Adria’s head was pounding as she turned out the light. The room smelled musty and stale with the lingering odors of old cigarettes and years of filth. But the motel was cheap and anonymous. At least for now.
She fell back on the bed and closed her eyes. Images of Zachary went through her mind. She couldn’t be distracted by him. She had to stay focused. She’d spent too much time on her mission. In the past few years she’d written letters, met with lawyers, people from government agencies, and kept a diary, trying vainly to find Virginia Watson. Only now, after her father’s death, did she have an inkling as to who she was.
And she was going to go through hell and back trying to find out if, as her father insisted, she was really London Danvers.
Zach glanced at his watch. Not long until daylight. Staring through the windshield to the motel where Adria Nash was sleeping, he wondered if she might just be his long-lost half-sister.
Impossible.
Crazy.
But she looked so damned much like Kat.
His gut tightened when he considered his hot-blooded stepmother and all the pain she’d brought his family. He didn’t want to think about her and what had happened after London’s abduction, didn’t want to consider his part in tarnishing the Danvers name. He slid lower on his back as rain began to drizzle down the windshield in earnest.
He remember standing, bleeding in the rain, the night London had been abducted. He’d run into the policemen who had pointed their weapons at him and demanded answers…
PART FOUR
8
“I asked you a question, Danvers,” Steve, the taller cop barked. “What happened to the girl?”
“What girl?”
“Your sister.”
The stocky one took hold of his arm and Zach nearly fell into the street. “Jesus, get your hands off me!” He sucked in his breath through loose teeth.
“Look at this, Bill.” The officer opened the front of Zach’s jacket, shoving aside the expensive lapel with his riot stick, showing off the sticky purple stains of blood. “You okay, kid?”
“Let’s get him up to his old man. There was a paramedic in the hotel-with the mother. And the old man’s called his personal physician. Come on, son, through the back door. We don’t want the press to get a picture of you looking like this, do we?”
“What happened to Trisha?” Zach asked, dazed. The two thugs, Joey and Rudy, they’d found his sister. She’d been drunk and…Oh, God. Rage burned through his blood.
“Maybe you can tell us,” Bill said as he hauled Zach in the direction of the service entrance. “My guess is you’ve got one helluva story.”
“I don’t give a good goddamn what time it is,” Witt yelled, his patience worn thin. London was missing. His precious little girl-gone without a trace! His heart had nearly stopped at the news and he’d been foggy, but after six cups of coffee he was clearheaded and he knew who the bastard was behind the kidnapping. “I want you to send a car over to Polidori’s house. You wake up that goddamned son of a bitch and find out what he knows about this!” Witt yelled at Logan.
“Back off, Witt. We’ll question Mr. Polidori, after the search of the hotel is complete.”
“You bet your ass you will,” Witt said, reaching for the humidor of cigars he kept on the desk of his office on the main floor of the hotel. Katherine was sleeping, thanks to Dr. McHenry and several sleeping pills. Witt lit up and stalked around his massive desk. “You’ve checked all the rooms?”
“Twice,” Logan snapped. He had no patience for Witt’s inference that he and his men weren’t capable of doing their jobs.
“And the service elevator-”
“And the boiler room, the linen closets, the conference rooms, the rest rooms, even the air shafts, elevator shafts, maintenance rooms, and freezers. We also checked out the parking lot, restaurant, bellboy’s closet, wine cellar, and every nook and cranny this old hotel has. It’s been renovated half a dozen times and my men have gone over every set of blueprints hoping to find some secret room that everyone here’s forgotten about. Take my word for it, Witt, she’s not on the premises.”
“Then what’re you waiting for?”
“I still haven’t heard from the men outside. We’re covering a ten-square-block area, talking to people on the street, checking other buildings nearby, and literally beating the bushes. We’ve got people at the airport, the train station, and the bus station.”
“You’re wasting your time,” Witt growled impatiently. “Polidori’s-” He glanced up and saw two officers and Zach, bloodied and beaten, stumble into the office. Witt’s guts twisted. The boy’s face was the color of chalk and a nasty cut had ripped his skin open near his ear. He was still bleeding and his nose was a pulpy mass. On his feet in an instant, Witt rounded the desk. “Get the doctor,” he ordered a policeman, then faced his son. “What happened?”
Zach glanced suspiciously to the police. He ran his tongue over dry, swollen lips. “What’s going on?” he asked, squinting against the light. “Did something happen to Trisha?”
“Hell, no! What’re you talking about?”
“They said, the police, that she was missing-”
Witt’s guts twisted. “They were talking about London.”
“London? But she’s only a kid-” Zach swallowed hard.
“You weren’t with her?”
Zach, stricken, shook his head.
“Christ.” His entire world was collapsing and he knew where to put the blame.
“What happened to her?” Zach asked.
“She’s missing,” Witt said.
“Missing? But she was at the party. I saw her. You saw her.”
“It happened later. Ginny’s gone, too. That’s all we know.” Through his silent fear, Witt forced himself to turn his attention to the boy who was nearly beaten beyond recognition. “Are you all right?”
Zach gritted his teeth. “I’ll live.”
“So how’d this happen?” Witt demanded, then picked up the phone and dialed three digits. “Is McHenry still there? I sent a man for him. Well, just tell him to come down here, on the double. Yeah, my office. What? Oh, it’s Zach. He’s back and he’s been roughed up. Looks serious.” He slammed down the receiver and motioned two police officers off a green leather couch. “Come on, you’d better lie down. Looks like you’ve lost a lot of blood.”
“I’m okay.”
Witt felt his temper snap. “Just do it, okay? For once in your life, Zach, don’t fight me. Lie on the couch and let McHenry examine you, for crying out loud!”
Zach looked like he was about to snarl back a hot retort, but instead he sat on the couch as Dr. McHenry
