The Millionaire Meets His Match
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Emilie Crosswhite laid a surprisingly firm hand on Cass’s knee, pressing her to stay seated. She thrust her small but determined chin forward. “Well, Gabriel,” she announced, “if the police won’t help this girl, we certainly must.”
Gabe fixed Emilie with a warning look. “Now, Emilie...”
“Now, Gabriel...”
“What is it you propose to do?”
“I don’t know yet. You’ll have to help me figure that out. But it must be something that brings Crudley home safe to Miss Appleton.” Emilie patted Cass’s knee to emphasize her comforting words.
“You can’t mean you want to cooperate with these alleged kidnappers?” Gabe said incredulously.
“If that’s what it takes.”
Gabe threw up his hands in disgust. “Oh, for Pete’s sake, Emilie! Do you seriously believe Mark Gallagher will allow you to write a blank check to pay off some bungling extortionists who can’t even snatch the right cat?”
“He’s a wonderful advisor, but it’s my money,” Emilie insisted serenely. “I don’t see how he can stop me.”
“Emilie, you know very well—”
“Gabriel, I adore you but—”
“Excuse me,” Cass said, “but I already told you I didn’t want—”
The phone jangled loudly, arresting the verbal free-for-all. The three combatants stared at the white instrument perched on the wicker table as it rang again. Emilie Crosswhite and Gabe Preston moved toward it together until Emilie halted Gabe with an imperious look. She picked up the receiver and spoke calmly into it. “Yes, Mark?”
Emilie turned to smile at Cass, pointedly ignoring Gabe who stood, hulking over her, apparently trying to look menacing. “Put him through, dear,” she said. For the next few moments she concentrated on her conversation. “Yes...yes, I do... I see... Well, of course I do... No, no I wouldn’t do that... Is he, er, she all right?... Good, because if anything were to happen to him, uh, her, naturally I wouldn’t pay... Yes, I understand... Yes... Well, that’s quite a lot of money—not the sort of sum I have just lying about the house. I’ll need a few days to make arrangements to have it ready.... No, that would be quite impossible. I’ll need until Friday at least—Friday, that’s right... Very well.” Emilie hung up the phone and turned to her expectant audience.
Emilie still ignored Gabe and looked at Cass, breaking into a triumphant grin as she did. “They’re giving us until Friday. I told them I couldn’t possibly have the money before then. That gives us three whole days to come up with a plan.”
Gabe took a quick step to Emilie’s side. “What kind of plan?”
“The police may not be interested in our problem now,” she said haughtily, “but once we capture the catnappers and hand them over, I assure you the authorities will take us seriously.”
Cass could hardly fail to notice she seemed to have acquired a new ally. Neither could Gabe. “This has gone far enough, Emilie. Despite my advice, you’ve done all Miss Appleton claims she wanted you to. You’ve stalled the kidnappers. Now stay out of it.”
Emilie shook her head determinedly. “She was counting on the police to help her after I’d done my small part. But as you’ve so logically explained, they won’t I’ll have to, instead.”
Gabe stared into Emilie’s unwavering blue eyes. Sighing heavily, he ran his fingers through his sun-streaked hair. “Just how do you two amateur detectives propose to catch these crooks? Where are you going to begin your investigation?”
Emilie flicked a glance at Cass, who could only look back blankly. Her meeting with the society matron hadn’t gone quite as she’d hoped. She’d never planned on doing any investigating on her own. She’d expected to turn the whole mess over to the police. Suddenly left to her own devices, she hadn’t a clue what to do next. She shrugged and bit her lip. “We’ll think of something,” she said lamely.
Emilie Crosswhite was not so easily daunted. She looked Gabe square in the eye and smiled engagingly, as though they hadn’t been arguing ten seconds before. “You could help us,” she said sweetly.
“No.” The softness of the immediate response did nothing to lessen its forcefulness. Gabe picked up Emilie’s tiny fragile hand and held it tenderly in his own. “You know I can’t. And you know why.”
For a long moment the two of them looked at each other as though conducting a private conversation in complete silence. Emilie patted Gabe’s hand and smiled pensively. “I know, dear.” She turned back to Cass. “I suppose we’ll just have to pay the ransom.”
“What?” Gabe and Cass chorused with varying degrees of surprise.
“I don’t see any other choice,” Emilie said to Cass. “And it’s only ten thousand dollars,” she said to Gabe, adding with a meaningful lift of one eyebrow. “Hardly worth arguing about.”
“Ten thousand dollars?” Cass echoed. Unlike Emilie Crosswhite, she was horrified at the thought of spending so much money in a lump sum for anything. At the same time she was relieved that complying with the kidnappers’ demands would not be impossible, after all.
“Ten thousand dollars?” Gabe repeated in turn. “Are you sure that’s what they said?”
“Ten thousand dollars,” Emilie confirmed. “Since you won’t help us capture the kidnappers, we’ll just have to pay them off. I would have given them ten times that amount to secure Princess Athabasca’s return.”
“I know,” Gabe said. He frowned in confusion. “It’s almost as though whoever planned to take her doesn’t understand how much she’s really worth. I don’t like it.”
Cass stared at him in amazement. “I don’t believe you! A minute ago you were insisting Mrs. Crosswhite not pay anything, and now you’re insulted because they’ve asked for too little money!”
Gabe conceded the seeming oddness of his remark with a wry smile. “Not exactly. I am worried, though, that whoever stole your cat doesn’t have a better grasp of what its market value should be.”
“Worry all you like,” Cass replied in exasperation. “Personally I’m thrilled. If they’d demanded any more, I would never have been able to pay. As it is, by emptying my bank account and floating a small cash loan on my credit card, I can come up with the ransom.”
“Now, dear, you shouldn’t have to spend your life’s savings, even for such a worthy cause as rescuing your beloved pet. When I agreed to the kidnappers’ terms without consulting you, I made myself responsible for paying. I had no intention of forcing you to accept the financial burden.”