Trapped by Annie Jocoby

food. I hadn’t realized until just that moment that I was famished. Luke did the same, and Liam looked at both of us, clearly amused.
    “I knew you would be hungry,” he said, pouring a Mimosa for Luke and himself. I satisfied myself with some freshly squeezed orange juice. “Now, tell me exactly what’s going on. Your dad just told me that the two of you had run into a bit of a predicament in the States, but didn’t exactly say what.”
    “Ugh,” I said. I didn’t much feel like talking about any of it. It was all just too stressful for me to even think about. “Well, let’s start from the very beginning. There’s this man named Nottingham….” I then launched into the whole sorry tale, from the time I met Nottingham until the present day. The entire story took me about an hour to tell, and Liam, for his part, listened quietly and really tried to absorb all of what was going on.
    “Well, lass,” Liam finally said, after I finished the story. “Sounds like you got into a right jam with that bastard. What’s your next move?”
    “Well,” I said, “I need to start some hacking into his computer. I don’t know the password, of course, and he changes it all the time. Like every day. But that’s not a problem for me. I know that I can get in past his security safeguards and try to figure if there is anything on there which would incriminate him and take a screen shot of it. I’m not even sure if there is anything on there, but that’s what I need to do.”
    “Ah, blackmail,” Liam said. “One of the oldest and most tried and true way of getting what you want.” He seemed to tacitly approve of what I was about to do. “Well, good luck with all of that. Let me know if there’s anything at all that I can do to help you out.”
    “I will,” I said.
    At that, Liam went to work out in his gym.
    Luke took my hand, and rubbed it thoughtfully. Then he sighed. “I really hope that this works, Dalilah. But what happens if he’s the one blackmailing you? What if you threaten to turn him in, and he decides that he’s going to go full-throttle on the custody issue if you don’t back off? Who’s going to blink first?”
    “I’ve thought about that,” I said. “And I think that he will. His legal position with this child is far from settled. I think that he will know that, just from talking with his attorney. On the other hand, if I find on his computer what I’m hoping to find, then I will have a much more solid hand against him then he would with me. Therefore, I think that I will have the upper hand with him, if push comes to shove.”
    “And what if Nottingham decides to do something even more drastic or devious? What then?”
    “What do you think that he’ll do?”
    “Oh, geez, that guy is capable of just about anything. Who knows? Maybe he’ll threaten your dad somehow.”
    I drew a breath. I doubted that Nottingham had a way of threatening my father, but he might have a way of threatening Nick. Perhaps Nottingham also had a way of finding out what Nick did all those years ago. It took me a long time to find that video, because it was pretty well scrubbed from Nick’s computer. But I did find it. What if Nottingham had his own capabilities in that department?
    “Well, I guess that’s just a risk that I have to take,” I said, but I started to feel uneasy again about my plan. The very last thing that I wanted to do was get Nick in trouble.
    But, then again, it was a long shot that Nottingham could ever find out about that. He would have to be looking, and know what he was looking for and why.  I really thought that I would be safe.
    I hoped and prayed that I would be, anyhow.
     

Chapter 7
    That night, I got dolled up and went with Liam to the restaurant to meet the boys from the Pixxallators. They were already there, waiting for us, having already gotten ales and beers. Neil, for his part, came right up to me and put his arm around me. “Dalilah,” he said. “You can’t imagine how