Sweet Reward: A Last Chance Rescue Novel

by Christy Reece

  He extricated himself from his ex-wife’s arms and held out his hand to Carter Dennison. After the couple had married, they’d moved to Paris so they could work at the same hospital. Lara was an ER doctor; Carter was a thoracic surgeon. Jared had seen the man only once. He had been standing in a deli, waiting for takeout, when Lara and Carter had walked in the door. It had been a brief and awkward moment. Now, having a better understanding of his ex-wife, Jared thought she and Dennison made a good pair.

  “Thank you for coming, Livingston,” Dennison said. “Lara insists that you have the kind of skills that can bring our baby girl back home to us.”

  Jared shot a quick glance at Lara. He had never told her the full truth of his experience. When it had become clear that the little information he had provided disgusted and shocked her, he’d seen no reason to go into more detail. If she couldn’t handle the little things, she sure as hell didn’t need to know more.

  Apparently thinking she needed to explain, Lara said, “He knows you work for a rescue organization.”

  Her reticence to talk about her ex-husband to her present one didn’t surprise him. Lara hadn’t been one to talk that much. Another reason he’d thought they’d get along well.

  Jared nodded and jerked his head toward the couch. “Sit down and let’s get started.”

  The couple seated themselves on the sofa, holding hands. Jared took a seat across from them and said, “When’s the last time you saw Mandy?”

  “Last night I put her down around seven for the night. Then she woke me at three for a bottle. I fed her and put her back to bed. This morning, around six, I went to wake her …” She inhaled a trembling breath and finished, “And she wasn’t there.”

  “Any sign of forced entry?”

  Carter shook his head. “The police checked every door and window. They took our fingerprints, and other than one set that belongs to our housekeeper, there were no others. No broken windows or doors.”

  As he took the parents through a series of questions, Jared kept a close eye on Dennison. Though he knew Lara well enough to be certain she would never endanger her own child, he didn’t know enough about Dennison to say the same thing. The man’s worried and grief-ravaged expression seemed sincere, but Jared knew better than anyone how easy it was to play a role.

  “The police have any leads?”

  Lara shook her head. “They’re sending someone to ask more questions this afternoon.” She straightened her shoulders, an expression of determination hardening her soft, attractive features. “I haven’t told them about you, and I don’t plan to.” She leaned forward. “I want my baby girl found. No matter what you have to do, I want her back.”

  The message was clear: Do whatever it takes.

  Now, that was one thing Jared knew how to do.

  Ryker’s Rescue

  Chicago, Illinois

  “I know I shouldn’t have done it, but I didn’t have any money to feed her.… They said they’d take good care of her.”

  Arms propped up on her desk, Mia Ryker leaned closer and tried to see the truth behind Sandi Winston’s lies. The girl was pencil thin. Dark shadows beneath her eyes told of poor sleeping habits, her pallid complexion was an indication of bad health, and her black hair, limp and lifeless, proof of improper nutrition. She was scratching her arms almost frantically, which could be anything from severe dry skin or fleas to a side effect of her condition.

  Mia had seen enough addicts to know the symptoms. Sandi said she’d given her daughter away because she couldn’t feed her. More likely, it was in exchange for her drug of choice … whatever that was.

  “When did this happen?” Mia asked.

  “Two weeks ago.”

  “And you told the police everything?”

  The flicker of her eyelids and slight dilation of her pupils gave Mia a warning before Sandi lied: “Yes … everything.”

  Mia would come back to that later. “And did these men say where they were going to take her?”

  Sandi lifted a bony shoulder in a tired shrug. “They just said they would take her to a safe, warm place where she’d be fed and loved.”

  Keeping her expression as bland and nonjudgmental as she could, Mia asked, “How much did they pay you?”

  Sandi’s bloodshot eyes went wide with denial. “I didn’t … They didn’t …”

  “I need to know as much as I can if I’m going to find your daughter.”

  Sandi chewed on her dry lips, apparently trying to decide whether Mia could be trusted. Allowing the young woman time to consider, Mia reviewed her next steps. She had contacts—unofficial avenues—that the authorities wouldn’t and couldn’t pursue.

  If the men were new, she might have more trouble tracking them down. But if they were some of the regular slime that dealt in human trafficking around the city, she should be able to locate them.

  The two-week time delay was her biggest concern. The child could be halfway around the world by now.

  “When did you tell the police?”

  “A couple of days after it happened. I got to thinking maybe they weren’t legit … you know?”

  Yes, she did know. Most likely, Sandi had woken from her drug-induced haze and realized what she had done. Screaming at the young woman who thought so little of the precious gift of a child was a temptation, but one Mia couldn’t take. Finding the little girl trumped lecturing the mother.

  That didn’t include not putting Sandi on a major guilt trip, though. “Your daughter is depending on you. When a mother brings a child into this world, she gives her a promise that she’s going to take care of her.”

  “But I did. I—”

  Mia raised her hand to stop another lie. “If you really want to help her, you’ve got to tell me the truth.”

  Hoping the silence would eat into Sandi’s guilt, Mia kept her mouth closed and waited. She pushed aside the need to jump up from her desk, grab the girl by the shoulders, and shake her until she told the truth. At one time, that’s exactly what would have happened. Experience had given Mia wisdom and, more important, patience. Pissing people off or scaring the hell out of them only worked sometimes, under certain circumstances. Patience would give her much better results.

  Mia was almost to the point of reverting to her old ways when Sandi finally spoke: “Two thousand dollars.”

  Alarms went off inside Mia’s head. From a human-trafficking standpoint, two thousand wasn’t a huge amount of cash for a healthy child. But if these were local lowlifes and they saw how desperate Sandi was, they should have known she would have taken much less. To give her that much made Mia think it was as much about buying Sandi’s silence as it was about purchasing her child.

  She picked up her pen and began to jot notes. “Describe them for me and how you met them.”

  “A friend hooked me up.”

  “And this friend’s name would be …?”

  “Arnold, Ernie … something like that.”

  Mia ground her teeth together, the vague answers from Sandi putting her on edge. “Sandi, look at me.”

  Startled and too old eyes widened as Mia’s stern voice shook the girl from her lethargic state.

  “You either give me all the information you have—answer all of my questions—or get up and leave with the knowledge that you’ll probably never see your daughter again. Which is it?”

  Sandi released a shaky breath and said, “It was my friend Freddy … I just didn’t want to get him into trouble. He hooks me up with the good stuff sometimes. When I told him I didn’t have any money, he told me about these men who might be willing to help me out.”

  “Describe them.”

  “There were two of them. They never told me their names.”

  “What did they look like?”

  “One was real short and kind of fat. The other one had a foreign accent, was tall and thin, and walked with a limp. They were both kind of old.”

  “Old? How old?”

  “I don’t know … maybe forties or something like
that.”

  Though life experience had aged her considerably, Sandi was most likely still a teen. Forties probably was old to her.

  “What about hair color?”

  Sandi slowly began to describe the men, her descriptions surprisingly vivid and detailed as she warmed to her task. Flipping to a clean piece of paper, Mia sketched the men. When Sandi stopped, Mia quickly finished her hasty drawing and then turned the paper for the girl to see. “Did they look anything like this?”

  The gasp Sandi released told Mia she’d nailed the drawings. Not for the first time, she was grateful for the art classes her elite education had provided.

  As Sandi suggested a few changes in the drawings, Mia absently made them while her mind zoomed toward what she needed to do. These men weren’t any she’d seen or heard of before. Since setting up her rescue business, she’d become acquainted with the local slime that traded in people as if they were marketable merchandise instead of human beings. In some cases, she’d helped the police put the creeps away; others continued to evade detection. But she knew most of them by sight or reputation. These men were new.

  What had they done with Sandi’s one-year-old daughter? Was the child even still in Chicago, or had she been taken to another state already? Or another country?

  “If I get your daughter back, Sandi, you’re going to have to clean yourself up and be the mother your child deserves. You going to be able to do that?”

  The emphatic nod seemed genuine, but Sandi’s physical appearance indicated that she was a longtime addict. Making promises and not following through was as habitual to her as the drug itself. Little did the girl know that Mia would make sure that either she cleaned herself up or the child would be taken away from her. She’d do all she could to help, but no way in hell was she going to put a kid back into her mother’s arms if she was going to be endangered or sold again.

  Mia opened a drawer in her desk, withdrew a disposable phone, and handed it to the younger woman. “I need to be able to get in touch with you. My number is already on speed dial. I’ll call you if I have other questions, and if you think of something else, you can get in touch with me at any time.”

  The girl stood. “That’s it? Is there anything else I can do?”

  “Yes. Clean up and get yourself some food. There’s a restaurant on Eighteenth Street called Maxie’s. Tell them Mia sent you. They’ll feed you as many times as you need. Do you have a place to stay?”

  “I’m staying with a friend.”

  “Is your friend using?”

  “No. She’s been trying to get me clean. She’s the one who told me to come see you.”

  Eager to get started on the investigation, Mia stood and walked the girl to the door. “I’ll call you as soon as I know something. And remember, if you think of anything, call me. Okay?”

  Sandi nodded, her eyes filling with tears. “Do you think they’re feeding and taking care of her?”

  As much as she wanted to snarl at the girl that her motherly concern was too little, too late, she wouldn’t. Having Sandi’s cooperation was imperative. Mia had learned long ago to keep judgment out of her tone and manner. Putting people on the defensive rarely helped a case.

  However, neither would she lie. “I don’t know what their plans are for your daughter, but I promise I’ll do all I can to bring her home.”

  The instant Sandi cleared the door, Mia turned back to her desk. Even with a detailed description of the men, she had her work cut out for her.

  She picked up her phone and began to make calls to the network of people she relied on daily for help. The little girl had been gone for two weeks. Finding her after such a long time was going to take everything she had, but she refused to believe it wasn’t possible.

  Having overcome impossible odds before, Mia was determined that this would be just one more challenge she would conquer.

  two

  Two weeks later

  Last Chance Rescue headquarters

  Paris

  Slouched in his office chair, Noah McCall studied a grim-faced Jared Livingston beneath half-closed lids. He’d seen a lot of determined people over the years, but never had he seen one more focused. Others, even the most skilled LCR operatives, sometimes allowed emotions and insecurities to alter their thoughts and lead them off task. Not Livingston. Noah knew that the man wasn’t a machine, but only because robots didn’t curse with such frequency or creativity. That was about the only difference between the two he’d seen so far. And the longer it took to find his ex-wife’s child, the darker and grimmer the man became.

  His gaze left the brooding operative and moved to the man seated beside Livingston. Lucas Kane had, at one time, been Jared’s best friend. They’d served together in a shadowy and secretive government agency known as International Deep Cover (IDC). Though Kane was British and Livingston American, IDC was a global agency. Borders and territories were blurred and the agents worked together to prevent terrorism worldwide. Noah had only heard rumors about such an agency before he’d met Lucas Kane. And he’d been impressed with Kane’s qualifications. When Lucas had given high praise for his friend Jared Livingston, Noah had hired the man. And as far as skills were concerned, he’d seen none equal to Livingston’s.

  It struck Noah as strange that Kane and Livingston had been such good friends. Their backgrounds couldn’t have been more different. Kane was from one of the wealthiest families in the world, and according to the little Livingston had been willing to share about his past, the man came from nothing—quite literally.

  Dissension had developed between the two after Livingston’s divorce. And from Noah’s viewpoint, it was all Livingston’s doing. Jared Livingston had closed himself off from everyone. Hell of it was, he hadn’t had that many people in his life to begin with. But that was a worry for another day.

  “Okay,” Noah said, “let’s retrace our steps and see where we are.”

  Livingston nodded. “I’ve investigated the hell out of Carter Dennison, the housekeeper, the babysitter, all their friends, and co-workers at the hospital. Even their patients. There’s nothing there that would indicate a need for revenge or, hell, even money. No ransom demand.” His jaw tightened. “Looks like a stranger did it.”

  “Damn bold for someone to walk into a private home and walk out with a baby,” Noah said.

  Livingston nodded and opened his mouth to respond, but before he could speak, Kane said, “And I’ve done a thorough check of Lara Dennison. So far, she doesn’t appear to be involved.”

  Only by the slightest furrowing of Livingston’s brow did he indicate that Kane’s investigation into his ex-wife bothered him. Lucas wasn’t a fan of Lara Dennison and had made no bones about his antipathy. Noah suspected that loyalty to his friend was one of the biggest reasons for the dislike.

  “Okay,” Noah said. “We know who it’s not. What else have you got?”

  Kane shrugged. “The usual group of human traffickers we’re aware of and have been after for years, but the ones on our radar don’t fit this case. Their prime victims are usually older children, young women, or people they’ve sold as domestic slaves. Not only do these traffickers not go after infants, going into a home to grab a victim would be totally off for them.”

  “So we either got a new game in town or this is an isolated case,” Livingston said.

  “We got a new game in town,” Noah answered grimly. “Got a report of three other cases.”

  “I haven’t heard of them.”

  “They’re not local. San Francisco, Copenhagen, and Chicago.”

  “Recently?”

  “Within the past three months.”

  “Why do you think they’re related?”

  “Age of the victims and the way the investigations have gone. The method of abduction varies, but every lead is a dead end. Those things and the fact that it’s too damn mysterious and hush-hush makes me think they’re related. I’ve got Angela researching all unsolved infant and toddler abductions within the past five years.
”

  “We got anyone going to check out these cases?” Kane asked.

  “We will soon. The one is Chicago is especially interesting.”

  “How so?” Livingston asked.

  “The abduction is different from the Dennisons’ child, but the age of the victim is similar. This morning, I got a call from an old acquaintance. She runs a small rescue business there and has been working the case. She’s got a couple of ideas I think are worth checking out.” His eyes zeroed in on Livingston. “I’d like you to go to Chicago and meet with her.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Mia Ryker. She’s expecting you at her office late tomorrow afternoon.”

  “What information do you think she’s going to have for us?”

  “If our case is related to hers, I think she’s going to have some leads and a possible suspect.”

  Livingston stood and headed to the door. “Send her address to my phone. I’ll call you after I meet with her.”

  Noah watched the grim-faced man leave. So far his “I don’t give a damn if I live or die” attitude had worked out for LCR. He’d been an asset and had saved lives. Hiring adrenaline junkies wasn’t usual for Noah. In fact, he’d fired more than his share. Livingston, however, didn’t seem to have a death wish as much as he didn’t appear to care what happened to him. This case might well bring everything to a head.

  How would he and Mia get on? They had a hell of a lot in common, with a few significant differences. Would those differences help or hurt this case? Time would tell.

  The next day

  Chicago, Illinois

  Jared stood outside the small, innocuous-looking building that housed Ryker’s Rescue. Red brick and at least half a century old, it looked more like a not-so-successful real estate office than a rescue business. Oddly, the façade’s plainness reminded him of LCR headquarters.