The Pearl Brooch

by Logan, Katherine Lowry

  It was a funny story, really, and they all chuckled about it now, but at the time JL threw caution to the wind, fell madly in love, and shamelessly jumped into bed with him, all within a few hours. Of course that led to the kidnapping of her oldest son and the entire MacKlenna Clan, two deaths, a rogue cop, an explosion, the reveal of previously unknown fathers, two attempted murders, and Kevin’s close call with death.

  But those events were all in the past—part of her still-functioning long-term memory.

  Funny, the things you think about when your brain is all mushy from an infusion of narcotics. She knew she had to be under the influence or else she’d be dealing with some serious pain. Pain. That agony was intact in her long-term memory too.

  Her hand inched up the side of her leg to her hip, where it paused briefly as her fingers brushed the old scar. Moving on, her fingers roved over her belly—squishy, not hard. Her baby wasn’t inside her.

  Where is he?

  Her worry now, her only concern, was for her baby. And no one would tell her anything about him. She patted the bed next to her hip, searching for the nurses’ call button, but before she could press it, a nurse entered the cubicle, pushing the curtain aside to admit a bigger sliver of light.

  “You’re waking up again. How do you feel?” It was still too dark to see the woman’s name tag or even her face clearly, until the nurse switched on the light above the bed.

  JL blinked. Laura. Her name was Laura. “Like crap. And that’s being polite.”

  Laura studied the monitor spitting out heart rate and temperature and God knows what else, probably how many ounces she’d peed. Laura repositioned the gadget, whatever it was called, on JL’s finger.

  “There’s a handsome man out there who’s been waiting for you to wake up,” the nurse said.

  JL glanced at the pillow and blanket in the chair. “Which means either Kevin or his father are out there. They look alike. Just ask my mother-in-law.” If she’d been up to it, she would have laughed—her long-term memory was working again—remembering when Meredith walked up behind Kevin, wrapped her arms around him, and whispered a very naughty suggestion in his ear. When she discovered it was her stepson, not her husband, she nearly died of embarrassment.

  “Did Kevin get any sleep?” JL asked.

  “A little bit, I think.”

  “Good. Then he can take me to see our baby.” But first JL would have to slip past Nurse Laura. She schooled her features and gave the nurse her most effective cop face. It was the tough-girl look she’d perfected after spending hours in front of a mirror, and had always gotten good results during the years she patrolled the streets of New York.

  Laura’s expression turned doleful. The look obviously didn’t faze the nurse. If JL had lost her ability to intimidate, she was screwed. It was the only thing she had to balance Elliott’s all-powerful presence with her pint-sized grrrl power. She’d always been petite, but it was more noticeable since the twins’ recent growth spurt had the pair of ten-year-old hooligans towering over her statuesque five-two.

  Laura moved around efficiently, checking the monitor, IV, and pulse-ox as if marking off items on her to-do list. Satisfied the IV was flowing smoothly, she said, “I’m going to inject Demerol into the line.”

  A coolness burned in JL’s vein.

  Laura lowered the bedsheet, checked the dressing, and pressed around JL’s abdomen, her fingers moving adeptly, as if they were on a scavenger hunt. She studied the monitor again, pulled a piece of paper and pen from her pocket, and wrote down several numbers.

  JL’s squishy belly became a bone-crushing reminder that she’d been separated from Lawrence. “Where’s my baby?

  “He’s in the NICU, and the latest report says he’s doing fine.” Laura pulled the sheet back up, pocketed her note, then slathered sanitizer on her hands.

  JL’s nose twitched at the astringent smell of alcohol and iodine. She massaged her belly. It was so odd that her son was no longer in there. “When can I see my baby?”

  “Dr. Winn usually makes rounds at seven, and she’s the one who will need to sign orders releasing you to get up and move around.”

  There wasn’t a window in the room, and JL’s concept of time and place were totally screwed. As often as they flew cross-country and to Europe, they could be anywhere in any time zone.

  “What time is it now?” she asked.

  Laura raised her arm, checked her watch. “Five-thirty-six.”

  “AM or PM?”

  “It’s early morning.”

  A muscular orderly strolled by her cubicle pushing an empty wheelchair, and she wanted to scream come back for me! But he disappeared beyond the curtain. Unless he came back with the wheelchair, she’d never get out of here and find her baby.

  “When can I hold my son?”

  “Soon.”

  JL found the matter-of-factness in the nurse’s tone sharp and annoying, even if it wasn’t. The old JL—the one before Blane was born—wouldn’t have put up with it. The current version was mellower unless she was riled. And she was moving quickly in the direction of riled.

  Laura’s tone conveyed a strange sense of foreboding, which rattled JL’s messed-up brain. God, she wished they’d given her something other than a general anesthetic.

  “Is there anything you need?”

  JL glared at the woman as if she’d lost her mind. How could she have forgotten so quickly what JL needed? Was her short-term memory shot to hell, too? If so, JL needed a new nurse.

  “I. Need. My. Husband. And. My. Baby.” She repeated her needs slowly and definitively to trigger the nurse’s memory. Hopefully, it would stick this time.

  “Mr. Fraser is at the nurses’ station. I’ll tell him you’re awake.”

  JL considered rolling her eyes, but the eye roll was a typical reaction of the old JL. “The nurses’ station, huh?”—she couldn’t resist, and rolled them anyway. “Better watch out. He has a thing for nurses.”

  “You must have been one,” Laura said.

  “Who, me? Be around blood and gore and guts?” She shivered. “No, I was a New York City detective.”

  Laura raised her brow in astonishment as she processed that tidbit.

  Yeah, lady. So don’t try to lie to me.

  “You’re so petite. I can’t see you carrying a gun.”

  “I wore stilettoes, but I don’t anymore.”

  “What? Wear stilettoes or carry a gun?”

  So Nurse Laura had a sense of humor. Good for her. Humor would help her deal with obnoxious patients. And it complimented her unlined face, shiny brown hair worn in a messy bun, and big, heavily-lashed brown eyes that smiled easily at JL. How could anyone not like Nurse Laura?

  “The gun.” JL tried to say it flippantly, like it didn’t matter. But honestly, she felt naked every time she left the house without a weapon. The truth was, though—if JL’s long-term memory was still recalling the past correctly—she’d given up her guns to save her relationship. She could live without her Glock. She couldn’t live without Kevin or her children. She yawned. She couldn’t live without sleep, either. Her eyes drifted shut.

  “I’ll tell your husband you’re awake. If you need anything, use your call button, okay?” Laura moved the device closer to JL’s fingertips.

  JL wrapped her hand around the plastic controls. If she needed anything? Really? Yes, she did. She needed her baby. Her droopy eyes snapped open again. “I want my baby.”

  In her sweet Tidewater accent, Laura said, patiently, “Dr. Winn will be here in a couple of hours. She’ll tell you when you can get out of bed.”

  “I’m not asking to get out of bed. I just want someone to bring me my baby. What’s so hard about that?” JL massaged her temples, trying to stave off a pounding headache.

  Laura patted JL’s arm and left the room just as Kevin walked in. “Hey, sweetheart. Does your head hurt?”

  She looked up into his tired face to see his well-defined jaw was dusted with scruff. She pulled him down for
a cuddle and a kiss. “I feel like I’ve been beat up and left on the mat. Where’s our son?”

  His dark eyes locked onto hers, and he grasped her hand, warm around her cold fingers. Tenderly he brushed her hair away from her face, tucking it behind her ear as if she was a child with a cut knee, not a woman who’d undergone emergency surgery.

  “He’s in the NICU. You can see him soon, but right now you can’t get out of bed.”

  The tears stinging the backs of her eyes during her tough-girl impersonation finally broke through the dam and streamed down her face. She wiped her eyes with a corner of the sheet. “New mothers always get to be with their babies. Why won’t they let me?”

  Kevin anchored his elbows on the bed’s siderail and leaned forward. “I’ve explained this at least five times, but you don’t remember. It’s okay, though. I’ll repeat it a hundred times. You, sweetheart, are a stickler for obeying rules. Unlike the rest of us, gray is not in your color palette. Right now, the rule is you can’t get out of bed. I can ask if they’ll roll you up to the NICU.”

  “That’s crazy. I can wait another hour. But if it comes and goes and I don’t get to see Lawrence, then I’ll insist they roll my bed up there.”

  Kevin pulled out a handkerchief and wiped her tears. She snatched the fancy linen, monogrammed with EBF, from him. “This is Elliott’s. What happened to yours?”

  “I left it in the ambulance.”

  Another memory tugged at her consciousness—airplane, Kevin’s bleeding face. Shivering, she shook it away, wondering why she’d been longing for her short-term memory. On second thought, it could stay AWOL a while longer.

  He tugged the handkerchief from between her fingers and dabbed softly at her cheeks. “I know you want to see him, babe, but you just had major surgery. You have a catheter and an IV. Dr. Winn has to order the removal of both, and she’ll be here in a couple of hours. I promise you, you’ll see him soon.”

  She sighed again, this time letting loose with a despairing one. “But I have to breastfeed him.”

  He held her face between his hands so she would narrow her focus to only him. “Lawrence is in the NICU. He’s too small to breastfeed right now. But when you get to your room, you can start pumping your breasts.”

  “When can I see him? He’s all alone.”

  “Shhh, babe. He’s not alone. There’s a whole team watching over him in the NICU, and I’ve been splitting my time between the two of you. I just got back.” Kevin looked like hell. He was disheveled, and his eyes were red. He smoothed his thick, untidy hair back off his forehead, then rubbed his gray face. His knuckles lingered along his whiskered and bandaged cheek, before dropping away. “Do you want to see his pictures again?”

  She blinked. “Again? But I haven’t seen any pictures.”

  “You have, love. You just don’t remember.” He swiped his finger across his phone’s screen and handed her the device. “Lawrence’s primary nurse took this one of the two of us.”

  She gasped at the shocking, studio-quality picture of Kevin with the smallest baby she’d ever seen. He had a tube in his mouth, a nasal cannula, a blood pressure cuff around his ankle, an umbilical line, patches on his chest, and a blue knitted cap on his precious little head. Did he even have any hair? How could she ever touch him through all those cords?

  The blue card on the front of the incubator said:

  BABY BOY FRASER, 2.2 POUNDS, 14.8 INCHES.

  Every inch of her skin broke out in a cold sweat. “Oh, my God. What have they done to him?” She dropped the phone, shaking her head. She was a cop. It was her responsibility to protect the weak and vulnerable. Why was she here when her precious, helpless baby was in a clear box?

  “They’re working to save his life. I’ll take you to the NICU as soon as Dr. Winn says you can get up.”

  A tide of anger washed over her. Enough. She wasn’t waiting any longer. She made a move to swing her legs over the side of the bed. The monitor beeped loudly, and the sudden movement sent shards of pain all the way through to her backbone. “Damn it!”

  Kevin gently pushed her back down. “Babe, you can’t get up. You have a catheter, an IV, and lots of stitches. You’ll hurt yourself.”

  Laura rushed into the room, turned off the beeping noise, untangled the IV line, and checked the placement of the catheter to be sure JL hadn’t dislodged any of the hospital’s instruments of torture.

  JL lit into him. She was tired of their patronizing attitudes. “Why won’t anyone tell me where my baby is? I want Pops! I want Pete! They’ll tell me the truth.”

  Arguing wore her out. Her eyelids drifted shut, and as sleep began to overtake her again, she heard Kevin whisper, “She was in a plane crash and had an emergency C-section. Our twenty-eight-week-old baby is in the NICU. Her family hasn’t been allowed in to see her, and she can’t remember anything from one minute to the next.”

  There’s nothing wrong with my memory. I remember Kevin’s voice…

  Next time she woke up she’d call Pete. Her partner knew how to find lost people. He’d find her baby.

  13

  Paris (1789)—Sophia

  Hoping to avoid the mob, Sophia, William, and the girls arrived at the Place de Louis XV, the largest public square in Paris, located between the Champs-Élysées and the Tuileries Gardens.

  Instead, Jefferson’s four-wheeled, convertible carriage brought them smack into the crowd.

  An even larger mob than yesterday packed the square with fresh vigor. They stood shoulder to shoulder, and their hostile voices echoed the chants of liberté heralded by yesterday’s violent horde.

  The scene, the sounds, the swords and pitchforks raised in anger triggered Sophia’s eidetic memories, her stomach tightened like a towel wrung dry, and she covered her ears, hoping to shut out the voices, but then quickly pulled her hands away. If the girls saw fear in her eyes and actions, they’d be scared too.

  Instead, she imagined fields of summer grass, soft breezes, and crickets, lots of chirping crickets. It didn’t work. The vividness of yesterday was indelibly imprinted on her brain, to hang forever in her mental art gallery.

  “I don’t recommend continuing on toward the Palais Royal…” William’s voice trailed off as he stretched his neck, looking from one window to the other and back again. “I don’t believe we’re in danger, but I promised Mr. Jefferson we wouldn’t take any risks.”

  Patsy and Polly sat on the rear-facing seat opposite Sophia and William. “Please close the top,” Polly whispered. “I’m scared.”

  William immediately pulled up the front part of the soft folding cover, then the back part, and latched the two halves together in the center. Closing the top would make the heat in the carriage unbearable, but for Polly’s peace of mind, Sophia would gladly suffer.

  Polly leaned back, disquiet in her eyes. “They won’t hurt us.” Her sing-song voice turned the unspoken words—Will they?—into a question.

  Patsy waved her hand dismissively. “We’re Americans. Their problems aren’t our fault.”

  “France is facing bankruptcy partly because of the enormous sums spent on the American Revolution,” Sophia said, “and partly because of the famine caused by years of bad harvests.”

  “Well, if they don’t hear us speak, they won’t know we’re Americans.” Patsy fastidiously smoothed the printed cotton petticoat of her open-front dress. “From the way we’re dressed, we could be French aristocrats.”

  “Aristocrats aren’t very popular right now,” Sophia said. “And the peasants have had enough. They’re provoking a revolution over a long list of inequalities.”

  “You’re well-informed, mademoiselle,” Patsy said. “But Papa says all women in Paris are informed and discuss politics as well as any man. Women know their place in America and would never meddle in affairs of state.”

  Sophia scolded herself inwardly, Stay out of it. She glanced out at the rioters. She wasn’t about to go out in that madness again. “There’s nothing I need badly enough to risk
another fall.” She would rather be at home recuperating on her sofa, surrounded by her art and frescos. But she couldn’t go home. Not yet. “Let’s go to Monsieur David’s atelier, then find Monsieur Watin.”

  “I concur,” William said. “We’re safe so long as we’re in Mr. Jefferson’s carriage. If we got out, it would be too easy to be jostled in the crowd and separated.”

  Polly visibly tensed. “Papa said the mob stole Mademoiselle Orsini’s carriage and left her stranded. Then awful things happened.” Her deep brown eyes welled with tears as she looked helplessly at Sophia. “I couldn’t have been as brave as you were.”

  Sophia patted Polly’s hand. “I wasn’t brave. If I had been, I would have fought my way out instead of allowing myself to get sucked in.” Jefferson deserved a tongue-lashing for oversharing with his daughters. It was nothing more than a thinly-veiled attempt to justify his invitation to Sophia to stay at the Hôtel de Langeac.

  Poor Sophia. She had such a horrible experience. She needs to be with other Americans who can provide a safe place. Never mind the fact that she’s an unmarried female artist and I’m an oversexed widower.

  Even if Sophia confessed the story about losing her carriage wasn’t true, she couldn’t deny the horror of almost being set on fire. She shivered at the thought.

  “William,” she said softly. “Tell the coachman to take us back to the legation.”

  William raised his knuckles to rap on the back window to advise the coachman, but paused, holding his hand mid-air. “Would you like to see if we can go around the mob to reach Monsieur David’s atelier before we turn back?”

  Sophia placed her other hand on Polly’s trembling shoulder, hoping to calm her. “His studio is a few blocks west of the Pont Neuf. But being out here is stressing us all. We should go back.”

  Polly shot Sophia an anxious glance. “I don’t mind going there if his studio is away from…from”—she pointed out the window—“all the screaming.”

  “You’re mistaken about the location, mademoiselle. Monsieur David is the most famous artist with an atelier at the Louvre,” William said. “I’ve been there.”