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But it wasn’t just that he was overdue for sexual release that had him gasping with want. It was Mariah herself.
She’d been nothing more than the mayor’s secretary when this all began, but in the past couple of days Lucas had seen her interminable strength, and she’d shared with him her past heartaches. He admired her and he liked her, and that as much as anything fed his desire for her and only her.
Their lips remained locked as his hands cupped her full breasts. Her nipples sprang to attention at his touch, and he grazed his thumb over them as she uttered a soft moan.
He broke the kiss and instead nipped lightly at the side of her slender neck, down across her collarbone, then he captured one of her erect nipples in his mouth.
She wound her fingers into his hair as he licked and sucked. She arched to meet his hardness, but he wasn’t ready to take her yet. He wanted her mindless with pleasure, knew that’s what she wanted … to be mindless.
He ran his hand down the flat of her stomach, down across her hip bones and touched her intimately. She gasped and at the same time she grabbed him. Her hand was warm around him, and he drew a deep breath to steady himself, not wanting to rush things.
He moved his fingers against her, and her breathing quickened as her entire body tensed. Once again he covered her mouth with his as he felt her getting closer to her release.
She whispered his name and he nearly lost it and at the same time she arched and cried out with complete pleasure.
“Take me,” she said with a thrumming urgency that radiated through him. “Please, Lucas. Now, please take me now.”
He rolled off her and grabbed his wallet, fumbling for the condom he carried inside. It took him only a moment to get it out and on, then he positioned himself above her and gazed down into her eyes.
“It’s not too late to stop,” he said, his voice hoarse and ragged. “You can stop this right now if you want to. I won’t be mad.”
She reached up and placed her hand on his cheek, her eyes filled with a depth of emotion. “Don’t stop,” she said.
He entered her, sliding into her awaiting warmth with a slow, sure stroke. She moaned her pleasure and wrapped her arms around his back.
Slowly he moved against her, but it didn’t take long before his own frantic need moved him faster and faster. She wasn’t a passive lover. Her hands raked him as she threw her head back and gave herself completely to the act.
All too quickly he felt the build up, and just before he exploded, she cried his name and his release washed through him with an intensity he’d never known. He kissed her then, a soft, tender kiss.
He rolled to one side of her and she turned to face him. For a long moment her gaze remained locked with his, and in the depth of her eyes he saw her heartbreak once again darkening her eyes.
He stroked her face, a sense of failure sweeping through him. He might have taken her away for a few minutes, but until he brought her son home safe and sound, her pain wouldn’t ever let her go.
And with each hour that passed, the possibility of bringing Billy home safe and sound grew dimmer.
BILLY WAS IN TROUBLE.
Jenny stared at the sleeping little boy and feared that he wouldn’t make it through another night. The sound of his ragged breaths filled her with a fear she’d never known. He hadn’t even had the energy to get off the mattress during the day.
He’d spent most of the time just lying there, the mere act of drawing breath taking every ounce of his strength. He didn’t even have the strength to be afraid. He seemed resigned to whatever was going to happen, and Jenny wanted to weep because an eight-year-old boy shouldn’t be resigned to his own death.
She walked around the small room and wondered if they both would die here. She didn’t care so much about herself, but it wasn’t fair that a little boy die in this ugly place without his mommy to hold him, to comfort him.
If she could just find a way out, or some means to summon help. But she’d been over the small room a hundred times and couldn’t find a way to do either. She’d pulled at the boards that imprisoned them, seeking a weakness, a flaw in their prison, but there was none.
She’d just sunk to the floor when she heard the sound. A boat. A motorboat. Maybe it was help! A search party. She sprang to her feet, hope raging through her. Maybe Lucas had found them!
Or maybe it was their kidnapper returning. The hope that had momentarily surged through her transformed to fear. She stood perfectly still, frozen as the sound of the boat grew closer … closer … then finally stopped.
There was a moment of complete silence, then heavy footsteps rang against wood. Jenny stifled a scream. If it were help, then somebody would have yelled. Somebody would have shouted their names.
The footsteps drew closer, then a slat in the door opened. Jenny ran to the door. “Hey … hey, you’ve got to get us out of here! He’s sick. Billy has asthma and he’s in bad trouble.”
Dark eyes peered back at her, then the slat closed.
She slammed her fists against the door as she heard footsteps going away. “Wait, please come back. Did you hear what I said? He’s in bad trouble. He needs to get to a hospital.” Again and again she slammed her fists against the wood as she began to cry. “Don’t go. For God’s sake don’t leave him here.”
It was only when she heard the motor on the boat start up again that she stopped beating the door and sank to the floor in tears.
He was leaving. He was leaving them here. Tears blinded her and she fought against the deep sobs that welled inside her.
She turned and saw Billy watching her. She quickly swiped at her cheeks. She didn’t want to cry in front of him. She didn’t want to upset him any more than he already was.
“Hey, buddy.” She scooted over next to him and pulled him into her arms. His wheezing seemed to intensify. She needed to distract him.
“Have I ever told you that female alligators usually lay about fifty eggs? Can you imagine having fifty kids?” As she told him everything she’d ever known about alligators and crocodiles, she felt him begin to relax against her.
But she couldn’t relax for, more than fear of her own safety, her biggest fear was that when morning came, Billy would no longer be breathing.
Chapter Nine
Mariah awoke as the faint purple spill of dusk filtered through the window. The bed next to her was empty, but the pillow still retained the scent of Lucas’s cologne.
She didn’t feel guilty about making love with him. She didn’t feel guilty about seeking warmth and life when her heart had been so dead. Nor did she have any illusions about what their lovemaking had meant. It had meant absolutely nothing.
Rolling over on her back, she stared up at the ceiling and realized that in some way the lovemaking and the sleep afterward had given her a new strength to survive whatever the rest of the evening might bring.
She got out of bed and dressed in a comfortable pair of gray jogging pants and a T-shirt, then went in search of Lucas. As she reached the hallway, she heard the voice of the kidnapper.
“… by the twisted tree you’ll find a clue.” She froze, heart banging against her rib cage.
The voice stopped, then started again. “… by the twisted tree you’ll find a clue.”
She relaxed a bit as she realized it wasn’t a new call. She followed the sound to the kitchen, where Lucas sat in front of the recording machine with a legal pad in front of him.
She stood in the doorway and watched as he pushed the Play button again. “Where the grass is green and the sky is blue.” He punched the Stop button, then rubbed the center of his forehead with two fingers as he stared down at the legal pad.
“What are you doing?”
He looked up at the sound of her voice, then leaned back in his chair and sighed. “Making notes, listening to the messages, trying to make sense of all this.”
She slid into the chair next to him. “And have you managed to make any sense of it?”
He shook his head. “No.” He leaned back in the chair and released a weary sigh. “I’ll tell you what we know. There was no sign of forced entry, so the odds are good that Jenny knew the kidnapper, that she not only knew him but trusted him enough to open the door to him. If they were taken from here.”
She frowned. “What do you mean? Of course they were taken from here.”
“We don’t know that for sure. We don’t really know where the crime scene is located. For all we know they were taken from the front yard or the park.”
She frowned. He had mentioned that before, but she couldn’t imagine Jenny and Billy being hustled into a car off the street or taken from the park … unless they knew their kidnapper … unless they’d trusted the kidnapper. That thought certainly didn’t make her feel any better.
He flipped through his legal pad. “We also know that the kidnapper is watching us. He was in the cemetery the other night, and he knew that we’d gone to the sheriff’s office this morning. Something else that strikes me is that he doesn’t seem to want dialogue, but instead wants monologues.”
She frowned at him curiously. “What do you mean?”
He leaned forward. “Other than the first call that I got and the one that Wally answered, he hasn’t called to talk to us, but rather to leave messages on the machine. He’s specifically chosen times when he knows we aren’t here. He wants to talk to us, but he doesn’t want us talking to him.”
“So what would happen if we don’t leave here? If we answer every call that comes in instead of letting the machine pick up. Would he stop calling?”
“It would be interesting to see,” he replied.
A flash of anger burned inside her. “He might think he’s playing a game with us, but he’s not. Games have rules and when he says there’s a clue, then there should be a clue.” She released a bitter laugh. “I know it’s ridiculous for me to be mad because a kidnapper doesn’t play by the rules I think are fair.”
Lucas nodded, his forehead still furrowed with a frown. “Our two main suspects are Remy Troulous and Phillip Ribideaux. I know Phillip has been financially cut off by his father.”
“Which might make him desperate enough to kidnap for a ransom,” she said. “He certainly doesn’t have the tools to make a living the right way.”
“But … I keep going back to the same problem. If this is about a ransom, then why take Billy?”
“Because he saw the kidnapper?”
He nodded. “Then we have Frank Landers, whom we can’t locate and have no idea if he has a hand in this. And if he took Billy, then why Jenny?”
“For the same reason. Because she saw him and could identify him.”
“I feel like we’re going in circles,” he said in frustration. He swiped a hand through his dark hair, and for a moment she remembered what those dark, rich strands had felt like between her fingers.
“Let’s take the suspects one at a time,” she said, focusing on the conversation. “We can pinpoint a plausible motive for Phillip. Maybe he’s just entertaining himself before making a ransom demand. What about Remy? Same motive? Money?”
Lucas sighed again. “The longer this thing goes on, the less I think it’s about money.”
“What other motive could Phillip have?” she asked.
“Who knows? I know Jenny was talking a lot of smack about him after they broke up. Maybe he’s trying to teach her a lesson.”
“And what about Remy? If you take away a money motive, then why would he be involved in something like this?” It helped, talking rationally about all the players. It felt constructive, and that was what she needed at the moment.
“Who knows what drives Remy? Certainly he’s always walked a line outside the law. I don’t think he was forthcoming in his answers to me about seeing Jenny, but I can’t imagine what he hopes to gain by a kidnapping.”
“It could be Frank,” Mariah said. “The caller is getting off on tormenting us. That’s definitely Frank’s style.”
Lucas reached out and covered her hand with his. “I’m sorry you had to go through what you did with him.”
The warmth of his hand was welcome, and she offered him a small smile. “I survived. But, as sheriff of this parish, you should know that if I find out he’s responsible for this, I might just kill him.”
“I understand the sentiment,” he replied, and by the darkness in his eyes she knew he felt the same rage that she did.
She pulled her hand from his and leaned back in her chair. “Any other viable suspects?”
“No, and that’s what’s so damned frustrating. Not knowing for sure what the motive might be makes pointing a finger at a viable suspect that much more difficult.” He tapped the recorder. “And what’s driving me crazy is that there’s something about the caller’s voice that’s vaguely familiar, but I can’t figure out what it is.”
This time it was her turn to place her hand over his. “You’re doing everything you can. You’ve got people searching and watching the suspects. There’s only so much you can do with so little to go on.”
He smiled, filling her with a welcome warmth. “I’m the one who’s supposed to be making you feel better.”
“Then who makes you feel better? Why have you remained alone?” During the past couple of days she’d seen a side of Lucas she’d never guessed he would have possessed. It was a tender and gentle side that was in direct contrast to the kind of man she’d believed him to be.
He rose from the table and went to the counter, where the pot of coffee was still warm. He poured himself a cup. “Want one?”
She shook her head, and he returned to the table.
“When my wife left me I decided to devote my life to Jenny. Someplace in the back of my mind, I knew that women would come and go, but that my sister would always need me. She had nobody else. I have my work and I date occasionally, and for the most part that’s been enough for me.”
“But a sister and work can’t be a partner for life,” she replied.
He cast her a wry smile. “Jenny could definitely be a job for life.”
She bit her tongue, not wanting to begin another contentious discussion about his relationship with his sister.
He seemed to read her mind. “You have to understand where we came from. My old man died when Jenny was just a baby and our mother, who was never real maternal, seemed to forget she was a parent.”
He got up from the table as if unable to sit any longer and began to pace the small confines of the room. “Mom was one of those women who thrived on attention and drama. She wasn’t happy unless everything was in an uproar, and she definitely wasn’t happy if she wasn’t with a man.” He paused and stared at the wall just over her head, his eyes dark with memories.
He focused back on Mariah. “Maybe I have been too hard on Jenny. I’ve just been so afraid she’d turn out like our mother. Mom killed herself with drugs. I don’t think she meant to die, but she had just broken up with some loser and I think the suicide was an attempt to get him back. She took pills then called him, but he didn’t believe her and she died.”
“But you’ve accomplished what you wanted. Jenny is nothing like the woman you’ve described,” Mariah said softly. Certainly what he’d just told her helped in her understanding of his relationship with Jenny.
He stared at her for a long moment. “If I’ve been the man you described, if I’ve been emotionally abusive and overbearing to her, my biggest fear now is that I won’t get the chance to change things.”
His voice broke and Mariah rose from her chair and walked to where he stood. She wrapped her arms tightly around him, knowing the torment that was in his heart.
“You’ll get your chance to make things right with Jenny,” she said. “And I’m going to get the chance to see my son grow up.” She said the words fervently, but what frightened her more than anything was she wasn’t sure she believed them anymore.
LUCAS STOOD at the front window, staring into the bright afternoon sunshine. He stretched, attempting to unkink muscles that had been knotted from the moment he’d awakened on the sofa that morning.
He’d spent a miserable night with horrible dreams of Jenny crying out to him and him unable to find her. When Mariah had gotten up, it had been obvious that she’d spent an equally miserable night. Her face had been lined with stress, and exhaustion had placed even darker circles under her eyes.
He wanted to be outside, searching, but he’d determined that the best place for him to be was here, waiting for another phone call. This time the caller wouldn’t talk to a machine, but to him.
Mariah had gone back to her bedroom a little while ago, and Lucas had almost been grateful that she had. Their conversation had been empty and strained today, as if the emotional outbursts from the day before had drained all the energy, all the will from them both.
Enough time had passed, now, that most of the concerned citizens who had come out on that first day to help search would have returned to their jobs, their lives.
Even when a young woman and a little boy were missing, life went on. What if they never found Jenny and Billy? People disappeared every day, and when foul play was involved bodies were often never found.
How would Mariah cope if Billy never came home? She’d survive, because she was a survivor, but her life would never be the same. He felt confident that she wouldn’t remain in Conja Creek, that the town itself and this house in particular would hold too many bad memories for her to stay.
He would miss her. The thought shocked him. In the course of these past days, he’d grown closer to her than he could ever have imagined, closer than he’d been to anyone for a very long time. He felt he knew her better than anyone, but more than that, he felt she knew him.
