***
Predawn light showed Cora the ceiling of a car. She smelled leather and pine. Nick’s Mustang. She didn’t remember leaving the cabin or getting into a car. Wait, why did they leave the cabin?
“Are you awake, Cora?”
He drugged her!
“Why? Why? How could you!” Flaming mad now, she jerked to sit up but fell back down, dizzy.
“I’m sorry, but I had to.”
“Why did you ask me to trust you and then do this?” Hot tears swelled up and fought to plunge over her eyelashes as she remembered the warning from Alexander.
“Wait, Cora.” He hit the brakes and threw the car into neutral, turning to her. “I won’t hurt you, I promise. I’m trying to keep you safe.”
“How will I find my father now?” she cried. “Alexander knows where he is, and I’m sure we won’t find him before Alexander does. He could have helped me.”
“What?” He looked genuinely shocked. And worried. “You don’t know that man.”
“Oh, yeah, Alexander is so evil, and yet you’re kidnapping me, AGAIN!” She yelled at the car’s ceiling instead of looking over at him.
“I used chloroform I found in his bag. Don’t you know what he planned to do with it?” He reached to her. “You’d only bring on worse trouble by accepting his help. Your dad trusted Alexander because he fooled him. I’m willing to bet my life that Alexander is the one who framed him.”
Cora wasn’t listening. She wasn’t just dizzy now, but also nauseous.
“Nick, I don’t feel so good.”
He hurried to gently help her stand up and lean against the car. The outside air felt cool, calming her stomach, but goose bumps popped up all over her. She shivered and Nick stood in front of her and rubbed her arms. Cora wanted to push him away, or maybe fall into his arms and cry.
“We only have a minute or two to spare. Are you okay?”
Shaking her head weakly, she told him, “I don’t know.”
“We have to go.” He glanced over the car, looking around, and she wondered if he thought Alexander could catch up to them. He apologized and helped her into the front seat.
“How the hell did you get me into the car?” she asked, her voice hoarse, although she was starting to feel better. The path from the cabin to the car was pretty steep and twisted through the trees.
“I carried you . . . through the woods, in the dark. So don’t say I’ve never done anything nice for you.”
“Maybe I’ll thank you when you find Jerry.”
“That’s the idea,” he said. A few miles later, the car left the gravel country road.
A thought occurred to her, and she couldn’t believe she had missed it before. “How do I know you didn’t have a part in stealing the money?”
“Excuse me?” He threw her an incredulous look. “Wouldn’t it be a waste of time to help you if I took the money, or knew who did?”
To a normal person, yes, but they had left normal behind when he kidnapped her.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know anything for sure anymore.”
“Listen, I’m going to tell you what I think is going on, but remember, it’s just my theory.” He waited until she looked his way. “I believe Alexander is behind this. If I can uncover his motives and get some proof, I think I can clear your father . . . and get you out of this mess.”
That almost sounded logical and reasonable.
“Do you have enough time?” she asked, remembering the deadline.
“I’ll have to make do. I’ve worked under pressure before.” He glanced in the mirror, checking behind them.
“Have you ever had to beat the clock to save someone’s life?” she asked. Glancing back, she wondered what he saw but didn’t want to leave the conversation hanging. There was a side road up ahead and he turned the car in. A ways down that road, he pulled over and drove the car into some brush. He turned the car off and cracked his door.
She heard a car drive past them on the main road. She held her breath as the reality of the situation hit her.
“I’m sorry if that sounded insensitive.” He turned back and looked at her quickly, his eyes burning a warm color in the morning light. Just as quickly, he turned back to the door, listening. The soft engine noise faded as the car drove farther away. Several silent minutes passed before Nick started the car again. They followed a line of tall grass and weeds growing between two tire ruts. Branches hung over both sides of the old abandoned dirt road as if they wanted to hide it.
“Are we headed even farther out into the sticks?” This road wasn’t going to lead them back to Eugene.
“We have to lose that car and make sure Alexander isn’t tracking us. He’ll assume we’re heading back to the city as quickly as possible.” Branches swept over the windshield and sides of the car as he slowly rolled through the brush. He stopped under a large evergreen. Again, he cracked his door to hear outside.
“Now what?” She let the panic take over. “How do we get back to town with them out here looking for us?”
Nick grabbed both her hands so she would turn to face him. “We’re okay. We just have to wait them out. They’re looking hard now, but everyone will expect us to race back to beat that deadline.” He pulled her hands to his mouth and kissed one and then the other. She expected him to say something but instead he looked into her eyes. He seemed to say a lot with his eyes, and somehow she felt that she understood him. Right now he wanted to calm her down and reassure her. It wouldn’t help her dad at all if she couldn’t keep it together.
He leaned forward, taking her by surprise, and kissed her lightly on the lips. The kiss happened so fast that he pulled back before she could even respond. Maybe it just meant I’m here or we’re in this together. Whatever it meant, the sensation of his lips on hers sent a heat wave through her.
“Why don’t we get out?” He pushed his door the rest of the way open and stood, stretching his arms above him. When she didn’t follow, he walked around and opened her door. “I have some water, dried fruit, and jerky in the trunk.”
She stretched her legs out of the door, but remained sitting while he went to the back of the car and opened the trunk. He came back with a sleeping bag that he threw over an old log settled into the earth and moss. “Cora, we’re safe here for now.” He sat and gave her a come-hither look with a glow in his eyes and a slight smile.
A noise came on the morning breeze and she thought it was a car engine at first. Seeing her face, he shook his head. “That’s a commercial jet off somewhere in the sky.”
The sound faded but she picked out the quiet hum of a river and the air moving through the needles way up in the trees. A bird chirped and an insect buzzed by. There were all kinds of noises if she listened. She finally left the car and sat by him. She sat close enough to feel his body heat. Her mind started down an unproductive train of thought while her emotions went wild.
“You must be hungry,” he said, opening a grocery bag. “Jerky? Dried fruit? Both?”
She took the jerky first. “You seem prepared for all of this.”
“Actually, I keep things on hand so I can take off for a hike or trip in the woods. There’s a camp stove and all kinds of other supplies in the trunk. Too bad I didn’t grab some canned soup from the cabin.”
He watched her as she chewed on fruit and jerky and studied the pinecones on the ground around their feet.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you right away who I was.” He handed her one of the water bottles. “What if I told you more about myself now?”
She looked at him but didn’t answer with words.
Nick ran his hands through his hair and dropped his gaze back to the pinecones. “This is something I keep to myself. My mom died when I was ten, from lung cancer of all things. We had a lot of money, always, but it wasn’t enough to help her. I was so mad at my dad at the time. I guess I still am.”
He could have looked down because he was lying, or because it was hard
to share. She couldn’t tell so she only said, “Because he’s a chain smoker?”
“Yeah, and it killed her. Even then, he didn’t slow down.”
She wondered if he was manipulating her. Maybe he knew her mother died when she was eight. The loss still ached inside her, sometimes it overtook her and she cried in bed at night. Things happened all the time that she longed to share with her mom. Life was full of reminders of her absence, from dances, to graduations and birthdays. She wanted to share that with Nick, and see understanding in his eyes, but she held back. Her heart wanted to trust him but her head warned her otherwise. Not now. Not like this. “And?”
“And…My dad started with money, from his parents. Did your father ever tell you about my family?”
“Not really. He said you had a lot of money and took care of him.”
“That was smart of him to keep you out of it.” He paused. The irony was just too thick. “My great-grandfather left Switzerland with the profits he made in banking. Over here, he started out buying a restaurant and then bought one more business at a time.”
“Taking over Eugene one business at a time, huh?”
“Actually, yeah. That’s about how my father thinks. He’s the oldest of three brothers. He makes all the family decisions, on top of running several hotels and other businesses. Adam’s dad, John, manages the restaurants, except the one Adam took over. John is married to a sweet Mexican lady named Martha.”
“You’re pretty close to Adam?”
“He’s more than my cousin. He’s my best friend.”
She’d always wished for family ties like that. She’d love to have a sister or cousin to confide in and share family memories. “You’re lucky to have him…These other brothers, I don’t think I’ve heard much about them.”
“No, they don’t like to be in the spotlight like Keith. John’s the middle brother, the only one who doesn’t fully support the things the family does. That’s why he sticks to managing restaurants, but he’ll never say a word to Keith. Michael is the youngest brother. He’s always eager to please.” Nick seemed to lose himself in his thoughts and didn’t share what he was thinking.
So now she had three other suspects including the two brothers. Adam could possibly be in on it. Right now she’d put her money on either Alexander, the youngest brother Michael, or possibly both of them. She directed the conversation elsewhere so he wouldn’t suspect her thoughts. “So what about you?”
“I went to private school before going to law school. I needed to get out from under all the pressure my family put on me. Keith, and his brothers, just about disowned me for doing something different, something they felt was against them. Keith was training me to follow him.”
It felt like the truth, instead of a practiced lie, even though he was a lawyer. Weren’t they famous for lying? The day’s heat got to her, and she braided her hair to cool herself down. She grabbed a hair band out of her pocket for the end. Nick fell silent too, and watched her play with her hair. Maybe he was waiting to hear a response from her, or more about her, but she stared off into the trees and breathed in the forest smell.
They sat, surrounded by the tall Douglas fir, Coast pine, and underbrush, listening to the soft noise of the wind caressing the treetops. There hadn’t been any suspicious sounds for a while. It was beautiful and relaxing, despite everything. She took a deep breath, glad they weren’t at the cabin or near Alexander, but she felt so guilty for not helping her dad.
She looked at Nick and pictured him growing up in that environment. Could he be different from the rest of them?
How could she validate his claims? She wanted so badly to believe him, needed to believe him, but she had been trained not to trust people. She thought of something, and even knowing it was a low blow, she asked, “Where did find out your mother died?”
Instantly, Nick’s eyes filled with pain.
“School let out for the summer that day.” His eyes unfocused as his mind drifted back in time. “I saw Uncle John parked by the curb, and Adam and I ran to the truck. He didn’t say anything during the ride home. Dad sat waiting on the porch. We both knew right away, we just knew, but we sat down and let them tell us anyway.”
Listening to him, her heart beat faster. She knew that day was etched in his memory like a snap shot, waiting to pop up at unexpected moments. She also knew at least that part of his story was the complete truth.
He asked, “What happened to your mom?”
She should have seen it coming. In the unguarded moment, however, both her snapshot and overwhelming feelings flooded into her.
“I’m sorry.” He reached over and touched her leg again. He seemed to be saying sorry for her loss, not sorry for asking.
Maybe she wasn’t so good at hiding her pain. “No, it’s fair game after I asked about your mom. She died of cancer, too, when I was eight. That’s why my family was so poor.”
Several moments went by with just the song of the breeze in the tree branches above them.
“Cora…You didn’t have much to stand on, but you did very well for yourself. You’re successful, and you don’t seem mad at the world that life hasn’t been easy for you.”
She looked into his eyes, feeling a connection even though she didn’t want to.
Quietly, he asked her, “Can I ask you one more thing?”
“Blood type? Credit history?”
“No.” He bit back his laugh. “Is there a man in your life, waiting for you back in civilization, worried sick about you?”
Cora tried to cover a small smile while shaking her head. Softly, she said, “Just my dad right now. I’ve been getting my career off the ground, and it actually helps to be single. You know, the whole young, single reporter thing.” She gave him a questioning look. “You’d be in trouble if you had to explain this to a girlfriend.”
He laughed. “Yeah…I can only imagine, but no, there’s no one right now. I’ve been so busy with work. A bit driven. Maybe we have that in common.”
The silence that followed was a peaceful one, and they shared a look of understanding. Something clicked, something more than sexual desire or affection.
Wow, he had gorgeous eyes. In the sun, they looked a rich, reddish brown. They transformed into a warm, fawn brown in the shade. She knew that he wanted to kiss her more. She wanted to touch him again, feel his strong arms hold her.
Cora didn’t want to become overly emotional with him, not when she needed a clear head. The way he looked at her could break through her defenses unless she did something quick.
Chapter Eight