“Sawyer said these goons killed a woman,” Seth went on, talking to Austin now. “And if so, they could come after Rosalie.”
That made her feel a little light-headed. She’d considered that, of course, but what she hadn’t realized was that if Austin took her to her family’s ranch, that she could put all of them in danger, too. Her pregnant sister, Rayanne, was there. Her father, as well, along with her oldest brother’s wife and toddler son. She didn’t want them caught up in the middle of this dangerous situation.
“I’ll get Rosalie to a safe house,” Austin assured him, and before either one could give her a say in the matter, they ended the call.
She had to make Austin understand that she wasn’t going into hiding. “I don’t want to go to a safe house. I want to find Sadie.”
But she was talking to the air because Austin’s attention was no longer on her. It was on the lanky dark-haired man who came through the E.R. doors. Rosalie immediately spotted the silver badge clipped to his belt and figured he was carrying a weapon beneath his buckskin coat.
“Agent Duran?” he said, heading their way. “I’m Deputy Gage Ryland. I’m here to guard the man you brought in.”
“Ryland,” Austin repeated. “You’re Sawyer’s cousin?”
The deputy nodded, the corner of his mouth lifting a little. “Around here, just about every Ryland has got a badge.” The half smile quickly faded. “Tell me about this guy I’ll be guarding.”
Austin showed the deputy the photo that Sawyer had sent him on his phone. “His name is Sonny Buckland, a P.I. I found him near a baby farm that I’m investigating.”
His mouth tightened. “You think he killed the woman with the babies?”
“No.” But then Austin huffed and shrugged. “He was with us when that particular shooting happened, but I can’t rule out that he’s not part of it in some way. In fact, he could have been the one to give the order to have her shot.”
The deputy nodded. “Then, I won’t let him out of my sight. We need to catch the SOB who put a bullet in the woman and endangered those babies.”
Rosalie couldn’t agree more. “How are the babies? Where are they?”
He tipped his head toward a hall off the E.R. “We brought them in through a side entrance. Two other deputies are with them and will escort them to Child Protective Services when the social workers arrive.”
That made her breathe a little easier, but her heart was still slamming against her chest.
“My brother’s the sheriff,” Deputy Ryland continued, “and he’s on his way to what’s left of the baby farm sites. We’ll have a CSI team out there, and the FBI’s been called in.”
With all that, they might find something.
Correction: they had to find something.
“What exactly happened to Janice? How did she die?” she asked. Part of Rosalie didn’t want to know the details, especially since she felt responsible, but the other part of her had to know.
“She was shot,” the deputy explained. “It appears the bullet went in through the back window of the truck she was driving, and it struck her in the side of the neck. It’s a miracle she managed to get away from her attacker. A miracle, too, that the babies weren’t hurt.”
Just hearing that spelled out caused her knees to buckle, and if Austin hadn’t caught her, Rosalie was afraid she would have fallen. It wasn’t just these babies who caused her reaction. Though they were the immediate concern. But if the monster behind this had put these two babies at such horrible risk, then her daughter was in the same danger.
Mercy, it hurt too much to think about that. And she’d tried to keep the bad thought aside. Impossible to do that now that she’d dealt with those guards face-to-face. Rosalie knew what they were capable of and how far they’d go to keep their operation under wraps.
Deputy Ryland must have noticed the alarm on her face and probably in every inch of her body because he grumbled something about checking on Sonny, and he stepped away, no doubt so Austin could tend to her.
“Come on,” Austin said, taking her by the arm. “I’ll get you to that safe house.”
Rosalie wanted to stay put, to learn as much as she could from whatever else Sonny might tell them. However, even she couldn’t deny that she was shaken to the core and needed a few hours to regroup.
After that, she’d have to get away from Austin.
Protect her, Seth had told him, and it didn’t matter about the bad blood between Austin and her. She figured Austin had no plans to let her out of his sight.
Well, temporarily, anyway.
He’d likely put her in some other agent’s protective custody so that he could get on with finding his nephew and putting an end to the baby farms. He’d want to exclude her while doing that.
But that wasn’t going to happen.
“How far is this safe house?” she asked.
“Not far. But we’ll have to drive around first to make sure we aren’t being followed. And it’s not a place we want to use for long. It’s best if I make arrangements for another place outside the county.”
That would put her even farther away from the baby farm. From Janice’s killers, too. But it wasn’t a trade-off Rosalie wanted since she needed to find answers about Sadie, and sadly, those killers might have those answers. Once they were at this interim safe house, she would somehow have to convince Austin to stay in the area.
That wouldn’t be an easy task.
Austin paused when they reached the E.R. doors and looked out. There were no other vehicles near his truck, just the same ones that had been in the parking lot when they’d arrived. Still, he hurried, and the moment he had her inside, he drove away.
“You okay?” he asked.
“No.” Rosalie didn’t even try to lie, especially since she was still shaking.
He made a soft sound of agreement. “I’m sorry. I know the shooting must bring back memories of Eli.”
“Everything brings back those memories,” she mumbled.
“Yes.” And that’s all he said for several moments. “I know saying I’m sorry won’t help, but I am sorry.”
Rosalie heard the words. Every one of them. But she couldn’t respond. She’d been raised to be polite. To not do anything intentionally to hurt a person’s feelings, but there was no way she could let him off the hook.
Eli was dead.
And Austin was partly to blame.
There were probably a lot of details of the investigation she didn’t know, but Seth had given her the big picture. Austin and Eli had been undercover investigating an illegal weapons ring, and when a hired gun of the operation had tried to flee, Austin had gone after him.
And in doing so, Austin had essentially blown their covers.
As a result, Eli had been gunned down a few seconds later by a second hired thug, who then disappeared along with his partner whom Eli had been chasing. All of this had happened just weeks before Eli and she had planned to walk down the aisle. Rosalie hadn’t even had a chance to tell Eli that he was going to be a father since she’d learned the news herself only that morning.
As horrible as all those memories were, they gave her something to focus on. Something other than Janice’s murder and the danger to all those babies.
Probably because she was still shivering, Austin cranked up the heat and took the road out of town. He didn’t go far, less than a mile, before he turned around and went in the opposite direction.
“See anything?” he asked.
Rosalie was about to say no, but she caught something out of the corner of her eye. A vehicle was parked on a side road. No headlights, and it didn’t pull out and follow them. However, because of the events of the night, it put her on edge.
“Yeah, I saw it,” Austin said, following her gaze to the side mirror. “It could be a spotter, to try
to figure out which direction we’re going.”
And that meant it could be someone connected to the baby farms. “Too bad we just can’t stop and question the person inside.”
“Not with you in the truck.” Austin continued to glance at the vehicle while he turned back toward town. “I’ll try another road.”
The words had hardly left his mouth when the vehicle pulled out onto the road, following them.
“Get down in the seat,” Austin warned her.
Rosalie slid down, but she stayed high enough so she could watch from the side mirror.
Austin handed her his phone. “Call Sawyer. Tell him there’s been a change of plans, that I’m taking you to the Silver Creek sheriff’s office instead so they can guard you there.”
She hated being pawned off, but her mere presence was stopping Austin from going after the person in the vehicle. Rosalie hoped once he dropped her off that Austin would go in pursuit with plenty of backup.
Before she could press Sawyer’s number, the phone rang, and she saw a familiar name on the screen.
Deputy Gage Ryland.
Mercy. She prayed something hadn’t happened to the babies. Rosalie pushed the answer button so hard that she nearly broke the phone, and she put the call on speaker.
“Are the babies okay?” she jumped to ask.
“Fine,” Deputy Ryland answered. “That’s not why I’m calling. Is Agent Duran there?”
“I’m here, but I’ve got someone tailing me. I’m heading to the sheriff’s office now.”
“Make a detour to the hospital, and I’ll have someone take care of the tail.”
Austin and she exchanged an uneasy glance. There’d been nothing urgent in the deputy’s voice when she’d met him at the hospital, but there was definitely some urgency now.
“I’m with the injured P.I. you brought in,” Gage continued, “and I think you should get back down to the hospital fast. We’ve got a big problem.”
Chapter Six
That was definitely not what Austin wanted to hear Deputy Gage Ryland say.
We’ve got a big problem.
Austin already had enough of those. A dead woman. Two destroyed crime scenes. And a whole mess of loose ends he needed to be working on.
Including taking Rosalie to a safe house.
“What’s going on?” Austin asked Gage.
“A guy just showed up at the hospital, and he demanded to see the P.I., Sonny Buckland. I told him it’d have to wait, that he was still being stitched up, but before I could send him on his merry way, Sonny came out of the examining room. Armed. He snatched the security guard’s gun and aimed it at the guy. Sonny’s holding him at gunpoint now.”
Of all the problems that Austin had imagined, that wasn’t one of them.
Austin shook his head. “And who exactly is the visitor?”
“Trevor Yancy.”
Even in the darkness, Austin could see the surprise dart through Rosalie’s eyes.
The concern, too.
“I wouldn’t have called you,” Gage went on, “but this Yancy idiot is egging Sonny on, along with demanding to see Rosalie and you. I’d really rather resolve this without bullets.”
So would Austin, especially since the babies might still be nearby.
“I’m on the way,” Austin assured Gage, and he turned and headed in the direction of Main Street.
“I want to go with you,” Rosalie insisted. “It’ll only waste time if you drop me off at the sheriff’s office first. And besides, it sounds as if the sheriff and his deputies already have their hands full.”
Austin couldn’t dispute any of that, but there was another angle to this. “You’ve already been put in enough danger tonight.”
She took hold of his arm, forcing him to make brief eye contact. It was just a glance, but Austin could see the determination written all over her face.
“Trevor might have kidnapped my daughter,” she reminded him. “And your nephew. If he did, I want to see his reaction when you ask him about it.”
“You’re not getting a chance to see his reaction or anything else.” Then, Austin huffed. “Sonny’s armed, and I don’t want you caught in the middle of whatever beef these two morons have against each other.”
And it was that beef that Austin was especially eager to learn more about. Sonny had said he’d suspected that Yancy had played a part in at least some of the baby kidnappings, so that might explain why the P.I. would want to hold Yancy at gunpoint.
But why wouldn’t Sonny just have Gage arrest Yancy?
Something more was going on here, and Austin intended to get to the bottom of it.
Apparently with Rosalie in tow.
Even if he dropped her off at the sheriff’s office, there were no guarantees that she’d stay put. Or that she’d be any safer there than she would be with him. She wasn’t under arrest, though he was sure he could come up with some kind of charges to force her to stay put or declare her a material witness. Still, it would take time to do that, and time wasn’t something that was on his side right now.
If Sonny managed to shoot and kill Yancy, then Austin might never learn the truth about the stolen babies.
Cursing his situation and this whole blasted mess, Austin drove toward the hospital.
“Thank you again,” Rosalie said when she obviously realized where they were going. She also released a long breath, one that sounded as if she’d been holding it for a while.
Austin darn sure didn’t say You’re welcome because he figured there were too many things that could go wrong with this situation.
Especially since both Sonny and Yancy were suspects.
Even if Gage hadn’t told him about the trouble going on, Austin would have known something was wrong the moment that he pulled to a stop by the E.R. Several medics and nurses were outside, huddled together against the bitter cold, and they were out there because Gage had almost certainly evacuated the immediate area.
Austin didn’t have a badge to flash. It was too risky to carry one while undercover, but no one questioned him when he identified himself as a federal agent and went back into the E.R. He spotted Gage immediately, his gun drawn, and every part of his body on alert.
“Stay here,” Austin warned Rosalie, and with his own gun drawn, he went into the hall to join Gage.
There, in the examining room, he saw the tall, heavily muscled man with blond hair.
Yancy.
He was backed into a corner. Literally. He had his hands lifted in the air. Sonny was in the opposite corner, the examining bed between them, and he did indeed have a gun pointed right at Yancy.
Despite the raised hands, Yancy looked calm, wearing an expression more suited for a social visit than a crime in progress. However, Sonny’s face was beaded with sweat, and the fresh stitches on his arm weren’t even bandaged. Judging from the way the supplies and equipment had been scattered around the room, the medical staff had left in a hurry.
It’d been over a year and a half since Austin had seen Yancy, but the man hadn’t changed much. He still wore a pricey suit that probably cost more than Austin made in a month, and he still had that cocky expression that Austin wished he could knock off his face.
Despite the fancy clothes, Yancy was nothing but a rich punk.
“Austin,” Yancy greeted, and the corner of his mouth lifted into a dry smile. “How kind of you to come to this little get-together.”
Austin ignored his sarcasm and the man himself and instead turned to Sonny. “Put down that gun now, and then you can tell me what the hell this nonsense is all about.”
“It’s about him,” Sonny snarled with his gaze still staked to Yancy. Sonny’s hand was shaking, and he was grimacing as if in pain. Not good. Since his shaking finger was also on the trigger. “Yancy came
here to set me up.”
Austin glanced at Rosalie to make sure she was staying put. She was. “Set you up how?” he asked Sonny.
But Sonny didn’t jump to answer, and Yancy’s renewed smile made Austin even more uneasy.
“I used to work for Yancy,” Sonny finally said. “I was his top security man, and when I discovered some things that didn’t mesh, he fired me.”
Yancy dismissed that with a carefree shrug. “He violated my privacy by poking his nose where it didn’t belong. And he found nothing illegal. Only some personal emails that he misinterpreted.”
“Oh, I found something all right,” Sonny argued. His gaze slashed to Austin. “But the emails disappeared. That’s why I went to the baby farm, looking for proof, and I’m sure it was Yancy who gave the order to have me shot because I was close to finding out that he’d kidnapped all those kids.”
Austin heard Rosalie make a sound of surprise. She obviously hadn’t missed what Sonny had just said, and almost immediately Austin heard her footsteps, heading straight toward them.
Oh, man.
Austin didn’t even bother to tell her to stay back. She wouldn’t. Not when she thought she could learn something about her missing baby.
However, he did try to keep himself between her and the gun Sonny was holding. Sonny didn’t seem to want to hurt Rosalie, but Austin wouldn’t take the risk of a stray bullet coming her way.
“All lies,” Yancy said without a shred of guilt in his voice.
“All truth!” Sonny practically yelled.
“Settle down,” Austin warned him, and both Gage and he moved closer to Sonny in case they had to go after that gun Sonny was still holding.
“Did you kidnap my daughter?” Rosalie came out and asked Yancy despite his denial just moments earlier.
“Of course not. If I were looking for some way to get back at your late fiancé and Austin for their witch hunt of an investigation, I would have gone after them, not your little girl.”
His tone was so placating that Rosalie took a step toward him, as if she might try to force the info from him, but Austin hooked his arm around her and held her back.
Kidnapping in Kendall County Page 5
