Save Her Child: A completely gripping and suspenseful crime thriller (Jericho and Wright Thrillers Book 3)

by CJ Lyons

  Luka had been almost ready to back off, find another course of action. But Matthew’s tone of smug superiority, his certainty that he knew better than anyone else, rankled so deeply that Luka gave in to his anger.

  “I’ll leave, then.” He bit out the words. “But I’d like you to accompany me to the station for further questioning.”

  “Are you arresting me?” Matthew seemed almost amused.

  “Perhaps. It won’t stick, I know, and I’ll look a fool, but I think you need to see evidence with your own eyes, Reverend Harper, of exactly how serious man’s law can be.” Luka threw the man’s own words back at him. “Not to mention how serious I can be when a child’s life is at stake.”

  Matthew appeared taken aback, and Luka thought for a moment that he might surrender, give Luka what he wanted: answers. But then Matthew shrugged and stood. “You’re wasting your time, Sergeant, but I guess it’s yours to waste.” He walked past Luka and opened the door. “Let’s go.”

  Thirty-Four

  Leah couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt this frustrated. At least in the ER, she could do something, anything to try to help a patient. Now she was relegated to the sidelines while Luka investigated—and he couldn’t even do anything more than speak to Reverend Harper, since Beth’s leaving the hospital wasn’t a crime and there was no evidence that she or the baby were in any danger.

  No evidence except Leah’s gut instinct. Luka hadn’t seen the terror that filled Beth’s face yesterday. Plus, why would she leave the hospital if she hadn’t felt threatened?

  And all she could do was wait for Luka to hopefully get some answers from Reverend Harper. Maybe he helped facilitate some kind of underground network for victims of domestic violence? She could definitely see his son, Jonah, doing that kind of work with the people who came to the Pierhouse Shelter. Maybe Beth was in good hands, and Jonah and the reverend simply couldn’t say anything because of confidentiality?

  Except… wouldn’t they have at least told Naomi? Keeping it a secret from a stranger like herself, she understood. But keeping it a secret from the reverend’s own daughter? A police officer who could help protect Beth? That made no sense.

  She returned to her office and tried to focus on actually getting some work done. Emily texted several times, each one more emoji-filled, but then came one final message, urging Leah to HURRY HOME. Leah had almost forgotten about back-tracking Beth’s movements using the photos Nate had taken. Better than sitting in her office doing busy work, given that Luka hadn’t called with any updates. She texted Emily that she was on her way, closed down her computer, and left for the day.

  By the time she walked through the kitchen door it was almost six o’clock. Emily and Nate were gathered around Ian’s old laptop on the kitchen table, their noses practically pressed to the screen, surrounded by neglected, forgotten bowls of congealing mac and cheese. The kids ignoring mac and cheese, one of Ruby’s forbidden temptations that flew in the face of Leah’s ban on processed foods? This had to be serious.

  “Mommy!” Emily cried out. She hopped down from her chair and raced over, tugging at both Leah’s arms. “We’ve found her! Nate took baby lady’s picture and I made a map and she’s here, she’s here!” She pointed triumphantly at the computer screen.

  Nate smiled shyly up at Leah. “Hi, Dr. Wright. How was your day?”

  No matter how many times Leah told him to call her by her first name, he always began every conversation with her surname and title.

  “My day was okay—better than your uncle’s, at least. He’s still at work.”

  “Poor Luka,” Emily said. “Did he fall off his crutches? We should get him a wheelchair. Nate, we could build one, customize it, make it really cool!”

  Two minutes in the door and Emily had used up a day’s quota of exclamation points, making Leah wonder how much sugar Ruby had fed them. “Where’s Ruby?”

  “Living room,” Nate said.

  “Talking to her booooyfriend,” Emily crooned. “Said it’s private, grown-up stuff.”

  Leah wondered if it was the same friend responsible for Emily’s fake ribbon. At least Emily seemed to have forgiven Ruby, even if Leah hadn’t. Her stomach growling—she’d missed lunch—Leah grabbed her own bowl of mac and cheese from the stove and took the seat beside Nate. “Show me what you found.”

  He clicked a few keys, saying, “I thought we could try to retrace the lady’s steps and see where she came from through the fair.”

  “Except she didn’t come from the fair,” Emily put in, nudging her own chair so she was between Leah and Nate.

  “What do you mean, she didn’t come from the fair?” Leah asked.

  “No wristband,” Nate answered.

  “Wristband?”

  “Like this,” Emily chimed in without taking her eyes off the screen. She and Nate raised their hands in unison, revealing bright green plastic bands they still wore.

  Leah thought for a moment. “Perhaps she was a vendor or a judge, someone who didn’t come in through the admission gate. In that case, she wouldn’t have needed one.”

  This time it was Nate who answered. “No, see, we’ve been going through all the pictures me and Emily took.” He pointed to the screen as the images flitted past. “That yellow band, that’s for the guys manning the booths. And the judges, they have red ones.”

  “So far we haven’t seen anyone with no bracelets,” Emily told Leah. “But we did find the baby lady in a few pictures.” She reached past Nate to move the mouse and a new photo appeared. “Here she is walking out past the horse barn.” Nate enlarged the photo and Emily pointed to a woman in the background. She had long dark hair, was wearing a sundress, and was very pregnant.

  “Do you see?” Nate asked. “See how scared she is?”

  “Were you able to retrace her steps? See where she came from?” Leah peered at the photo. No one seemed to be with Beth or following her.

  “That’s exactly what we did,” Emily answered, excitement filling her voice. She brought up a map of the fairgrounds. “Here’s where you and Nate found her at the judges’ tent.” She pointed.

  “Then we followed her backwards and found her here, here, and here.” Nate pointed out locations on the map that formed a path ending with the horse barn at the far edge of the fairgrounds. “And that’s it. We haven’t seen her in any other pictures.”

  “Show me all the photos with her. Can you put them in order? From the first time you see her?” Emily reached past Nate and clicked a few keys, the screen filling with a slideshow.

  In the first few images Beth seemed upset, yelling at someone she was talking on the phone with, and in the final shot of the series she actually threw the phone onto the ground. It had to be more than anger, Leah thought. A pregnant woman in preterm labor wouldn’t just toss away her lifeline. Was she afraid that someone was tracking her through the phone?

  Leah inspected the map of the fair, pinpointing where the photos had been taken as she followed Beth’s progress through the fairgrounds until the last photo at the judges’ tent. Then she went back to the very first ones. Beth was behind the horse barn. Leah scrutinized the photo, then compared it to the map which showed an exercise ring for the horses and beyond that was a bunch of green swirls, indicating the state forest.

  Craven Peak. It had cabins and a campground. The perfect place for someone to hide out.

  “Do you have any more pictures of this area?” She wanted to see what kind of barrier someone coming in from the forest would need to climb over to gain entrance to the fairgrounds and the background had been too hazy to tell in the photos with Beth.

  Nate and Emily huddled over the computer, scanning their photos with dizzying speed.

  “Here, we found it!” Emily clapped her hands.

  On the screen was a photo of two teenagers walking horses on leads, preparing for their event. Behind them was a wall of trees, too thick to see anything but shadows. And between the trees and the exercise area was a split-rail fenc
e about four feet high.

  Anyone could have gotten past the fence. Even a pregnant woman in labor, if she was desperate enough.

  “She came from Craven Peak,” Leah muttered, taking over the keyboard from Emily. A few clicks later and the state forest’s page appeared. Craven Peak was considered a primitive wilderness area, so hikers and overnight campers had to sign in with a ranger. There was a page where you could make reservations for the cabins. Leah clicked on the cabin closest to the fairground. A calendar appeared, showing that it had been rented up until yesterday and was available any night this week.

  Leah typed in her information, reserving the cabin for that night. A confirmation window popped up instructing her that she had to arrive at the ranger’s office to check in by seven p.m. She glanced at the clock: it was almost seven already.

  Nate watched her. “You’re going, aren’t you? Shouldn’t you talk to Luka?”

  Leah wasn’t worried about running into any danger. And certainly she had no hope of actually finding Beth at the cabin. After all, it was where Beth had fled from—she wouldn’t return there; it was too risky. If two kids with a computer could track her there, then anyone could. Leah’s curiosity was overwhelming her. Who was Beth really? What was she running from? Maybe she’d left some clues behind in the cabin. Plus, if Leah could find Beth’s phone, it might provide a treasure trove of information that could help her find Beth and the baby.

  “I’ll let him know if I find anything,” she promised Nate. “But it looks like, if Beth was there, she checked out yesterday, so it’s probably a dead end.” Both kids looked disappointed. “You guys did great, though. Really good work.”

  “If it’s a dead end, can we come with you? See for ourselves?” Emily asked. “After all, we found the clues like real detectives. And then we could stop for ice cream on the way home.”

  As if they needed another hit of sugar tonight. “Tell you what, you guys behave yourselves for Ruby and I’ll plan something special for tomorrow night. Something we can all do, even Pops and Janine and Luka, if he’s not busy.”

  Nate nodded eagerly but Emily was skeptical, always preferring the bird in the hand. “Promise?”

  Leah grabbed her bag and kissed them both. “Promise.”

  She was halfway to Craven Peak when her phone rang—the Labor and Delivery ward. “Dr. Wright here.”

  “Dr. Wright, this is Vicki, the nurse who took care of Beth Doe yesterday. I wasn’t sure who to call—” Her voice was taut with anxiety. Very unlike an L and D nurse—they were usually as calm and collected as Leah’s ER nurses.

  “What’s wrong, Vicki?”

  “Beth’s baby boy. His blood culture came back positive for Group B strep.”

  Leah sucked in her breath. This was exactly why the pediatricians had wanted to keep a close eye on the baby. “He needs antibiotics.”

  “My charge nurse called the police, but I’m not sure they understand how dangerous it is. So I thought I’d call you, since technically you’re the one who admitted her.”

  “I know the detective in charge of the hunt for Beth and her baby. I’ll call him myself, make sure he gets the word out. Thanks, Vicki.” Leah hung up, adrenaline sparking her nerves. There still was little that she could do to help—but at least now Luka had a good reason to make the search for Beth public and get more people working on finding her.

  She’d just reached the ranger’s office inside the entrance to Craven Peak, so she parked in the gravel lot in front of the ancient log cabin and called Luka. “Did Reverend Harper know where Beth and her baby are?”

  “He’s not talking. I’m going to send Harper in, hoping an appeal from his daughter might get him to open up.”

  “Everything’s changed. The baby’s sick—I got a call from the hospital. He has an infection in his blood; he needs antibiotics and to be back in the hospital.”

  “What kind of infection?”

  “Group B strep. It can cause sepsis, meningitis. If it isn’t treated, he could die.”

  He made a noise over the phone that was part frustration and part sympathy.

  “Does this give you enough to go public? To call in the state police to help?”

  “Yes. I’ll start a PSA, get the networks involved, Beth’s picture will be everywhere. Given how much time has elapsed, the staties will probably take over and go wider to New York, New Jersey, Maryland.”

  The amount of ground they had to cover to find one woman and baby was overwhelming. “They could be anywhere by now,” Leah said. “What can I do to help? I’m actually at Craven Peak. Beth might have stayed in one of their cabins—it’s the only one within walking distance of the fairgrounds, so I reserved it tonight myself. I thought there might be a slim chance she left something behind, even though it’s probably been cleaned since yesterday.”

  She heard the sound of his keyboard clicking in the background—coordinating a public search over several states was a huge endeavor. “Call me if you find anything,” he said in an absent tone.

  “Luka—” Her fear colored her voice.

  “We’ll find them. I’ll call you as soon as I know anything.”

  He hung up. Leah stared at the darkened phone for long enough that the screen saver came on. A photo of Ian and Emily, laughing and playing. She took a deep breath, closing her eyes in a silent prayer. They had to find Beth and the baby.

  Before it was too late.

  Thirty-Five

  Now that she knew Darius had an alibi for Lily’s murder, Harper relaxed her questioning, taking a more conversational approach. For a kid who liked to present himself as a hardened street thug—even to the point of threatening Macy with a knife—he was pretty naive. With a few gentle nudges, including a soda and a candy bar, he opened up and told her everything she needed to know. Well, almost everything.

  No matter what she tried, he refused to acknowledge that he’d ever heard of Lily before that night and insisted that Macy couldn’t have had anything to do with Lily or even met her Saturday night since she’d been busy getting the money to bail him out after his arrest.

  “My girl loves me, would do anything for me, and that’s all I’ve got to say.” He backed up his statement by leaning back, crossing his arms over his chest, and speaking one word, the magic word that ended any chance she had of getting more from him. “Lawyer.”

  Harper glared at Darius, then pushed her chair back, retrieved Lily’s photo, and stalked out of the room. Only to find Luka waiting for her, leaning heavily on his crutches, his posture one of disappointment.

  A flush heated her cheeks as she realized that he’d been watching her interview on the video monitor. “I still think he knows something about Lily,” she insisted.

  “Forget about Darius,” he said, giving her a look reminding her who was boss and who was the rookie detective. “He’s not going anywhere anytime soon. Come with me.”

  Lily wasn’t going anywhere either, she thought in resignation as she followed him to the conference room that the VCU used for meetings. Krichek and Ray were there already, laptops open, a map of Craven County spread out across the table between them.

  “Leah Wright called,” Luka told them.

  “Is Macy okay?” Harper asked.

  “Fine. They’re keeping her overnight. But that’s not why she called.” He paused, waiting until each of them made eye contact. “It’s the missing baby. His blood work came back showing a potentially life-threatening strep infection. If we don’t find him soon, he could die.”

  “Damn,” Ray cursed. He had two kids at home, Harper knew.

  “Before, the most we could do was be on the lookout, since Beth hasn’t committed a crime and left of her own volition,” Luka said. “But now everything has changed. We have a critical missing person, so all hands on deck. Finding that baby takes priority over everything.”

  “What’s our next step?” Krichek asked.

  “I’ve got a call out to the staties and they’re taking point, widening the searc
h to a tri-state area. Ahearn is making a public appeal, but without a vehicle or even Beth’s full name to go on, it’s going to be difficult to find her.” Then Luka turned to Harper. “Which leaves us with really only one viable avenue to pursue.”

  She tensed. Why was he staring at her like that?

  “When I reviewed the security footage from Good Sam,” Luka continued, “there was one man who could have helped Beth and her baby leave without anyone seeing her.”

  “Who?” she asked. Now both Ray and Krichek were staring at her as well; obviously they knew the answer.

  “Your father.”

  “The Reverend?” Shock rattled through her, had her grasping her hands together below the table even as she fought to keep her face devoid of expression. “You think he helped Beth?”

  “Take a look for yourself.” He cued up video on the big screen. There was no audio, but there was a clear progression of events: Beth leaving alone, dressed like a hospital worker; the Reverend carrying a diaper bag out of the Labor and Delivery ward; the Reverend then Beth both leaving via the same exit; and finally, the Reverend driving away.

  Harper sighed. “You want me to talk to my father?”

  “I already spoke with him. At his church. He wasn’t exactly forthcoming.”

  “I’m not surprised.” It was so like the Reverend—he always had all the answers, never hesitated once he knew what needed to be done. If Beth came to him for help, he wouldn’t even think of telling his daughter the police officer, much less answer Luka’s questions. The Reverend was above questioning, his judgment final. “He would have been embarrassed, humiliated to be suspected of any wrongdoing,” she explained. “Not to mention, the church is where he wields power—he would have felt in command.”