Larry was like a superstar in her eyes. She remembered the first time she’d seen him in person. He’d been standing in the elevator, his security team draped around him like he was the POTUS, instead of the Clark County mayor. She’d been too afraid to get onto the elevator even though Larry had smiled at her and one of his men—she would later learn his name was Timothy Hall, a lying bastard—had beckoned her inside.
It had only taken a day or so for Timothy to walk into the mailroom and escort her out. Her heart had hammered wildly as she thought she was being reprimanded for doing something wrong, or possibly fired. Instead, he’d taken her straight to the mayor and that’s when it all began.
Alayna’s cell phone chirped and she looked down at the screen. The phone had been in her hand all night long, just as she felt like she’d been standing in this window for the same endless hours. With desperation clawing at her throat she read the message and felt the burn of tears at the words. She was coming. Victoria Lashley was coming to see her, to save her.
Her hopes of being rescued from this situation had been dashed so many times before, Alayna had almost lost faith. But that would totally break her grandmother’s heart. Nothing else she did could be worse than not having faith in the God Ethel Jonas had taught her to love and trust. And even though she knew she’d sinned—so badly that in another time and place, she would’ve surely been stoned to death—she could repent her sins and she could be forgiven. That was the small glimmer of hope in her mind that kept her going. It sparkled right next to the memory of her daughter. Lia was her life and Alayna refused to spend more time away from her, no matter what she had to get back home. She had to start thinking about Lia and not the broken heart that would never be mended because the manshe’d loved with all her being was gone. That was probably for the best, she’d had months to come to that conclusion. Months to realize that men would continue to be users and abusers, if she let them.
Moving from the window finally, she headed into the bathroom and turned the rusty old faucet. She waited a few minutes, and then a few minutes more, while the water warmed before she grabbed the moderately clean washcloth to cleanse her face. Her eyes were puffy from the crying bouts throughout the night. And her lip was split from the fight that had pushed her over the edge.
There was a soft knock at the door. It seemed much louder as it jolted her out of her deep thoughts. Alayna sucked in a breath and said a prayer.
Ben
“She’s going to call me within the hour,” Grace told Ben as they stood in the living room of the home she shared with Judge Ramsey.
The judge was standing right beside his wife, an arm around her shoulder, his pensive dark eyes glaring at Ben. He hadn’t been too pleased to open his door at seven in the morning to find Ben with Trent and Devlin standing behind him like henchmen on his doorstep. But Ben was respectful, or as respectful as he could be under these circumstances. He’d explained why he was there without going into too much detail and asked to see Grace. When Grace had come into the living room she looked like she’d been crying and like she’d been expecting him.
“Where did she go?” Devlin asked impatiently.
To that Grace responded with an elegant eye roll and a squaring of her shoulders. On another day, in any othercircumstance, Ben would’ve found the complete brush off funny and would’ve joked Devlin about it for days to come. But not today, not now.
“She’s in a lot of danger,” Ben said, the words sticking in his throat with razor-edged sharpness.
“I know everything that’s going on,” Grace informed him. “You should have told her when she first got this case dumped in her lap. Then maybe she could’ve gotten out before it was too late.”
Grace’s words were cool, not filled with so much vehemence as fear. Ben respected her, he respected her relationship with Victoria and so he only nodded, taking her words and the accusation that went with them.
“I did what I thought was right at the time. Yes, I could have done things differently but I don’t really know that we would be at a different point then we are now if I had,” he admitted honestly. “But I’m not about to let him hurt her. That’s why I need you to tell me where she went. Now.”
He hadn’t raised his voice. Judge Ramsey was not going to take that well if he did. And the last thing Ben wanted was an altercation between the judge and Devlin. That wasn’t going to work out well for any of them.
“I think we should contact the police,” Judge Ramsey interjected.
Ben nodded. “Detective Noah Hannity is already aware of the circumstances, Your Honor.”
“And why isn’t he here? If this situation is as dire as you say, and I believe it is since my wife is trying valiantly not to shake and or cry in front of you, why aren’t the police already out looking for Victoria?”
“Because we have information that leads us to believe there’s a leak in the police department,” Trent offered. “I’ve been looking into the disappearance of Alayna Jonas for thepast couple of months and the conclusion I’ve come to is that someone on the inside must have tipped Vega’s men off about her whereabouts. Or, in the alternative, someone on the inside is one of Vega’s men.”
Judge Ramsey’s frown was immediate. “That’s a serious allegation,” he told Trent.
“One I can back-up,” was Trent’s response.
“Then you know who the leak is?” The judge persisted.
Trent stood with his feet spread apart, hands clasped in front of him, shoulders squared. He looked directly into Judge Ramsey’s eyes when he said, “I’ve got a couple of leads. But Victoria’s safety supersedes that. Look, Judge, I’ve been on the battlefield, I’ve been in covert operations and for the past few years working all sorts of cases on the streets of Las Vegas and in other states. I’ve seen guys like Vega in my travels. He’s a walking deadly weapon and if we don’t stop him, the death toll is just going to keep rising.”
“Unless we can take him down now,” Devlin added in his dour tone.
Grace’s eyes had just about bulged as fear gripped her. She touched a hand to her stomach and gasped. The judge immediately directed her to a seat.
“It’s alright, baby. Just take a deep breath. It’s going to be fine,” he was saying to her.
From a distance Ben just watched. There was a connection here, an intimacy that was unlike anything he’d ever seen. This was a family, or they were about to be a family, and the love between them would be apparent. This is what Ben wanted in his future. It’s what he wanted with Victoria.
Crossing over to the chair where Grace was seated, practicing what he thought were most likely Lamaze breathing methods, he knelt down and took her free hand in his.
“Grace, you know me. You know how long I’ve been in love with Victoria. I can’t let anything happen to her. Not now when we’ve just found each other. Please tell me where she is,” he implored.
