by Jaycee Clark
Someone is very interested in your child, Ms. Ferguson.
“I haven’t decided yet and I don’t believe the father will ever sign them.” She used the same excuse she’d always given them.
This time though . . .
“That can be gotten around,” the woman said, smiling. “Just leave that to us.”
Her heart was racing. Racing.
. . . A quarter of a million dollars . . .
Her chest tightened. Panic roared. They took her. Took her precious little angel.
“I think you should rest,” Quinlan said to her as a machine started to beep.
A nurse came in. “Is something wrong? Our monitors show . . .”
“You have to get the journal! Quinlan, you have to get the journal. I just wanted to get away, but I knew, I knew they could stop me and they did. I told you. You have to get it!”
“Mrs. Kinncaid, you need to calm down.”
Calm down? Her baby was out there somewhere and she was stuck in the damned hospital.
She shook her head and tried to sit up, but the room spun and tilted. She pulled at the IV needle.
“No, I need to find my baby. I’ve got to find her. We have to find her. We have to . . .”
A hand on hers stopped her. “Ella.”
She shook her head. No. No. She couldn’t stay here. “Quinlan, help me. Please.”
The nurse said something, and from the corner of her eye Ella saw her inject something into the IV line.
“No. No, don’t! I don’t need it!” She shook her head. “Please, not yet. I have to find her. I have to . . . Where . . .” God, she wanted to yell, to scream, and yet she barely managed whispers. “Please.”
“You need to calm down, Ella,” Quinlan told her. “Take a deep breath.”
Her eyes locked on his green ones as he gently pushed her back down.
She took a breath.
“Another. Come on.”
She listened to his calm voice.
Another voice came through the fog of panic.
“How much did you give her?”
“Half a dose. I know the FBI want to talk to her but she was becoming too agitated again.”
“Mr. Kinncaid, I told you to keep her calm,” the voice said.
Ella turned and saw a tall, dark-haired, blue-eyed man in a lab coat. She frowned.
“Hello, I’m Dr. Forrester.”
The doctor.
She ignored him and looked back at Quinlan, who sat on the edge of her bed. “I want my baby . . . The journal will explain. The journal. I gave it to Mr. Richardson to keep it safe in case they looked through my stuff. The flash drive.”
“I know Mr. Richardson, I’ll ask him, okay?”
“You could call them, they would come and bring it.”
“We’re not in Taos, Ella. We’re in Albuquerque.”
“Albuquerque?”
She tried to wrap her mind around that. “But how? When? I was leaving. Had the car packed and ready to go. Called you . . .” Ella shook her head. “Where is she? Where is she, Quinlan? Who did they give her to? Who did they sell our child to?” The blood pressure cuff went off again and she started to shake.
“Calm down, honey.” He brushed a strand of hair off her forehead, the brush of his fingers warm to her. “You need to rest. We’ll figure it out. All of it. And I swear to you, we’ll get her back.”
“I’ll talk to them, whoever, to help. I’ll talk to them,” she told him, feeling the slide of calm that coated over her nerves. “Don’t leave me with them, please. I don’t know who to trust. Jareaux didn’t have time to listen . . . Please don’t leave. I don’t know who to trust . . .”
Her eyes were heavy. She felt his hand cup her jaw, brush across her cheek.
“You can trust me, Ella. I won’t leave,” she heard Quinlan say.
“They’ll kill me. I know too much . . . Too much . . .” She slid into a calm pool of whatever drugs they were giving her. “They killed others. They’ll kill me too.”
“No, they won’t. I won’t let them.”
Chapter 24
Quinlan waited until Ella dozed off and then stepped outside the door to call the Richardsons. He knew they were coming. He’d talked to them earlier this morning. Mr. Richardson said they’d be there after lunch. He had expected them before now. And now, he needed the journal. The call went to voice mail. Perfect. Next he called Ian and told him about the journal and Ella’s mistrust of Jareaux. Ian agreed they’d check him out and that he’d be up in a minute, he was just grabbing a drink from the cafeteria.
The doctor walked out of the room just as he got off the phone with Ian.
“Mr. Kinncaid, we’ve discussed this. She needs to remain calm,” the doctor snapped, frowning.
“Yes, I know.” He raked a hand through his hair and leaned on his cane. His leg was killing him.
“Look. New mothers can be . . .” Again his eyes narrowed. “Can often be fragile. Especially new mothers who have been traumatized as Ella has been. Are you trying to push her off the deep end?”
“What?”
Dr. Forrester narrowed his eyes. “I know you want to know what happened, that you want to know where your child is. I get that. I do. But you can’t push her much more. She’s stable now, but still shocky, and her blood pressure isn’t where I’d like it to be. Too high, to be perfectly honest. And until her tox screens are clear, or at least clear of whatever she was given, I don’t really care to have her shut down, or spiral into postpartum depression.”
He agreed, he did. He got it. “I know, but she wants to help, and the police need to talk to her. These bastards, whoever they are, scared her, pressured her, terrorized her.” He saw Brody and Aiden stroll around the corner with the fed and two other policemen. Just seeing Agent Jareaux pissed him off.
They stopped beside him and the doctor, who turned to the newcomers and said, “I will be present when you speak to Mr. and Mrs. Kinncaid, gentlemen. As I just told Mr. Kinncaid, she’s not completely out of the woods yet.”
Agent Jareaux and the others nodded. The two—state and local—followed the doctor in. Just as Jareaux stepped up, something in Quinlan jerked tightly.
Without another thought, he swung out and right hooked the son of a bitch, who then tripped and slammed into the wall.
“Fuck,” Brody said, grabbing his arm.
Quinlan threw him off and pressed his cane across the bastard’s chest. “You and I have a few things to get clear, Jareaux,” he bit out.
“Quinlan, for God’s sake,” Aiden said beside and behind him.
“You put her in danger. You put my wife in danger. You didn’t listen to her, didn’t have . . .” He pressed closer. “Time, I believe she said, didn’t have time to babysit her or hold her hand. Didn’t have time for her or the investigation you threw her into the middle of.”
Jareaux’s eyes, gunmetal gray, stared at him. He made no move to defend himself. “Mr. Kinncaid, I get that you are upset.”
“Oh, no, Jareaux, I’m far, far beyond upset,” he said very quietly, very calmly. “You endangered my wife. No one endangers my wife, let alone my child. Where is my daughter, Jareaux?”
He heard other voices join his brothers, heard, “Mr. Kinncaid, step away from Agent Jareaux.”
“You, Jareaux, are just as responsible for my wife lying in there hurt and broken as much as the bastards who put her there.” He straightened back, felt someone’s hand on his shoulder and shrugged them off, never taking his eyes off the bastard with the gun—which was still in the man’s holster. “One more thing, you have property that doesn’t belong to you or the bureau. I want them back. Or, if you prefer, give them to my wife, as she signed and addressed them to me.”
The agent swallowed. “Mr. Kinncaid, the investigation—”
“Fuck you and your investigation.” He raked the man with his eyes. He stepped closer again, or as close as his brother grabbing his arm would allow him. “Your investigation led to this mess.
They kidnapped her, forced her labor and stole her child. My child!”
He jerked his arm away from his brother and gave Jareaux one last piece of advice. “You be careful with her in there”—he pointed to her room—“you be very, very careful with her.”
“Agent Jareaux is no longer working this case,” a voice said behind them.
Quin was watching Jareaux, caught the slight flash of something in his eyes, before they narrowed and slid to the side.
Agent Sabino stepped up beside Quinlan. “Mr. Kinncaid, Jareaux will have no further contact with Mrs. Kinncaid. It will either be myself or Agent Landry.”
“Why? I thought he was in charge of this, she said he was the one she spoke to, the one that got her involved in all this.”
He finally turned from Jareaux and faced the female agent. She smiled, though it didn’t reach her eyes. “Agent Jareaux is needed elsewhere, we will be handling your wife’s case. Don’t worry.” She turned to Jareaux. “Agent, you’re wanted back at the office, should we send someone with you?”
Jareaux held her gaze for a moment. “No.” He rubbed his jaw.
“Good.” She turned back to Quinlan. “Mr. Kinncaid, it’s time we speak to your wife.”
“Fine,” he bit out. He stepped closer to Jareaux again. “In that case, stay the hell away from my wife.”
A muscle bunched in Jareaux’s jaw.
Quinlan took a deep breath and turned back to the doctor. Both Aiden and Brody held his arms, he didn’t remember them doing that.
“Perhaps your wife isn’t the only one who needs some rest,” the doctor said, slapping him on the shoulder. “One of you needs to be clearheaded, and we both know it’s not going to be her. After this interview, get some rest, Mr. Kinncaid.” They walked into the room.
Brody leaned in and said, “You know, with everything else going on, I’d rather not have to worry about bailing your ass out of jail for assaulting a federal agent.”
He cut his cousin silent with one look.
“I’m just saying,” Brody said and then moved to the back of the room. Before the door shut, Ian slid in.
“What did I miss?” Ian asked Aiden.
“Oh, our formerly laid-back youngest brother just decked the dick of the FBI agent in front of the cops and said agent’s colleagues.”
“Really? Did you take a photo?”
“Evidence is not what we need, guys,” Brody interrupted.
Quinlan listened as the cops, the one with the state police, asked the first question. Quinlan moved up and sat in the chair beside Ella, taking her hand. She turned her hand and laced their fingers.
“I thought I heard Jareaux’s voice,” she said.
“No, he won’t be talking to you,” he told her. “Agent Sabino will be, though, and the other agent, don’t know his name, can’t remember.”
She shifted. “I won’t have to talk to Jareaux? Good. He lied.”
“About what?” Agent Sabino asked, stepping closer, probably to better hear Ella.
“Probably everything,” she said, hardly more than a whisper. “The letters, he never mailed them to Quinlan. He told me I couldn’t tell anyone about the investigation and said you guys had to approve the letters I sent Quinlan so that the investigation couldn’t be compromised. I just wanted Quinlan to know about the baby. But Jareaux never mailed them. After talking to you on the phone, I realized he probably lied about it all, didn’t he? Was there even a real case?”
Agent Sabino cleared her throat. “How did you get involved with Jareaux?”
Quinlan stilled at the question.
“I wasn’t involved with the man,” Ella said. “I’m married.”
Sabino chuckled. “I didn’t mean . . . How did you start working with him?”
Ella sighed. “He kept coming to the studio wanting to talk to me, leaving a card. Finally, I called, to verify he was who he said he was. You guys confirmed he worked with you so I met with him at the coffee shop and he asked for my help.”
“Help with what, exactly?” Sabino asked.
“He said you guys knew I was working at the Retreat, wanted my help in watching things, making sure things were okay. Missing women, babies,” she muttered. “I was perfect to help you. I was working there and I was pregnant.”
“Okay, we’ll come back to how you got roped into it later. Right now, let’s go forward, all right? Our priority is your baby.”
Ella nodded against the pillows and kept hold of his hand.
More questions followed and she squeezed his hand tightly as more and more questions were fired at her.
He listened, nausea greasing his stomach as he listened to her tell of her friend Lisa showing up, of the tea on the couch, how she felt dizzy.
“What’s Lisa like? Tell us about her,” Sabino asked, making notes.
“Lisa Hammerstein.” Ella told them what she knew of Lisa. “I know she has a place in Taos, but I don’t know where, she never invited me over. We always went out and did stuff. Or I met her at the studio or at the Retreat.”
“Okay, so you remember being dizzy on the couch,” Sabino asked, easing them back to Ella’s kidnapping.
She nodded. “I remember looking at her, at the tea she’d made for me. I knew she’d put something in it and was wondering why.”
“Then what happened?”
“I woke up . . . I woke up and couldn’t move,” she said, her voice devoid of any emotion. “I couldn’t move.”
“Why?” someone asked.
She shook her head, her eyes glass. “Tied down, I think. Plastic. Tied with plastic.”
“Zip ties,” Ian muttered.
“She left me,” she said, her voice barely more than a whisper.
“Who left you, Ella?” Sabino asked.
Quinlan bit down at the way she trembled, and yet her eyes were so flat. Bastards.
“Lisa. Lisa was there, she said they needed the baby, my baby.” She laid her hands on her stomach. “Or I think she did. It’s such a blur. Some things are clear and jagged, sharp. Others are just foggy, smooth, and I don’t know if they really happened or not. Like . . . like . . .” She shivered. “Fran. Like Fran. I think I know, but I’m not sure anymore.”
“It’s okay,” he said, rubbing her arm gently. “Just tell them what you can.”
And she did, painting pictures in his mind he didn’t want, even as he’d wondered what the hell had happened for the last day or so.
“I was so tired by that point,” she said. “But for just a mo-moment.” She blew out a breath, tears running down her cheeks. “She was perfect. It was like the world stopped for a minute. I felt her on my stomach. Red hair, like Quin’s, but brighter, lighter. So tiny. So little. And a birthmark on her inner arm. Like me.” She held out her right arm and showed the little skin discoloration the size of his pinky nail that rested near her elbow. “All her fingers and toes . . .” She closed her eyes. “I could smell her, that perfect, absolutely perfect scent of baby. I kissed her head.”
No one said anything. She swallowed and opened her eyes.
“She took her. They took her.”
“Who else was there, Ella? Who else was with her?”
Her eyes glazed over again and she began to tremble. “I have to find her. I have to find her. They took her.” Tears flooded her eyes and rained down. “I need to get out of here. I need—” She strained to sit up, but even as she gripped his hand with hers, he knew she was weak.
“Who else was there, Mrs. Kinncaid?” the other agent asked, stepping closer.
Her eyes locked on the agent and flashed with aquamarine fire. “You. You didn’t help me. Jareaux said he was too busy with a new case. He got mad because I didn’t get him proof quickly enough after he said I was established and settled. He—”
Her breaths came faster.
“He promised me I’d be safe. I told him they wanted my baby! I told him! I told him! And they did, didn’t they?” She tried to yell, the muscles in her throat straining, but no
more than a fractured whisper emerged.
“Enough,” the doctor said.
“I. Want. My. Baby. Find her! You have to find my baby!” she tried to scream. “My baby!” The doctor took a syringe out and attached it to the IV in her arm.
“Doctor,” the agent started.
The other cop put his hand on the agent’s arm. “We can start looking for Lisa again.”
“Ella, did Lisa say anything about the buyers?” the agent asked.
The doctor watched her monitors as she strained against Quinlan.
“Buyers? Buyers?” she asked, shaking her head.
“Not another word!” the doctor snapped. “Get out. Everyone out!”
The others filed out, clearly not wanting to piss off the doctor.
Ella cried against his chest until he again felt her relax. For several minutes he didn’t let go, his mind swimming with what she’d told them.
A blessed time had become a horror.
He closed his eyes, kissed her hair, and realized the doctor was talking to him.
“You can lay her down now,” the doctor said. “I think, considering everything, the nurse and I will check her over now. Why don’t you go get something to eat, Mr. Kinncaid. She’ll be out for a while. She needs rest and I think the cops have more than enough information to work with for today.”
Quinlan gently eased her back and touched her cheek. “I’ll be back,” was all he could manage.
He took a deep breath when he stepped out of her room, but that didn’t really help either.
Aiden and Brody stood there, leaning against the opposite wall. The nurse smiled at Brody as she passed.
“Where’d Ian go?” he asked.
“Followed the cops out. He seems pretty tight with the state guy, the local didn’t have much to say and the agents were in a hurry. Ian said he’d be back later. Lieutenant Ruiz, the state boy, said he wanted to cheer you on earlier but that wouldn’t have been appropriate. Apparently no one really likes Jareaux, who is always trying to get ahead. Ian was asking them questions.”
He frowned and then nodded, realizing what the man had meant. He raked a hand through his hair, trying to dispel the thoughts and images there.