A Deadly Influence (Abby Mullen Thrillers #1)(24)

She checked her watch. Where was her replacement? She wanted to go home and get a quick shower before returning to work, but she didn’t want to leave Eden alone. She glanced at the woman who sat on the couch, her eyes glazed. Eden kept staring at her phone as if to make sure it was on, that it had enough reception.

When it rang, they both started. Eden’s eyes widened with fear. Abby quickly checked her laptop’s screen, the number calling Eden flashing on the monitor. It wasn’t the same number as the day before, but it didn’t match any of Eden’s contacts either.

She quickly sat down on the couch by Eden’s side, laptop on her knees. “Remember, ask questions. Mind your tone. If I squeeze your hand, it means you need to pause and take a deep breath to regroup, okay?”

Eden nodded, lips trembling. Gabrielle hurried into the living room and stood by the couch, watching her mother. Abby put on her earphones and took Eden’s clammy hand. She gave it a small squeeze. Eden took a deep breath and answered the phone after the sixth ring.

“Hello?” Her voice trembled.

“It took you long enough to answer,” a metallic voice said. Eden had described it as pure evil, but as Abby had guessed, it was merely the result of a voice modulator. She watched the graph of the sound wave on-screen, knew that in the situation room, someone was listening in, trying to undo the voice modulation, tracking the location of the caller. The longer this call was, the better.

“I’m sorry, I . . . I was in the bathroom,” Eden blurted.

Abby squeezed her hand again. Eden turned to look at her, a desperate glint in her eyes. Abby did her best to give her a reassuring stare.

“Do you have the money?” the man asked.

For a second Eden seemed lost. Abby mouthed how.

“How can I get five million dollars?” Eden asked. Her voice was strangled, but she managed to get the words out in a steady pace.

“I don’t care how; that’s your problem. Sell your car, take out a loan, rob a bank. Just get that money.”

Eden was about to answer when Abby squeezed her hand again. The first mistake people always made when negotiating was thinking they had to answer fast. As if the other person would hang up with impatience if she took a moment.

Eden took another deep breath. When she spoke, her voice seemed slightly calmer. “How can I get the ransom if I don’t know Nathan is okay?”

“He’s okay. Don’t worry about him.”

“How can I be sure of that?”

“Eden, don’t mess with us. Do you want us to hurt your son? Do you want us to cut his finger off?”

Eden’s hand went to her throat, eyes widening. Before Abby had the time to squeeze her other hand, she blurted, “Don’t hurt him, don’t hurt my boy. I’ll get you your money, just please, please, don’t hurt him.”

Her voice cracked, then shattered, the last words punctured by deep, wet sobs. She tried to say something else, but the phone tumbled from her hand, dropping to the floor.

“Then you’ll get that money for us, right?” the voice in Abby’s earphones asked.

Abby picked up the phone and held it out to Eden while squeezing the woman’s hand hard.

“Hello? You don’t worry about your son; he’s fine. Get us the money, you got that?”

Abby pushed the phone into Eden’s hand. Eden put it to her ear, her lips moving, but all she could do was weep.

In one swift move, Gabrielle snatched the phone from her mother.

“Hello?” she said. “This is Gabrielle; I’m Nathan’s sister. I want to talk to Nathan.”

Abby waved at Gabrielle and whispered, “Questions.”

A few seconds of silence followed, and then the man said, “Nathan can’t talk at the moment.”

“Then how do you expect us to believe that he’s okay?” Gabrielle asked.

Abby’s heart sank. The way Gabrielle phrased her question, it didn’t sound like a request, an attempt to work together to solve a problem. Instead, it came out as finger-pointing, assigning blame. The anger in her tense voice didn’t help the situation either. Instead of disarming the situation, she was escalating it.

“If you give us trouble, my associates won’t be happy,” the man said, his voice sharp. “They might hurt your brother. I don’t want that to happen.”

“We’re not giving you any trouble; we just want to know that he’s okay. Why won’t you let us talk to him? Put him on the phone.”

“He can’t come to the phone right now—”

“Why not?” Gabrielle raised her voice. Tears were running down her face. “Did you hurt him? Is my brother even alive? I want to hear him say that he’s okay—”

The line went dead.

Gabrielle let out a shuddering breath and slumped on the couch. Abby watched the mother and daughter crying, feeling sick to her stomach. This call had made things worse.





CHAPTER 17


He sat in his car, heart pounding wildly, bile in his mouth. A loud honk made him start in panic. The traffic light was green. He tried to control his breathing as he drove slowly down the street. Hundreds of vehicles on the road, and only one of them driving away from the cops, who had surely tracked his phone . . .

His phone. He’d forgotten to turn it off. He fumbled, grabbing the phone from the passenger seat, one eye on the road. He hit the power button, pressing so hard his finger whitened with the effort. The phone turned off. He struggled with the battery, attempting to remove it with one hand, but it was impossible. He took his other hand off the steering wheel and grappled with the battery. Damn it, the thing wouldn’t come loose. Enraged, he smashed the phone on the dashboard, and the battery finally popped out. Then, raising his eyes to the road, he hit the brakes, his car pausing inches away from the bumper of the car ahead of him.