Harlequin Love Inspired Suspense March 2021--Box Set 2 of 2 by Dana Mentink (novels to improve english txt) 📗

Two record sheets with notes, taken after a physical exam. His eyes flew to the top line, the name. No, he had to be wrong. He read it again.

“What does it say?” Kenny said. “Quit stalling.”

“I have to get to Laney.” Beckett tried to barrel past Kenny, but he lunged forward, the blade sinking into his biceps. He did not feel pain, but blood began to spill down his arm in a warm trickle.

Kenny crouched, gleeful. “Awww. Does it hurt, Beckett?”

The next time Kenny launched an attack, Beckett was ready. He sidestepped and Kenny’s momentum carried him forward. Beckett raised his forearm and smashed an elbow into Kenny’s chin as he stumbled forward. The strike snapped his head up and he fell to the floor, groaning, the knife popping from his grip and sliding under the shelving unit.

Beckett grabbed the envelope and sprinted up the stairs, exploding into the kitchen and out to the courtyard. He yelled as he went. “Laney!” But he knew even as he ran to the cabin that he was too late. Levi stood in the doorway, hands on hips, Admiral whining and clattering in anxious circles around the front room. Irene’s car was gone.

“I was just about to call you.” Levi frowned. “Where’s Laney?” He looked closer. “Are you bleeding?”

“Can’t explain right now. Kenny’s in the basement, semiconscious. Get your rifle. Herm can help you tie him up. I have to go.”

“Where?” Levi yelled after him.

To save my wife and my baby.

He leaped into the truck and gunned the motor, dialing as he went. He hadn’t finished his own call when his phone lit up with another.

He thumbed it on. “Don’t hurt her,” he almost shouted.

Irene sounded a million miles away. “Bring me what Rita left, and she’ll be fine. I’m going to leave Death Valley and you’ll never see me again. I want the papers and the pills. You give them to me and I won’t kill her.”

“But…” he choked out.

“Drive north from the hotel for ten miles and stop. I’ll call you again. No police or she dies.”

He was left with a dial tone and his heart beating with such violence he thought his sternum would crack open. Hardly able to breathe, he drove out of the hotel parking lot. Another incoming call sounded from his phone. He stared at the number before he answered.

“Jude, listen.”

“What is going on?” his cousin barked. “I just talked to Levi…”

Beckett cut him off. “Dr. Irene killed Pauline to cover up malpractice. Where are you?”

“I’m two minutes from the hotel.”

“I need your help.”

“I’ll…” Jude started.

“Not the Inyo County police department, Jude. You. Please. She has Laney.”

There was a heavy silence. He knew his cousin was measuring their history, the distrust, the anger and weight of everything that had passed between them since he’d stepped into the wrestling ring with Dan all those years ago.

“All right,” he said finally. “I’m almost there.”

“No red lights and sirens.”

“Beck, if this doesn’t work…”

“If it doesn’t work, then nothing else matters.”

His answer was clipped, terse. “Copy that. Wait right there.”

And then Beckett pulled to the shoulder, gripped the steering wheel, counting the seconds and praying with all his might that he would get there in time.

* * *

Laney felt as though her head was stuffed full of cotton. Her senses were numb, slow, cramped as her eyes slowly opened. She was in the back seat of a car. Panic exploded as she realized her ankles were bound with duct tape, hands raised above her and zip-tied through the handle intended to help back-seat passengers exit the vehicle.

Irene peered in the rearview mirror.

“Hi, Laney. I hope the ties aren’t too tight. I hated to do it, but I didn’t want you coming to while I was driving.”

“You…drugged me?”

“A mild sedative. Won’t hurt the baby, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

She gaped. Could Irene really have drugged and abducted her? She tugged on the wrist binding. “Let me loose.”

“When Beckett brings me what I want.”

So Rita really had left something at the hotel. “It’s proof, isn’t it? Proof that you killed Pauline.” She could barely believe her own words.

Irene shot a quick look at her in the rearview mirror. “I’m a good doctor.”

A good doctor? Had she heard correctly? She peered out the window, trying to gauge how far they were from the hotel. She did not recognize any landmarks. They had diverted course from the main road, traveling one of the thousands of isolated trails that crisscrossed Death Valley. Remote trails, where it was unlikely to see another human being for days, perhaps even months. Her mouth went dry. “Yes,” she said, distractedly. “A good doctor.”

“My father never thought I could do it. I was expelled from high school. I cheated on a test, just one, but they chucked me out anyway. Humiliating. I had to get my GED. But I persevered, in spite of everything, got massive student loans and put myself through medical school. It was the best moment in my life when I walked across that stage and they handed me my medical license. You know what my father said at the ceremony?”

Laney subtly pulled on the handle where her hands were bound, trying to test the sturdiness. “What?”

“He said, Did you have to cheat on your medical boards too?” Irene’s lips quivered as she relived the memory.

“I’m sorry,” Laney said. “That was unkind.” But it doesn’t give you an excuse to kill people. “But you’re right. You’re a good doctor.”

She shrugged. “Yes, I am. I do pro bono work and go the extra mile to make house calls, don’t I?”

“Yes, you do.”

“That mistake never should have happened.”

The road became bumpy and Laney struggled to keep from bashing against the car door. “What mistake?”

“I was just tired, is all. Trying to squeeze in as many patients as I could in my office in Oregon. There’s so much pressure starting a practice, building a clientele, handling staff, insurance, rent, keeping up