Claire just stared. It was a small, square black gun, but the pinpoint of its barrel seemed as big as a rain barrel.
“It’s all right, Claire,” Will said, locking the safety bolt on the front door. “I’ve seen everyone else go out, waited. I swear to you I will not hurt you or anyone here, as long as you cooperate—help me. Now where’s that doll Lexi told me about on the phone?”
“You—you talked to Lexi on the phone?”
“Earlier today. What luck that she answered the phone herself, but I was calling your cell and she said you were in the shower. I told her—and she did remember who I am from story times—that I was friends with her aunt Darcy and that I had been helping you to look for her and to keep our phone call a secret.”
Claire just gaped at him, trying to take in what he was saying—and what it could mean.
“I assured her,” he went on, sounding both earnest and calm, “that her aunt would be fine, be home soon and that the person who had hurt her would pay for it. And I told her that was all a secret, too.”
Thoughts bombarded Claire. Had Will been the one who planted the doll here through Nita? There had been newspaper articles about how Nick and Claire had helped their nanny, Nita, when a body was found in her house several months ago. Had he observed Nita, saw she was pregnant, then arranged for her to win the doll? To spy on them? So had he taken Darcy? If so, he might intend to destroy the doll now so it could not be traced to him. Strange, but despite the fact that gun was pointed at her, she didn’t think he’d shoot her. And yet she couldn’t take that chance. If only Nick or the others would get back soon, but then what would Will do?
“It will save us time if I have the doll,” Will said.
“I can go get it, bring it out here.”
“Hardly. Claire, I know you are as smart as Darcy is sweet. I can’t let you call for help, and I don’t plan to wake the girls. Take me to the doll, and we won’t bother them at all. I assume from watching their bedroom light go out they’re in bed. It’s late.”
“Were you watching from where you yanked up the butterfly flowers and bushes?”
He frowned. “Never would I do that, and you must not think so. But we’ll settle with who did soon.”
Strange, but once again she believed him. Tara would never do that. Did that leave Clint Ralston or that Jedi lackey of his?
“Will, I can’t take you to the girls when you have that gun.”
“I’m here to help, really to show and tell you things so that you understand. So that you can tell Darcy when she’s better, tell Jilly, too.”
“Tell them what?”
“What I did for them—am going to do. Justice. You and Nick—that detective, too—all believe in justice, and you will have it. Do not be afraid and do as I say, and everything will go well. Now!”
He raised the gun. “Get me that doll,” he said. “It’s served its purpose, and the girls have each other. They’ll get over its loss. Actually, you should have drowned that thing days ago, but I know you were looking for Darcy, too, and you probably thought the doll could distract or help the girls. But I have the answers. Now, move!”
His voice, his tone, had changed. For the first time, she was terrified of him. Her thoughts flew to Trey, asleep in his bed in the nursery across from the girls’ room. Will hadn’t mentioned him, seemed unconcerned or ignorant about him. But what if this was a ruse and he tried to take or hurt the girls? Could she grab a lamp from Lexi’s dresser, hit him with it? Yet best not to wake the girls, alarm them—and maybe wake Trey, and then Will would have another way to make her do anything he wanted.
“Do you just want the doll, and then you’ll go?” she asked, her voice quavering.
“Yes, I’ll go. I need to give you answers, have you be my witness, then tell Darcy.”
For some reason, as cryptic and confusing as that seemed, she believed him. Get him the doll. Listen to his story. Get him out of here. She suddenly knew with such conviction and clarity that he would not hurt the girls, hopefully not hurt her, either, if she was to be his witness, his mouthpiece. She only hoped that for some reason he did not hurt himself when all was said and done here. That portrait must mean so much to him. Was he giving away his dearest possessions? Was he going to make some terrible admission and then kill himself or someone else who had been behind Darcy’s disappearance?
He followed her through the house and down the hall. Trey’s door was barely ajar. Thank heavens, silence from within. The door to the girls’ room stood open. The dim night-light glowed golden. They both slept peacefully, faceup, in the matching twin beds with a small table and unlit lamp between them.
Hoping he’d stay in the doorway, Claire mouthed and gestured, “Wait there.” He stopped one step in.
She tiptoed between the beds and carefully lifted the doll from where it lay outside the covers by Lexi’s feet. She hadn’t tucked it in, hardly had it near her. Smarter girl than a smart doll, once things were explained to her.
She turned back to take the doll to Will, wanting to get him out of here, out of the room, even out of the house. But she saw he had come farther and stood at the foot of Jilly’s bed, just staring raptly at her. And he was crying.
Despite the fact he held the gun, though not pointed at anyone now, she tugged at his arm to leave. Should she lash out at him now? Go for the gun? But no, not here at least.
He sniffed hard and pushed her, still holding the doll, from the room.
“I take it the others will be back soon,” he whispered as they stopped in the kitchen, and she put the doll on the counter. He seized a terry-cloth towel from the rack and wrapped the doll in it one-handed, still holding the gun. He whispered, “Wrap it in more towels, maybe tin foil.” She thought the wind and thudding rain probably muted their voices for the recording device in the doll, but she did as he said. And, after all, since Will was possibly behind the doll, what did he care anymore? But then perhaps he had someone monitoring it for him, since he obviously still held a normal day job—if anything was normal here anymore.
He motioned her down to the other end of the kitchen. “I’ve written a note to leave for your husband,” he told her, his voice still a mere whisper. She had to almost read his lips.
“But you said you’d explain things to me, then leave.”
“I am leaving and I will explain, but I must show you things, not just tell. You will then be the witness, the conduit, the testifier to justice and their destruction.”
She pictured little Trey again, sleeping, peaceful, and the girls, so sweet. Will had said Darcy was sweet.
“I’m not leaving this house with you.”
“You must. You must to understand, to keep Darcy safe in the future in case he doesn’t think she’s forgotten enough.”
“Will, who wants her to forget?”
“You must go with me now. Your children will be all right, for surely your husband and others will be back soon.”
“You—Then, you are the one who’s been listening through this doll?”
He hesitated a moment. “I wish I could have gotten one for Jilly, too, but Darcy told me some backstory about Lexi’s being kidnapped once—before Darcy disappeared, of course. I don’t want you wounded, hurt and bleeding on our journey, so don’t even think of trying to take this gun. You come now, or I’ll take the girls, too. Claire, I swear, I’ll have you back safe soon.”
“Back soon, like Darcy? Drugged? Memory erased?”
“I will tell you one more time. I did not—would not—hurt Darcy. Now you must come with me willingly or—or another way. Yes, I arranged for the doll here and figured, from things Darcy had told me, your daughter would be the best recipient. And Darcy mentioned your nanny, Nita, was pregnant and that seemed a good conduit to get the doll here. I needed to keep track of what you were doing to trace Darcy, so I could help, lay my own plans and trap. I paid a friend to monitor the doll for me, and I don’t want him to hear anything else through it now. Claire, we are leaving immediately—now!”
She thought to bluff him, to refuse. But she feared he might take Jilly then, even Lexi, and they’d both been traumatized too much.
She stared as he fished a business-size envelope out of his jacket pocket and propped it up on the counter. She saw printed on it Nick Markwood.
“That’s not supposed to be from me, is it?” she asked.
“I signed it. It explains you will be back soon with enough information to free Darcy’s husband from those charges and to have the mastermind of all this ungodly butterfly and dolphin research—and Darcy’s drugging—arrested and put away for life, if he’s alive then.”
“Do you mean Lincoln Yost? Has he made money from his research from someone rich and powerful—surely not you?”
“An excellent guess, but a bit off. We must go now. If you don’t, we’ll go get the girls, and they don’t need to see where we’re going. They wouldn’t understand, and it would terrify them even more than it evidently haunts Darcy.”
Claire realized the portrait in the hall would testify to who had been here, even without the note. So Will had discovered who took Darcy and he wanted her to know, to see, perhaps, where he was holding that person captive?
She grabbed her purse where she’d left it in the kitchen and an umbrella—the one Darcy had come home with. At least she hadn’t taken her cell phone out of her purse. After locking the door with a gun pointed at her, trusting Nick would be home soon to care for the children, she went out into the storm with Will.
“It’s a monster, and it’s going to hit Naples, at least damn near,” Jace told Mitch as the most recent storm readings were relayed to them in the cockpit and then back to NOAA so public announcements and warnings could be prepared. “I don’t care what they say, I’m tempted to call Brit when we land and tell her to hunker down. Wish we could just parachute out, not have to fly this big baby back to Tampa, then sit it out there in case we’re needed again.”
“Yeah, right. Pie in the sky, like they say, but we have a job to do,” Mitch muttered, nodding so hard his tinted goggles bounced on his nose. “And if the phone lines and cell towers go down, it may be a while before we know things. At least—after all you and I’ve been through, facing the enemy, combat—it’s good to know we have people we love, ones we want to go home to.”
Nick drove himself and Heck into the garage. Heck had decided to leave his car parked up tight against the back brick wall of the law firm, hoping that would provide some shelter from possible flying debris, so Nick had brought him here to join the others who would be arriving soon.
“Boss, I’m really worried that Gina decided to stay in Miami for this big blow. At least it looks like it might not be as bad there. She’s really dedicated to her hospital work. Something else I haven’t told you and Claire—I’m gonna give her a ring for her birthday next month, ask her to marry me. If she can’t or won’t move here when she’s ready for medical residency, I may have to move there—but I could still work for you, consult, drive here if I need to.”
“I’d hate to lose you,” Nick told him as they got out of the car and the garage door closed behind them to stop the rush of wind. How Nick wished South Florida had basements with protection and flooring overhead. The price—one of them—you paid to live in paradise.
“But it’s more important that you and Gina be together, live together,” he tried to assure Heck. “Claire and I have been through so much apart and together. We’ll ride out this storm and any others on the horizon together, and I’m sure you and Gina will, too.”
Nick popped his trunk and took one of the boxes of food and supplies Heck had put there. They each carried a box into the house, set them down on the island in the kitchen, then Heck went back out for more. Nick looked in the Florida room, but it was quiet there. This late, Claire probably had checked in on Trey—who would be in la-la land for the night. He was a very talented sleeper, and Nick wished he still had that in him.
He saw an envelope propped up on the counter with his name printed on the front. It wasn’t Claire’s writing. Whose and what?
“Just put this down here, too, boss?”
“Yeah, fine. I’ve got to go find Claire and check in on the kids. She probably fell asleep in the girls’ room or is with Trey,” he added, glancing at the kitchen clock. Only nine thirty, but yeah, the kids would have been tucked in by now.
“Make yourself at home, Heck,” he said, taking the letter out of the envelope. It wasn’t sealed. “Be back in a sec. Get something to drink out of the fridge.”
He headed for the library and noticed the large item wrapped in heavy plastic in the hall. He turned on another light. It was that portrait of Will Warren’s grandmother that looked like Darcy, so he must’ve stopped by.
He hit the lights in the library and opened the letter, skimming to the bottom for the signature. Yes, Will had dropped that off. This was not printed by hand but typed. It must explain about the portrait, ask them to keep it safe.
He read just a few lines and raced out into the hall. Down to the girls’ room. No Claire. The kids sleeping. No doll for once.
He opened Trey’s door. The little guy was lying on his back, breathing in regular rhythm. Safe. The kids were safe.
He tore toward the master bedroom. She had to be there, maybe in the shower. No one in the bathroom, not in bed. He even looked under the bed, in the closet.
“Claire,” he whispered, but he knew now, he sensed, she wasn’t here. Ken Jensen, not to mention everyone who would be here soon to sit out the storm, would not believe this. He didn’t believe this.
He skimmed the letter again.
I know who took Darcy and he will pay. After Claire understands and can explain, I will see that she returns safely and soon with information about what happened to Darcy and information to free Steve from the murder charges.
It is the only and best thing I can do for Darcy. When I am gone, assure Darcy and Jilly that I love them, that I would—and might—die for them.
Do not try to contact me. I will not have access to my phone, and if it sounded, it could give me away.
I do not need the doll anymore to watch over Jilly and Darcy’s family. I have found answers another way. Someday, some way, I will send Jilly more than the living toy I sent Lexi.
In haste to get this over, to see it all end,
William Warren