The Negotiator by Melinda Di Lorenzo

Author:Melinda Di Lorenzo
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2021-03-09T14:24:31+00:00

Chapter 13

For the first time in the thirteen months since it had happened, Norah let herself turn her mind toward the tragedy instead of away from it. She knew it was unhealthy to keep it in. After Greta’s abduction and the horrifying loss of her life, Norah had been the first to jump onto the therapy wagon. Her brother had fought against it. Her parents had understandably fallen apart, and both rejected the idea of seeking any kind of closure. Which Norah believed was a falsity anyway. But that hadn’t stopped her from doing everything she could—even at that young age—to fight her way back to normalcy. To salvage her life and do something good with it. To act. To thrive. To help create a world where no one would ever have to share the same grief-riddled experience that had torn apart her own family.

“I thought I was succeeding,” she told Jake. “And then I met the Morrisons.”

The second she spoke the name, she was tossed back to the moment she’d walked into their house. And the more she talked, the more vivid the memory became.

It was a sprawling rancher on a stunning acreage just outside of Mission, BC. The exterior had been tastefully manicured to look just right. From the grass to the stables to the riding circle to the figure-eight pool. Norah’s feet had slowed while her eyes drank it all in. And the interior was no less impressive. Every inch of the place had been custom-decorated. Artwork worth millions hung on the walls in the foyer. Imported rugs sat under antique tables, and everything was shiny. Oak. Marble. Teak. Crystal. Even Norah—who’d grown up in a wealthy home in a sought-after neighborhood, who’d inherited her share of wise investments, and who lived without worrying about counting her pennies—had been all but blown away by the Morrisons’ home.

The parents were equally impressive. The father wore a bespoke suit. The mother was decked out in diamonds that sparkled far more casually than their worth. Both were polite and soft-spoken, and Norah recalled thinking that the word “classy” had never been so apt. Despite their daughter’s missing status, Mr. and Mrs. Morrison had remained quite calm, with the father being slightly more tearful than the mother. Their abducted girl was named Pearl, after her great-great-grandmother. Professional photographs showed her to be a dark-haired, bright-eyed beauty.

“I asked all the same questions I always do,” Norah said. “The things that give me a baseline for the family and let me know that I can move forward. I always check that they haven’t already contacted the authorities. I make sure they don’t have a suspicion of who it might be, because that can backfire. I gather as much personal information as I can so that when I speak to the kidnapper, they associate me with the family and not the police.”

It was easy to remember what the Morrisons had told her. In fact, all of the details were surprisingly clear, considering how much time Norah had spent avoiding thinking about it.

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