by Julie Miller
A.J. glanced at his partner, Josh. “We can work on Zero. Get a name on where he heard about this clinic. As we get closer to the source, he could start dropping hints about our couple looking for a baby to adopt. Zero could use a few brownie points with the department.”
“I’ll work the boyfriend angle with the Chileses,” Bellamy volunteered. “See if we can find this mysterious Roddy.”
“Now all we need is a well-to-do couple.”
“You look the part, ma’am,” Bellamy suggested.
The commissioner laughed. “My name and face have been in the paper too much recently, with the Baby Jane Doe funeral and task force. Until the department solves that murder, I’m too hot a topic. I’m afraid my days of undercover work are behind me. Besides, I don’t believe I could convince my ex to play along.”
Everyone’s gaze gradually settled on Dwight and Maddie and the familiar way her hand rested on his shoulder.
Dwight rose to his feet, quickly putting the kibosh on what they were thinking. “Maddie’s a civilian. You’re not putting her in the middle of any undercover op.”
“Technically, you’re a civilian, too, counselor,” Shauna pointed out.
A.J. defended him. “Dwight’s one of us. He can handle himself, think on his feet. He keeps a nice behind-the-scenes profile, so he’s not a recognizable face. I could give him a few pointers on undercover work.”
Ignoring the fact that he was the last man in the world who could convince anyone that he wanted to adopt a baby, Dwight pointed out one very dangerous sidebar that they’d all overlooked. “What about Joe Rinaldi?”
The commissioner topped off a chorus of curses and scoffs about the bastard they suspected had killed one of their own. “Let’s get that man on death row, where he belongs.”
Her efficient tough-lady image softened with a thoughtful pause. She tapped the earpiece of her reading glasses between her lips as she studied Dwight.
“I’m pretty sure I don’t like that look.” He splayed his hands at his waist and subtly positioned himself to shield Maddie from both view and consideration.
“I think I might just have an ingenious way to keep your girlfriend safe.”
Dwight didn’t know if he was more stunned to hear Maddie referred to as his girlfriend or worried about what danger ingenious might entail.
Chapter Eight
“I need something nice for court tomorrow,” Maddie insisted, shivering as the car’s air-conditioning hit her damp skin.
They’d stayed at their meeting long enough for the sun to drop low on the horizon and disappear behind a squall line the same gray-green color as Dwight’s eyes. She shook the rain from the jacket Dwight had held over her while she’d buckled Tyler into his car seat and draped it on the headrest behind him.
Dwight might have thought the discussion ended the moment the storm hit, but Maddie still had a point to make. “I can’t go in front of the judge looking like this.”
“You’ll dry out.” Dwight turned on the headlights and windshield wipers and pulled out of the Fourth Precinct’s parking lot. He headed past the block-sized city park that had been recently landscaped just south of the new Federal Court Building. The gleaming glass, steel and concrete of the semicircular high-rise seemed as cold and foreboding in the eerie green cast of the storm as the man sitting beside her.
“You know that’s not what I mean.” Lightning over the river just a few blocks away charged the air and pricked goosebumps all along her arms.
Dwight adjusted the temperature to defrost the windows and warm the Mercedes’s gray interior. “I think we just need to get home right now, don’t you? Maybe after the storm passes, we can drive over.”
It wasn’t much of a concession, but, at least, he’d finally given his opposition to Commissioner Cartwright’s proposal a rest. Personally, Maddie could see the sense in taking on a new name, dressing like an upper-crust attorney’s wife and moving into a recently seized estate home across the state line in Mission Hills, Kansas.
She eased back into the cushy comfort of the leather seat. No one would expect to find inner-city schoolmarm Maddie McCallister setting up house in the swanky suburb. Especially with a distinguished husband who commanded authority and oozed masculinity with every word, every look, every move at her side. Joe Rinaldi would never think to look for her there. He’d never think to look for a married woman.
It truly would be an ingenious way to hide from the escaped fugitive. And with Tyler securely tucked away at a safe house out of harm’s way, Mr. and Mrs. Dwight Payne could be setting up an undercover sting. As an older, wealthy—childless—couple, they would certainly be taken seriously if word got out that they were desperate to adopt. They’d be invited to meet with the proprietor of the Baby Factory—or a representative—because they could pay the going price for instant offspring. And if they could finagle an invitation to the clinic itself, if she could get inside and search for Katie…
Maddie was willing to consider the idea. She would consider anything that might help Katie.
She looked across at the granite jaw of the man behind the wheel. No way was still etched in his face. Dwight had insisted that going undercover would put her at unnecessary risk. Despite the growing rumors circulating around the precinct, maybe he worried that they wouldn’t be convincing as husband and wife and that their cover would be easily blown.
She’d wondered if he wasn’t ready to even pretend he was part of a couple. Standing by her side at the same morgue where he’d identified the slain bodies of his wife and son had used up his emotional reserve. Dwight had made it clear more than once that he had no interest in being part of a family again. That die-hard sense of justice flowing through his veins had given him the power to stand beside her and support her when she’d needed his strength. But he probably didn’t have it in him to give a repeat performance. It was too much to ask that he play the part of the loving husband, especially when she wasn’t the wife he loved.
Maddie ached for the pain locked up behind that unsmiling profile. She marveled at the way the words tumbled out of her mouth when she was around him—as if shyness had never been part of her character. An unfamiliar yet exciting tension thrummed through her whenever he turned the force of his personality on her. Just like the sultry humidity had finally erupted into this summer storm, that kiss on the stairs had been the brief ignition of the desire simmering in her veins. By first light tomorrow, the heat and humidity would return to Kansas City.
This push-pull hunger to feel Dwight’s passion again had already returned.
Maddie was beginning to think she could play the part of Dwight’s loving wife. But one kiss, endless debates and the most amazing set of arms and chest a woman could turn to for comfort didn’t make them a couple.
No matter how well she acted her part, she couldn’t allow these growing feelings for Dwight to become real. Because acting as though they cared for each other didn’t make it so.
Maddie shivered in her seat and hugged her arms around her waist. Dwight, ever observant, reached out and cranked the heater up another notch. She smiled and nodded her thanks, though she knew darn well that the chill of emptiness she felt right now came from inside, not from the car or storm.
Pushed once more to take action before the waiting overwhelmed her, Maddie turned and glanced at the seat behind her. There was still one little man in the world she could love as much as she wanted without pretending a thing.
Tyler was awake but content to watch the swirl of colors and movement outside the window as they drove through downtown. He needed his mommy around to teach him that these things were buildings and lightning and rain. He needed his mommy to teach him about love and family.
“I’ll get her back for you, sweetheart,” she promised. Her throat burned with the tears she didn’t want to shed anymore. Seeing Whitney’s body had really shaken her faith in the belief that she would have Katie home—alive and in one piece—soon. Guilt fisted in her stomach that she could
even think in terms of if, not when she’d have her niece in her arms again.
Tyler pursed his lips in an instinctive suckling rhythm. He startled as he saw his fist flail in front of his face. Maddie reached back and guided his delicate little hand up to his mouth. The thumb found its way in and he settled back into contentment once more. She couldn’t help but smile at his unshakable trust that all would be right in his world.
Renewed determination turned her around in the seat. She might not be able to convince Dwight to take a risk on the undercover sting idea—and she certainly couldn’t pull it off on her own—but she could use his refusal to budge on that point to persuade him to relent on another.
“We’re not that far from my house,” she reasoned. “If you’d just turn around and head north, we could be there in ten minutes. I could grab what I need and we’d be heading to your place in twenty. You wouldn’t have to worry about going back later tonight.”
“Couldn’t we just go shopping in the morning?”
“Oh, right. You look like the type who loves to shop.”
“I don’t mind if it’s for a good cause and you make it quick.”
“I have two perfectly good suits at home.”
He glanced across the seat, his gaze passing over the spots where her damp shirt clung to her shoulders and breasts before returning his attention to the traffic narrowing through a construction zone. “Wear that pretty, flowery blouse you had on the other day.”
“With what?” Was that a flash of heat she glimpsed in his eyes? Or just her own body’s helpless reaction to Dwight’s attention? Now wasn’t the time to get sidetracked over whether or not that was a compliment or just a practical observation. “I’m not going to jeopardize my claim to be a fit parent for Tyler by showing up in front of the judge in a pair of blue jeans. Either you take me or I’m calling a cab when we get to your house.”
His shoulders swelled in a huff, sending ripples of displeasure through the air between them. There was no mistaking what that look meant when he turned her way again.
“Fine.” He signaled and eased into the turning lane, then whipped around the block and headed back north. “Twenty minutes. Then we’re back at my place under KCPD’s watch.”
Maddie doffed a salute at his grumpy order. “Yes, sir.”
When he opened his mouth to take issue with her sarcasm, she cut him off with a thank-you.
“Yeah….” There. She’d deflated that argument. He shook his head, grumbled something under his breath and fixed his attention on the road once more. “Twenty minutes.”
Maddie allowed herself to relax for a moment, knowing she and Tyler were in good hands as the storm blew past and ebbed into a steady rain and the sky turned to night.
It took him less than ten minutes to reach her home a few blocks north of Independence Avenue. As Dwight pulled into the driveway, he was already giving instructions. “Get your keys out. Pick up whatever you need and we’re out of here.”
Ignoring the steady drumbeat of rain that took the edge off the heat and filled the air with the scent of ozone, Dwight climbed out and surveyed the house and the spaces on either side of the detached garage at the end of her driveway. He walked down to the sidewalk and looked up and down the street.
Matching his wary tension, Maddie got out beside the car and turned a slow 360, looking for signs of anything out of place. There was no police van now, no crime-scene tape. Just the familiar houses and vehicles and trees. With the curtain of rain adding its own camouflage, the illumination from the street lamp across the way seemed to create more shadows than it erased. A shiver of unease followed the water that dripped inside her collar and trickled down her back.
Maybe she didn’t want to be back here, after all. The very normalcy of her surroundings made the violence that had happened here seem that much more shocking. Still, for Tyler’s—and Katie’s—sake she would do this.
“Let’s go.” Dwight nodded toward the porch as he strode back up the driveway, appeased that all was safe.
Maddie blinked the moisture from her lashes and reached for the backdoor. “It’ll take me a minute to get Tyler out of the car.” She stopped the protest forming on his lips. “I can’t leave him out here alone.”
“Of course not.” The streetlight revealed an interesting play of ridges and hollows as it reflected off the rain that plastered Dwight’s shirt to his skin. “Why should anything be simple with you?”
Maddie knew his grinching was the result of that protective state of alertness that kept him on guard and on edge, so she took no offense. But he did surprise her when he took the carrier from her grip. He draped his jacket over his arm to keep Tyler dry, then hooked his free hand around her elbow and hurried her up the front steps.
“I wish I had the porch light on so I could see what I was doing.” Maddie did a little grinching of her own. She shoved her soggy hair behind her ears, then squinted into the shadows. With her key in one hand, she used her fingertips to find the center of the dead bolt.
“Today, Red.”
She found the slot and inserted the key. “Ha!” But her victory was short-lived. Her cellphone rang in her pocket and she jumped inside her skin. “Damn.”
“Easy.” A broad hand flattened at the small of her back, its steady presence making her realize how badly she was shaking.
Maddie forced herself to breathe normally, in and out, before pulling the phone from her pocket. “It’s getting to where I don’t want to answer it anymore.”
“You want me to?”
“Not if it’s Katie.” She tilted her face and mustered a smile, whether he could see it or not. “That big bad wolf voice will scare her.”
“Big bad—”
“Oh, wait.” She recognized the number on the lighted screen. “It’s Mrs. Dixon across the street. She probably saw us pull up and wants to make sure that everything’s okay.” Able to take a real breath without thinking about it, she pressed the talk button. “Hello?”
She turned around and waved toward her neighbor’s porch light. Maddie went still, her arm frozen in the air, her fingers slowly curling into a fist.
“Ms. McCallister?” Trent Dixon’s familiar voice conveyed only a margin of the concern that kept her peering into the shadows farther up the street. “I saw a black car, like you described, parked in front of the Dooleys’ house when I got off work at five. There was some man sitting in it, but he’s not there now.”
“I see it.”
Dwight did, too. “Get in the house.”
He slid in front of her, blocking her view of the black sedan and keeping her out of its view. Adrenaline sped up her pulse, chasing the chill from inside her. She tried to spy around him, but he moved to keep her trapped between him and the house. “Thanks, Trent,” she spoke into the phone. “I’ll handle it from here.”
“You’ll handle nothing.” Dwight reached around her and twisted the key in the lock.
“I want to know who’s been creeping around my home like some kind of ghost.”
Dwight shoved the baby carrier into her hands and opened the door. “Get in the damn house. Lock yourself and the kid inside. I will check it out.”
As he backed out of the doorway, Maddie grabbed his arm. “Maybe we should call Cooper. Or your friend A.J. Or just 911. What if it’s Joe? He’s already killed a cop and a prison guard. He won’t have any qualms about killing again.”
Dwight took her by the shoulders and backed her into the foyer, calmly refusing to listen. “Don’t turn on the porch light until I’m around the corner of the house. Then I want every light inside this house blazing.”
“Dwight.”
He pulled the door shut. She brushed aside the curtain, but even with the barrier of a window between them, there was no arguing the point. “Lock it.”
As soon as she slid the dead bolt in place, he dashed down the stairs into the rainy night and was gone. “Bully,” she accused, not really meaning it. “How come it’s okay for you to risk your
life but not me?”
Hearing her fears echo off the glass, Maddie pressed her fingers to her lips and drew in a more rational breath.
“Be safe,” she whispered, praying the appearance of the black car was just an unfortunate coincidence. She counted to five after Dwight’s silver-and-gold hair had disappeared from sight before turning on the porch light. Her pupils contracted at the sudden brightness, reminding her of Dwight’s order to turn on the interior lights, as well.
The eight pounds of weight in the carrier registered. Maddie pulled off Dwight’s coat and smiled at her grandnephew. “Besides, I have you to take care of, don’t I, sweetheart?” She blew him a kiss. “That’ll be my job, okay? We’ll pack our bags as fast as we can so that we’re ready to go when Dwight gets back.”
Bracing herself to face her violated home, Maddie walked from one light switch to the next. The mess in her living room had been picked up, the entire sofa removed. Her kitchen had been sanitized to removed the smell of rotting food, though the stains embedded in the linoleum remained. She flipped on the dining room light, the back porch light and even the light in the downstairs bathroom before getting into the hall closet and pulling out a garment bag for her suit. With the bag draped over one arm and Tyler’s carrier hooked over the other, Maddie climbed the stairs and turned on the second-floor lights, as well.
Dwight wanted security? She’d see that he got what he wanted so he’d quit worrying about her and concentrate on watching his own back.
As Maddie flipped on the light in Katie’s room, the vaguest hint of cigarette smoke in the air gave her a shiver of unease. But then she sniffed again and sensed nothing but the pines and polishes of the cleaning crew that had come in that morning.
Maddie shook off her suspicions and smiled at Tyler. “It’s nothing, sweetie. Let’s go get some fancy duds for court tomorrow.”
With Tyler cooing in imaginary agreement, Maddie headed for her bedroom. The stale scent lingered here, too. But even as she crinkled up her nose, she rationalized that it could be from one of the cleaning crew or one of the detectives or crime-scene investigators who had swept through her house over the past few days.
