Special Agent Nanny

by Linda O. Johnston

  There was a message on her answering machine from Randall, asking her to call about their schedule for Jenny over the next couple of weeks. Kelley sighed. He’d be angry that she hadn’t called back right away. But she knew he scheduled surgeries first thing in the morning on Tuesdays, so she wouldn’t even try to reach him until late in the day.

  Another message on her machine was from Janice Fritz. “I’ll be taking the girls to KidClub early today, Kelley,” she said. “I need to be at work early.”

  Reminded that she hadn’t had her daughter for three days, the first thing Kelley did when she and Shawn arrived at the hospital was to go to KidClub.

  Jenny, in a denim smock dress and tights, was arguing with Claire when Kelley arrived. She couldn’t quite understand the origin of the disagreement, though cereal flakes and pieces of doughnut littered the table and the floor beside it. Jenny burst into tears without explaining. So did Claire.

  Kelley took her small, sorrowful daughter into her arms as Shawn tried to distract the other little girl. Kelley wanted to make it all better, whatever had caused the problem. “We’ll talk about it tonight, honey, okay? I’ll try to come for you early, and we’ll have a good time tonight, I promise. If you want, I’ll even let you help me cook dinner.”

  “Cookies?” Jenny asked hopefully through her tears.

  “Sure, as long as we have a good balanced meal first.”

  “With lettuce and other green stuff with s’getti?”

  “Something like that,” Kelley said with a relieved laugh as she breathed in the scent of her daughter’s soft, clean hair.

  Jenny didn’t exactly cry when Kelley left that morning after helping to clean up the mess, but she did cling to her mother and get misty-eyed again. She hadn’t done that for days, since Shawn had begun occupying the kids with his caricatures.

  A pang of remorse burrowed into Kelley’s heart.

  She glanced around for Shawn as she prepared to leave. His gaze was on her, but he was involved in a conversation with Marge Ralston. He held up one hand as if to tell her to wait, but she had patients to see.

  “Now, you go over to Shawn, Jenny,” she said, wishing she felt better about leaving. The child gloomily obeyed.

  Kelley waved back toward Shawn and left, but not before she all but ran into Cheryl Marten. “Randall was here when Claire’s mother brought Jenny in this morning,” she said. “He’s not happy that you didn’t call him back last night, and that you didn’t tell him Jenny had an overnight at a friend’s.”

  And that’s why you’re here? Kelley steamed inside. To make sure everyone here knows that Randall is angry with me?

  “I was busy until late last night, Cheryl. You can tell Randall I’ll be in touch later today. Do you want to give Jenny a good morning hug?”

  “Er—Randall is waiting for me before starting his surgery this morning.”

  “Of course,” Kelley said sweetly. She watched Cheryl leave, then chose a piece of apple from the treat box that rested in the usual place on the counter. She’d insisted that Shawn not stop for breakfast since they would arrive so late. He’d not been happy about it.

  He’d also tried to give her instructions on how to act that day regarding the ambulance incident and to remind her not to treat him any different from the way she had before. And why should she? She’d never quite accepted that he was a college student anyway.

  She was still nibbling on the fruit when she saw Juan Cortes pushing a large broom in a hallway near KidClub. She lifted it to show him. “It really hits the spot this morning,” she told him. “Thanks. Our turn is Friday, remember.”

  “If that’s what you want, Dr. Stanton,” he said, a smile of pleasure brightening his face.

  She began her rounds, stopping first to check on Heather Harrell. The young woman was doing much better. Her prognosis was excellent and she would probably be discharged from Gilpin in a day or two.

  Kelley thought she couldn’t have been more pleased. But she was, a short while later, when another colleague on the floor asked her a question about one of his patients’ symptoms.

  A few weeks earlier, such a consultation would have been routine. Now, it felt as if she had grabbed onto a vine while sliding down a slippery slope toward hell and was swinging her way back to heaven.

  She didn’t even flinch when she found a message from Louis Paxler waiting in her office. Not that she wanted another meeting with the dour and difficult hospital administrator, but at least her reburgeoning self-esteem would allow her to stand up to whatever gripe he had this time.

  Or so she thought. The first thing he said, after she’d settled in the designated chair across the desk from him, was, “Are you sleeping with that childcare worker Shawn Jameson?”

  “What?” Kelley sputtered. “Who I sleep with is not your business, Louis.” She ignored the scowl that knitted his thin brows together beneath his gold-rimmed glasses. “And why on earth would you ask me about Shawn? Is someone starting more rumors about me?”

  Had someone seen her at Shawn’s apartment? Or had they been spotted arriving together this morning? She hadn’t noticed anyone in the parking garage when they’d pulled in, but that didn’t mean no one had noticed them.

  “Be careful, Kelley. Sleeping with your child’s caregiver, a hospital employee, would be in poor taste.” His jowls quivered in his righteous indignation.

  Did Paxler know Shawn was an undercover investigator? Kelley sat up straight in her chair. She couldn’t be sure what Paxler knew, and she had promised Shawn not to reveal his true reason for being there to anybody. He hadn’t made Paxler an exception.

  “What kind of strange idea do you have, Louis?” she dissembled. “Why would you think Shawn and I have any interest in each other?” She cringed inside, knowing even as she spoke that she sounded defensive.

  “I’ve got your best interests in mind, Kelley,” Paxler said in a more reasonable tone. He leaned back in his tall leather desk chair. “There are circumstances behind his being hired that I can’t reveal. But your getting involved with him could wind up hurting the hospital.”

  Kelley’s facial muscles froze. Good thing, too, or her angry frown might have fallen into an expression of dismay.

  Was Paxler suggesting that Shawn would cozy up to her to look for evidence of incompetence? Could Shawn have lied about investigating the fire?

  Her tone was less acerbic when she spoke again. “Are you suggesting that Shawn’s integrity is questionable? If so, Louis, why did you hire him to work around kids?”

  He waved a hand. “I can’t go into it. But watch your step, Kelley. Your every action is being noted.”

  “Right.” Feeling dismissed—and wanting to escape— Kelley stood and headed for the door.

  “Oh, and another thing.”

  Slowly, she turned back toward the thin, black-haired administrator.

  “I’ve heard again from Etta Borand. She is giving us a chance to pay her a million dollars before she lets her attorney file a lawsuit for mistreatment of her husband. We’re not going to pay unless we can negotiate a more reasonable sum. Still… Is there anything about that matter that you want to tell me?”

  “Yes, Louis, there is.” Kelley’s dismay was trumped by irritation. “You said you have my interests at heart. If so, you’ll stand behind me on this and everything else. I did nothing wrong in my treatment of Ben Borand. I did nothing wrong in my treatment of the Silver Rapids influenza patients. You should feel damned glad to have my services as a physician here.” She glared at him.

  “Oh, yes, you must be thinking of that little Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever matter.”

  Little? Kelley opened her mouth to protest, but he continued, “I talked to Madelyne Younger. She was pleased you found the solution. The thing was, the patient hadn’t told her that piece of the puzzle, that she’d been hiking a couple of days before her symptoms first began to appear. If she had, I’m sure Madelyne would have diagnosed the disease right away.”

  Made
lyne didn’t ask, Kelley wanted to shout. She didn’t, though. Madelyne was her friend as well as her colleague. The disease was not an easy one to diagnose.

  And Kelley could not force the administrator to recognize her abilities, she realized drearily.

  “Right, Louis,” Kelley said grimly, then left the office. Only then did she realize she hadn’t found out the source of Louis’s information.

  How did he know she’d spent the night at Shawn’s?

  CONCENTRATE, SHAWN TOLD himself.

  It was late morning. The other childcare staff were looking to him to keep the tots amused. And he was doing his usual bit of giving them a drawing lesson, the only way he knew to deal with them. He actually enjoyed it.

  He’d already used colored pencils to sketch a panda and a moose with antlers that held drying laundry.

  Except that all he wanted to draw was pair of sad and watchful brown eyes. Brown eyes that twinkled. A lovely lady, flustered as she wrapped herself in a bedsheet that might have hidden the flesh he longed to see, but did nothing to camouflage the soft, firm curves beneath….

  “Here, Shawn,” said Claire Fritz, who tugged at his sleeve as he walked around the table to see that all the kids were drawing. “I drew a octopus, wif’ lots of legs.”

  He glanced down. Lots was the operative word. The stick creature she had drawn probably had several dozen limbs writhing around it. “Do you know how many legs an octopus has, Claire?”

  “Lots,” she repeated.

  He smiled without correcting her. “Well, this is a really nice octopus,” he told her, then continued around the table.

  One boy had drawn a box he had labeled, “Gilpin,” not a bad representation of the light brick edifice. Another had drawn a person with blue eyes. “This is you, Shawn,” he said proudly.

  Then Shawn got to Jenny’s place at the table. She didn’t look up. But there was nothing at all on her paper.

  He knelt beside her. “What kind of animal would you like to draw today, Jenny?” She blinked rapidly, and when he put an arm around her he felt her shaking. “What’s wrong?” he asked gently.

  She didn’t say a word.

  “I’m in the mood to draw a…princess,” he said. With colored pencils, he sketched a caricature of Jenny as he had once before, with a crown on her head.

  “No!” Jenny stood and grabbed a crayon from the table. She drew jagged red lines over his smiling picture.

  Shawn had a horrible suspicion he knew what they were intended to represent. Still, he had to ask. “What does the red mean, Jenny?” he asked casually.

  Her eyes, as she looked up to face him, were huge, and her lower lip trembled. A large tear rolled down her face. “Fire,” she whispered, and then she began to cry.

  “SHE WOULDN’T TELL me more,” Shawn said. He clutched a cold glass of iced tea, wishing he’d been able to spike it. He wanted to reach across the cafeteria table and touch Kelley’s arm in comfort but didn’t dare. People around here talked too much.

  Kelley’s pale face looked stricken. He had called her to meet him here, for he wanted to tell her about Jenny’s drawing when the child was not around.

  Kelley’s soft brown eyes blinked rapidly as if to hold back tears. “She added fire to a sketch of herself?” She sighed desolately. “I’m worried. What if she saw whoever set the fire that night, Shawn? Someone may have tried to harm me yesterday. What if it was the arsonist, and he knows that Jenny saw him?”

  “Or her,” Shawn said grimly, shaking his head. “We don’t have a clue as to the arsonist’s gender.”

  “Sure you do.” Acid suddenly dripped from her tone. “Your agency thinks it was me.” Her glare turned hard. “Did you try to talk to Jenny about the fire—to manipulate me into confessing that I set it?”

  He stared at her, his blood suddenly running as icy as his tea. Where had that attack come from? And, damn it, he might not know how to work with kids, but he sure as hell wouldn’t try to scare one like that.

  Especially not Jenny.

  “Are you confessing?” he asked coldly.

  “Of course not.” She lowered her voice. “But we both know why you’re here. And I have it on authority that I’m still the focus of your investigation.”

  “What authority?” he demanded, also in a tone designed not to be overheard. Which was hard, when what he wanted to do was shout some sense into her. “Damn it, Kelley, have you been talking about my work with someone, after you promised to keep it confidential?”

  Confusion seemed to war with defiance in her expression. “No,” she said. “Not the way you think, anyway.”

  “If you’ve talked about it in any way, it’s a problem. Don’t you understand that?”

  She rose but bent down so that her lips were near his ear. Damn it all, as infuriated as he was, her breath on the side of his face, tinged with the sweet scent of the soft drink she had been sipping, made him crazy with lust.

  “I understand more than you think, Shawn,” she whispered. “I understand that you still believe I’m capable of setting the fire, and that I am therefore capable of having botched the treatment of those flu patients enough so that some died. And I understand it’s your job to find out the truth, no matter what it takes for you to get the information. But what you need to understand is that I will not allow you to use Jenny. If you want something from me, ask me. And if I hear that you interrogated my daughter to try to get her to reveal why she drew fire, I will ruin your cover. Do you understand?”

  Without allowing him to respond, she hurried from the cafeteria.

  KELLEY PRACTICALLY RAN down the halls toward KidClub.

  Had she been right to heed Louis’s warning about Shawn? Or had she, in her fear for her daughter, overreacted?

  One thing was certain—Shawn had his agenda, and she had hers. As an undercover investigator, no matter what he was truly investigating, it was his job to try to ferret out the truth—as he perceived it.

  Despite his saving her life yesterday, she couldn’t be certain that he had exonerated her from setting the fire.

  And though she didn’t understand why, she had the distinct impression that Shawn particularly despised arsonists.

  She’d no doubt that he was good at his job. Stubborn. Tenacious. Qualities she found appealing.

  She found him appealing. But she would not allow him to railroad her. She was innocent.

  As innocent as Jenny…

  Once she reached the admin wing, she stopped. How should she approach Jenny without upsetting her more? How could she get her daughter to explain her reason for slashing fire onto Shawn’s drawing without interrogating her?

  She still had no answer when she walked into the childcare center.

  Marge Ralston, in the middle of a group of kids, spied her at the door. The curly-haired manager hurried over, a big, false smile on her face. “Hi, Kelley. Glad you’re here.”

  Shawn had said he had put the picture away with Jenny’s approval, without showing it to anyone else—a surprise for Mommy, they’d agreed. Did Marge know about it?

  If so, she didn’t mention it. She had another reason for being glad to see Jenny’s mother.

  “I’m sure it’s just a phase,” Marge said, “but Jenny’s being a holy terror today. She’s been yelling and pinching and throwing things—everything from crayons to snacks. It’s not even lunchtime yet, and she’s had two time-outs.”

  What was wrong with her sweet child today? “I’m sorry,” Kelley said. “I’ll talk to her.”

  She saw from the corner of her eye that Shawn had entered KidClub, too. He loomed beside her. She practically felt how tense he was with anger.

  She thought of their closeness last night. How his arms had enveloped her. Their kiss…

  Come off it, Kelley, she commanded herself. This man’s investigation could hurt her. And Jenny.

  “Hi, Shawn,” she said a bit too cheerfully. “I know you have that picture you wanted to show me. Why don’t you get it for me now? I’m
here to take my daughter to lunch.”

  “And I—” his soft, sensuous breath on her ear, as he whispered into it, caused her to shiver. Or was it his words? “—intend to find out the truth.”

  REMEMBERING SHAWN’S comment a while later, as Jenny and she sat in her daughter’s favorite fast-food restaurant, Kelley shuddered.

  Then she steeled herself. She intended to find out the truth, too. The real truth.

  She wanted to hug her daughter. To run away with her. But that would not teach Jenny anything positive. Above all, Kelley wanted to be a good role model for Jenny. They would stay, as long as her daughter appeared to be in no danger.

  As for danger to her, well, the more she thought about it, the more certain she was that the whole ambulance incident had been an accident.

  The sullenness Jenny had shown when Kelley first approached her at KidClub had all but disappeared. Jenny seemed excited about their midday adventure. For now. But Kelley had to handle this just right. Without scaring Jenny.

  “So how has your day been so far, sweetheart?” she asked.

  Her daughter dipped a French fry in ketchup and popped it into her mouth without answering.

  “Did anything new happen at KidClub today?”

  “No,” Jenny replied, but this time she glanced up at Kelley with a wary expression on her small, fragile face before she began to smoosh the ketchup around in the fries’ cardboard container without trying to eat anything.

  Holding her breath, Kelley reached into her purse and pulled out the picture Shawn had handed her. She unfolded it carefully. “Shawn gave me this. Do you know who this is?” She pointed to the caricature of a smiling, familiar face with a crown on her blond hair.

  Jenny nodded solemnly. Her eyes were huge. “It’s me.”

  “Shawn said that the red stuff is—”

  “It’s fire, Mommy,” Jenny whispered, her gaze darting around them.

  “Does the fire still scare you?” Kelley asked carefully. “I know it scared me, especially when I found you near it, but we’re safe and sound now.”