Her Baby, His Secret

by Gayle Wilson

  “I don’t...” She hesitated, again sensing, and yet not understanding, his anger. As soon as her words faltered, he spoke, filling the silence.

  “I was,” he said. “But then, I didn’t know, of course.”

  “Didn’t know what?” she asked, trying to understand what was wrong. This was what they had been waiting for, and yet Griff was acting as if... As if it wasn’t good news that the kidnappers had contacted them.

  His eyes held hers. Held them long enough that the blood began to pound in her temples.

  “The truth,” he said finally, his voice flat. “Something you apparently saw no reason to tell me,” he accused softly. “Not last night. And not before.”

  “The truth?” she repeated. And hearing the tone of accusation, she thought of the long lie he had lived this past year. Whatever he meant, Griff didn’t have much room to chide her about truth. “The truth about what?” she asked, truly bewildered.

  Again the silence stretched, but angry now herself, she didn’t allow her eyes to fall, and finally he spoke again.

  “About why they think I’d be willing to do whatever they want in order to get your daughter back?”

  His voice was soft. And reasonable. But she didn’t like what she heard there, underlying those surface qualities. And she didn’t understand the emphasis on the pronoun.

  “What do they want you to do?” she asked.

  “She’s mine, isn’t she, Claire?” he asked, ignoring her question. “Gardner is my daughter, and that’s why these people are so certain they can call the tune, and I’ll have to dance to it. She’s my daughter. And you never told me.”

  Then, of course, it all fell into place. His anger. The tone of accusation. But if he hadn’t known, then who the hell did he think had fathered Gardner? And how was she supposed to let him know about the baby when the agency had lied to her, telling her he was dead?

  “My God, Griff, I thought you were dead. Or have you forgotten that?” she asked bitterly. “I don’t do seances. Or maybe I was supposed to whisper that I was pregnant to your tombstone.”

  “And last night?” he asked.

  “I thought you knew,” she said truthfully. “I thought that’s why you called. Why you offered to help.”

  He said nothing for a moment, but the coldness didn’t leave his eyes. “I did the math,” he said. “If she’s six months old, as this morning’s paper said, then you had to have known you were pregnant. Before Langley.”

  Before Langley. A pleasant euphemism for what had happened to him. For the lie the CIA had told her. But he was right She had known. Not long, but long enough to have picked up the phone and told Griff.

  And she hadn’t. The unexpected pregnancy had complicated everything. And it had all been too complicated to begin with. By their conflicting ideologies. Their matching stubbornness.

  And by her stupidity, she admitted, remembering the sleepless nights of regret after his death. Regret that she hadn’t told him about the baby. But of course, Griff was dead, and eventually she had forced herself to acknowledge that it was too late to change anything she had done.

  “It happened that night?” he asked. He already knew the answer, of course. Since he said he had done the math, it was the only answer.

  That night. The night she had come to him. Because she couldn’t stay away any longer. The night she had dreamed about over and over again.

  She hadn’t intended to go to him, of course. Not even when she had left this house. But driving aimlessly through the fall darkness, she had found she couldn’t resist any longer what she had wanted for the last three months. She couldn’t deny herself another minute. Because she loved him. And she wanted him. Wanted to be with him.

  “Yes,” she admitted.

  “I thought you were protected,” he said.

  After she had broken off their relationship, there had been no need for protection. She hadn’t been involved with anyone else, and she had known she wouldn’t be. When her prescription had run out, she hadn’t even bothered to renew it.

  And when he had taken her hand that night and drawn her across the threshold, the fact that she hadn’t never crossed her mind. Maybe, she admitted, because she didn’t want it to. She had always heard there was no such thing as an unwanted pregnancy.

  “I wasn’t. Not...then,” she admitted.

  “You got pregnant that night,” he said. “And you didn’t tell me.”

  “There wasn’t time,” she said quickly. That was the same excuse she had offered herself after his death. There hadn’t been time. “I intended to. But...”

  She hesitated, knowing some part of that was a lie. There had been time. Only a few short weeks, but time nonetheless. She had still been trying to decide what to do when they’d informed her, through her grandfather, that Griff Cabot was dead.

  There were some admissions, however, that were too painful to make. And ultimately, of course, she had made all the right decisions. The only one she had ever regretted was not to tell Griff as soon as she knew she was pregnant.

  “I know what they want in exchange for the baby,” Griff said, not even waiting to hear what excuse she might offer for what she’d done. “If you’re interested.”

  “If I’m interested?” she repeated disbelievingly. “Of course I’m interested, Griff. This is my daughter.”

  “And mine. I might have been prepared for this if I’d known.”

  She wasn’t sure if he meant prepared for the kidnapping or for whatever the kidnappers wanted him to do in exchange for Gardner’s return. She knew from what he had already said that it wasn’t money, but something they wanted Griff to do.

  Give them information? Something classified? With that thought, her heart squeezed painfully because she wasn’t sure Griff would ever commit treason. Not even to save the life of his child.

  “Will you do what they want?” she asked.

  It was a far more important question than those he had been asking. She waited for his answer, afraid the code of honor he had lived by so long would keep him from getting Gardner back.

  “First, I think I need to hear you say it, Claire. I think your telling me is long overdue. Why should I do what they want?”

  She didn’t know why he thought this was necessary. A form of punishment, maybe? Or simply a need to hear her say it, as he’d claimed? But whatever his motives, she could think of no reason not to comply. Not when it was so important.

  “Because Gardner is your daughter,” she said, her voice low.

  He nodded, holding her eyes.

  “What do they want?” she asked again.

  His lips moved into a semblance of his familiar smile. Unlike any other smile she had ever seen on Griff Cabot’s face. Not in all the time she had known him. It was totally without humor. Without amusement. As cold and as empty as the nursery had been yesterday morning.

  “They want me to kill someone,” he said softly.

  “Kill someone?” she repeated, after a stunned second or two of thinking that she couldn’t have heard that right. She could hear her horror at the thought echoing through her question.

  “An assassination. After all, I’ve arranged those before. Given the orders for them to be carried out. That’s all they’re asking, Claire. They just want me to arrange another assassination.”

  Bile surged into her throat as she realized he was serious. Assassination. This was part of what had driven them apart. There had been other things about his job that bothered her, of course, but this...

  That had been the one thing she could never condone. Never forgive. Or accept. Not from the man she loved.

  “As soon as it’s done, they’ll give Gardner back.”

  There was a silence, so deep she could hear her blood rushing through the veins in her ears.

  “I assume,” Griff added softly, “that you won’t object to me paying their price.”

  The silence grew and expanded, and his eyes held hers, waiting for her response.

  “Who?�
�� Claire whispered instead, still fighting the sickness climbing into her throat.

  This was a growing nightmare she couldn’t escape. Instead, with each minute that had passed since she’d found that open window, it had grown worse, more frightening, more horrifying.

  “The less you know about that the better,” Griff said.

  “I have a right to know.”

  She supposed she did. That didn’t mean, however, that she really wanted to. Griff was right. The less she had to think about all this...

  “And when you do?” Griff asked quietly.

  She knew what he was really asking. Would she refuse to let him do what they demanded? Was she prepared to sacrifice her daughter’s life for a principle? And she didn’t have an answer for him.

  “I have a right to know,” she repeated stubbornly.

  Griff took a breath, his lips flattening, his eyes still on hers, and then he said, “His name wouldn’t mean anything to you.”

  “But it does mean something to you?”

  “I know who he is.”

  “And you know why someone wants him dead?” she asked, knowing from his tone that he did.

  “A lot of people probably want him dead,” Griff said.

  That was almost comforting, until she realized she was falling into the same trap she had almost fallen into before. Long ago when they had argued—intellectually then—about this. It was a trap of logic that said it was all right to take someone’s life if he were engaged in actions that were reprehensible. Threatening to others. Or inhumane.

  “Are you going to do it?” she asked, because she believed she had read that in his eyes as well. And then she waited, bracing herself for the questions he had only implied before.

  Do you want me to? Do you want your daughter back badly enough to tell me to do what they’ve asked? Even if doing it is something you have always condemned, no matter the justification.

  Moral arrogance. Did she want Griff to get Gardner back like this? At this cost? Yesterday she would have said she would do anything to get her baby back. And she would have thought she was speaking the truth.

  “Let me handle it, Claire,” he said, his eyes almost as soft now as his voice. “I’ll stay in touch.”

  Dear God, she wanted to let him handle it. How could she weigh her daughter’s life against everything she had ever believed? Against everything she had been taught?

  Her daughter’s life. And all the precious images of Gardner’s short existence ran through her head. Suddenly, Claire wanted to tell Griff how much his daughter looked like him. How her minute chin could tilt at exactly the same angle his sometimes did. If he were being challenged. In the heat of argument. And how Gardner’s eyes, as dark and beautiful as Griffs, would sometimes study Claire’s face as intently as his were now.

  She wanted to say all those things to him. She wanted to tell him about their daughter, so that he would love her as much as she did. So that he would make this decision. So that he would do what they had told him to do, no matter what she said. No matter what she had once argued. No matter what she said she believed was morally right.

  But instead, the confusion of too many conflicting emotions made her strike out at Griff instead. Just exactly, she would realize later, as she had always done.

  “I should leave it to you,” she said bitterly. “After all, this is your fault. You’re the one who brought these people here. Into Gardner’s life. Into mine. This is your filth, Griff. This whole nightmare is the result of how you chose to live your life. I damn well hope you’re satisfied with the results.”

  She saw his eyes change. There had been compassion in them when he’d told her to let him handle it. That was replaced slowly by pain, an agony so unbearable it was visible. And then his entire face hardened, accepting that unforgivable blow.

  He didn’t say another word. He pushed up from the table, picking up his coat and the cane. Then he turned, limping back down the hallway to the front door.

  She listened, unmoving, as the uneven footsteps faded. It was not until she heard the slam of the front door that she remembered to breathe. And then, using the heels of her hands, to wipe away the tears.

  She had no right to blame Griff for what had happened to Gardner. This was simply the inevitable intrusion of the world he had warned her about. A world that lay in wait just beyond the confines of the safe and protected one in which she had grown up. The one she had arranged for her daughter.

  Maybe what had happened to Gardner had originated in his world, but she knew Griff had done everything in his power to protect her from it. She had once thought he was too obsessive about keeping their relationship private. Too secretive.

  This was, of course, what he’d feared. That she would be used against him in this way. A victim of the violence he knew so well. Instead of threatening her, they had used his daughter. A daughter he had never known and couldn’t possibly love as much as she did.

  So in her fear, she had struck out at Griff, just as she had done before. And struck out at him because she knew in her heart she wanted him to do anything to get Gardner back. God help her, anything. Even this.

  Chapter Six

  “His name is Jake Holt. And I know he’s still working for the agency,” she said to her grandfather. “I need to ask him only one question. And I promise I won’t make you contact the director again.”

  It had taken her two days to reach this point. Two endless days during which nothing had happened. She had talked to Minger, of course. Several times. And to the FBI. During those interviews, however, her mind had been only half-engaged, because she had known that it didn’t matter what they asked or what she told them.

  The police weren’t going to find Gardner. Nor was the FBI. No one was going to contact her and demand ransom. That demand had already been made. Not to her, but to the person at whom this kidnapping had been directed.

  And whoever had known enough about Griff and his team to pull this off was not going to be discovered by the local police. So whatever they were doing was pointless, and she knew it. This playing field was not on their level. Even the bureau was probably not capable of influencing events in this arena.

  She couldn’t tell the authorities that. She hadn’t even told her parents or Mandy and Charles what was going on. Only her grandfather knew what had happened the night she had driven to Griff’s house in Maryland. And the morning he had come here.

  She had slept last night on the floor of Gardner’s room, an exercise in trying to recapture the serenity their life had once held. To reconnect with her daughter. But Gardner was both too near and too far away in that room.

  And Claire had acknowledged that Gardner might never be there in reality again if Griff didn’t do what they’d asked him to do. And given the unforgivable things she had said to him, she could no longer be certain of anything he was doing.

  So she had driven out to the Maryland house again today, searching for him, and had found it empty. There had been no sign that anyone had been there in months. No sign of her meeting with Griff. As if she had dreamed the entire episode.

  I’ll stay in touch, Griff had promised. But that had been before she’d lashed out at him, accusing him of being responsible for what had happened to Gardner. She had heard nothing from him during these two endless days. And she knew she couldn’t live through another one without knowing what was going on.

  “Cabot told you to let him handle it,” her grandfather said. “That sounds like excellent advice, Claire.”

  “Actually,” she said, finding a smile for him, because she understood he was trying to comfort her, “it sounds like blatant male chauvinism, but we’ll ignore that for the moment.”

  “I don’t know what you believe this Holt can tell you.”

  “Where they are,” she said simply.

  “They?” Her grandfather’s voice reflected both his frustration with her and his puzzlement.

  “Griff. Jordan Cross. A man called Hawk. And maybe Jake Holt as well. Bu
t...I think he would stay at headquarters. I think he’s their contact there. And he would probably need the agency’s computers.”

  She was thinking out loud, of course. Articulating all the things she believed she had figured out in the last two days about what Griff might do.

  “You think they’re really going to do this,” the old man said. “You think Cabot intends to do what the kidnappers demanded. And you want to try to stop them.”

  “No,” she said. “I don’t want to stop them. God forgive me, I want to help.”

  “I HAVE NO RIGHT to ask you,” Griff Cabot said, his eyes touching on the face of each man in turn, “but I would like to have you with me,” he said softly.

  “I’ve got vacation coming,” Jake Holt said, his voice laced with amusement, a contrast to the quiet solemnity of Griff’s. “After all, I’m the only one who’s still working for a living. Since you’re paying all the expenses for this little excursion and since I think Florida’s a really nice area to visit this time of year, you can count me in.”

  Griff nodded, not really surprised by Jake’s acceptance, or by the cheerful nonchalance with which he’d made it. Jake wasn’t a field agent, of course, but he had grown up around the area where they were going, so his knowledge of it would be invaluable. And Jake was a bachelor.

  The other two men he had called had new lives, an existence outside the agency. And they had families. The fact that they had answered his summons spoke of the depth of their friendship, but Griff knew he had no right to ask them to lay their lives on the line for a mission that was purely personal.

  “Quid pro quo,” Jordan Cross said. “I owe Claire Heywood a couple of favors. And more than a few to you,” he said, smiling at Griff. “I’m in.”

  Griff nodded, his gaze lingering unconsciously on Jordan’s altered face. It was disconcerting, although he had known what to expect. And it was a little eerie when Jordan spoke to find his deep voice totally unchanged.

  “Are you waiting for me to agree?” Hawk asked, and Griff’s eyes swung to his face, its harsh contours reassuringly the same.

  “I need to hear you say it,” he said.