Page 8

Janelle groaned and reached up to hold her head, willing the pain of a booming headache to stop.

“Shut up,” a man snapped at her. “If you bring any attention to us, I’ll be pissed.”

She slowly opened her eyes, not sure who was talking, but knowing it wasn’t Guilliam. She stared at the face in front of her. “ Ugh ,… you.”

“Yes, me,” he declared, giving her a hard grin. “When I looked at things from a business perspective and realized that you would probably be the best ticket in this case, I couldn’t believe my luck. You weren’t on my list, until I realized you would be the ultimate leverage to get somebody to do something I needed him to do.”

She swore at that. “I don’t know what you think you’re going to do, but now that my mother’s gone, nobody out there will give a shit about me one way or another,” she snapped.

“Oh, I think you’re wrong there.” He chuckled. “Maybe you don’t quite believe it yet, but he cares. Oh, he cares a lot, and he’ll pay dearly,” he declared. “We need this to go away, and we needed something completed.”

“What’s the matter?” she asked, staring at him. “You run out of lackeys?”

“Yeah, I did,” he admitted. “And not just me, the whole family’s got a problem with that right now. But apparently your boy Guilliam’s a part of this bloody mess, and we were looking for a weakness to exploit, So guess what? You’re it.”

She shook her head. “Then you don’t understand.”

“Oh, I understand just fine,” he stated. “You can say all you want, but it won’t make a difference. It will be your life or Mason’s.”

She frowned at him, knowing that choice would kill Guilliam. “Then it will be my life,” she decided. “You already know that.”

“I hope you’re wrong,” he muttered, giving her a nasty look. “If it was me, it would be an easy choice. I would pop you in seconds.” He glared at her. “But we need somebody to take care of business, and it looks to be you.”

“And if I’m not?”

“Then you’re in trouble because, if you’re not it, I have to get rid of you anyway,” he explained. “I can’t let you live. So, don’t even start with promises that you won’t tell anybody, especially since you’ve already blabbed several times.”

She winced and sighed at that because she had. She’d even accosted him in the hallway. “You were obviously not a doctor, and you were walking around this place, looking lost, like an idiot. It was clear you were up to something.”

He glared at her. “Keep talking. Chances are good I’ll have to pop you, and you’re just making it all the more appealing.”

“What do you mean, chances are good?” she asked. “It’s more than chances. You’ve already told me how you can’t let me live. So, no matter what I say, no matter what Guilliam does, you will kill me. Do you think he won’t know that? No way will he play your stupid little game.”

“He better,” the fake doctor growled, “because, if you think you’re the only one I can use for leverage, you’re wrong. You’ll just be the place I start. We’ll see how quickly he falls into line, and, if not quickly enough, believe me that I’ll just up the ante.”

She stared at him, her stomach sinking as she realized he was prepared to kill her to ensure Mason died. “So, it doesn’t matter to you about Mason, as long as he’s dead, is that it?”

“Personally I would even be happy with him permanently being a vegetable,” he shared, with a laugh. “I don’t have a whole lot in this fight, but it matters to the family. Mason killed my cousin, so he’s got to pay.”

“And what about the fact that your cousin was trying to kill Mason’s wife?”

“He didn’t plan to kill her. He planned to rape her.”

She stared at him in shock. “And that’s okay with you?”

“No, but, when it comes to shit like that, and it’s family, it is what it is,” he told her. “And since the old man’s due to die sometime soon, if I want to be in his will—and billions are in that estate—I have to do my part.”

“And if you don’t do your part?”

He shrugged. “Presumably I get cut out. At least that’s been the threat since forever.”

“Aren’t you tired of getting your chain yanked?”

“Sure.” He sent her a glare. “And that’s another reason I’m not letting you mess up anything. He’s almost dead.”

She asked, “Your grandfather?”

He nodded. “See? That’s why you’ll get popped anyway. You know too much.”

“You guys don’t make it hard to figure out,” she replied, with a sneer.

He turned to face her. “Keep it up. Just keep it up. I may have to make you suffer before I kill you.”

“See what it gets you,” she taunted. Janelle wanted to shut up, she really did, but this part of her couldn’t let anybody else yank her chain. She’d spent a lot of years doing what she thought was right, and it was right, and she wouldn’t listen to anybody else telling her that it wasn’t. She wasn’t even that person anymore. She was free. She had done what she thought she needed to do, and she would never resent the time she spent helping her mother, but she would be damned if she’d let this guy ruin it for her now. “You do realize I spent the last three years nursing my mother, and now she’s gone, as of about an hour ago. Now you’re here, trying to take a new life away from me.”

He barked out a laugh. “Yeah, that’s pretty funny. You finally get a chance to live without the old broad, and here you are, about to get killed for something you didn’t even do.”

“I can see how that really bothers you too,” she quipped.

He laughed and laughed. “Yeah, it does.” Then his laughter cut off midstream, as he glared at her again. “All I give a shit about is making sure I get my share of that estate. The rest I don’t give a crap about.”

“Maybe you should go pop the old man instead.”

“Oh, I’ve thought about it, don’t you worry. And, if he keeps living much longer, I probably will.” When she winced at that, he laughed. “You don’t even like it when I tell you the truth.”

“Wow. You are not a nice guy. Yet it’s you, and you are whatever you are. I can’t see that you’re likely to give a crap about anyone else anytime soon, even your own violent family.”

“No, I won’t,” he confirmed. “So, don’t worry about it. And you sure as hell can’t redeem me, so get that idea out of your head. I’ve been doing their bidding for a very long time, and for an even longer time they’ve been promising me all kinds of shit,” he explained. “It’s payday time, as soon as we’ve done this job. I’ve put an awful lot on the line for it, and I’m not missing out now.”

“But that implies that you think you’ll have a chance to spend that money,” she noted, looking at him. “No way that’s happening, especially not now.”

“Sure, I will. What with Mason dead, and Guilliam doomed to die, those two are out of the way.… I expect you to burst into tears anytime now.” He gave her an exaggerated eye roll. “What, no tears?”

He wore such a mocking expression that she just glared at him, hating the power in his tone, based on his belief that he held all the aces in his hand. “You have these grandiose ideas, yet you’ve been wandering this hospital for at least the two days that I first noticed you. If you have things all wrapped up, why the hell didn’t you pop Mason two days ago? Why the hell didn’t you shoot Guilliam two days ago? Why the hell didn’t you kidnap me two days ago? Are you waiting for the real killer in your family to show up? Yet your cousin is dead, and your granddad is too old and infirm. So are you waiting for Daddy to come pull the trigger? You talk like you know it all. You don’t know anything.” She stared at him in fury.

“It’s called surveillance .” He slapped her hard, rattling her teeth, and her headache bloomed again. “Shut your trap. In case you haven’t noticed, you’re sitting in a laundry hamper, and I will soon take you out of this hospital and move you someplace where nobody will find you.”

She swallowed at hearing that, rubbing her jaw, hoping none of her teeth had been knocked loose with his slap.

He nodded. “Believe me when I say that nobody will hear you, that nobody will give a shit about you, once you’re out of here. You’ve probably been a pain in the ass to the nurses since the day your mother arrived, and then you just moved in too. God, how disgusting to stay at the hospital while she was dying,” he said. “That’s just gross.”

Shocked at his attitude, she asked, “What I did was gross, but killing people for money isn’t?”

“No, that’s just business.”

“ Right . My vote is you get your ass kicked before you end up with your cousin.”

He glared at her. “That’s not happening.”

“You don’t think the rest of your screwed-up family will throw you to the wolves? Of course they will. That’s the kind of family you belong to, right? Nobody gives a shit about you. They just want to make sure that whatever they’re doing happens, and then you’ll be blamed,” she pointed out, with a broad smile. “I wouldn’t get too happy as you dream about that inheritance money because I don’t see any of it coming your way, or, if it does, it will be temporary, and you’ll be dead before you get a chance to spend it.”

The hand that smacked her across the face again had dealt a blow before, but even now she smiled as she looked at him, knowing she’d gotten his goat. She knew what made him tick. Clearly the thought that he wouldn’t get his payday and that the family might somehow turn the tables on him was enough to make him choke. She continued to smile at him. “Nice to know you can lose control too.”

“Yeah, I hope so because the next time I lose control, it might just be with a bullet. Now shut up.”

“And if I don’t?”

He sighed. “You know what? This will be easier.” And, with that, he pushed the laundry cart into the wall, slamming her head hard against the concrete, and she blacked out.

*

Guilliam yelled into the phone, “She’s gone. Her phone’s here and all the rest of her stuff, but she’s gone.”

Jasper replied, calm and stable, “That doesn’t mean she’s not in the bathroom.”

“I checked,” he snapped. “I’m heading back to security right now.”

“Good idea.”

“We’ll send out an alert within the hospital and make sure she’s not still on the premises somewhere,” he said.

“See what you can find from security. I’m on my way.” And then Jasper ended the call.

Guilliam turned the last corner, approaching the security unit, when his phone rang. Hearing the man on the other end, he slowed his steps. “Who is this?”

“Somebody who has a package that you care about,” said the guy in a mocking tone.

He stopped. “If you touch her, I’ll kill you, you little bastard.”

“Ooh, look at that, feisty words. You must be missing somebody. Not very good at your job, since you allowed her to get plucked away from you.”

He glared into his phone. “What do you want?”

“I want a lot of things in life, but the big question is, what do I need? And what I need is for you to finish the job on Mason.”

He froze. “That won’t happen.”

“If it doesn’t,” he replied in a mocking tone. “you’ll never see her alive again.” And, with that, the call was terminated.

Guilliam stared down at his cell, his breathing raspy and horrified. He phoned Jasper. “The kidnapper just contacted me,” he began, his voice harsh. “They want me to finish the job on Mason.”

“What?”

“Yeah.”

“Holy shit. What the hell is going on here?” Jasper asked.

“This is an all-out deal against Mason, I gather,” Guilliam replied.

“I’m on the way. I’ll grab Masters and Gideon and get the whole team there.”

“I don’t even know if she’s still here in the hospital,” Guilliam noted. “I have no idea where she is. I don’t know how long she’s been missing. I’m at the security door right now.”

“Follow up, get that going. I’ll get everybody there. We’ve got police out looking for the fake doctor as well.”

“Yeah, you might have the police out, but he’s got her,” he declared, his throat constricting. “God, what have I done?”

“You’ve done nothing, man,” Jasper stated. “You remember that. This asshole has done this. Not you.”

“You say that, but—”

“I mean it,” he snapped. “You and I both know these guys are just looking for opportunities to prey on somebody like her.”

“Exactly,” Guilliam grumbled, “and, if I hadn’t shown her that I was here, if I hadn’t looked after her—”

Jasper interrupted, “Then somebody else would be their kidnap victim. You and I both know that it’s much better that this involves you, that this involves us. We can deal with this,” he stated. “Hang on, and get the damn hospital security team on it.”

“I’m here. I’ll call you back.” He quickly disconnected and raced inside, barking off orders. When the security guards realized what had gone on, everybody began searching through the various cameras to see what happened.

“He’s right there,” one of the guards yelled, pointing at one of the cameras in the hallway. “He’s pushing a laundry cart.”

“Where’s the laundry room?” Guilliam snapped.

“Down in the second basement,” he replied.

“Okay, I’m heading down there. Keep tracking him, see where he and that cart goes, and somebody call me as soon as you find anything,” he cried out, as he raced from the room.

The security guard he’d spoken to earlier joined him. “Come on. I know where we’re going, so I can get you there faster. This way.” He quickly ran down to a double set of elevators. “We need to go on the industrial one.”

And, with him at Guilliam’s side, they ran until they were at the laundry room. Guilliam stopped and looked around, while the security guard talked to the rest of his team on his phone, with the Speaker on. “A couple carts are here,” the guard shared, “but no sign of anybody in them.”

“Where did he go?” Guilliam roared. “You should be on those cameras right now. Where did he go?”

“We’re checking. We’re checking,” the other guard replied from the phone. “We’re not seeing anything.”

“He didn’t just pick her up and carry her over his shoulder out of here,” Guilliam snapped. At least he didn’t think the kidnapper would. “Would you have noticed? Do you ever get anybody carrying something suspicious like that?”

“Not like that,” the guard beside Guilliam noted. “But if some guy was carrying a suitcase or a duffel bag, obviously that would be something suspicious. What do you guys see?” he asked the guards in the security room.

The guard on the phone replied, “We’re looking, but we’re not seeing anything yet.”

“Keep looking,” Guilliam roared, as he headed back through the laundry chutes, looking for her. “Make sure your guards are checking the garage floor. Check to see if any activity is going on down there.”

“We’re on it,” one of the guys replied.

Guilliam added, “The rest of my team is on their way. Make sure you tell them where I am.”

He and the guard with him quickly ran through every machine in the laundry area, looking for carts, looking for any hiding spots where Janelle could have been stashed. Anywhere. He turned a few minutes later to see Jasper and the rest of the team standing behind him. “She’s gone,” he muttered brokenly.

“She’s not gone,” Masters countered, stepping forward. “The asshole plucked her out of here, and that is bullshit, but you’re not to blame.”

“Thanks, but I am,” he said, looking around. “Dear God, he could be anywhere with her by now.”

“And he might be nowhere. Let’s not lose hope right now. We need you to focus.”

Guilliam nodded. “I’m focused, but you might have trouble keeping me from killing this fucker when we find him.”

“Understood, but that’s not the problem right now,” Masters noted.

“That’s not the priority,” Jasper added, “but nobody will give a shit if it’s a clean deal, just don’t put anybody in a bind.”

Guilliam nodded again. “I know. And I know exactly how Mason felt when he popped Gabe. It’s that twisted family. I need to get to the grandfather, and we need to call in the father and even the mother. I don’t give a shit if she’s taking chemotherapy or not,” he snapped. “They will know where this guy is, and somebody will tell us.”

With Masters at his side, he turned and raced back outside. Masters called him over to his vehicle.

“Come on. I’m driving. Tell me where we’re going.”

“First to the old folks’ home,” he muttered, “before that asshole calls me back.”

“You think he will?”

“Oh, hell yes. And he’ll make it bad, so I do what he needs me to do.”

“You think he’ll hurt her?”

He looked over at him and nodded. “Absolutely he will. At this point, I think they’ll do whatever they need to, just to bring this to an end. And, for whatever reason, killing Mason is the end.”

“That’s an awful lot of hate,” Masters said. “This whole thing has been one big long nightmare. To think that it’s gotten this far makes me think it’s declining.”

“Maybe. The evil grandfather is probably dying, and this is his last wish. To see Mason dead. And maybe that’s all there is to it. Maybe somebody is at the end of their line who just doesn’t give a shit anymore.”

He turned and nodded. “The grandfather?”

“It’s certainly possible.”

“Yeah, it is. The grandfather certainly had a bad reputation and, even as an old man now, might be angry enough to do something like this. And if he’s an old codger who’s been controlling the whims of everybody else in their lives for all these years, I can see that would be a serious problem.”

Guilliam nodded. “As far as we know, the kidnapper is his only grandchild, Greg. So, the family dynasty dies with him.”

“Wait, I thought this Greg guy was a cousin to Gabe.”

“Yeah, the old man had two daughters. The one with cancer is the mother to Gabe. The other daughter is not the favorite, so she and Greg moved away years ago. So Greg is a blood relative in the grandfather’s line.”

“Okay, so if the kid Mason killed was the golden boy, that could make the grandfather really pissed off that Gabe was killed.”

“Right, and, if the mother is dealing with cancer, she’s quite likely to die soon too.”

“So,” Masters suggested, “from the grandfather’s perspective, maybe he’s thinking it’s just losses upon losses, and the family line won’t survive. Presumably it’s all about the family surviving. It often is. You know that.”

“I do know that,” he agreed with a nod. “Even though sometimes I think a lot of these families shouldn’t survive, their methodologies are archaic, and they’re one step away from being feudal.”

“Oh, they definitely are,” Masters agreed, with a nod. “Maybe the added impetus is that the grandfather wants redemption for his dead grandson before granddaddy kicks the bucket.”

As they pulled into the senior living facility, Guilliam started to hop out.

Masters grabbed his arm and said, “Buddy, you need to calm down.”

“I’m calm,” he bit off. “As calm as I will get until this bullshit is over. Janelle needs to be back where she belongs.”

“And where is that?” Masters asked, a smile at the corners of his lips.

“You know exactly where that is,” Guilliam snapped, with a hard glance in his direction.

“I do. Just checking to see if you had gotten there yet.”

“Of course I did. I was there all along, which doesn’t make it any easier. We’ve had a lot of years apart that didn’t need to be, but I understood. I didn’t like it, but I dealt with it. I won’t deal with somebody stopping us now.”

“Of course not,” Masters agreed, “but we also can’t go hog wild and give this guy the upper hand, so—”

“I know. I’m fine now. I’m completely calm,” Guilliam stated.

“Like hell you are.” Guilliam glared at him, and Masters just shrugged. “What, you think I can’t tell?”

“Let’s put it this way. I’m as calm as I’m likely to get,” he snapped, as he turned and strode toward the front of the retirement home.

As he got there, the administrator of the home stood there, almost guarding the front door.

“You can’t come in here,” he stated.

“And who do you think is likely to stop me?” Guilliam asked, his voice silky soft.

“I already called for the police.”

“That’s good. I hope they bring the search warrants we asked for.”

“Search warrants?” he asked, paling visibly.

“Yes, search warrants. Those things that allow us to double-check all the criminal activity you’re involved in.”

“I’m not involved in any criminal activity,” he protested.

“Yeah, so you say. Yet I highly doubt that will be the truth of it by the time we’re done tearing apart your place.” And look at that. The manager didn’t even ask who they were or who they were after. The manager paled, and Guilliam nodded. “You’re harboring a murderer, and I will talk to him whether you’re okay with it or not.”

“He hasn’t left this place at all in years. No way he could have murdered anybody.”

“Getting family members to do his dirty deeds and blackmailing others to do more dirty deeds does not exactly make him innocent,” Guilliam snapped, as he glared at the man.

“Where are your cops?” he asked.

“It may take them a little bit longer to get all the search warrants ready. Meanwhile, move out of my way.”

“He’s an old man,” he protested. “We’ve never had any trouble with him.”

“Because he won’t cause trouble here, since it won’t get him anything. What he wants is revenge and retribution.”

“Is that so wrong?” the other man asked. “He spent his whole life helping others.”

At that, Guilliam stopped and stared at him.

The other man quickly backed up. “We don’t know that he’s done anything wrong,” he protested. “And this needs to be tried in a court of law.”

From a distance they heard somebody laughing, then shouting out to them. “Give it up, you old goat. Let them in to see me. I’ve got to have some entertainment in my life.”

The other man groaned. “I could have just told them you were sleeping.”

“Does it look like they give a shit if I’m sleeping? I’m pretty darn sure they would be all over us in two seconds anyway.”

The manager glared at Guilliam. “You have no right to accost him.”

“Accost him?” Guilliam repeated, frowning at him. “Now that I’ve seen your obvious allegiance to him, I am very interested in taking a deep dive into your life and history. We have five counts of murder already, and now it seems that you’re an accomplice.” With that said, Guilliam strode past the man, hearing him stutter and stammer.

Masters now spoke to the man, saying something along the lines of, “Just stay out of our way, but you’ll need to collect whatever you want to bring with you because you’ll be coming downtown with us.”

The old man deeper inside cackled again. “You’ve got him good and scared now. Aren’t you big tough boys? Have you come to arrest me?” he asked, with a sneer.

“Sounds like a great idea to me,” Guilliam replied. “Not that you care. You don’t care about much these days though, do you?”

“No, I sure don’t. What’s to care about? My whole family is gone because of assholes like you.”

“Assholes like me?” Guilliam shook his head. “So, you kidnap an innocent young woman at her dead mother’s bedside, so you can use her to get me to go kill somebody else, huh ?”

The grandfather’s expression was crafty. “Did it work?” he asked.

“No, it didn’t.”

“Ah, the poor woman, to think that she matters so little that you’ll just let her die.”

“Since when does killing one to kill another work?”

“In my world it works just fine,” he said, with a smirk. “And if you think this is going in any other direction than the one I want, you’re wrong. The only way we get out of this mess is if Mason dies. And I don’t give a shit who dies with him.”