Send the feed to my tablet.”

A moment later, an electronic tablet on the small kitchen table buzzes. Ryan taps it, and Damien and I watch a jerky black and white image.

“There’s a bank branch in the same strip mall as Anne’s art class,” he explains. “You’re seeing the feed from the exterior ATM.”

For a moment, there’s nothing. A few cars leaving the lot. A few moms I recognize from class. Then Anne and Bree step into view. Bree’s holding Anne with her left hand, and I can see car keys in her right. Anne clutches a paper bag in her free hand, which explains why they’re leaving so much later than the other kids from the class. They’d walked down the sidewalk to the small convenience store.

They pause as Bree looks both ways, then I see them step off the sidewalk and onto the parking lot. They walk toward the Volvo we bought Bree to use when driving the kids around. I can’t tell how far away they are when the hatchback pulls in front of them, but Bree tugs Anne tight to her side, keeping her from stepping toward the car. The driver’s window comes down, and I see a shadowed face hidden under the rim of a cap.

“We tried to enhance the image, but the perp’s wearing a stocking mask. Features distorted. We’re pretty sure it’s a Caucasian, but even that we can’t be one hundred percent on. Not with a black and white image and such poor resolution. And as for male or female … well, the odds are male, but at times like these, I prefer evidence to odds.”

I start to nod in understanding, then gasp when I see the barrel of a gun. The kidnapper waves it, and Bree stiffens. I see her look from left to right, obviously trying to assess the situation. Then she hustles Anne into the back seat. The last thing I see before the car drives out of the frame is Bree pulling Anne into her arms.

My vision blurs, and I realize I’m crying. Damien draws me to him, and I cling to his shirt, terrified and helpless.

“What about Bree’s phone?” Damien asks. “It’s trackable.”

“We found it on the street just past the entrance to the parking lot,” Ryan says. “Her entire purse was tossed.”

I shudder and hold Damien tighter.

“I’m sorry.” The voice is soft and gravely. Someone who’s been crying so much her voice is raw. I look up, and see Moira standing in the doorway. She has Ryan’s chestnut hair, but her eyes are golden brown. Like him, she’s slim and athletic, and usually she has an easy smile and a demeanor that suggests a wicked sense of humor.

Right now, she just looks broken.

“I’m so, so sorry,” she repeats.

I want to say it’s not her fault, but the words get lodged behind the tears in my throat. So instead I stand, and she hurries to me, and we clutch each other, both crying as our legs give out and we sink to the floor together.

“Who?” she asks. “Who would have done this?”

“Sofia,” I whisper. Then I pull away from Moira and turn to look at Damien. “Sofia,” I repeat.

“No.” Damien stands, the horror in his voice palpable. “She wouldn’t.”

“Bullshit.” I rise to my feet, my whole body aching, my heart most of all. “She lost it after the miscarriage. The note on my car. The graffiti in my office. She snapped. Goddammit, she snapped after she lost her baby, and now she wants mine.”

I expect Damien to protest again, but all he does is drop back into his chair, his elbows on his knees and his face in his palms. He believes it. He really believes that I might be right.

I start to go to him—I want to wrap my arms around him and hold him close, comforting him as he comforts me—but I’m halted by heavy footsteps and a deep, sympathetic voice.

“We need to call the police.”

I look over to find Charles Maynard, Damien’s attorney, standing near the threshold between the living area and the kitchen. Evelyn stands beside him, and I gulp out a sob. She opens her arms and I run to her, letting her hold me like a child as I cry. As I watch Damien stand and face Charles.

“No police,” he says.

“Damien—no.” I take a step toward him, but he just shakes his head.

“Not yet,” he says, his eyes on me and not Charles. “Trust me. God, Nikki. Trust me.”

I draw in a breath and feel Evelyn’s hands tighten on my shoulders. Then I nod, just barely. He sees it, and I can almost feel the relief that floods through him.

“I have a team coming in. Experts.”

Now it’s my turn to feel relief. He means Dallas Sykes, and that means Deliverance. The vigilante group exists to rescue kidnap victims. And while the need for them hammers home the reality of this horror, the fact that they’re coming fills me with hope.

Still, they aren’t here yet, and I turn to Ryan. “What about now. What about finding the car. What about—”

“They’re on it,” Damien says, and Ryan nods.

“I promise you, my men are all over that area,” Ryan assures me. “And we have back door arrangements with several government agencies. I have someone reviewing a traffic camera feed right now. And anything we can’t get through cooperation, I promise you we can still manage. I’ve already given Noah a heads-up,” he adds, referring to a friend and former Deliverance tech guru, who I know can hack his way through pretty much anything.

“We’ll find them,” Ryan promises, his gaze going to both me and Damien.

I lock eyes with Damien, the pain in those dual-colored eyes mirroring the ache in my heart. “I’m going to go see Lara,” I say, because right now, I need to hold her close. I need to know that she’s still here. That she’s still vibrant and real in a world gone completely insane.

“Do you want me to come, too?” Evelyn asks, but I shake my head. “It’s okay. Jamie’s back there. I won’t be alone.”

I pause before entering the girls’ room. I draw one breath, then another and another. Then I scrub my palms over my face, erasing any sign of tears. I don’t want Lara to worry. She’s already going to know something is going on. I don’t want her having nightmares about her sister disappearing.

I plaster on a big smile, then open the door. “There’s my girl,” I say, when I see her sitting cross-legged on the bed playing Go Fish with Jamie. “How’s my sweet baby?”

I meet Jamie’s eyes as Lara turns to me, rolling her big brown ones. “Momm-eee. I’m not a baby. That’s Anne.”

“Right,” I say, my voice tripping over the word. “You’re my big girl, and she’s my baby.” I can’t control the shaking in my voice, but Lara doesn’t notice. I reach the bed and sit down, then pull her close to me and hug her harder than I intended.

“Mommy! I’m trying to play.”

“Oh. So sorry.” But I barely let up the pressure of my hug.

Jamie meets my eyes, and I see sympathy and fear. She reaches across and takes my hand, and I blink fiercely, determined not to cry.

We’re like that, the three of us together on the bed, when Damien comes in an hour or so later. I turn to look at him, just the sight of him giving me hope, though my head knows that’s foolish. He holds out his arms, and Lara runs into them, and I watch as he hugs her tight, pain written all over his strong face.

Then he puts her down and tells her to run to Jamie. “We need to talk,” he says to me, then immediately holds up a hand when he sees the arrow of fear strike me. “No, don’t worry. We don’t have news, good or bad.”

I nod, then follow him out of the room with one last glance toward Jamie. And Lara.

“Sofia’s here,” he says, and I stiffen. “She’s downstairs with some of Ryan’s men in one of the first floor rooms.”

“Why?”

“She’s taking a lie detector test.”

“She agreed to that?”

He nods. “She understands why we might believe she’d do that.”

My mind latches onto the word we, and I frown.

He sees it, then shakes his head. “I don’t want to think it, but I can’t deny you make a good argument. She gets that, too. I figure that’s a point in her favor.”

I lick my lips. “People can fool lie detector tests.”

“I suppose so. More in movies than in real life, I think.” His eyes meet mine again. “I need you to be strong.”

I nod, then reach for him, but he takes a step back. Just one casual step, but it sends ice coursing through my veins. “Damien?” I study his face, seeing something horrible and dark and lost there. Seeing fear like I’ve never seen before.

“We’ll get her back,” he says. “I’ll make sure we get her back. No matter what it takes.”

I nod slowly, wanting so much to believe him. I’ve never doubted Damien. But right now I can’t even believe in the reality around me. So how the hell am I supposed to believe in happy endings?

19

“Mommy, what’s going on?”

I open my eyes to find Lara straddling me, her face scrunched up in question. “Why are all the people here? Are we having a party?”