Til Debt Do Us Part (Married At Midnight #4)

Chapter 3

Three

Dare

“A nd? Where is she? Where is my wife?”

The private investigator glances nervously around the coffee shop where he agreed to meet me. He looks nothing like what I imagine a private investigator looks like. He's young, extremely gaunt, with a shorn scalp, dark eyebrows, a lip ring, a tight black hoodie, and the honest to God tightest pair of black jeans I've ever seen. He looks at me and swallows.

I lean forward, almost leaving my seat, and snarl at him. “Where is Talia? Tell me right now or get the fuck out of my face.”

This new investigator, the fifth that I have talked to in the last day and a half, leaps to his feet and backs up, putting his soft leather chair between us.

“Hey man, I'm sorry that your wife left you. But that's no reason to be a dick.”

I get to my feet, my anger filling every inch of my being, crackling around me as I glare at him. He gulps and turns tail to run out of the coffee shop. I clench my fists and look at him as he runs around the glass walls of the coffee shop. He is a fucking idiot. But so were the four investigators that I talked to and fired before I came to talk to him.

“Sir?” A young barista asks me. “Are you okay?”

I glance over at her and she smiles coquettishly at me. She's blonde and thin, her big tits pushed-up in a tight little shirt that she wears under a blue and green apron. She's pretty, in an alternative, indie rock kind of way. Normally I would spend a few minutes here, talking to her, seeing how she feels about taking orders and spending a few hours in my bed.

But just now, I don't have time for her. There is only one pretty young girl on my mind, and her name is Talia fucking Chance.

No.

A shiver runs through me as I think of her new name.

Talia Morgan.

She will be back under my control very soon.

I flop a hand at the barista and stride towards the door, pulling my cell phone out. I check my text messages and see that Rob has finally gotten back to me about Talia's little friend Olivia. She is surprisingly difficult to track down and who I have yet to talk to about Talia's disappearance.

The text just reads ‘found her home address…’ Followed by an address on the other side of Harwicke, just down the street from Talia's old house. I walk straight out to my waiting chauffeur, climbing in the back seat and giving him the address. My heart beats fast and I can't keep the smile off my lips.

If Olivia knows where Talia is, I am about to break her.

I wait in Olivia's darkened kitchen until she gets home at ten thirty. The room is tiny, the worn flowered linoleum on the floor peeling at the corners, the paint on the cabin has gone gray with age, the ugly green countertop chipped and warped. It's not a nice place to wait, but at least it's quiet enough to do some thinking and hatch a plan for what I want to say to Olivia.

But by the time she gets home, the front door opening with a groan, I am waiting, sitting on the worn countertop. I hear the sound of her keys hitting the entryway table and the clunk of heavy boots as she takes off her coat and her shoes. I don't have to wait long for her to flick on the light, illuminating the shabby old refrigerator, the scant cupboards, and me. I lean forward, glaring at her. She gives me exactly the reaction I want because she splits the night air with a shrill scream.

She looks around, panicking. But I hop off the counter and fold my arms across my chest.

“There you are, Olivia. I've been looking for you. I think you know where Talia is.”

She looks at me sharply and her eyes narrow on my face. “What are you doing in my fucking house? Get out. Now!”

“Now Olivia, I need you to shut the fuck up and listen to me.”

“Get out! Get out right now or I'm calling the police. You can't just come into my house and wait for me here. It's creepy.”

I shrug my shoulders. “You can call the police if you want to. We both know who the police really work for, and it isn't for the average Joe's in this city. I have the Chief of Police on speed dial. I can call them right now if that will speed things up.”

Olivia licks her upper lip and glares at me. “You are intolerable. I don't know how Talia even stood you for as long as she did. I would have poisoned you, I'm pretty sure.”

Something low in my body tightens. “Just tell me where she is.”

She gives me a disbelieving laugh. “You’ve gotta be kidding me. Most men in your situation would be crawling on their hands and knees right now, kissing my feet and begging for that kind of information. But you have the nerve to come here and demand that I tell you where my best friend is after she ran away from you?” She makes an exasperated gesture. “You gotta be out of your mind. Like totally crazy.”

It's not like I expected Talia's best friend to just roll over and give me Talia’s address or anything. But she is making this harder than it needs to be.

It's time for the second phase of my plan. I will get the address from her the way that I get anything and everything that I've ever wanted in this life. Through deception and trickery and knowing the right people in higher places.

I shrug, uncrossing my arms and trying to look worried. “Talia's doctor called last night. She got the results of Talia’s genetic testing back. That’s the testing they usually do before a fetus is twenty four weeks old.” The lie leaves my lips smoothly, although I haven't rehearsed a single word of it. I am relying on my confidence and Olivia's lack of knowledge to sell my deception. I lean forward, dropping my voice like someone that's actually worried would. “There may be something wrong with the baby. I'm not just trying to hunt Talia down for shits and giggles. There's really a lot riding on Talia getting to the doctor as soon as possible.”

Olivia pokes her cheek out with her tongue, staring at my face and trying to decide if I am being truthful or not. I don't waiver and after a few moments, her shoulders sag the tiniest bit.

That could mean that Olivia has bought my lie hook, line and stinker.

“Dare, you should leave. Even if I knew where Talia is, and I'm not saying that I do know, I wouldn't tell you even if you threatened to kill me. I am loyal to Talia and I will be until my very last breath.”

That surprises me a little. My eyebrows rise and I take a half a step back. “You're serious.”

“Serious as a heart attack.” She waves her hand towards the front door. “Now leave, before I call your bluff and get the police down here.”

I snort. “Morgans don't bluff. But I do have a few other places that I can search for Talia. So I will see you around.”

“I hope not. I really hope not.” Olivia's voice is tight as she ushers me out of her house. Stepping outside into the frosty air, I turn up my coat collar and hustle toward my waiting SUV. When I get in, I tell the driver to start moving, anywhere but here is fine.

I need to be out of Olivia's line of sight long enough for her to make a phone call, which would complete my little act of deception. See, if Olivia is dumb enough to call Talia, my private investigator will tap her phone and give me the location of Talia's hideout.

Bing bang boom. Talia is caught in my web again. And I'm going to wrap her in a silk cocoon so tight that she'll never get free, no matter how hard she struggles.

I’m gone for less than five minutes before I get the phone call I have been waiting for so desperately.

“Yeah?” I answer. My private investigator Sam rumbles out an answer. “You are right. As soon as you left, Olivia started sending a flurry of texts. I’m going to patch you through right now. But don’t worry, they can’t hear us on the line. It’s a one-way connection.”

There is an audible clicking sound and then I hear Olivia talking. Her voice is hushed and frantic.

“Dare was here.”

“Oh?” My wife answers.

The sound of Talia’s voice pushes me to the edge of sanity. I was right, Olivia did know where Talia is hiding out. I’m going to have to click Talia’s wings and cut her relationship with Olivia into ribbons in order to prevent this from happening again. Talia needs to know that she will never escape me, never live another day where she isn’t Mrs. Morgan.

“He said that the doctor called and said that there may be something wrong with the fetus.”

I hear Talia’s quick inhale of breath. “Do you think that he was being honest?”

Olivia pauses before answering. “I don’t think Dare has ever been honest a single time in his whole life. But I do think that you need to get this checked out. Assuming that you still want the pregnancy, it isn’t worth risking the fetus’ life on the assumption that Dare may be lying. He lies as easily as he breathes, but it’s too risky not to have this checked out by a doctor up there.”

“All right,” I growl.

There is a clicking sound again and then the women’s voices disappear. Sam asked the most obvious question.

“So what do you want me to do? I have the address. You want me to go up there and get her?”

I laugh, the sound cold and menacing.

“Oh no,” I say. I smile at my private investigator’s question, though he can’t see my expression. “I'll go and get her. You've done your piece.”