by Alex Gates
“London.” Adamski never bothered with pleasantries this late at night. “The foster home that took in Baby Hope just burned to the ground.”
“What?”
“The local VFD responded to the scene two hours ago,” Adamski said. “Didn’t realize who lived there until now.”
I rolled over, accidentally kicking James. Three AM. The worst time of night for a fire. Everyone would have been sleeping.
“Is anyone hurt?” I kicked the sheets tangling my legs and wrestled with the comforter. My butt nearly landed on the floor. At least I’d been too lazy to toss my clothes in the laundry. I grabbed yesterday’s shirt and slacks and put the phone on speakerphone to fasten my bra. “How’s the baby?”
Adamski was on the move too, his car chiming as he started the engine. “I got nothing. Trying to call the CO on site. Apparently, the house is already gutted. I’ll text you the address. Get down there as quick as you can.”
“I’m on it.”
I hung up, racing to dress. James stirred. Probably couldn’t see what I did in the shadows, but he managed to find my sock at the bottom of the bed. I grabbed it with a quick thanks.
“What happened?” he asked.
“Fire at the foster house.”
“Bad?”
“Yeah.” I flipped on my vanity light and swore. My hair kinked everywhere. I swept the clutter from the top and searched for a ponytail holder. The tension balled in my shoulders. “They’re targeting her.”
James frowned. “It could have been an accident.”
“I don’t believe in accidents anymore. Not on this case. Not when I had that note.”
“The one Amber wrote in the bathroom?”
It seemed so damn obvious now. How could I have been so careless?
“I couldn’t let them take her,” I said. “Amber told us from the beginning. Someone is after her baby. They know Hope proves that Amber was raped.”
“But why hurt the baby? Amber’s not talking.”
The truth terrified me. “Because they can’t trust Amber not to talk. The baby is important. No. Her father must be important. They’re trying to get rid of the evidence before it implicates someone powerful enough to order a hit on an infant.”
He didn’t want to believe me, but even James couldn’t rationalize this. “Who? Who would be that evil?”
My voice dropped. So did my stomach. “Maybe Judge Reissing didn’t just collect money for sending the girls to the facility…maybe he got another reward for delivering the goods?”
I bolted to the stairs. James followed, tugging on a pair of boxer-briefs before skipping the bottom step and rounding the corner to block my path.
“Corruption and greed are perks to positions of power,” he said. “But most men don’t just rape and murder, London. I met the man, talked with him, read through his rulings. Nothing in his history suggests violent crime.”
“We’re not talking a hardened criminal—Reissing is a powerful man protecting himself. You know as well as me that desperation is more dangerous than sadism.”
I shouldered my purse and turned, quieting as James’s expression darkened. It wasn’t often that he worried—less often that he dared to show it.
“Promise me…” he said. “You will not repeat that aloud. Not to Adamski. Not to Falconi or Riley. No one.”
“What if it’s true?”
“Especially if it’s true.” He pulled me close for a kiss. No matter the rush, I’d never again refuse his touch. Not after nearly losing him in the river, not after that photograph. “You can’t accuse a man as connected as Reissing of rape and attempted murder without gathering concrete evidence.”
“I know what I’m doing.”
“But no one else does, and that puts you in the most danger, London.”
Fine. I wouldn’t speak it.
But I’d think it.
Monsters weren’t confined to opened closets, darkened basements, or under children’s beds. They roamed free, passing into our realm via the shadows of money. If Reissing had been sending underaged, attractive girls to Grayson House for bribes, it only made sense that the man would eventually be tempted by the fruit he’d helped to plant.
Judge Edgar Reissing raped Amber Reynolds.
He’d impregnated her.
And now, to mask the crime, he had to destroy the evidence.
Baby Hope.
I should have protected the baby. Should have done more to help her, to shield her. Instead, I’d relied on the hospital and social services to keep her safe while I focused on trying to free the girls still trapped at Grayson House. But too many days had passed, and no one had heard from Hannah.
I couldn’t risk endangering the girls at the facility, but without Hannah or Amber to lead me to the truth…
Everyone was lost.
Including the baby.
It took twenty-five minutes for me to pass from Pittsburgh to the suburb of Peters Township, but I had no trouble finding the address. The McMansion should have been a perfect place to raise a child—huge yard, even bigger house, and the means to take care of a growing family. Now, bright orange flames led me past the community’s gate and into the nightmarish scene.
Five thousand square feet of charred inferno.
A police car blocked traffic a block away. I flashed my badge, and he waved me through.
“Anyone hurt?” I asked.
The etch of worry darkened the creases on his face. “I think you oughta get up there, Detective.”
My heart crushed. I wasn’t used to begging for a miracle, but the big guy owed me a few favors. How many Hail Marys, confessions, and communion wafers did it take to turn this night into a bad dream that would fade by morning?
The fire department barricaded off the house, but standing in the street was too damn hot for me. The heat blasted from the house in billowing, uncompromising bursts of flame, smoke, ash, and debris. Every window had popped, the glass shining in the saturated grass. Flames licked out of every window, reaching beyond the roof, high into the sky. The heat charred the once sunshine yellow exterior black, and the inside burnt orange and red.
The fire department could do nothing but spray outside the house and hope the wind wouldn’t carry an angry ember to the neighbors’ homes.
“My baby is gone!”
On the hardened cement of the sidewalk, soaked with rivulets of splashed water from the hoses, a woman howled into the night. She beat at the two paramedics desperate to keep her in place. Her robe fluttered open, the edges singed. The nightgown underneath had also burnt, black and curling near the hem. Charred in the escape? A paramedic attempted to wrap a bandage over her flailing arms.
Hope’s foster mother screamed until she retched. “My baby is gone!”
I stared at the house, consumed by the roaring, unquenchable fire. Every room. Every hallway. Every space filled with smoke and fire.
She must have burned herself trying to rescue the baby.
But where was Hope?
Someone had to have rescued her from the room. Was she in the ambulance? Were the paramedics working on her?
My stomach lurched.
Someone must have rescued the baby…
Right?
“My baby is gone!”
Her husband was braced on his feet by two neighbors. Twin collies rested at his feet, their leashes slack. A teenage boy nervously shifted his weight back and forth, crossing and uncrossing his arms over a bony, acned chest. His Superman boxers were all that he had managed to wear in his escape.
No one held the baby.
She hadn’t escaped the fire.
“No…” I nearly fell to my knees. “Not her.”
They’d murdered an innocent baby.
And for what?
How much money did Reissing and Geralt figure the baby was worth? A million? More? What sort of monster put a price on an innocent and sick newborn?
The paramedics did all they could to soothe the frantic, hysterical woman. I a
pproached, but the male EMT did his best to whisper over the rush of water, sirens, alarming radios, and burning wood.
“We just gave her a sedative. The husband thought it was best. She’s…upset.”
So was I, but I couldn’t let it destroy me. “What’s her name?”
“I don’t think she remembers, but the neighbors are calling her Cassie. Cassie Yates.”
I thanked his. His partner moved aside so I could kneel before the hysterical foster mother. I offered her my hand.
“Hi, Cassie. My name is London McKenna. I’m a detective with the Pittsburgh Police. I…”
“Hope.” The woman’s eyes were glassy with the sedative and tears. “You found Hope.”
“That’s right. I’m the one who found the baby. I came as fast as I could.”
“She’s gone.”
The devastating agony in her voice ached through me. “I’m so sorry.”
“She’s gone. Gone.”
“It’s not your fault.”
The tears streamed over her cheeks. “We applied with the state…waited three years for a girl…we just wanted a little girl. Tim’s all grown, and Bryan’s at college. Aidan is in high school. We just wanted a girl. She’s gone.”
“What happened, Cassie? Did you see anything? Hear anything?”
“Gone. Gone.”
And so was she.
I let a neighbor take care of her and searched the scene for anyone with information. Someone had to have seen something.
A fire fighter monitored the flames near a parked truck. A sergeant. I jogged to him, tossing my identification before blitzing him with questions.
“What do your guys say?” I asked. “What happened?”
“Can’t tell yet,” he said. “Fire’s burning fast and hot.”
“Arson?”
He shook his head, sweating beneath the thick, bulky equipment. His cheeks burned red, partially hidden by a scruffy mustache. “Don’t know yet, Detective.”
“What are you feeling?”
“That that family is lucky to be alive.” He regretted the words as soon as he spoke them. “At least…they’re lucky.”
“Can you get to the baby’s room? Can anyone get in?”
“No way. Even if we could get through the door, the fire chewed through the stairs. Roof’s caved in, tore through the back of the house.” His voice cracked. “Can’t send my guys in to rescue those who aren’t alive, no matter how…” He shrugged, unable to speak.
Not him too.
I breathed hard, focusing on my inhalations, the steps across the muddy yard, blinking away the tear-blurred halos over the lights from the emergency vehicles.
I couldn’t break too. Someone had to be strong.
Someone had to find out the truth of what happened here.
Someone had to catch the bastards who did this.
She was gone. And the rage that surged through me would have set the rest of the neighborhood ablaze.
It wasn’t right to barge into the family’s life now, but they had no idea how lucky they were to be alive. The husband watched his house burn to the ground, unflinching even as the gutters fell and the porch roof collapsed.
I didn’t introduce myself to him. He wouldn’t be able to remember me from any of the other authorities who had offered their help and sympathies.
“Did you see anything?” I asked. “What about the security system? Do you have outdoor surveillance video?”
He rubbed his face, missing most of the dirt and ash. “I got rid of the security last year. Kept the sign. Too expensive.” His words choked. “I didn’t think…I should have…”
“You couldn’t have known.”
“The fire just…erupted. Everywhere. Flames and smoke. I didn’t…I went to get Aiden out. Cassie went to the baby…I had to drag her away. She kept screaming.”
“Are you hurt?”
“Who cares.” His words were punctuated with a grunt. The answer was yes, but he’d never admit it. “How does something like this happen? Aiden said…he said…where’s Aiden?”
“He’s next door.” I pointed to the teenager sitting on a neighbor’s porch. “I’ll bring him to you.”
He didn’t answer, and I had no right to expect one. I did as I promised, crossing the yard to the neighbors. Aiden was already standing. He tried to hide his tears and left the dogs with the older lady. He rushed to his dad, but neither said a word to each other.
“Poor thing.” The neighbor slowly bent to pet a dog behind the ears. She looked to be in her young sixties, but the motion was too much for her. She rubbed her back more than she petted the dogs. “Horrible. Just horrible. I can’t believe someone would do this.”
I tensed. “What did you say?”
“I heard all that commotion outside. Went to look, and that SUV sped away.”
“SUV?”
She nodded, rubbing her neck. Her face flushed with embarrassment as she attempted to detangle a curler she’d forgotten to unhook behind her ear. “I was up—hard to sleep with my back the way it is. Heard a car outside and thought it was strange. Cassie and Rick are never out that late, especially with Aiden on a school night. Two people leapt into the SUV and sped off. Tore a chunk out of the yard too. Dirt everywhere.”
“When was this?”
“Just before the fire started. They left, then…” She gestured with her hands. “Boom. Up like a box of tinder.” She wagged a finger. “I bet they had something to do with it.”
Son of a bitch.
My mouth dried and lungs burned like I’d swallowed half of the flames. I stepped off the porch, nearly tripping to the sidewalk as my stomach lurched.
Cassie’s screams began once more.
“My baby is gone!”
Not dead. Not lost.
Gone.
Taken!
They hadn’t set the fire to kill the baby.
They’d kidnapped her!
I pulled my cell, frantically dialing Adamski. He answered on the second ring and immediately launched into his own tirade. I didn’t listen and interrupted him as I raced to the car.
“It’s arson! Deliberate! I got a witness who says a black SUV pulled up in front of the house before the fire started.” I didn’t let him ask questions. “Get an Amber Alert issued. They took the baby!”
“Are you sure?”
“The mother is in hysterics, she wasn’t making sense. Just kept screaming that her baby was gone. They took Hope. Get an alert out. She’s been missing for…” I checked the time. “Christ, probably three hours. Left in a black SUV from Peters Township.”
And now she could be anywhere.
Taken to another house.
Driven into the city.
Killed in the car and dropped into a creek.
“McKenna!” Adamski’s voice cracked over the line. “We got another problem. Get back to Pittsburgh.”
“What? Why?”
“I just got a call from the county jail.” A subtle panic haunted his words—the most Adamski ever voiced. “Amber Reynolds was attacked and beaten in the showers. They don’t know if she’s going to survive.”
17
“Now you know that it’s war…
But do you really think you can beat me?”
-Him
Nothing slowed time like the spilling of blood.
A long night was made longer with the news of Amber’s attack and my absolute helplessness to save Baby Hope.
The child had been kidnapped with no leads, no identifiable perpetrators, and no conclusive identification of the vehicle. None of the homes in the area had surveillance footage, and the SUV wasn’t spotted on any red-light cameras or security feeds outside of stores, banks, or commercial buildings. Peters Township was a recently developed area outside of Pittsburgh, but the kidnappers had their pick of safe passages through numerous backroads and farmland.
The second time Hope was kidnapped.
The second time someone attempted to take her under the cover of
fire.
If I wasn’t so certain Amber was in intensive care, I’d have suspected she’d lit the match. But this wasn’t a hurried, desperate kidnapping. This was a coordinated attack. They shielded their faces with ski masks to hide from the foster mother who’d attempted to intervene. They escaped undetected from the neighborhood. Probably swapped cars and found a safe place to take the child.
I’d experienced custody battles gone wrong, misunderstandings between family members at after-school pickups, and evil men enticing runaways, but nothing as heinous as this. These people were professionals—probably paid handsomely for the destruction they’d cause.
And unless someone saw it happen, unless someone reported a suspicious person with a baby, I had no way of tracking Hope.
Except through Amber.
But they’d thought of that too.
I’d come straight from the fire—dirty, wet, and reeking of smoke. Two hours passed in the waiting room before the doctors and nurses tried to turn me away.
But no matter the regulations regarding the ICU, I pulled every bit of authority vested in me to remain in the waiting room until I got my answers.
One surgery down. Another to go. The doctors had no need for optimism in their field, but I had one way to help Amber.
Hope.
I tossed a magazine away, checking my phone for an imaginary vibration that would give me some news about the baby. Nothing. Half of the city’s forces were on high-alert for the infant, but it wouldn’t be enough.
What was I supposed to tell Amber?
She’d sacrificed everything—her reputation, her freedom, and now her very body to protect her baby. Now the child she’d worked so hard to save, the one soul in the world worth the agony of giving birth alone and scared, was gone. Amber had damned her own life to give Hope a chance, even begging to sign away her legal right to the child so no one would know where she came from.
It hadn’t worked.
And now I was the one who had to interrogate a woman on the verge of death about the baby she’d already lost.
I hated to do it. I hated to press her, but if Amber knew Hope was in danger, then she’d know who had finally made good on their threats.
No more lies. No more hiding. No more refusals. If we were going to save that baby, I had to know who took her.