The Truth About Toby

by Cheryl St. John

“Something that would hold impressions,” Shaine supplied. “I know she’s just a baby, but something that meant a lot to her.”

  “I have everything,” Samantha said, standing. “Back here.” She led the way through the small house with its obviously secondhand furnishings to a bedroom that held a double bed and a crib. The crib was filled with bags and boxes.

  She gave an apologetic little wave toward the beds. “We shared this room.”

  “These are her things?” Shaine asked.

  She nodded. “And the bear,” she said, gesturing to a stuffed animal lying on her bed. She gave a foolish shrug. “I sleep with it now.”

  Cosmetics and cheap jewelry littered an old dresser, a teddy bear calendar hung on the wall. Samantha Cutter was just a kid herself.

  “You want to touch her things?” she asked, gesturing to the crib.

  Shaine nodded. “May we?”

  “Sure, but...”

  “What?”

  “Would it bother you if I stayed and watched?”

  Shaine glanced at Austin for his reaction. He shook his head as though it didn’t matter to him.

  “Okay.”

  The girl moved to arrange the cartons, dismissing sheets and clothing, and going immediately to the toys and personal items. She placed a box on the floor and showed them a soft-bristled hairbrush and ajar holding barrettes and tiny rubber bands. “She has pretty hair.”

  She lowered her face quickly. Shaine knew the pain of looking at these things, and made a point to listen with her heart each time the girl spoke of where something had come from and how Amy had liked it.

  One by one they went through the items, taking turns, getting impressions similar to the ones they’d already seen. Austin had several views of Amy with Samantha, and after he related them, she cried brokenheartedly.

  “I can’t do this to her,” he whispered aside to Shaine.

  “No, please don’t stop,” the teen said, overhearing. “Now I know you’re exactly what you say you are. I trust you. Go on.”

  Shaine held a bulbous rattle with a red-and-white-striped tube that swirled around inside.

  “That was her favorite,” Samantha whispered just as the spark of electricity shot up Shaine’s arm.

  “The day care has one like this,” Shaine said.

  “What?”

  “She’s seeing,” Austin told Samantha quietly.

  The girl brought shaky fingers to her lips.

  “She cried and stomped her feet, but they wouldn’t let her take it home.” Shaine was seeing the same facility she’d seen before. The surroundings were a little sharper this time. “The mother picks her up just after juice time every day. She carries her across the parking lot to the car.”

  “This is it.” Austin mentally nudged her forward with an insistent note. “Turn and look back at the building.”

  “The van,” she said. “It’s silver.”

  “Who are you seeing it through?” he asked.

  “I don’t know...I just see it.”

  “You don’t know cars—can you see plates?”

  “No.”

  “Damn! The building—turn and look back at the building.”

  “Tender Care Center,” she said. “Tender Loving Care For Your Little Ones.”

  “That’s one smart baby if you’re reading through her viewpoint,” Austin mumbled.

  “There’s a car seat in the back. It’s upholstered in gray,” she went on. “A pile of mail on the front seat.”

  Austin’s breath touched her ear. “Addresses?”

  Shaine’s hands were so cold, she started to shake. He took them between his and buffed them. A throbbing heat centered in her chest and spread through her upper arms as she painstakingly centered her attention on the envelopes. “A postmark,” she said weakly, and squinted at the round stamp mark.

  No one breathed.

  The ink swirled and came into focus. “Spring-field... Illinois.”

  “Perfect, baby,” Austin breathed. “Take it from her.”

  Shaine felt the toy pulled from her grasp, heard the rattle of tiny balls inside the plastic.

  “Hold her hands,” he told Samantha.

  “Oh, they’re like ice.”

  He flipped his phone open and punched in a number. A pause. “Allen here. Call me immediately.”

  The room came into focus, and Shaine became aware of the white-faced teenage girl who held her hands.

  “I’ve never seen anything like that before,” Samantha said in amazement. “How can you do that?”

  Shaine shook her head more to clear it than to answer the question. The heat that had encased her chest dwindled to a dull ache that made her feel as though she’d been running for miles and couldn’t catch her breath. “I’ll take that drink now.”

  Samantha shot up and returned with a diet cola. “This okay?”

  Shaine sipped it, her pulse sluggish.

  Austin’s phone sounded, and he answered it before it finished the first ring. “Allen... Yeah, Ken, we’ve got the Cutter baby. A Springfield, Illinois, postmark and a day care called Tender Care Center. The sign says Tender Loving Care for Your Little Ones.”

  “Don’t forget they call her Amanda,” Shaine prompted.

  He repeated her reminder, answered a few questions and hung up.

  Shaine yawned.

  “She needs to sleep,” he said.

  Samantha tugged her worn bedspread down. “You can lie right here.”

  He raised his brows questioningly at Shaine.

  They’d come straight here from the airport and hadn’t planned any further.

  “Okay,” she said, leaning back, and feeling the residual effects of the draining experience.

  “How about you?” Samantha asked.

  Austin shook his head and Shaine couldn’t help a grin.

  “No, I’ll be awake for a while,” he replied. “But can you tell me if there’s a gym in this town?”

  Austin’s phone woke Shaine. She opened her eyes and listened to him fumble in the dark. “Allen.”

  While he spoke in his usual terse phone manner, she blinked, trying to orient herself. She’d gone to bed in so many different places over the last couple of weeks, remembering where she slept challenged her. In the gray darkness, she made out the bars of the crib, and the room came into balance. Samantha’s.

  He switched the phone off. “You awake?”

  “What time is it?”

  “About five.”

  “In the morning?”

  “Yeah.”

  “That was Ken?”

  “The Tender Care Center has an Amanda Bryant enrolled. She’s the right age, fits the description to a T. Ken’s sending someone to the Bryants’ house in about an hour to print her.”

  Shaine came fully alert and sat up.

  Samantha, who’d obviously been roused by the call, appeared in the dimness of the doorway. “They think it’s her?”

  “How do you suppose the Bryants got her?” Shaine asked.

  Light flooded the room. Austin leaned back from turning the table lamp on. “Either they worked something out with this Rossi, or they thought the proceeding was legal. Which I doubt.” He nodded at Samantha. “Yes, they think it’s Amy.”

  Samantha staggered to the edge of the bed. “All this time,” she said in a hoarse groan. “All this time she’s been gone, and now—just like that, you find her?”

  “It’s not ‘just like that,”’ Shaine told her gently. “We’ve been all over the country looking for Toby.”

  Samantha’s body trembled and she hugged herself. “I can’t believe it’s her. I’ve prayed for this for so long. And now I’m praying that this is not some cruel joke.”

  “We can’t promise you anything,” Austin said, leaning back against the cluttered bookcase headboard. “But it’s no joke.”

  “Of course not,” Shaine said, glancing at her wrinkled clothes. She crawled to the end of the bed and put her arms around the teen’s shoulders.

>   A tear splashed the back of her hand. Her heart went out to the young mother who obviously had no support from her family. She didn’t know Samantha’s situation, but there didn’t seem to be a father in the picture. Maybe, like Maggie, she’d made a few mistakes, but she loved her baby and had been though hell the last year.

  “I should call my mom,” the girl said finally, pulling back and wiping a sleeve across her face. “You’ll stay with me?”

  Austin looked at Shaine. “We have three days left,” he said.

  “We’ll stay a while longer,” Shaine promised.

  Two hours later they got the call. Amanda Bryant was Amy Cutter. Samantha nearly fainted, and Austin helped Shaine lay her on the couch. He got her a glass of water, and watched Shaine rub her wrists and talk to her. The young girl cried, huge racking sobs that drained the energy from all of them.

  “Can she meet us at the airport in Kansas City in the morning?” Ken asked.

  “I’ll have her there,” Austin promised.

  The following morning he and Shaine observed the joyous reunion of mother and child in the bustling terminal.

  “The Bryants paid big bucks for that kid,” Ken said. “They claim they weren’t in on the operation, but they bought a baby that turned up out of thin air.”

  Plump little Amy cried at the handling of strangers and the tearful kisses Samantha rained over her rosy cheeks. Shaine felt sorry for mother and child. Even though she’d been found and returned, it had been an entire year since the baby had been with her real mother. The adjustment would be an enormous one for both of them, and it wouldn’t be easy.

  She had to wonder how Toby would react to seeing her again after all this time. Children were amazingly resilient and adapted to changes far better than adults. Or was that just a fallacy created by adults to justify the changes they forced on the children?

  Ken led Austin and Shaine a short distance from the noisy reunion. “The Bryants are being formally charged today. We also have one Antonio Rossi, alias Tony Reames, alias Tim Bradford in custody. He’s the top dog. And the Holbrooks have already given their statements incriminating him.”

  “What about Toby?”

  Ken turned to her. “Rossi has a lot of kids to account for, Shaine. It’s going to take a while to go over the missing-persons data and connect them with this guy. We’re doing everything we can.”

  She nodded and turned away. Across the lobby, Samantha and her mother comforted the dark-haired toddler. After several minutes Samantha noticed her, said something to her mother and the three of them approached.

  “Mom, this is Shaine. The one I told you about. She found Amy for me.”

  The woman looked like an older version of Samantha, her hair tinted a deeper auburn shade. “Samantha says she’ll never be able to repay you,” the woman said. “I never set much store by your psychic stuff, but Amy is here with us, and I’m grateful for that.”

  Shaine assumed that was an expression of appreciation. “Samantha doesn’t owe me anything. I’m just grateful that the FBI was willing to work with us. They helped as much as Austin and I did. And Austin’s the one who showed me how.”

  “Well, to all of you, then,” Samantha said. “Thanks.” Impulsively, with Amy on her hip, she leaned forward and caught Shaine in an awkward hug. Shaine returned the embrace, touched the little girl’s soft dark hair once and didn’t let herself talk.

  “We’ll keep in touch,” Samantha promised. “I’ll send you pictures and I’ll call.”

  “I’d like that,” Shaine replied.

  Austin came next. Shaine’s throat tightened when Samantha pressed herself against his chest, and one of his hands cupped the baby’s head.

  Then Ken, who shot a hand out before Samantha could hug him. She shook it, giving him a watery smile.

  Shaine followed Austin toward the baggage claim.

  “We have about an hour,” Austin said, looking at his watch. “Let’s grab a drink before our flight back to Omaha. Want to join us, Ken?”

  “No, thanks. I want to be there when they start questioning Rossi.”

  “Let us know as soon as you hear anything,” Shaine said needlessly.

  They waved him off and found a bar in the airport. A listless feeling of melancholy swept down on Shaine as they settled themselves and ordered.

  Trying to relax, Shaine found Austin studying her. She looked into his dark, concerned eyes. For not spending much time around people most of his life, he displayed acute perception. Did that go with the gift?

  “This is it, Shaine,” he said, as though reading her mind, which he swore he couldn’t do. “Don’t give up now.”

  “You heard him,” she said, tucking her hair behind her. ear without thought. “The number of children who went through that place will astound all of us. It’s not like they kept records to incriminate themselves, you know. How will they know where Toby is?”

  He’d told her from the beginning. Hope was what a person conjured up when they wanted something badly enough. But it wasn’t enough to make that something happen. Fate had a way of controlling that, and fate had a way of, more often than not, being cruel.

  It was entirely possible that she might come away from this with nothing. Without Toby.

  And without Austin.

  Chapter 17

  Shaine paced the inn’s kitchen floor on Thursday morning. “Feel anything yet?”

  Audrey looked up from the newspaper and her cup of tea. “For the tenth time, I feel like a blimp.”

  “I mean pains, twinges, you know,” Shaine said in irritation.

  “Look, hon, Nick stayed home like you insisted. I’m not going anywhere. I haven’t gone anywhere except to the doctor’s office in three weeks because I can’t get my shoes on. You can go about your business. A watched pot never boils.”

  Since she was obviously getting on Audrey’s nerves, she cleaned and aired the guest rooms, then straightened her office. Austin hadn’t returned the computer, nor had he mentioned it again. She’d seen him in here the night before. Curiosity got the best of her, and she sat in her squeaky swivel chair.

  The action brought to mind the afternoon they’d put his aquarium together, and he’d sat before his computer. They had never found anyone to send him fish. His generous kisses, his inflaming touches were a sad-sweet memory.

  She understood why he’d closed that door between them. He was protecting them both from the pain of their inevitable parting. He couldn’t know she would rather have had every moment with him until that day came. This way was harder for her. This way was cheating her of his time and his body and the glorious hours of comfort and closeness.

  Had she overreacted about the computer? He’d seemed to think he’d done something perfectly simple. The cost didn’t mean as much to him as it did to her. Thinking back over the last several days with the remote, the phone, and now this, was he perhaps unconsciously making her environment more like his so he didn’t feel quite so out of place?

  She noticed what she assumed to be the power button and pushed it in. The quiet whine of the machine surprised her. The monitor made a fizzling sound and the screen popped on. Little boxes appeared. Cool.

  She’d seen him do it enough times; it had something to do with the mouse. She moved the gadget and an arrow zigzagged across the screen.

  “You have to double-click on one of those icons.”

  She jumped a foot. Austin entered the room and leaned a hip against her desk.

  “You scared me half to death.”

  “Sorry. Got caught showing an interest, did you?”

  “Shut up.”

  He chuckled.

  She grinned.

  He moved a stack of folders from a battered straight-backed chair, pulled the chair beside hers and tapped the screen. “Click on that one.”

  “This one?”

  “Yeah.” After a minute he said, “That’s a menu. You can try a couple of the games to get a feel for the mouse and the keyboard.”

 
; He found her a matching game in which she had to hold the mouse button down, align a row of rocks so that they fit into the puzzle and then release it to get them to stay. The first time she let go too soon, and the speakers made a funny sound. She jumped back, thinking she’d broken something.

  He laughed again. “It’s supposed to do that. Those are the sound effects.”

  He prompted her to try a few more of the features, and she didn’t want to disappoint him, but her baffled responses had him laughing so hard, he had tears in his eyes. The sound touched her, and she was glad she’d been the one to reach him after so many years. Surely he knew he meant more to her than just being the man who could help her find Toby. She wished she could tell him, but she didn’t want to lay any additional pressure on him.

  Nothing either of them had given the other had come with strings attached. And that’s the way it should stay.

  He leaned forward to point at the screen, and she turned her head to look at him.

  Slowly he met her eyes.

  She hadn’t admitted it before. Not really. Not like this. Not like the soul-deep knowledge that rose up inside her now and set her heart on a wild unsteady beat.

  She loved him.

  She loved Austin Allen. This all-consuming emotion wasn’t gratitude, though she recognized she felt that toward him, too. It wasn’t simply desire, though she desired him in a completely earnest and elemental way.

  This was love. “I’ll-want-you-till-I-die, I’ll-never-get-enough, I-need-to-have-your-heart-and-soul” kind of love. The emotion filled her with joy, and the knowledge that he didn’t want her love stole it away again.

  He looked at her like he wanted to kiss her.

  She wanted to touch him.

  She wanted to keep him.

  “Shaine!” Audrey appeared in the doorway, one hand beneath her swollen belly. “Shaine, it’s time. Go find Nick!”

  “I’ll get him.” Austin stood, and Audrey stepped aside so he could leave.

  “Oh, God, this is it,” she said in a quavering voice.

  Shaine hurried to her side. “You’re going to be just fine. And you’re going to have this over with in a snap.” She glanced at her watch. “Six hours. That’s great for a first baby.”

  “Six hours! Easy for you to say!”