The Hijacked Bride
Autore
Liz Ireland
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1
WHERE ON EARTH WAS BOB?
Cathy Seymour tightly clasped her delicatessen bouquet in sweaty hands. The very appropriate bone-colored suit she had purchased specifically for this occasion felt limp and clammy against her skin; no doubt accordion wrinkles would crease her lap when it came time for her to stand up. Normally Cathy would have rather walked across hot coals than appear untidy, but right now she was so nervous she was beyond caring. She’d been warming up the same city hall bench for the past forty minutes now, and there was still no sign of her fiancé. Her very reliable fiancé. Something terrible must have happened to make Bob Delaney forty minutes late for his own wedding!
Bob had told her it was a bad idea to meet downtown, but no, she had insisted. No matter that they were having a prearranged elopement; it was still bad luck for the groom to see the bride before the ceremony. To Cathy, a wedding just wasn’t a wedding without some superstition and tradition. She’d never understood couples who could just jet off on a whim to Vegas, to be married in their blue jeans by an Elvis—which, incidentally, was what her parents had done. She wanted something a little more proper, more normal, for herself, even if it was just city hall.
That was a prime reason she was marrying Bob Delaney, who was about as far from the flaky Seymour family as she was likely to get in this lifetime. Bob reeked normality. Some people might find him a little boring, but Cathy couldn’t think of a man she’d rather move to the suburbs with. And that’s exactly where they were headed, just as soon as their nest egg was big enough. She could hardly wait. Finally, she would really be living her dream of white picket fences and backyard barbecues. They could join a country club and have a bunch of kids and the greenest lawn in the neighborhood, just like people in the movies and TV commercials…If Bob ever showed up.
She felt her mouth go dry as a horrible thought hit her with the force of a two-by-four. Was Bob purposefully not showing up? Could she actually be in the process of being jilted?
Nonsense! Probably something had happened at the bank, Cathy assured herself. If there was one thing on earth that Bob Delaney cherished more than her, it was the FIB—the First International Bank—where they both worked, she as a loan officer and he as one of the vice presidents in charge of international accounts. It was just hard for her to feel too sympathetic for a bank when her future—not to mention nonrefundable honeymoon tickets to the Cayman Islands—were at stake.
A long, sturdy pair of legs appeared before her, pushing the uncertain status of her honeymoon right out of her thoughts. In fact, the startlingly handsome man in front of her managed to exile Bob Delaney himself to a desert island of her consciousness. Slowly, her eyes travelled up the suited body, up slim hips and a broad chest that made the crisp but plain yellow shirt covering it eye-poppingly appealing. The man had a square jaw and a nose that looked as if it had withstood some breakage, giving him a weathered, dangerous look. Finally, she met with the most arresting pair of clear blue eyes she’d ever seen. Her lips parted about the same time her mind made a very interesting observation. This tall, dark-haired stranger was hands down the handsomest man in the room—and he was alone. Not only that, he was looking directly down at her—as if she were the one person in the world he was looking for.
Her heart fluttered erratically a few times in response…until she managed to get a grip on herself. You’re about to be married—and so, probably, is he!
Cathy prided herself on being sensible, so she began to search for some flaw in the man’s appearance she might have overlooked, something that would make him seem less desirable—like a budget shopper looking for a flaw in a designer handbag that she couldn’t afford anyway. It took some doing, but her eyes zeroed in on that fatal flaw. His tie! How had she missed it? It was a ghastly psychedelic striped affair—a fashionable throwback to the 1970s, the decade she’d spent in and out of a commune, and would prefer to forget.
Bad Necktie nodded to the empty space next to her, silently asking if the place was taken. His simple gesture filled Cathy anew with panic. Giving up that empty space—which in a way stood for Bob, after all—would be a little like giving up on her wedding, wouldn’t it? Nevertheless, what could she do? Every other seat in the place was filled with happy couples. She scooted over to make room for the handsome stranger. The stranger with the bad necktie, she corrected. At least with another person on the bench with her she would feel less…single.
She surreptitiously glanced at the hunk sitting beside her. Maybe when Bob walked in and saw her waiting in the marriage bureau with another man, it would make him a little nervous.
Then again, maybe not. It wasn’t likely Bob would suspect her of eloping with a hunk, not even for a nanosecond. As he always said, her best quality was her stridently sensible nature.
That, of course, was a matter of perspective. Her sister, Joan, thought practicality was Cathy’s worst quality. But then, Joan was almost as nutty as their parents, with the fortunate exception that she managed to hold down a steady job. And like Cathy she lived in New York City, not Guatemala, which was a sensible choice given that she made her living as a therapist.
Cathy was Joan’s favorite test case. “Someday,” her big sister always warned her, her words inevitably accompanied by some long-nailed finger wagging, “someday that free spirit you’ve been running from all these years will burst loose, and cause your carefully controlled life to topple like a house of cards.”
That thought made Cathy shudder with trepidation. She might have been christened Blossom Drop and raised on a commune, but that was the past. As soon as she was old enough to buy a bus ticket out of Santa Fe, where her parents had been dabbling temporarily in crystal healing, she’d changed her name and transformed herself into the most buttoned-down of the buttoned-down. She’d never strayed.
Well. Except that one little incident with Skippy Dewhurst right after college. Thank heavens Joan didn’t know about that! Cathy would never have heard the end of it—when really the whole business was nothing but a slightly humiliating learning experience, one that had steeled her resolve never to make such a dismally fickle life choice ever again. Ever since Skippy, she’d been grabbing for that upper-middle-class brass ring, that suburban nirvana, that dream life with a solid citizen like Bob.
Joan thought her marriage to Bob was an aberration, but Joan was a woman who changed weird boyfriends almost as frequently as she changed her hair color, which was about once a week. Joan, for all her modern ways, truly believed that every woman was a Cinderella, breathlessly awaiting Prince Charming’s arrival. And Bob Delaney was definitely not her idea of P.C. According to Joan, by marrying Bob Cathy was kidding herself—“sublimating her romantic nature.” But to Cathy, Bob, with his banker’s paunch and wire-rimmed glasses and his Connecticut background, was Prince Charming, and their castle would be a split-level on Long Island.
Out of the corner of her eye, Cathy looked at her thin gold watch, careful not to alert anyone in the crowded room that she might be an abandoned bride. Bob was now forty-five minutes late. Her face heated with anxiety. Could Bob really be jilting her? Steady, reliable Bob?
Never! Bob Delaney didn’t know the meaning of the word devious. Oh, maybe he sneaked an extra Snickers bar in the afternoon, or switched to caffeinated coffee in hopes she wouldn’t notice, or ducked out to a happy hour with his buddies, when he knew alcohol was bad for him. These were minor infractions, but he certainly wasn’t a cad! Nor was he the type to be late.
Cathy bit her lip nervously, feeling a bead of sweat trickle down her spine. She began to fan herself with the wilting daisies and gave her engagement ring a few nervous twists. Could something have happened to him? Should she call the bank?
“Catherine Seymour and Robert J. Delaney!”
The flat, officious voice boomed across the room, startling her. Cathy’s pulse pounded. It was time to get married, but where was her groom? Why, oh, why had she given the clerk their names before Bob had arrived? And what should she do now? Should she admit Bob wasn’t here, and risk losing their place?
“Catherine Seymour and Robert J. Delaney?” The clerk’s face, which had held the same bored, placid expression for forty-eight minutes, now came alive with speculation as he scanned the room. “Are Catherine Seymour and Robert J. Delaney here?”
Couples whispered to each other and looked around in curiosity as Cathy’s knees knocked with panic. It would be a long, long lonely walk across that room. But she just couldn’t sit here and pretend she didn’t hear the man! To do so would make it even more embarrassing when Bob showed up—which he was bound to do any moment now, she assured herself.
The clerk’s face broke into a smile. “Catherine Seymour and Robert J. Delaney—going once, going twice…”
Cathy attempted to clear her throat, yet the tight marblesized knot that had lodged there wouldn’t allow a sound to come out. With quivering limbs, she began to stand.
A hand clamped down on her arm. “Cathy?”
At the sound of her name, Cathy stopped and a roomful of heads turned in her direction. Startled, she gazed into the deep blue eyes of the hunk sitting next to her—the guy with the bad necktie. In her panic about Bob, she’d almost forgotten he was there. She looked down at the fingers gripped firmly about her arm, then back into the man’s blue eyes. Who was he, and how did he know her name? And why was he gazing at her so soulfully?
“I’m sorry, Cathy, I can’t go through with it,” he said in a grave, very audible voice.
A hushed silence fell over the room. Cathy heard the blood pounding in her ears as she stared into the hunk’s earnest face. Was he insane? She tugged on her arm, but he refused to let go.
“P-please,” she gasped.
“I was afraid you would beg.” He shook his head sadly, then looked back up at her, his eyes glistening with tears. Tears! “It’s not that I don’t love you, Cathy.”
“You are insane!” she cried, finding her voice at last.
The man’s eyebrows knit together. “Cathy, please don’t make a scene.”
It was like The Twilight Zone. Or a nightmare. That was it! Maybe she was sleeping, having a bad dream. Bob wasn’t late. This wasn’t happening. If she just closed her eyes and counted to three…
One, two, three. When she opened her eyes, that blue gaze was still fastened on her, the look of concern deeper than before. “Darling, do you feel faint?” Holding her arm, he stood. “We need to get you out of here…and go somewhere we can talk.”
Cathy dug the practical low heels of her bone-colored pumps into the tile flooring. “I’m not going anywhere with you!” she cried. “You’re not Bob! Who are you?”
He just shrugged. Unless he really was a madman…and then maybe it wasn’t pretend. If that were the case, it was even more crucial not to let him drag her away. Cathy clutched the bench armrest. “I’m not leaving!”
“Darling,” the lunatic soothed, “you’re making a spectacle of yourself.”
It was true. Couples eyeballed the unfolding drama with shock and pity—the would-be bride refusing to leave the scene of the jilt. This was a nightmare!
“Someone help me!” she cried, pointing at the stranger frantically with her deli bouquet “This man isn’t my fiancé!”
“Not anymore, apparently,” someone quipped.
New Yorkers!
Would she ever be able to convince these people of what was happening? Would anyone care? Desperately her eyes darted from face to face and finally settled imploringly on the clerk at the front. “Please,” she said, “I’ve never seen this man before.”
The clerk shook his head. “Then all I can say, lady, is if you didn’t know the fellow you shouldn’t have dragged him down here to marry you.”
“But I didn’t!” Cathy practically shrieked. “Will someone please call the police?”
As every single person in the room gaped at her, Cathy felt her body go limp in frustration.
“Honey, honey, honey…” Seeing her weakening, the man dragged her boneless jittery body away from the bench and pulled her close. Cathy pushed against his chest as hard as she could, until she heard him whisper for her ears alone, “I have a gun, lady. Move toward the door, pronto.”
Gasping in shock, she stared into his blue eyes as with his right hand he led her corresponding hand down his jacket. A hard lump rested beneath his coat. A hard lump that felt like a gun.
Her hand jerked back reflexively and he smiled. “Ready?”
Oh, Lord…Terror settled into her quivering bones. She could just imagine the headlines. Bloodbath at Marriage Office! Stories of innocent couples on the brink of lifelong bliss gunned down because she was a magnet for weirdos.
Numbly, she nodded. What else was there to do? No one in this building was about to help her. Once out on the street she could make a dash—but for what? Where would she run? And what had happened to Bob? Did some hoodlum have him, too, or was this madman working solo, preying on lone women in marriage offices?
The questions galloped through her mind as she somehow managed to put one foot in front of the other, clutching her flowers and her handbag tightly. As she and the man passed, couples tsked at the sight of a wedding-day casualty in retreat.
“You won’t get away with this!” she said as they walked through the door into an empty hallway, their footsteps echoing against tile and marble.
“Listen, don’t jump to conclusions,” he urged.
“What else am I supposed to do—wait patiently to see if I end up at the bottom of the East River?”
He rolled those Paul Newman blues. “I assure you, that’s not going to happen.”
Right! As they crossed the foyer, approaching the revolving door that led outside, Cathy tried to picture the world outside—a flight of steps, the busy avenue, the graying edifices of surrounding city government buildings, the subway station two blocks away. Where should she flee? The revolving door posed an obvious problem for her captor. She mentally geared up to bolt the minute he let go of her, but he kept a firm grip on her arm and swung her around in front of him. In lockstep, they shuffled into the triangular space, mincing awkwardly until a gust of spring air alerted them to duck out of the door’s relentless circular path.
Cathy seized that clumsy split second as the door deposited them outside. Jerking her arm free, she ran hell-forleather toward the steps, dashing past startled pedestrians with Bad Necktie close on her heels. She could hear his heavier footsteps running behind her, see his shadow cross hers as they raced down the stairs. Next time she got married, it would be in sneakers!
He caught her elbow as they again hit even pavement, and his sudden stop pulled her up short against his chest
“Let me go!” she cried, whacking his psychedelic tie with her purse.
The man reacted to her blows as if she were a slightly annoying gnat. “Cool your jets, lady,” his gravelly voice said in her ear. He didn’t sound the slightest bit out of breath, which angered her even more. “I just need to talk to you.”
“Oh, sure! Just want a cappuccino and conversation, I’ll bet!” Cathy cast her gaze around anxiously as he tugged her along to the curb. Way over on the other side of the avenue was a policeman. Should she yell, or make another dash for freedom?
They came to a stop in front of the door of a late model sedan. With his free hand her captor opened it and instructed, “Get in. I promise you won’t get hurt.”
Some promise! And yet, as she looked into the velour interior of the back seat, then again at the policeman across the street, a plan formed in her mind. If she timed it just right…
“All right.” She forced her voice to sound pleasant. In response, for the first time she saw her captor’s lips twitch into something like a smile. At least, a deep dimple appeared to the right of his lips, making him look as if he were smiling. It also made him heart-stoppingly handsome. Just her luck. The only time she encountered such a gorgeous creature at close range, he would have a gun in her side!
Every muscle tensed like a cat preparing to spring, Cathy stepped into the back of the car, noting the driver in front for the first time. She tried to memorize what she could about him for later. Maybe she could recognize his bald spot in a police lineup. As she made contact with the seat, Bad Necktie let go of her arm to get in himself. The moment he did, she vaulted across the seat and launched herself against the opposite passenger door. Ignoring traffic, she jumped out of the car, slamming the heavy door behind her. A cab honked long and hard as it whizzed by her, missing her by inches. She darted out as soon as the cab passed and began sprinting toward the policeman on the other side of the street.
“Help! Officer!” she cried, spurred by the sound of the sedan door slamming shut again behind her. “Officer!”
She ran, heedless of oncoming traffic. Heart pounding, she concentrated only on the blue uniform. As she neared him, the cop’s surprised face came into focus.
“Officer!” she cried, panting. “You’ve got to hel—”
The man’s chubby face broke out into a wide, friendly grin. “Hiya, Captain!” the policeman said, tipping his hat genially to someone behind her.
Captain?
Confused, Cathy whirled around. Bad Necktie stood smiling, dimple intact, blue eyes twinkling. “Hello, O’Donnell. Hard day of strolling around, I see.”
The cop chuckled. “And I can see now how you spend your days off—chasing pretty women!”
Cathy’s jaw dropped in astonishment. This man—this gun-toting thug—was a policeman? Her shoulders sagged. This definitely was not her day.
His hand again locked firmly on her arm. “Just a little unofficial business.”
O’Donnell, an older man, chortled. “Is that what they’re calling it nowadays?”
“No, they’re calling it abduction,” Cathy said flatly.
Both men laughed as if she’d just made a big joke, and Bad Necktie began tugging her away. “C’mon, Cathy.”
O’Donnell winked. “Go easy on him, Miss. He’s gentler than he looks.” Then he cracked up all over again.
Cathy couldn’t keep the scowl off her face. No wonder crime was so high in the city when innocent people could be abducted in broad daylight—in government buildings and right in front of a policeman, by a policeman! Suddenly, a wave of realization nearly knocked her over. A cop! Oh, heaven. They’d caught up with her!
She stopped. “Is this about the parking tickets?”
Her captor pivoted, frowning. “Parking tickets?”
She didn’t waste any time launching into an explanation. “Because if it is, I’m willing to pay up right now. I would have before, but they really weren’t my tickets. They were Bob’s.”
“No, listen, lady—”
“I’m a law-abiding, Volvo-owning citizen,” she said, knowing she was babbling, but desperate to get herself out of this pickle. “See, we use it on weekends sometimes—”
“Would you be quiet?” he said impatiently as he tugged her across the street “This isn’t a parking problem.”
Her brain whirred as it attempted to shift gears. Not a parking problem. What could it be?
“And I have to say, what you did just now was really dumb.”
She couldn’t believe the nerve of the man. “Well, pardon me!” she snapped back. “My mother always warned me against getting in cars with strange men.”
Which was a blatant lie. Her mother, who lived and breathed macramé during Cathy’s formative years, had never given her daughters any such practical advice.
Bad Necktie paused as he again opened the car door for her. “Let’s get one thing straight, Cathy—”
“How do you know my name?” she interrupted. “Who are you?”
To his credit, the man actually seemed to consider answering her question. His strong jaw worked from side to side as he thought “Never mind. Believe me, you’re not going to get hurt—unless you insist on jumping in front of moving vehicles.”
“Never mind?” she asked, flabbergasted. “I’m being kidnapped, and you’re telling me to never mind?”
“Nothing’s going to happen to you.”
“If you’re so harmless, what’s with the gun?”
“I’m a cop,” he answered.
“Don’t try that with me—I watch TV. I’ve seen enough shows on cops gone bad to know to be scared.”
He rolled his eyes. “I was just trying to explain why I have a gun.”
“Would you care to explain why you threatened me with it?”
“I needed to get you out of there.”
He was a gun-toting goon, was what he was. He—
Just then, a thought occurred to her, and the blood drained out of her face. “You’re not…not FBI, are you?”
He tilted his head. “Why?”
Her heartbeat stopped. Of course! “Is this about my parents?” With all the excitement about the wedding, she hadn’t been listening to the news much lately. There could have been a coup d’état in Central America that she hadn’t heard about, or some disaster that her crazy parents might have become embroiled in. Or worse…Maybe they were back in the U.S…in jail!
“Your parents?”
“Because if it is, I think I can clear up a few details,” she said quickly. “They were never really deported, you know. And the only reason they were growing that hemp in the first place was to prove a point about deforestation. Not that I agree with their tactics, mind you, but—”
“What?”
“You see, you can make paper from it, and all sorts of useful products—”
“Hemp?” The man looked more confused than ever. “Lady, what the heck are you talking about?”
“My parents,” she explained.
“This isn’t about your parents, or parking tickets, or hemp, or anything like that,” he told her. “It’s about your fiancé.”
Every muscle in her face went slack and her heart pounded a slow beat of dread. “Bob? What about Bob?”
He nodded to the back seat. “Get in, and we’ll discuss it.”
“No! I want to see Bob!”
“You will, as soon as you get in the car,” he insisted.
Cathy couldn’t have said why, but in that instant she detected a note of sympathy in the man’s voice, and a little regret. She looked again into his blue, blue eyes and was surprised to see a hint of kindness there. And she was struck anew by this man’s appearance. There was something familiar about him…something about the face. Could it be possible that she’d seen him before?
Yeah, right. On a post office wall, maybe!
But maybe Bob was in some kind of trouble—maybe that’s why he had been late for their wedding. She had to find out
“You promise I’ll be able to see Bob?” He nodded. “When?”
“Immediately.”
Taking a deep breath, she slowly turned and got into the car. He followed, and before they were even fully situated in the back seat, Cathy heard the automatic locks click into place.
“Hey!” she cried, turning on him as though this were a betrayal of their verbal agreement. “Am I a captive?”
Bad Necktie, once again his old unreadable self, ignored her. He faced forward and looked straight into the driver’s rearview mirror. “Brooklyn,” he instructed.
“Brooklyn!” Cathy protested. “Bob would never go to Brooklyn.” Not even at gunpoint.
“You got that right, lady.” Bad Necktie turned to her, cynical humor sparking in his eyes. “Bob’s not in Brooklyn.”
“You lied!”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Where is he, then?” she asked in growing panic as the car moved forward, then turned onto a side street. “You said I would see him!”
“Look behind you.”
For a moment, the car slowed to a stop, allowing Cathy a good look at a black limo at the curb of the avenue they had just pulled off of. There in the back seat, his body turned so that his face was pressed against the back window, was Bob. His wire-rimmed glasses made his blue eyes appear owlishly wide with surprise as he also caught a glimpse of her.
“Bob!” she cried, squashing her face against the glass of the sedan’s back window. He was a captive, too! But why? And why in heaven had she ever agreed to get into this car?
Bob’s pudgy hands flattened against the glass, and the sight of his cuff links glinting through the limo’s lightly tinted window brought tears to Cathy’s eyes. He was all gussied up for their wedding! He hadn’t been late, after all. Just kidnapped. She called his name again, and, as the limo pulled into traffic, she could have sworn his lips formed hers, too.
“Stop them!” she cried to the man beside her. “They’re taking him away!”
“He’ll be all right where he’s going.”
But how could she be sure? She remained plastered against the back window, watching her fiancé recede into the distance until he was no more than a bug-eyed speck. Suddenly, Cathy mourned for the wedding that was supposed to have brought her so much garden-variety happiness. So much normalcy. Perhaps she hadn’t looked forward to her marriage enough, at least to the loving and cherishing part. But then, Bob had never seemed quite so dear to her as he was right this moment, being hauled away in an unmarked car.
