“I know of him. He’s one of the men who tried to kidnap Liam. Last I heard, he was in the hospital.”
“You never had any dealings with him?”
“None,” Hector insisted.
Which meant he’d just lied.
Cooper slid another piece of paper Hector’s way. “Then why did you pay Vernon Graham a hundred dollars?”
Hector looked at the transaction as if seeing it for the first time. “I didn’t pay him. But my assistant often gives contributions to various charities in my name.”
It was either a very convenient answer or Hector had messed up and left a paper trail connecting him to a man he’d hired to kidnap a little boy.
Hector opened his mouth to say something else, but his phone rang. “I’ll turn it off,” he mumbled, but then seemed to freeze when he looked at the screen. “I think the caller might be Peggy.”
That got Cooper’s attention. He took the phone from Hector and answered it on speaker.
“Hector?” the caller immediately said. “Where are you?”
It was Peggy, all right, and Tucker hurried from the room, no doubt so he could try to trace the call. Jessa didn’t stay put, either. She went to the interview room and threw open the door. Hector spared her a glance. A nasty one. Before he turned his attention back to Peggy.
“I’m at the sheriff’s office again,” Hector answered.
“Don’t hang up,” Cooper warned the woman. “Tell me where you are.”
Peggy didn’t jump to answer, and Jessa prayed she’d stay on the line until Colt and Tucker had a chance to pinpoint her location. “I’m someplace safe, I hope. I know you don’t believe me, but someone’s trying to kill me.”
“I might believe you if you turned yourself in. You held a man and two women at gunpoint. You need to answer for that.”
“And I will. When you have this would-be killer behind bars so he can’t get to me.” She paused. “But I might have been wrong about Donovan. He might not be behind the illegal adoptions.”
“You seemed pretty sure he was guilty when you were holding him hostage,” Cooper reminded her.
“Yes, but I think Hector could have misled me so he could cover up his own guilt.”
“Right,” Hector snarled. “Point at me now, will you? Well, I’m not the one who did something wrong. Hell, Peggy...” He stopped, obviously struggling to keep a leash on his temper. “Quit slinging mud at me so we can get to the bottom of this. Someone tried to kidnap Jessa’s boy again.”
Peggy made a sound. Hard to interpret what it meant, though. “I didn’t know.”
“Well, you do now,” Cooper snapped. He grabbed one of the papers from the file. “Now tell me about these deposits made to your bank account.” He started reading off the sums and the dates.
“I told you. People pay me to find the perfect match for the babies.”
“But I wasn’t perfect,” Jessa said. “I was single.”
“The perfect match for someone who can afford it,” Peggy corrected in a very loud voice. “You paid for your son, and it’s payments like yours that keep the adoption wheels turning. If I had to work elsewhere in a day job, I wouldn’t have time to find babies in need of adoption.”
Then people would have to go through normal channels. Channels that Jessa hadn’t taken because it would have been years, if ever, before she’d gotten a child. It sickened her though to think that cutting corners had brought them to this point. Not just her, but countless others.
“Did you steal Liam?” Cooper came right out and asked.
“No.” Peggy didn’t raise her voice. She merely sighed and then hung up.
Cooper hit Redial and stuck his head out into the hall. “Did you get her location?”
“Sorry,” Tucker said a moment later. “It’s a burner.”
Cooper and Jessa both groaned, and he added some profanity when the woman didn’t answer. A burner was a prepaid cell that couldn’t be traced. However, that did cause Jessa to snap in Hector’s direction.
“How did you know it was Peggy who was calling?” Jessa demanded.
He lifted his shoulder. “Peggy’s called me before, and it’s appeared on the screen as unknown name, unknown number.”
“It’s how she called me,” someone said. Jessa hadn’t heard him come up the hall, but it was Donovan. And he wasn’t alone. There were two men wearing suits standing behind him. His lawyers, no doubt.
“You’re going in there,” Cooper ordered Donovan, and he pointed to the interview room across the hall.
Donovan walked closer, that oily smile on his mouth. She figured that smile got to Cooper, because it sure as heck got to her. There was nothing about this situation that warranted a smile.
“Cooper,” Donovan said, his tone as condescending as that smile. “I know you’d love to see me suffer. But this vendetta against me has got to stop. In fact, my lawyers are here to tell you that there’ll be no more questions...unless you file charges against me.”
Jessa knew Cooper couldn’t do that. Not yet, anyway. The only evidence they had against Donovan was Peggy’s accusations, and considering Peggy’s situation, those weren’t nearly enough to bring charges against the man.
“Now, if you don’t mind,” Donovan said, casually checking the time on his pricey watch, “I’ll just be going. I have a business to run.”
Donovan turned as if ready to leave, but he stopped and looked at Hector, who was still in the interview room. “Don’t I know you from somewhere?”
Hector shook his head. Maybe too quickly.
“Funny,” Donovan remarked. “I could have sworn I’ve seen you around Sweetwater Springs.”
With that, Donovan smiled again and strolled away. Jessa sure didn’t smile, and neither did Cooper. They just stared at Hector, waiting to see if Donovan had hit a nerve or was just blowing smoke.
“I was here in town after the flood,” Hector finally said.
He didn’t have to clarify what flood. Jessa knew from Cooper’s suddenly blanched expression that Hector was talking about the one that had swept away his wife.
“A former client lives here,” Hector went on, “and she had some flood damage. Not Donovan, but a rancher just outside of town. Norma Cullen.”
Jessa knew the name, had seen it on records for an old embezzlement case, but she’d never met the woman.
“Norma asked me to come out and take a look at the damage,” Hector went on. “I don’t normally handle that sort of thing, but I made an exception because she was an old high school friend.”
“That’s all there was to the visit?” Cooper said, and it sounded like some kind of accusation.
“That’s all,” Hector snapped. “I don’t know how Donovan found out about me being in town, and the only reason he brought it up was to implicate me in all of this.”
“You’re already implicated,” Cooper reminded him. He opened a file on the laptop. A file with photos of a white car and another of Molly. “Did you see my wife, that car, the baby, anything?”
Hector studied the photos and shook his head to each of the questions. “Donovan’s just muddying the waters. And now, if you’ll excuse me—and even if you don’t—I think I’ll take a page from Donovan’s book and leave. When and if you have more than just speculation, contact me.”
“Oh, I will. Maybe as soon as the crime scene folks find something in that Jeep that will lead right back to you.”
Hector stopped, stiffened. “If you find anything, it’s because someone planted it.” He walked out. Or rather, stormed out, slamming the door behind him.
Cooper stood there, staring after the man’s hasty exit. But he didn’t stand there alone for long. Colt went to one side of him. Tucker, the other. A united front. A family. Even with the shadow hanging over them from Jewell’s trial, they were still very much a family.
One that would make sure Cooper got his son back.
Jessa got that urge again. To grab Liam and run. But then Cooper looked over his shoul
der at her.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice far more soothing than it should have been. He walked closer to her. “I wanted to get more out of them.”
And he surprised her—surprised his brothers, too—by brushing a kiss on her mouth. It was quick. Barely a kiss. But she felt it all the way to her toes. Colt and Tucker no doubt felt something entirely different.
Confusion.
They probably thought Cooper had lost his mind.
“Come on,” Cooper said to her, ignoring his brothers’ stares. “We’ll get Liam back to the ranch.” He put his hand on the small of her back, easing her in that direction.
But he stopped.
Jessa followed his gaze to the glass front door and the woman who stepped inside. Rosalie.
“We need to talk,” Rosalie said, not to her brothers but to Jessa.
She didn’t like the sound of gloom and doom in Rosalie’s voice. There’d already been way too much bad news. Jessa couldn’t handle more.
“You remember I told you I’d been investigating missing babies? Like my own daughter,” Rosalie explained.
Not trusting her voice, Jessa just nodded.
“Well, I found out something,” Cooper’s sister continued. “About Liam.”
Chapter Thirteen
Cooper just stood there, staring at his sister. He tried to tamp down his hopes. But it was hard to do that when Rosalie might have exactly what he needed to put an end to the danger.
And reclaim his son.
Of course, he couldn’t do that without hurting Jessa. Maybe Liam, too. After all, Jessa was the only parent Liam remembered having. Still, that didn’t mean Cooper would just hand him over to her and bow out of Liam’s life.
However, that left him with one Texas-size question: What was he going to do?
“What did you find out?” Jessa asked Rosalie.
Jessa was definitely wearing her heart on her sleeve. Her voice was mostly breath. She was pale and shaky. And she, too, looked as if she were trying to tamp down something—a panic attack, maybe.
Rosalie took a moment to gather her breath. “I’ve been working with criminal informants and just about anyone else who could give me information about my missing daughter.”
Cooper almost gave her a stern scolding for that. It was dangerous, and she should leave that sort of thing to the cops. Still, he knew what Rosalie was going through, and he would have bargained with the devil himself to get his son back. Rosalie no doubt felt the same way about her own child.
“One of the informants told me about a woman who found a baby,” Rosalie continued. “The timing and circumstances are right for it to have been Liam.”
“But you’re not sure,” Jessa jumped to say.
There was sympathy in Rosalie’s eyes, and she volleyed glances between Jessa and Cooper as if asking if she should continue. Cooper just nodded.
Rosalie took another deep breath. “The woman refuses to talk to me, and the informant wouldn’t give me her name even when I offered him money.”
“If you think he’s telling the truth, I’ll offer him enough money so he’ll talk,” Cooper assured her. “What’s his name?”
“Calvin Brinton. He lives in San Antonio. And he has a record a mile long, mainly for petty stuff, but he did some time for forgery about a decade ago.”
Cooper looked at Colt. “I’m on it,” Colt assured him, and he hurried back to one of the offices, no doubt to make a call to locate everything he could about this criminal informant.
“Brinton said a woman who was a friend of friend had found a baby boy nearly two years ago after the flood,” Rosalie continued. “According to this woman, the baby was floating in his car seat, and she rescued him.”
God, it was hard to hear this. His son could have been out there on that raging creek. A dozen bad things could have happened to him. If this woman was telling the truth about rescuing him, then she had also saved his life.
Jessa started shaking her head. “Why didn’t the woman report it?”
Cooper had the same damn question. He’d died a thousand times after Molly’s death and his son’s disappearance. And yeah, he was thankful for the rescue, but not thankful that his baby had been kept from him.
“This is where the story gets a little sticky,” Rosalie went on. “The woman says she’d heard of someone who would pay big bucks for a healthy newborn, so she made some calls and arranged to meet with this person.”
That immediately got his attention. “Peggy Dawes?”
“No. I’m sorry.” She turned to Jessa. “She said the woman was you.”
“Then she’s lying,” Jessa insisted. “She’s lying,” she repeated to Cooper.
He ignored her for the time being. “What else did the woman tell your criminal informant?”
Rosalie didn’t look especially eager to continue, but she nodded eventually. “She said that Jessa wanted the adoption to look aboveboard, so she gave the woman the name of a baby broker who was in turn supposed to contact an adoption attorney.”
“I didn’t,” Jessa protested. She caught Cooper’s arms, pulling him around to face her. “I wouldn’t do anything like that.”
“I know. But we could still get some truthful information from this woman if we can find her. My guess is that she’s covering for the real kidnapper and purposely gave that false info about you to the criminal informant.”
Jessa stayed quiet a moment, obviously giving that some thought, and he saw the muscles in her arms and shoulders relax a bit when she realized he wasn’t accusing her of anything.
“We need to start by locating the criminal informant and pressuring him to give us her name,” Cooper said, and he met Rosalie’s gaze. “Thank you for bringing this to me.”
Rosalie nodded, but she didn’t get a chance to say anything because Tucker spoke first.
“Who else knows about this Calvin Brinton and what he told you?” he asked Rosalie. Unlike Cooper, Tucker’s question sounded more like an interrogation.
Rosalie lifted her shoulder. “I’m not sure. I’ve talked to a lot of people, and Brinton’s someone I use often when I’m following a lead.”
Cooper and Tucker exchanged glances, and Cooper knew what had triggered his brother’s question.
Hell.
“This could put both Brinton and you in danger,” Cooper told his sister. “The woman, too. Until we get this situation under control, it’s best if you take some precautions. Don’t go anywhere unless one of us or your sister is with you.”
Cooper had expected that to frighten Rosalie, but it didn’t. She only gave a resolute nod. He wanted to add that she should back off from her investigation for a while, but a mere request from him wouldn’t stop a parent in search of her missing child. Heck, once the danger was over for Liam and Jessa, Cooper would jump to help Rosalie himself.
Tucker mumbled plenty of profanity. Maybe because he didn’t like being joined at the hip with a sister they no longer considered a sister. At least that had been the case when Rosalie had first shown up at the ranch with Jewell’s entourage. However, Rosalie had more than pulled her own weight by helping to take care of Liam. And now she’d given them a lead.
Maybe.
If it wasn’t already too late.
One glance at Tucker and Cooper realized his brother was thinking the same thing.
Tucker took out his phone. “I’ll find out if there are any missing persons reports or dead bodies that might match this woman who found the baby.”
“But you don’t know anything about her,” Rosalie interrupted.
“She must live near the creek,” Cooper explained while Tucker proceeded with the call. “And she’s probably not elderly if she walked down to the creek so soon after the flood. Also, since she was willing to commit a crime by selling the baby, then she possibly has a criminal record.”
Of course, it still could turn out to be a needle in a haystack, but it was a start.
Jessa went closer to him. “I know I sound
like Hector, Peggy and Donovan, but I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I know.” And Cooper would have given her more reassurance than that if Colt hadn’t finished his call.
“It’s not good,” Colt told them right off the bat. “I just spoke to a friend in San Antonio P.D., and Calvin Brinton was found dead just a few hours ago. Murdered, execution-style.”
Rosalie’s hand flew to her mouth, but Cooper could still see her lips trembling. Jessa wasn’t faring much better. Maybe because she was thinking this would implicate her in a murder, but in Cooper’s book, it didn’t.
“It’s not your fault,” Cooper immediately said to Rosalie. “I wouldn’t be surprised if the person behind these attacks paid Brinton to contact you just so he could implicate Jessa.”
Jessa nodded, but she lost more of the color on her cheeks. “He wants us divided. He wants me to take Liam and run. That way I’ll be an easier target.”
Cooper nodded, too. “I figure this guy will do anything to eliminate any chance that Liam could be linked back to him.”
There’d already been a lot of effort made to cover up that link. The kidnapping attempts. The break-in at the lab to destroy the DNA sample. Now Brinton’s murder.
Colt finished another call and joined them. “I’ve put out feelers. Whoever this woman is, we’ll find her. Hopefully alive,” he added in a mumble.
“Come on,” Cooper said to Jessa. “We should get Liam back to the ranch. Rosalie, too.”
“Wait. What are you gonna do?” Tucker asked with his hands on his hips and his gaze firmly planted on Cooper.
He didn’t think Tucker was talking about the danger now. “I’ll have to sort it out with Jessa,” Cooper settled for saying.
That caused Tucker to huff. “For Pete’s sake, Liam’s your son, and you’ve already lost too much time with him.”
Colt made a sound of agreement. “All you have to do is show any judge those DNA results, and that’ll start the process to revoke the adoption.”
Cooper couldn’t deny what his brothers were saying. Neither could Jessa. If he pushed, he could have custody of Liam by the end of the month. No matter which way he went with this, it would mean a drastic change in all their lives.
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