A Deadly Game

A Deadly Game
Virginia Smith

After discovering her boss's dead body, Susanna Trent receives an unusual package from him filled with strange metal tokens and odd clues.Then Susanna, who is the guardian of her three-year-old niece, starts getting anonymous phone calls taunting her with thinly veiled threats. Worried for her life and that of her sister's child, Susanna struggles to trust the one man who can help: wealthy executive Jack Townsend.As they work together to solve the mysterious puzzle, Jack and Susanna are led into a dangerous game neither knows how to play. But they do know the stakes - life or death.

“Here, let me check the house first.” Jack leaped ahead of her up the concrete steps of her small porch. “I’ll take a look around inside, just to be on the safe side.”

Susanna followed him in and stood, hugging little Lizzie tight while Jack made a tour through her small home. The alarm created by the detective’s warning was fading. She would feel much safer now, knowing a killer wasn’t waiting to jump out at her the moment she and Lizzie were alone.

Jack reappeared in the living room. “Everything’s fine. I made sure all the windows were locked, too.”

“Thank you.” She forced herself to smile. This guy was certainly an anomaly. One minute he offended her, and the next he was going the extra mile to make sure she felt safe. “I appreciate that.”

The moment he left, a wave of anxiety threatened her composure. What if the detective was right? What if someone is watching, waiting to get me alone?

VIRGINIA SMITH

A lifelong lover of books, Virginia Smith has always enjoyed immersing herself in fiction. In her mid-twenties she wrote her first story and discovered that writing well is harder than it looks; it took many years to produce a book worthy of publication. During the daylight hours, she steadily climbed the corporate ladder and stole time to write late at night after the kids were in bed. With the publication of her first novel, she left her twenty-year corporate profession to devote her energy to her passion—writing stories that honor God and bring a smile to the faces of her readers. When she isn’t writing, Ginny and her husband, Ted, enjoy exploring the extremes of nature—skiing in the mountains of Utah, motorcycle riding on the curvy roads of central Kentucky and scuba diving in the warm waters of the Caribbean. Visit her online at www.VirginiaSmith.org.

A Deadly Game

Virginia Smith

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.

—Matthew 7:7, NIV

For my son, Jonathan Leake.

As you seek to solve your own mysteries,

don’t forget that the answers

are already written down.

Acknowledgments

Thanks so much to my husband, Ted, for patiently answering questions about cars and auctions and dirt bikes. I’m grateful to my sister, Susie Smith, who helped me figure out where to hide tokens all over Central Kentucky. Huge thanks to my editor, Tina James, for brainstorming above and beyond the call of duty. I’m grateful to Wendy Lawton for a million things. And of course my undying gratitude goes to my Lord, Who knows all mysteries and reveals all things hidden.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

EPILOGUE

LETTER TO READER

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

PROLOGUE

Rich men died just as easily as poor men. As he looked down at the body before his feet, that fact disturbed the killer even more than the act he’d just committed. In the end, money bought no advantage. The wealthy, too, fell victim to the great equalizer of men—death.

Killer. A shudder rippled through his frame at the word. That was how he must now think of himself. He’d sunk to a new low, performed an act he had not considered himself capable of. Murder.