M.L. Gamble - Trust With Your Life

www.millsandboon.co.uk

With love for two beauties, Kathleen Rose Seaman and Sara Kathleen Seaman. Also for Beulah Mae McKinney Curran Beckland, the dearest Valentine.

Molly Jakes—Kidnapped, chased and framed for murder—will she end up loving the man she trusts…or trusting the man who kills her?

Alec Steele—This Australian may have been brainwashed to destroy the person closest to him.

Frederick Brooker—This millionaire businessman was seen pulling a trigger, but it’s what he’s done that wasn’t seen that could prove much more fatal.

Dr. Alicia Chen—The beautiful psychiatrist caught between love and fear. Will her Hippocratic oath rule her actions?

Eric Brooker—This deaf teenager is very accomplished. Will his trust be betrayed by those closest to him?

Mason Weil—Brooker’s slick attorney walks a tightrope between duty to his client and duty to his conscience.

Lieutenant Cortez—Paid to uphold the law, he does his best to work both sides of the street.

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Epilogue

February 14

Molly Jakes grabbed her cellular phone out of the front seat compartment and slammed the car door. She glanced at her watch, grimaced at the 11:53 reading and stuck the phone in her purse. Slinging the strap over her left shoulder, she shivered and buttoned her coat.

Fog drooped down like gray flannel from the starless sky, refracting light from the surrounding buildings into a bright blur. Molly shielded her eyes against the glare. She could just make out the shape of the Summer Point Towers office complex a few yards away to which she had been summoned.

Checking to be sure she had locked her car door, Molly headed toward the bulky form ahead, holding her arms close to her body. It was February and forty-two degrees—cold, very cold for California.

It was also one of the last places Molly would have wanted to be if she had been given a choice. Handling service complaints against her telephone installation crew was part of her job. But being called out on Valentine’s Day from the warm bed she had collapsed into three hours before seemed above and beyond, she thought grumpily. As she got near enough to the building to see the glass doors of the entrance, she attempted to shake off her rotten mood.

But her brain wasn’t through grousing. It was bad enough to be thirty-four and to go to bed alone on the traditional lovers’ holiday because there was no likely lover within a hundred yards of her life. But to finally get to sleep only to be awakened by a shrill phone ring followed by a leering, male voice that taunted, “Hey, Jakes, I hope I’m not interrupting your big night...” Those sweet words were spoken by Jerry Williams, one of the more obnoxiously chauvinistic dispatchers, a man she had less respect for than a cockroach.

The heavy glass door swishing closed behind her, Molly finally managed to lay to rest her slightly self-pitying thoughts and take a deep breath. Hey, even cockroaches were entitled to their fun, she reminded herself. Another day, another buck. Think of the town house you want to buy. That’s why you took this promotion, remember? So you could earn enough money to buy some overpriced California real estate all by yourself. And this is how you do it. So be quiet and be happy you’ve got such a good job when a couple of million people are out of work.

Standing in front of the lobby directory, Molly searched out the office number for the alarm company she was seeking. She found Inscrutable Security listed in Suite 330.

She pressed the elevator button with a finger stiff from the cold and rode up alone, composing an all-purpose apology for the owner of Inscrutable, one Frederick Brooker, which she hoped would serve the situation.

Williams hadn’t been clear about the problem but said that the foreman was having dial-tone problems with another telecommunications line carrier, that the crew was going to blow the installation deadline and that they “requested, as per union guarantee, you know,” Jerry had crowed, “a manager type ASAP to run interference” with an unhappy client.

The steel doors slid open and Molly disembarked, peering to the left, then the right. Small painted numbers on the marble-faced wall across from the elevator directed her to the left.

Just her luck. The hall lights to her left were off. She took a few tentative steps into the gloom and stopped. A door eight feet away was marked 320, which meant 330 was several yards farther along into the unseeable.

“It was a dark and stormy night,” Molly muttered into the silence. She squared her shoulders and headed down the carpeted hallway. The air inside the building smelled of salt water as strongly as it had outside. The Pacific was only a few blocks away, and the building’s decor was typical of the growing beach town of Summer Point, sixty miles from L.A. Seascapes, painted rattan pictures and a collage of hemp and polished shells hanging on the walls she passed reinforced the style.

She stopped in the darkness and peered at the information on a doorway.

Suite 328 California Psychiatric Clinic, Inc.

Dr. T. Kahn/Dr. A. Chen/Dr. S. Thompkins

Molly grinned. “Not a bad time to get my head examined,” she said aloud, immediately feeling foolish to be talking to the woodwork. She also scolded herself for feeling so ill at ease. She was an experienced professional. This was a safe part of the county. Chill out, Molly, she ordered her thoughts.

Hurrying to the next door, Molly practically had to put her nose to the wood to read.

Suite 330 Inscrutable Security

A thin line of light escaping under the door spilled over her toes. She allowed a sigh of relief. Resting her hand on the doorknob, she turned it, eager to get inside even if it was to confront an angry client.

But the door was locked. Molly turned harder, but the knob didn’t budge. She raised her fist to knock, then heard the sound of a small chime and snapped her head to the right in the direction of the elevator. Someone was coming up. She was quickly reminded of the fact that she had not seen the security guard in the lobby her dispatcher had told her to check in with.

Was it the guard?

The hiss of the elevator’s air brakes told her she would soon find out. Despite her earlier admonitions to herself, Molly’s heart began to race. She remembered she had pepper spray in her purse, as well as her phone, which had nice, big buttons. She banged her knuckles against the door in a more frantic rhythm than she had intended and glanced toward the elevator. A husky, dark-skinned man wearing a black jacket and black pants, carrying a bright orange gym bag, stepped into the shadows and began walking briskly in her direction.

She only saw his face for a second, but it shocked her, mostly because she recognized him even though they had never met. The man with the bag was Paul Buntz. He had been a local sportscaster in Los Angeles when she was growing up, though she hadn’t heard anything about him for years.

Reacting to her fears, Molly reached into her purse. At that moment, the door she was leaning against opened and she gave a little yelp. Off balance, she nearly tumbled inside. A tall, very tanned blond man stared at her, his blue eyes narrowing when he caught the movement of her hand into her purse.

“What’s this about then, miss?” he demanded, his deep voice full of the lilt and music of a native Australian.

“I’m—I’m sorry, Mr. Brooker, is it?” She removed her hand and extended it, then threw a glance down the gloomy hallway. Paul Buntz was nowhere in sight.

“No, I’m not Brooker. You got business with him?”

Molly noted that the man seemed to dig his boot-clad heels into the thick carpeting, while managing to lean back and tower over her all at once. He crossed his arms and looked more angry than wary now.

“I’m sorry. Yes, I do have business with Mr. Brooker. My name is Molly Jakes. I’m a field supervisor with Pacific Communications. I’ve got a crew of men on the premises, and they called me out to assist with a problem.”

Her hands fell to her sides and she tried a smile out on the stranger. “I’m sorry if I startled you, but there was a man in the hallway and I got a little spooked.”

The blond man quickly brushed by her and stuck his head out for a look, then he took her by the arm and moved her into the office. He closed the door.

He locked it.

Molly took a few steps toward an empty receptionist’s desk, watching the Australian lean against the wall and quite openly appraise her from head to toe.

His very blue eyes finally came to rest on Molly’s face. “No one there now, love. Shouldn’t be sending a chit like yourself out alone in the dead of night, if you ask me. What’s your boss thinking?”

Molly straightened her back as the muscles in her face tightened. It was the nineties, but some men still lagged a century behind in their regard for women, she reminded herself. But why did a modern-day Neanderthal have to look like this guy?

“Well, this is only a guess, but I’d say he’s thinking he had a job to get done so he sent the person responsible for doing it. Are my men from Pacific Communications here in this suite, do you know?”

His smile grew wider at Molly’s challenging tone. “Just me. But I saw a van and a crowd of chaps with hard hats and the like around back at the receiving dock when I came up a few minutes ago. Probably your crew. Can I walk you down?”

“No, thank you,” Molly replied, not liking the fact that her voice held more sarcasm than was really necessary. She realized the stranger was getting the brunt of what she’d wanted to say to her dispatcher. Molly prided herself on doing a great job in a field overwhelmingly populated by men—the majority of whom felt pretty much like this guy did about women—without letting their jibes rankle her. She tried hard to smile sincerely and reached into her bag for a business card.

With a snap, she left it on the desk. “If you see Mr. Brooker, would you mind telling him I’m down with the installation crew?”

The stranger raised his brows, which were bleached white by the sun. He grinned. “I’ll do it if I see him. Have a good one, love.”

Molly nodded, then hurried past him out of the office and down the dark hallway. She pushed the button for the elevator and glanced back into the darkness. She made out a tall shape and was a little annoyed to realize that the Australian stranger was watching her.

He’s being kind. Chivalrous, one side of her brain said.

He’s getting a last look at your fanny, the other said, with a bit more conviction.

Molly stepped into the elevator and stabbed at the button marked B as well as the Door Close command. Staring straight ahead, she thought about the Aussie. It wasn’t until the other passenger made a noise that Molly realized she was not alone.

Paul Buntz looked more frightened than she felt, Molly realized after the initial jolt of adrenaline surged through her. His eyes were wide and his mouth tense. She had the distinct feeling he had been expecting someone else.