Chapter 19

Chapter Nineteen

At dinner that night, everyone filled their plates first before starting their practice of sharing the latest news. Zara picked up the metal ladle and handed it to Lyra to start the talking spoon rotation as everyone ate. Her news caused quite a storm of reactions from both the Littles and their Daddies.

"So, he made you his drug mule?" Sadie asked in outrage, focusing on the culprit—Boyd.

"I hadn't thought of it that way. That pretty well sums it up," Lyra agreed.

"But she didn't even know it. He made her his fall-guy drug mule," Juniper added.

"He sounds worse with every moment that passes," Zara commented.

"He was amazing in the beginning, or at least I thought he was amazing. Maybe I was just young and inexperienced," she suggested, shrinking back in her chair. Phoenix immediately lifted her onto his lap.

"Oh, it wasn't your fault," Zara rushed to reassure her. "I'm totally not blaming you. He's the manipulative jerk."

The other Littles nodded in agreement.

"The worst is that Lyra would've faced jail time if the stones had been found," Kestrel pointed out. "Being in jail in a foreign country is not a good thing. Trust me."

"How can we check that you didn't miss any in the case? Can we x-ray it?" Sadie asked.

"Depending on the diamonds' size, type, and cut, they could pass through an x-ray process and never show up," Magnus answered. "That's why Boyd set Lyra up so many times and got away with it."

"So, we tear it apart?" Lyra asked, biting her lip as she wondered how she'd get the instrument home without its protective case.

"You and I checked it over well. We should have a couple more sets of eyes look over it as well to ensure we didn't miss anything," Magnus suggested. "Tonight after dinner, I thought I'd try vacuuming that spot at the bottom where the vial opened to make sure there aren't any more gems."

"Thanks, Magnus," Lyra said as she passed him the spoon.

"I'm going to ask Celeste and Zara to help me look for serial numbers on the loose diamonds tomorrow," Magnus said, looking at the two scientists.

"We could look tonight," Zara offered.

"Tomorrow, Little girl. Work is done for today," Magnus informed Kestrel's Little.

"You're always working," Zara reminded him.

"Just keeping an eye on things. Consider me a guard dog. I'm going to hang out with you all tonight while I keep my ears open," Magnus told her. "What we really need to do is match the fingerprint that Celeste found on that vial."

"Really? You found some proof that Boyd's guilty?" Lyra asked.

"I have the computer checking the database for matching fingerprints. If we're lucky, we'll get a match to something Boyd gave his fingerprints for. It may take a while," Magnus warned.

"And if it doesn't come up with anything?" Lyra asked.

"I would imagine, in that case, we'd have a couple of choices. We can turn the diamonds over to the police here in New Zealand. Or we can get Kingsley's assistance in transporting them to an agency that can investigate without us being involved," Rocco suggested.

"Can we give them to the police without getting Lyra in trouble?" Sadie asked, her brow wrinkled with worry.

Rocco looked concerned as well. "That's the major concern."

"Boyd keeps messaging my phone and leaving text messages," Lyra said. "I could meet with him and get his fingerprints or something."

"No" rang out from every Daddy's mouth and even Caesar's.

Lyra looked around the table at all the men. "It works on TV all the time."

"This isn't TV. You will not risk yourself in such a way," Phoenix said, his tone harsh.

"Well, you just tell him that I won't meet him then," Lyra said, pulling her phone out of her back pocket and handing it over.

Phoenix read the latest message and scrolled back to read the others that had come in. "Crash, when was the last time you read one of these messages?"

"Probably yesterday. I don't even want to look at them."

"It appears that we have someone else to worry about. Or maybe more than one someone." He turned the phone to show a picture of Boyd tied to a chair. His face was bloodied and bruised.

"Is that faked?" Lyra asked. "It doesn't look like it. He looks really injured."

"He does. There was a message that came with the picture."

Phoenix began reading.

Lyra Bloom, you have twenty-four hours to respond with our goods, or Boyd Zhivers will die.

"Die?" Lyra echoed that last word as adrenaline flooded her body. She had to do something. "I hate him, but I don't want Boyd to die. Give me the phone. I'll answer."

"You will not answer, Little girl. We'll devise a strategy and then message them back," Phoenix corrected her firmly.

Lyra wanted to argue, but the look on his face told her she didn't have a chance at winning. "We've got to do something."

"Goods. That seems to imply that they don't know if Lyra is aware of the stones. Or is involved," Kestrel pointed out.

"At least Boyd didn't throw her under the bus and say Lyra was the mastermind," Celeste said in an obvious attempt to be positive.

"Or they know their messages could be used against them," Hawking countered.

"The picture alone is pretty damaging," Magnus pointed out dryly.

"It is, but until Boyd is found with real, actual injuries, they've got deniability," Phoenix pointed out.

Lyra shook her head when her Daddy lifted his fork to her lips. "I can't eat any more. This situation is overwhelming. I can't believe I've been waltzing through countries with illegal gems hidden in the lining of my cello case for who knows how long. I could be rotting in jail, or my cello could've been stolen or destroyed."

"I know, Crash. It's hard to conceive that someone would put you in the line of danger," Phoenix said gently.

Hawking grunted. "It makes sense. The screeners look for certain tells from people as they go through security: sweating, nervousness, and a whole variety of physical traits that guilty people exhibit. Because you didn't know, you didn't react like that. I'd bet Boyd made them take a second look at him the first time he tried it."

Looking at him in shock, Lyra leaned forward. "There was one time when we entered France. They pulled him aside and even took him to a separate room to go through his clothes and things. He joked that he must've looked like a criminal they were on the hunt for. I was worried for him but forced myself to practice a new song mentally to not pace the floor."

"Did it take an extended time or just a few minutes?" Kestrel asked.

She knew he understood airport procedures. "Almost an hour. I thought he'd miss the plane," she said, knowing they had to be right. "He put me in jeopardy over and over again. We've traveled a hundred times since that moment."

"We're going to figure this out. Is everyone finished?" Rocco asked, putting his fork down.

This time, "yes" was repeated around the table. The Daddies stood and piled the dishes back on the cart.

"Don't send that chocolate cake back," Magnus ordered.

"He's so going to have a midnight snack," Caesar predicted as the computer guru lifted the cake off the cart's bottom shelf and carried it to the refrigerator in their break area.

"I'm betting everyone will be hungry later," Magnus called over his shoulder.

"You're probably right," Rocco agreed. "Besides, I think I'm on duty at midnight tonight."

Rocco glanced over at the displays and noted a message had popped up. "Hey, Magnus. Your screen says it made a match."

"What?" Magnus whirled around and returned to his desk, setting the cake holder on Juniper's workspace. Taking a seat in his chair, he clicked buttons.

"There's a match to the fingerprint," he shared. "It's matched to a Karl Rivers. Let me see if I can find a picture."

Everyone gathered around, watching Magnus track down an image. When it appeared, Lyra gasped. "That's Boyd! His name is really Karl? He's so young there."

"It looks like a prison mugshot," Phoenix observed.

"It is. An eighteen-year-old Karl Rivers spent three years in prison for possession of an illegal substance," Magnus said, reading the report.

"He was fingerprinted there." Mind-boggled, Lyra tried to navigate the flood of questions and conclusions this piece of information provided.

"Did you know he'd been in jail?" Celeste asked.

"No. He told me he was raised in the Hamptons and had gone to the most exclusive schools. He got into managing musicians by chance. A friend of his asked for help booking performances. I never knew he had a different name."

"His name change—is it legal?" Rocco asked.

"Yes," Magnus said as he continued to click his mouse. "It looks like he buried Karl Rivers. He must have known someone in high places to get a fresh start without people finding out about his real past.

"My parents wouldn't have investigated his background. They looked at the people he represented already before choosing him," Lyra said, shaking her head.

"Running a background check on someone wouldn't have been as common several years ago," Kestrel murmured.

"And, of course, running a background check on him myself never entered my mind. He was a part of my life and career for a long time," Lyra said quietly. Her emotions were all over the place.

Anger, sadness, feeling used, outraged, ashamed, and so much more battled inside her. She jumped when Phoenix wrapped an arm around her to tug her close to his side. "Running a background check wouldn't have brought anything up for Boyd anyway. Not if he managed to completely separate himself from Karl."

"How long was he doing this?" she whispered.

"I would guess that he started just about the time he stopped his role as your boyfriend and lover," Phoenix suggested. "Perhaps there's something inside him that told him he was doing something wrong, and he couldn't be the doting fiancé and a diamond smuggler."

"That may be giving him too much credit. There's a note here that says he's on a watch list for international diamond smuggling. This must be recent," Magnus muttered, putting a short memo up on the screen.

"How did you get that from the federal government's files? Surely that's illegal," Rocco said.

"Only if I download the file. I can look at it online as long as I wish," Magnus clarified.

"So, what do we do about this message?" Lyra asked, waving her phone in the air to remind them. "And Boyd? We can't just leave him there."

"Let me see your phone, Lyra. Did Boyd enable a phone-locating service for friends?"

"I don't know," Lyra confessed, handing her phone to Phoenix. "I know he could track me. If you turn the tracking app back on, will they know where I am?"

"Tell me Boyd's telephone number," Magnus requested and typed it into the computer as Lyra reported it. "This could be fast or… Look! There's Boyd's phone."

"Where is that? It looks like it's just north of us," Phoenix said, leaning over Magnus's shoulder.

"Time to make some plans," Kestrel declared.