Page 49 of Somebody's Watching Me
“Alright everyone, listen up!” Klausen pocketed his phone. “Both Claudia and Emily Fairweather were kidnapped last night.”
There was a millisecond of shock before everyone started talking at once. Liam held up his hands and shouted for them to be quiet. “Give us the details, Klausen.”
“Claudia Fairweather was at home with her partner,” Klausen said. “According to him, she got up sometime around midnight to check on their daughter, and he assumed she went to sleep on the bed they keep in the nursery. This is apparently normal, and he didn’t realize Claudia was missing until he woke up.”
“Madison is fussy at bedtime and hasn’t broken her afternoon nap routine.” Evie snuggled closer to Samuel, both holding their girls tight. “I saw Claudia a couple of weeks ago and we talked about sleep methods that had worked for Theo.”
The idea of Evie having a friendly conversation with Claudia Fairweather would have been ludicrous a few years ago. In all her life, Jamison had only ever known the woman to be a viper. But after Evie exposed her exploits of mishandling Fairweather funds, Claudia left Fairweather Holdings and entered a new phase in life by becoming anadvertising executive for a small company in Charleston. There she met Parker, and Claudia’s bitch factor dropped significantly when they had their daughter two years ago.
“Madison is alright?” her father asked, checking his phone. Jamison peeked at the screen but didn’t see any messages from Claudia’s dad. Trevor wasn’t exactly Grade A father material, but you would think he would have been alerted by now and be a little concerned that his daughters were missing.
“Madison is safe,” Klausen confirmed. “The girl is saying she didn’t see her mother leave.”
“Forced entry?” Will asked. “Or are they still assessing?”
Klausen looked sick to his stomach. As far as Jamison knew, the most he’d ever dealt with was the occasional stalking or attempted break-in. “Assessing, but as for now, there doesn’t seem to be any forced entry.”
Piled on top of their parents still, Harper and Theo whimpered while Samuel murmured softly to soothe them. Evie looked as pale as Klausen, staring blankly ahead as she struggled to keep it together. “So, they had the security codes to get into Claudia’s house, like they did here,” she said. “Does that mean they have it for all our homes?”
“If they had the codes, then I would say yes. We need to start a complete overhaul.” Liam worked on his phone, expanding something on the screen. “What about Emily?”
“She was visiting friends in Seattle.” Klausen peered over Liam’s shoulder, his bushy eyebrows going up and down over whatever he was seeing. “They went out to dinner, and Emily claimed to have forgotten her phone at the friend’s apartment. She took a taxi to retrieve it but never returned to the restaurant.”
“Her phone is still in the apartment,” Liam confirmed. “I’ll need the address to verify, but it hasn’t moved from that spot in the last twelve hours.”
Jamison snapped straight. “How do you know where her phone is?”
“I had Rowan equip all your cars, phones, and electronic devices with tracking software. The information on your whereabouts routes directly to my phone.”
“You’ve been spying on us?”
Finally, his head lifted, and Liam’s gaze swept over her. “That’s kind of my job.”
Jamison didn’t think she could get any angrier, but nope. Her freshly manicured fingers curled into claws, and she told herself to keep it together.
“Easy.” Her father touched her lightly on the back when Liam’s attention returned to whatever Klausen was saying. “Your anger needs to be directed at me or Samuel, not him.”
“You can bet your sweet ass I’m angry with you.” Refusing to storm to the other side of the room, she moved to sit in Simone’s corner wingback. “I had a meeting with Emily on Tuesday when she was in Texas, and I remember I complimented her on the new smartwatch she was wearing. Can you track that?”
“Already did, and it’s with her phone,” Liam replied, but he was grinning when he next spoke. “However, Claudia still has hers on.”
Everyone, even Theo and Harper, rushed to gather around him.
“Georgia?” Evie wedged herself in front of Samuel to see. “Does that say Georgia?”
“It’s south of Atlanta.” Jamison tapped Liam’s phone screen to expand the map. “That’s in a pretty rural area, isn’t it?”
“It is,” Liam confirmed. He rattled off the coordinates to Klausen, who was already calling someone. “She’s moving slow, almost like she’s walking.”
Klausen relayed the information to whomever he was speaking to and moved to a corner for privacy. Jamison tried to listen but was too busy paying attention to what Liam and Samuel were saying.
“Locals in the area will be first on the scene. We’ll know something within the next fifteen to twenty minutes.”
“Someone needs to call Trevor.” Samuel had Harper in his arms, holding her high so she could dangle precariously over Liam’s shoulder and not miss anything. “He should hear it from one of us.”
“Hell.” Next to Jamison, her father blew out a blast of annoyed air. “He’s in Australia on vacation for the next two weeks.”
“We call.” Theo tugged at his pant leg. “I’ll goes wit cha, Papa.”
