Page 56 of Married to My Master

She kicked frantically in her chair, looking around, trying to track all the sudden movement around her.

“Bedroom secure!” came another voice from deeper in the house.

One of the police officers came up to her, pulling down his face guard and letting his deadly weapon drop to the side and hang from his tactical sling. “Ms. West?” he asked, as looked her up and down. He pulled the tape Dane had placed over her lips, peeling it off as gently as was possible with the sticky material. “You all right, ma'am?”

“Dane Bishop is my boyfriend!” she shouted. “He's not a threat!”

“Pardon me?” the SWAT member said, as more men, plain clothed officers this time, came rushing into the now-secure scene. Another one of the assault team flicked open a pocket knife and dropped into a squat, beginning to work at her bindings. The blade slipped against her skin as he sawed through the tape.

“Dane!” she repeated loudly. “He's not a threat!”

“Stand aside,” one of the plain-clothed detectives, a heavy set, middle-aged man with a mop of brown curls up top said, as he brushed aside the SWAT member who'd removed Emily's duct tape gag. “I'm Det. Moore,” he said, as he offered her a hand. Behind him came the trauma units and first responder EMT's. “Let's get you out of here.”

“No!” she shouted. “I need you to listen to me!”

“Ms. West,” Det. Moore said, “I know this a stressful time, but we need to ask you a few questions. We need you to calm down, let the teams do their work, and—”

“Det. Moore,” she said, her words suddenly as cold and focused as when she was just the Ice Queen of BioSphere, “Dane Bishop didn't kidnap me. He's trying to exonerate his brother Benton Bishop by tracking down Edward Barker, the head of sales for my company. Barker intentionally released a bad medication for profit. He's the man you need to investigate, not my boyfriend.”

Det. Moore wiped a hand through his mop of curls, his eyes searching. “Aw, geez. Thought this was just another day at the office.”

Emily smiled, thinking she was getting through to the detective. He turned to one of the uniformed officers next to him and, with one eye glancing her over, said, “Make sure we get her back to the station after the EMT's look her over. This ain't adding up.”

Wait. She knew that look. They didn't believe her.

The trauma team, almost on cue, got her attention and helped her sit down so they could begin taking vitals. The uniformed officer Det. Moore had spoken to came over, his eyes settling on her, his hand on his gun.

Emily shook her head. No, this was not how things were supposed to work. Dane had run to get the attention of the cops, not to leave her as some sacrificial lamb. But that was exactly how she felt—a poor animal being offered up for slaughter.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Emily

With a clean bill of health, she was ushered out of the house a short while later. Det. Moore and the uniformed officer were at her side the whole time as they escorted her out the front door and onto her demolished lawn.

She groaned as she looked at the damage Dane had caused to the front of her house with her SUV. She ran her eyes over the pieces of her garage door laying all over the driveway and street, the mud-hole of a front yard, and her destroyed mailbox. “Dane,” she groaned. “Really?”

As the two men took her across the street to an unmarked police vehicle, she told them her side of the story.

Det. Moore sighed as he escorted her around to the passenger side door. “Look, I want to believe you. I really do. It sounds almost sweet, even, your boyfriend saving you from your rivals while he's trying to exonerate his twin brother. Real sweet. Almost perfect, like one of my wife's romance novels or some kinda nonsense.”

“But, you don't believe me,” Emily said, her voice glum.

“No, unfortunately, I don't. Wanna hear what I think? I think, what we got here, is you trying to extort money from your company for whatever reason. Greed? The thrill? Trying to reliveNatural Born Killers? I dunno yet. But, you got cold feet on the whole thing, so your boyfriend took off on ya to try and get the money before word got out.”

She just looked up at him, blinking sadly in defeat.

“And, since you ain't got proof on hand of any of this,” Det. Moore continued when she didn't respond, “I'm gonna advise you to get a lawyer. This doesn't look good for you, Ms. West. That's what I think.”

Then, she realized what she was forgetting. No, she might not have evidence, but two other people did. “Charlene Padilla,” she said, “the reporter you let in to interview us as Dane's first demand?”

“What about her?”

“She made a recording of me and Dane, together, while she was in there, explaining the whole thing. She'll back me up, and be able to provide you with the evidence. And, Jas Robertson, my personal assistant, will back up my story on Dane being my boyfriend. Call them. They'll tell you.”

Det. Moore sighed and checked his watch. Inside the car, the police radio crackled and popped, static-filled communications filling the airwaves. The detective tugged at his tie and pulled it out at a forty-five-degree angle from his chest as he seemed to consider her words for a long time. Then, he sighed again, and let the strip of cloth drop to rest on his barrel-chest. “Okay,” he said. “I'll call the reporter lady and see if she backs you up. You got a number for your secretary?”

“You got a pen?”

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