And now, Annie was coming up on four months. They would be able to try her on solid foods for the first time, since she had good head and neck control. At last, they could sit her in the high chair. Chelsea thought about bringing the chair out of the closet and setting it at the end of the table. Would that be a good omen—a positive step toward bringing her home—or a reminder of the terrible limbo they were all in?
“We’re just about ready to plate it.” Leo poured the pasta into a drainer and stepped back from the steam. Usually, he called, “Facial!” and they both laughed at the silliness of it. Someday, Annie would laugh along with them.
She would be back. Most stolen babies made it home safely . . . in the cases when they were stolen.
“What are you reading there?” Leo asked.
She lifted the cover of the book to show him and his brows sank down. “Do you think that’s a good idea?”
“She’s going to be four months soon. I want to know what she’s doing.”
Whether she’s with us or not.
He turned back to the stove. “What does it say?”
“At four months the baby can try solid food. And one of the big milestones is communication. She’ll begin to notice when people are around her, and she’ll respond to their actions.”
“She’s already doing that,” Leo said. “Do you remember last weekend when I had her on the kitchen counter in her bucket seat, and I was doing peekaboo?”
“You kept hiding behind the fry pan.”
He nodded. “It cracked her up. She definitively gets it.”
“And she smiled.” That cherubic smile, her eyes lit with glee. At that moment Chelsea could see Annie’s face so vividly. She could imagine the chubby folds of her arms and imagine her sweet scent.
Earlier, while the plumber had been working on the valve in the bathroom, Chelsea had gone into Annie’s room and closed the door. The need for Annie had been like a physical craving, primal and pure.
In the closet, she had pulled the little hanging outfits together and pressed them to her face. The baby powder smell of Purex was sweet, but it wasn’t Annie.
She had felt her way around the room, trying to find something that reminded her of Annie. A picture, a stuffed animal, the musical chime on the mobile over the crib.
How strange to know that these weren’t Annabelle’s things. Not really. It was a room designed for a baby, but the collection of books, the squishy blocks, and the white pine crib might have belonged to any infant.
In the end she had curled up in the corner on the snowy carpet they’d had cleaned in preparation for Annabelle starting to crawl. Huddled in a ball, she stared up at the green elephants marching across the wall.
Had Annie stared up at those elephants from her crib?
Did she know that elephant girls spent their entire lives in a tightly knit family?
“Elephant mom bats her eyes, telling her baby to reach for the sky.”
Chelsea helped Leo with the dishes. As she stowed the meatballs and washed the pot in soapy water, she realized that it had been months since she had stood at the sink beside her husband.
“I’ve been so out of it,” she said. “You’ve been doing all of this stuff since Annie was born. If I were you, I’d be annoyed with me.”
“Nah. You had your issues.” He dried the plastic sauce spoon and shoved it in the holder. “But I’m glad you’re back.”
The phone rang, and they both turned to check the caller ID.
Grace Santos.
A knot twisted painfully in Chelsea’s stomach as Leo nodded toward the phone. “Go ahead.”
Her mouth was dry. “Grace, have you found her?”
“Not yet, but I did get the lab report back, and I know you and Leo will want to hear this. The muffins checked out fine, but the frosting was laced with a strong sedative.”
“What?” When Leo turned to her, she pressed the speakerphone button. “I’ve got you on speaker, Grace. Leo is here.”
“I was just saying that the baked goods left on your porch contained a sedative. A prescription sleep medication, and plenty of it.”
“Really.” Leo winced. “So someone planned this. Someone set Chelsea up.”
“It appears that way.”
Chelsea’s throat grew tight as the truth set in. Someone had drugged her and then stolen her baby while she was asleep. She hadn’t acted out one of her dark visions from the postpartum depression insanity.
“So it was the drugs . . . that’s why I didn’t hear the intruder. That’s why I can’t remember where I left Annie or how I got to bed.”
“Memory loss can be a side effect of this type of drug. Dizziness, disorientation. Some people report sleepwalking, even episodes where they get in the car and drive without knowing how they got there.”
Leo came up behind her and gently pulled her against him. “I guess the next question is, who would do this to Chelsea?”
“And what kind of person masterminds a kidnapping this way? I mean, what does it mean about our chances of finding Annie?”
“This type of planning is typical of an infant abductor,” Grace said. “It helps to fill out the profile of our suspect. I just wish the fingerprints at the scene were more definitive. Right now there are some partial prints that we haven’t been able to identify.”
It wasn’t really an answer to her question, but Chelsea was getting used to hearing the detective think out loud. Grace went on to mention something being off with Helen Rosekind’s credentials. They were still investigating it, but had trouble reaching Helen. Leo passed on her contact number, and they ended the call.
“I will never eat another muffin again,” Chelsea vowed.
“I’m glad Grace figured out why you couldn’t remember that night,” Leo said, “but this is really scary. What if you’d eaten all the muffins?”
“There’s too much trauma going on now to play the ‘what if’ game.”
“You’re right.” Leo’s arms tightened around her, and she leaned into him, feeling loved and secure.
“What do you think she’s doing now?” Chelsea asked. “I keep worrying that she’s not being fed or changed.”
“I know. I hope someone’s talking to her . . . holding her. Or maybe not. Maybe it’s better for her to get really annoyed with them. She has that angry face now, right? She should lay that on the kidnapper, with one of those shrieking wails that can take the paint off a wall.”
Thoughts of the baby made her aware of the heaviness in her breasts. “I need to pump again.”
“Okay, Chels.” Leo placed a kiss on her cheek and his arms fell away.
Sitting on the bed upstairs, with the machine humming, she tried to relax at the thought of Annie’s little laugh, which they’d be hearing more of, come the fourth month.
If we get you back, I’ll make sure you laugh every day, Chelsea promised. Things will be different.
The ritual of expressing milk had become Chelsea’s own vigil to draw her daughter back to her. If she kept producing milk, Annabelle would return. Those bottles lined up in the fridge, carefully labeled and dated, would not go to waste.
When she finished, she carefully labeled the bottle and carried it down to the kitchen to store it. Leo was putting away the dry pots as she leaned into the fridge and blinked.
The bottles were gone.
“Leo?” She shuddered as betrayal chilled her veins. “I had seven or eight bottles in here . . . what happened to them?”
Chapter 38
“Did you enjoy your time with your dad?” she asked. “You know I didn’t want to leave you, but it’s good for a baby to be with her daddy, too.”
Annabelle twisted away from the voice, her face puckering. She was tired and hungry and the sweet voice wasn’t helping either of those things. She whimpered, clawed at her chin, whimpered again.
“I know you’re hungry.” The woman pressed the nipple to her lips. “Drink up, little one. This is much better for you than the formula you’ve
been getting.”
Annabelle frowned when her lips were teased with the rubber nub. This wasn’t good and familiar. It was too hard, attached to something even harder and colder.
“Come on.” The voice was patient. “You must be hungry.”
The baby attached her lips to the cold nub and began to suck.
“That’s it.” The woman wriggled into a different position, not so comfortable for the baby, who had to stretch her neck to get the bottle.
“Is it yummy? This is what you need.”
Her face, at the end of the long shaft of the bottle, was familiar. Round eyes and a shiny nose the baby could almost reach out and grasp. She had lips, too, but the baby rarely saw them smiling like the big smile that sang to her each night. A low, rumbly voice that made her smile, too.
“And just so you know, I thought of everything. Those first two bottles? Poured them down the drain, just in case there was any trace of the sedative left.” Her big eyes came close. “I can’t have my baby girl getting anything that might hurt her.”
Annabelle blinked. This was different, and she missed the warm, soft body she always melted into at feeding time.
“Drink up now, baby girl. It’s mother’s milk. Very good for you,” she said as Annabelle looked at her sternly. “Probably the only good thing she ever gave you.”
Chapter 39
“So, best case scenario, what is this old man going to tell us?” Chris asked as they waited for Ira Rosekind to appear in the reception area of the assisted living facility.
“All about Helen Rosekind.” Grace smiled at an older woman who walked past at a good clip. “We know she’s not the woman who was providing nursing services for Annabelle Green, but maybe there’s a link between Rosekind and the woman operating under her nursing credentials. If the sitter is faking it, she must have gotten Rosekind’s credentials somehow. Maybe they met. It’s worth a shot.”
“You know, we should have thought of the baby nurse earlier,” Chris said. “That’s part of the profile in a lot of infant abductions. They pose as medical personnel.”
“You’re right.”
“A little late to be right. I have this weakness with doctors and nurses. I tend to trust them,” Chris said, a wry look on his face as he watched a nurse in formfitting white pants push a wheelchair toward them.
The man in the chair was hunched over but alert, his eyes shining behind silver spectacles.
“This is Mr. Rosekind,” the nurse said.
“Ira Rosekind. And I gotta say, I don’t get visits from police detectives every day. Tongues are going to be wagging around here.”
Grace was charmed by his begrudging smile. “Mr. Rosekind, thank you for seeing us. We have a few questions about your wife, Helen.”
“May she rest in peace. Or are you here to tell me she faked her death and ran off to Tahiti with a younger man?”
Chris shot the man a grin. “Is that what you suspect?”
“Ach! No.” Ira waved off the notion. “I was there when she passed. My Helen is gone. That’s why I’m wondering why you’re here.” He cocked his head. “Why are you here?”
“We’re trying to locate an infant who’s been abducted,” Grace said. No need to beat around the bush.
The old man squinted. “The Annabelle Green case? I saw that on television. That’s a terrible thing. What does my Helen have to do with that?”
“It appears that the woman who’s worked as a baby nurse for this nice couple has been posing as your wife,” Grace explained.
“Is that right?” He shook his head. “I have to say, that part doesn’t surprise me. Some shyster stole Helen’s identity after she died. How’s that for the bottom of the barrel? Stealing from the dead!”
“How’d you find out about it?” Chris asked.
“Some credit card companies had the nerve to send me the bills. They made threatening phone calls, too, but I didn’t let them scare me. My daughter fixed it. She got a lawyer, who told the bill collectors to cease and desist.”
“Do you know if an investigation was done?” Grace asked.
“We reported it to the police. Whatever they did with it, I couldn’t tell you.”
The pieces were falling into place. If the baby nurse went so far out of her way to forge her credentials, chances were that the identity theft was a building block for the bigger crime of kidnapping.
“Mr. Rosekind, you’ve been very helpful,” Grace said as they began to wrap things up. “Just one more question. Your wife worked as a baby nurse for many years.”
“That’s right. Helen loved the little ones.”
“Do you remember if she had any complaints from customers? Any lawsuits against her?”
“No, nothing.” He shook his head. “Everyone loved Helen, and her reputation was impeccable. Did you know she was on the board of the Mount Oliver Children’s Hospital?”
“I happened to read an article about that,” Grace said. “Sounds like she was a lovely woman.”
“She was. A good woman with a big heart,” he said, staring off down the hall. “I still miss her.”
“I’m glad Ira Rosekind refused to give in to the bill collectors,” Grace told Chris as they crossed the parking lot. “It really pisses me off when people prey on the elderly.”
“Next stop, the baby nurse’s apartment?” Chris asked. He had found an address in Eastchester using a reverse phone directory.
“Let’s hope that it’s the right address and that she’s home,” Grace said.
Just as Grace buckled her seat belt, her cell phone rang. “Leo Green,” she said, reading the display.
The man sounded frazzled. “Chelsea is freaking out, and I don’t blame her. Since Annie disappeared, she’s been pumping breast milk and storing it in the fridge. Now suddenly it’s all gone.”
“Gone . . .” Grace squinted. “You mean the bottles are gone from the fridge?”
“All of them. Someone took them. It must have been one of the people visiting today.”
“And you weren’t there for most of the time.” Grace got out her iPhone. “Can I talk to Chelsea? I need to know exactly who came into your house today.”
Chelsea came to the phone, and though her voice was a bit shaky, she made an effort to stay calm. Her first visitor was her friend Sasha Barton, but Chelsea added a bottle to the refrigerator long after Sasha left. Then came Emma and Melanie and Melanie’s kids. Eleni Zika and Helen Rosekind. The two neighbors, Raquel Jarvis with her kids, and the older gentleman. . . Chelsea took a deep breath, trying to remember his name.
“Kellog,” Grace interrupted. “Like the cereal. That’s how I remembered.”
“Right. Joseph Kellog. And Leo and me, of course. You and Detective Panteleoni. Was there anyone else? There were just so many people coming and going.”
“That’s okay. You can call me if you remember any others, okay?”
“Wait—the plumber was here. He fixed the valve upstairs. His name was Mark . . . from Triple A Plumbing.”
“Okay, we’ll add him to the list.” It’s going to be a woman, Grace thought. Probably someone you know. The plumber was a dark horse, but Grace added the man’s name.
“Do you think the person who stole the milk is giving it to Annie?” Chelsea asked.
“I’d say that’s likely.”
“I can’t believe this. If that’s not a gutsy move, coming in here and stealing right from under my nose.”
Grace could feel the woman’s panic. “Chelsea, I know this must be a torturous situation for you, but I think this is a good development. The abductor has revealed herself by taking that milk. It’s got to be someone who was in your house today. That narrows it down to about half a dozen suspects.”
“And my two sisters are on the list.”
“I know.” Grace frowned. “We have to consider every possibility.”
“We need to find Annabelle,” Chelsea said. “Can’t you bring them all in for questioning? Or . . . or go to their houses an
d do a search.”
“There are a few constitutional amendments standing in the way of that.”
“Find Annabelle, please.”
“We will.” Grace looked up and saw that they were cruising slowly down a block of small Dutch Colonials.
“It’s six-two-five,” Chris said.
“I have to go,” Grace told Chelsea. “Hang in there. I’ll call you later.”
She studied the house, its two upper-story windows resembling brooding eyes. “Looks too small to be a rental.”
“In this part of New York, people will sublet a closet.”
Chris paused over by the garbage cans beside the front porch.
“What is it?” Grace asked.
He slid a folded carton out from between the house and a plastic can. “Two boxes for baby stuff. A car seat and . . .” He turned to read the side of the box in the dim light from the streetlamp. “A stroller.”
Grace sighed. “I want to get real excited right now, but I don’t want to assume anything.”
“I’m reserving my happy dance for when we find the baby.”
Grace noticed ice at the corners of the porch stairs. No one had bothered to properly shovel, but she hoped it would all be gone soon, melted in the spring thaw. She turned to the door as Chris leaped up the stairs. “Two doorbells,” she said. “Which one?”
“We’ll try them both.” Chris pressed the buttons, and a buzz sounded nearby in the house.
Immediately, the cry of a baby rent the cool air. Grace felt her heart leap in her chest. Could it be?
The porch light went on, and a moment later the door was opened by a man wearing a Giants sweatshirt and jeans. The rattling cry of the baby was louder with the downstairs door open.
“Can I help you?” the man asked. He seemed to be in his late twenties, with olive skin and dark eyes that, Grace thought, were either tired or very sexy, depending on how you looked at it.
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