Conviction (16 page)

Chapter 17 – James

“I'm sorry, she did what?”

“Shit hit me. Knocked me out cold.”

There was laughter on the end of the phone. Kelly had taken his car and his phone, but he had a spare throw away hidden in his emergency pack he kept in the hallway cupboard.

“Fuck you, Xander.” Xander's laughter faded quickly, replaced with a more concerned tone.

“What did you do? She wouldn't have hit you for no reason, James, she's not that type of girl. She’ll back away from a fight because of the physical contact, the girl does anything to avoid it.”

“Look, I came in from working out and she used her safe word, just like that. I could tell something was up as soon as I walked in. She was so pale, like she'd seen a ghost. She looked so...lost and frightened and there was a strange smell in the room...I think she might have been sick.” James paused as he recalled in vivid details everything that had happened. “I couldn’t touch her or make her talk, I couldn’t do anything. She touched
me...
my face and apologised before she gave me
the
best right hook I've ever been on the receiving end of, then took my truck and phone.” James rubbed the side of his head causing pain to shoot down his legs and he groaned. The splitting headache he'd woken up with wasn't helping him to figure out what had happened to set her off.

“Look, I'll come and get you. We'll find her, okay and get her to tell us what has her so spooked. I'll be about an hour, I need to tie up a few loose ends here. I'll be as fast as I can, James. Put some ice on that head of yours and sit tight.”

Xander ended the call before James could say anything.
Sit tight
? Seriously? How the hell was he just supposed to sit here while Kelly was running away from him, with such fear in her eyes he worried she would do something stupid. A bout of nausea took over and he quickly went to the sink and threw up. She must have hit him pretty hard to give him a concussion. Although maybe he hit the back of his head on the way down, it was tender as hell.

James retrieved the frozen peas from the freezer and went to his computer. The only thing he could do was track his phone. Quickly he ran the trace and in less than a minute he knew that she had turned the phone off at the end of his driveway. The girl was smart. Why wasn't she leaving him some bread crumbs to follow? He didn't understand what he had done. He hadn't walked out on her and ran after their pash-fest in the dungeon, like he normally would have. He had needed to go and work out and she'd understood when he told her. Her mood when he'd left was fairly relaxed. Confused, yes, but definitely not angry or scared enough to deck him and run for the hills.

James set an alert on the tracking program he used so that an alarm would go off if Kelly turned on the phone, and started pacing. He was still pacing when Xander walked in. Dressed in his black business suit and charcoal shirt, the top two buttons were undone. The man was stunning and, if James swung that way, he would certainly be attracted to the man. Xander exuded control and his cool, calm demeanour was exactly what James needed right at that moment. He was ready to tear the city apart looking for Kelly. God only knows what was running through her head. He'd obviously set her off with his advances and what he'd coaxed her body into as he'd massaged her.

“So, any ideas yet?” Xander asked as he walked straight to James' liquor cabinet and poured them both a glass of scotch on the rocks. James took the glass a swigged the amber fluid in one mouthful.

“No, dammit! I don't know where to start. She wouldn't go home, she knows I'll look for her there. She hasn't called you, which I thought she would do straight away. I've tracked my phone but she switched it off.”

“You need to tell me what happened from the minute you got up this morning.”

James sighed. This was going to take a while.

Chapter 18 – Kelly

Kelly pulled into a small town around an hour from James' house. Instead of heading straight back to the city she'd gone in the opposite direction knowing that the city is where James will start looking for her. She needed a train or bus station. Looking around she noticed a sign for the train and followed them until she found it. Parking the car she put the keys in the engine bay from underneath. James had told her when he went to some clubs that he didn't have pockets and rather than leave them at the front desk, he preferred to put them in the engine. If anyone found them, they deserved to take it, he'd said.

Kelly was in luck, the next train was leaving in fifteen minutes. She paid with the cash that she'd taken from James' wallet. The man had had a grand in
cash
and she'd cleaned it out. Kelly's guilt was only slightly alleviated by the fact that she knew she was doing the right thing by leaving. Obviously, Devlin knew who he was and where he lived. Devlin always knew everything. She'd pay back the money someday, somehow.

She turned on the phone to see if he'd tried to call her. There were twenty-six missed calls and ten text messages. She deleted them all without reading them. She couldn't. She knew that if he got through her defences she'd end up back with James and then Abbey would be dead.

The train came in and as she was taking her seat she heard a text message arrive. Kelly tucked her backpack between her legs and quickly opened the message. It was from an unknown number. She instantly knew who it would be.

A little more resourceful than I remember, my little whore. You know where to take the train to. I'll be waiting at the other end. A driver will escort you to my car.

Kelly shuddered and let the tears flow again. The carriage was nearly empty, after all it was the middle of the week. Pressing reply she tried to get herself to stop shaking enough to use the touch pad on the phone.

I want Abbey there. You can let her go at the hospital. No-one will know who she is or where she came from.

Again another instant reply.

You think you can dictate to me you fucking bitch? I told you I would let her go. When have I ever lied to you?

He was right. He'd never lied about what he was going to do to her, or when. He'd omitted things, like certain rules, and changed them when it suited him but he'd never out right lied.

Kelly didn't bother replying, she simply turned the phone off again and hoped that she hadn't been on it long enough for James to track her. She knew he was a genius when it came to technology.

The train left the station and it wasn't until nearly an hour down the track that Kelly realised she'd left her laptop behind. Kelly froze in her seat. Where had she left it? She shook her head and desperately tried to recall what she had done after she had thrown up the second time. She couldn't even recall if she had flushed away the contents of her stomach.

If James realised it was there, there'd be no stopping him. She knew how determined he was to help her get Abbey back. After all, it was the only reason he had taken her on as a slave to be trained. She thought she had been doing well. Letting him be intimate with her body was certainly nothing she ever thought that she would let
anyone
do.

Exhaustion finally took over and Kelly fell asleep, leaning against the window as the train rocked her exhausted mind and body.

Two hours later she woke with a start as the train pulled into the metropolitan station. Her journey wasn't finished yet. She still needed to board an interstate train, which would take her straight into Devlin King's waiting clutches. She shuddered, knowing that the rest of her life, for however long she would be left alive, she would be in near constant pain and fear. Kelly focused on the images of Abbey that the bastard had sent her, sending her own fear to the back of her mind. She had no other choice but to put herself on the line for her daughter. After all, it was her fault that she had even gone through those things. Devlin had only sent her two photos. She wondered how many he would make her look at, how many would she have to relive for her daughter. He would finally destroy her, finally he would be able to crush her soul like the demon he was. It was the one part of her that she had held onto. He'd taken her body and parts of her mind, destroyed the innocent young girl she had been. But her soul? She'd hidden that inside herself, buried it so deep that no matter what he'd done to her he couldn't reach it. And he'd known. As his actions against her became more despicable and heinous, she knew he was trying to take that last part of her away. She knew now that it was the only reason he'd kept her alive. He hadn't completely destroyed her. But this time he would.

Kelly pulled a pen and paper out of her bag and began a letter to James. She ripped it up several times before finally finishing it.

James,

Thank you for everything you taught me in the short time you were my Dom. I cannot begin to express my sincere surprise at the fact that I was starting to actually understand the relationship between a Dom and their sub.

I found myself wanting more. For you,
from
you. I never thought I'd want to please anyone the way I wanted to please you. Thank you for teaching me that I can be more. More than a shell of a woman, more than functioning. Thank you for teaching me that I have feelings and emotions that matter. Thank you for showing me that I can feel.
I'm sorry that I ran from you when I promised you that I wouldn't. I had no choice. Abbey is in more danger than I anticipated and I can't stand by any longer and leave her to be abused by that monster.

Please find her. She should be at the nearest hospital to Devlin. I'm exchanging myself for her.
I'm sorry.

Kelly.

Kelly sat back and folded up the small letter putting it into her pocket to send later, once she had reached her final destination. Kelly barely noticed the train stopping in between stations, or the people who were getting on and off. Is she had have been paying attention, she would have seen a familiar face sitting at the front of her carriage watching her.

Chapter 18 – James
“How the hell did he track her here, to me? I mean only three people knew where she was. You, me and Sarge.” James paced back and forth. After reading the emails that had obviously came from Devlin, James was sick to his stomach. He'd actually thrown up on the floor of the office, unable to make it to the bathroom before the vileness of the images emptied the contents of his stomach.

“It doesn't matter how, it matters that we know where she's going. And the fact is, there's only one way to get there for her. There's no way she would risk taking your car interstate, she wouldn't know if you would report it as stolen to try and find her.” Xander had lost his cool exterior at the images of Abbey and was now almost as frantic as his oldest friend. “With our resources we
will
be able to catch up to her before Devlin does.”

“I'm not so sure. She doesn't
want
us to help her. And if there's one thing I know about Kelly, the damn stubborn red head won’t back down once she's made her decision. I've watched her grow at such a rapid rate in just a few short days, and part of that growth made her even more stubborn. Once she wraps her mind around something she followed through straight away regardless of the consequences.”

“You fell for her didn't you? Not just a little, but you actually fell for her.”

“Xander, when have I ever fallen for
anyone
?”

“You didn't fall for Carly as quickly as this, but you still fell for her.”

“No Xander, I didn't. This is different. This is nothing about the lifestyle. I fell for
her
. Her tenaciousness, her sassiness, hell, I even fell for her damn stubbornness!”

“So you agree, you have feelings for her then?”

“Dammit Xander! What do you want? Do you want me to write it in stone? I don't know what I feel, I just know that if something happens to her, I'll never,
ever
be the same.”

“James, that's what love is about.”

Xander left the office to make some calls and call in some favours that he was owed. Luckily for him he'd always done favours for a lot of people, and now they would pay up and help them. Being nice had its ups and downs, people expected him to be a 'nice' Dom as well, when in fact he could be and enjoyed being a little sadistic sometimes.

James paced the office and checked again on the messages from Kelly to Devlin from his phone. Then he realised that maybe, just maybe she had taken his phone on purpose. So that he
would
be able to track her.
“Come on, Kelly, you've got to give me something to go on here.” He read the messages over and over until Xander came in and interrupted him.

“Pack some clothes, we leave in ten minutes.”

“We'll never catch her by car, Xander.”

“Who said anything about a car?” Xander smirked at him and James knew that he had worked some kind of miracle and got them some faster wheels. He packed Kelly's laptop as well as his own and randomly threw some clothes into a bag. He would just buy anything else he needed.

In exactly ten minutes the wind picked up outside until the distinctive sound of a rotor blades echoed through the house. He grabbed his bag and headed out the back as Xander wave down the descending helicopter.

“Ah...you've got a few more friends than you let on, Xander.” He yelled over the noise.

“Not friends, more like I've called in a few IOU's!”

The two friends nodded at each other. James fought back tears from what his friend had done for him. Xander smacked him on the back in a typical man to man back slap and they hunched over and headed to the helicopter.

As they buckled in, Xander made the introductions and gave directions. A quick call to air traffic control with their flight plans and they were set to go.

James had never meet Nick Dammagio before, but Xander had spoken highly of him for years. He knew he was a private investigator and closed out ninety-nine percent of his cases.

Nick handed Xander a manila folder with Devlin King's name on the front.

Xander took the file and quickly read through it. He had a photographic memory and he quickly handed it to Nick.

“You're going to want to read this. There's something in there that you're going to want to see.”

James opened the file and immediately understood what Xander meant. He felt sick and even more worried for Kelly. She was walking into a lion's den, and Devlin King was going to pull her apart limb by limb and then leave her scraps for the rest of his animals to devour.