Undercover in Six Inch Stilettos (21 page)

“What exactly are you doing?”

“The question gal. Never know when to just shut the hell up.” Johnny chuckled as he leaned toward her. Cyndi caught sight of the hot pink satin bra under his v-neck t-shirt. Man, if she thought Johnny was an anomaly before, now she had no idea what the hell was wrong with him.

Roxy returned with the well-worn rope and tossed it to Johnny. “This ought to hold her.”

While Johnny set to tying her hands behind the chair, Cyndi tugged and pulled against his efforts. He pinched the back of her arm hard enough to make her cry out.

“You really need to settle down now, Cyndi. That pretty little girl of yours needs her mommy. Harper is her name, right?”

Cyndi fell completely still. Johnny knew Harper’s name. She was absolutely certain she had never mentioned her daughter’s name to anyone at the club. Realization dawned on her.

“It was you? You gave her the necklace?”

Johnny grinned. “She looks so much like you. A real mini-me. So sweet and so trusting too.”

He was baiting her. Mario had said the same thing to her. Obviously Johnny had been bragging about his exploits, but there was no way he would really hurt a little girl. She didn’t think he had it in him. Of course, there was an awful lot about Johnny Cyndi obviously didn’t know.

“Don’t you ever go near my little girl again!”

“No need to.” He pulled the rope so tight her fingers instantly started to numb. “I got what I want.”

“You don’t
have
me!”

Roxy let out a grainy laugh. “Sure looks like he does. You fell for it all so easy. Hook, line, and sinker. Undercover ain’t your thing, doll.”

He finished securing her hands and switched to Cyndi’s ankles, securing each one to a chair leg. “You just couldn’t stop snooping around. I tried to divert your attention, convince you that Jade ran away again, but you even came snooping around on your days off. You are too damned nosy for your own good, Lady Liberty.”

“You think ol’ Roxy here can’t spot a cop from a mile away? Girlie, I was doin’ half the police force in my heyday!” Roxy worked a cigarette out of a pack of Lucky Strikes and rolled it between two fingers before sticking it between her lips and lighting it.

“I don’t know what you are talking about.”

“Come on, Cyndi, we all knew what was up tonight.” Johnny stepped between her and the older woman. “That’s why I told Roxy it was now or never. You push too hard. If you hadn’t been pokin’ around in everybody’s business, things would have gone on as they always have before you showed up struttin’ your ass all around and sticking your nose in all over the place. When the notes didn’t scare you off, I figured slashing your tire and giving that necklace to your little one would.”

He was baiting her again. Cyndi steeled herself, sitting rigid in the chair and glaring at her captors. “So, you know what happened to Jade?”

“It’s not what you think, so go ahead and lose that look of fear. I am not a murderer.” Johnny chuckled. “Even a smart girl like you would never find Jade.”

“But, Lola…?”

“An accident.” Johnny shrugged, his indifference to the girl’s death obvious. “She asked too many questions.”

“So, you admit you had something to do with her death?”
Please let the mic be recording this.

“There you go with the questions again. You think you’re Angela Lansbury or something? Gonna solve the mystery and have a cup of tea?”

“Why don’t you just tape her mouth shut?” Roxy called from over by the fire. “Tough to ask questions if you can’t talk. You got any tape?”

“
You got any tape?
” Johnny mimicked Roxy. “Does it
look
like I got any tape? I wasn’t exactly planning on this tonight!”

“Do I have to do everything myself around here?” Roxy snuffed out the cigarette she had been working on and rose from her seat.

Attempting to ignore the panic rising up within her, Cyndi appealed to Johnny. “No need to use tape. I’ll stop asking questions.”

Johnny shrugged and indicated Roxy with a nod of his head. “She’s the boss. I’m just the muscle.”

“Aww, come on, Johnny, you and I both know you could dance circles around Roxy in the intelligence department.”

“You’re just saying that to get on my good side.”

“Maybe.” Cyndi offered up a flirtatious smile. Despite his choice of undergarments, the man had an ego. “Is it working?”

“Aw, Cyndi, you know I love you. This is business, nothing personal.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?
Business?
You had Roxy kidnap me!”

“Yeah, well…business, like I said. You didn’t leave us much choice.”

“I told you from the day she started she was too smart for her own good,” Roxy’s gravelly voice spoke from the darkness beyond the fire.

Cyndi decided it was time to change her tactic. “I really wish I knew what this was all about. All I wanted to do was have a part-time job. I didn’t mean to cause any trouble.”

“Cut the crap, Liberty.” Roxy stood in front of her and pulled a chunk of silver tape from the roll. “You have been in everyone’s business from the start.”

“What business?” Cyndi snapped, anger rising. “You threaten me…threaten my daughter, do God knows what to Jade, Lola is dead, and
I
am the problem?”

“Johnny and I ain’t done nothin’ to those girls. All we do is deliver.”

“Deliver?”

“Aw, come on, Liberty. You can’t be that naïve. Those girls were whores. You know what they say, once a whore always a whore. I just make sure they finally get the big pay day…for a decent payday of my own.”

“Oh my God, you are a human trafficker?”

“Try not to look so disgusted, Liberty. They been selling themselves for years.”

“They were children, Roxy!”

“Umpf!” Roxy put her hands on her hips, the piece of silver tape sticking to the black cat suit she wore. “They were plenty grown up enough. I offered them a better way of doing what they already been doin’ for a long time.”

“By kidnapping them and selling them as slaves?”

“Oh please, Cyndi,” Johnny stepped in. “We aren’t slave traders, we’re brokers. Jade was plenty happy to marry off to some rich dude. Why do you think no one has heard from her or found any sign of her?”

“But the blood…?”

“Tripped in those stupid heels of hers and banged her head on the dumpster. Used that ratty old purse to mop at the cut then tossed it out. She wasn’t needing it where she was going.”

Roxy had since wadded up the piece of tape and cut another one from the roll. She approached Cyndi with an evil smile, her hands out in front of her, holding the tape.

“What about Lola?” Cyndi asked quickly. A shadow passed over Johnny’s face, and then it was gone.

“Collateral damage,” Johnny said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

“She asked too many questions, same as you.” Roxy leaned in close to Cyndi’s face.

“So, you killed her?” Cyndi demanded. She had to keep them talking as long as possible, praying that the mic was recording everything, but she knew it was a shot in the dark. “And dragged me out to First Landing State Park in the middle of the night? What are you gonna do? Kill me too?”

Roxy and Johnny burst into a fit of laughter. Johnny actually snorted as he clapped a hand on her shoulder. “What else would we do?”

Cyndi panicked then. Flashes of Harper and Jason filled her brain as she struggled against the fear that was knotting in her chest. “You know my husband is a cop.”

“Duh. We already established that.” Roxy regained her composure.

“You will never get away with this.”

“We already have.” Roxy clapped the tape over Cyndi’s mouth with a self-satisfied grin. “That ought to keep you quiet for a while.”

Cyndi threw her head back and groaned in frustration. The force of the movement lifted the front legs of her chair ever so slightly. The rope around her right ankle loosened and slipped down the chair leg. She froze, watching her captors to see if they noticed. Roxy and Johnny paid her absolutely no more attention.

Maybe all hope wasn’t lost after all.

Chapter Twenty-One

Cyndi had a pretty good idea what Johnny and Roxy planned to do with her, and it wasn’t to kill her. If they were successful, she would fall into their trafficking business, never to ever see her husband or her daughter again.

Think, Cyndi!

Johnny hadn’t tightened the ropes around her legs adequately. If she leaned back far enough, they would slip right down off the bottom of the chair. Shifting her hands behind her, she tried to assess the knots binding her wrists together without calling attention to herself. She found if she rubbed them up and down, the rope loosened a little each time. Obviously, Johnny had never been a boy scout or he would have known how to tie a better knot. Not that she was complaining.

“I don’t know! This was your idea!” Johnny jumped up out of his seat so fast the chair fell backward with a crash. Cyndi froze.

“We are in this together!” Roxy sprang to her feet as the younger man disappeared into the dark. “Where are you going?”

Cyndi couldn’t make out Johnny’s response, but whatever it was, it angered Roxy. She also disappeared into the night, muttering a string of curses that would have made any truck driver proud. Cyndi worked at her bonds frantically. As she felt the ropes start to give, her captors reappeared in the light given off by the fire.

“Just call the boss and let him know she’s here.” Roxy actually sounded like she was pleading with Johnny. That could be a good thing. They were wearing down under the pressure of what they were doing. She didn’t think they intended to hurt her. The whole call-the-boss thing worried her though. The boss probably had no qualms at all about hurting her.

“I already did. He is sending a van. Be here in about twenty minutes. By morning, she will be nothing more than a memory around here.”

Roxy dropped back into her chair. “Good. No more complications. Things were going well until she showed up. Who the hell hired a cop’s wife anyway?”

“I had no idea who she was.” Johnny outright lied to Roxy as he plopped back down into his chair. He had known all along her husband was a cop. “She was hot, fun to talk to, and can dance like hell.”

“Dance like hell?” Roxy scoffed. “Is that a technical term?”

“Hmpf!” Johnny crossed his arms over his chest. “You’ve seen her dance. The dudes love her. Call it what you will, but she makes bank.”

“They like her perky titties. That’s all.”

“Geez, Roxy…jealous much?”

“What she got for me to be jealous of?”

“A rockin’ body, mad dancing skills, a hot husband, and the all-American life.”

“Damn, Johnny, don’t hold back.”

It didn’t matter what Roxy thought of her. All she needed to be worried about was getting her hands free.

Was Roxy actually jealous of her? The whole thing was ridiculous. Cyndi was a stay-at-home mom who worked one night a week to satisfy some unexplainable morbid desire to be an exotic dancer.

Focus, Cyndi!
Enough worrying about Roxy, she had to get out of there before the boss arrived. Whoever “the boss” was…

She wiggled and waggled her arms, working the knots loose until finally she felt the rope begin to slip. Her captors were occupied with each other. It was like she wasn’t even there. In a few seconds, she wouldn’t be. The rope on her wrists fell to the ground. Cyndi leaned back in the chair enough to let the ties slip off her ankles. Without looking back, she jumped from the chair and ran for all she was worth. If she could make the tree line, she would be home free. It was dark, and the foliage was thick. Cyndi pumped her arms and willed her aching bare feet to keep carrying her over the rough ground without turning an ankle, or seriously cutting the sole of a foot.

Behind her she heard Roxy cry out, “She’s gone! Liberty escaped! You numb-nut—who taught you to tie a rope?”

“It’s not like I grew up knowing I had to tie someone to a chair!”

Cyndi reached the wood line and disappeared into the trees. She ripped at the tape over her mouth, resisting the urge to throw it away. Instead, she folded it quickly and tucked it into the top of her bustier. The terrain turned tumultuous for her shoeless feet. She picked her way carefully through the branches and roots; Cyndi was grateful for Jason’s lessons in navigation. She used the moon through the tree tops as her guide as she worked her way toward the dirt road.

Voices echoed in the trees. Roxy and Johnny were looking for her. Bruised, bloody feet carried her forward as she alternated watching the ground and the sky. If only she had looked ahead, she might have seen the strong chest and muscular arms that wrapped themselves around her.

“Umf!” She hit hard against the form in the dark. Whipping her head up, she gasped and stifled a scream.

“Relax, Cyndi. It’s me!” The low voice with its deep Hispanic accent rumbled next to her ear.

“Rafael! What are you doing here?”

“Everyone is looking for you. Your old man panicked when you didn’t pick up your little girl.”

Jason knew she was missing! That was excellent news. People were looking for her.

How late was it? Raf never left the door of the club before closing time. It didn’t matter. She was found. Wait. How did Rafael know where to find her? She was in the middle of the woods in a state park in the dark.

“How? How did you know where to find me?”

Suddenly, his arms tightened around Cyndi’s waist as he picked her up and tossed her over his shoulder. “What the hell, Raf? Put me down!”

“You know I like you, Cyndi, but you are way too damned nosy for your own good. If only you had been content to dance for a few hours on Friday nights, then none of this would have happened. Now, your little girl will have no idea what happened to her momma, and super-cop at the club tonight will have to live with the fact that you were stolen right from under his nose while he was so busy trying to bust up my business.”

Cyndi stopped struggling. “Your business?”

Rafael was plowing through the trees and brush back the way she had just come. She flopped on his shoulder like a ragdoll, but it didn’t slow him down.

“What do you mean
your business
?” she demanded once again.

“Miss Liberty, you didn’t think that working as a bouncer in a strip club paid all my bills, now did you?”

Why did everyone keep calling Sugar Shakers a strip club?
“It’s not a strip club! No one takes their clothes off!”

A deep throaty chuckle escaped from Rafael. “No. Maybe not. But it sure as hell isn’t a place I would let my sisters or my mother work. Respectable women don’t shake their…tassels…for money.”

Ouch!

“I like to dance! What’s wrong with that?”

“Men give you money to turn them on. Might as well be a prostitute.”

Rafael stepped out of the woods and into a clearing. The very same place she had fled. Realization hit her with all the intensity of a bolt of lightning. “Oh my God, you’re the…”

“Hey, boss.” Johnny stepped into her line of sight. Before Cyndi could even try to free herself, Rafael dropped her with a
thump
on to the ground. Landing on her elbow, Cyndi let out a grunt.

“What the hell did I ever do to you people?”

“You ask too many questions!” her three captors answered in unison.

She sat back on her heels and massaged her elbow. Looking from one sneering face to the next, Cyndi felt a chill run down her spine. This was it—the end of the line for her. She was about to be sold into the sex trade market, and she had no idea how to escape.

Rafael’s cell phone rang. He fished it out of his jeans pocket. “Hello?”

Cyndi strained to hear but couldn’t make out the voice on the other end of the call. Rafael listened for a few seconds and then, without bidding the caller goodbye, he hung up. That wasn’t a good sign.

“Tie her up,” he demanded, nodding at Johnny.

Roxy let out a loud guffaw. “Don’t let the boy scout over there do it. He couldn’t tie up a loaf of bread!”

“If you think you can do better, go ahead!” Johnny kicked some rope at Roxy and stomped away.

Cyndi looked from one of her captors to the next, still having trouble digesting what was going on.

Rafael grabbed her by the arm and yanked her to her feet. “Skip the chair. Tie her to that tree over there. The transport will be here in a few minutes, but I don’t want to risk her getting away again. Once we dispose of Miss Liberty here, life can get back to normal at the club.”

“Normal? You think things will go back to the way they were? My husband and his team will be all over that place if I go missing!”

“I’m not worried. No one wants to see anything happen to the club. Excitement over your disappearance will be short lived. A couple newscasts, a vigil or two. Maybe even one at the club. Then people will find something else to talk about.”

Raf gave Cyndi a little shove toward the tree. Roxy followed them, grinning like the Cheshire cat. As soon she was close enough, Rafael spun her around and pushed her against the tree. Roxy set about wrapping rope around her in a way that reminded Cyndi of the old Saturday morning cartoons. Despite Cyndi struggling against her, by the time Roxy was done, she was wrapped up like a mummy with no hope of working her way out of it.

“They may never find me, but mark my words…they will never stop looking. I know my husband. He is like a bloodhound on a case. He will take you all down!”

“Now, now, Liberty.” Roxy patted her on the head like she was a faithful house pet. “I’m sure you are right. That hottie of a husband of yours will need a lot of comforting in your absence.” Roxy lifted her boobs and squished them together, exaggerating her tired cleavage. “Do you think these will be enough to keep him happy?”

Although her mind knew Roxy was only trying to get a rise out of her, the thought of Jason’s hands on the older woman was enough to give Roxy exactly what she wanted. “If you so much as lay one finger anywhere on my husband…”

“Oh, it’s not a finger I plan to lay on him, Liberty. Your husband ain’t never been with anything like ol’ Roxy here. I’ll have him begging for mercy!”

Her gravelly laugh incited so much hatred in Cyndi that she lunged at the older woman and nearly decapitated herself. She gagged where the rope snapped against her throat, spitting out a string of cusswords even she didn’t know she was capable of.

Rafael, Roxy, and Johnny dissolved into fits of laughter.

Cyndi clamped her jaw shut and glared at them. Getting angry wasted too much energy. J.J. would never touch the likes of Roxy Feathers. In her heart of hearts she knew that, but in less than an hour she would be no more than a memory in her husband’s dreams. A handsome, virile man like Jason would eventually be with another woman.

As long as it was never Roxy, Cyndi could live with that knowledge. As long he never, ever put any part of him in the same
room
as Roxy Feathers, Cyndi could accept that Jason might fall in love again one day.

She hung her head in resignation. It was over. She was about to become another statistic on the Monday night news.