Mariah Stewart - Cry Mercy

“Emme!” he called, but there was no answer. With his free hand and with one good push with his foot, he righted the boat, and saw Emme on the stony beach. She moved awkwardly, and he realized her limbs were constrained. He found his pocket knife and cut the tape from her hands.

“You okay, Em?” He was still holding on to her abductor and wasn't about to give the bastard a bit of slack.

Emme swallowed hard and nodded, then screamed as she ripped the tape from her mouth. “Damn, that hurts!”

“Are you all right?” he asked again.

“I don't think anything's broken, but I think I'm going to be damned sore. Everywhere.”

He handed her the knife and she cut the tape that wound around her ankles. She rubbed at her wrists, then wiped the blood from her cheek where the skin had torn away.

“I see you met JJ. Gardner. My, my, won't daddy be proud.” She took a moment to catch her breath before grabbing the side of the boat and pulling herself up unsteadily. “J.J., meet Nick Perone. Belle's uncle.”

J.J. glared.

“Your cuffs are in my back pocket,” Nick told her. “Fish them out and you can have the honors.”

She reached into his pocket and tugged at the cuffs. Nick turned J.J. around so she could snap them on his wrists.

“Is that my Glock I saw you waving around?” she asked.

“It is.”

“Thanks for not losing it.” She pulled it from his waistband and pointed it at J.J.'s groin. “Now, J.J.-Justin to us folks on the message board, right? I'm not in the best of moods right now, so why don't you just tell us where you buried the girls so we can get on with the business of digging them up?”

He smirked at the Glock. “If you think that scares me, you're dumber than you look. That gun was under water. It isn't going to-”

She pulled the trigger and shot a round into the side of his boat.

“You were about to say something?”

He went white.

“Talk about being dumber than you look.” She smiled at him and held up the handgun. “Here's something you may not have learned on TV. One of the beautiful things about the Glock is that it has all these plastic parts, see? And the ammo's in this nice, tight, dry clip. You can swim with this sucker and it's still going to shoot. So tell me, J.J., where are they? Where are your sisters?”

“They're not my sisters,” he snarled.

“Right, technically, they're only half sisters.”

“They're nothing to me. That whole donor sibling thing, that's such a stupid sham.”

“Clever of you and your sister to climb on that bandwagon so you could see what was going on, though. How'd you find out about them, anyway?”

“Avery found some papers in my dad's desk and she showed them to me.”

“Avery?” Nick asked.

“My sister. Ava.” JJ. rolled his eyes. “She called herself ‘Ava’ on the board because she thought it was funny.”

“Funny, how?”

“Our last name's Gardner, get it?” JJ. stared at Emme as if waiting for the light to dawn. “Hello? Ava Gardner?”

“Oh. Right. Funny girl.” Emme wasn't finding anything about these two amusing. “Go on.”

“We started looking around on the Internet for information about sperm donors and found this website and decided to pretend to be one of them just for fun. It was so lame, you know, this whole donor sibling thing. Like these kids really thought they were related somehow.”

“They are related. They share the same paternal DNA that you have,” Nick reminded him.

“That's just bullshit, don't you get it? They were accidents. Test-tube accidents. Me and Avery, we're his only kids. Those others… they were biological freaks.”

“And what kind of freak are you, J.J.?” Emme asked quietly.

From downriver, they heard sirens. A moment later, three speeding boats were hurtling in their direction.

“Here comes the cavalry,” a much relieved Nick told her. “Right on time.”

It was almost four on the following afternoon when the Firebird pulled up to Robert's gate. Emme waved a weary hand to the guard and he waved back.

“I can't wait to see Chloe.” Emme came to life after having slept for half of their drive time. “I can't remember the last time I wasn't home to tuck her into bed. I hope she's okay.”

“Are you kidding? I've got a twenty in my wallet that says she barely knew you were gone.”

She shot him a withering look.

“Okay, she knew you weren't here, but let's face it, she had Trula. And we both know what that means.” He smiled as he parked the car behind the great house. “If anyone can make you forget what's bothering you for a while, it's got to be Trula.”

“I knew she'd be in good hands, and you're right, she didn't seem at all upset when I called last night. Still…”

The back door opened and the little girl shot out.

“Mommy!” she cried as she ran to the car.

“See, she did miss me.” Emme got out of the car and opened her arms to her child.

“Mommy, guess what? Trula and me got a kitty! Her name is Foxy and she's this big!” Chloe held her hands about eight inches apart, then grabbed her mother by the hand and tugged her toward the house. “Come see her.”

“Chloe, don't I get a hug?” Emme knelt down.

“Sure.” Chloe wrapped her arms around her mother's neck and squeezed for one second, which was apparently all she had time for. “Come see Foxy.”

Nick walked past, whistling.

“Smug is not a good look for you,” she told him, and he laughed.

“Nick, come see our kitty,” Chloe ran past them both to open the door.

Trula greeted them in the kitchen. “Well, you two look like you had a rough night.”

“A very rough night,” Emme agreed, not wanting to go into detail in front of Chloe. “We'll talk about it as soon as we can get everyone together.”

Trula nodded. She got the message: the story wasn't one for tender ears.

“Actually, everyone's here,” Trula told her. “In the conference room.”

“Is something going on?” Emme gave Trula a hug. “Thank you so much for letting Chloe stay with you. I appreciate it so much.”

“We had a grand time.” Trula patted Emme on the back. “I suppose you heard all about our trip to the small-animal-rescue shelter this morning.”

“Not quite, but I'm sure I will very soon.”

“I hope you don't mind, Emme. The cat will stay here, of course, but she's talked about nothing else for the past several days, and frankly, once she brought it up, it did seem like a good idea.”

“I don't mind at all. I think it's wonderful of you to do this.”

“Here she is, Mommy. Isn't she beautiful?” Chloe held up the little orange tabby kitten. “She is so soft. You can pet her but you must be very gentle because she's just a baby.”

“She is very sweet.” Emme took the kitten and held it up to take a good look. “Such pretty eyes.”

“Let Nick hold her next.” Chloe jumped up and down. “Then me again.”

Emme passed the kitten off to Nick and he made a suitable fuss. Mallory came in through the swinging door and stopped in her tracks when she saw Emme.

“So. I hear you had a successful evening,” she said. “Congratulations. We saw everything on the news this morning. Good job.”

Surprised by her curtness, Emme nodded and replied, “If by successful you mean”-she glanced quickly at Chloe and found her totally wrapped up in her new pet-“we found what we were looking for on all counts, then yes, we had a very successful evening. I'll be happy to give you all the details. The story isn't a pretty one, but we did what we set out to do. We found Belinda.”

“You have my condolences, Nick,” Mallory told him. “I'm sorry there wasn't a happier ending for your niece and for you.”