Tavist drew his eyebrows together and looked down at his feet. “We found some hair on the sheets of her bed. Brown curly hair, doesn’t belong to her or her husband.”
“Hull has brown curly hair,” Cade said. “Shouldn’t be hard to compare.”
“We’ve also found plenty of evidence linking her to the kidnappings. She had papers in a safe in her closet with the name of a prominent lawyer in town—Jasper Beal.”
Cade gaped at him. The wedding Sadie had gone to. Hadn’t it been for one of the Beals? He knew the family well and had investigated them on a number of occasions. Jasper was the only lawyer, and he lived in Savannah.
“Do you think he was the accomplice?”
“Could be. We have a warrant out for his arrest.”
Cade couldn’t explain the relief he felt. “So if he’s the accomplice, then maybe Hull is innocent.”
Tavist shook his head. “There may have been more than one accomplice,” he said. “We’ve investigated Beal and his brother on a number of other cases. Typically, he lets others do the dirty work and keeps his distance.”
“It was his daughter’s wedding where Ann Clark and Hull were seen.”
Tavist nodded. “We think he may have been selling the babies to desperate couples who wanted to adopt. There were five substantial deposits into Ann Clark’s bank account the last few weeks. Could have been payoffs for delivery of the babies.”
Cade drew his eyebrows together. “Five? But there were six. What about the Miller baby?”
Tavist shook his head. “Maybe it hadn’t been placed yet.”
“Then where is it?”
Tavist looked up at him. “We don’t know.”
Cade closed his eyes and tried to put it all together. Ann kidnapping the babies, Hull helping her cover the crimes, Beal placing the babies . . .
Was it even possible?
He looked around him at this house where he’d been held like some kind of caged animal. Had Hull stalked through it, scheming to use his name and his handwriting and his cell phone . . . ? Planning his death after the world was sure he’d committed those crimes?
Tavist touched his shoulder. “Go home, Cade. You’ve earned your rest. Let us do our job. We’ll handle it.”
Cade studied the man’s face. Would he handle it? Or would he take too long compiling evidence before he even approached Hull?
He crutched his way back outside. It was still raining, and the morning sky gloomed gray and angry. He stood in the downpour for a moment, his mind racing through his options.
What if Hull wasn’t guilty, after all? What if Sadie had made a mistake?
And even if she’d been right, wasn’t it possible that Ann Clark had used him to get information about the investigations? Could it be that he was just a pawn too?
Or was Cade simply in denial?
He took one deliberate step after another, holding his bandaged leg up. The bandage was soaked, and he saw that blood was seeping through. It needed to be elevated, but not now.
Cade went to the car and dropped onto the passenger seat, carefully pulled the leg in. It was swelling within the dressings, and pain pulsed through it.
Joe looked over at him. “What’s the story?”
Cade stared at the windshield for a moment. “They’ve found a lot of evidence, but nothing linking her to Hull yet.”
Joe tapped on his steering wheel. “They will. Give them time.”
“That baby may not have time.”
Joe looked over at him. “So now you believe Hull was involved?”
“I still don’t know.” In the side mirror, he saw Blair getting out of her car, throwing her umbrella up, and hurrying toward his window.
He rolled it down when she reached it.
“What did he say?” she asked. “Does he believe Hull’s involved?”
“He doesn’t know,” Cade said. “But I told him what you told me.”
“So are you going back to the hospital?”
Cade looked up at her for a long moment. The truth was, he didn’t want to go back. He wanted to go find Hull and look him in the eye.
But Blair couldn’t know that.
“Yeah, we’re going back,” he said. “But you might want to stick around here for a while. They’ve found some things that do connect Ann to the kidnappings. Just wait and they’ll probably make a statement soon.”
That satisfied Blair, and he watched as she got back into her car. She would be safe here, he thought, and it would keep her out of trouble for a while.
Joe started the car and backed away from the blockade. “So we’re going to the hospital?”
Cade shook his head. “No. I want to go see Hull.”
Joe got the car turned around. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No. I’m still not sure he did it, Joe. I just want to talk to him.”
He picked up Joe’s cell phone that lay on the seat and dialed the number of the Cape Refuge Police Department. Georgette, the office clerk, answered on the first ring.
“Hey, Georgette. Cade, here.”
Georgette caught her breath. “Oh, Chief Cade, it’s so good to hear your voice! We’ve been so worried about you! How are you feeling?”
“I’m good. Look, would you put Billy Caldwell on the phone for me, please?”
A moment passed and Billy came to the phone. “Hey, Chief! Good to hear from you.”
“Yeah, you too. Look, Caldwell, I need your help. I need for you to find out if Detective Hull of Precinct Three in Savannah is on duty today. I need to get in touch with him.”
“Sure. Want him to call you if I reach him?”
“No. In fact, I don’t want you to reach him. Just find out if he’s working, and I’ll take it from there. Call me back on McCormick’s phone.”
He hung up and looked out the window, waiting for Billy to call back.
Joe shook his head. “Cade, you need to let the FBI do this. If you approach him knowing what you know, you may give him a heads-up that the feds are on to him.”
“I won’t,” he said. “Just a friendly visit, that’s all. I’m an angry victim who wants to put all the pieces of this thing together. He has some of those pieces, since he worked on the kidnappings and questioned Ann Clark with you.”
The phone rang and Cade flipped it open. “Yeah?”
“He’s not on duty right now, Chief.”
Cade sat silent for a moment. What now? If he couldn’t just drop into the police precinct to talk to him, he’d have to go to his house.
But would Hull suspect they were onto him?
“Do me another favor, Caldwell. Find his address for me. I’ll hold.”
He waited as Caldwell went to his computer and started the search.
Joe looked troubled as he navigated his way through traffic. “Cade, you can’t seriously be considering going to his house.”
Cade’s jaw muscles tightened. “I want to see inside his house. Just look around, that’s all.”
“The feds’ll do that.”
Cade sat there for a moment, staring through the windshield. “Whoever was working with Ann Clark dragged me into that house and shoved me, unconscious, down the stairs. He conspired with her to plant evidence that I was involved in the kidnappings. He shot me twice when I tried to escape. He slammed my head into concrete.” Cade’s voice trembled with the last words. “I have to know if he’s the one.”
“You will know. Just wait.”
Cade leaned his head back on the seat. Joe was driving toward the hospital, but Cade decided it didn’t matter. He could make him turn around as soon as he made up his mind.
He thought of Hull, if he was guilty, hearing that there was a warrant out for Jasper Beal’s arrest. Wouldn’t he realize then that the jig was up? That there was no way he’d get away with placing the Miller baby? Wouldn’t he see that baby as too much of a liability and want to get rid of it?
Then again, this whole thing could just be a deadend. Sadie thought she had seen him wi
th Ann Clark, but everyone knew that teenage girls sometimes overdramatize things. Maybe she just thought it was Hull. That should be easy to find out. All they needed was the guest list from the wedding. If Hull was on it, then Cade would believe it.
Caldwell came back to the phone and gave him the rural address out on Highway 16.
As Cade hung up, he glanced over at Joe. “Turn the car around, Joe. We’re going to Highway 16.”
Joe groaned. “Cade, this is a mistake. If he’s the one, we need to approach him with backup. We need to go by the book. We need a warrant.”
“I’m not approaching him as a killer. I’m approaching him as a cop. I just want to talk to him.”
Joe was silent as he turned the car around, and Cade stared out the window.
Joe was right. Cade didn’t have any business showing up there like this, when the FBI was on the case. He could be jeopardizing the investigation. He could even get himself killed.
Was he going for the sake of that baby or for the sake of his own satisfaction?
Conviction pressed down on him, aching through him with the same intensity as his leg.
But he just wanted to look the man in the eye. He would know. If he saw him and talked with him about the case, he’d be able to tell if he had something to hide.
Hull was probably not even involved, and Cade would see it as soon as he looked the man in the face.
“You don’t have to go with me, Joe. I don’t blame you if you don’t want to be a part of this.”
Joe kept driving. “If you’re going, I’m going, Cade. I can’t let you do this alone.”
CHAPTER 79
Hull lived out in a rural area off of Highway 16, outside the city limits east of Savannah, in a house that they almost missed because it was so hard to spot from the road.
“Secluded,” Joe said as he pulled onto the man’s dirt driveway. “He could do almost anything out here and no one would see him.” He glanced at Cade. “Give me the plan.”
Cade leaned his head back on the seat. The pain in his leg was wearing him down. “First we get him thinking we’re just his colleagues paying a professional visit. When his guard’s down, I’ve got some questions for him.”
Joe pulled up the muddy driveway, his wipers arching back and forth across the windshield. Cade set his hands on the dash and peered through the wet glass as the back of the house came into view.
It was an old restored farmhouse that sat on the edge of a small lake, its front facing the water. As they approached, Cade made note of the doors and windows. The back door opened on a small porch, and there were six windows, all of them shut against the rain. As they followed the dirt driveway around the house, he saw a side door.
They pulled up to the front of the house. A motorcycle was parked under a tree, a blue tarp thrown over it, protecting it from the rain. Next to it sat Hull’s Taurus.
Cade got his crutches from the backseat and got out, wincing as he moved across the yard. He almost wished he had a cast to protect his leg from bumps. But with the internal splint, there had been no need for one. It was swelling now, and the bandage had grown too tight. Gritting back the pain, he made his way across the porch. He stood there a moment before ringing the bell.
What was he doing? He shouldn’t be here, facing down his tormentor, if indeed that was what Hull was. He didn’t even have a weapon. He needed backup, in case Hull figured him out and made a run for it. He needed to wait for the FBI to act.
But he had to look Hull in the eye.
Joe came up on the porch and stood next to him.
“Gonna ring the bell or kick the door in?”
Cade didn’t find that amusing.
“Cade, are you sure you want to do this?”
Cade pushed the doorbell. He heard a television inside. He was watching a ball game . . .
But there was something else . . . another sound . . .
A baby crying.
Cade shot Joe a look. “You hear that?”
“Yeah. A baby.” Joe reached for his gun, and Cade nodded. Drawing it, Joe stepped to the side of the door. Cade took the other side, in case Hull came out firing.
The door came open, and Joe raised his weapon. Hull jumped back. “Whoa, man! Hold on! What’s this about?”
“I came to talk to you, Hull,” Cade said. “But when I heard that baby crying, I decided that talking wasn’t necessary.” He moved close to Hull and began to pat him down. A pistol was holstered on his belt. Cade pulled it out.
“Come on, man. My sister’s here with her kid.”
Cade turned the gun on Hull. “How about we go into the house and meet your sister, Hull?”
Hull stared at him. “Look, I don’t know what this is about, but, man, you’ve been under a lot of pressure. Probably on painkillers.” He shot Joe a beseeching look. “Man, I don’t recommend you go along with this.”
“In the house, Hull,” Joe said, pushing him back inside.
Clutching that gun, Cade hobbled in behind them.
Hull backed across the living room, deftly avoiding the furniture in his way. “Don’t shoot,” he said, holding his hands up. “You don’t want to kill a brother.”
Cade looked around at the mess in the place. It reeked of cigarette smoke, and ashtrays overflowed with butts. Beer bottles and plates with dried food adorned the coffee table.
He saw a closed door and knew the baby was beyond it. “That door,” Cade said, motioning with his gun. “Open it slowly. One false move, it’ll be your last.”
Hull opened the door, and in one swift motion, grabbed up the infant seat sitting on a table just inside the door. The tiny black infant’s screams pitched an octave higher.
Hull held the seat like a bucket, clutching its handle as the child squirmed and kicked, unfastened. If he tipped it enough, Cade saw, the baby would spill out.
“Put the baby down, Hull,” Cade said.
But Hull kept moving into the room, knowing they wouldn’t shoot with the baby so close to him.
Then Hull grabbed a gun out of the carrier and aimed it at Cade.
Sweat dripped into Cade’s eyes. One crutch fell, and he put his foot down to steady himself. Pain exploded through him, blurring his vision and loosening his grip on the gun he held.
The child’s high-pitched screams pierced through the room.
Cade bent down, grabbed his crutch back up, and propped it under his arm. His hand shook as he took aim again.
“Put the baby down, Hull. Put him down, now!”
Hull laughed. “You thought you could beat me, didn’t you, Cade? You thought you could hobble in here and save the day.”
“Give me the baby, Hull, and you can make a run for it. All I want is the baby.”
“Are you kidding me?” Hull’s face reflected his strain at the situation he was in. He held the car seat at his side, swinging it back and forth. “This baby is my way out. Remember, they still think you might have been involved, Cade. I’ll let them think I found the baby, that you were running with it.”
Joe stepped toward him, his gun aimed for Hull’s forehead.
“Come one step closer, Joe, and I’ll blow your head off,” Hull said.
Joe stopped, but kept his gun on him.
“Take me, instead,” Cade said. “Give Joe the baby, and I’ll go with you. That’s what you want, isn’t it? Just a hostage?”
But Hull wasn’t buying. He backed his way to a door that led out the bedroom onto the back porch. He managed to open it and stepped outside, still swinging the seat. “Stay back,” he said, “or I’ll kill it.”
Cade held his fire, and Joe did the same. Hull took off through the rain, running toward the Taurus. He started the car and sped down the muddy driveway.
Joe shot out into the rain, firing at Hull’s tires, but the car sped out of sight. Moving as fast as he could manage, Cade crutched back out to Joe’s car and jumped in, jarring his leg as he did. Choking back his agony, he closed the door. Joe took off, radioing an all-poin
ts-bulletin for Hull’s car. Within seconds, every officer in the area knew that Hull was fleeing with the baby.
But Hull had a radio of his own. “This is Detective Hull,” he screamed into the radio. “I am in possession of an African American infant that looks to be a few days old. I found the baby in a warehouse on Highway 16. I am in hot pursuit of a Cape Refuge police car believed to be occupied by Police Chief Matthew Cade and Detective Joe McCormick, both of whom I believe to be connected with these kidnappings.”
Cade heard the transmission and grabbed the radio from Joe. “Negative,” Cade yelled. “Detective Hull is not pursuing us, we’re pursuing him southbound down Highway 16. We found the baby in Hull’s home at 353 Highway 16. He is armed and threatening to kill the infant. We need backup ASAP.”
The car in front of them slowed, and Cade raised his gun.
Suddenly the Taurus made a U-turn. Joe slammed on his brakes and turned around, but Hull’s car took a side street and disappeared.
Joe turned down the street. The Taurus was nowhere in sight. “Where’d he go?” Joe yelled.
Suddenly, a bullet fired through the back window.
“He’s behind us!” Joe said.
Cade ducked as another bullet fired. He had claimed to be pursuing them, and now he had made it so.
Cade grabbed the radio and told them where they had turned. “We are under fire. Suspect is armed and dangerous and still in possession of the baby!”
They heard sirens turning up the street, coming after them, but it still looked as if Hull was chasing them.
“Cut him off,” Cade shouted. “When he stops, I’ll fire.”
Joe slammed on his brakes. Hull swerved and came around him. Cade tried to take aim, but as long as that car was moving, he couldn’t take Hull out. The baby’s life was at stake.
Joe followed him, the convoy of police cars right behind them. “Shoot out his tires, Cade!”
Cade fired, but the Taurus was too far ahead of them, zigzagging from lane to lane, out of bullet range.
Other Savannah police began to fall in behind them.
Cade heard another transmission from one of the Savannah cops. “Hull, do you have that baby with you?”
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