Hush Little Baby

by Jennifer Rebecca

  “This is true.”

  “Now tell me I’m wrong,” he says as he makes his way to the door of my office. “I dare you.”

  “I really hate you.”

  “No, you don’t.” He laughs as the door closes behind him, and I think maybe he’s not completely wrong. Maybe I need to knock Emma off balance a little bit. Maybe I need to show her that I’m done fucking around. I’m all in. I mean, what’s the worst that could happen?

  Famous last words, right?

  FIVE

  * * *

  LIKE A BAD PENNY

  I let out a frustrated sigh as I pull my car over to the side of the quiet suburban street and park. After Wes left my office in search of his wayward wife, I grabbed my jacket and headed out. It was time I spoke to Ashley Horner’s family.

  This is by far the shittiest part of the job. I like to think this is a small drop in the bucket of things I have to atone for in my life, and one day, hopefully before I die, I’ll know I’ve made up for all the bad I have done and all the damage I caused.

  Then again, maybe not.

  I unfold my long legs from the driver seat and shut the door behind me, beeping the locks as I go. The guys in the station would have a field day if I got my duty vehicle stolen on a next of kin notification. Those loveable bastards would eat me alive at the first smell of blood in the water.

  I tuck my keys in my front pocket and make my way up the slender walkway to the narrow house with white clapboard siding. The Horner’s live just outside George Washington Township, which is probably why I hadn’t recognized their names. GWT is a pretty small town, and more often than not, it feels even smaller, but I had never seen Ashley before in my life.

  My fist falls heavy on the door as I knock. I don’t have to wait long when it swings open, revealing a tired-looking woman in her mid to late forties. Her brows pull together in a way that hints that she frowns often and rarely smiles.

  “Can I help you?” she asks when she gets a good look at my badge.

  “Are you Mrs. Horner?”

  “Yes,” she says hesitantly. “What do you want?”

  “I’m Captain Liam Goodnite with the George Washington Township Police Department,” I inform her. “May I come inside?”

  She sighs but pushes the door open for me to follow her into the small sunroom where an older floral sofa sits faded in the middle of the room. Other than being sparse, the home is clean and nice.

  “Gary!” she shouts. “Get in here.”

  “What now, Evelyn?” a man, late-forties to early-fifties and slightly overweight, asks as he makes his way into the room.

  “I don’t know,” she says in a nasty tone. “But I’m sure it has something to do with Ashley. It always does.”

  “That girl is like a bad penny,” Mr. Horner agrees. “She’s always turning up where she isn’t wanted. What kind of trouble has she gotten herself into now?”

  “Maybe you both should have a seat,” I suggest gently.

  “Better just get it over with,” he says. “We prefer to rip the Band-Aid off where she’s concerned.”

  “If you’re sure?” I ask.

  “I am,” he says, pulling his wife into his arms. “She’s nothing but bad news.”

  When I ran Ashley’s background this morning, I didn’t find anything that suggested she was the bad seed her parents seemed to think she was. She had a decent job making a low wage, her apartment was clean, and even her high school transcript was decent. I’m not sure what they found so appalling, but I was going to find out, because no matter how they felt about her, she didn’t deserve to die like that.

  “As I told your wife, I’m Captain Liam Goodnite with the George Washington Township Police Department, and I regret to inform you that your daughter, Ashley Horner, was found dead last night.”

  I wait for them to respond. To ask how or why she died. To inquire after their missing grandchild, cry, yell—I don’t know, something. But when it became abundantly clear they were going to have no reaction at all, I buried my own personal feelings about these people and got down to doing my job. Whether they were responsible or not, I was going to find out who did this to Ashley if it was the last thing I did.

  “When was the last time you saw your daughter?”

  “When she told us she was pregnant,” Mrs. Horner says after a minute.

  “Were you excited about the baby?” I asked, figuring they were absolutely not, but I had to ask anyway.

  “Of course not,” she scoffs. “She was throwing her life away.”

  “How so?”

  “She was offered a modeling contract,” she answers. “She was going to get out of here and live a great life, and instead, she got pregnant and started waiting tables. How could we be happy about that?”

  I didn’t answer her. My opinion isn’t needed, she was clearly on a roll all on her own.

  “And the baby’s father?” I ask. “How did he feel about it?”

  “Who knows?” she answers. “We never met him. He didn’t even have the decency to do the right thing.”

  “And what would that be?”

  “Marry her? Make her get rid of it? I don’t know! Something!” she shouts. “She was throwing her whole life away, and it was embarrassing!”

  “What was embarrassing about it?”

  “Everyone was talking,” she says. “I couldn’t go to the market or church without people whispering about my daughter. She humiliated me! I begged her to get rid of it, and she said no! Can you believe that? I told her she wasn’t welcome back here unless she gave it up for adoption. Something. But to clean up her act.”

  I mean, who needs enemies when you have parents like this? It makes me thankful for my loud, overbearing, annoying, but totally amazing family. I would be lost without them. All of them.

  “And you never saw her again?” I asked.

  “No.”

  “Did you ever go to her apartment on Ashland?”

  “No,” Mr. Horner finally speaks up. “We had no idea she even moved to GWT.”

  “That’s all I need for now,” I tell them as I grab a business card out of my wallet. “If you think of anything else, give me a call.”

  I leave the Horners to their misery and jump in my car. I wipe a frustrated hand down my face before I stab the key in the ignition, jerking the gear shift into drive and heading back to the station. My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I pull it out and slide my finger across the glass to unlock it.

  Emma: Autopsy is done.

  There it is. I equal parts love being around Emma and I hate it. But I will swallow all the heartache she needs to dish out to me, because it’s the least I can do. Whatever she needs to make her okay, I’ll do it. So I respond, letting my fingers fly over the keys while I’m stopped at a red light.

  Me: I’m on my way now.

  Emma: See you soon. ;)

  I love the station. It’s my home away from home. Actually, I spend significantly more of my time there than I do at my actual house. My career is everything I have. I guess now is when I could wax poetic about how I could have everything I ever wanted if I wasn’t such a fucking idiot, but my dad always says you can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube, so we need to make the best of it. Which is why I’m heading back to the place that usually makes me the happiest, even though today it makes my gut burn, because instead of the world open in front of me, I have an autopsy meeting with the one woman who drives me crazy and makes me regret everything I ever did in my life except her. I’ll never regret her.

  I drive back to GWT, not seeing the town I’ve loved my whole life. Instead, it’s like a cloud hangs over my head. I need to figure out how to right the ship that is my life, and fast, before I sink for good.

  I turn into the station and drive around back, pulling into my parking spot by the glass front door that opens to the hallway where my private office is. With a heavy sigh, I push open my door and step down from the Tahoe, slamming the door closed a little more forcefully than
I meant to. With a final look back at my car and a sad and pathetic shake of my head, I pull open the glass door and head inside, only not to the safety of my office but down the stairs to the basement where Emma Parker, one of the best medical examiners I have ever seen work, is waiting to tell me how Ashley Horner met her end.

  I take a deep breath and try to steel my emotions. If I can just lock everything down, I might just get through this briefing. And then I push the heavy steel fire door open, and I’m stopped in my tracks by the most beautiful smile I have ever seen.

  “Hey, Lee,” Emma greets me before pulling her surgical mask back up over her mouth and nose.

  “Hi, Em,” I say and have to clear my throat. So much for getting through this meeting in one piece. “What do you have for me?”

  “A lot was the same as the girls last week,” she explains as she snaps on a new pair of latex gloves. “Ashley Horner, nineteen, died due to complications from a crude cesarean section.”

  “Official cause of death?” I ask her.

  “Exsanguination,” she says softly. “The incision site was never closed, and she bled out on the floor.”

  “That’s consistent with the crime scene.”

  “Yes,” Emma agrees thoughtfully. “It is.”

  “Any blunt force trauma?” I ask. “Or do you have anything as to how they got her like this?”

  “Yes.” Emma turns the body so I can see a small puncture mark on the side of her thigh. “Ashley was injected with a sedative.”

  “So are we looking for a medical professional?” I wonder what kind of doctor would cut up pregnant girls like this.

  “No, I don’t think so,” she answers. Her brows scrunch up over her eyes, and I can see she’s working through a puzzle. “The downward trajectory of the needle is more consistent with someone administering an EpiPen, a quick strike like a snakebite. Hard and fast.”

  My eyes snap up to hers the minute the words are out of her mouth, and I watch the skin of her neck and ears flush a pretty pink. I know if she weren’t wearing that damn mask, I’d see she’s blushing all over, and I love it. Maybe she is still affected by me. That does more to boost my mood than anything else could have.

  “Emma—” I start, but she interrupts me.

  “Just forget I said anything at all.” She rushes to get the words out quickly while she covers Ashley Horner back up and shoves her back in the drawer. “It was a Freudian slip.”

  “I think it was on purpose,” I say, my voice lower than before as I move toward her. She’s too busy flitting about the room like a hummingbird to notice my movements.

  “I’ll run some toxicology tests on Ms. Horner and on the Jane Doe from last week and see if I can find anything,” she explains without looking at me as she snaps her gloves off, but by then it’s too late. I’m right beside her.

  “Stop, honey,” I say softly. I don’t touch her, but I lean in as close as she’ll let me before she gets that wild look in her eyes.

  “Lee—” she starts.

  “Stop,” I repeat just as gently as before. “It’s time to stop running.”

  “No,” she whispers.

  “I’m done fucking around.”

  “You’re w-what?” Emma stammers, and her ears turn red, a clear indicator she’s no longer scared but pissed as hell. Good. I don’t want her meek and mild; I want my tiger back.

  “I’m done fucking around,” I say once more. “You are mine, and I am yours.”

  “You know why we can’t be together,” she whispers harshly.

  “I know why you think we don’t deserve to be together,” I respond. “And honey, we did wrong by Anna, but it’s also time for Anna to be given her fair share of the responsibility for what happened. We can’t keep living our lives like this.”

  “I’m with someone else.” I can see she’s scrambling. Emma is trying to throw up roadblocks left and right to discourage what has been happening between us all along, but it only serves to make me even more determined.

  “Then end it.”

  “You can’t be serious,” she snaps.

  “I’m as serious as a heart attack,” I say as calmly as she is agitated. “You can’t honestly admit he gives you anything close to what I can.”

  “Conceited much?”

  “Am I wrong?”

  “You’re an asshole, Lee.”

  “I’m an asshole who’s been in love with you for a long time, and now I’m done fucking around.”

  “So you say,” she snarls. “I’m having someone else’s baby, Lee.”

  “I see that,” I tell her. “But what you clearly do not get, so I’m going to spell it out for you, is that I don’t care whose baby that is. His, mine, someone else’s, the minute I claim you for good, I claim that baby too. I’ll give it my name and raise it as my own with you in our home.”

  “Lee—” she starts, but I don’t give her a chance to run.

  “I will teach it to catch a ball and ride a bike, and I will walk the halls with it in the middle of the night. I’ll do it all with a smile on my face, because I love you that much. So I’ll love it too.”

  “Stop calling her ‘it.’ She’s a girl,” she says softly.

  “Then I’m going to cry like a fucking baby at all the dance recitals,” I tell her honestly. “But I’m still going to teach her to throw a ball and ride a bike. So I’ll let you have your space—for now—but think on what I’ve said.”

  And then I place a hard but quick kiss on her lips and head back up the stairs to my office, where all the paperwork I know my sister did not do is waiting for me. Thankfully, no one is in the back hallway, so no one sees me with the enormous erection my standoff with Emma has left me with.

  I quickly shut the door behind me, make my way around my desk, and sit down in my chair. I need to cool my thoughts, which are decidedly on the wrong track for the middle of a workday. But I can’t stop thinking about the way her big blue eyes went soft when I said I didn’t care who the biological father of the baby is. And the way her blonde-and-pink curls were barely contained on top of her head in a disaster of a bun. I love the way her little bump is barely concealed under her tee and scrub bottoms, and the little noises she makes when her breath hitches ever so slightly drives me wild. Everything about her has my dick painfully hard in my slacks, but I have to go slow with Emma. I swear to God that I won’t scare her away.

  And then there’s a knock at my door.

  SIX

  * * *

  I NEED

  “Come in,” I bark and hope to hell and back that my desk hides my dick that is refusing to listen to reason and play by the rules.

  The doorknob slowly turns, and it seems like an eternity before my door pushes open the tiniest bit, and the person on the other side is the last person on earth I thought would seek me out right now. I figured I pushed her too far this afternoon, but now, I’m not so sure.

  Emma slips through the partial opening of the door and closes it softly behind her before turning around to face me, but she still doesn’t give me her eyes. She leans against the heavy door as if she’s using her tiny body to block my path. On her face, she wears an expression with a wild air and a little desperation. Her eyes are closed tight.

  “What can I do for you, Emma?”

  And then she opens her eyes, and those baby-blues burn me where I sit. But still, she looks nervous, like she doesn’t know how to ask for what she wants. And color me surprised.

  “I-I-I—” she stammers.

  “You what, honey?” I ask softly, and fuck if I don’t hope she asks me for me.

  “I need….” she whispers, and I can see the pink flush on her cheeks and down her neck, where I’m sure that pretty blush stains the tops of her full breasts as well.

  “I know what you need,” I respond, and her eyes flair. “Come here, Emma, but lock the door first.”

  Her mouth opens and she pants a little. She looks around wildly, and I’m not sure if she’s going to come to me or run. Then
, after seeming to come to a decision, she turns around, and I think, Now, I’ve really pushed her too far. And I wonder how long it’s going to take me to make up the ground that I’ve just lost by jumping the gun. But she surprises me, and maybe herself a little too, when she flips the fucking lock and takes a step away from the door.

  I hold my breath as she moves another nervous step toward me, and then another, and another. I let her come to me, when what I want to do is jump up and pull her into my arms. But I’ve made myself clear. The ball is in her court now, and she has to come to me on her own terms. We’ll figure the rest out from there. But I know one thing for sure—after this, there will be no going back.

  I push my chair back a bit to make room for her to stand between me and my desk. Emma rests her ass against the edge of the scarred wood and wraps her delicate fingers around the edge on either side of her.

  “I need you,” she whispers before leaning down and pressing her mouth to mine.

  I deepen the kiss, and she lets me take over. I run my hands up and down her sides, warming them with the heat of her body. Over her arms, her little belly, and then up to her breasts. She gasps against my mouth when I find one of her nipples, and I soothe it with the back of my knuckles before trailing my hands down the middle of her belly to the tie at the front of her scrub pants.

  I untie the knot and let them gape open then slide my hand down the front and into her panties. She widens her stance to let me in, and I feel how wet she is for me on my fingertips. I toy and tease, letting my fingers circle her pussy but never dipping inside. She rocks her hips against my hand, but I don’t give her what she wants, not yet anyway.

  And then I pull my hand free, and Emma lets out a little whimper, but it doesn’t last long when I grab the waist of both her scrubs and her cute little cotton panties and slide them down her legs. She kicks out of them and her black-and-white-checkered Vans sneakers, and I help her up onto my desk, where she leans her weight back on her elbows.