Denim Detective

by Adrianne Lee

  She said the last with compassion, but no matter how soft her words, they chiseled through his heart. He couldn’t hold in a sob.

  “We’re not giving up, Beau. We’ll keep looking for your daughter no matter how long it takes.”

  He nodded and she knew he needed to be alone. The door closed and the silence wrapped around him. Hurt settled in his chest, a hard, hot ball of wounded despair. How could he tell Dee?

  DEEDRA’S MOUTH FELT COTTONY, her shoulder tender and sore. She moved and winced, identifying a different area of distress. Her lower body. But this ache was an ache dulled by pain killer. Why had no one ever invented painkiller for heartache? For loss? A pill or serum that would deaden emotional agony? For no matter how hard she’d tried not to, she kept hearing Heck telling her they’d never see Callie again.

  She drew a wobbly breath and caught a scent she recognized beneath the antiseptic ruling the air near her nose. Not cologne. Not man-made. But of the man. A scent unique to him.

  Beau.

  His handsome face, battered and bruised, hovered inches from her own. Her pulse hummed at the sight of him, and a smile sprang to her lips. He sucked in a breath as if every part of him were in pain. She wanted to fold him to her, but she was strapped down with IV tubes, and he balanced on crutches. She settled for caressing his cheek below the purplish discoloration. “Does it hurt much?”

  His mouth softened. “I was going to ask you that.”

  “Oh. Well…I have great drugs. But with a concussion you’re probably not on anything yet.”

  “You’re right.”

  “Did they catch Heck?”

  “No one told you?”

  She shook her head. “You tell me.”

  She patted the bed, inching over slightly so that he could sit beside her. She wanted him near. No more distance between them. Not right now. Beau settled with care, putting the crutches to rest against a visitor’s chair and taking her hand in his. He filled her in on all that T. R. Rudway had told him about herself, Nora Lee and the Dillard family.

  “Callie?”

  He glanced away from her, blowing a breath through his nostrils, and when his gaze locked with hers a second later, a sheen slicked his eyes. His grip tightened on her hand and his voice cracked as he said, “I’m sorry, Dee. She wasn’t one of the children at Wanda Dillard’s house.”

  Deedra had braced for this eventuality, but still tears stung her eyes and threatened to spill hot and scalding down her cheeks. She blinked hard. She would not cry. She would not fall apart and deepen Beau’s pain. But, oh God, Callie. She swallowed with difficulty, and counted herself lucky to have Beau. She hadn’t felt his support when Callie had disappeared, but she had it now. She knew now that he felt the same exact loss and ache she did, and somehow that eased her suffering. They could get through this together. If he was willing.

  “T.R. thinks she may have already been adopted by someone,” he said, sounding as if he’d abandoned all but the smallest of hope. “If that’s so, she says there will be a paper trail and our chances of finding Callie will increase.”

  Deedra inhaled once. Twice. She needed courage to broach her next question. Courage to face his answer if it was not what she hoped. She’d planned to leave once she’d had her surgery, but in the cellar she’d realized she would rather die with Beau than live without him.

  He was her other half. Callie had come into their lives as a gift, an extension of their love, but she wasn’t the main element of it. That precious commodity belonged to Beau and her alone.

  She finger-combed her hair, thinking suddenly that she likely looked a fright. “What if you knew we would never find Callie, Beau? I mean, what Sean said about you having ‘scrappin’ Shanahan sons’…well, you’re a great daddy and you should have kids. Lots of kids.”

  Beau touched her face as if she were the most delicate lace, the most treasured jewel. “I don’t need children to fulfill me, Dee. I need you. Only you. As long as I have your heart, I’ll be one happy cowboy.”

  “You have my heart, Beau. All of it.”

  “Welcome home, Dee.” He grinned and leaned to kiss her, his mouth sealing their deal better than any handshake or contract.

  “I hate to interrupt this tender moment…” Cassidy barged into the room. “But I’m glad to find you both together. Sean is coming. We have a surprise for you.”

  Surprise? What Deedra would rather have is a few moments alone with her husband. She struggled to keep her face from showing her annoyance at the ill-timed intrusion.

  Beau gathered his composure with difficulty and Deedra did the same. He held tight to her hand and grinned at Cassidy. “What’s this? You finally get him to pop the question?”

  “Not yet, but I’m working on it.” Cassidy gave a flip of her braid. She looked shaken to her toes but excited. “This is even bigger than that.”

  Deedra frowned, her curiosity raging. “How so?”

  “I’ll let Sean tell you.” The door opened and Sean’s silver crewcut poked through. Cassidy turned back toward Deedra and Beau, grinning sloppily. “Or should I say, I’ll let him show you?”

  A little boy with dirty-blond hair cut close to his head, clung to Sean’s neck. The child looked about two years old, dressed for play in a colorful T-shirt, faded jeans and scuffed tennis shoes.

  Beau shifted on the bed, and Deedra winced at the sharp zing of pain his movement caused across her belly, but she couldn’t take her gaze off Sean. If she didn’t know better she’d think his eyelashes were damp. His cheeks, too. Inexplicably her heart began to beat a tattoo and her mouth went drier than desert air.

  “What is this, Sean?” Beau demanded. “If you’ve come up with some scheme or other about Deedra and me adopting a child—”

  “Why don’t you shut up?” Sean barked. “And open your eyes, son?”

  The little boy lifted his head, and Beau stopped speaking as he saw the child’s face. Deedra and he said it at the same time, “Callie!”

  Her long raven hair had been cropped and bleached, but there was no mistaking those raven-lashed, green eyes. Beau’s eyes. Beau shook as he reached for his daughter. Sean grasped his arm, and tears filled the older Shanahan’s eyes. “We got our little girl back, Beau. We got her back.”

  Callie came reluctantly into her daddy’s arms, and her daddy closed his eyes as though he couldn’t bear the joy.

  Seconds ago Deedra had accepted that they might never see their child again. And now, in the blink of God’s eye, here she was. She reached a trembling hand to touch her baby, and tears burned through her eyes. Blurred her vision. For the first time in longer than she could recall, she let go and wept, rejoicing in this miracle. Tears streamed hot against her cheeks, tasting salty in her mouth.

  But Callie couldn’t know she cried for happiness. The tears might be scaring her. Deedra swiped at them and smiled at the little girl whose face had haunted her dreams. Callie’s eyes were wide, her raven lashes blinking quickly. Her eyebrows had been left their natural black, and the roots of her hair were still ebony. A sprinkling of freckles had started popping up on her button nose. There was a tiny white scar on the under-side of her chin. It hadn’t been there before….

  Deedra touched it with her finger, and Callie shied away. Pulled back. Deedra hesitated, then caressed her daughter’s tiny, perfect fingers, and this time Callie grabbed on to her hand. Fascinated by her wedding ring.

  Cassidy and Sean had slipped out of the room, leaving the small family to reunite. Beau and she couldn’t get enough of touching Callie, talking to her. After a while a look came into Callie’s eyes, a recognition of Deedra and Beau that was primal but indecipherable by a toddler’s mind.

  Deedra kept her touches light, her voice lighter. It would take time to make their daughter feel secure again. Before she would really “know” her mommy and daddy.

  “Her hair’s as short as yours,” Beau laughed.

  “It’ll grow.” Deedra laughed, reaching for her own hair. “Six mon
ths from now we’ll both have long hair again.”

  “I hate to intrude on this happy reunion,” Deedra’s surgeon said as he did just that. “Are you two ready for more good news?”

  Beau stroked his daughter’s hair. “Doctor, there couldn’t be news better than this.”

  Epilogue

  Six Months Later

  The barn of the S bar S pulsed with voices and music and celebration the likes of which Buffalo Falls hadn’t enjoyed in years. Cassidy Brewer had finally hooked and landed Sean Shanahan and thrown a wedding and reception with guests including everyone in town.

  Pilar had catered the shindig and outdone herself. Beau stood beside his uncle, watching Cassidy, a vision in off-white, her golden hair loose and swinging as she danced with her brother. Beau would swear his uncle hadn’t stopped grinning since he’d said, “I do.”

  He clasped Sean’s shoulder, nodding his head toward Cassidy. “Now that is a Shanahan woman if ever I saw one.”

  “You would be the expert in that area.” Sean said it as a compliment. He’d finally welcomed Deedra into the family with open arms, but she’d also, finally, included herself in the family.

  Beau teased. “Took you long enough to come to your senses.”

  “Took Cassidy tossin’ out her birth control,” he whispered. “Hell, I couldn’t let my own child be born out of wedlock. Now I’m worried the whole town’s gonna know it when the baby comes early.”

  Beau laughed. “It’s your own damned fault. If you’d admitted to yourself and her sooner that you’re head-over-heels and always have been, you’d have saved yourself that indignity. But you always were as stubborn as six mules.”

  Sean let off a braying laugh, sounding like the very animals in question. “Yeah, I guess I’ll just have to settle for a lifetime of pure old happiness.”

  “I guess you will.”

  Cassidy came to retrieve her groom. “I need to sit down and have some punch.” She fanned herself. “For a January night, it’s hotter than Hades in here.”

  Sean was as delicate with her as he could be tough with a wild bronco. He led his bride to a table, kissed her gently and went for punch. Beau grinned like a sap. Could a man get any happier than his uncle? Any happier than he? Beau didn’t think so, but he went in search of his wife and daughter, anyway.

  Ever since they’d been reunited, body and soul, he couldn’t spend enough time with both of them. He found them finally in the house, sitting quietly on the living room sofa. Callie’s head rested in her mommy’s lap. Her eyes were closed, her long ebony lashes gentle against her creamy peach cheeks. She’d ended up exhausted after the excitement of the day. Deedra stroked Callie’s chin-length hair, a look of such contentment on her beautiful face his chest swelled with joy.

  DEEDRA STROKED Callie’s hair, loving the length, the natural blue-black hue, the soft, satiny feel. She thanked God for every minute of every day that this child had been returned to them. Thanked God that she’d finally found the path to trust. She’d finally been able to give her heart completely to her little girl and to her little girl’s daddy.

  She glanced up and saw him standing there, the love of her life, and her pulse danced. He still walked with a slight limp. Always would. It served to remind them to never take for granted the glorious gifts of their lives or their love.

  Beau sat down beside Deedra and gathered a lock of his daughter’s hair in his coarse fingers. “How’s she doing?”

  “Great.” Every day Callie did better. She had never been shy before she’d been taken. But when she’d first come home, she’d been frightened, distrustful and clingy. Her age and a child’s natural resilience were turning that around rapidly. “It’s been quite a day for her.”

  “Quite a day for all three of us,” the quaver in his voice said it all.

  Today Callie had called Beau “Daddy” for the first time. Deedra had relived the memory again and again, and each time it brought tears to her eyes.

  “How are you feeling, Mommy?” Beau’s hand slipped over her rounding belly. She was three months pregnant. Same as Cassidy. The surgeon’s good news the day of her hysterectomy had been that he’d only had to remove the noncancerous tumor, not her uterus. It had been textbook procedure, he’d said. She’d not only be able to conceive again, but likely have a normal pregnancy.

  So far everything was going right.

  “Cassidy had an ultrasound this week,” Beau said. “She told Sean today that they’re having a little girl. He’s over the moon.”

  Deedra pulled his head to her, and she nuzzled his cheek. “Do you suppose we could go to bed now? I’d really like to show you how a wedding night ought to be celebrated.”

  “Why, Mrs. Shanahan, what a nice, naughty suggestion.” Beau chuckled lustily. “But, since we’re hosting this hoedown, I think we could disappear for an hour or so and not be missed, but longer than that would be bad manners, lady.”

  She gave him her most innocent round-eyed look. “My mama didn’t teach me no good manners, sir.”

  His grin sent a zing of need through her.

  He gathered Callie into his arms. “First tell me when you’re getting your ultrasound. I want to be there.”

  She blew out a shuddery breath. “I had my ultrasound this week, too. I’ve been saving the news for after the wedding and reception. I didn’t want anything to take away from Sean and Cassidy’s special day.”

  Beau’s gaze flashed from emerald to jade and filled with concern. “Is everything okay? Are you okay?”

  “I’m perfect.”

  He sighed, his shoulders loosening. He caught her face gently in both hands and kissed her soundly. Then he gazed at her again, a different concern crossing his face. “The baby?”

  She couldn’t contain either her smile or the excitement for one more second. Her secret news burst out now. “Babies.”

  Beau jerked back, his ebony brows arching. “Babies? As in more than one?”

  “It seems, Sheriff Shanahan, that we’re having twins.”

  “Twins?” The idea seemed to stun him, but he quickly recovered. His smile grew as big as a Montana moon and his chest puffed with male pride. “Yeah, twins. All right!”

  Deedra laughed from her very heart, a warm musical chime of joy that brought a glow to her face and a grin to Beau’s sexy mouth. “That’s right, cowboy. We’re having two ‘scrappin’ Shanahan sons’ to carry on the family name.”

  ISBN: 978-1-4592-3771-1

  DENIM DETECTIVE

  Copyright © 2004 by Adrianne Lee Undsderfer

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

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