The Property of a Lady - Elizabeth Adler [161]
Flinging on his jacket, he slammed from the office and took a cab over there.
“Sorry, Mr. Warrender,” the man at reception told him, “but Miss Reese has already left.”
“Where’s she gone?” he demanded.
The man shrugged. “I can’t say, sir.”
“Goddamn,” Cal said savagely. “Let me talk to the station director.”
“He’s gone too, sir,” the man said, avoiding his eye.
He strode to the pay phone in the lobby and dialed her home number. He let it ring for a long time but there was no reply, not even her answering machine. He wondered where the hell she was, cursing himself again for involving her in what had turned out to be a dangerous game. There was no way to reach her. He would just have to wait until their date at eight o’clock, and then he was going to tell her she wasn’t leaving his sight for a minute until this affair was over, even if he had to move in with her! Dammit, didn’t she realize she had just told the world that she knew who the “Lady” was? Didn’t she even consider what a dangerous position she had put herself in? Gloomily he took himself off to the Four Seasons to wait for her.
He sat in the pleasant flower-laden cocktail lounge, nursing a drink, listening to the piano music and watching the ebb and flow of Washington’s bright young things, checking his watch worriedly every ten minutes. Eight o’clock came and went. At ten past his name was paged. There was a message from Genie saying she couldn’t make it. He called her number again and got no reply. He called the operator, got the home number of the station director, and called him.
“There’s no problem, Mr. Warrender,” he said. “Obviously we thought about the risk. We put a limo at Genie’s disposal and two bodyguards on her house. I shouldn’t worry. She said she might be going away for a couple of days. She also said she knew she would be okay.”
“Wanna bet?” Cal said with a snarl, slamming down the phone and heading for the parking lot.
He covered the distance from Foggy Bottom to N Street in five minutes flat and sat in the car, staring at Genie’s house. It was dark. Fear gripped his throat as he walked up the steps and peered at the windows. All the curtains were drawn. He hesitated, his finger on the bell, then he tried the door handle instead. It opened under his touch and he stepped warily inside, calling her name. He heard a distant muffled bark and remembered Genie had a dog. He groped for the light switch, to the left of the door. The hall was tiny, a few feet of polished floor with a pretty rug and an antique console with his two dozen cream roses arranged in a tall crystal vase.
“Genie?” he called again, opening the door leading off to the left. He turned on the light and stared at the empty room. Oriental rugs, white sofas, flowers, soft lights—but no Genie. The door on the other side of the hall refused to budge and he put his shoulder to it savagely. It gave suddenly and a huge dog flew at him, lathering him with excited licks, barking with joy at being freed.
“Okay, okay, boy,” Cal said soothingly, trying to push the door wider. “Where’s Genie, eh? You tell me, boy.” He slid through the gap into the kitchen, peering behind the door to see what was stopping it. Two men lay on the floor, their wrists and feet bound and their eyes and mouths taped. They were ominously still. He dropped to his knees, feeling for a pulse. It was slow but they were alive, and he guessed they had been drugged. He searched the rest of the house quickly but there was no sign of Genie.
There was a wall phone by the kitchen counter. He called an ambulance and the police and then the FBI, and told them Genie was missing. Then he called Cornish at home and told him to get his ass over to his office right away.
Even though they saw