Page 11

Chapter Eleven

K enna had been waiting all her life to have a mother, but right now, all she could think about was the child in her care. Maizie.

“You got my note,” the woman said.

It was definitely her. She looked like the photo—Maizie had been right about that. Dark hair with a few silver strands. Smooth skin with not many lines. She hadn’t lived a life of laughter. She’d aged well or employed other means to slow time. She wore black khakis and a heavy jacket, her hair loose over her shoulders.

If Kenna didn’t know better, she’d think this woman was worried.

And she’d mentioned a note. Kenna frowned. “In the bathroom? That wasn’t a note; it was intel.”

The woman’s expression softened a little.

Until Kenna said, “You think I’m gonna act like we’re friends?”

“We’re family.”

Kenna felt Maizie’s hand on her sleeve. “You left me. You didn’t want to protect me.”

“I died to protect you!”

The outburst made Maizie flinch. Kenna could feel the shift behind her. She just stared at the woman standing in the open door, whose face betrayed nothing of the stress they were all under here. Like she was a spy who could keep her face completely impassive.

If she hadn’t just yelled, Kenna might wonder if she cared at all.

According to the novel, The Constantine Initiative , it was true that Amara had opted to die to keep the family safe. She had faked her own death to return to the company as a double agent. Always working to safeguard the family she’d left behind. But her father had embellished nearly everything he ever wrote.

So how was she supposed to believe this was the first truthful thing he’d ever written?

This woman wanted her showdown. Or reunion.

But Kenna had to get Maizie to the hospital.

She thumbed at the teen over her shoulder. “She needs to be checked out. So talk, Amara. If that’s even your name.”

“No one has called me that in a long time,” the woman said. “I like to hear it. I’ve wanted to see you for a long time, Kenna. To let you know I’m alive.” She looked past Kenna. “And to meet you, Maizie. I hear you are a remarkable young woman.”

“You know,” Kenna said, “when people say stuff like that, it just sounds like a giant red flag. A security breach.”

Amara looked at Kenna. “Leave this alone.” She paused. “Just take care of that woman, the company asset.”

“Roxanne?”

Amara tipped her head to the side. “That’s what she told you her name was?”

“Any information you have that will lead to her would be helpful. But I’m working the missing couple case.” Probably that was what Amara referred to when she’d said, “Leave this alone.” But Kenna was only guessing.

Amara lifted her chin. “I don’t need your help to find them.”

That kind of determination? This wasn’t just a job to her—it was personal. The kind of personal it would be if Kenna lost Maizie today or if anyone she cared about was taken. She’d be all set to burn the world down to get them back. Scorched earth wasn’t just an expression. It would become reality.

“Who is she to you?” Kenna asked. “Because if there wasn’t a personal connection, you wouldn’t care so much, I’m guessing.”

She felt Maizie shift behind her again and then heard the teen whisper, “Hello?”

Kenna figured she’d picked up her phone and was talking to Ramon. She kept her focus on the woman who was supposed to have been her mother. Who had chosen to be dead rather than raise her. Who’d put the fight for the world in front of family.

The choice had already been made, so there was no point berating this woman for it.

But that didn’t mean it hurt any less now than it had every day when she’d been growing up, knowing she had no mother and never would. Seeing other kids with a mom and realizing what she would miss.

Amara finally said, “The missing woman is my daughter.”

“And I’m your niece?” She wanted confirmation. She wanted to hear it from this woman’s mouth even though she already knew the truth.

“And she’s more your sister than anyone has ever been. Or could be.”

Kenna frowned. “What? Her father was Malcom Banbury?”

Maizie gasped.

Amara said, “Perhaps you could tell her what it was like to be raised by him. When I find her, that is.”

“I don’t know what it’s like to have a father.” Kenna shrugged. “He was barely mine.”

“He took care of you.”

“He lied to me.” She wasn’t going to resolve the point with this woman. Maybe she’d been holding on to some things recently, and they’d just spilled out. Fears she’d harbored and hadn’t even had the notion to say aloud. “But yes, he did take care of me. Funny how things seem different when you look back.”

“I don’t need help to find my daughter, and Roxanne only wants to use you to get to me .”

“What is her name?”

Amara stared at her. “Zeyla.”

Kenna repeated the name in her head. Zeyla. “Thanks for the heads-up about Roxanne. It was helpful. It didn’t stop her from trying to kidnap Maizie, but it helped.”

Amara said, “She would’ve kept her to force you to find Zeyla.”

“I was already going to find Zeyla. And the man.” Wasn’t that a good thing? Despite her words, this woman surely wanted help to find her daughter.

Amara made a face that indicated she didn’t think much of the man. “She’d have forced you to find her…faster.”

“Tell me how to take down the company.”

Amara laughed, but it had a hollow sound. “You can’t take them down. All we are is a nuisance, and that only barely.” Her British accent, softer earlier, grew in strength now. “None of us can take them down.”

“Okay, so how about all of us working together?”

Behind her, she heard Maizie whisper, “Okay.” Talking to Ramon on the phone, or so Kenna assumed.

Amara shook her head. “We do what we can. It has to be enough.”

Behind her, a pickup truck pulled over on the road, kicking up a cloud of dirt as it came to a sliding stop at the back of the ambulance.

“Your friend, I presume.”

Maizie said, “His name is Ramon.” She didn’t sound nervous. She sounded determined to stand up for herself, even if it was only because Kenna stood in front of her, and it was the two of them against the world right now.

Amara smiled slightly. “I know who he is. You both have some interesting…friends.”

He jumped out of the driver’s seat, immediately confronted by the male EMT. “Kenna!” He had his gun out and a thunderous expression on his face.

“We’re good,” she called out. Assuming these people were going to let her and Maizie go, however, and that remained to be seen. “As long as we’re free to go.”

Amara took a step to the side, leaving the way open for her to get out with Maizie. She grabbed the teen’s hand and the backpack, and Maizie brought her ice pack. They stepped carefully out of the ambulance, and then she looked at her mother, not really knowing what to say.

Amara said, “Don’t interfere. You’ll just get hurt.”

Kenna led Maizie to Ramon and slid into the pickup between them. Huddled on the bench seat, Maizie held her hand.

The teen put her head on Kenna’s shoulder. “Sorry.”

Kenna shook her head. “Don’t worry about it.” But a tear slipped down from the corner of her eye.

She closed her eyes and let Ramon drive, knowing he wanted a rundown of what had just happened but determined to give herself some time first. For once, she didn’t need to process it. She felt almost numb about the whole thing.

Ramon pulled up at the curb in front of a hospital. He left the engine running and came around to open her door. “Maizie?”

The girl stirred, moaning.

“Picking you up, okay, kiddo?” He slid his arm under her knees and behind her back, then drew her out. To Kenna, he said, “Slide over and drive. Call Stairns.” He stepped back. “I’ve got this.”

She nodded and found her phone on the seat and the backpack on the floor.

“Go.” Ramon slammed the door shut.

Despite his order, she found a parking space and shut the engine off. Gave herself a second. If only she could call Jax, but he was at work and busy, and she probably didn’t have it in her to reiterate all of it.

She called Stairns’ number. They had gone to investigate another case that was supposed to have been perpetrated by the same kidnapper—killer—who had taken her sister and the man she’d been with.

Her sister.

Kenna couldn’t believe her father had not only seen Amara after her “death” and not told Kenna about it, but he’d also had a child with her.

A child who was now grown up and in danger.

Had she been raised in that world, trained to fight the resistance in the way Kenna had been trained her whole life to be an investigator?

“Hey.”

Kenna pushed the thoughts of her sister aside. “Yeah, it’s me. What’s going on?”

“Found another motel, same kind of incident, but the manager was looking out the window and saw the whole thing. Two people carried out the couple and put them in the back of the vehicle. A small SUV. They just laid them in the trunk. When he ran out the door after them, not thinking but determined to stop them, one of the assailants swung around and stabbed him in the shoulder. They left him for dead in the parking lot.”

“He told you all this?” That meant they hadn’t been successful.

“Yep. It was a year ago, and the couple was never found.”

Kenna said, “The victims or the perpetrators?”

“Exactly. But he saw her face.”

“Her?”

“Yep, says one of the two was a woman.”

Kenna frowned. “A couple kidnapping couples? That’s a new one.”

“Got ourselves a murdering Bonnie and Clyde,” Bruce said in the background of the call.

“Regardless…” Stairns actually sounded a little nervous. “We should figure out how to find them because no one else is looking.”

“Except my mother.”

“Huh?”

“I’ll explain later. But the resistance wants us to take care of Roxanne and let them find the missing couple.”

“And we’re going along with that?”

“Of course not.” Maybe he was just checking they were on the same page.

“Good.”

In the background, Bruce said, “Good!”

“We need to ignore all this international company business and focus on what we know how to do. Solving missing persons cases.”

“Agreed.”

“We need to know who the guy was and find out what was going on between him and the woman.” Her sister. “Figure out how they were targeted.”

Stairns said, “You think this Roxanne person knows more than she’s letting on?”

“I think Maizie’s laptop probably has more information on it than any person we can ask.” She reached over and dragged it out of the footwell on the passenger’s side. “We need to run everything on the victims. Figure out where they went during the last couple of weeks before they were taken and see if we get any matches.”

If each of the victims used a particular gas station or visited the same location, it would be a big clue as to how the perpetrators were selecting them.

“There’s someone I need to talk to. See if they have more information than they want to admit.” And bonus, they were a couple. “Call me if you figure anything else out.”

“Got it.”

The line went dead.

She sent a message to Detective Langford, then to Ramon about what she was doing and got a thumbs-up in return. A second later he texted.

They’re treating her now.

And looking at me like I did this to her.

Kenna replied that she would get the case file number for him from the police since that was where she was headed. Fifteen minutes later, she pulled up at the police station and went to the front desk. She showed her ID and asked for Detective Langford.

She didn’t have to wait long before Langford came through a side door and waved her over. “This way.”

Kenna went with her and was led through a series of halls to a bullpen area. She spotted Davis across the way, a few other detectives, and through the glass window on the side, an older woman she presumed was their superior officer standing up while on the phone, gesturing wildly.

“Figured you’d be at the hospital with your friend,” Davis said.

“She’s covered.” Kenna wasn’t going to explain about the ambulance. It wasn’t relevant to their search for Roxanne, and despite how it had shaken out, she didn’t actually want to get the resistance, or Amara, in trouble.

She had Davis give her the report number from the crash so Ramon didn’t have to deal with a social worker or the staff calling the cops thinking Maizie had been beaten. Then she said, “Can I have a word with the couple from the motel?”

“Serious charges.” Davis leaned back in his chair.

Langford sat at her desk opposite his. That left Kenna to sit in the chair a suspect would use at the end of their desks. She pulled it out and turned it to face them, effectively blocking the aisle. But no one would confuse her for the criminal in this situation.

Langford’s lips curled into a slight smile.

Kenna asked, “They have priors?”

Davis nodded. “She has a couple of arrests for prostitution. He’s got some assault and battery charges. Five years of time served between them. Neither is going to skate out from under this.”

“Are they talking?”

Langford said, “The DA won’t offer them a deal, even if they have information that would lead us to the woman who tried to take your friend. You know who she is?”

Kenna said, “Sort of. I know the group she belongs to. I met some of them overseas. They’re pretty hardcore. Like they think they’re assassins. She’s trying to find the victims of the motel kidnapping, but she’s going about it by every means except actually looking for them.”

Langford looked at her partner, a question in her expression, and when Davis indicated she proceed she slid a file over the desk and held it out to Kenna. “We finally got a match to the man’s DNA. It hasn’t officially been logged into the case file yet because the minute it gets inputted, someone is going to see it, and the word will get out. Right now, we need to figure out how to control the fallout.”

Kenna said, “You know who he is.” And the information was significant enough the public would certainly react—likely with an uproar. Whoever the guy was, the fact he’d been taken was newsworthy.

Langford said, “We know who he is.”

Kenna opened the cover of the file folder and looked at the image. His name. “Oh boy.”