by Julie Miller
But he was right behind her moments later in unsnapped jeans and miles of bare chest when she pulled her phone from her purse. He nudged her aside. “You talk. I’ve got the munchkin.”
Lucy didn’t recognize the number on her phone. But too much had happened in the past week for her to take the chance on ignoring it. “Hello?”
“Lucy?”
“Diana? Thank God.” She braced a hand on Niall’s arm to steady herself as relief overwhelmed her. “Are you all right? Are you someplace safe? I know you used to work at Staab Imports. You didn’t have anything to do with that horrible murder, did you? I told the police you couldn’t have.”
“Even though it was my screwdriver stuck in his chest?” Diana sniffled a noisy breath, as if she was fighting back tears. “I’m so sorry to get you involved in this mess. Everything is so screwed up. I need to ask one more favor of...” She hesitated as the baby wrinkled up his face and cried out in earnest when Niall left him lying in the bassinet to eavesdrop on the call. “Is that Dorian? He sounds healthy. Is he?”
“Dorian?”
Diana sniffed again. “Of course. Anton said you were calling him Tommy. I like it. I named him after the lead singer in one of my favorite rock bands. But Tommy’s a good name. It makes him sound like a regular, normal kid. And I want that for him—”
The conversation ended with an abrupt gasp. “Diana? Yes. He’s healthy. I took him to a pediatrician. Are you still there—”
A different voice cut Lucy off. “I want to hear my son.”
The voice sounded familiar. It was thickly accented, deep pitched, and it could have been melodic—if it weren’t for the absolute chill she heard behind the tone.
“Who is this?” she asked.
Niall’s calming, more familiar voice whispered beside her ear. “Put it on speaker. Keep him talking.”
She nodded her understanding and watched as he took a few steps away to call his brother Keir and order a trace on the incoming call.
“Tell me who you are,” she demanded. “What have you done to Diana?”
“She does not matter” came the smug answer that frightened, angered and saddened her at the same time. “I am the boy’s father.”
Niall had evidence to the contrary. Lucy had seen it. “She matters. His father is Antony Staab. And he’s dead.”
“You lie!” Lucy jerked at the angry voice, flashing back for a split second to the night she’d said no to Roger Campbell.
But Niall’s blue eyes, demanding she focus on the call and stay in the moment with him, gave her something to concentrate on. “I saw his dead body,” she explained. “I read the medical examiner’s report.” She hardened herself against the man’s curses and Diana’s pleas muttering in the background. “I’m guessing you had something to do with his murder. And you tried to pin it on Diana.”
Blowing off the accusation she’d just made, the man came back on the line, speaking in a deceptively calm voice. “My son was taken from me. You kidnapped him.”
“No. I’m watching him for his mother.” Poor Tommy’s cries quieted to a mewling sound of frustration when she reached into the bassinet and captured one of his little fists in her fingers and moved it to his mouth to suckle on. “I’m his legal guardian.”
“I am his father! He belongs to me. Let me hear him.”
She heard Keir’s voice coming from Niall’s phone. “We got a ping on her phone from a cell tower downtown.”
“Narrow it down, little brother. I need an exact location.” To Lucy, Niall gave her the sign to draw out the conversation for as long as she could.
Lucy nodded.
“Here.” She pulled Tommy’s fist from his mouth and the baby wailed. Lucy put her phone next to the crying baby for several seconds before pulling it back to speak. “Is that what you wanted to hear? I need to change and feed him. Are you willing to do that kind of work to take care of an infant? To be responsible like a real father? Or is he just some prize to you? Now either tell me who you are or put Diana back on the phone.” There was a terse command about explaining things and a sharp smack of sound. “Diana? If you hurt her...”
“It’s me, Luce. I’m okay.” But she wasn’t. Diana was crying again. No wonder her foster daughter had wanted to get her baby away from such a dangerous situation. But why wouldn’t she save herself, as well? “I thought after I had the baby I could disappear on the streets the way I used to before I came to live with you. You know, when I was a runaway. But I’ve never met anyone like Mickey before.”
“Mickey?” Now the accent made sense. “Mickey Staab?”
“Yes.” Diana’s voice was rough with tears. “I used to cut his hair, you know. That’s how we met. I thought he was handsome and charming. He offered me a job that paid three times what I was making. I thought we were going to live happily ever after. Then I got pregnant and everything changed.”
Lucy glanced over at the bassinet. “All he wanted was the baby.”
Diana sniffled an agreement and continued. “It’s some cultural thing from his country—something about firstborn sons being raised by their fathers. But I couldn’t let my baby grow up like that—with all the violence and no regard for others. You taught me how children should be treated. How I should be treated.” Niall had crossed the room, pinning down some important piece of information with his brother he didn’t want anyone to overhear. “He found me. He found us. I was desperate to save Dorian—er, Tommy. And then Anton, sweet, sweet Anton, tried to help me get away. Stupid me. I fell in love with the wrong brother. I wanted to tell you that I didn’t kill him. In case we don’t get a chance to talk later.”
How long did she have to listen to these horrible things Diana had had to deal with before KCPD could find her location and get her out of there? “What do you mean? We will see each other again. I promise you.”
Guilt and regret shook in Diana’s voice. “Mickey knows I left Tommy at your place. He followed Anton and me to your place the other night and tried to take him from you.”
“In the laundry room.”
“Keir?” Niall prompted, returning to her side to squeeze her hand. Lucy held on just as tightly.
“Yes. I wanted to see my baby one more time and explain everything to you. But this guy showed up and made everything worse.” Roger Campbell. “Mickey blamed Anton—said his brother should be helping him get his son back, not helping...” She didn’t need to explain whatever crude word Mickey had called her. “He was so angry. There was a horrible fight.”
The blood at the hospital. He’d cut his own brother. Mickey Staab was a sick, obsessive man.
And now, without Antony Staab alive to even try to protect her, Diana was completely at his mercy.
Mickey’s cruel tone at the other end of the call confirmed as much. “Tell her what I said. Tell her!”
Diana’s next words came out in a panicked rush. “Stay away, Lucy. You stay away and don’t let my baby anywhere near—”
Lucy heard the sting of a slap and a sharp cry of pain.
Her knees nearly buckled at the helpless rage surging through her. “Diana! You sorry SOB. You keep your hands off her. Diana!”
Niall’s arm snaked around her waist, pulling her to his side. She tilted her gaze to his and he nodded. Keir had pinpointed the source of the call and dispatched every available unit to the location. “We’re coming for you, Staab.”
For a moment, there was only silence at the other end of the line. And then, “You think you have it all figured out, Dr. Smart Cop?”
“I know you killed your brother.” Niall’s articulate voice held none of its mesmerizing warmth. “It’s the only answer that makes sense, Mikhail. Or should I say Mickey? You and Antony are twins. That’s why all the DNA at the crime scene showed up as his. You share the same genetic code. That’s why I thought he was Tomm
y’s father.”
“His name is Dorian,” Mickey corrected, his articulation slipping each time his anger flared. “My son’s name is Dorian.”
“No court of law is ever going to let you be his father. I won’t let you be his father,” Niall warned. “Now let Diana go when the police arrive, and maybe you’ll live long enough for Tommy to visit you in prison someday.”
“You cannot deny me what is mine.” Lucy collapsed against Niall’s strength at the frightened yelp she heard in the background. “The time for conversation is over. Listen very carefully, Miss McKane. I will leave the phone here so all your police friends can find it. But you—and you alone—will bring my son to me at the address I will tell you, and then I will give you this piece of trash you value so highly. If I see any police, Diana will die. If you are a minute late, she will die. If you do not bring me Dorian, you both will die.”
Chapter Ten
“Is that the clearest picture we can get?”
Lucy heard Niall’s voice over the device in her ear, taking some comfort in the knowledge that he was with her, even if he was stuck in a surveillance van with Keir nearly half a block away on the far side of the Saint Luke’s Hospital parking lot. Meanwhile, she was making a grand show of unpacking a stroller and diaper bag from the trunk of her car, taking her time to assemble and stow Tommy’s belongings before she retrieved the doll dressed in Tommy’s clothing from the carrier in the backseat.
The deception was risky, but no way was she going to let Tommy anywhere near his father, especially after Mickey had murdered the baby’s uncle and kidnapped his mother. While she followed the rest of Mickey Staab’s directions to the letter, Tommy was safely hidden away at Thomas Watson’s house, with Niall’s father and Millie Leighter keeping a careful watch over the infant.
“I’ve got tech working on it,” Keir assured him. “And remember, I’ve got men stationed all around the hospital complex. If Staab’s Camaro or anyone matching his description shows up, we’re going to know about it long before he gets to Lucy.” Then she realized Keir was talking to her. “Luce, we’ve got you on screen. I need you to do an audio check, too.”
She pulled her knitting bag out, keeping appearances as normal as possible. “Make sure you’re getting my best side.”
“This isn’t the time to joke,” Niall warned. “You know how easy it is for this meeting to go sideways. No matter how prepared we are, we can’t control all the parameters. Staab is vicious and unpredictable.”
“I know, Niall,” she answered, wondering if he even realized how worried he was about her, and wishing she knew how to help him recognize and deal with those burgeoning emotions. “Trust me, I know.”
She’d stood up to Roger Campbell in a courtroom over a decade ago, and she hadn’t had backup of any kind then beyond her attorney. Today she was standing up to another violent man—but this time she had Niall Watson, the rest of the Watson clan and a good chunk of the Kansas City Police Department supporting her. Meeting Mickey Staab face-to-face again would be far more dangerous than testifying against Roger had been, but knowing she had people she could rely on in her corner this time made it easier somehow.
Niall’s brother, on the other hand, appreciated a little sarcasm to lighten the tension of the situation. “We’re reading you loud and clear, Lucy. We’ll keep you posted as soon as we spot our guy. Are you sure you’re still up for this?”
Keir, who’d worked sting operations like this before, suggested Staab had picked the parking lot at Saint Luke’s Hospital because of the easy access to traffic, enabling a quick getaway once the hostage exchange was made, and because there were so many innocent bystanders around the busy public hospital who could get caught in the potential line of fire that he rightly assumed the police wouldn’t be eager to get into any kind of gun battle with him. And if they cleared the area, then Staab would immediately know they were waiting for him. That left Lucy out there, unprotected and alone to face off against a kidnapper and killer.
“I’m sure.” She held her breath as a car backed out of a parking space a few stalls away. She didn’t breathe again until it drove past and turned toward the hospital building. No threat there. “But I want to move to a house with a private driveway. I’m sick of parking lots.”
Niall surprised her by responding to her nervous prattle. “When this is all said and done, I’ll take you to Mackinac Island, Michigan, where they don’t have any cars or parking lots.”
Lucy looped her knitting bag over her shoulder with her purse and closed the trunk lid. “Is that an invitation, Dr. Watson?”
She didn’t giggle when she said his name this time.
He didn’t answer the question, either. “Let’s get through the next few minutes first.”
Right. That would be the smart thing to do. She checked her watch and moved to the back passenger door, unable to delay the inevitable any longer. “And you’re sure you’ve got Roger Campbell out of the picture? I don’t want him thinking he’s going to come in and save the day and wind up getting someone killed instead.”
Niall answered. “Not to worry. Campbell violated his parole six ways to Sunday by showing up at your office and our building. Duff’s got him down at the precinct offices now booking him.”
That was one less random factor about this whole setup she could eliminate. “So it’s just Mickey Staab we have to worry about.”
“Theoretically.”
“Theoretically?” Lucy shook her head, unstrapping the doll and covering its face with the blanket she’d wrapped around it. “Is there some other bad guy you want to tell me about?”
But someone on Keir’s team had spotted the car. “Be advised. We’ve got Staab in a silver Camaro approaching your position from the north entrance.”
Lucy inhaled a deep breath, spying the all-too-familiar car turning down the lane where she was parked. She was shivering from the inside out. She was scared. Scared for herself and scared for Diana. But she wasn’t alone, right? She didn’t have to do this alone. “Talk to me, Niall. I need to hear your voice right now. Ask me a question or something.”
“We need to talk about what happened this morning.”
“What?” This morning? Did he mean making love? Or going over Antony Staab’s autopsy report and DNA tests? Or something else entirely? Those weren’t exactly topics that she wanted to get mixed up, especially over an open com line where Keir and a bunch of other cops could hear. “I can’t talk about that right now. I can’t...”
Mickey Staab’s car slowed, and Lucy carried the camouflaged doll in her arms to the back of the car. The man who’d terrorized her foster daughter was close enough that she could see his dark eyes. But she didn’t spot anyone else in the car with him. “Where’s Diana?” she whispered, more afraid of what she didn’t see than what she did.
“All right, people, this is it,” Keir announced. “Eyes sharp. Nobody moves until I... Niall? Where are you going, bro? Son of...” Keir swore something pithy in her earbud. She heard a metallic slam in the distance. “Be advised. Hold your positions until I give the go to move in. We need eyes on the hostage.”
Lucy adjusted the straps of her bags on her shoulders and hugged the doll to her chest as the silver car that had nearly run her down once before stopped in the driving lane only a few feet away. She swallowed hard, steeling herself for the coming confrontation. Mickey shifted the car into Park but left the engine running. She was confused when he leaned across the front seat. Why wasn’t he getting out? Did he know there were a dozen cops watching him?
Eyes on the hostage. She couldn’t see Diana.
“Where’s Diana?” she shouted. She dipped her head to kiss the doll’s forehead, keeping her eyes trained on the black-haired driver. “I did what you said. I brought Tommy. Where is she?”
The passenger door opened and a young woman tumbled out onto
the asphalt with a barely audible moan.
“Diana!” Lucy lurched forward.
She froze when she saw the bloody knife in Mickey’s hand. It was a long, wicked-looking thing like the one his brother had carried. Maybe it was even the same blade the monster had taken off his brother’s dead body. Mickey followed Diana out the same door, standing over her as she curled into a fetal position, but crouching low enough that the door and frame of the car protected him from the eyes of any cop who might take a shot at him. He knew this was a setup. He knew he was being targeted. But he was that desperate to be united with his son.
And a desperate man was a dangerous one. “In my home country, women are good for two things. Betraying me is not one of them.”
Lucy’s eyes burned with tears. “You lousy son of a—”
He pointed the knife at Lucy. “Give me my son.”
Lucy inched around the hood of his car, trying to get a clear look at how badly Diana was injured. “Let me help her. Please. Let me get her inside to the ER.”
His dark eyes tracked her movement until she came one step too close. He thrust the knife in her direction, warning her to stop. “My son first.”
The charade had gone on long enough.
“Here he is.” Lucy tossed him the fake baby and grabbed Diana’s hand to drag her from beneath the open door.
Even though he was startled enough to catch the doll dressed in Tommy’s clothes, as soon as Lucy threw the package, Staab must have guessed the deception. “You bitch!” He dropped the doll and charged around the door into the open.
Lucy heard a chorus of “Go! Go! Go!” in her ear and dropped Diana’s hand to reach into her bag as he raised the knife to attack.
“You are all lying—”
She jabbed the knitting needle into his arm as hard as she could, ripping open a chunk of skin. But she’d only deflected the blade, and his momentum carried the screaming man into her, knocking her to the ground. Lucy ignored the pain splintering through her shoulder and rolled.
