The Cradle Will Fall

by Maggie Price

  “That would be me.” Mark pulled off his navy suit coat, laid it on the end of the bed. “I realize this is more than you bargained for when you agreed to join this operation.”

  She flicked him a look before turning toward the closet. “You gave me the opportunity to get out of working the assignment. I chose to stay in. Which means I deal with whatever comes my way, like it or not. So do you.”

  “True.” Settling beside his suit coat, Mark pursed his mouth. “Good thing the problem of sleeping arrangements didn’t come up during my last undercover gig.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “I was partnered with a two-hundred-plus-pound DEA agent. After college he played tackle for one season for the Green Bay Packers. I doubt sleeping in close proximity with him would have been the same as with you.”

  “You always did know how to give a girl a compliment, Santini,” Grace murmured while tucking a handful of sweaters into a drawer on the bureau. “We’re adults. Professionals. We’ve agreed to keep our minds on the job,” she said, not totally sure if she brought up the point more for his benefit or hers. “We shouldn’t have a problem.”

  “We shouldn’t,” Mark agreed softly, his eyes fixed on hers.

  A whisper of awareness stirred Grace’s senses. The room that had seemed so spacious when she’d first stepped inside now felt smaller. Intimate.

  “So, speaking of the job,” Mark began. “In three hours we’ve got an appointment with an attorney who we suspect sells kidnapped babies to childless couples who pay him immense fees. However, on paper the guy appears to be Mr. Upstanding Citizen.”

  “Mr. Loaded Upstanding Citizen,” Grace amended. “Thanks to the trust fund he inherited from his great-grandfather.”

  Grace thought about the background information on Stuart Harmon, she and Mark had spent the previous day studying. “Harmon donates thousands of dollars annually to various charities,” she said. “Mentors in a literacy program. Volunteers time to his church, which he attends regularly. Does a man who is falling-down rich and goes around doing good deeds have the time or inclination to sell babies kidnapped from their murdered mothers?”

  “If there’s one thing I’ve learned from this job it’s that there is an appetite, and therefore a market, for anything and everything. And sometimes the appetite belongs to the last person you’d suspect.” While he spoke, Mark loosened his perfectly knotted crimson tie.

  “Yes, you’re right.” Grace forced the words past the sudden constriction in her throat while she watched his long, strong fingers unhook the button on the collar of his shirt.

  The familiar movement shot her back six years, to when they’d been lovers. Assigned to the same task force, they invariably ended the day reviewing their case, winding down while they changed into comfortable clothes. How many times had Mark sat on the end of her bed, tossing out theories while he loosened his tie, opened his shirt? And unfailingly, they’d wind up in that bed, mindlessly tearing off the remainder of their clothing, half-crazed to get at each other.

  The memory seemed so real, so sharp, so hotly erotic that Grace could hardly breathe against the desire that wrapped around her like a thick, glossy spider’s web. Dragging her gaze from him, she grabbed a handful of lingerie and moved to the bureau.

  With her back to Mark, she closed her eyes. The longing, the need clawing inside her was so quick, so strong that for a moment she didn’t want to resist it. Wanted only to act on it.

  “During the past five years, Harmon has represented couples in more than seventy adoptions,” Mark said, unaware that her libido had kicked into overdrive.

  Grace knew the heat blazing inside her, the depth and suddenness of it, held its own special danger. Knew, too, she needed to control it. Had to control it.

  Because she in no way wanted to analyze why her emotions had gone on this sudden roller coaster ride, she forced her thoughts to follow Mark’s.

  “More than seventy adoptions,” she repeated, vaguely amazed that her voice sounded even. Level. “In all of those, legitimate adoption agencies were involved in the process. Everything was approved by the courts. The documents properly filed.”

  “Then along comes Iris Davenport. She forged paperwork to make it look like a social worker picked up the babies and turned them over to adoption agencies. Instead, those babies disappear into thin air. And Davenport drops Harmon’s name in our lap.”

  “Mr. Upstanding Citizen.” Grace slid the last of her clothing into the drawer, slid it shut. “If Harmon is in on this with Iris, it’s hard to imagine he’s doing it for money.”

  “Some people never have enough.”

  “Good point.” Grace frowned. “The man’s an enigma. It’s like we’re looking at a good-twin, bad-twin scenario. Maybe after we meet him we’ll have a better sense of who he is. What drives him.”

  “Maybe.”

  Grace rubbed at the tension that had settled at the back of her neck. “I keep thinking about the young girl who’s giving up her baby to the Calhouns. The FBI agent undercover at the clinic where Iris works hasn’t yet pegged who that girl is.”

  “She may not be a patient there. Davenport never specifically said she was.”

  “She didn’t,” Grace agreed. “We can’t even be sure what Iris told us about the girl’s background is true. What is true is that she’s due to deliver any day. What if she changes her mind? Decides she doesn’t want to give up her baby?”

  “If Davenport is in the vicinity, the girl is in danger of getting shot full of anticoagulant.”

  “Mark, we can’t just leave her on her own with no protection. We need to try to convince Harmon to let us meet the mother. If that doesn’t work, maybe we can get him to tell us something more about her background. Some details that will point us in her direction.”

  “I agree.”

  Thoughtful, Grace lowered the lid of the suitcase, set the locks. “When I work a case, I equate it to picking up a piece of knitting.”

  Mark angled his chin. “Knitting?”

  “Threads,” she explained. “Pull at the right one and the entire garment comes unraveled. We need to find the loose thread in our case.”

  “The sooner the better,” Mark agreed. “Right now all we’ve got are two murders and kidnappings, and a circumstantial case against Davenport, at best. We need solid proof to take her down. Not to mention evidence of where those two babies wound up.”

  “If Senator Grayson knew how little progress we’ve made in finding his granddaughter, he’d probably have a stroke,” Grace said.

  “That would happen only after he reduced the Bureau’s budget by half,” Mark drawled. He rubbed his right temple, as if an ache had settled there. “When you’re dealing with murder, it only takes a tiny mistake to leave a hole for someone to peer through and learn the truth. Senator Grayson was Davenport’s mistake.”

  “How so?” Grace settled on the bed, leaving a safe distance between them.

  “All Davenport knew about the two young women she killed was that they were drifters. Homeless. They lived on the street or at a shelter. Neither put the name of a contact in her file at the clinic. Davenport assumed they had no one who cared about them or their babies. Andrea Grayson’s father cares.”

  “And the senator has a very loud voice,” Grace observed.

  “If it wasn’t for him, Davenport would have committed two murders and no one would have known. Just goes to show how fate has played a hand in this case.”

  A big one, Grace thought, studying Mark’s hard, chiseled profile. If not for that same twist of fate, she might have lived the remainder of her life without ever again seeing Special Agent Santini.

  Without having to watch him walk away for a second time.

  Fate, she already knew, wasn’t always kind.

  Mark and Grace, as the Calhouns, were shown into Stuart Harmon’s office at three o’clock that afternoon. Mark had the sensation of stepping into an English study that boasted polished expanses of mahogany furnishing
s, gleaming brasses and expensive rugs. Shelves filled with law books lined the walls; leather armchairs formed a half circle in front of a small stone fireplace filled with flaming wood.

  It struck Mark that the office itself instilled confidence. Trust. A good place to start a family.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Calhoun, a pleasure to meet you.”

  “We’re glad to be here,” Mark said, returning Harmon’s brisk handshake.

  The attorney was in his early seventies, dapper, tweedy, with a sedate tie tucked beneath his vest. He was tall with thick silver hair and carried himself with an old-fashioned ramrod-straight posture.

  Grandfatherly was the term Mark applied to him. Still, it was obvious from the way he enfolded Grace’s hand in his that age hadn’t dampened Harmon’s appreciation for a beautiful woman.

  The outfit Grace had chosen for the meeting was perfectly tailored—the slate-blue blazer and pleated slacks, the white shirt with the slim, diamond bar pin at the collar. Mark had worn a pin-striped charcoal suit, white tab shirt and red and ivory tie. Together the Calhouns presented the picture of the perfect couple whose clothes and jewelry were a study in understated good taste. And, most important, wealth.

  “You’ve been out in that nasty rain,” Harmon said. “Let’s sit by the fire and take off the chill.”

  “That sounds wonderful,” Grace murmured.

  Before settling into the chair beside Grace’s, Mark swept his gaze across the massive desk on the far side of the room. There were no files in sight, no stacks of legal documents awaiting Harmon’s review. Not exactly standard for an attorney’s office.

  Harmon took a seat across from them, their chairs separated by a small coffee table. “Shall I have my secretary bring in coffee?” he asked. “Tea, perhaps?”

  “Nothing for me,” Mark said. “Darling?”

  “No.” Grace sent Harmon a jittery smile. “I’m such a bundle of nerves, I’d probably spill coffee all over me.”

  Harmon inclined his head. “This is an emotional time for you.”

  “Yes.” Grace fingered the diamond pin at her throat. “Mr. Harmon, my husband and I are so pleased to have found you. Thankful, is a better word. We’ve wanted a baby for so long. I can’t tell you what this means to us.”

  The nerves in Grace’s voice and the shaky breath she pulled in had Mark admiring her acting skills all over again.

  Harmon smiled. “My wife and I have three children of our own, Mrs. Calhoun. Had we not been blessed, I can only imagine how empty our life together would have seemed. So, in some small way I understand how you and your husband feel. I’m glad I can be a part of this happy event.”

  Mark leaned forward. “From having read the background information Grace and I supplied, you know we’ve attempted a private adoption before.”

  “You said the birth mother changed her mind at the last minute.” A glimmer of sympathy settled in Harmon’s eyes. “Unfortunate. That would have been very disappointing for you.”

  “Deeply disappointing.” Mark reached, took Grace’s hand. “We hadn’t been allowed to meet the birth mother. Later, we wondered if our doing so would have made a difference in the outcome.”

  “How so?”

  “She could have gotten to know us,” Grace explained. “Seen for herself how much Mark and I love each other. How much love we had to give her baby.” Grace’s voice wavered. “Mr. Harmon, we have so much love to give a child.”

  “I can see that.”

  “Can you also see our reasons for wanting to meet the biological mother this time around?” Mark asked.

  “Of course,” Harmon said. “I fear, however, that isn’t possible.”

  “We’re asking you to make it possible,” Mark persisted. Not wanting to push too hard, he kept his tone light, even. Still, they were talking about a young woman whose life might be in danger if she changed her mind about giving up her child. He and Grace had to find out her identity.

  “I’ve had several conversations with the young woman,” Harmon explained, his tone all patience. “The fact that the child’s father is no longer in her life played a large role in her decision to seek an adoption for the infant.” Harmon propped his elbows on the arms of his chair and steepled his fingers beneath his chin. “She’s insistent about not wanting to meet the adoptive parents. Prefers not to see her child after its birth. Basically she intends to get on with her life as if the child never existed.”

  “That’s not possible.” Even as Grace blurted the words, Mark felt her hand shudder against his. “She’s carrying her daughter next to her heart. How is it possible for her to forget her child ever existed? How can she deny that small, precious life?”

  “Darling.” Mark spoke softly as his stomach knotted. Grace’s voice had dropped to a trembling whisper. Tears welled in her dark eyes; her skin was as pale as paper. He had no idea what was behind her emotional reaction. All he knew was that she was no longer acting.

  He tightened his hand on hers. Any alteration to their cover story could put the entire undercover op in danger. Still, it wasn’t thoughts of their case that had every protective instinct in him shifting into overdrive. Grace was a determined, tough cop; yet, sitting beside him was a woman who looked fragile and defenseless.

  “Let me take you back to the Mirador.” He lifted their joined hands, pressed his lips against her icy fingers. “You can lie down for a while. I’m sure Mr. Harmon understands the stress you’re under. That we’re both under.”

  “Of course,” Harmon said. “We can certainly reschedule—”

  “No, I’m fine.” Grace pressed her free hand to her stomach. “I’m sorry, I’m just…” She gave Mark a weak smile. “I’m fine.”

  “Giving up a child is an emotional issue for everyone involved,” Harmon put in.

  “Yes.” Her hand tightened against his, and Mark could almost feel her struggling to regain control. “Mr. Harmon, you’ve handled so many adoptions,” she continued. “I’m sure you understand my reaction. Mark and I have waited so long for a child. So long.”

  “You must also try to understand the birth mother’s feelings, Mrs. Calhoun. She’s giving up her child. Though voluntary on her part, it’s a type of loss many people equate with death. One that changes lives. I can’t fault the young woman for trying to make the situation as easy on herself as possible.”

  “There’s nothing easy about this.” Mark ran a soothing hand down the dark fall of Grace’s hair. Color had returned to her face, her eyes were dry and she seemed steadier. He bit down on a gnawing curiosity over what had caused her reaction. He would find out soon enough.

  He shifted his gaze back to Harmon. “Because there’s nothing easy,” he repeated, “Grace and I are concerned the biological mother might change her mind before the child is born. Perhaps even after. That’s why we’d like to meet her. To try to prevent that from happening down the line.”

  “The contract you sign will protect against her doing that, Mr. Calhoun.”

  “No contract is ironclad,” Mark countered. Since it was clear they weren’t going to get Harmon’s help in learning the mother’s identity, Mark shifted the conversation in another direction. “Speaking of the contract, I’d like to see it. I want my lawyer to review it, too.”

  “The document hasn’t been prepared.”

  Mark narrowed his eyes. “I was under the impression we would deal with the paperwork and other details today.”

  “To be candid, the birth mother asked me to meet with you in person. Do my own evaluation of you and Mrs. Calhoun as prospective parents. Conduct one final test, if you will. If you failed, there would be no need for a contract.”

  “A test.” Grace lifted her chin. “Did we pass or fail, Mr. Harmon?”

  “You passed, most splendidly,” Harmon said, compassion sounding in his voice. “It’s obvious you will cherish the child. Love her as if she were your own.” He rose, indicating their meeting had ended. “I’ll have my associate draw up the contract.”

&n
bsp; “Thank you,” Grace said quietly. “Thank you.”

  “When do we see the contract?” Mark asked, keeping a firm hold on her hand as they both stood. It was hard for him to believe Harmon would let them walk out the door without first asking for a healthy retainer.

  “Come back tomorrow afternoon, the same time as today. I believe we can finalize all the issues then.” A twinkle settled in Harmon’s eyes. “Well, all issues, except for the birth. The timing of that is up to a higher power.”

  He stepped toward them, his smile deepening. “If all goes as planned, you’ll have your daughter by Christmas Day.”

  Chapter 11

  For Grace, the drive through the pelting rain from Harmon’s office back to the Mirador Resort seemed unending. It wasn’t only her over-the-edge reaction in the attorney’s office that hung in her mind like a shadow. The small detector Mark carried in the pocket of his suit coat had alerted them to the presence of a bug that had been planted in the rental car while they’d been with Harmon. Out of necessity they’d kept their conversation on the drive back in line with that of the Calhouns.

  By the time they walked into their suite, an ache had settled in the center of Grace’s forehead. In the bedroom she glanced at the bureau, saw the green light still glowed on the surveillance device. For good measure Mark used his small detector to recheck the bathroom for bugs.

  Rubbing at her forehead, Grace clicked on the lamp on the nearest nightstand.

  “It’s clear,” Mark said when he strode out of the bathroom.

  “Iris and her pals mean business.” Grace slipped off her coat and hung it in the closet. Her slate-blue blazer followed.

  “They do.”

  She hadn’t realized Mark had come up behind her. She turned, saw that he, too, had shrugged out of his suit coat. When he reached for a hanger, the space between them narrowed. The rich, musky scent of his cologne slid around her, filling her lungs. He was too close, but then, even at opposite ends of the room, Mark Santini would have been too close for her peace of mind.