Desperate Measures (29 page)

That woke Tomas up. At the mention of the news, he leaped out of bed. His legs and feet failed to cooperate. His arms swung in erratic directions in an effort to maintain his balance. Scott grabbed him before he wobbled against the nightstand and assisted him into the bed.

In a hurry to question Linda, Scott instructed Tomas to lie still for a moment and promised to bring a wheelchair once Linda roused and then left the room. Drew, who’d been sitting in an uncomfortable standard issue hospital chair by the window, followed Scott to Linda’s room, a few doors down.

As they sprinted down the hallway, Drew asked, “Could she really have done this? I can’t believe Linda would do such a thing.”

“Me either, but I just don’t know at this point.” Scott answered as they walked into the room.

Linda cried at the sight of Scott and Drew. “What happened and where’s Isabel? Why am I here?” Linda looked around the room, her face marked with confusion.

Scott threw Drew a glance to notify him he’d take the questioning at this juncture. Drew stepped aside but had his notebook ready. “Linda, Isabel is fine. She’s with your mother. You and Tomas were poisoned with a drug called Luminal.”

Linda leaned forward. “How did we get poisoned?”

“We don’t know yet. Who prepared the food you brought to us yesterday?’

“Me, only me. I made it at the café and then brought it over.”

“Is there anyone else that came in contact with the platters? The hotel kitchen staff has already been questioned.”

“No one. Oh God, are my employees under suspicion?”

Scott managed a slight smile but nodded affirmatively to the question Linda raised.

Linda continued to ask questions. “Who could have done this? My staff at the café didn’t have access to the food. Marcus, my cook, would never let anyone into his kitchen unsupervised.” She halted her statement.

Scott noticed a change in Linda’s face. Earlier it revealed confusion and fear but now her eyes focused. It seemed as if the drug induced fog that cloaked her began to lift.

Linda made a revelation. “Wait a minute. There was someone I ran into yesterday but it couldn’t have been her.” Linda couldn’t reveal the identity. Her head swayed, she slumped and gripped the bed railing.

Scott offered a cup of water and counted the seconds, anxious for Linda to finish her statement, the same scenario he’d been through with Tomas. It was imperative he find out who she ran into yesterday.

She sipped water, managed to swallow some, but the rest dribbled down her chin. Finally, the apparent dizzy spell passed and she continued. “I ran into Mabel Thompson before I came to see you and Caitlin. She helped me load the food into the car.”

At that moment, the cell-phone in Scott’s left shorts pocket rang. He turned away from Linda and stepped to the other side of the room and answered, “Yeah, Scott Martel.”

“Oh sorry, Scott, I thought I hit Tomas’s number,” Rich Gilbert apologized.

“You dialed the right number. I have his phone, anything break? Today’s flight doesn’t leave for several hours.”

“Look, I need to fill you in quick and you have to get things moving down there. Track down Bernice Willis.”

“Bernice Willis.” Scott repeated the name, as he fumbled for a pen and paper.

Startled by the quick movement from the hospital bed, he jumped when Linda appeared next to him. Agitated, she waved her arms to get his attention.

“Hold on a sec, Rich.” He spun toward the woozy woman who seemed desperate to say something. “What is it, Linda?”

“What about Bernice, what’s happened to her?”

“What do you mean? Who the hell is she?”

“She’s Mabel Thompson’s sister. That’s what I was trying to tell you before. I saw Mabel yesterday, she’s here visiting her sister.” Scott held the phone away from his ear so Rich could hear that last bit of information.

Scott attempted to draw Drew’s attention but he flipped through pages of reports, searching for something. He handed a brief note to Scott,
Mabel Thompson was on the plane yesterday and cleared customs. On my way to Bernice’s house, meet me there. A police cruiser will pick you up in front of the hospital.

Scott re-read the note. Once he digested the meaning, he left Linda’s room in a panic and ran into the hospital corridor. On the way to Tomas’s room, he listened to Rich relay the situation with Mabel.

When Rich concluded his report Scott asked, “Are you sure she’s the real Mabel Thompson you have in New York? She cleared customs down here yesterday!”

“After Ian Yates, I’m not even sure I’m Rich Gilbert at this point. A lab report says she has a high dose of Luminal in her system. The only thing I can figure is someone drugged her, assumed her identity, and took her purse, passport, and seat on that plane. Meaning he or she’s been there all night. By the way, Sergeant Ben Regis is the hero in finding this woman. You owe him some sort of recognition.”

Scott resisted the urge to shout that he didn’t owe anyone a damn thing for doing their job; instead he directly stated the situation. “Drew just took off to the Willis residence. I’m on my way.” Scott sprinted to Tomas’s room, stormed the door, and handed his cell-phone back to him. “Get dressed we’re on our way to Bernice Willis’s house. I’ll explain on the way.”

* * * *

Jack arrived home after dropping Dean and Constance off at the airport. No messages on the answering machine and his cell-phone hadn’t rung. He tossed his keys on the table, grabbed the phone to call Barry, reached voice mail, and left a message.

Weary from getting up so early so his wife and son could catch their eight a.m. flight, Jack settled into his favorite chair and drifted off to sleep. When the phone rang, he awoke with a start and leaped from the chair.

“Hello,” Jack gasped.

“Jack, what’s the matter, you sound out of breath. Are you all right?” his wife asked in a panicked tone.

“I’m fine, just walked in the door. I decided to get my exercise and walked up twenty flights of stairs,” Jack lied.

“Jack, are you insane or worse, trying to kill yourself? Why have you just gotten home now, traffic?”

In a hurry to get off the phone, Jack ignored the questions. He looked at his watch and changed the subject. “Shouldn’t you and Dean be in the air by now? Your flight should’ve left an hour ago.”

“That’s why I’m calling. Our flight has been delayed for another hour and a half. Are you sure you don’t want us to cancel this one and wait for you until later this afternoon?”

Jack’s pulse and breathing quickened but not from the so-called stair climbing he claimed. He had to get his son and wife to safety so he could finish what should never have happened so long ago.

He put an end to the debate. ”Constance, Amy is being induced tomorrow but she still could go into labor and have the baby at any moment. I know you wouldn’t want to miss the birth. You practically took the door down in the delivery room when Chad was born. Keep your flight.”

“All right. If this hurricane changes, you promise you’ll get to safety if they shut the airport down?”

“Yes, yes, I already told you I’ll go to Murray’s.”

“Bye, Jack, stay safe.”

Jack hung up the phone and returned to his chair. Outside the glass wall, the raging ocean roared. He could see the effects of the stalled hurricane in the Atlantic. The waves crashed one on top of another in white crests, at least ten feet high. Staring at the violent and angry sea aroused the fury burning inside him.

He strode onto the wrap-around terrace. The stairs leading from the beach to the building were underwater up to the fifth step. Frequent gusts of wind whipped at his face as he shouted, “Where the hell are you? I should never have done what I did when you threatened me. I was up for re-election and you backed me into a corner. I couldn’t take any chances with your half-assed innuendoes. I put my stellar career on the line when I helped you that last time. What I did was wrong, so very wrong. You’d still be behind bars if I hadn’t snuck into the evidence room, making it look like the chain of custody was broken! Where have you been all of these years and what’s caused you to resurface all of a sudden? Every scam and arrest surrounding you involved money. I have money now, so why aren’t you coming after me again? Leave my daughter out of this; it’s between you and me!”

A sudden bolt of lightning streaked across the dark sky miles out into the ocean. Just then the neurons fired in Jack’s brain, bringing a forgotten memory to the surface of his thoughts. He slammed the sliding door and walked back to his chair.

“Money, that’s what I’m missing here. Just where have you been getting your money?” Jack forced himself to remember every detail of that fateful night twenty-five years ago. He knew something else happened but was pushed out of his recollections, mostly on purpose.

He sat forward with his forehead in both hands, thinking hard, he knew he repressed something and it held a major clue. The memory slid into place.

The phone rang, but he continued shouting at the uninvited guest. His mother-in-law intercepted the phone. The kids were at the beach. Marie gave the caller details of what was happening. He rushed toward her and snatched the phone.

“Hello! Who is this?” Jack shouted into the phone.

“Oh Jack, it’s your mother. I’m so sorry that lousy bastard is causing all of this trouble for you.”

The front door slammed.

“Thank God he’s gone now, he just left. How much did Marie tell you?”

“She told me what you did for him. I know you, Son, you’re beating yourself up with your morals and high standards but you protected your children from being dragged through the mud when the case went to court. The name change should keep him out of your life forever.”

“It’s not that simple, Mom. He has a new start thanks to my unscrupulous activities but now he wants money. He’s not only threatening to expose my misdeeds as DA but that I was adopted. He’s on a mission to find and confront my real father if I don’t pay him an outrageous sum of money. Apparently, Gary is his new best friend these days so he might have access to enough shit to cause trouble for me.” Jack left out the fact that the bastard was having an affair with his sister, Ginny, trying to spare his mother further pain. “This is the last thing I need. I’m up for re-election. My record is phenomenal with the exception of this issue. There’s no way I can come up with the money to shut him up. My career and reputation will be history.”

Jane asked, “How much money, Jack?”

Jack recoiled at his mother’s question and stern voice. Her tone indicated disappointment in his failures. With shame he answered, “Quarter of a million dollars. Constance and I do quite well but there’s no way we can come up with that kind of cash.”

“Jack, you’ll be fine and will get through this. You did the right thing and I will always be proud of you. There’s no better man on this earth and I’m blessed every day knowing you’re my son.”

They both said goodbye and hung up. Jack raced to the master bedroom to get ready for the fundraiser he and Constance were expected to attend that evening.

A rumble of thunder brought Jack back to the reality of the significant piece of information that his mother discreetly relayed to him on that night.

After all these years the flood gates opened, permitting the truth to crash through. “You went to him again, didn’t you, Mother? The man in the limousine I remembered from Belmar Beach when I was a teenager. I saw you get into that limo and when you came back hours later, you had bags full of expensive clothes and gifts for all of us. You went back to him and he paid off the money, didn’t he?”

Jack shot from the chair once he realized how badly he’d misjudged the circumstances surrounding the threats aimed at his daughter. It all came together. The bastard already has a link to the money and is after Caitlin now for spite. How could this happen?

* * * *

Chris told Caitlin he’d only be a few minutes in the shower and ready to go quickly. That was bullshit. Wasn’t going to happen, not in the state of arousal he found himself in. He rested his head on the shower wall and let the cold water cascade down his broad back. He couldn’t figure out what the hell happened on that terrace. When Caitlin gripped his arms, the thick terry cloth provided no barrier to the electric shock that coursed through his body in a ripple of excitement. Doomed the minute he looked deep into her eyes. He never before experienced something so strong. He had to admit he was attracted to her. Really attracted and he had no idea how it happened.

The first time he saw Caitlin, he couldn’t believe how beautiful, self-confident, and friendly she was. She also had a fantastic sense of humor when she wasn’t so intense. Hell, he met beauties every day, but Caitlin in her long nightshirt, she looked so damn sexy. Chris had seen her in skimpy bikini bathing suits and the sight didn’t even faze him. This morning something snapped inside his libido. One last blast of cold water hit his body as Chris talked himself into being able to face Caitlin again and take her to that deserted warehouse.

Chris reminded himself of the facts so he’d stop thinking like an asshole. He recounted the many reasons why he had to get his act together and dispel the lustful thoughts creeping through his mind. Firstly, Caitlin’s happily married, has two kids, and is at least ten to eleven years older. Secondly, she’s also related to both his boss’s. The last thought made Chris laugh into the stream of water. “Well at least Barry would be more receptive to my relationship with Pam if I told him I had the hot’s for Caitlin.”

Ready to face the duty before him, Chris turned the water off, toweled himself dry, and dressed in shorts and a tight tee shirt. He stepped into the living room and heard Caitlin on the phone. She held up a finger, indicating she would be just a minute. He eavesdropped on the conversation. He remembered Steve was the VP of her company. Now he felt protective of Caitlin, dressed in a skirt that rose above her knee and loose cotton shirt tied at her waist. This was the guy that upset her the other day on the boat. Chris listened to Caitlin’s side of the conversation, at this point it seemed to be amicable.