of our fine restaurants will mitigate the difficulty.”
“I understand.”
“We also recommend bringing any medications or other necessities with you, as well as a change of clothes, blankets, pillows—everything you might need in the short term. While we don’t want to anticipate the worst, we want our guests to be prepared, just in case. Should the power go out, it would be a tad difficult to reach your floor without an elevator.”
Twenty-six flights of stairs—yeah, not an easy hike, Dirk thought with a stab of mordant humor, the kind that sometimes hit in tense situations. The British sure have a knack for understatement. To the concierge he said, “Thank you, we’ll be down shortly.”
“Thank you, Mr. DeWinter. Do you and your family need any assistance? We understand this can be a trying situation for families with small children.”
The reminder that his daughters weren’t with him caused Dirk’s heart to clutch momentarily. He cleared his throat. “No, we don’t need assistance, but thanks anyway.”
“Please don’t hesitate to ask any of our staff should you need anything. Once again, we apologize for the inconvenience.”
Dirk hung up the phone and told everyone, “The typhoon has been upgraded from a T8 to a T9, and the hotel wants us all downstairs before the winds get any worse.” He moved purposely toward the windows, saying as he did so, “Those shades come down. They won’t protect us if the windows shatter and there’s flying glass, but it could minimize any damage if the windows break while we’re gone.” He started rolling the shades down, and Patrick began to help him, but Dirk said, “I’ve got this. Get the ones in the other rooms, will you?”
Patrick left and Dirk turned to Vanessa. “Better pack at least one change of clothes for yourself. You don’t want to have to trek up all those stairs if the elevators aren’t working. And grab the blanket and pillows from your bed—we’ll need them.” She left quietly, and Dirk said to Chet, “Your hotel’s a few blocks away, isn’t it?”
Chet nodded. “Just up Nathan Road.” His mouth twisted in a grimace. “But I don’t think I want to try to get there tonight,” he said, indicating the rain they could hear thrumming against the windows. “Not even in a cab.”
“I wasn’t suggesting it. I’ve got clothes to spare. Might not be a perfect fit, but in a situation like this I don’t think that matters.” Dirk turned his attention to Mei-li. “Sorry, my mind’s not working properly. Vanessa should be able to lend you a change of clothes. Let me go ask her—”
Mei-li shook her head and indicated the large purse she’d set down beside the sofa. “I came prepared,” she told him in her calm voice. “When Patrick called, I threw a few things in there, just in case. Don’t worry about me. But Patrick will probably need to borrow some clothes.” She smiled slightly, as if the thought of five-foot-nine Patrick wearing six-foot-two Dirk’s clothes amused her. But then her smile faded, and her eyes sent a message Dirk had no difficulty interpreting—she wanted to speak with him privately.
“Patrick’s welcome to whatever I have,” Dirk said deliberately. Then he looked at Chet. “Why don’t you get what you need from my bedroom and tell Patrick to do the same. I’ll grab a few things after you’re done. Oh, and Chet,” he added as the other man started to leave the room. “Call Rafe and Mike, would you?” he said, referring to the other two bodyguards he’d brought from the US, who weren’t on duty today. “Let them know what’s happened, but tell them to stay put until after the typhoon. I don’t want them trying to get here when there’s nothing they can do.”
As soon as they were alone Mei-li said in an urgent undertone. “I’ll make this quick. Don’t say anything in front of Vanessa or Chet. I’ll explain later, but Vanessa isn’t telling the truth. Not all the truth. I don’t know why—not yet. She might just be feeling guilty about something—perhaps that she didn’t do more to stop the kidnappers—that’s one possibility. But there are other possibilities. Until we know, it’s better to keep our conjectures and plans to ourselves. Because if she’s lying, it’s possible Chet is lying, too.”
Dirk’s brows drew together in a sudden frown. “Why do you say that? That’s not a fake contusion on his forehead—I’ve seen enough in my business to know the difference.”
“Shh,” she replied as Vanessa came back into the room, a small overnight case in her hand. Mei-li picked up her handbag from the floor, tucked her notepad and pen away, and hooked the strap over her shoulder. “I’m ready to go down as soon as you are, Mr. DeWinter.”
Dirk was perturbed by Mei-li’s statement that Vanessa was lying, and possibly Chet, as well. But he was too good an actor not to be able to hide what he was thinking when he wanted to. He glanced at Vanessa, then away. And in that brief instant he knew Mei-li was right—Vanessa was concealing something. What, he had no idea...but something.
* * *
The five of them had dinner in the Spring Moon Restaurant on the first floor while the storm raged outside. They could hear the howling wind and the slashing rain as the outer wall of Typhoon De-De came ashore, but the Peninsula Hotel had withstood typhoons before, and the staff carried on as if nothing were amiss. As long as they had power, guests were guests and needed to be fed.
The normalcy of it all seemed bizarre to Dirk, despite the bundles of pillows and blankets the restaurant patrons had stashed next to their tables. But it wasn’t just the preparations for a night to be spent in the hotel lobby that had him on edge, and at first he thought he couldn’t possibly eat—not when he was desperate to do something about finding his daughters. But Mei-li murmured for his ears only, “There is nothing we can do until the typhoon has passed—it would be suicide to go outside now.”
“I know.” His voice was rough with suppressed emotion.
When she added, “Refusing to eat accomplishes nothing, Mr. DeWinter,” and ordered the crispy rice with lobster in lobster bisque, he realized she was right.
The lobster sounded particularly good, especially with the lobster soup as a sauce, and he told the waiter, “I’ll have the same,” without even looking at the menu. He needed to keep up his strength, if for no other reason than to tear his daughters’ kidnappers apart when they were found. When, he reiterated to himself with grim determination. Not if. Because he would never rest until his daughters were found. Would never know a moment’s peace until their kidnappers—including Terrell Blackwood—were brought to justice...a father’s justice.
That thought reminded him he needed to talk privately with Mei-li, needed to tell her what had happened nearly twenty years ago and why Terrell Blackwood would have engineered this kidnapping. And why ransom might not be the reason behind it.
* * *
The disposable cell phone Terrell Blackwood kept by his bed when he was sleeping and in his pocket when he was awake rang once, twice, three times before he managed to shake off the dregs of a dream and answer it. He squinted at the clock and saw by the glowing red numbers on the clock that it was just past 5:00 a.m. “Yes?”
“We have your packages,” a cold voice informed him, and his heart leaped. The code phrases had all been worked out in advance, so he knew what the voice was referring to—Derek Summers’s daughters were now in his agents’ custody. “But there’s a problem.”
“Problem?”
“Nothing major, but we were unable to ship them as originally planned. Hong Kong is shut down tight because of an unseasonal typhoon. All flights are grounded.”
Hurricane, Terrell translated in his mind. Shipping the packages—that meant transferring custody of Summers’s daughters to the pilots who were supposed to whisk them out of Hong Kong in a private plane and take them to Manila in the Philippines, then to Jakarta in Indonesia, to Perth, Australia, and finally—the trickiest part of the plan—back to the United States. There the little girls would be sold for adoption on the black market. The income the sales would bring was a pittance compared