Forbidden Territory & Forbidden Temptation: Forbidden Territory / Forbidden Temptation. Paula Graves
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He’d removed his sunglasses, exposing her to the full brunt of his fury. “Don’t do this, Ms. Browning.”
She jerked her arm from his grasp. “Did I break a law?”
He didn’t answer.
“I didn’t think so.” She headed toward her car.
McBride fell into step, his long strides easily matching hers. “He’s vulnerable and desperate. The last thing he needs is someone promising she can bring his baby back home to him when we both know damn well you can’t.”
She unlocked her car and opened the driver’s door, putting its solid bulk between her and McBride. “I know you don’t think she’s still alive.”
His only visible reaction was a tightening of his lips.
“But I know she is, and I’m not going to wait around for you to get over your knee-jerk skepticism before I do something about it.”
She started to get into the vehicle, but he grabbed the door before she could pull it shut behind her. Looking down at her over the top, he narrowed his eyes. “If you really know Abby’s alive, answer me this—why have four days passed without anyone calling with a ransom demand?”
Lily’s stomach knotted. She had no explanation for that.
“Think about it.” He let go of the door and stepped away.
* * *
HE WATCHED FROM the gravesite, his heart pounding. Who was this woman with the knowing eyes? What could she know about what had happened to Abby?
He’d planned so carefully. Worked out all the details, figured the odds. He’d visualized just what would happen, down to the lightly traveled shortcut Debra took every weekday morning on her way to Abby’s school. He knew where to stage the surprise attack, and how quickly Debbie would be scared into compliance.
It was supposed to be fast. Grab the girl and go, leaving Debra to sound the alarm and put the rest of the plan in motion.
But she had fought back.
He hadn’t thought she’d fight back. She’d always been such a marshmallow.
Everything had gone terribly wrong. And now there was Lily Browning, with her strange gold eyes and her knowing look, claiming she’d seen a vision of Abby.
His heart twisted with growing panic.
What if she really had?
* * *
A PHOTO OF LILY, Andrew Walters and Gerald Blackledge made the front page of Wednesday’s Borland Courier. The teacher’s lounge was abuzz when she arrived at school that morning.
“At least it’s a good picture. And they spelled your name correctly,” Carmen Herrera pointed out when Lily groaned at the sight of her face above the fold.
“I didn’t give anyone my name.” There was no mention of her in the body text, at least. “I guess Mr. Walters told them.”
“Or the senator,” Carmen suggested.
That was also possible—a jab at Mr. Family Values, consorting with a new woman right there at his ex-wife’s funeral. What would voters think?
Worse, what would Lieutenant McBride think when he got a look at her name and face plastered across the front page?
She half expected to find him waiting on her doorstep when she arrived home that afternoon, storm clouds gathering in his eyes, so she was almost disappointed to find no one waiting. But when she entered her house to find her phone ringing, she wasn’t surprised. She was listed in the directory; any reporter with a taste for a trumped-up scandal could look her up.
Lily grabbed the phone and took a deep breath, steeling herself for unpleasantness. “Hello?”
“Lily Browning?”
She knew that voice. The kidnapper’s harsh drawl was unmistakable. Lily’s heart slammed into her ribs. “You have Abby Walters.”
There was a long pause over the phone. When the man spoke, he sounded wary. “How’d you know that?”
“Is she okay?” Lily’s mind raced, wondering what to do next. Nobody was expecting the kidnappers to call here; all the recording equipment was no doubt set up at Andrew Walters’s hotel, waiting for a ransom demand. As she scrabbled for something to write with, her gaze fell on the answering machine attached to her phone.
The kind that allowed her to record incoming conversations.
She jabbed the record button with a shaking finger.
“She’s fine, for now,” the kidnapper said.
“You hit her, you son of a bitch!”
There was a brief silence on the other end before the man spoke in a hushed tone. “What the hell are you?”
Lily ignored the question. “Let me talk to her.”
“Don’t be stupid.”
Shivers raced up her spine, followed by the first hint of gray mist clouding the edges of her vision. Gripping the phone harder, she fought off the sensation. “Why are you calling me instead of Mr. Walters?”
“You think we don’t know the cops have his phone tapped? We’ve been looking for a way to contact him away from his hotel.” The caller laughed. “Then we seen your picture in the paper. Lucky break, ain’t it?”
Lily sank down on the floor, tucking her knees close to her body. “You want me to pass along your demands to Mr. Walters?”
“Tell him it’s time to pay up. We’ll be in touch.”
She heard a soft clicking noise. “Wait!”
But the man had already disconnected.
She slammed down the phone and covered her face with shaking hands. The door in her mind bulged, trying to force its way open, but she continued to fight the vision.
She had to call McBride.
With pain lancing behind her eyes, she checked the tape in the answering machine, terrified she’d pushed a wrong button and failed to record the kidnapper’s message. But the harsh drawl was there. “Tell him it’s time to pay up.”
She shut off the recorder and dialed McBride’s cell phone number. He answered on the second ring. “McBride.”
She released a pent-up breath. “It’s Lily Browning. The kidnappers just phoned me.”
“What?” He sounded wary.
She told him about the call. “I managed to record most of it on my answering machine. Do you want me to play it for you?”
“No, I’m on my way.” He hung up without saying goodbye.
By the time he arrived ten minutes later, her head was pounding with pain, the vision clawing at her brain. She didn’t bother with a greeting, just flung the door open and groped her way back to the sofa, concentrating on surviving the onslaught of pain in her head. She wished she could escape to her room and let the vision come, but she had to stay focused.
McBride went straight to the answering machine. “What time did the call come in?”
She altered her expression, trying to hide the pain. “The phone was ringing when I got home—maybe three-forty?”
He listened to the tape twice before he pulled it from the machine. “I’ll get this to the feds on the task force, see if they can clean it up a little, pick up some background noises. Maybe we can pinpoint where he was calling from. And I’ll take a copy to Mr. Walters, see if he recognizes the voice.”
“I recognized it,” she said, keeping her voice low out of self-defense as the pounding in her skull grew excruciating. She tried to say something more, but the