He pushed the plate of donuts and the coffee over to her side of the coffee table.
She picked a creamer and added it to her coffee, gave it a couple of stirs, and then brought the cup to her lips. “Thanks.”
“Eat.” He motioned to the plate.
She picked up the chocolate-glazed and took a bite out of it. A smear of icing was left on her bottom lip. He watched her tongue dip out to catch the sweetness. He remembered kissing her, and how she’d brushed her tongue over his. Hell, maybe it was a good idea that she’d sat in the chair.
“Have you called about the birth certificate yet?” she asked.
He set his coffee down and folded his hands between his knees. “Yeah.”
He must have let something leak out in his tone because she leaned forward.
“And?” She set the donut down.
“The birth certificate is real.”
Her face fell. “It can’t be. I mean, I look just like Nancy Bradford and… and my memories. And—”
“I’m not saying you’re Zoe Adams. I’m saying there is—or was—a Zoe Adams.”
She shook her head. “But I don’t understand.” She set her coffee down beside the donut. “If they had their own kid, why would they have… You said was? Can’t you check for death records?”
“I did,” he said. “There was never a death filed.”
“But there has to be. I mean…”
He gripped his hands together; he wasn’t looking forward to saying this. “I’m just guessing here, but the body of the girl they thought was you… It could have been the real Zoe Adams.”
She looked at him. “You think something happened to Zoe Adams and that’s why… why they kidnapped me. To replace her.”
Hurt sounded in her voice. “I’m saying it’s a possibility.”
She shook her head. “But I read that… that the body was… burned and…” Tears filled her eyes, and Tyler had to force himself not to go to her and pull her into his arms.
“It doesn’t mean they killed her.” But it was hardpressed not to believe it.
She shook her head. “They couldn’t have. They could never have hurt a child. They never even spanked me. And there were times I deserved it.”
But they hurt you, Tyler thought. Her “parents” had kidnapped her and kept secrets from her all her life. And right this moment Tyler wished he could get a pass to hell—because that’s where he knew they were right now—to kick their asses. She didn’t deserve to have to go through this.
“If we can prove that you are Caroline Bradford, I’m sure they will exhume the body.”
She stared at the coffee cup. He saw a tear slip from her lashes to the cup.
“I want to take a shower.” She popped up and so did Tyler.
Before she could walk away, he caught her arm. He just wanted to touch her, to let her know he cared. “Are you going to be okay?”
“I’m fine.”
He expected her to pull away, but instead she fell against him. Her head pressed into the side of his shoulder. He debated putting his arms around her, and then, without giving it another thought, he did just that. He wrapped his arms around her, hoping he’d managed to do it in a totally nonsexual way.
He felt her reach up and take handfuls of his shirt in her fists, and she let go of a painful sob. “I know my parents kept secrets from me. I know they lied to me. I’ve accepted that. But they couldn’t have killed their own child, Tyler. They just couldn’t have.”
He tightened his arms around her and held her against him.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
WHEN TYLER WALKED back into the office, Dallas was there, going over a few things with Ellen. Bud, Dallas’s dog, was sniffing Ellen’s leg. Tyler remembered Lucky and panicked for a second, then remembered seeing the cat in the leather chair in the apartment.
Everyone in the room looked at him.
Dallas smiled sheepishly, and Tyler knew he’d been told about his sisters’ call. Problem was, Tyler wasn’t in the mood to laugh about anything right now.
“I want answers, damn it,” he started barking.
“But I thought…” Dallas hesitated. “Wasn’t the birth certificate—”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass what they said. Zoe didn’t make this shit up. Someone shot at her. There has to be a reason for that, and I don’t think it’s the lunch specials down at the diner. And right now the only thing that makes sense is that she’s somehow tied to the Bradfords.”
Dallas frowned. “But—”
“Did we question you when you believed Nikki was innocent even after her ex ended up dead in her trunk after she told people she was going to kill him?”
Dallas’s eyebrows shot up. He held out his hand. “I didn’t realize that was what’s going on.”
Tyler didn’t know exactly what Dallas implied, but he knew if he gave it some thought, he probably wouldn’t like it. So he didn’t think about it. At this point in time, he didn’t care. He just wanted his partners behind him on this. He needed them.
It felt so damn right to have her believe in him at the station yesterday, and he was going to believe in her. She wanted answers, and by God, he was going to get them.
“Fine,” Dallas said. “What do you want us to do?”
“Help me get to the bottom of this.” Tyler’s emotions and mind were running all over the place, and he couldn’t seem to catch up with them.
Dallas held out his hand. “Where’s your list of questions?”
Tyler went to his desk, picked up his pad, and dropped down in his chair.
“Read your questions,” Dallas said, and went to his own desk.
Austin rolled his chair a little closer. Tyler looked down at the questions.
Why did making Zoe laugh feel so damn good?
Why was he thinking so damn much about Lisa?
Why had he written Xs and Os on the note, when his gut had told him not to?
All of a sudden, he added another question to the list. Why after all the lessons he’d learned about caring too much from his dad, from Lisa, and from the police force, was he tempted to let down his guard with Zoe?
The last question bothered him most of all. This was supposed to be just another case. Besides, she wasn’t even going to stay here when the case was over.
“I think Dallas meant to read them aloud,” Austin said, being a smartass.
Tyler scowled at Austin and then flipped the page to the list of questions involving the case. “Who was the dead girl they thought was Caroline Bradford?”
“Okay,” Dallas said. “Let’s start there. Since you’re the best at researching on the Internet, why don’t you go and find any missing children cases about that time? Also see what you can dig up on the Adams family and their daughter Zoe while they were in Texas. See if they have any connection to the Bradfords.”
Tyler was usually the one referring the questions and giving advice on who should do what. What was it about this case that made him so crazy? The answer shot back. Zoe.
“What’s the next question?” Dallas asked.
Tyler looked back at the list. “Why would Mildred and Ralph Adams kidnap a kid? Especially one so high profile if they didn’t intend to get a ransom for her.”
“You gave one possible answer to that earlier,” Austin said. “If they murdered their own kid, they may have needed a replacement for her or they’d have gotten caught.”
Tyler leaned back in his chair, which produced a loud groan of springs. He felt the sentiment echo in his chest. “Zoe doesn’t believe they could have hurt a kid.”
“So she wasn’t abused in any way?” Ellen asked from the back of the room.
Tyler had forgotten she was there. So, it seemed, had Austin and Dallas. They all looked back at her at the same time. But her question ran around Tyler’s head. Physically hurting a kid was only one type of abuse. His dad had managed to hurt his kids without ever raising a fist to them. Not that his mom had been so lucky.
“Uh,
I’m sorry,” Ellen said, obviously thinking she’d done something wrong. “I guess you just want me to file and keep my mouth shut. It’ll be hard, but I can do that.”
“No,” Dallas said. “You’re welcome to toss out ideas. This is how we work, put our heads together and come up with answers or at least leads to follow. However, this office is like Vegas—what happens here stays here.”
“I pretty much figured that out all on my own.”
“Ahh, good looking and smart,” Austin said in his come-on tone, and he winked at Ellen.
“Thank you,” she said in such a nonflirting manner that the message, “Not interested,” was tacked onto the line loud and clear. Tyler even saw the look of surprise on Austin’s face. And when Dallas turned away, a smile was pasted on his lips.
Tyler picked up a pencil. “I asked Zoe if they’d ever mistreated her. She insists they were never anything but upstanding parents.”
Austin leaned his elbows on his knees. “It could have been an accident and they were afraid it might look intentional.”
“That, and some kids block out the abuse,” Ellen said. “Or they just don’t want to talk about it.”
“I know,” Tyler said. There were a hell of a lot of things he preferred not to talk about. “But I don’t think that’s the case here.”
“You’re probably right,” Dallas said. “But maybe she might be more apt to tell another woman. Maybe Ellen could talk to her and just see if she gets anything.”
“She talks to me,” Tyler said, insulted they thought Zoe wouldn’t tell him something. But then he remembered his sisters sharing things with each other before they came to one of their male siblings. “But I don’t see how it would hurt,” he amended.
He looked back at Austin. “But the whole accident angle… I don’t think so. It just doesn’t seem logical that they would go as far as kidnapping a high-profile child. Or any child to cover up an accident. Law-abiding citizens don’t usually commit a crime without some serious motivation.” He paused and realized an error in his thinking.
“But maybe they weren’t law abiding,” he said. “Maybe they were good parents but bad people. I need to get all the information I can on the Adamses.”
“I’ll take that one,” Dallas said. “What county was Zoe Adams born in? I’ll start looking there first. Maybe I can ask Tony or Rick to run a check and see if they were in any trouble with the law.”
“Shadows County.”
“Do we know who the officer was that headed the kidnapping case?” Austin asked.
“I have that.” Tyler started looking through his notes. “A John Phillips. I read he retired shortly after the case went cold. If he’s still alive, he’d be in his eighties now.”
I’ll see if I can run him down,” Austin said. “If he’s still breathing, maybe we can get something from him.”
“Good idea.” Bud came over and started sniffing on Tyler’s leg where Lucky had rubbed against him. “Is Bud cat-friendly?” Tyler asked Dallas.
“The lady I got him from when he was a puppy had cats, but I don’t think he’s been around them since.”
“Maybe we’ll get lucky and he’ll finish the poor thing off,” Austin added.
Dallas looked at Tyler. “Is something wrong with the cat?”
“He was in an accident, but he’s fine.”
“He lost more parts than he kept,” Austin said.
“He’s fine.” Tyler defended Zoe’s cat. “But we should keep them apart.” He refocused on the notes and started making a game plan for the day. And first on that list was stopping himself from making more out of this thing with Zoe than there was. He was a PI and she was a client. He had an obligation to solve her case.
Dallas’s chair squeaked when he leaned back and cupped his hands behind his head. “Now that we all have our jobs on this case, how are we on the Drake and Smith cases?”
Tyler started to say he didn’t give a damn about them but caught himself. They still had a business to run, so he dug through the files on his desk to find his written questions on those cases. Then he opened the computer to his case files where he’d started inputting the data electronically.
They discussed the two other cases: one a cheating spouse case and the other a missing person case. After a short discussion, Tyler assigned something for all of them to run down. Because Tyler wanted to stay close to Zoe, he agreed to do the Internet searches on the two cases. Austin was going to take over following Mr. Drake to see if his lunches with his secretary involved more than lunch. Last Friday, Tyler had done the honors, and it had been as boring as watching snails race. Dallas was going to visit the two clients and give them updates.
“Have we heard from Roberto yet?” Dallas asked.
“He’s been calling in every Monday, but I haven’t heard from him yet today. Which is odd.” Tyler looked at the clock. “Usually he calls at eight o’clock on the dot.”
Roberto Campo was their biggest informant, working the streets to get information on Rafael DeLuna, the lowlife drug dealer who’d been responsible for framing the detectives for murder. Since the Feds had finally put the man on their wanted list, he’d slithered under some big rock. Although Tyler and the guys had managed to shut down several of his operations in the Houston area, all the leads had gone cold. Now they had Roberto looking into things in Dallas. Roberto hadn’t found anything in Big D yet. Yet being the key word.
Dallas looked back at Ellen. “If a Roberto Campo calls in, you make sure he speaks to one of us.”
“Roberto Campo,” she repeated. “I got it.”
“Have you given her all our info, cell numbers, home numbers?” Dallas asked Tyler.
“Not yet.” Tyler looked up from rereading his list of questions. “But I finished the list on Friday, so I’ll give it to her.”
“Good.” Dallas looked back at Ellen. “We have a desk, computer, and phone that’s being delivered for you. Tyler will help you get the computer up and going.”
“It may take a while to get everything set up,” Tyler said, wanting to focus on Zoe’s case.
Ellen looked down at the stacks of files around her feet and then up at the metal filing cabinets lining the back of the room. “I think I have plenty to keep me busy for a few days.”
“My plan is to set you up in the entrance room,” Dallas said. “We might have to lose the casket.”
“Darn,” Ellen said. “I was hoping to keep the casket. Makes for a good conversation piece.”
“It makes a good doggy bed, too.” Dallas patted Bud resting at his master’s feet. Maybe we can just move things around. We’ll see.”
“I was joking,” Ellen said.
“Yeah, but you’re right,” Dallas said. “It’s sort of become our trademark. The other day I got a call from someone who wanted to know if we were the PIs who had the casket in their office. Hey, it’s a gimmick, but if it works…”
Tyler leaned back in his chair again, only half listening to the conversation around him. When there was a pause, he spoke. “I’m getting with Rick and have him work on getting some DNA samples from Bradford.”
“You don’t want to wait and see what we get first?” Dallas asked.
“No, I don’t want to wait,” Tyler said matter-of-factly. “I want to get answers and put this case to bed.”
“I don’t think that’s all you want to put to bed,” Austin muttered, and shot him a shit-eating grin.
“Drop the wisecracks,” Tyler snapped.
Austin glanced at Dallas. “See, I told you he was in a piss-poor, didn’t-get-any mood.”
Dallas wadded up a piece of paper and tossed it at Austin. “Now might not be the time to mess with him.” But there was humor in Dallas’s voice, too.
Tyler’s phone rang. He checked caller ID and frowned. His older sister again. He’d told her that Zoe was someone he was working with on a case, but he knew his sister thought he was holding back. And her way of getting people to talk was to hound them to death.
“Rick Clark?” she asked with some hesitancy he didn’t quite understand.
He nodded and walked out to deal with the first hounding session by his sister.
Ellen sat down at Tyler’s desk and accessed his electronic address book to find Rick’s number. Her stomach fluttered at the thought of calling him. But she’d already told herself that she just needed to pull up her big girl panties and grow a pair. Well, she couldn’t grow a pair, but she needed to just get over it. She worked here. Rick Clark was going to be in and out, and she’d have to deal with him.
She found his number and punched it in the phone. It rang once, twice. Maybe she’d get lucky and he wouldn’t—
“Hey, how are they hanging?” His deep male voice flowed from the phone.
“Uh, they’re not.” She almost smiled, especially after having just told herself she needed to grow a pair.
“Sorry. I thought… Who is this?”
“Ellen Wise,” she said.
“Usually it’s Tyler who calls from there.”
“I figured that.” Ellen picked up a pencil. “I was just calling to—”
“To tell me you kicked the other guy to the curb and now you want to take me up on my dinner invitation,” he said.
“No.”
“A man can hope.” He chuckled. “So you need for me to change another tire for you?” he teased.
“I don’t think so,” she said, and laughed.
“Right, but can I call you if I have transmission problems?”
“I’ll give you the name of my dad’s shop.”
“Ouch,” he said. “So what do you need Ellen I-can-roar Wise?”
She laughed again. What did she need? Suddenly, all sorts of erotic things ran through her mind, and her cheeks brightened. “I don’t need anything.”
Blame It on Texas Page 18