The Agent's Secret Baby

by Marie Ferrarella

  “But he’s sure someone broke in…?”

  Adam nodded. “He said the security company said that the alarm was tripped.”

  “Could just be a faulty system,” she suggested hopefully. “Maybe nothing was taken.”

  “That’s always a possibility,” he agreed. He’d forgotten how optimistic she could be. It was one of the things about her that reached out to him.

  She shook her head, crossing her arms before her tightly. “Books should be sacred.”

  “Nothing is sacred,” Adam responded, looking at her intently. Except, maybe for you.

  “Do you think you should go, make a report?” she suggested, mentally crossing her fingers that he wouldn’t feel the need to do so.

  “No, Bill can handle it. He spent the holiday with friends and was on his way home when the security company called him—”

  “Why him and not you?” she asked.

  “Because I knew I wouldn’t want to be interrupted,” he told her, his eyes caressing her. “Bill has no family here so he can handle it for the time being, unless the police need to talk to me,” he said.

  Banishing Hugh’s call from his mind, as well as the fact that he’d been forced to lie to her again, Adam gave in to his urges. He gathered Eve into his arms. The heat of her body stirred him just as much now as it had before they’d come together tonight.

  He swept the hair away from her face. “Now, where were we?”

  He watched the smile bloom on her face. “In ecstasy as I remember,” she teased.

  “Ecstasy, right. Sounds familiar,” he agreed, bringing his mouth down to hers.

  There were no more calls that night. He’d made sure that he’d shut off his cell phone, just this once.

  Adam frowned. He could feel the tension building in his body.

  Every hour that passed without a call from the cocky Sederholm was another hour in which to wonder if something within the operation had gone desperately awry. Or if whoever currently headed up this deadly daisy chain was on to him and had decided to pull up stakes, cutting his losses before the trap snapped around him.

  There was no way of telling. Hugh’s informants on the street, as well as the one that he himself had cultivated, said there were no rumors about a possible shift in power or even that a shipment was being moved.

  It was as if no one knew anything, a highly unlikely scenario.

  Adam grew progressively antsy, but at least he had a story in place if he had to suddenly leave Eve’s house.

  Unless, of course, the play went down in the wee hours of the night, he thought darkly, nodding his head at his last customer of the day as he rang up a rather worn copy of The Catcher in the Rye.

  Walking the man to the door, Adam flipped over the closed sign and secured the locks.

  Ten minutes later, he was on the road, his thoughts reverting back to the precarious situation he was in. Again.

  Although the narcissistic college kid had a flare for the dramatic, Adam was fairly certain that he didn’t have to worry about a middle-of-the-night call from the supplier. He knew for a fact that Sederholm preferred conducting his business in the light of day. Despite his bravado and incredibly poor imitation of Al Pacino, the brash student felt safer when he didn’t have to remain alert, worrying about who or what was hiding in the shadows.

  Practically on automatic pilot, Adam blinked and realized he needed to turn off on a street where a strip mall was still in its infancy. He’d decided to pay Eve a surprise visit. This was where Eve and Vera had moved their practice in order to accommodate the needs of their growing clientele. The new animal hospital had space for new X-ray machines.

  This was the best part of his day, Adam thought. The part where he got to see Eve and the baby. Where he got to pretend that he was actually just a regular person with a regular life.

  For how much longer?

  He shut away the annoying voice in his head.

  Because of what he did, there was no point in his thinking too far ahead. All he had was right now and he intended to make the most of it, the most of every moment he had with his family.

  His family. It had a nice ring. Even if it was a false one.

  As he pulled into the parking lot situated before the Laguna Animal Hospital, Adam didn’t see her car. Eve usually parked off to the side, leaving the area right before the hospital entrance clear for her four-legged patients and their owners. Right now, the parking lot was fairly empty. Where was Eve’s car?

  Something was wrong. He could feel it.

  Susannah was seated behind the front desk, focused on several beige folders spread out before her. She was working on their billing statements. The brunette looked up the moment she heard the door open. Recognizing him, the perfunctory smile she flashed at the owners of their patients faded. In its place was a look of grave concern.

  He was right. Something was wrong. Ever mindful of his surroundings and the dangerous tightrope he walked, Adam swept his eyes over the immediate area. But nothing seemed out of place.

  “Hello, Mr. Smythe.”

  There was a note of hesitation in her voice. Was the animal technician debating telling him something? Again Adam glanced around, searching for some telltale sign that would give him a clue. Had one of Sederholm’s lowlifes come here to threaten Eve?

  He dispensed with the niceties. “Where’s Dr. Walters, Susannah?” he asked the technician.

  Susannah seemed genuinely distressed as she began her narrative. “Dr. Walters had to rush to the hospital.”

  His brain instantly spun scenarios. He forced himself to bank them down. Eve was a veterinarian. Susannah could be referring to the emergency animal trauma center located in Bedford.

  “Why did she have to rush off, Susannah?” he asked, striving for patience.

  “It’s the baby,” the receptionist blurted out.

  Okay, now he could panic. “What about the baby?”

  One word came tumbling out after another. “Brooklyn started coughing and sneezing and it looked like she was really having trouble breathing. Dr. Walters called Brooklyn’s pediatrician—”

  “Name, I need a name,” he said, interrupting her when he couldn’t recall the physician’s name.

  All he could remember was that it was a woman and that she was associated with the same hospital, Blair Memorial, that the ambulance had taken her to right after Eve had given birth to their daughter.

  Susannah stopped dead for a moment, apparently drawing a blank.

  “It’s Dr. Collins,” Vera told him, walking into the reception area from the rear of the clinic. Eve’s associate heard Adam’s voice and came out to fill him in. “Dr. Sarah Collins,” she specified. “Dr. Collins told Eve to meet her with the baby in Blair Memorial’s E.R.” Approaching the desk, the short, ordinarily perky blonde pulled out a pad and a pen from her lab coat pocket. “I can give you the address—”

  “No need,” he thanked her, hurrying out again. “I’ve already got it.”

  “I offered to drive her,” Vera called out after him, following him to the door. “But she wanted someone to stay to take care of the dogs scheduled for appointments.”

  That sounded like Eve all right. Even in the middle of a possible crisis, her mind was on her responsibilities. Hell of a woman, he thought.

  “Don’t worry,” Vera yelled after him, holding the door open so he could hear her. “Brooklyn’s going to be just fine.”

  “Thanks,” was all he managed to shout back.

  The next moment, he was in his car, slamming the door. His heart raced as he gunned the engine. He’d been in life-and-death situations where a single word could blow his cover and hadn’t felt half as apprehensive as he did right at this moment.

  Being a father changed you. He’d never fully appreciated that until this very minute.

  Traffic was heavy this time of day. Not wanting to get hemmed in by gridlock, he avoided the freeway altogether and took side streets instead. With one eye on his rearview mirror, ever on
the lookout for police cars that might further impede his progress, Adam drove to the hospital as if his engine was on fire and he needed to reach his destination before it exploded.

  For the first time since his sister had overdosed, he prayed.

  The nurse at the information desk looked as if she was ready to summon one of the security guards. With effort, Adam lowered his voice and reined in both his impatience and his fear. “Look, my little girl was brought in a little while ago. She’s only six weeks old. Dr. Sarah Collins is her doctor—”

  At the mention of the doctor’s name, the nurse seemed mollified. “Why didn’t you say so?” Typing something into the computer database, she skimmed her finger along the resulting list that appeared on the monitor. “What’s your daughter’s name?”

  “Brooklyn. Brooklyn Walters.” He was going to get that changed as soon as he could, he thought. He wanted there to be no doubt that she was his.

  “They admitted her. Second floor. Room 213.” She raised her eyes to his face. “The elevators are—”

  But he was already running not toward the elevators, but to the stairwell. He could make faster time on his own instead of waiting for the elevator.

  Brooklyn had been admitted. This was worse than he thought.

  Adam stopped short in the doorway of 213. There were five cribs inside the room. Four of them were empty. The one in the middle was not. Encased in a see-through plastic tent, the sight of which made his blood run cold, Adam saw his daughter.

  She looked tiny. Tinier somehow than she had when she was born. And he had never felt so utterly helpless in his life.

  It took him a second to take the rest of the room in and realize that Eve was sitting in the chair beside the crib. Keeping vigil.

  Crossing the threshold, he came up behind her. With his hands on either side of her shoulders, he bent over and kissed the top of her head.

  Eve never took her eyes off the face of the sleeping infant in the oxygen tent. Reaching up for the hand on her right shoulder, she laced her fingers through his, silently taking comfort from the contact.

  She’d sensed Adam’s presence the moment he’d entered the room. All afternoon, when she wasn’t praying for the baby’s recovery, she’d been praying that he would come. All her attempts to reach him on his cell had ended with irritating messages conveyed to her by a metallic voice. Signals were not going through.

  Eve liked to think of herself as a strong person. She believed that she was able to handle anything that came her way. She had so far. But the mere possibility of something happening to her daughter had completely undone her.

  There was a lump in her throat and she had trouble talking through it, even after clearing her throat twice. “Dr. Collins says she’s going to be all right,” she whispered. Her voice cracked as she felt tears choking her.

  “I know. I ran into her in the hall.” He’d rushed to the baby’s room when he all but ran right into the woman. She’d given him a brief update, starting with the prognosis and working her way backward. He came around to stand beside Eve, next to the crib. “Why didn’t you call me? I would have dropped everything.”

  “I did. But I couldn’t get through and I didn’t want to leave her to go looking for a pay phone.” She pressed her lips together, gazing at Brooklyn. The baby had been so uncomfortable earlier. “She looks so little and helpless in there.”

  Adam shook his head. “She might be little, but she’s not helpless. She’s like her mother, a fighter,” he told her. In his heart, he held on to that. On to the good news that Dr. Collins had given him. That Brooklyn was responding to the medication. Right now, he was concerned about Eve. “Have you had anything to eat?”

  “I don’t know,” she answered truthfully. Turning from the crib, she looked up at him. “I don’t think so. It all happened so suddenly. First a sniffle, then a tiny cough—it almost sounded cute.” She should have been paying closer attention, she silently upbraided herself. “And then she was having trouble breathing.” Eve paused to take a deep breath, trying to still her rapid pulse. “I was never so scared in my life.”

  “But she’s okay,” he reminded Eve, his voice, low, soothing. “Dr. Collins said Brooklyn was just staying here overnight to make sure everything was all right. Lots of kids get the croup.”

  She didn’t care about lots of kids, all she cared about was this kid. “But she’s not even two months old.”

  “All her vitals are fine.” Taking her hand, he raised Eve to her feet. “She’s going to be fine. And look at the bright side.”

  “Bright side?” Eve echoed, puzzled.

  He brushed her hair out of her eyes and smiled at her. “Yes. You can hold this over her head when she acts out.”

  With a laugh that was half a cry, Eve turned to him and buried her head in his chest, grateful beyond words that he was here with her.

  And then all the self-control she’d employed, holding tightly on to her panic, her fears, dissolved. Her fingers wrapped in his shirt, Eve felt the dam break inside of her. There was no holding back the tears.

  Chapter 13

  “You’re sure about this?” Josiah inquired, his tone giving no clue that the information surprised him.

  The deep, slightly raspy voice on the other end of the landline answered, “Absolutely.”

  Just for a moment, Josiah closed his eyes, absorbing what he’d just been told. Who would have thought? And then he took a breath and said, “Thanks, Harry. I owe you one.”

  The man known as “Harry” to only an assorted few chuckled. “You owe me five, Turner, but who’s counting?”

  “You, obviously. And you still have trouble with your sums.” Moving forward on the finely creased brown leather chair that had memorized his imprint from years of use, Josiah prepared to hang up. “See you on Saturday as usual?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it.”

  The receiver made contact with its cradle. Sitting back again, Josiah stared off into space, reviewing what he had just learned.

  The truth was a lot better than he’d thought. It removed the need of having to do away with Eve’s Adam. He hadn’t been in a position to have to rely on that set of skills in a while. Admittedly, he’d gotten a little rusty although he knew that ultimately it was like riding a bike. You never really forget. Still, his eyesight wasn’t what it used to be. The task would have fallen to Lucas.

  Josiah allowed himself a hint of a smile. His lips were not given to curving and the action was somewhat unfamiliar to them. Anyone passing by would have thought he was grimacing.

  “Bad news?” Lucas asked, walking into the study less than a heartbeat after the phone conversation was terminated.

  Josiah raised his eyes to look at Lucas’s face. The grimace widened.

  Away from prying eyes, the rapport between the two men was a great deal less formal than when they were out in public. But even so, it was a given for Lucas that Josiah was and always would be his superior, his mentor, the way it had once been when they had worked at the Bureau together. Furthermore, Lucas never lost sight of the fact that it had been Josiah who had saved his life in the field.

  Unable to give a hundred percent to the job, Lucas had handed in his resignation rather than be relegated to a desk job. His life seemed to have lost its purpose.

  When Josiah retired from the Bureau several months later, he made it a point to look Lucas up and promptly hired the still young man to be his “man Friday,” a position which entailed doing everything and anything that needed doing. If that included occasionally falling back on past talents and conducting a little investigating, so be it.

  However, this time around, because it was Eve, Josiah had decided to undertake the investigation himself. He wound up pleasantly surprised for his trouble.

  Josiah paused for a long moment before answering. “Strange news.”

  They had been together a long time. Lucas knew enough to wait for the older man to elaborate. Prodding Josiah usually had the opposite desired effect. The former s
enior special agent had the ability to imitate the tight jaws of a clam when he wanted to.

  Josiah decided to share his intel with Lucas, a man who he had allowed, over the years, to get closer to him than anyone else, even his daughter. And, during that time, he had come to regard Lucas as the son he had never had, although he never said as much out loud. Words to that effect were not necessary. Besides, he had a feeling that Lucas knew anyway.

  “Do you remember how upset Eve was when she first came back to Laguna?”

  Lucas nodded. “She tried to hide it, but yes, I remember.”

  “It had to do with that bookstore owner.”

  “Brooklyn’s father,” Lucas said to clarify things.

  Josiah inclined his head in agreement. “Yes. She had just begun to come around, to be her old self, and then her father died. That sent her into a tailspin. I thought she was just having trouble coping with her grief…” His voice trailed off for a moment as he relived the episode in his mind. “When she began to show, I realized she was trying to come to terms with something more than just grief.” He looked directly into Lucas’s eyes. “I sensed that she needed to talk to someone.”

  Lucas merely nodded, not saying a word. They both knew that in his day, Josiah was known to be at the top of his game when it came to getting confessions out of people. He never had to resort to torture or the threat of using it. There was just something about the way he looked at a person, about the way he made them feel—as if whatever was said behind closed doors would be understood and kept confidential even though no promises were made.

  “She told me that she’d left Santa Barbara abruptly when she discovered that the man she was in love with turned out to be a drug dealer.” Josiah took a breath, as if he was attempting to keep his anger under control. Lucas couldn’t remember a time when he had seen the older man lose his temper, but wrath, when it came, would enter his eyes and was a terrible thing to behold. “I wasn’t exactly happy to see him turn up here. I don’t make it a habit of butting into other people’s lives—”