Marital Privilege

“No.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Whatever I have to.” And the first thing on his list was finding Laura. Now. “I’ve got to go.”

“Will I hear from you again?”

“I don’t know.”

“Let me give you my cell.”

As soon as he finished reciting the number, Alec cut off the call. He had to reach Laura. And he was afraid he didn’t have a second to lose.

He hit her number on his cell’s speed dial. His wife’s phone service picked up on the second ring. A pleasant voice directed him to her voice mail. Damn. Laura was always forgetting to turn on her cell phone. And at this hour in the morning, the restaurant’s answering machine would still be on.

He ended the call without leaving a message, and concentrated on driving. He had to get to the restaurant. He had to reach Laura. If Griggs had been tortured, he could have caved. He could have spilled Alec’s location. And if that happened, dear old Dad and his thugs were already on their way.

Pushing the accelerator to the floor, he raced down streets and around curves until he reached the strip mall at the edge of the tiny-but-growing town of Beaver Falls. Nestled at the end of the mall next to the Cup-N-Sup coffee shop and a women’s clothing store sat Laura’s pride and joy, The Blue Ox Café. The parking lot in front was still empty. It wouldn’t get busy until eleven o’clock, when Laura threw open the door for the lunch crowd.

Tires squealing their protest, Alec gunned the SUV around the building to the back lot. Three cars dotted the employee parking area. Laura’s blue van was not among them, but he spotted her partner’s Jeep. She’d probably hitched a ride with Sally, as she often did. He could only hope that was the case. If today was errand day, he might not be able to reach her for hours. And by then it might be too late.

He stopped the SUV at the curb behind a produce truck and jumped out. Dodging a ripe-smelling Dumpster, he dashed to the employee entrance and ducked inside.

No sound came from the kitchen, not the rattle of pans on the cook’s line, not the slam of the walk-in cooler’s door as the produce guy made his delivery. Heart knocking against his rib cage, Alec stepped into the kitchen. His shoes squeaked on rubber mats stretched over red tile. He moved as quietly as possible, walking through the prep kitchen, peeking into the deserted line. The odor of deep fryers hung in the air, heavy as an approaching storm. And there was something else. Another odor. Familiar but too faint for him to identify.

Pulse pounding in his ears, he ducked back into the prep kitchen. Next to a slab of prime rib, a meat cleaver lay on a cutting board, blood dulling the shine of its razor-sharp edge. He grasped the wood handle. Weapon poised in front of him, he stepped into the waiters’ aisle that led into the dining room.

Music drifted from the dining room, the high-pitched tone of strings rasping his nerves like cheese across a grater. The scent grew stronger.

Natural gas.

The restaurant was filled with it. Flammable. Highly explosive. He had to do something. If he didn’t, it wouldn’t take long for gas to reach the flames heating deep fryers and ovens on the cook’s line.

He spun around and raced through the waiters’ aisle and into the kitchen, his shoes squeaking on the mats. Reaching the cook’s line, he switched off fryers and ovens. He extinguished each pilot light and turned off every gas valve he could spot. It wouldn’t be enough. The leak hadn’t originated in the kitchen. The scent was strongest in the dining room. Even if by some miracle he found the leak, there was enough gas already hanging in the air to blow the place. All that was missing was a flame. But it wouldn’t be missing for long. Once the furnace clicked on, the gas would ignite. It would be all over. If anyone was in the building, he had to get them out. He had to find Laura.

And as much as he didn’t trust the police, he needed help. He flipped open his cell phone and punched in the number.

“Nine-one-one,” a woman’s voice answered.

“There’s a gas leak at the Blue Ox Café.”

“What is your name, sir?”

Alec hesitated. “That’s not important. There’s something else going on, too. I’m not sure what, but the place seems deserted. You’ve got to get the police out here. Hurry.” He cut off the call. Clipping his cell phone back on his belt, he clutched the meat cleaver, rounded the corner of the waiters’ aisle and stepped into the dining room.

As he rounded the corner, another odor hit him. A sweet copper scent that mixed with the natural gas and turned his stomach. He slowed his pace, weaving through tables, listening for anything out of the ordinary. He circled a row of booths and inched across the open center of the dining room, and jolted to a stop.

Dark blotches fouled the multicolored carpet and streaked a table in the center of the room. And beyond the table—

“Oh my God.” Cleaver in front of him, Alec raced toward the bodies, waiting for a flash of movement, a gun to his head, a blade between his ribs.

He reached Laura’s prep cook first. His chef’s whites were black with blood from the slash across his throat. His eyes stared blankly at the ceiling.

There was no helping him. No saving him. Cursing his father, Alec moved on to the next body.

A waitress no older than twenty curled around a table leg at the edge of the dining room, as if she’d been hiding when the bullet had drilled into her chest and stolen her life. Her face was swollen, purple with bruises. She’d taken a beating before the bullet. And that pointed to one man. A sadistic bastard who got his kicks beating women before he killed them. His father’s right-hand thug, Sergei Komorov.

Gritting his teeth, Alec left the waitress and moved to the final prone form. The middle-aged guy who delivered produce had made it as far as the tile floor in front of the hostess stand before he’d been shot. His blood puddled under him and ran in rivers between the tiles.

Panic roared in Alec’s ears. The odors of blood and gas clogged his throat. Three dead. Where the hell was Laura?

There was one place left. He straightened from beside the produce guy’s body and forced his feet to move. Laura and Sally usually opened the kitchen first thing in the morning. By this time, they had moved to the bar.

He raced into the lounge. The room was cloaked in shadow, heavy wood blinds drawn over the windows. He led with the meat cleaver, checking behind half walls and plants, glancing under the row of bar stools. No blood. No bodies.

No Laura.

Relieved, he tried to block the image of his beautiful wife bloodied, dead. He had to find her. She had to be okay. Laura was his life, his future.

Laura and their unborn son.

He stepped behind the bar. Booze bottles that spent the night under lock and key lined the rail. The till was open, its tray of cash not yet in place. Someone had been opening the bar when this had happened.

Alec tried to breathe, tried to stay calm. He strode over the rubber mats, straight for the closed office door at the end of the bar.

Dread blared in his ears like a siren. He closed his fingers around the cool brass doorknob. Turning it, he yanked the door open.

A body leaned back in the chair. Long blond hair streaked dark with blood. A plastic tie clasped feminine hands together at the wrists. Broken and battered, fingers jutted at strange angles.

A sob shook from his chest. He grasped the back of the chair with trembling hands. Holding his breath, he spun it around. Blood coagulated, sticky beneath a slashed throat. Her face was so bruised and swollen, it was almost unrecognizable. She stared at him through blue eyes glazed with death.

Blue eyes.

Another sob tore from his gut. Sally, not Laura.

He averted his eyes from her face, ashamed at the relief welling within him. Spilling over. Sally, not Laura. Laura might still be alive.

But where was she?

If Laura had left to run errands, there might be a clue as to where she went, what the restaurant needed. He studied the desk. Blood spattered the surface, the three-ring binders, the papers detailing the Blue Ox’s liquor order—the order he was to pick up later that morning. He raised his eyes to the computer screen. A pink message slip stuck to one side of the screen, a simple message scrawled on the front.

“Laura sick. Won’t be in until late. Sally, could you open bar?”

Cold dread throbbed in Alec’s ears and pumped through his veins. He had to get home. He only prayed he wasn’t too late. Because if he had spotted the message, he could be sure his father and his men had spotted it, too.

And they’d already be on their way.

Chapter Two