Caught in the Frame (Ponderosa Pines Cozy Mystery Series Book 3) by ReGina Welling (novel24 .TXT) 📕

be pulling open the door, rifling through the contents, and clicking photos of anything she found. He waited the allotted two minutes before reengaging the lock. Two minutes more for her to check the rest of the room and get out.

Time crawled past while he waited, finger poised to execute the command that would lock the door behind her—all the while knowing that for Baylee, the same five minutes must be whizzing past.

When the digital timer clicked to zero, Javier pushed the enter key with an unsteady finger. Baylee had agreed to a second foray if this one turned up nothing, but Javier wasn’t sure he could do it again. If this much adrenaline was surging through his veins, how much more would be turning Baylee into a jittery mess?

Javier spent another five minutes erasing all evidence that Vincent’s lock had been activated from the system. Baylee should have checked back in by now. Cold dread settled into his belly when he pinged her cell and got no response.

Now what? Should he stay here and prepare to clear the history if she had needed to trigger the lock again, or should he go look for her?

It was already too late, but Javier had no way of knowing that.

* * *

Baylee checked the hallway in both directions, watched the red light on the video camera flicker and go out. To her right, the soft click of the door lock deactivating sounded louder to her ears than it should have. With a glance over her shoulder to make sure the coast was still clear, she slid inside. All the rooms in this section were laid out the same, only the fabric and paint choices differentiated one from another.

Bathroom to the right, closet to the left. Beyond that, a small seating area took up the left side of the room, with a compact executive workspace in the far corner. A king-sized bed flanked by a pair of nightstands rested along the right hand wall. The nightstand closest to the door contained a small safe. That was the most likely place to find what she was after, but to be thorough, she quickly checked the closet and desk area for a laptop or briefcase that might hold additional evidence.

Finding neither, she turned to the safe, counted down the seconds until the lock clicked open.

Javier had been right, this Remy Vincent character really had been behind everything that had happened to turn her husband’s life—and hers, by extension—into a smoking ruin. She spread the documents on the floor, snapped several photos of them, then packed it all back into the safe, being careful to conceal any evidence of the search.

With thirty seconds to go, Baylee flipped the door that concealed the safe closed, and double-checked that nothing appeared out of place. Satisfied, she exited the room.

Adrenaline rushed through her—narrowing her focus to a small point while everything else blurred, quickening the breath in her body—that was the only excuse she had for not noticing Remy standing there. When he called out, “Hey, what are you doing?” She let the juice flow through her and took off at a sprint.

Remy gave chase; legs longer than hers eating up the distance. Baylee knew she was sunk. Fumbling while she ran, the pulled the SIM card from the camera; her only thought now was to hide the evidence somewhere she could retrieve it later. He was older, out of shape, so she used the last burst of adrenaline to put on some speed and turned the corner with extra space between them. If she could get back to the more populated area of the castle, maybe someone would help her.

She made it out of the south wing, feet flying down the short staircase that would get her back onto the level of her own room. Turning into the west wing of the castle, she wondered where was everyone? Behind her, his feet pounded toward the stairs; getting louder as he began to close the gap.

Scanning the area with frantic eyes, she saw only one possible place to hide the SIM card. She lost a few precious seconds, but when it was done, she knew he would never find it.

The hallway ended in a T. Baylee searched her mind for which direction to take, and that was her fatal mistake. She dodged right, and when the hallway turned left again, found herself racing toward a dead end. There was no way she was going to escape now. She turned to face her fate.

Behind her, Remy panted out the evidence of his lack of physical fitness. Baylee estimated that if she could get past him, she could make it back to the intersection of the T and double her lead.

“What were you doing in my room?” Sweat beaded on his brow from the same exertion that reddened his face and shortened his breath.

Baylee gauged the distance with her eyes, without realizing she had telegraphed her plan. Rising onto the balls of her feet, she launched into a sprint which ended abruptly when he sidestepped to clothesline her. Carpeted, though they were, the heavy stone floors underneath were unyielding, so when Baylee landed, the blow to her head stunned her into complacency. She felt him lift her with more strength than she would have given him credit for, and the world tilted, then grayed to black.

* * *

The next clear thought Baylee had was that someone must be driving nails into her skull. She wished they would stop. Temple throbbing, she tried to lift her hand, to press fingers against the pulsing pain, but something was weighing it down. Her eyes fluttered partially open, then closed tightly again. She cataloged the places where she ached. Her head, her neck, her shoulders. Full awareness returned slowly, bringing with it the memory of a desperate flight ending in pain and darkness.

Remy.

Her eyes snapped open. With her photographer’s insight into human emotion, she knew the look on his face had