Burn: A Novel Read online

  Kim took Syd’s arm and led her back through the foyer, past the double doors, toward the bedroom. “In a little while, we’re going to call Ms. Redwine. Use the time to pull yourself together. You’re going to give Ms. Redwine instructions, and if she does as she’s told and you do as you’re told, everyone will be all right. I give you my word.”

  She sounded sincere. It was all Syd could do not to laugh in her face. Was she supposed to trust these people? She’d do what they said, because she had no choice, but their “word” didn’t mean a thing. What kind of fool would take comfort in the word of a criminal?

  They stepped into a spacious corner bedroom. Light poured into the room, which was decorated in blue and beige—mostly beige. There was a king-size bed, a comfortable-looking chair by the window, and a private bath.

  “In a day or two we’ll let you call your father, since it’s possible he’ll hear that you aren’t on board the ship.”

  Yes, Syd could imagine that happening. An e-mail or a phone call from someone aboard the Silver Mist could cause all sorts of complications.

  “You’ll tell him you were too ill to make the trip, you must have caught a virus, but you’re feeling better and you’ll spend some more time in San Diego, with Caro, until Ms. Redwine returns from the cruise.”

  “If I’m better, then why don’t I just fly to Hawaii and join the cruise there?” Sydney blurted.

  Kim stared at her, then gave a shrug. “You’re feeling better, but the virus is still holding on.”

  “You’re not going to … ask him for money?” Why else would they be holding her?

  “No,” Kim said briefly, and her expression hardened. “Here’s the situation, Ms. Hazlett. You’ll notice this bedroom has no walls common to another room. There are two outside walls, and the emergency stairwell runs beside the third wall. We’re on the top floor, so, barring an emergency, of course, traffic in the stairwell will be limited.”

  That was true. Some people took the stairs as a matter of course, for the exercise, but from the twenty-fifth floor?

  “If you scream for help or bang on the walls,” Kim continued, “no one will hear you but us. However, we’re hoping you’ll continue to cooperate. You won’t be completely confined; maids will come in and you’ll need to be in the parlor with us while they’re here. We’ll also be ordering room service, and you’ll take your meals with us.”

  Room service that would be charged to her American Express, Sydney thought bitterly. That really pissed her off, that she was being made to finance her own kidnapping.

  “If we see even a hint that you’re not cooperating fully, if you do something silly such as try to signal one of the maids, our people who’re holding Ms. Redwine will be informed.” Her eyes turned cold. “You really don’t want to do that.”

  While Sydney stood there, maddeningly impotent, Kim went around the room and collected the pens and notepads that the hotel provided. She disconnected the phone, leaving the phone itself sitting there so the maids wouldn’t notice it was missing, but taking the cord with her. She went into the bathroom and checked there. While she was out of sight Sydney stood there, looking longingly at the door, but chained by her fear for Jenner.

  Kim came out of the bathroom and nodded approvingly when she saw Sydney still standing in the same place. “Good choice,” she said, knowing of course that running had been considered. “Especially since Dori is standing in the foyer and you wouldn’t have made it outside.”

  Just then there was a sound in the foyer as someone knocked briskly at the double doors. Sydney’s heart leapt, but then she heard the sound of the door opening and Dori said, “Good Lord! There’s enough luggage there for three people!”

  Sydney’s face burned.

  “Do the math,” Adam said, amusement in his deep tones. “This was a two-week trip. Most women need more than two tracksuits and three changes of underwear for that length of time.”

  “I wash out my underwear every night,” Dori said, her tone as annoyed as Adam’s was amused.

  “Just saying. You aren’t exactly in a position to judge whether this is a lot of luggage or not.”

  Their banter spoke of a long relationship but not, to Sydney’s ear, of anything romantic. Then Adam came into the bedroom, easily carrying two of her heaviest bags. “We’ll need to go through everything, make certain she doesn’t have anything in here that could cause us any trouble.” He hoisted the bags onto the bed. “You take these two,” he said to Kim. “Dori and I will handle the others.” He flicked a quick, impersonal look at Sydney. “How’s she holding up?”

  “She’s holding up just fine,” Sydney snapped, infuriated that he talked over her as if she weren’t there. She was lying, of course, because she wasn’t holding up fine, but at least she wasn’t a limp puddle on the floor.

  “Good deal,” he said, smiling at her.

  She met the smile with a stony gaze. How dare the bastard smile at her?

  His expression remained pleasant, because of course he didn’t care if she was upset or not, didn’t care what she liked or didn’t like.

  Turning, he started into the foyer to help Kim with searching the rest of Sydney’s bags, but he stopped in the bedroom doorway and pulled a small gadget out of his pocket. Flipping out a screwdriver head, he whistled softly as he dismantled the lock on the bedroom door.

  Even though logically she knew the flimsy lock wouldn’t have kept them out, she had been looking forward to at least the illusion of privacy. Now that was gone, as casually and easily as getting a drink of water.

  Her knees wobbled again, so she sat down in the chair and dully watched as all her belongings were sorted through. Kim wasn’t careless with the fragile fabrics; she took each garment out separately, and neatly laid it aside, but she was extremely thorough in her search, even checking the lining of the suitcases. Good God, what did they think she was, a spy?

  At last the chore was finished. Pausing at the door, Kim said, “We’ll bring your cell phone to you in a little while, so you can call Ms. Jenner. Until then, make yourself comfortable.”

  Comfortable? Comfortable?

  Sydney supposed that was possible, at least physically. The bedroom was nice enough. This wasn’t a luxury hotel, catering more to the business crowd, but it was decent. But how could she be comfortable when she was a prisoner, when Jenner was, too, somewhere—and they were both likely to die before this was over?

  And she still didn’t know what the hell these people wanted.

  Chapter Nine

  JENNER CHECKED HER WATCH AS THE PLANE LANDED IN San Diego. The flight was almost two hours late, and even though she wasn’t worried about missing the ship—it didn’t sail until four p.m.—the weather delay in Dallas had been both annoying and tiring. Despite her changed financial circumstances, she wasn’t exactly a seasoned traveler. She had never been to Europe, for instance. A lot of the Palm Beach crowd would fly to Switzerland every winter for the skiing, but she wasn’t interested in learning how to slide down a mountainside on two skinny planks, so she had no reason to go. One day she wanted to go to Australia, maybe, and there were a couple of other countries she’d like to see, but so far she simply hadn’t traveled all that much.

  When she did fly it was first class, but she didn’t belong to any of the airlines’ clubs and didn’t really see a lot of difference between sitting in one place or sitting in another. Sitting wasn’t what she wanted to do; she was too restless, too antsy after the long flight. So she’d walked the Dallas-Fort Worth airport for two hours, trying to get in some exercise, but constantly dodging around more slowly moving people or, worse, getting trapped behind them was about as relaxing as driving in rush-hour traffic. Still, at least she’d been moving.

  She had tried to call Syd from Dallas, to let her know about the storm delay, but the calls went straight to voice mail. Syd was scrupulous about turning her phone off when she was in a restaurant or any other social situation, because she was so hypersensitive about disturb