stomach tightened with anxiety. Mitch clearly had every confidence that the court proceedings would go his way. “Where exactly are we going?”
“To the judge who married us, finalized our separation and granted us joint custody.” He hadn’t, of course, answered her question, although he probably thought he had.
“I have to tell certain people I’ll be gone, or they’ll worry.”
“Too bad you didn’t think of that when you ran away with my daughter. You just disappeared.” He leaned forward, his arms resting across his knees. “I wouldn’t trust you to call anyone, Camryn, so you’re going to just disappear again. Shouldn’t surprise anyone who knows you. You can spin whatever crazy tale you’d like when you get back.”
Resentful at the control he had over her, Kate flung more clothes and a pair of shoes into the suitcase. In actuality, there wouldn’t be many people who would miss her. Her parents had been dead since she was five years old, and she had no close relations left. She supposed that her neighbors might get curious about her extended absence, her friends might wonder where she was and her lawyer might leave messages on her answering machine, but no one would raise an alarm. She’d taken a leave from work, which meant co-workers wouldn’t note her absence. She was entirely on her own. A sobering thought. She could disappear from the face of the earth and very few people would notice.
She stalked to her closet and rifled through her dresses and suits, looking for just the right one to wear into a courtroom.
“Don’t tell me those are yours, too.”
She jumped at the low, gravelly voice that came from right behind her. She hadn’t heard him move from the chair, but now he stood peering over her shoulder at the neatly hanging garments in her closet. She understood his comment perfectly. She doubted that Camryn had ever worn a tailored suit or conservative dress in her life. Kate affected a nonchalant shrug. “So my tastes have changed.”
He let out a laugh and wedged a broad shoulder against the wall beside her closet. “I get it now. The puzzle pieces are beginning to fit. You’ve got some rich fool believing you’re a real prim and proper Miss Priss.”
“Miss Priss!”
“With your practical underwear, your tailored suits, your hair all pinned and braided.” He slipped his thumbs into his pockets and ambled across her room, nodding at the shelves that lined one side. “Leather-bound books in your bedroom, a piano in your living room.” He looked genuinely amused. “So your new man’s fallen for it, has he? Obviously so, since he must be paying the bills.”
Jamming her balled-up knuckles onto her hips, Kate cast him a withering stare. How she hated his implication that Camryn had been living with a man for his money! “How do you know I haven’t worked for everything I have?”
“Come on, Cam. Even if you worked long enough to earn a little cash—which is doubtful, since you’ve only been gone for six months—money slips through your fingers like water.”
He clearly thought very little of Camryn. The fact that he was basically right about her character did little to ease Kate’s resentment. “Maybe I got financial help from my—” She stopped on the verge of saying sister. Did Mitch know that Camryn had a sister? If so, he clearly wasn’t aware that they were identical twins. Perhaps it was better not to mention anything about sisters. Prudently, she finished with “My family.”
“You told me you didn’t have family.”
A surprising pain accosted Kate. So Camryn hadn’t acknowledged her existence at all. Pushing the pain aside out of pure necessity, she pursed her lips as if she’d been caught in a fib. “Okay, so maybe I don’t have any blood relations. But I do have people who care about me enough to extend a loan.”
“Maybe so. Maybe you borrowed the money to feather your elegant new nest. Won’t your new boyfriend be surprised when your true colors shine through?”
“You know nothing about my life now. Nothing.”
His lips curved in mock appreciation. “You’re good, Camryn. You’re really good. I like your lady-of-the-manor act. I like your upscale clothes, and your sophisticated new look.” He stopped beside her, leaned in too close and inhaled deeply. “And your expensive new perfume.” His nearness sent a frisson of awareness through her bloodstream. “I even like your smooth new way of walking.” His gaze roamed her face. “It’s all very effective,” he whispered. The odd intensity in his golden-green eyes suddenly cooled, leaving only contempt. “But you can drop the act with me, chèr’. It won’t do you any good. In case you’ve forgotten, I caught the last show.”
Thoroughly shaken, Kate drew back from him and gripped the edge of the dresser for support. Her hand itched to slap him. He’d invaded her personal space in a way no one ever had; in a way that disturbed her just as much as his earlier manhandling. She would resist the urge to slap him, though. He might kill her. Or, he might leave. Then what would the future hold for Arianne?
Only one thing Kate knew for sure—she needed more information.
She’d play the role he’d cast her in until she got it. And if, along the way, she discovered that this hot-tempered, hard-eyed man was indeed violent or emotionally cruel—“mean,” as Camryn had described him—she wouldn’t hesitate to take whatever steps were necessary to protect her niece.
Even if that meant running with her.
“I’m ready to go,” she muttered between clenched teeth, her hands still gripping the edge of the dresser behind her, “whenever you are.”
“Good.” With a faint smile that didn’t reach his eyes, he again leaned in too close. “Then let me make it official. I’m placing you under citizen’s arrest.” From behind her came a click-click sound, and cold metal encircled her wrists. “For the crime of kidnapping.”
She jerked her arms, found them bound together and stared at him in horrified surprise. He’d reached behind her and handcuffed her!
“Kidnapping,” she repeated in panicked disbelief. “You’re charging me with kidnapping?”
“It was against custody orders for you to take Arianne out of state…which you well know. Not to mention the six months you kept her away from me.”
Alarm buzzed in Kate’s head. Could she, as the baby’s aunt, be charged with kidnapping, or accessory to kidnapping? She didn’t believe so, but she didn’t know much about kidnapping laws. “If you really think I kidnapped her, why don’t you just call the police, here and now?”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you? All you’d have to say is that it’s your turn to keep the baby, and I’d be the one forced to prove otherwise. By the time they got the mess straightened out, you’d be long gone.” He shook his head. “No, chèr’. The only place I know I’ll get justice is in my neck of the woods.”
His neck of the woods. Where, exactly, was that? From his use of the word chèr’, she guessed Louisiana…but she couldn’t be sure. Cajun communities in Texas, Mississippi, even South Carolina and California, also used the term. She certainly couldn’t ask him where he was from. If she was Camryn, she’d know.
Kate stiffened in fury as he gripped her arm and forced her into step beside him. He seemed pretty darn sure of himself. Maybe she’d tell the authorities her real name and charge him with kidnapping
