Free Found Wanting by Joyce Lamb Page A

her. She'd already determined he wasn't here. That meant he had to be at the airport, waiting and worrying.
    Hang on, baby, I'm coming.
    Brushing the dirt from her hands, Alaina pushed to her feet and raced around the building to the back. The sliding door on the cement slab that served as a deck seemed to be the best option. But when she examined it, she discovered that someone else had reached the same conclusion. The door, half off its track, slid jerkily open, and Alaina stepped into the kitchen and hit the light switch.
    The devastation stole her breath. Dishes that had been in the cupboards had been smashed to bits on the floor. The microwave looked like it had been hammered by a brick, the cart that had held it reduced to sticks. The ficus tree that had thrived near the sliding door had been ripped apart, the dirt from its pot thrown around by the handfuls.
    The rubble crunched under her feet as she picked her way through it. When all was said and done, it didn't matter. She'd planned to leave it all behind anyway. But the destruction of what was hers and Jonah's was another violation. Whoever had done this hadn't been looking to steal. If they had, the screen of the television wouldn't have been shattered. No, whoever did this did it to violate, to punish. She imagined that the people who shredded the cushions of her sofa had also shot Grant and hurt Lucas.
    In the bedroom, her stomach pitched as if she stood on the deck of a boat tossed by three-foot waves. She braced a hand on the wall, her heart stuttering. The closet had been emptied, all of its contents torn to pieces and scattered. A burnt smell permeated the air, and she glanced inside the metal waste can near the door to see blackened sides and a pile of ashes.
    What did they burn?
    The answer struck her like a fist to the temple. "No," she whispered, tearing through the debris for the locked fireproof box she used to store the paperwork she had accumulated over the years to maintain the identities she and Jonah would assume next. Along with the passports, birth certificates and credit cards she had bought through underground channels years ago, she kept more than a thousand dollars in it.
    She found the beige metal box and sat back on her heels, almost giving in to despair. The lock had been broken. The box was empty. Its contents -- or probably everything except the cash -- had been reduced to ashes. She hurled the box against the wall. "Dammit!"
    Now what would she do? She and Jonah would have to start from scratch again. No money. No credit. No job. No friends. The thought of it made her head spin, and she fisted her hands in her hair, struggling to get a grip.
    When she had the despair under control, she realized that none of this mattered if she didn't find Jonah. If she lost him, then she truly would have nothing. He was her life, her reason for breathing. Everything she had done for the past fourteen years had been for him. She would die for him. She would die without him.
    Shoving to her feet, she surveyed the damage in her room and Jonah's and determined that nothing was salvageable. Not even a pair of underwear. The thoroughness of the destruction was staggering, and it struck her that she had seriously underestimated the depth of Layton's rage. Apparently, he had nurtured his hatred for her for fourteen years, and now he was venting it. Though, knowing him, rather than getting his own hands dirty, he had instructed his henchmen to do this. Not as a warning, but as a promise.
    The message: First, I'm going to make it very difficult for you to run, and then I'm going to destroy you.
    Alaina walked out of the wreckage that had been the home she had shared with Jonah for the past five years and didn't look back.
     
     
    * * *
     
     
    "What is that?" Addison asked.
    "PlayStation 2." Layton grinned over his shoulder at her from where he sat in front of the television, a game controller gripped in both hands. "Want to play? I'll show you how."
    "Since