Jack wasn’t sure if the guards could see him, but he figured yes. There were a dozen other cars in the parking lot, sickos already here for their purchases. Like a man walking into a black-tie gala, Jack took the steps slowly. Cocksure. Ready.
At the top of the stairs he bent to tie his shoe. At the same time he dropped a cell phone and a loaded Glock in the grass. Once more he went over his escape plan. If Eliza didn’t cooperate. If she screamed and tried to alert the armed guard outside her bedroom door, then Jack had a sedative-filled syringe in a plastic case in his shoe. He would keep it in his waistband once he was alone with her.
If he had no choice, he would stick her leg with the drug. It was fast-acting and would wear off in twenty minutes. Enough time for him to make his escape. If that happened, when she stopped moving, he would slip out her bedroom window, climb down, and sprint for the cell phone and gun at the top of the stairs.
A single button on the phone would signal every operative on the ground that there was a problem. By then Terri would’ve activated two agents parked on the main road, one of whom would drive into the lot. Terri and Jack would jump inside their car and an hour later—dressed as a monk—Jack would be on a plane headed for Miami. Oliver had overseen the details, so Jack wasn’t worried.
Should he need to escape, every minute was orchestrated.
But that wasn’t going to happen. Not tonight. With clear understanding of the facts he made his way to the massive front doors of the Palace. One of Anders’s housemaids answered and pointed him to a room off the foyer. The same room where—earlier in the day—Jack had been introduced to Eliza.
He didn’t have to wait long. A massive man carrying an assault rifle entered, and without saying a word he escorted Jack two floors up a spiral staircase. Jack felt his heart rate quicken. Were the guards always like this? So intense? Jack stayed cool. He’s on to me. How could he be on to me?
Never mind, Jack was ready. He memorized every detail of the walk up. Windows and hallways and the number of rooms each floor seemed to have. Guards at the end of each hallway. When they raided this place in three days, he would need to know where the exits were, and how best to handle the guards.
The burly man led Jack down the hallway on the third floor to a door trimmed in gold. Much nicer than the other doors that lined the hall. Don’t think about what’s happening behind those doors, he told himself. Just get in the room and make the pitch.
Jack’s escort opened the door. “The walls are thick. You have an hour.”
And like that, Jack was inside Eliza’s soundproof room. Alone with her.
CHAPTER EIGHT
For this is what the Sovereign Lord says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. As a shepherd looks after his scattered flock when he is with them, so will I look after my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered on a day of clouds and darkness.
—Ezekiel 34:11–12
No matter how indifferent or angry Eliza wanted to appear, she couldn’t get around the truth. She was scared to death.
When Henry Thomas entered the room, Eliza rose from her enormous satin-covered bed. She stood and pulled her robe around her shivering body. Her father’s voice echoed in her head. Be kind to him, Eliza. I’ve been planning this since you were nine years old.
The guard outside the door had given her a different kind of warning.
“Don’t disappoint your father, Eliza.” That’s all he had to say. Something like hatred dripped from every word.
Eliza’s hair was a mass of pale curls, and her makeup made her look like a model in a bridal magazine. She wore a floor-length pink silk robe and she moved to the other side of the room, where she sat on a high-backed swivel princess chair. Henry Thomas closed the door behind him.
Their eyes met, but only for a few seconds before Eliza looked away. In days she’d be married to this man. But she couldn’t stand the thought of being in the same room with him. Let alone… She felt sick to her stomach.