“Is Beth with you?” he asked as she stepped out.
“Beth?” she asked with surprise. “Is she not still recovering from the explosion?”
“Nay,” Scotty said, his mild concern turning to real concern as he realized she wasn’t here either. “She’s missing.”
Odilia looked confused. “She cannot be missing, Scotty. Did you look in the kitchen? Perhaps she was hungry when she woke up.”
“We checked the house, upstairs, downstairs, even the basement and garage. This was the last place.”
“You must have missed her,” Odilia said with certainty. “Just give me a minute to let the dogs out and I will come up to the house and help you search it again.”
“No.” Scotty shook his head. “Stay here. Mortimer and I will look again.”
“What about Donny?” Odilia asked.
“Donny?” Scotty echoed with confusion.
“Is he not helping you look for her?” she explained.
“I did no’ see Donny either,” he realized aloud.
“Well, maybe they are together somewhere. I know he has not left,” she said with certainty. “His vehicle is still here.”
Scotty frowned, but turned to head back out of the hall into the main part of the building. Now Donny was missing too? Or he might have been in the front yard when he and Mortimer searched the house. For that matter, Scotty thought suddenly, perhaps Beth was too. She had to be here somewhere. The car she’d rented until she bought another vehicle was still in the parking lot. He’d noted that from her bedroom window when he’d checked her room the second time.
His gaze slid around the yard. It seemed strangely empty without the dogs, and he now wondered how long they’d been in the kennels for feeding. The dogs, the fence, and the gate worked together to ensure the security at the Enforcer house. So long as the dogs were out, no one could get over the fence and around the property unnoticed, but while they were inside . . . that was another story. He should have asked Odilia that.
Eighteen
A sharp pain in her hands stirred Beth from sleep. She shifted with a moan, or tried to, and frowned when she found her movement restricted. She opened her eyes with confusion, peered around and began to wake up much more quickly as alarm slid through her. She was lying on her side on the floor of one of the kennels, her hands restrained behind her back, presumably with the same heavy chain she could see around her ankles. She was experiencing pain because she’d been bound so tightly, the blood supply to her hands and feet was cut off.
Beth raised her head and swiveled it first one way and then the other. The dogs were busy gobbling up whatever was in their food dishes, and paying her no attention at all. But she could hear voices coming from outside the room, and was just opening her mouth to call out for help when the talking ended on the sound of a closing door. Beth shouted anyway, despite knowing this part of the building was soundproofed so dogs barking and inmates shouting wouldn’t drive anyone who had to man the office crazy.
Much to her surprise, the door to the hallway opened almost at once. Unfortunately, it was Odilia who entered.
“Awake, I see.” Her voice was cold and calm as she walked over to stand in front of the seven-foot-high chain-link door at the end of the kennel. She peered at Beth with disinterest, and then glanced toward the dogs as they finished eating and moved to surround her. Odilia waited another minute for the last dog to finish, and then walked to the door at the opposite end of the room from the one she’d just entered and opened it. Beth knew it led directly outside, and wasn’t surprised when every last dog went rushing through. Dinner was done—time to play and poop, she thought grimly.
Odilia let the door close and then locked it before turning to walk back to survey Beth. After eyeing her briefly, she commented, “I thought the kennel was an appropriate place to put you until we could leave. After all, you have been acting little better than a bitch in heat.”
Beth stiffened, but then forced an uncaring shrug. “Wouldn’t want you to be the only bitch in here.”
She watched the fury explode on Odilia’s expression and then ignored the pain in her hands and feet and shifted to a sitting position before asking, “Who were you talking to in the hall?”
Odilia’s fury disappeared at once and she smiled slyly. “Scotty. He is looking for you. I asked if he needed my help, or if Donny was helping him look, and when he said he had not found Donny in his search either, I suggested perhaps the two of you are together.” Her smile widened. “He will soon be imagining you are somewhere spreading your legs for the boy.”
Beth’s eyebrows rose and she said with amusement, “He won’t think that at all. And the very fact that you think for even a moment that he would believe it possible tells me you know absolutely nothing about life mates.”
“He will,” she spat furiously. “You are a prostitute! A whore! You probably spread your legs for half of London back in the day, and half of Toronto since you got here. He will believe it, and he will see just how cheap a slag you are and how unworthy you are of him and the love he proclaimed for you.”
“Where is Donny?” Beth asked rather than address her words. But she hadn’t missed that the woman had basically admitted that she must have been listening to her and Scotty in her room earlier when they’d said they loved each other.
“Somewhere safe,” Odilia said, calming at once. Her mouth even curved into a slight smile again. “Do not worry. You will be joining him soon enough.”
Beth nodded, and then raised her eyebrows. “So, I’m guessing this means it was you behind everything?”
“Yes,” Odilia said simply.
“Just so I’m clear,” Beth said, “you were behind it all? The highway accident? The sword attack? The barn? Rickart’s car? You were behind all those attempts on my life?”
Odilia nodded, but her expression was annoyed. “And you skated through every single damned attempt!”
“Well, I wouldn’t say ‘skated,’” Beth said modestly. “I mean, you almost hacked my arm off, and I was burned pretty good in the barn. I’m not sure what injuries I sustained from the bombing—nobody’s told me yet—but I’m sure they were gruesome and painful too.” She tilted her head. “I did survive, though. Sorry if that didn’t jibe with your plans. I’ve been told I can be difficult to work with. To be fair, though, you didn’t really tell me your plan, and it’s hard to cooperate when I don’t know the plan.”
Beth watched the woman for a moment and could see the fury building quickly in her again. She was up and down like a yo-yo, with little to no control at all. Definitely off her rocker. Anger was good. Angry people made mistakes. Crazy people, though? Yeah, they were unpredictable and dangerous. A change of tactics was necessary.
“So you were already in Toronto when Scotty got here?” she guessed, and wasn’t surprised to see the woman calm again at once.
“I arrived a day ahead of him. I was supposed to be checking out a tip about a possible rogue in Kirkwall in the UK. I called in the tip,” she admitted with amusement. “And I called in regular reports that were completely bogus.”
“How did you know we had gone to Vancouver?” Beth asked, very curious to hear the answer. That had been the stumbling block to connecting the attack in Vancouver to the others, after all.
“Scotty,” Odilia said with a grin. “He called in and told Magnus that Mortimer needed help out here and to round up Rickart, myself, and three others. He said to send the three others to Toronto and that Magnus, Rickart, and myself should meet him in Vancouver. He would contact us with the address as soon as he knew what it was.”
Odilia shrugged. “As I said, I was supposed to be in Kirkwall, which is way up in the north of nowhere, so I said I would fly commercial to British Columbia from Scotland and meet Magnus and Rickart in Vancouver rather than fly to London, where they were, and travel with them. I followed you from the house that first day, caused the accident, and when that didn’t work, I then hopped on a plane in Toronto. I probably landed an hour after you. I went to the Enforcer house there when Magnus texted me the address, and then followed you again, this time to the club.”