He blew out a breath. When had life, his life, gotten so damn complicated? "No, I guess not. Did he know?"
She shook her head. "No, I found out I was going to be a mother and a widow all on the same day. Just hours apart," she added quietly. There was a sadness within her, battling to take over. She refused to let it. "Look, I couldn't find the proper way to tell you without making it sound as if I was assuming that this—this thing," she said for lack of a proper term, "between us was becoming a relationship and that it was going somewhere."
His eyes never left her face as she spoke. Dax knew that for the first time in his life, he wanted a relationship to go somewhere. He wanted it to go all the way up to the altar and beyond.
But he couldn't just put himself out there without her giving him some indication that she had strong feelings for him.
"Do you want it to go somewhere?" he finally asked.
Yes, damn it, yes!
The words hovered on her tongue, begging for release. But she was too afraid of making a fool of herself. She'd already experienced the pain of rejection because of him. What if after he had all the facts laid before him, it turned out that he didn't feel the same way about her that she did about him? Then what? She couldn't be asked to bleed twice. Last night had been enough.
"That's up to you," she replied, her voice devoid of all emotion.
When he didn't say anything immediately, she knew she had her answer. And that answer was that he didn't want a relationship, that he was only asking so that he could know, not so that he could respond in kind.
She felt tears closing in on her again. She picked up the container and took another sip in self defense.
Anything to get her mind away from the pain infiltrating through her. "Brenda—"
But as he reached for her, his cell phone rang. Dax immediately shifted gears. He pulled his phone his ear as Brenda watched, her eyes wide and hopeful.
"Cavanaugh. Wait, just a minute, give me that location again." He grabbed a napkin, then felt his pockets for a pen. Brenda produced one out of her purse. Nodding at her, he quickly jotted down the address the person on the other end was reciting to him. Thank God criminals slipped up. "Thanks. If they use the card again, I want to know." He slapped the cell phone lid closed. "That was the credit card company. Our kidnappers just used the card. We've got a location."
She was on her feet instantly, her adrenaline rushing. "Where?"
"Gas station, twenty miles from here." Leaving the last of his espresso, he hurried to his vehicle. "Maybe they had to clean up some old business," he speculated.
Something inside of Brenda froze. "I just hope that 'old business' wasn't Annie." Beyond that, she wouldn't allow her mind to venture.
Inside the car, Dax was on the phone again, alerting Nathan to this latest kidnapper sighting and giving him the address of the gas station.
"I want five people there to fan out in the area," he said as he drove out of the small strip mall parking lot. "If there're any sketches left of the couple or flyers with Annie on them, bring them with you."
Closing the phone, he put it away again. As he did so, he glanced at Brenda's face. "What are you doing?"
"Praying."
"Yeah," he muttered, looking back on the road. "Me, too."
The gas station attendant identified the man in the sketch after some hemming and hawing coupled with head scratching and only after Brenda had added a mustache.
"Yeah, he was here. But he was alone."
"Which means," Dax said to Nathan who had arrived on the scene less than a couple of minutes earlier, "that he's left his partner and the girl somewhere, most likely at a motel."
Nathan frowned as he covertly slanted a look toward Brenda. "Or he's ditched them both."
They both knew he didn't mean the word ditched. It was a euphemism to spare Brenda's feelings until the very end. "Let's hope it's the former." Walking away from the attendant, Dax's mind kicked into high gear. "We need a list of all the motels in the area," he told Nathan. "They've been splattered all over the media, he's not going to risk checking into an upscale hotel with Annie."
If Annie's even with them, Brenda thought, hurrying along in their wake.
They were about to question their third motel manager when Dax's cell phone rang again. Emotionally worn out, Brenda immediately crossed her fingers as he answered.
The conversation was short, ending with Dax murmuring, "Must be karma," as he hung up.
"What is?"
"That was the credit card company. The woman there said the card was just used at the Blue Bird Motel, not more than fifteen minutes ago."
She raised her eyes. The faded sign above the manager's office, a tiny building sadly in need of paint, proclaimed the establishment to be the Blue Bird Motel. "That's this place."
"Bingo."
Stopping, Dax was hitting numbers on his keypad again, calling in his people. They had a target now.
Two minutes later, he was leading the way into the less than pristine manager's office.
"Morning, folks, what'll it be?" Dressed in a T-shirt that proclaimed the name of a new band on its way up, the young man behind the counter was barely out of his teens. On his thin face he sported what he probably hoped would pass for the beginning of a goatee. Dax estimated that a turtle had more hair on its back. "Only got a few rooms left," the clerk was saying. "Season's a busy one."
Dax held up his shield. The clerk paled visibly. His breathing grew dangerously shallow. "Did I do something wrong?"
"No, why would you think that?" All sorts of possible tie-ins went through his head. Was this kid involved in the kidnapping, too, somehow?
The young man looked trapped as he stared down at the dirty blotter on the desk. "I only added ten to the price of the room, honest. He looked like he could pay it." When his head bobbed up, there was contrition written all over his face. "But I'll give it back, I swear and I'll never do it again." Dark eyes shifted back and forth between him and Brenda. "Jeez, how did you guys find out?"
Dax played along, looking for some kind of leverage in obtaining the man's cooperation. He'd learned that if you let someone talk long enough, you're bound to get something on them.
"We're the police, we know everything." He dug into his pocket, producing the sketches. "These two people come in here wanting a room?"
Appearing to be more than a little petrified, the clerk looked from one sketch to the other. "Maybe. I'm not that good with faces. But the mustache looks familiar and if you made her hair darker…"
Disguises. He'd expected as much, Dax thought. "What room did you give them?"
"One-two-oh." The clerk spat the number out. "Why, are they in some kind of trouble, too?"
Brenda pushed her way to the counter. "Was there a little girl with them?"
But the clerk shook his head, his stringy hair waving back and forth. "I didn't see no little girl."
The words cut through her heart. Did that mean…?
"Oh God, Dax."
Dax said nothing, just gave her hand a quick, reassuring squeeze even though he felt far from confident himself. The couple had their money, they didn't need the little girl anymore. That meant they could have disposed of her at any time. Which put them in a brand new category. Murderers.
"You got the key?" Dax demanded.
The clerk nearly fell over himself as he got a spare out of a rectangular grouping of cubbyholes with hand-painted numbers above them. The key shook as he held it out to him.
Nathan and the others hadn't arrived yet, but Dax felt he couldn't afford to wait for them. Every second counted in a situation like this.
He also knew he could rely on Brenda to stay in the car, so he decided to use her.
"Tell them you're the maid bringing them towels," he instructed as they hurried across a weed-covered courtyard. "And once the door's opened, I want you out of the way." He pinned her with a hard look. "Understood?"
"Understood," she echoed. She only half heard him.
Annie had to be with them, she had to. People didn't just kill little girls in cold blood, they didn't. It was more of a prayer than anything else.
Once at the door marked 120, Dax drew out his service weapon and pointed to Brenda.
She knocked once, then again.
"Yeah?" A thick voice demanded from inside the room.
"Housekeeping, sir. I have towels."
"We've got towels. Go away."
She exchanged looks with Dax. She tried again. "Please, sir, it's my job. The manager'll fire me if I don't give you these towels."
"All right, all right, give me the freakin' towels," the man growled as he threw open the door. The next second, he was staring down the barrel of a gun. "Run, Cloe," he yelled as he tried to slam the door again.
Dax pushed the door all the way open. "Freeze," he ordered. "You're under arrest."
The sound of approaching sirens mingled with screams and shouts from within the room.
"Where is she?" Moving from behind Dax, Brenda shouted at blonde woman. "Where's Annie?" When Cloe said nothing, Brenda stepped forward, as if to force it out of the woman's throat. "I said where's Annie? Tell me where she is or I swear I'll—"
"Mrs. York? Mrs. York!" a muffled voice from the closet cried.
Instantly, Brenda turned from the woman, rushing to the closet. Behind her, she was vaguely aware that the police had entered the room. From the sound of it, two of them took the woman prisoner.
Brenda threw open the closet door and her heart caught in her throat. She sank to her knees. Annie was inside the barren enclosure, tied up and blindfolded. There was a gag around her mouth as well, but she'd somehow managed to work it loose.
With shaking hands, Brenda quickly undid the blindfold, then the ropes. The little girl squinted against the light.
Brenda gathered her into her arms, holding the little girl close, fighting her own tears. "Annie, oh Annie, you're all right. It's all over, baby. You're going home."
Annie said nothing, her face wet with tears. She clung to Brenda as if she would never let her go, wrapping her arms and legs around her like a gibbon monkey.
Brenda remained kneeling as she kissed the top of Annie's head over and over again, murmuring soothing words. She felt Dax's hand on her shoulder as she rocked with the little girl.
There were no words to express the depth of Simon Tyler's gratitude. To everyone's surprise, he dissolved into tears beside his wife as Dax and Brenda brought his daughter to him at the mansion.
And when he'd managed to pull himself together, in an unprecedented show of generosity, he wrote a huge donation to the police department on the spot.
He gave the check to Dax. "So that you can buy the department state of the art computers and programs like the one she used to help find Annie." He nodded at Brenda.
"I'll pass it along," Dax promised. He felt tired and wired at the same time. The case was over. Nathan had taken the two suspects down to the precinct in order to book them. Matthew Harwood was already down there, cooling his heels in a cell.
He turned toward Brenda and gestured at the Tylers. "Why don't we leave them alone for now?"
Brenda merely nodded.
"Looks like it's all over but the shouting," he said as they left the mansion. And then he looked at her, admiration in his eyes. "Speaking of shouting, you were some wildcat back at the motel. I thought I told you to stay back once the door was open." He couldn't even muster a pretense at annoyance. In her place, he would have done the same thing.
"Sorry, slipped my mind." She felt tired, drained and relieved. But there was a glow that was missing. This was going to be the last time that they saw each other. The realization weighed heavily on her. "Can I get a ride from you? My car's still in the school parking lot." And then she laughed softly to herself, although the sound had little humor in it.
Taking her arm, he brought her back to his car. "What's so funny?"
"Nothing, it's just that this'll probably be the last time my car'll be there." A sadness drifted through her. She'd been at the academy for three years and had grown to love it. "The school will be closing down without Matthew to run it. That means I'm out of a job."
Was that the only reason for that sadness he detected? "I wouldn't worry."
She looked at him, trying to gauge his tone. "Why?"
"I've got a feeling that once that computer equipment Tyler's funding arrives at the precinct, the department's going to need someone good to help teach the rest of us bozos what to do with it. Most likely, they'll want to keep you on, too, to help with the hard stuff, so I don't think you need to hit the bricks just yet, looking for a job."
His words, he noted, seemed to comfort her a little. She was unconsciously running her hand along her stomach. Something he'd seen countless other expectant mothers do, he couldn't help thinking.
Dax held the door open for her and then closed it after she got in. Moving around to the other side, he slipped in behind the wheel.
Now or never, he thought.
Leaving his keys in the ignition, he turned toward her. "Now that that's out of the way, you and I have some unfinished business."
"We do?"
"We do. Back at the coffee shop, you asked me a question."
She remembered. She'd thought he'd answered it with his silence. "I did?"
"All this excitement make you forget?" He sincerely doubted it. The lady was too bright for that. Was she not-so-subtly telling him to drop it? He was in too deep; he couldn't. His natural sense of self-preservation took a back seat to something that was now consuming him. His need for her. "You asked me if I wanted our relationship to go somewhere." He paused, waiting for her to say something. When she didn't, he forced himself to get the words out. "I do."
She could feel her pulse accelerating. "And where is it you want it to go?"
He took another cautious step along the tightrope. Below him was a sheer drop, but he had no choice. He had to do this. Had to let her know what he felt. In hopes that she felt it, too.
"Does the 'sky's the limit' mean anything to you?"
Don't hope, don't hope, you know how disappointed you get when things don't work out the way you want them to. You already know that life isn't a fairy tale. She took a deep breath before answering. "It's a term people use when betting."
"And I'm betting everything, putting it all on the line."
She shook her head. "I lost you."
He took her hand in his. Her fingers felt cold. Was she nervous? He began to feel better. Because he was nervous as hell.
"That's just it, you didn't. Look, I'm not sure how to say this, so I'm just going to say it straight out."
Fairy tale, her mind mocked her. She clung to the edges of it anyway. "'This?'"
Like a swimmer about to dive into ice cold water, he braced himself. Then jumped. "I love you and I want to marry you."
The words had rushed at her like a speeding train. She stared at him, not sure she'd heard what she'd heard. The mind played tricks, sometimes. "Why do I get the feeling you just read me my rights?"
"The only rights I'm concerned with right now is your right to say no." Dax searched her eyes. "I'm hoping you won't exercise it."
Brenda smiled at him and he could feel the rays begin to enter his soul. "Why would I say no when everything inside of me is shouting yes? In case you hadn't noticed, I love you, you big stupid jerk."
"I love it when you talk sexy like that."
Her smile continued to fill him until it spread all the way through his being, just the way it had the first time he had made love to her. He had a feeling it was there to stay.
Which, he thought as he brought his mouth down to hers, was just fine with him.
* * *
Epilogue
« ^
Faye Walker had been a nurse for close to thirty years. She'd worked maternity for twenty of those years, most of them right here at Aurora General. She had seen a crowd scene the likes of which was presently engulfing the waiting
room only once before. And it had involved the same family.
That birth had taken place less than three months ago, when Maggi Cavanaugh had presented a darkly handsome, widely beaming Detective Patrick Cavanaugh with a healthy baby girl.
It looked like history had just repeated itself, same scenario, different players.
She surveyed the area. There wasn't a place left to sit and almost no place to stand. Obviously anyone named Cavanaugh didn't remotely believe in the virtues of practicing abstinence.
Faye Walker cleared her throat. Instantly, like a wave in the ocean, the people within the room moved toward her. A formidable woman standing almost six feet with girth to match, she held up her hand as if to physically dismiss the questions that were about to come her way.
"Two," the woman announced, holding up the same amount of fingers and slowly passing her hand before the crowd of siblings, father, uncle, aunt, cousins and assorted mates. "I'll take two visitors in at a time. And just two," she warned.
Troy began to move forward when Tared pulled him back. "Dad and Janelle," he told his younger brother, making the choice for everyone.
Troy, always the impatient one, inclined his head and sank back into the multitude. "But I get to go next," he announced grudgingly.
Following the nurse, Janelle and her father slipped quietly into the birthing room where, only minutes before, Brenda had been going through the soul wrenching agony of bringing a new life into the world.
"You look great, kiddo," Brian said to her.
Wanly, she smiled her thanks. "Never felt better," she murmured.
Dax was standing beside his wife, looking far more relieved than she did. Brian knew how that felt. Childbirth was still a miracle, but things went wrong with miracles sometimes. He had held his breath each time his own wife had gone through this. Being here, waiting for his first grandchild to be born had brought it all back to him.
"What's her name?" Janelle asked softly as she looked at the precious being wrapped in a pink-and-white receiving blanket and nestled in the crook of Brenda's arm.
"Elizabeth. Elizabeth York Cavanaugh," Dax said. "We named her after Mom."
In Broad Daylight Page 17
