Chapter Fifteen
The Apartment
Leah packed the last of her things into a final box, then glanced around the living room.
Her few pieces of furniture, as well as the ones that had belonged to the real Isla Morris, were being donated to charity.
With Isla’s mother dead—of an overdose, as Alyssa had suggested—there was no one to take possession of anything.
As for the clothes and personal belongings, they had been boxed up for donation as well.
Leah sighed. She was glad to be finished with this part.
She glanced at the time. Owen would be here in a few minutes to pick her up. He’d rented a small moving van for hauling her boxes to the new place. His friend had come through with one of the studio apartments Owen had mentioned. Leah was excited about the move.
She couldn’t deny having some regrets about walking away from the last three years of her life, but what else could she do?
The friends she’d made had been friends of Alyssa’s.
They hadn’t really cared about Leah. And that was okay.
She didn’t need those people. She’d recognized their self-centeredness from the beginning, but they were her roommate’s friends, so she’d ignored their shortcomings.
Lambert and the Chicago PD had caught Alyssa. She and Louise Douglas were in jail, both charged with murder. The Douglas children were with their grandparents. Leah would never understand how a parent could do this to her children.
Alyssa was spilling her guts in hopes of a deal. Louise had said nothing since her outrageously expensive attorney had counseled her to keep her mouth shut.
Leah had given her statement to Lambert, and she, of course, would have no choice but to testify at the trials as a witness. But until then, she was not looking back.
The woman who had pretended to be Isla Morris’s mother had gotten scared and turned herself in.
Alyssa had admitted that she and Louise had gotten intimately involved and devised the entire scheme.
Now they would both be going to prison. No matter the deal Alyssa wrangled, she was not getting out of a murder charge.
Leah regretted that she had ever believed the woman. But she was a good person, and she’d always believed the best in people. She would have thought she’d learned her lesson with Chris, but apparently not.
She had contacted Bechel at the insurance company and signed over her portion of the insurance proceeds to Raymond’s children. Whatever kind of selfish person he had been, he would have wanted his children cared for, Leah felt certain.
The sound of the buzzer announced that Owen had arrived. She rushed to the door and was just about to press the necessary button to grant him entrance when she remembered that there was a possibility it wasn’t him. She pressed the intercom button instead. “Yes?”
“It’s me,” he said.
A smile broke across her lips. She pressed the button that would release the entrance-door lock and then waited just outside her door for him to arrive.
When he hit the top of the stairs, her heart started to pound.
Watching him walk toward her had the organ racing.
She loved the way he walked. Loved every part of him.
During their weeklong vacation, he had explored every inch of her and she had done the same to him.
Her smile stretched even wider at the beautiful bouquet of flowers he carried.
“You’re here,” she said, sounding breathless.
“I am.” He stopped directly in front of her. “You ready?”
She nodded. “I am so ready.” She looked at the flowers. “Are those for me?”
He smiled. “They are. You said no one had ever sent you flowers. I intend to do that as often as possible.”
She kissed him, almost crushing the flowers in the process.
They spent the next few minutes carrying boxes to the rented van. When she locked the apartment door for the last time, she turned to Owen.
“I’m glad this is behind me.”
He smiled. “Me too.”
“But the best part—” she reached for him, slid her arms around his waist “—is what’s in front of me.”
He leaned down and kissed her.
She could not wait to see where their journey took them next.
The Colby Agency, 7:30 p.m.
VICTORIA SHUT OFF the light to her office and closed the door.
It had been a long day, but a very good one.
Several investigations were settled, and all investigators and clients were safe.
This was always what she hoped for. When love bloomed between an investigator and a client, it was all the better.
The Colby Agency had a long history of solving the most difficult cases as well as bringing some amazing people together.
Victoria was very proud of her agency and of all who’d worked here, past and present.
They were all such great people. In all the years she had been at the head of this agency, she had only ever lost one investigator and that was one too many.
The many, many clients they had helped often sent postcards or letters of thanks even years later.
Victoria truly loved the agency and the work they did.
She smiled as she reached the lobby. Lucas waited there for her.
She should have known Jamie would call him.
She hadn’t wanted to leave this evening without Victoria.
Everyone else had gone. But Victoria had needed some time alone at her beloved window, watching life on the street below.
Not that she had any troubles to worry about.
No. Life was well within the Colby family.
But there were times when she just needed to stare out that window and remember all the times she had done so before.
This evening had been one of those times.
The sight of Lucas waiting for her lifted her nostalgic heart. No matter that they were both getting up there age-wise, she still saw him as the dashing man who had stolen her heart when she had been certain her heart would never again feel that kind of love.
Like James, her first husband, Lucas had been a master spy, his work the darkest of dark operations.
He, James and Victoria had been dear friends for a lifetime before tragedy stuck so very hard.
First, her son had been abducted, and then her husband had been murdered.
Before James’s death, they had desperately searched for their child.
She regretted so that James had not lived to see their son returned. Jim was a good, strong man.
He hadn’t returned to Victoria that way, however.
Jim had been horribly abused and brainwashed.
He had come back to her as a killer, determined to murder her.
But somehow she had reached him and he had changed.
Over the years since that time, he had married and had two beautiful children.
One of which, Jamie, now worked with Victoria, running the agency.
Luke, the younger of the two, was in medical school.
Life was as perfect as could be expected in this changing world.
“I thought,” Lucas announced, “that I would take you to dinner, my love.”
Victoria put her arm in his and turned to the elevator. “I think that is an amazing idea.” She grinned. “Jamie called you, didn’t she?”
He grinned as well. “She did. She said you were looking a little sad.”
Victoria rose onto her tiptoes and gave him a kiss on the jaw. “Not sad, just lost in memories.”
The elevator doors opened and they stepped into the car.
“I hope I was present in those memories.”
“You, my dear husband, are in the very best of all my memories, going back to the night we met.”
“The night James stole you away from me,” he teased.
Victoria laughed. Lucas swore to this day that he had been smitten with Victoria, but it was James who had swept her off her feet that long-ago night when they were all so young.
“But you were always there,” she reminded him. “Always a part of our lives, for better or worse.”
He nodded. “I was, indeed.”
“Thank you, Lucas.” When he met her gaze with a questioning look, she explained, “For being the man who helped me love again.”
“No thanks necessary, my dear. I was happy to wait for that moment.”
The doors closed and the elevator swept them down to the lobby.
When the doors opened once more, rather than finding an empty space where only the security guard manned the information desk, she found a room full of people.
She gasped. Not just people. Everyone from the agency…
even some she hadn’t seen in years. And the massive lobby was decorated beautifully with balloons and flowers and streamers.
“What on earth?” she murmured.
“Happy birthday, Victoria,” Lucas said, turning to her. “I hope this one is the best one yet.”
Jim and Tasha, Jamie and Luke, they hurried forward and hugged her. Despite her best efforts, tears filled Victoria’s eyes.
“You didn’t say a word,” she said to Jamie.
Jamie grinned. “It was a surprise, Grandmother.” She gestured to a small stage that had been erected with a waiting microphone.
Victoria surveyed the clapping crowd as they urged her to speak.
“Come along,” Lucas said, ushering her toward the stage. “They’re all waiting to hear from you.”
Victoria stepped up onto the stage and scanned the crowd. She smiled. Lucas didn’t have to worry. This was certainly the best birthday ever.