Jenna Black - Replica

“They stole his locket,” she said. “That’s where I’d put the tracker.”

“And why would they do a thing like that?” Mosely asked. His face stayed expressionless, but there was a hint of something, maybe anger, in his voice.

She frowned at him as if completely puzzled by his question. “It was solid gold, and antique at that. Why wouldn’t they take it?”

Mosely’s eyes bored into her. “Very convenient for you, wouldn’t you say, Miss Lake?”

Nadia had drunk the liqueur in hopes it would give Mosely an alternative explanation for any inconsistencies in her story or awkwardness in its delivery, but she was now glad for its soothing warmth in her belly, and for its ability to keep her adrenaline from going wild. Even so, fear chilled her from the inside out. If Mosely thought she was lying to him, or thought she had arranged for the tracker to be stolen …

She shook her head, both to shake off her fears and in response to Mosely’s question. “I don’t see how it’s convenient,” she said. “Nate wore the tracker into the Basement just like you wanted him to. He says he was there for a couple of hours. And since you no doubt had someone following him, you know who he talked to. And you also know he got beaten up. How does his losing the tracker after all that translate into something convenient? Oh, and by the way, he’s not planning to go back to the Basement anyway.”

“Really,” Mosely said flatly, not even bothering to hide his disbelief.

Despite her fear, there was a part of Nadia that wanted to laugh again. She’d been afraid that Mosely would see through her lies and know that she and Nate had learned something—albeit, very little—about Bishop’s whereabouts; however, that didn’t seem to be the conclusion he was drawing. Instead, he seemed to think she’d arranged for some big cover-up to free Nate from the tracker.

Nadia looked at her hands again, remembering the stiff way Nate had moved this morning. “I didn’t see any bruises on him, but he was obviously in a lot of pain when I went to see him. He wants to find Bishop still, but I think last night proved to him that he was in over his head. Besides…”

“Yes?”

“Nate still doesn’t believe Bishop killed him, but he did tell me something this morning I thought you might want to know. Something I think makes even Nate have doubts now and then.”

“I’m intrigued. Please, continue.” More skepticism, but Nadia couldn’t allow herself to worry about it.

“Nate keeps a stash of dollars in his apartment. He and Bishop were the only ones who knew where those dollars were. When Nate went to the Basement for the first time, he wanted to take dollars with him, but when he went to get them, they were all gone.”

For the first time, Mosely looked like he really was intrigued. Was he drawing the same conclusion Nate had when he’d found the dollars missing? She wasn’t sure exactly what the misdirection would buy them—after all, neither she nor Nate had any idea why Bishop was still in Paxco—but maybe it would at least throw Mosely off the scent for a while.

“Very interesting indeed,” Mosely said.

Now would be a good time to let Mosely draw his own conclusions, but since Nadia was still pretending to be at least a little tipsy, she didn’t think sitting quietly and letting Mosely think was the right thing to do.

“Nate keeps making excuses for why Bishop took the money, but he’s pretty upset about it. He thinks it means Bishop used the dollars to get out of Paxco. He wasn’t going to the Basement because he expected to actually find Bishop there. He was going because he hoped he’d find someone who could help him get in touch with Bishop wherever he’s hiding.

“I know you think Nate is reckless and naive, and you won’t get any argument from me. If he still thought he had a chance of finding Bishop in the Basement and helping him, I’m sure what happened last night wouldn’t stop him from trying again. But under the circumstances…” She let her voice trail off.

Mosely regarded her with those disturbingly cold eyes of his, and she felt like he was mentally taking her apart, peeling away layer after layer as he tried to figure out whether she was telling the truth or lying. Her stomach burbled unhappily, the noise loud enough to make her cheeks heat with a blush. She probably should have eaten a little more solid food to balance out the effects of the liqueur, but her meeting with Nate this morning had stolen her appetite. She hoped the booze was having the desired effect, confusing Mosely’s interpretations of her word choice or body language—or whatever it was that made him so good at figuring out when people were lying to him.

“Did you learn anything last night before the tracker went dead?” she asked, unable to bear the silence and the scrutiny any longer. “You wanted to know who Nate was talking to, and it gave you a clue, right?”

“Indeed. I have issued an arrest warrant for this Angel of Mercy who so mistreated our Chairman Heir last night. Unfortunately, the men I had following him felt they had to deliver their report to me before detaining her, and by the time I issued the warrant, she had made herself scarce.” He leaned forward in his chair, those eyes boring into her again.

“Make no mistake: my men will find her. And she will talk to me, with the greatest of candor. I want you to think very, very carefully about what you’ve told me this afternoon, Miss Lake, and be assured that if I talk to her and her story of last night’s events doesn’t exactly match yours, you will pay a heavy price. With that in mind, is there anything you’d like to add? Or amend?”

If Mosely got his hands on Angel, she’d end up telling him about her connection to Bishop, whatever it was, and Mosely would know Nadia had lied to him during this interview. By keeping this secret, Nadia was risking her entire family’s future. Gerri could go to prison over this, and Corinne and Rory … Everything she had done so far, she’d done to protect those she cared about most, and now she was risking it all. Her sane and sensible side told her to blurt out the truth now, before it was too late.

“Well, Miss Lake?” Mosely prompted.

Coming clean with Mosely was the sensible thing to do. It would mean giving up forever the idea of marrying Nate. But it wasn’t fear of losing her advantageous marriage that kept Nadia silent. It was the boiling cauldron of indignation inside her.

What Mosely was doing was wrong, on so many levels. He was abusing his authority, using blackmail, threats, and even torture to hunt down an innocent man while refusing to even consider the possibility that someone else was behind Nate’s murder. He might say he was doing it all for the good of Paxco, that he was just doing his job, but Nadia would never, ever accept that. Mosely enjoyed the power he wielded, the fear he inspired. There was no way she could see the avaricious gleam in his eyes every time he talked to her without knowing deep in her heart that he was a bully who loved his work. And after everything he’d already bullied her into doing, she was through with letting him win. She was just going to have to hope that Angel was as good as Bishop at staying hidden.

“That’s all I can think of,” she told him, and even the artificial bravery of the alcohol couldn’t keep her from sounding as scared as she felt. “I hope you’ll keep in mind that everything I’m telling you comes to me secondhand. It’s possible Nate is keeping things from me.”

“You’d better hope he isn’t, then. Because if I find out anything you’ve told me is untrue, it’s going to be you I hold responsible, not him.” He pulled an envelope out of his pocket and tossed it at Nadia. “There’s another tracker in there. If you’re telling me the truth, then it’s possible you’re right and Nathaniel won’t venture into the Basement again. But if he does, I want to know about it.”