“Is it still hot outside, Mama?” Abigail asked. “I was sweating really bad yesterday.”
My baby…
Isabella grasped that horrifying tell on Monica’s face. “You’re correct in that I can look out for her in ways you have not,” she said. “Kidnapping. Such a foul word to use. I’vesavedher, Monica. Take her back to America now, if you insist, but know that there’s no real life for her there. She’ll rot and fester ineven private education, where she’s been mercilessly bullied by another low-class, low-brow girl whose mother has tainted her husband’s illustrious line. Much like you have attempted to this otherwise sanctified family tree.”
Abigail rolled the suitcase behind Monica and took her hand. “Okay, Mama. I’m ready.”
Monica swallowed her pride. “Say goodbye to Grandma, honey. She has to stay here.”
“Goodbye, Grandma. Thank you for taking me to France. I had a good time.”
Monica smoothed the back of her daughter’s hair.She’s so polite.Even when she didn’t know what was happening, who she should completely trust…
Polite to a fault. Monica knew another girl like that. One who had existed a long time ago and learned some terrible lessons the hard way.Me.
“I don’t want you coming anywhere near her unsupervised again,” Monica hissed at her mother-in-law. “If I had my way, you would never see her again. And you will not set foot on Warren Manor as long as I’m around. You cannot be trusted around any of our children.”
Isabella slightly cocked her head in mild amusement. “I will always do what I must for this family. Even if you are too soft to do it yourself.”
“Dowhat?Hold my daughter prisoner while you wait for her to be old enough, groomed enough to be married off to a boy she barely knows?”
“Louis Beaumont is a lovely young fellow who would have made an excellent playmate for our Abigail. They got along quite swimmingly in Nice. I was very much looking forward to taking her to his birthday party next month.”
Lest she said anything testy that she would later regret, Monica held firmly to Abigail’s hand and pushed Isabella aside. “Let’s go.”
“Bye Grandma…”
Those two simple words almost made Monica cry as she rendezvoused with Nina’s team in the living room of the guest house and followed them back to the SUV still idling its engine in the front driveway.
Mercy’s Grove was soon a mote in the distance. Monica clung to Abigail as they raced back toward Phuket, Nina sitting across from them with one of her brothers and pretending not to notice that their client was crying.
With tears still streaming down her cheeks, Monica ensured that the white bunny was back in Abigail’s lap, her daughter staring straight ahead at the strangers in the car with them. She never asked who they were, and Nina and her brother never spoke to her.
There was little communication until the car finally pulled up to the hotel Monica was staying in until she could fly out again the next day. If fuel, inspections, and human rest weren’t all necessary, they would have gone straight to the airport and flown back to New Englandimmediately.
“Thank you for your help.” Monica didn’t know what the tipping protocol was in Thailand, but she didn’t think twice about removing a few hundred dollars from her wallet and handing them to Nina in the hotel lobby. The woman took them without thinking about it and placed the folded bills in her inside jacket pocket. “I would not have had to strength to stand up to them like that if it weren’t for you and your crew. Now…”
“No worries, Mrs. Warren. I’ve got two stuck to tailing you and guarding the lobby for any Beaumonts until you’re on a plane in the morning. Besides, we’re just getting started in this part of theworld. Something tells me your daughter isn’t the first one to be trafficked through the Beaumonts’ lair.”
Trafficked.Monica truly hated that word.
After saying their final farewells, Monica led Abigail up to their room. It was still the middle of the day in Phuket, but there would be no sightseeing. They would order room service from the hotel kitchen for dinner and Abigail would be welcome to plant her butt in front of the TV to watch whatever she wanted. Just as soon as Monica went through her daughter’s suitcaseandtook a shower with her in the bathroom.
“It’s important.” Monica hurried Abigail into the other room, where the shower was already on. She began taking off her clothes and urged her daughter to do the same. “I’m sure you took a bath last night, honey. But I just want to check a few things. Come on. I’ve missed you, darling.”
She tied Abigail’s hair on top of her head. While she needed that hair out of the way to keep it from getting wet when it wasn’t being properly washed, Monica also needed to see the skin beneath it even more. Her duty now was to inspect every inch of her daughter’s body for bruises, cuts, and scrapes.If anybody laid one hand on her…If she had bumped into a table… fallen down the stairs… tripped over her own feet and split her lip open…
Monica would kill them. All of them. Isabella. The Beaumonts.All of them…
But Abigail was clean. The only sign of distress on her body was an old scab in her ear from when she had an allergic reaction to some calla lilies and scratched her skin open. Nevertheless, Monica inspected it closely, telling her daughter that she was proud of her for not constantly ripping the scab open again andagainas the child often did.
“Mama…”
Monica sat on the bench in the shower, Abigail on the floor as the water hit the tiles between them.
“Yes?” She lifted her head, not caring if the showerhead hit her directly on the scalp and wetted her hair.
“Did Grandma do something bad?”
