by Gina Wilkins
“I have to go,” she said with a sigh, drawing away from him.
“I know.” His jaw flexed, a sign of his unwillingness to see her leave. “Be careful.”
“I’m always careful, Perry.” Except where you’re concerned.
He walked her to the door. He stopped her just as she reached for the doorknob. “Uh, Sanders?”
She glanced over her shoulder. “Yeah?”
“Aren’t you forgetting something?”
She frowned. Her purse was in her hand, so she knew he wasn’t referring to that. “Am I?”
He grinned. It always amazed her how his rare, full smiles could transform his dark face.
Sam knelt and retrieved something large and bulky from the floor next to the couch. “Does the name Bob ring a bell?” he asked, dangling the heavy harness from one hand.
Dallas groaned and slapped a hand to her forehead. “Oh, my God, I forgot it.” She was genuinely chagrined. In her entire career, she’d never made that kind of monumental mistake while working undercover.
Sam was obviously amused by her embarrassment. “I think Polly might have noticed.”
“Yeah,” Dallas said grimly, reaching for the harness. “I’m sure she would have.”
“Need help getting back into that thing?”
“You start fumbling around under my clothes and it’ll be midnight before I leave,” Dallas retorted, turning her back to him as she raised her shirt.
“There is that.”
She felt him watching with interest as she strapped herself into the rig, then smoothed the maternity shirt back into place. “Now,” she said in relief, turning back to him. “How do I look?”
“Beautiful,” he assured her, no longer smiling.
She blushed. “That was nice,” she said, caught off guard. “Thanks.”
“It just happens to be true.” He kissed her, but touched her only with his mouth. Dallas suspected he was resisting temptation. She knew how he felt. It was taking all her willpower to keep her hands off him.
“Take care of yourself,” he murmured as he stepped back.
She had the door open and was halfway out when she looked back at him. “You’ll think about what I said?”
“I’ll think about it.”
She couldn’t read his expression. She didn’t waste any more time trying. She left then, while she still could.
* * *
SHE CRIED ALL THE WAY back to the apartment. The people on the bus around her looked uncomfortable in the presence of a sobbing pregnant woman, but only one elderly black woman asked if there was anything she could do to help. “No,” Dallas whispered miserably. “But thank you.”
The woman awkwardly patted Dallas’s shoulder. “It’ll work out, honey,” she offered bracingly. “Whatever it is, you’ll find a way to work it out. Just you wait and see.”
“Th-thank you,” Dallas murmured brokenly, giving the sweet lady a feeble attempt at a smile and feeling a bit guilty about deceiving her this way.
The tears had a purpose, of course. Dallas needed to return to her apartment with a red nose and tear-streaked cheeks in order to reinforce her cover. Again, she was rather pleased with her acting talents. Had she not chosen a career in law enforcement, she probably could have made a living on the big screen, she decided.
Which only made it easier for her to cry as she thought of how Sam had abandoned his own career dreams. She hoped his parents were properly grateful for the sacrifice he had made for them. She suspected they didn’t fully realize what Sam had given up.
Dallas understood all too well. She knew what it was like to have a dream. Knew what it felt like to be on the verge of letting it go. Knew how it was to be the only one who believed in that dream.
No wonder Sam had become such a loner. He hadn’t believed there was anyone who truly understood. She could identify with that, too.
She loved him. She wanted him to have everything he’d ever wanted—even if it meant pushing him away, freeing him to go after his dreams.
Her tears weren’t all feigned by the time she stepped heavily off the bus and made her way toward the joyless apartment building.
* * *
SAM STARED AT THE battered copy of Gray’s Anatomy he held in his left hand. Medical school, he thought scornfully. At his age? Dallas must have temporarily lost her mind to even suggest such a thing.
He couldn’t do it, of course. Couldn’t walk away from a successful, nine-year career to go back to school now. Even if he could get accepted again—and that was a very big if—it would be too hard. He wasn’t sure he even remembered how to study. Medicine was nothing more to him now than a boyhood dream, the way some kids once dreamed of being astronauts or superheroes.
Or cops, he thought, remembering Dallas’s words.
Damn, but she’d had a tough life. How could she still be so much of an optimist? How could she possibly believe that life could all come out just the way it should if someone was just willing to work hard enough at it?
She was wrong, of course. Just because it had worked for her, just because she had managed to overcome enormous odds, didn’t mean everyone could. Nor that everyone even wanted to try.
It was too late for him.
And even if he should lose his own mind and go back to school, Sam thought, shoving the thick book back onto its shelf, was Dallas aware of how hard that would be on any sort of personal life they might have? He’d be spending long, hard hours studying, working part-time, probably, and then more grueling hours and seemingly endless nights working as an intern and a resident. The real truth was that he wanted it so badly his mouth watered just thinking about it—but would Dallas be able to live with those demands on his time? Assuming she was even considering hanging around that long, of course.
He’d had to make a choice once. Follow his dream, or give it up to help his parents out of a desperate situation. The choice had been painful, but not really difficult. He couldn’t have lived with himself had he taken the selfish path then; would have taken no pleasure from any success he might have found.
If he allowed himself to be swayed by Dallas’s bold advice—to risk going after that old dream again—would there come a time when he’d have to choose between his dream and Dallas?
He wasn’t sure he could survive having his hopes shattered again. But he was equally sure he didn’t want to live the rest of his life without Dallas Sanders in it.
He’d once wondered if he was capable of falling deeply, permanently in love with any woman. Now he knew that he was. He’d fallen in love with Dallas Sanders, of all people.
He groaned and rammed his fist against the wall. Why did life always have to be so damned complicated?
* * *
POLLY REACTED TO Dallas’s tear-ravaged face exactly as Dallas had hoped she would. “What happened?” she gasped, clutching Dallas’s arm with one scarlet-taloned hand. “What’s wrong?”
“I—I saw Sam,” Dallas confessed brokenly. “He—he said he isn’t going to change his mind about the baby. He doesn’t want it. He’ll never want it. And he doesn’t want me if the baby comes with me.”
Polly relaxed a bit, though her dark brows drew together in a scowl. “What did you do, go crawling to him? Beg him to take you back?”
Dallas nodded disconsolately. “Yes. It didn’t work,” she sniffed. “He gave me some money for food and then told me he hadn’t changed his mind.”
“I could have told you that,” Polly muttered. And then she sighed. “Well? What are you going to do?”
Dallas paced her living-room floor, trying to look torn. “I don’t want to lose Sam.”
“Does that mean you’re willing to lose the kid?”
Dallas touched the harness. “It’s probably better this way,” she whispered. “What kind of life could I give it?”
She turned slowly to Polly. “You’re sure these people you told me about find good homes for the babies?”
“Rich homes,” Polly said. “People with money and power. The kid w
ouldn’t lack for anything.”
Except scruples, Dallas could have retorted. Being raised by wealthy people who didn’t hesitate to break the law for their own convenience was hardly an ideal upbringing. She’d seen the kind of people who’d been raised with money and power and no respect for the law or the rights of others. People like that gave no thought to the “little people” left strewn behind them like unidentifiable roadkill.
No child of Dallas’s would ever be raised in that atmosphere—and she was going to do her best to make sure that Polly’s baby wasn’t, either. “I’d like to meet them,” she said.
Polly hesitated. “Meet who?” she asked carefully.
“The people you’ve been talking to. The ones who are going to pay you for your baby. The ones who are going to make sure your baby goes to a good home.”
For the first time since Dallas had known her, Polly looked uncertain. “You’re sure you want to do this? These people are very serious about this, Dallas. Once you give them your word, they aren’t going to let you back out.”
Dallas took a deep, shaky breath. “How much will they pay me? After all the hospital expenses, of course.”
“Enough to make Sam’s eyes light up again,” Polly retorted. “But you can’t decide something like this on impulse, kid. You gotta think about it.”
“Did you think about it?”
“I didn’t have a whole lot of other options,” Polly said bitterly. “The money these people are paying me will let me start a whole new life somewhere. I need that.”
“I need to start my life over, too,” Dallas insisted. “With Sam.”
Polly sighed. “I still think you’re crazy. For one thing, I think you got feelings for this kid. I don’t think it’s going to be easy for you to give it up.”
Her hand still on the padding, Dallas tried not to be amused at the unintentional irony. Polly couldn’t begin to guess how anxious Dallas was to finish this assignment and permanently rid herself of the hot, heavy harness—so anxious that she’d almost blown everything by forgetting to put it back on before leaving Sam’s place!
“I can handle it,” she said. “I want to do this, Polly. Please help me.”
Coming to an abrupt decision, Polly nodded her dark head. “Okay. Fine. I’ll talk to them.”
“I’ll come with you.”
“No.” Polly spoke sharply, flatly. “I’ll talk to them. They don’t welcome strangers around much. If they’re interested in talking to you, they’ll tell me. If not—you’re on your own, you got that? One word from you to anyone about this, and you’ll be lucky if you live long enough to go into labor.”
Dallas gasped. “They’re that dangerous?”
“People are always dangerous when enough money is involved,” Polly answered matter-of-factly. She searched Dallas’s face. “You still want to talk to them?”
Dallas gulped audibly, but nodded. “Yes. I still want to talk to them.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
“Thank you.”
Fifteen minutes later, Dallas was alone. She ran a hand through her hair and gave a weary sigh.
All in all, it had been one hell of a day.
* * *
THE MEETING TOOK PLACE on Sunday afternoon. Dallas wasn’t surprised that the leader of the baby-selling ring working the neighborhood turned out to be a friend of the surly Ms. Blivens. It seemed that Blivens passed along the occasional tip on a baby-source prospect in exchange for cash. It had been Blivens who’d brought Polly into the scheme.
The woman introduced herself only as Myra, an attorney. She was rail thin, with limp, dark hair and hard, lifeless eyes. Dallas had no doubt that the woman was cunningly intelligent. That became obvious during their brief meeting, when Myra skirted skillfully around any concrete promises and offered only veiled innuendos that were far from providing enough evidence for successful prosecution. With what little she’d said so far, a clever lawyer could make a case that Myra was only offering her services to set up a legal, private adoption.
Dallas knew better.
“I didn’t like her,” she told Polly later when they were alone in Polly’s living room.
Polly shrugged, and pressed a hand to her back as though it ached. “Who said you gotta like her? Her money’s good.”
“Are you sure we want our babies to go to someone like her? What if she’s lying about making sure they’ll go to good homes? What if she’s selling them to people who’ll abuse them or something?”
Dallas saw the anxiety that flashed in Polly’s eyes, though it was quickly masked. “She ain’t going to do that,” she insisted. “Myra says the people wouldn’t want babies so bad if they weren’t willing to take care of them.”
“But what if she’s lying?” Dallas insisted.
“Look.” Polly spoke sharply, irritably. “She’s not, okay? You’re the one who nagged at me to set this up. Now you better not start changing your mind.”
“Why not? I didn’t agree to anything,” Dallas protested, crossing her arms over her protruding middle.
“You saw her. You could identify her to the cops.”
“Why would I go to the cops? I could get into trouble.”
“Yeah, you just remember that.”
“Besides, she never really said anything about buying the baby. She hinted, but she never committed. She wouldn’t even commit to a firm fee.”
“She’s not crazy, Dallas. She ain’t going to give you more than you need to know at this point.”
“How are you going to get your baby to them? Will they pick it up at the hospital?”
“Don’t be stupid. I’ll bring the kid home. It’s gotta look like I’m going to keep it or Child Welfare starts getting involved.”
“So you give them the baby later, after you’re released from the hospital?”
“Yeah. We’ll arrange an exchange point and everything will be taken care of. I’ll take my money and disappear. Start over somewhere else with a new name, a new life.”
“How do you know you can trust them? How do you know they aren’t conning you?” Dallas persisted. And then she gasped as if at a sudden flash of thought. “What if Myra’s a cop?”
“A cop?” Polly dropped her hand from her back and gave a snort of laughter. “Yeah, right.”
“No, really, Polly. What if she’s trying to set you up? You could hand her the baby and she could arrest you. You could go to jail for a long time. Me, too, now. I’m scared.”
Polly lifted both hands. “Calm down, you’re getting hysterical. Myra ain’t no cop, okay? Trust me, I know a cop when I see one.”
Dallas looked skeptical. “How?”
“Let’s just say I have experience. Myra’s a snake, but she’s no cop.”
“I still say you should think about this some more,” Dallas argued.
There was no mistaking the haunted look that crossed Polly’s face then. “Maybe you can still change your mind,” she said, her voice low. “You haven’t really committed yourself. You could disappear now and they wouldn’t come looking for you. Probably. But I’ve made ‘em a promise. I’ve already taken money. Already spent it. I change my mind, they’re going to want revenge.”
Dallas lifted a hand to her throat. “But—”
“Look, I knew someone, okay? Someone who promised them her kid, then changed her mind after she had it. She turned up in the river a few days later. No one knew for sure what happened to the kid. You think that was a coincidence? I ain’t that dumb.”
“Oh, Polly. What have you done?” Dallas asked sadly.
Polly lifted her chin. “I’m taking care of myself,” she said. “Just like always. And you better be prepared to do the same. I don’t see that man of yours around to take care of you.”
The faint remnants of fear behind Polly’s bravado made Dallas’s throat tighten. She still didn’t approve of Polly’s choices, was still prepared to arrest her if she eventually refused to cooperate with the sting, but she felt rather sorry for her,
anyway. Misguided as she’d been, Polly had obviously felt that she’d had no other choices.
Like Sam, Dallas thought with a silent sigh.
She hoped it wasn’t too late for either Polly or Sam to turn their lives around. She had grown fond of one, fallen in love with the other. And now she found herself caught right in the middle of their personal dilemmas.
It was a damned unnerving position to be in, she thought ruefully.
11
IT TOOK DALLAS ANOTHER week to break through Polly’s brittle defenses and finally discover the woman’s true feelings about selling her baby.
It happened almost by accident. They returned home from walking to the grocery store together and found a small package sitting outside Polly’s door. Polly bent with difficulty to pick it up. “Wonder what this is?”
Dallas shifted the small bag of groceries she’d just purchased to her other arm. “Come on in for coffee. You can open it at my place, if you want.”
Polly nodded, suspiciously examining the brown-paper-wrapped box.
Dallas put away the few supplies she’d purchased and put water on to boil for instant coffee. “You going to open that or stare a hole through it?” she asked Polly, who was still studying the package.
Polly shrugged. “Guess I’ll open it.” She ripped the paper and tossed it to one side, revealing a small, inch-thick white gift box. She lifted the lid.
Her breath caught audibly. Dallas stepped closer to see what had caused Polly’s look of stunned disbelief.
The baby outfit was incredibly soft looking. It was made of white cotton—a one-piece garment suitable for a newborn boy or girl—and was accompanied by little white booties. “It’s adorable,” Dallas said. “Who’s it from?”
With hands that weren’t quite steady, Polly plucked a small square card from the box. “It’s from Blivens,” she said, her voice carefully uninflected. “It says she wanted me to have something for the kid to wear home from the hospital.”
“How weird,” Dallas said, frowning. “I wouldn’t have thought she’d do something like this.” It seemed unbelievably cruel, under the circumstances.
Polly shrugged, her dark eyes locked on the tiny outfit still in the box. “I guess she knew I wouldn’t think to buy anything. They want the baby to look good to anyone who’s interested enough to notice.”