It worked. She made a small sound of amusement. Not quite a laugh, but it wasn't one of those frustrated groans. It didn't last, though. A moment later her eyelids floated down, and she shook her head.
"Distract me with something," she whispered, her voice strained. "Please."
It was the please that got him right where it hurt. God, he hated to see her like this.
"All right. Here goes." Jared went for the not-so-obvious this time, but it was something that he'd been dwelling on a lot lately. "Remember the first time I kissed you? It was your senior year at the university. We were sitting in my car, just outside your dorm. I reached for you. You reached back. At the end of all that reaching, you were in my arms. Right where I'd wanted to get you all night." He paused a heartbeat. "We fogged up the windows."
Rachel glanced over her shoulder at him. She bunched up her forehead. "Are you trying to distract me or get me hot and bothered?"
Jared smiled, and after the nightmare they'd been through, it felt good to share a light moment with her. "Hell, if you have to ask, I've failed already."
She stared at him and studied him before her face relaxed slightly. "I definitely remember our first kiss. You treated me like…glass. Well, for a second or two, anyway. Then we sort of devoured each other. It was French and fantastic."
Jared suppressed a groan. Her memory was way too good for this distraction game. "Well, that's what hellions like me do to innocent college girls like you." He continued the massage, working his fingers across the tight muscles. "We corrupt them with French kisses, all the while trying to cop a feel or two."
Rachel managed a short-lived smile. "I still dream about it."
So did he. It was pretty darn memorable if after six years he could still remember the exact taste of her. That wasn't all. He could also remember every last detail about how her breasts felt when he closed his fingers around her.
The distraction was working. Well, for Rachel it apparently was. It was giving Jared a whole new kind of distraction to deal with. There was suddenly a three-ring circus going on in his boxer shorts.
"And then the second time you kissed me," she continued, "we were at the lake. You'd taken me out on your friend's boat. It was more than just one kiss, though. More like twenty. It qualified as making out."
"And then some." He'd taken a long, cold shower after he dropped her off at the dorm.
It hadn't helped.
And neither was this conversation. It was probably best if this stopped while he could still walk.
"Come on. Let's try some other way to burn off this excess energy." He stood and braced his hands, palms out, in front of his chest. "Without inflicting any permanent damage, show me what you can do. Give me your best shot."
She stood. Slowly. "My what?"
Another wince. "Okay, bad choice of words. I meant, give me your best boxing move, and I'll see if I can block it. Remember that part about no permanent damage, though. And no aiming at any part of my body that contains vital organs. Let's go."
Rachel continued to stare at him. "You're sure?"
"You bet." Well, not really, but this had to be a better way to lighten her spirits than talking about French kissing sessions. "Let's get the juices flowing with a little one-on-one."
Even though she still looked uncertain, there was nothing tentative about her maneuver. Rachel gave him a warning signal just a second before she slammed her fists into his palms. First one and then the other. Then she pivoted and thrust her elbow against his hand.
Jared grunted at the force, and he managed a grin.
Barely.
"Classic Shaolin attack. The soles of your feet were aligned with your palms. The move wasn't too high to give me an opening," he complimented. "And if I hadn't blocked it, it would have hurt like hell. Okay, let me see if I can stop you. Come at me."
She did so with no hesitation, her right hand aimed at his face. Jared executed a defensive move of his own, deflecting the blow with his forearm. He pivoted, trapping her hand under his arm and then grabbing her wrist.
Rachel looked up at him, scowled. She came back at him immediately with a sidekick aimed at his midsection. Jared was thankful that she pulled back before impact, or she could have done some serious damage. He deflected the kick with his hand.
"A Bruce Lee move?" he asked, surprised.
She shrugged. "Whatever works. The trainer taught me a variety of techniques for defending myself. I think she did a good job with her instruction."
Obviously. And Rachel had done a good job learning. "This is a little more dangerous than I thought it'd be. Either we'd better try a different distraction technique, or we might have to consider sex, after all. This is starting to feel a little like rough foreplay."
He'd meant it as a joke. A really bad joke. But there was no humor in Rachel's eyes. There was, however, a fire. A scorching heat that had him inching toward her.
Just as the phone rang.
"Tanner always did have lousy timing," he mumbled. Then, "This better be good news," Jared said into the phone.
"I guess it'd qualify as good. For us, anyway. Esterman might not feel the same way."
He went completely still, and any aggravation he felt over the interruption was long gone by the time Tanner made it to the end of his sentence. Jared was almost afraid to voice the conclusion he drew, for fear it would vanish before they could do anything about it.
"You found Dr. Sheridan?" Jared asked.
"Yep. He's not only alive and well, he's with me. Ready to come over here and meet him?"
"You bet." He grabbed the notepad and jotted down the address that Tanner gave him. "I'll see you in about ten minutes."
Rachel quickly grabbed her shoes. "Tanner has Dr. Sheridan?"
Jared nodded but didn't waste any time. He took Rachel's arm and hurried out the door.
Chapter Fourteen
The idea of any kind of foreplay went straight out the window. In its place, Rachel felt another huge surge of adrenaline. Another wave of panic. And some hope. They raced out of the room and to the car.
"Where did Tanner set up this meeting?" Rachel asked as Jared drove away from the hotel. She pressed her foot against the dash so she could tie her shoelaces.
"At Sheridan's private office downtown. It's closed today, so we'll get a chance to talk to him without anyone interrupting us." He paused. "Well, hopefully there won't be any interruptions."
Yes. The memory of the fiasco at Livingston's house hadn't dimmed much. Nor had the nauseating reaction she still had to Sergeant Meredith's attack.
"There won't be a repeat performance like the one at Livingston's," he assured her. "Tanner's going to stand guard while we're inside."
That was something, at least. Maybe that meant they could find some answers and get away from there before Esterman's people arrived. And maybe those answers would lead them straight to the baby before another day went by.
And then what?
She settled back against the seat and contemplated that. It was a question that had come to mind at least a dozen times in the past twenty-four hours, but since learning the child was theirs, it'd taken on a new urgency along with new complications. What did the future hold for them?
Through all of this, through the search and the steamy kissing sessions, he hadn't said a word about wanting to be part of their baby's life.
Or hers.
However, Rachel doubted he'd just let her walk away with their child. Besides, her leaving would mean the obvious—that their baby wouldn't be with his father, and she wouldn't be near Jared, either.
An ache made its way across her chest and sank right into her heart. Was that too much to hope for, that he would ever want her back in his life?
Maybe.
God, maybe it was.
Rachel saw her reflection in the vanity mirror over the visor. She watched the cold, hard realization take hold of her face. Jared might never risk loving her again.
Never.
Thi
s could possibly be as good as it ever got between them. And if so, she might have to accept the fact that the most she'd ever have of him was his child. A child that they couldn't even raise together.
"You're quiet over there," he murmured. "Are you thinking too much again?"
She tied her other shoelace. "No. Now, I'm obsessing. Seems like a good time for it."
As if it were the most natural thing in the world, he took her hand, brought it to his mouth and brushed a kiss over her knuckles. The gesture was obviously meant to comfort her, but all it did was remind her that there was more at stake here than just their child.
"Have you thought beyond this?" she asked. The question was too vague to make sense, but Rachel thought that maybe Jared would understand.
He didn't answer right away. He concentrated on driving. "It's hard not to think about it."
Okay. That didn't tell her much. She pressed for more. "If I'm in witness protection, what do we do about the baby? I mean, about you seeing him."
She had to choke back a groan. She hadn't intended to be so forthcoming, but skirting around issues definitely wasn't her forte.
"I know what you're asking," Jared volunteered. "And I don't know what to say. It's hard to think beyond now, beyond this visit."
Rachel quietly agreed. But it was also hard not to think beyond it—
"This is it," she heard Jared say.
Rachel checked her watch. Barely twelve minutes since they'd left the hotel. She hoped, Tanner had had time to set up security.
Jared stopped the car in the back parking lot of the one-story vanilla-colored brick building. There were only two vehicles in the lot. Tanner's black truck and a white car that must belong to Sheridan. It certainly appeared that they'd have privacy.
The place wasn't in the best part of town, and it was modest by anyone's standards. Either being on Esterman's payroll hadn't been lucrative for the doctor, or else Sheridan was a master of deception. Not good. Rachel was praying that he'd be willing to skip the pretenses and spill his guts.
Tanner was at the back entrance, looking much like the guardian of the gate. He held open the door, motioned for them to hurry inside, and then followed right behind them.
"How did you get Sheridan to agree to this meeting?" Rachel asked.
Tanner shrugged. "Let's just say I made him an offer he couldn't refuse."
And with that ominous response, Tanner directed them into a private office. Sheridan was there, seated behind a desk littered with manila folders and other assorted papers. He had a cup of coffee in one hand and a cigarette in the other.
He wasn't quite what Rachel had expected. He was thin, almost wiry. Stress and worry lines were all over his face. And even though he was probably only in his mid-thirties, his auburn hair had streaks of gray.
Tanner immediately turned to leave. "I'll leave the three of you alone."
The moment Tanner closed the door, Jared walked behind the desk, bracketed his hands on each side of the chair and got right in the doctor's face. "Let's make this quick. Do you have any idea who we are?"
Sheridan nodded.
Rachel released the breath she didn't even know she'd been holding. It wasn't a tell-all confession, by any means, but at least he wasn't going to try to stonewall them.
"And you know why we're here, don't you?" Jared again. But instead of a question, it sounded like a threat.
"I know what you want." Dr. Sheridan turned his hazy blue eyes in Rachel's direction. He crushed the cigarette in an ash tray and slowly blew out the leftover stream of smoke. "I'm sorry, but I can't help you. They'll kill me. You must realize that."
"Do I?" she countered. She walked closer. "Or are you the one who put this plan together?"
"No. Never. It was Esterman."
Jared pulled up a chair, parking it right in front of the doctor. "I need names and information. And I need it now. Where's my son?"
"I don't know," Sheridan answered immediately. "I swear I don't."
"Then, you'd better start telling me what you do know, because Esterman isn't the only one you should be afraid of. As far as I'm concerned, my child is in danger because of you, so that makes your life worth next to nothing." Jared paused just long enough to move a fraction closer. "Convince me otherwise, and you might just get out of here alive."
Normally, the threat of violence would have sent her heart pounding, but it was pounding for a different reason now. Jared was a good cop. She knew that for a fact. If anyone could get answers from Sheridan, it was Jared.
With his hand shaking so much that the coffee nearly sloshed out, Sheridan took a drink before he responded. "I'm sorry for what you're going through. I'm even sorrier that I wasn't able to stop this."
"You can stop it now," Jared pointed out.
"But Esterman—"
"You can go into protective custody. Hell, you should have done that already. Because if we can find you, then Esterman won't bother to keep you around much longer. You're a huge liability to him now, and you're living in a dreamworld if you think otherwise."
That must have sunk in, finally. The doctor glanced at both of them and took a deep breath. "You really believe you can arrange protective custody so I'll be out of Esterman's reach?"
Jared nodded. "Not me personally, but I'll put you in touch with someone who can."
If Sheridan believed that, it didn't show on his face. He gave a heavy sigh as if surrendering to the inevitable. The inevitable in this case being not protective custody but something much worse.
"Esterman's assistant came to me in prison a little over a year ago," Sheridan began. He sat his coffee cup aside and rubbed his hand over his face. "He said he could get me out early if I'd do a surgical procedure. He didn't explain beyond that. He just said that I'd have to keep it a secret, and that it might not be legal."
No surprise there. Many things that Esterman did were illegal. "But you agreed, anyway?" Rachel asked.
"Yes." Sheridan stared down at his hands and repeated it. "Because I would have died if I'd stayed in that prison. I swear, I would have died. I was being threatened by this…thug who had this intense hatred for anyone in the medical profession. He'd already gotten to me twice, and each time I ended up in the infirmary. I knew if I stayed there, he'd kill me."
Even though there were tears in the doctor's eyes, Rachel could feel no sympathy for him. He'd known that he was agreeing to do something illegal before he ever left prison, and in this case, the illegal activity had put others in danger.
"So Esterman got you out early," Jared finished. "And you did the in vitro procedure on Sasha Young—"
"Were there others?" Rachel interrupted. It was something that had bothered her from the beginning. After all, several embryos were stolen from the clinic. "Or was Miss Young the only surrogate?"
Sheridan shook his head. "She was the only one as far as I know, and I think Esterman would have told me if there had been others. I did the surgery here in the office. Not ideal conditions, I can assure you. But it was successful."
Yes. Very. And because of that success, she, Jared and their son were facing this horrible ordeal.
"That's a great start, but keep talking," Jared insisted when Sheridan paused.
"I did the prenatal checkups on Miss Young at her house. Nothing much more than cursory exams. Then, last week Esterman called me to do the C-section. It was a little sooner than I would have liked, but he insisted."
Rachel latched onto that right away. God, she couldn't believe she hadn't asked about that earlier. "The baby was healthy when you delivered him?"
"He was fine. Good Apgar." Sheridan glanced in her direction again. "That's the test we give newborns to evaluate their heart rate, muscle tone and other physiological indicators."
So her baby was alive and well.
At least, he had been about a week ago.
"Esterman had a backup plan," Sheridan continued. "If for some reason the child didn't survive, he wouldn't have told you. He intended to use t
he infant's DNA to prove the infant was yours, and he thought that would be enough to get you to cooperate."
Rachel held onto the desk. That wasn't an easy thing to hear. She'd hated her former boss before this, but after listening to Sheridan spell out Esterman's intentions, her hatred reached a whole new level. If all Esterman had wanted from the child was a DNA sample, then maybe…
But Rachel couldn't even finish the thought. She couldn't let her mind go beyond the moment. She was thankful that Jared was able to continue the questioning.
"After you delivered the baby, did you murder Sasha Young?" he demanded.
"No!" Sheridan's face bleached out to a sickly color. "It was that man, Gerald-something. The one who calls himself Esterman's personal assistant, the one who visited me in prison to tell me about this arrangement. He's really a hired killer, that's what he is. He strangled Sasha before she even came out of anesthesia. You have to believe me, I had no idea that Esterman had planned something like that."
"I'll bet Sasha Young didn't, either," Jared tossed back at him.
"Yes. You're right. She was the innocent one in all of this. She just wanted a way to make some money. She wanted a new life. And instead, she was killed."
Yes, and they had to stop him before he killed again.
"Where's the baby?" Rachel managed to ask.
Sheridan shook his head again. "I honestly don't know. Gerald took him just minutes after the delivery, and I haven't seen either of them since."
"Then, give an educated guess as to where you think Gerald took him," Jared ordered.
The man touched his fingers to his temple and mumbled something as if going through some old information. "I can't say for sure, but once when I heard Gerald talking to Esterman on the phone, I heard him mention a woman's name. Agnes, or maybe Alice. I think she could possibly be the one who's taking care of the child."
"Agnes," Jared repeated. "You have a last name for her?"
"No. I only heard him mention her that one time."
Rachel moved closer so she could whisper to Jared. "I know who she is. It's Agnes McCullough. That's one of the names on the list of parolees. She's an RN, but there wasn't an address for her."
Confiscated Conception Page 11