#FreeDailyRead - Forbidden, Book 4 (Lady Sotheby's Curse) - Part 11

Chapter 15
 
Jayne was so exhausted that she slept until almost noon the following morning. Today was Sunday, thank god. She didn’t have to go into work. After the restaurant was open, she would have to work six days a week, Tuesdays through Sundays, with Mondays her only day off.

After eating breakfast, she busied herself by cleaning up the house. But she had trouble concentrating—all she could think about was that damn blackmailer and the money that Rob would probably have to fork over tomorrow.

She found herself thinking: would it really be so bad if Rob simply refused to pay any more money and the blackmailer followed through with the threat and sent the story to the tabloids?

She stood there for a long time with the broom in her hand, staring unseeingly at the kitchen countertop, imagining the gutter press’s gleeful reaction to such a juicy pile of dirt...the sleazy reporters and paparazzi following her and Robert around Oxford, endlessly hounding Lord and Lady Astor.

Robert’s parents would never forgive her then, not a chance. If he stayed with her after that, he would be totally estranged from his family. And forget the restaurant project, that would be finished.

And the wedding of her dreams, having an intact biological family and a doting set of British grandparents for her children—she could see that fairy tale crumble to dust right before her eyes.

Her thoughts shifted to Schröder. No matter how insistent Robert was, she still had doubts about the detective’s work ethics. More time meant more money for the man, after all. How freaking difficult could it be to go to Cyprus and find a degenerate like André Gaillard? He was the son of a famous French movie star, and he’d been in the tabloids. If he was in Cyprus, surely he couldn’t be that difficult to track down. He was a semi-celebrity—people would have seen him out and about.

Before her rational mind could come up with a dozen excuses why it was a bad idea, Jayne dropped the broom and strode to the living room. She switched her laptop on and typed “Limassol, Cyprus” into the search engine, then scrolled through the results.

It was beach town on the southern coast of Cyprus, with just about enough attractions—like a medieval castle and a historical port—to pull in a steady flow of tourists. Even though it was supposedly the second-largest city on the island, only around one hundred thousand people lived in it. Hell, André was probably still there, hiding out and thinking himself oh-so-sly and invincible. He and his accomplice would just choose another bank and pull the same type of stunt.

The anger was back, and she made an impulsive decision on the spot. Typing rapidly on her computer, it only took her a couple of minutes to determine that there were several direct flights to the small Mediterranean island that she could catch this evening. It would be expensive, but it could be done.

She made a snap decision. She would fly to Cyprus today and track down André herself before he could tell Rob to wire the money. She quickly checked the time differences. Noon in Changshu would be six a.m. Cyprus time. If she left soon, she would have the entire evening and night in Cyprus to check all the fancy clubs where André would surely hang out.

It may have been a long shot, but it was better than puttering around the house playing Little Miss Homemaker.

She had to try!
 

Chapter 16
 
The city of Limassol had no airport, so Jayne booked an expensive last-minute ticket from London to Larnaca. It appeared to be the nearest one and was the island’s main airport, less than an hour’s drive from Limassol. She grimaced at the exorbitant price she would have to pay—there were budget airlines that offered flights there but, unfortunately, none that she could make tonight.

She called for a taxi, then threw the few clothes she thought she would need into a Gucci carry-on bag and locked up the house tight.

The taxi arrived just as she stepped out the door, taking her to the Gloucester Green bus station in the center of Oxford. The next bus to Heathrow was just leaving, and she had to bang on the doors to get the driver to let her on. She nervously counted the minutes as the bus made stops in Thornhill and Lewknor, which seemed to drag on forever. Her creative mind now in full gear, she kept going over different scenarios that might happen once she was in Cyprus and had found André Gaillard. She needed to catch him before he had a chance to send that next wire transfer message, come hell or high water.

When she finally reached the airport, she had less than an hour left until take-off. She jogged all the way through the terminal and barely caught the British Airways plane that would take her straight from Heathrow to Larnaca—the agents were calling her name over the loudspeakers when she scrambled into the gate area, wheezing from exertion.

During the four hour flight, she felt a little guilty at times about taking this trip without telling Robert, but of course he would never have agreed to her going in the first place. He would have thought it was far too dangerous.

There was a bit of turbulence as they flew over Southern Europe, and a thousand thoughts raced through her mind about this impulsive plan, making her even more jittery. Should she have brought along a disguise? Should she have searched for more condemning facts about Gaillard?

hat if he wasn’t in Cyprus at all right now?
 

Chapter 17
 
The plane touched down in Larnaca just after ten p.m., Cyprus time. By then Jayne was a nervous wreck, now doubting that this was such a wonderful plan. She had never been to Cyprus or anywhere like it, and she had no idea what to expect.

She was a bit surprised when she walked through the corridors and out into the expansive airport lobby. She wasn’t quite sure what she had expected, but the building was modern and spacious—it seemed almost brand new.

But her first positive impression of this new country quickly vanished. She had made a reservation for a rental car, but when she reached their desk, she found that the company closed at ten p.m. She angrily went to the airport general information desk, and the Cypriot woman simply shrugged and said, “What can I do? If they want close, they close.”

“Well, is any rental car office open?”

“Of course,” she said, pointing. “At end of corridor.”

When Jayne reached the last counter, she found a man who looked half asleep sitting behind a computer screen. It turned out they only had two cars, both of them economy models, Ford Fiestas.

“That’s fine,” Jayne said, pulling out her driver’s license and credit card.
“You can drive manual vehicle?” he said, looking at her doubtfully.

“What do you mean, manual?”

He made a motion with his hand to indicate a stick shift.

“Oh.” Jayne wanted to groan—she wasn’t a great driver in the first place, but she could barely drive a stick. “Of course I can drive a manual,” she said confidently.

As she filled out the documents, she also opted for a GPS navigator, which was an extra fifteen euros—she figured she would need it.

When the clerk handed her the keys, he said, “Go out that door and turn right, walk fifty meters, you will find car there. Red car.”

“Turn right,” Jayne said.


“Yes.”

As she walked away, he called out, “Remember keep left!”

Jayne frowned. “Okay,” she said, waving. She thought maybe the man didn’t know his right from left, but was sure she could find the car. The airport seemed fairly deserted at this hour.

When she went out the door and into the parking lot, a wave of heat hit her with such force she slowed to a stop. It was the middle of the night and the temperature must have been above ninety degrees. The air was balmy and smelled of brine. She pulled off her jacket before continuing on.
By the time she found the lot with the rental car company name on it, she had already broken into a light sweat. She spotted a red compact in one of the spaces.

She hurried over to the driver’s door, was about to stick the key in, and then did a double take as she glanced inside.

What the hell?

She found herself looking into the passenger seat.

The steering wheel was over on the other side.

“Oh, no,” she groaned, and hoped it was some kind of mistake, some kind of driver training car. Then she moved over to the two cars next to it, peering through the windows, only to find they all had their steering wheels on the right-hand side.

“Don’t tell me these people drive on the left-hand side of the road, too,” she muttered aloud, but then she remembered reading this morning that Cyprus was once a British colony. “Damn it,” she hissed, yanking the door open and sliding behind the wheel. The main reason she had never driven a car in England was because they drove on the “wrong” side of the road, at least from her perspective.

And a stick shift to boot!

Now she understood why the clerk had yelled, “Remember keep left!” in his broken English.

Jayne sat there behind the wheel for a long few seconds, thinking of just marching back into the airport and buying a ticket for the first flight back to London...

You can do this, she told herself.
 
* * *

A few minutes later Jayne was driving on a modern, four-lane divided highway that looked more or less like any American interstate...except that she felt like she was looking out the windshield through some kind of widescreen rear-view mirror, with the oncoming cars to her right. Merely maneuvering the vehicle out of the airport parking lot had been a challenge. She’d ground the gears so hard she wouldn’t be surprised if she’d left behind transmission shavings on the concrete and was thankful that few people had been around to witness that black comedy.

Then, before she’d driven more than thirty seconds she came upon a dreaded roundabout, like they had all over the UK and which she had zero experience with. She had the navigator working, and by the time the annoying female voice told her to “exit the roundabout” she had already passed the correct one, and she drove around in circles three times before she got it right.

At least the road signs were not only written in the national language, Greek, but in English as well.
 

Chapter 18
 
Jayne finally relaxed a little bit when she had the little car droning along the divided highway towards Limassol, but it didn’t last long. She had completely glossed over the problem of not showing up at the restaurant tomorrow morning.

Before leaving home, she had checked all the return flights from Cyprus to London. Whether she tracked down and stopped André or not, she could hopefully catch the flight that left at eight a.m. tomorrow morning, which would put her back in London about ten a.m., since she would gain two hours due to the time difference. Still, it would be early afternoon by the time Jayne got to the restaurant.

Beatrice would be livid.

Better to diffuse this situation than have it blow up in my face, she thought.
She pulled out her cellphone and, keeping an eye on the road, called Beatrice.

Her business partner answered after the second ring.

“I hope I’m not bothering you,” Jayne said. “I hate to call you on a Sunday, but—”

“I’m actually glad you called, Jayne. I was just about to call you.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. One of our important construction clients had an emergency in Amsterdam, and that’s where I am now, fixing the damn problem, which was trivial.” She made a low growling sound in her throat. “I get so tired of these fire drills, can’t wait until I can quit this job. Anyway, I don’t think I can get to the restaurant tomorrow at all, unless a miracle happens.” Beatrice paused. “Can you hold down the fort until Thursday?”

“Sure,” Jayne said. What a stroke of luck, and a what relief!

Then Jayne realized Beatrice was waiting to see why she had called. She said, “I, um, wanted to let you know that...” Jayne faked a cough, desperately trying to think up a reason to have phoned her.

“Are you all right?” Beatrice said.

“I’m fine, just some dust in my throat.”

“Oh. Where are you—in a car?”

“A taxi,” Jayne blurted. “I called because I wanted to let you know that I found a decent pasta cooker that sounds like it’s in prime condition, great price. It has baskets to cook six portions at once.” More lies. She was beginning to lose track of them. “I’m on the way to check it out right now. Should I snap it up before anyone else does?”

“Oh, that sounds perfect. Yes, please go ahead and buy it—do you have enough cash?”

“Yes, I have enough.” What a total load of crap, Jayne thought guiltily. “I—I hope I can snag it before anyone else does.”

“Well, good luck with buying it. I have to run.”

“No problem, see you tomor—”

“Thursday,” Beatrice broke in.

“Thursday then.”

Jayne cut the call, sweat running down her belly. At least that problem was solved.

Read Part 10 here.

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