Chapter Thirty-One

27 December, Late Afternoon

‘Thanks for doing this.’ Drew buckled himself into the passenger seat of the battered Land Rover, parked next to the administration building of the private helipad. ‘I want a bill.’

Devlin shrugged. ‘Handcuff keys in the case down there.’ He indicated the well between the seats. ‘Better than a bolt cutter.’

Drew found the box, wondering how he came to have friends – Clint was another – who carried handcuff keys as a matter of course. The second key he tried fitted. With a sigh he eased the metal apart and the whole thing fell to the floor. He returned the key, leaning back in his seat.

Devlin was navigating them onto the main road. In an hour, maybe less, he’d be in his flat. ‘My people checked your place over. Discreetly. Nothing has been disturbed, and the cars and the bike are okay. They’re changing the locks and there’s a new phone charged and waiting for you.’

‘Thanks.’ Muscles relaxed that Drew hadn’t realised he’d been holding tense. ‘I didn’t know whether the place would be ransacked.’

Devlin shot him a sideways look. ‘Not part of the plan.’

‘No.’ It was getting dark. Drew blinked through the windscreen at the street-lights and the house decorations as they passed.

What would Lori and Misty … He shrugged himself out of the thought. ‘I need to find out what’s going on.’

Devlin grinned. It wasn’t a pleasant grin. ‘Already started – but do you want to tell me your side of the story?’

Drew did, swallowing down the shadow of nausea as he recollected and relayed as much detail as he could remember of the kidnapping, the trip through the woods and the time in the hut.

Occasionally Devlin prompted him with a question. Drew ended with the rescue on Christmas Eve. ‘The woman helped … She’s definitely not involved. And there’s a child … I don’t want any of this getting back at them. I don’t intend to talk about it. To anyone.’

‘Understood.’

Drew took a deep breath. If anyone understood the need to protect, it was Devlin. He was nodding. ‘Everything you’ve said fits with what I’ve got so far. As soon as it was clear you were missing, Kaz insisted I do some digging around.’

‘How is Kaz? I should have asked.’

‘Complaining that she can’t see her feet. She’s still got over a month to go. It’s another girl, did you know? I have a house full of women,’ Devlin said gloomily. Drew let that one ride. Devlin was fairly new to the family thing, but he was doing okay.

Family, now that’s a word. ‘What did you find?’ he asked instead.

‘The outfit that was hired by the TV people, they were paid off. A new lot took their place. Clint Edgerton Associates.’

‘Clint. Shit!’ Drew bunched his hand into a fist.

‘The guy you pay to throw you out of planes and all that stuff.’

‘Yes.’ Drew was distracted, mind racing. ‘Clint would never be involved in something like this – apart from anything else, Mr Right and Lefty, the men from the wood … I wouldn’t say they were amateurs, but they weren’t of the calibre of Clint’s people, not organised the way anything Clint ran would be organised.’ He turned to look at Devlin. ‘It was done to make it look as if I’d set it up – to raise doubts, if the police were involved.’

‘They were involved and there were doubts,’ Devlin confirmed. ‘The TV people called them in. They talked to Edgerton and he denied it, but then, he would.’

‘You talked to him too,’ Drew guessed.

‘Yep. And I’m with you.’ Devlin made a turn. They were getting close to home. ‘It wasn’t him. He was pretty sick about you being snatched, and mad as hell that someone put him in the frame.’

‘I put money his way,’ Drew observed, dryly. ‘But he’s a good bloke.’ He paused. ‘Will you keep digging, but quietly? I need to know, Devlin. Who and why. I thought if we didn’t let anyone know that I was free, you could keep looking … I had time to think, in that hut.’ All the time in the bloody world. ‘I realised—’ unexpectedly his voice hitched.

‘Whoever arranged this, is someone close to the action. Devlin completed the sentence. ‘Someone who knew the arrangements in detail, and was able to circumvent them.’

‘Yeah.’ Drew tried not to grit his teeth. ‘But it could have been done on behalf of another person. The “why” might lie somewhere else entirely, and we need to know that. As far as fixing the arrangements is concerned … assuming it wasn’t anyone from the TV, and I can’t see why it would be, although we’d better look at them too.’ He raised his head. ‘If it’s not them and it’s not Clint, then it comes down to one of three people.’