CHAPTER THREE-1
1324 Words
CHAPTER THREE
WARWICKE POURED ORANGE juice and added it to the tray. He did a quick check and realized he’d forgotten salt and pepper. Grabbing the shakers off the kitchen table, he wedged them onto the tray, between the plate and the coffee.
He wasn’t sure Fabiana would be up to coming to the kitchen. So he’d decided to take breakfast to her. He picked up the tray and turned.
She was standing in the doorway, her dark eyes filled with fear.
“Good morning.”
She just looked at him.
“I made you breakfast.”
She jerked a little and looked at the tray in his hands, licking her full lips. Her stomach rumbled loudly.
Warwicke pretended he hadn’t noticed. “Do you want to eat here or in your room?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
Warwicke panicked. “I’m sorry. What did I say? Whatever it was, I take it back!”
He looked so miserable Fabiana took pity on him. She shook her head and moved toward the table, sliding into one of the padded chrome chairs. The breakfast set was a nostalgia piece, modeled after furniture from the 1950s.
She ran a hand over the clean Formica surface, smiling slightly. Her parents had had a similar piece in their kitchen.
Warwicke settled the tray carefully onto the table in front of her.
She looked up and frowned. “Thanks.”
Some of the tension left his long body. Fabiana allowed herself the pleasure of looking into his gorgeous face for just a second, enjoying the near perfection of his features. She felt the tiny tug on her heart his presence always caused. It was a response that had made her keep him at arm’s length since she’d met him.
As a woman in the racing world, the last thing she needed was to fall under the shadow of one of the men in the field. Nothing would make that happen faster than having a relationship with any of them.
Especially one as talented and well known as Warwicke Honeybun.
She took a few bites and sipped the coffee. It all tasted delicious.
Warwicke sat down across from her with a mug of coffee. He watched her eat for a moment, sipping from his mug. Then he set it down on the table and looked at her. “I need to know what happened last night.”
She swallowed a bite of scrambled egg and looked up at him, frowning. “You tell me.”
Warwicke blinked in surprise. “You don’t remember?”
She glared at him. “You know I don’t. You must have drugged me.”
He just stared at her for a long moment. Finally he said, “You showed up on my doorstep after midnight, covered in blood and in shock. You had a bruise on your cheek from when Lautaro hit you and a new bump on your head. I put you into the shower and rinsed you until the blood stopped running, then I tucked you into bed and called my brother. He’s a doctor. That’s all I know about last night.” He stood up and moved to the sink. Every line in his long, scrumptious body rigid with indignation. He set his mug into the sink and stood with his back to her, staring out the window.
Fabiana bit her lip and frowned. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe he didn’t kidnap her and drug her. After all, he did make her breakfast. She shook her head. He was obviously demented. Covered in blood. Yeesh! What an imagination. “And here I thought Edric Honeybun was the thriller writer.”
Warwicke turned around, his jaw clenched with anger. “Obviously you have no memory of what happened last night, Fabiana. But I can assure you that you came knocking on my door and you were covered in blood. You’ll need to take my word on that.”
She nodded and stood. “I’m leaving now, Honeybun.”
Warwicke took note of the stubborn tilt to her small chin and the way her fists clenched at her sides. Her eyes sparked with determination. He’d seen that look, and the results, too many times to ignore it. When Fabiana made up her mind, it pretty much stayed made up.
He shrugged. “You’re free to leave Fabiana. I didn’t bring you here by force. You came to me.”
She turned away and headed for the bedroom. Though she hadn’t seen her clothes when she’d gotten out of bed she figured they had to be there somewhere. A quick search turned them up in the bathroom, in a sodden pile at the bottom of the shower.
Remembering his story of how he’d showered blood off of her, Fabiana felt a small jolt of discomfort at the discovery. But then she told herself Warwicke Honeybun was a very smart man. He would have foreseen the need to create a plausible story for her.
Obviously he was more devious than she’d assumed.
She sorted through the sodden clothes, reluctant to put them on in their current condition, and then looked for her shoes. They were missing.
She dressed quickly, shivering as the cold clothing hit her warm skin.
In the distance Fabiana heard a phone ring. The sound made her stomach clench with fear. She hoped, whoever it was, he or she wasn’t calling about her.
Sighing, she headed for the kitchen.
###
* * * *
“BRITA! WHAT’S UP? IS Percy all right?” Brita’s disgusted sigh was a reassuring but frustrating sound. The Honeybun family was starting to worry that Percy would never get his lady love back.
“I assume he’s fine. I wouldn’t know. I need to ask you about another driver.”
Warwicke stiffened, his mind racing. Godric must have told her about Fabiana. Dammit! What could he say to protect her until he could find out what had happened? “I’m listening.”
“Casio Lautaro was found dead in an alley last night. He was beaten pretty badly and stabbed repeatedly.”
Warwicke felt the blood draining from his face.
“Where are my shoes?”
Warwicke’s hand tightened on his cell phone as he turned.
Fabiana!
“I have to go, Brita. I’ll see you here in a few minutes.” He disconnected and looked at Fabiana. “You can’t leave yet.”
“I thought I was free to go.” She took a step toward him, her small fists clenching at her sides.
He glanced at the clock on the wall. “I need you to talk to somebody about last night. She should be here in ten minutes.”
She paled. “Who?”
Warwicke turned away, tidying up the kitchen in an effort to avoid responding. When she didn’t repeat the question he turned back around.
She was gone.
He checked the front door but it was still locked. He had the key in his pocket. Running toward the back of the apartment, Warwicke found his bedroom door closed and locked.
He knocked. “Let me in, Fabiana!”
Nothing. He pounded again, thinking about the Glock. He’d put it back into the nightstand beside his bed. “Come on, Fabiana. We’re trying to help you.”
Silence.
Warwicke swore, stepped back, and gave the door a solid kick. It slammed back into his room and he ran in. The sliders out to the ground level patio were open and the room was empty.
She was gone.
###
* * * *
“HOW DID IT GO?”
“We had a slight problem but I’ve handled it. The girl showed up with a knife.” He chuckled. “I was tempted to let her finish Lautaro off herself...save me the trouble.”
“But you didn’t?”
“No. She passed out. I think Lautaro fed her one of his trademark date r**e drugs or something. I appreciated her giving me the knife though. It came in handy. I was just gonna use a baseball bat. But that’s so much more work.”
The man stood up from behind his desk and walked over to the small, well-stocked bar in his office. “When you left she was still alive?”
“Yeah, she was covered in blood though.”
“The cops didn’t find her did they?”
“No. I don’t know how she did it but she managed to get out of there somehow.”
He sipped his brandy, closing his eyes in pleasure as the rich liquid slid like warm velvet down his throat. “That’s good then. I want her clean. For now at least.”
He disconnected and returned to his desk, dropping into his chair with a heavy sigh.
Things had gone from bad to worse. The public was little more than an angry mob. Profit margins were in the sewer. And now he had a dead man to deal with, damage control to perform, and a prima donna to manage.
###
- Writer
