The Cradle Will Fall

by Maggie Price

  Looking down three stories onto the building’s parking lot, Grace idly studied the vehicles that filled the slots. When her gaze snagged on a day-glo-yellow van, her eyes narrowed. As a juvie detective, she had constant contact with the various shelters in Oklahoma City. One being Usher House, the shelter where Andrea Grayson had stayed for a short time before the birth of her baby. Grace knew Usher House had several vans painted the same eye-popping yellow so street kids needing a place to stay could easily identify the shelter’s vehicles.

  Unhurriedly she moved to a window closer to the lounge’s center. A monster SUV prevented her from getting a look at the van’s door to see if it displayed a logo.

  What were the odds a van painted that off-the-chart color belonged to anyone else but Usher House?

  Grace knew from having scanned the directory downstairs in the main lobby that Harmon’s law firm was the only business operating in the building. So it stood to reason that whoever parked the van in the lot had business with the Harmons.

  Was that person possibly a young, pregnant girl who’d decided to give up her baby for a private adoption? If so, was she a patient at the same clinic where Andrea Grayson and DeeDee Wyman died after being dosed by Iris Davenport with an anticoagulant drug? Was she the soon-to-be mother intending to give up her baby to the Calhouns?

  Those possibilities had Grace’s heartbeat picking up speed. The first thing on her list was to get a better look at the van to find out if it belonged to Usher House. If so, she and Mark had to find out who had reason to drive the vehicle an hour west of Oklahoma City for an apparent meeting at the Harmon law firm.

  Grace drifted to Mark’s chair. Since it was almost a sure thing they were being observed, maybe even listened to, she couldn’t risk explaining her interest in the van. “Sweetheart, I left the list in the car,” she improvised.

  He closed the magazine, sat it on the coffee table in front of him. “The list?” he asked casually. Although his expression remained relaxed, Grace sensed his cop instinct going on alert.

  “The one we made last night with the questions we want to ask Mr. Harmon.” They had indeed come up with questions, but had committed them to memory instead of writing them down.

  “Ah, that list.”

  She held out a hand. “I need the keys so I can run down and get it.”

  Mark stood, slid back one flap of his suit coat and retrieved the keys from the pocket of his slacks. “The sun may be shining, but it’s still frosty. Why don’t I go instead?”

  “That’s okay. Standing around waiting makes me as nervous as a caged cat.” Plucking the keys from his palm, she raised on tiptoe and pressed a kiss against his cheek. “Watch the yellow van in the lot,” she murmured. If the driver exited the building and drove off before she could get downstairs, Mark might at least get the person’s description.

  “Want me to get your coat from the receptionist?” he offered.

  “Don’t bother.” She dropped the keys into the pocket of her plum-colored wool blazer. “This jacket’s warm as toast and I’ll only be outside a minute or two.”

  “All right.” He picked up a different magazine and began leafing through its pages as he wandered toward the windows.

  Since Grace Calhoun would predictably be in a hurry to get back for the meeting with Harmon, Jr., Grace bypassed the elevator and took the stairs down to the main lobby. Five minutes later she reentered the building, shivering from the sharp wind that made the afternoon seem colder than it was.

  She had been right—the driver’s door of the day-glo-yellow van bore the logo of Usher House. High priority on Grace’s list was to call Millie Usher, the shelter’s director. Grace and Millie had a good working relationship, and Grace knew the woman would tell her which of her shelter live-ins had reason to come to Winding Rock. The call would have to wait, though, until she and Mark could get to a secure phone.

  Grace was almost to the staircase when she heard the elevator’s faint hydraulic hum. Five feet away, the doors opened with a soft sighing hiss. Out of the corner of her eye she glimpsed a young woman step off the elevator, followed closely by Stuart Harmon, Sr. Grace moved smoothly out of sight behind a pillar.

  “Sorry I didn’t call first, Mr. H., but this is really starting to bug me.”

  The girl had a petite, slender build. Her short, spiked hair was black at the roots with bright purple tips. A diamond stud had been drilled into one side of her nose. Her face was bare of makeup, her eyes red from crying. Grace calculated she was in her late teens.

  And pregnant. Close to her due date, considering the girth of the sweater-covered belly that jutted between the flaps of her unbuttoned wool coat. Instead of fitted maternity jeans, she wore regular ones that swallowed her legs and had frayed hems that hung over scuffed boots.

  Looking as sedate and grandfatherly as he had the previous day, Harmon patted her shoulder. “It’s all right to drop by anytime. The decision you’ve made is very serious. Once the papers are signed, it would be an almost impossible task to regain custody of your child. If you’re going to change your mind, now is the time to let me know.”

  Grace held her breath. If this girl was the young mother whose baby the Calhouns were slated to purchase, her changing her mind could get her killed.

  “Yeah, I figured that.” When the girl rested a hand on her protruding belly, Grace spotted the small lightning bolt tattooed on her little finger. “There’s no way I can manage with a kid, especially since Slash did his disappearing act.” She sniffed, then swiped the back of her hand beneath her nose. “Creep. I figured he’d walk when I told him about the baby and I was right. That was months ago. Don’t know why I’m even thinking about him. I woke up this morning all emotional or somethin’.”

  “That’s understandable.” Harmon gave her a long, assessing look. “Are you sure you don’t want to meet the couple who plan to adopt your baby? As I said in my office, they’re anxious for a meeting if you’re willing. I’m convinced they’ll make excellent parents. Love your daughter as if she were their own. Meeting them might make you feel better about the decision you’ve made.”

  “Nah, I’d probably just blubber all over ’em.”

  “I don’t believe they would mind if you did, but the decision is yours. Are you sure you’ll be all right driving back to the shelter?”

  “I’m cool.” She forced a smile. “I’d better get started. I sort of borrowed the van without remembering to ask nobody’s permission. Just had to get out of there for a while, you know? Sometimes the walls start closing in.”

  “I know the feeling,” Harmon said as they moved toward the door. “I’ll be happy to call and tell them we had a meeting, if you’d like. Smooth over the rough spots.”

  “That’d be good. Might get me out of a night or two of the kitchen duty I’ll get for takin’ the van.” She stuck out her hand. “Thanks for the talk, Mr. H. You remind me of my grandpa. Nice.”

  “Where is your grandfather now, Lori?”

  “Dead.” She shrugged. “Everybody went and died on me.”

  Chapter 13

  With time creeping by as slow as a glacier, Mark aimed an occasional glance out the lounge’s third-floor windows. Pretending interest in the latest magazine he’d picked up off the coffee table, he flipped a page every so often while his gaze returned intermittently to the parking lot.

  What had Grace seen? Why was the bright-yellow van significant to their case?

  Below, a young girl with short dark hair moved into his range of view, apparently having just exited the building. Her tan coat was unbuttoned; at one point the wind picked up, blowing back the coat’s flaps as she lumbered across the parking lot.

  Pregnant, he realized. Very.

  Just then Grace appeared through one of the lounge’s doors. The smile she sent Mark held an edge of nervousness. “I just knew I wouldn’t get back before Mr. Harmon got done with his conference call.” She finger combed her windblown hair. “I was afraid you’d start the meeting
without me.”

  Mark tossed the magazine onto the coffee table and went to her. He took her hand in his, found her fingers to be ice cold.

  “Harmon and I would have waited for you.” Eager to find out what she knew about the van, Mark attempted to read something in her dark eyes, but saw nothing revealed. “Did you find the list in the car?”

  “No.” She rolled her eyes. “I must have left it in the suite. I’ve just been so scatterbrained lately.”

  “Mr. and Mrs. Calhoun?”

  They turned in unison toward the door on the lounge’s opposite side.

  A short, heavy woman whose suit was the same drab brown color as her hair gave them a polite smile. “Mr. Harmon, Jr. will see you now.”

  The office they entered three doors down from the lounge was the same size as the one they’d met in the previous day. It, too, boasted a fireplace in which flames currently blazed, along with dark wood and masculine leather furniture. That was where the similarity ended, Mark decided. Unlike the senior Harmon’s neat-as-a-pin surroundings, his son’s work area resembled an avalanche of papers, file folders and bulging brown accordion files tied with string.

  And there was no sense of cultivated politeness about the man who rose from behind the desk inches deep in clutter. Stuart Harmon, Jr. had inherited height from his father, but not leanness. The black cashmere jacket he wore over a gray cashmere T-shirt and black slacks did nothing to camouflage his muscled, powerful build. Burly was the word Mark decided on to catalog the man whose age was probably edging toward thirty.

  “Stu Harmon.” Stepping around the desk, Junior offered his hand. He had a narrow face and wore small wire-rim glasses. His coal-black hair lapped over the collar of his jacket; his eyes were deep-set, guarded by heavy brows. Up close, Mark noted his eyes were red-rimmed and shadowed with fatigue.

  “Mark Calhoun,” he introduced himself, returning the handshake. “My wife, Grace.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Mark watched Grace offer the attorney her hand. Her expression reflected just the amount of nerves and apprehension expected of a woman hoping everything would go right with yet another attempt to adopt a child. If she noticed the surreptitious examination Junior gave her breasts, Grace didn’t acknowledge it.

  With ancient instincts surging to the fore, Mark had to hold himself back from baring his teeth.

  “Good to meet you,” Harmon said, keeping Grace’s hand encased in his. “I hope your suite at the Mirador meets with your approval.”

  “It’s lovely,” Grace said. “From what I’ve paid attention to. I’m afraid I’m so nervous about the adoption that you could have stuck us in a closet and I wouldn’t have noticed.” She eased her hand from his. “My nerves just aren’t going to settle until Mark and I have our baby.”

  Nodding, Harmon, Jr. gestured toward the visitor chairs in front of his desk. “Once we take care of business details and have the contract signed, things should go fast.”

  Mark settled into the chair next to Grace’s, then leaned in. “Your father said you would have our contract ready today.”

  “I do.” Harmon shoved aside one stack of papers, then began shuffling through another. “As you can see, handling adoptions keeps me busy.”

  Mark didn’t doubt the man’s resolve—he was in some capacity working with a nurse who murdered young women and kidnapped their newborns. Mark knew he and Grace were about to hear for the first time the price tag the Harmons and Iris Davenport put on each baby.

  Harmon unearthed a file folder, pulled out paperwork and handed it across the desk to Mark. “Here’s your contract. The language is standard for all adoptions, but feel free to have your attorney check it.” He paused, then added, “I feel it’s my duty to point out that doing so will no doubt hold up the adoption process.”

  “How?” Grace’s gaze whipped up from the contract. “How will having our attorney review the contract hold up the adoption?”

  Giving her a self-deprecating smile, Harmon leaned back in his chair. “Not to criticize the law profession, but do you know any attorney who does things fast? Even if we get a document that’s perfect, there’s always the urge to demand a change to the language, just because we can. Same thing could happen in your case, so be prepared.” He rubbed his hands over his face, his fingers sliding under his glasses to press against his eyes. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “Didn’t get a lot of sleep last night.”

  “I hope you’re not getting sick,” Grace said.

  He raised a shoulder. “Like I was saying, there could be a delay. That’s not good, considering the baby you’re adopting is due any minute. You won’t get to even see her until the paperwork is signed by the parties, and all other business is completed. That’s our policy. It’s carved in stone. We don’t make exceptions.”

  That was one hell of a good squeeze tactic to put on desperate parents-to-be, Mark thought while he continued to study the contract.

  As expected, Grace clamped her hand on his. “Mark, you deal with contracts daily in your business. Surely you can tell if this one is okay.”

  “I deal with a lot of legal documents,” he agreed. “That doesn’t qualify me as an expert on interpreting legalese.”

  “Mr. Harmon just said the language in his contract is standard,” Grace persisted. “If that’s the case, I can’t see why we really need our attorney to look at it. What if we fax it to him and he doesn’t check it right away?” When she fisted her free hand against her thigh, her diamond wedding ring glinted beneath the lights. “It just hit me that our attorney always takes a vacation before Christmas, so he’s probably already gone.” The reedy panic building in Grace’s voice with each sentence now glimmered in her eyes. “I don’t want to wait until after the holidays to see our baby, Mark. I can’t wait.”

  “Darling, take a deep breath.” As if weighing options, he lifted her hand, pressed a kiss against her knuckles and gazed at her for a cluster of seconds. “All right, Grace, we won’t wait,” he said finally. Mark wanted Harmon to believe the husband was as desperate as the wife to take a shortcut in order to obtain the child they wanted.

  “The contract’s okay?” Grace asked, her voice filled with hope.

  “As far as I can tell.” Mark shifted his gaze to Harmon. “Grace and I will sign all the necessary paperwork before we leave today.”

  “Good.” For the first time, Harmon’s fatigue-shadowed eyes took on an intensity, as if he’d just received verification that the Calhouns were easy prey. “The way the contract’s written, it virtually guarantees there’s nothing that can come back and bite you later.”

  “I’ll hold you to that, Mr. Harmon.” Mark raised a brow. “I’m sure you’re aware the document doesn’t state the specific amount we’re required to pay for…” He let his voice drift off as he thumbed through the pages until he found the clause he wanted. “‘…fees incurred by all parties for legal representation,’” he read. “‘In addition to medical, living and other miscellaneous expenses for the infant and its biological mother. Said fees to be paid in advance in full by the prospective adoptive parents prior to their acquiring the child.’”

  “We don’t put dollar amounts in the contract because the fees vary from adoption to adoption,” Harmon explained. “That’s because the expenses paid to each birth mother are different.”

  And because there’s one less piece of evidence if you don’t put the amount in writing, Mark added silently.

  Harmon slipped a small calculator out of his desk’s lap drawer. “In your case, I figured all fees and expenses last night. Here’s the total.” He punched the amount into the calculator, then handed it across the desk to Mark.

  He studied the green digital numbers that glowed back at him. “Seventy thousand.”

  Harmon spread his hands. “That amount ensures you’re first in line for the infant.”

  “First?” Grace asked. “There’s another couple interested in our baby?”

  “Two couples, actually.”

&nbs
p; Mark handed the calculator back to Harmon. He would have preferred to snap the man’s neck while he was at it. “Money is not a problem for us,” he said levelly. “How and when do you want to be paid?”

  “A wire transfer. I’ll give you an account number before you leave. To keep yourselves at the top of the list, the money has to be deposited in the account by this time tomorrow. If not, the deal’s off.”

  “The deal won’t be off, Mr. Harmon.” Mark checked his watch. “You’ll have the money in the morning.”

  “Good.” Harmon plucked a pen from the clutter on his desk. “Let’s get that contract signed.”

  By the time the Calhouns left his office, Stu Harmon’s head was throbbing like a toothache, making his brain feel too big for his skull.

  Shoving back from his desk, he made a beeline in the direction of the fireplace. He pushed back a panel on the wall, revealing a small wet bar. Snatching up a crystal decanter filled with vodka, he removed the stopper and took a long, greedy chug.

  He was coming down hard.

  He had been flying on cocaine for two days, getting everything done. Everything. He glanced across his shoulder at his desk, swamped with file folders and papers. His old man drove him like a slave. Used him as a glorified clerk, forcing him to take care of the mundane, eye-crossing work inherent with practicing law.

  Only he wasn’t practicing law. The thought clogged Stu’s throat with bitterness, compelling him to swill more vodka. He had taken—and failed—the bar exam three times. Until he passed the damn thing, his father refused to pay him more than pauper’s wages. As a way of openly showing his displeasure, the old man wouldn’t even make him an official employee of the firm.

  Bastard.

  Fine. Daddy dear could keep his money because Stu had stumbled onto his own gold mine in the guise of a sexy redheaded nurse. Stu considered it a bonus that Iris Davenport was damn good in the sack. All he’d had to do when they’d met was steer her in the right direction. He’d gotten her a job at the clinic. After that, the money had started rolling in.