Memories of Us

by Linda Winfree

  Her eyes narrowed in calculation, Celia looked at Tom once again. “We need to look deeper into Jessica’s life. There’ll be a connection somewhere. We just have to find it.”

  Cook waved a hand in an annoyed gesture. “Would you mind sharing, or are you two going to continue talking in secret code over there?”

  “In going through Jessica’s banking records, we discovered some evidence of possibly money laundering—large cash deposits, withdrawals, transfers.”

  “And we think someone may have been paying her for carrying this baby.”

  Eagerness dawning on his face, Cook tapped a finger on the table. “Grady specialized in family and divorce law, didn’t she?”

  Tom frowned. “Yes.”

  “Does that include adoptions?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Yes, it does.” Tick cleared his throat. “Cait and I talked to her about what was involved in a private adoption earlier in the year. She said she had people who helped her find birth mothers. We, well, something about the way she said that made it seem like it was something we didn’t want to be involved with.”

  “Oh God.” Celia stared at Tom. “You don’t think…?”

  “A baby ring.” Disgust colored Cook’s voice. “You said it, Tick. Anything with money attached. Wonder what a healthy white infant goes for these days?”

  “Obviously more than fifty grand.”

  “You know who I want to talk to again? That couple from Cader County.”

  Celia nodded. “Both of them.”

  “We want to make them come to us.” Tom rubbed a hand over his jaw. “I think we also want to take a look at any adoptions she’s put together in the last year as well, especially any she had in the works when she was killed.”

  “Couple’s name was Campbell.” Cook looked up from his notebook and focused on Celia. “Now where have we heard that name before?”

  Awareness dawned on Celia’s features. “The DVDs. One of them was labeled Campbell. But I don’t remember seeing the husband on any of the ones we watched.”

  “Because he’s not. The husband is Wesley Campbell. The Campbell we have on the DVD is Jameson Campbell, the county administrator from over in Cader County.”

  “They’re brothers,” Tick offered. “I’ve met Jameson once or twice and my brother bought some farm equipment from Wesley.”

  “Coincidental, isn’t it?” Cook lifted an eyebrow. “Wesley and the wife wanting a kid so bad, and Jameson has an affair with a woman who turns up dead with her baby cut out of her belly?”

  Tom chuckled. “Coincidental enough that I think we want to invite both the Campbell brothers and the wife over to the sheriff’s department for a little talk.”

  Cook cleared his throat. “Well, St. John, feel like going for a little drive?”

  —

  “I made a couple of calls to agents I knew from the OCB.” Tick handed Tom a cup of coffee. “According to them, neither of the Campbell boys is on the bureau’s radar.”

  Tom sipped the hot brew, grimaced at the strong taste, and studied the white board set up in the department’s small conference room. Celia’s neat handwriting filled in areas not covered by Cook’s slashing script. They’d spent thirty minutes or so writing up leads and theories on the board before heading out to Cader County. In the corner of the board, Celia had written Jessica, second pregnancy? The notation niggled at him as much as it seemed to bother Celia.

  He slanted a look at Tick. “You said Jessie told you she had ways to find birth mothers?”

  “Yeah. And something about the way she said it? Made my skin crawl.”

  His attention drifted back to Celia’s notes. Jessica had said the same thing once about the idea of being pregnant. If she’d had access to birth mothers, why carry a baby herself? The money?

  What made that particular baby worth so much?

  “I started looking through the records we pulled from her law offices.” Tick indicated a banker’s box on the table, a stack of manila folders beside it. “Her laptop is gone, so I’m afraid some of what we wanted to look at was on it. All her files at home were personal stuff.”

  “Find anything?”

  “You’re the lawyer.” Tick handed him the topmost file. “They look okay to me. They’re ‘open’ adoptions. Records of contact between the birth mother and the adoptive parents before the baby was born, questionnaires on the adoptive parents, home studies, that kind of stuff. The waiver of parental rights from the biological parents, the adoption orders.”

  Tom frowned. “Let me see the others.”

  With a shrug, Tick slid them across the table. “Be my guest.”

  “I don’t believe this.” Tom flipped through them quickly. A disbelieving laugh rumbled through him. “All of these orders are signed by the same judge.”

  “That’s not kosher?”

  Tom shook his head. “Adoption orders should be filed in the county in which the couple resides. Somehow, I doubt all of these people live in Chandler County.”

  “Who’s the judge?”

  Tom dropped the files back on the scarred tabletop. “The Honorable Alton Baker.”

  “That’s…interesting.”

  “Do me a favor.” Tom pulled a legal pad in front of him and began a list of the adoptive parents and birth mothers. “Run these. See if we can get current addresses and phone numbers on any of them.”

  Tick reached for the paper. “Will do.”

  “I don’t fucking believe it.” Tom stared at the names before him.

  Interest flared in Tick’s dark eyes. “What?”

  Tom turned the paper so the investigator could see it. “Look at this.”

  Tick whistled. “Holy hell.”

  —

  “So, was offering to take me along an olive branch, Cook?” In a low murmur, Celia tossed the question at him as they followed the unhappy Campbells up the department steps.

  He shrugged. “Something like that.”

  “Still pissed at me?”

  With a quick glance at her, he caught the door behind Wesley Campbell and held it for her. “I worry about my friends, St. John. I don’t want to see you hurt.”

  Touched by his gruff concern, she grinned. “I’m a big girl this time around, Cook. I know what I’m doing.”

  “I sure as hell hope so,” he muttered. “Come on, let’s see where your boss is.”

  He ushered the Campbells into the squad room and she smiled at the careful, almost undetectable way he separated the three. Watching the woman and two men in the squad room, she and Cook stepped to the doorway of the conference room. Surprised, Celia stared.

  McMillian and Tick had flipped the white board to use the opposite side. His jacket and tie gone and sleeves rolled up, McMillian stood at the board, writing a list. “All right. I’ve got four Stephanie Nichols, three Jennifer Skylars, and what looks like two Natalie Bradleys.”

  Tick nodded, looking up from a legal pad balanced on his knee. “That’s what I’ve got.”

  “What’s going on?” Celia asked and Tom glanced around at her, excitement glinting in his sharp blue gaze. He waved her into the room.

  “Come look at this.”

  She stopped at his shoulder and looked at the list—repeated names with dates beside them. “It’s a list of names.”

  His mouth twisted. “Funny. Look, Celia. These are the birth mothers Jessica listed on the adoption papers.”

  “Rather prolific, aren’t they?” She frowned. “Those are not nine-month spans between babies.”

  “Oh, it gets better.” Tick tossed a small stack of Internet articles on the table. “Stephanie Nichols died of leukemia when she was three. Jennifer Skylar? Car accident before she was a year old. Natalie Bradley drowned at age four.”

  “My God.” Celia shook her head. “That’s nine babies. Where did they come from?”

  “Good question,” Cook said. He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “Maybe the Campbells can help us find an answer.”

>   —

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Jameson Campbell laid his hands atop the table, obviously preparing to leverage up from the chair. “I damn sure don’t know anything about a baby, either.”

  “You want to know what I think?” Celia tilted her head to one side and leaned forward, lowering her voice. “I think you had an affair with Jessica and she got pregnant. I think she told you about the video and the baby and tried to shake you down. And then? Then I think you killed her.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “Where’s the baby, Mr. Campbell?” Cook scraped his thumbnail along his teeth, appearing bored by the whole proceedings. Bored like a big, edgy lion waiting to pounce.

  “I don’t have to stay here and listen to this bullshit.”

  “No, you don’t. You’re free to go at any time.” Cook dropped his feet from the corner of the table and sat up straight. “Hey, St. John, you still got that friend at the TV station, right?”

  He fixed Celia with an inquiring look and she swallowed a laugh. “Yeah, I do.”

  Campbell’s gaze swung between them in a wild arc. “What are you talking about?”

  Cook spared him a pithy glance and shrugged. “You don’t want to tell us where the baby is and we have to find it. Figure when our friends over at the NBC affiliate run the next Amber Alert, they can show your video with it. Someone’s bound to put two and two together for us.”

  Celia smiled. “Of course, they’ll have to blur parts of the film.”

  Cook nodded. “But it’s about to be sweeps month. Hell, Mr. Campbell, you might make Dateline.”

  Panic flickering in his eyes, Campbell shook his head. “You can’t do that.”

  “Sure we can.” Cook shrugged. “Whether or not we have to is up to you.”

  Celia pitched her voice to a gentler tone. “Where’s the baby, Mr. Campbell?”

  “She’s dead!” Campbell slumped in the chair. Celia looked at Cook, her heart clenching in her chest. Campbell rubbed a hand over his face. “She’s dead, all right?”

  —

  “I told the other detectives everything.” In Tick Calvert’s office, Wesley Campbell kept a tight grip on his wife’s hand. “Our adoption fell through and the birth mother went to Florida. There is no baby for us. End of story.”

  “There’s only one problem with that, Mr. Campbell.” Tom leaned against the windowsill, arms crossed over his chest. “We don’t believe you.”

  Anger flashed over the man’s face. “What do you want from me? I can’t tell you what you want to hear because I don’t know anything.”

  Tick folded his hands atop his desk. He smiled at Ashley Campbell, who huddled into the chair next to her husband. Beneath her tidy dark hair, her thin face was pale. “You wanted this baby very much, didn’t you, Mrs. Campbell?”

  She darted a look at her husband. Her tongue slipped out to moisten her lips. “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry it didn’t work out. I understand how hard this is for you.”

  Campbell made a disgusted sound in his throat. “You understand jack shit.”

  Tick ignored him, his attention focused on Ashley. “My wife has had two miscarriages in the last six months. We lost another baby farther along in a pregnancy the year before that. The doctors keep telling us it may never happen for us, because of damage to her uterus, but she’s having a hard time accepting that.”

  For the first time, a spark of life appeared in Ashley’s hazel eyes. She twisted her hands together in her lap. “It’s so hard. She probably blames herself.”

  Naked pain flickered across Tick’s face. “I know she does. It tears her up inside, even though she tries to hide that from me.”

  “You can help her. There are other ways.” Ashley leaned forward. “There are people who would help you. Like Ms. Grady helped us—”

  “Ashley, shut up!” Campbell recovered himself quickly, covering her hands with his as she cowered away. He glared at Tick. “That’s enough.”

  Tom unfolded his arms and tucked his hands in his pockets. “Actually, I’m interested in what your wife has to say. How did Ms. Grady help you, Mrs. Campbell?”

  “We’re leaving.” Campbell rose, pulling his wife to her feet. She glanced at Tom helplessly, then away, her expression lost and filled with a devouring pain.

  “Mrs. Campbell?” At Tick’s gentle prompting, she turned her bruised gaze his way. “You don’t have to have your husband’s permission to talk to us. Someone murdered Ms. Grady. They cut out her baby and we have no idea where that baby is—”

  “I said that’s enough.” Campbell dragged her toward the door.

  “No!” She pulled away, tears spilling from her wild eyes. “You have to tell them, Wes. God knows where that baby is and she tried to help us. We have to help her now. You have to tell them everything.”

  —

  “What do you mean, she’s dead?” Celia eased into a chair at the table. “Just slow down and tell us everything, Mr. Campbell.”

  Jameson rubbed his hands down his face and dropped back into his chair. “All Wes and Ashley wanted was a baby. They’d tried for years and…nothing. The doctors said Ashley would never be able to conceive. Jessica said she could help.”

  “By giving them her baby?” Cook asked, his voice quiet.

  Poison saturated the glare Jameson cast in Cook’s direction. “No. She told me she could find a girl who wanted to give up her baby. A private adoption, but perfectly legal. I had no reason to doubt her.”

  With a sinking sensation, Celia glanced at Cook. Mouth twisted, he returned her look. They had no doubt which baby Jameson had told them was dead. Jesus above, they’d never be able to sort through this mess.

  Cook rubbed a hand over his face. “When did she tell you the baby died?”

  Jameson blew out a long breath. “I called her after I saw the news report about that dead baby found in the roadblock. It seemed too coincidental not to be Ashley and Wes’s baby after she’d phoned to tell us the baby had been born.”

  Celia shook her head. “Why didn’t you come forward then?”

  “Why?” A rough laugh vibrated Jameson’s frame. “And have her release that damn movie of us? Have Wes and Ashley’s pain splashed all over the news? Do you know what that would do to Ashley?”

  Celia exchanged a look with Cook, then turned to Jameson again. “You love her too, don’t you?”

  “Does it show?” Jameson buried his face in his hands. “God. All I wanted was for Ashley to be happy, to have that baby she wanted so damn much. Look at this mess.”

  “Did you know Jessica was pregnant?”

  Jameson lifted his head, surprise registering on his features. “No. Jessica didn’t like children personally. She was adamant that she’d never get pregnant. She said it ruined a woman.”

  —

  “Tell them, Wes.” Ashley’s voice broke, pitching higher with each word.

  “Yeah, Wes.” Tom rocked back on his heels. “Tell us.”

  Wesley dropped his head and drew in a deep breath. “She said she could help us. That for the right amount of money, she’d find us a baby.”

  “How much money?”

  “Fifty thousand.” Wesley’s mouth twisted. “Twenty-five grand up front, another fifteen a few weeks later, and ten when the baby was born.”

  “So what happened? Did she renege, so you decided to take the baby from her?”

  “No.” Wesley shook his head. “The baby died before she got to us. Hell, y’all found her during that roadblock the other night.”

  “That was the baby you were supposed to get?” Tick asked, his voice quiet.

  “Yes.” Ashley blinked rapidly. “That was our baby.”

  “Did you ever meet the birth mother?”

  “No, I wanted to meet her, but Ms. Grady said…she said it was better if we didn’t. She sent us updates, sonograms, that kind of thing.”

  “Do you still have those?”

  Ashley nodded.

 
“We’d like to see them. It might help us.”

  Tom waved a hand at Wesley. “How did this work? Did you ever meet with anyone except Ms. Grady?”

  Wesley shook his head again. “No. We actually only met her once or twice. Jameson handled most of it for us. That’s really all we can tell you, all right? We’re leaving now.”

  —

  “I don’t think Jameson Campbell is our guy, even if he did know about the video.” Cook popped a fresh piece of gum in his mouth. He tapped a thick finger on the stack of adoption files. “Maybe one of these couples can tell us something more.”

  Celia leaned against the table, staring at the white board. Nine babies. Fifty thousand dollars per baby. Almost a half a million dollars.

  Maybe one more baby, worth so much someone would kill for it?

  McMillian jerked his chin at Cook. “Why don’t you and Tick start those interviews?”

  Cook waved a finger in the air. “And what, pray tell, Counselor, are you and St. John going to do?”

  A feral grin crossed McMillian’s face. “Ms. St. John and I are going to have a little conversation with the Honorable Alton Baker.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “Mr. McMillian. Ms. St. John.” A bright, false smile curved Judge Alton Baker’s mouth as he rose from his plush leather chair. The discreet maid who’d shown them in faded into the hallway. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

  “We’d like to ask you a few questions,” Celia said. Standing behind her, Tom shook off a frisson of uneasiness. Ridiculous when Baker wasn’t a threat to them in his own home, when Celia could more than take care of herself.

  “May I offer you a drink?” Baker crossed to the bar and lifted a decanter, amber liquid glowing in the lights from a large crystal chandelier.

  “No, thank you.” Before he could fight the protective instinct, Tom took a step closer to Celia. She glanced at him over her shoulder, blue eyes cool and shuttered.

  A grin quirked at his lips. She was in full cop mode. Funny how he was beginning to like that on her. Maybe because when they were alone together, that cop was nowhere to be found. Then it was all-woman mode. His woman.