Lost in Relocation
The entire trip back to Blue Serene Lake Resort, all Amber could think about was her conversation with her sisters and the old skeleton key in her purse. Had it truly gotten this dire? She had to admit that it had. Calvin probably would never be the same again—Blue Serene would pay for his medical bills, including rehabilitation, and she would definitely honor their agreement over the bed and breakfast. But he had lost a pinky and perhaps even a kidney.
Her thoughts were interrupted when her phone rang over the SUV speakers. It was Dan. Her stomach knotted with anxiety as she reached over and connected the call. "Dan?"
"Amber! I have a security team coming to meet you now. We are going to take a little holiday and settle into our new place."
Her heart fluttered. He was doing this before the set time. Maybe Jessica was underestimating the men in their lives. "Now? I wanted to get some things done at—"
"I am sorry, my darling, but we need to try and finally get ahead of this. Whoever this is wants something I am not willing to part with—our happiness. Pull over, wait a few seconds, and turn off all your location systems like they taught us. Then drive to the restaurant that never seems to have the wine I want and wait for the team. They have the rest of the directions."
Amber blinked several times. This was getting a bit insane.
"I know all of this is crazy, but Samuel, Albert, and I have been talking. We feel that this man is dangerous and he may still be ahead of us. We need to get ahead of him and trip him up at the same time." There was a pause, and Amber tried to collect herself. "Please, love."
"Okay, Dan. I am pulling over now. I love you."
"I love you too. I will see you soon."
The call disconnected just as Amber's tires fully stopped. She began by turning off the location and GPS systems in her phone and her car. She sighed and pulled a small, secure phone from her purse and dialed the only number in its address.
"Virginia."
"What's going on, Am? Are you okay?! Where are you?"
"Dan is doing the move now. It seems we are going dark."
There was a short pause. "Good. Maybe Jessica was wrong and you don't need the key. Keep the phone. It has a satellite connection. If I find out anything, I will contact you. Love you, Am."
"I love you too, Ginnie."
Amber took another cleansing breath and started her car. She drove to a beautiful restaurant set against the mountains. She parked to the side of the building where it was hard for the security cameras to see her or her car. When she stepped out, two of her security guards approached her casually. She handed her keys over; one drove her heavily tinted SUV out of the parking lot while she ducked down low in the back of a second SUV and was driven away.
"It's best if you stay low, Mrs. Lance-Trace," the passenger spoke with his head turned to the driver as if he were talking to him. "Just in case he can hack traffic cams, we don't want him to find you."
She nodded silently and repositioned her body so that she was more comfortable. "Do you have your phone?"
"No. I actually left it and my handbag in my vehicle."
"That's good, Mrs. Lance-Trace. Very smart."
Jessica slowly read the text from Virginia. It had been her idea for Virginia to give them all satellite phones. She relied on Albert for everything, but sometimes she needed to do things on her own.
003: "It seems the party is starting early. Everything is now dark."
She nodded as she sent a text of her own.
001: "Maybe the heads are a bit better than I had presumed. Love you."
She looked up with a bright smile as Albert entered the room. She watched his eyes flick to her hand as the little phone slipped from it into her handbag. Her smile widened. "Come here." She wrapped her arms around his neck and looked into his eyes. "I can't always go to you for everything." She kissed him. "Virginia has some nice toys as well—besides, I don't want you to ever get bored of me."
He smiled and wrapped his arms gently around her waist. "There is no way I will ever be bored with you."
As the Lances, Traces, and now Cummings coordinated, Sebastian sat in his lab with a frown. He had decided to watch and wait—allow his seeds to spy and then he would go in and set things up inside the main house.
It seemed Dan Trace was moving a bit faster than he had expected. His frown deepened as he lamented not killing Calvin Tucker. Because of him, his plans were now off-track. He calmed himself and ordered one of his sleeper drones to follow the cars that had just left the Lance-Trace estate.
He became more frustrated as he began to review footage. Had they switched the cars? His hand slammed down on the desk before him; the keyboard rose and slammed back down. Why hadn't he deployed two of the stealth drones?! He had left three on the estate for such an eventuality.
His body suddenly stiffened, and for the briefest of moments, his mind went blank.
"Mommy can't know of this. This is a horrid mistake. A tremendous miscalculation." He began berating himself, his eyes blank and distant the entire time.
He shook himself back to the moment and his hands began furiously typing. He kept one drone on the convoy while two others began to backtrack to figure out when the center car had changed and where it could have gone.
It wouldn't have mattered. Sebastian Montague III was looking for the wrong thing. Dan had changed vehicles in the second tunnel the convoy went through. As the new car continued on with the convoy, and the decoy car went up a secluded backroad, Dan himself had gone down a ravine alongside the bridge and met up with a security team with four-wheel ATVs.
He was now going in a completely different direction, toward an underground complex he had acquired—and sold to a dummy company—when he was fresh out of high school. He smiled, pretty pleased with himself. He always knew the crazy acquisition, as his father had called it, would come in handy. His smile fell. He just hoped all of this would work. He needed to make sure that Amber was not just safe; she had to be calm and happy, too.
He wouldn't allow her to suffer ever again.