“I’m not sure.”
“You must have a plan.”
“Oh, yes.”
She waited, but he said nothing more, so she dropped her gaze to her lap. “The plan is to make me nervous. Just as you’ve been doing for the past two weeks.”
He puckered his lips, then relaxed them in acknowledgement of her perception. “Very good.”
“But you do have the wrong person,” she argued, albeit in a respectful tone. “The first few things you did didn’t even make me nervous, because I had no reason to suspect there was anything to them.”
“You wised up.”
“Not really. It was the mail for Susan Miles that pulled it all together. Up until then I couldn’t imagine what anyone would have against me.” The issue of Chester Hawkins was irrelevant. “That’s when I realized it had to be a case of mistaken identity.”
“Sure,” he drawled.
Lauren felt a movement in the arm that was pressed against her right side, and she looked sharply toward the hulk connected to it. The man was laughing. Silently, but laughing nonetheless. On the one hand, she was livid; on the other, she was more frightened than ever. They were obviously prepared for her denials, which practically defeated her efforts before they’d begun, but she wouldn’t give up. There had to besomeway out of this mess—if only she could find it!
Chapter Nine
For the first time since her abduction, Lauren looked beyond the confines of the car to the outside world. If she’d expected to see narrow, unfamiliar streets, she was mistaken. The car was on Storrow Drive, taking the very same route out of the city that she traveled every day.
She wished she knew what her wardens were up to, but she hadn’t gotten that far yet, so she thought of Matt. Surely he’d have arrived at the shop. Surely he and Beth would be getting nervous when she didn’t return from the bank. The bank!
“I have money,” she exclaimed in a burst of hope. “If it’s money you want, I’ll give you all I’ve got.” She fumbled in her purse for the envelope containing the cash and checks she’d been on her way to deposit, but her offer was immediately denied.
“We don’t want money. The boss pays us plenty.”
“Who’s the boss?”
“Come on, Susan. We’re not really as dumb as you’d like to think.”
“I don’t think you’re dumb at all,” Lauren declared quietly. “You’ve just made an innocent mistake. I’m not Susan, and I don’t know who ‘the boss’ is. Andbecauseyou’re not stupid, you’ll realize that I’m telling you the truth before you do anything drastic. If you go ahead with whatever you’re planning, sooner or later someonewillcall you stupid—because you’ll have done whatever you’re planning to do to the wrong person.”
He shot her a sidelong glance. “You’ve gotten quick with words. You never used to talk this much.”
“Maybe Susan Miles didn’t, but I always have. Look, there are any number of people—people who’ve known me for years—who can vouch for my identity.”
“Like the medical records in that clinic did?” His question dripped of sarcasm.
“If you don’t believe the records, that’s not my problem.”
“But it is. Seems to me it’s very much your problem.”
He was right. She had to take a different tack. “Okay. So you don’t believe the records and you won’t believe my friends. You tell me. Who am I supposed to be? Just whoisthis Susan Miles?”
“You want to play games? I’ll play games. Susan Miles was the boss’s best girl. He gave her everything any woman could want—” his eyes pierced Lauren’s and his voice grew emphatic “—like a safe full of jewels and a closet full of furs. Where are they, Susan? We haven’t been able to find them yet. Did you sell everything to bankroll that little shop you’ve got, or the house?”
“Jewels?”
“And furs.”
“That clipping,” she murmured, horrified. “Matt was right. There was a message in the clipping, but we just didn’t get it.”
The man on her left said nothing.
“I don’t have jewelsorfurs. I bought the shop and the house with a legacy from my brother, who died a year ago.” In other circumstances she’d never have volunteered that information, but these were unusual circumstances, to say the least.
