The Switch

by Sandra Brown

  Imperceptibly he leaned forward, until it was more than his body heat she felt against her back—it was him. "I needed to hear you say that."

  "Don't, Chief," she implored in a hoarse whisper.

  "What?"

  "Don't forget that I'm Melina. I'm not Gillian."

  CHAPTER 25

  Tony and Candace Anderson lived in an upscale neighborhood in north Dallas. The lawns were well maintained. Each garage had at least two vehicles, one of which was a minivan or SW. Homeowners here could afford private schools for the kids, ski vacations in Vail, and a membership to the nearby country club.

  "Nice area," Chief remarked.

  "Hmm." Melina probably hadn't noticed. She was apprehensive about the reception the publicity-shy Andersons might give them. They had waited until late in the day to come, when it was more likely that they'd find both at home.

  Their house was situated at the end of a short cul-de-sac. It was contemporary in design. The walkway brought Chief and Melina up to a front door that was constructed largely of panes of beveled glass, so that they could see Tony Anderson's approach before he opened the door. A dog inside the house barked once, but it was a halfhearted, nonthreatening bark.

  "Mr. Anderson?" Melina asked.

  "That's right." He was of average height and better-than average looks. His tan suggested a lot of time spent outdoors; his trim, athletic build implied tennis over golf. Friendly but

  cautious, he evenly divided his inquisitive regard between them.

  "My name is Melina Lloyd. This is Christopher Hart."

  Anderson looked Chief's way, showing surprised recognition and curiosity over his battered face. "The astronaut?"

  "Tony?"

  Candace Anderson might have been a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader. She had the figure and the face for it, a mane of sun-streaked blond hair, and eyes as large as a doe's. She was wearing old blue jeans with split knees and a knit top that was cropped at her narrow waist. But for all her beauty, her face bore the imprint of sadness and her doe-eyes had a wounded look. She sidled up to her husband and stood close to him, as though for shelter and support.

  "I thought you looked familiar," Tony Anderson said to him. "Nice to meet you."

  Tony looked pleased to be shaking hands with him, but also perplexed. "Uh, this is my wife, Candace. Candace, Christopher Hart. And Miss ... Sorry."

  "Lloyd. Melina Lloyd. Could we have a few minutes of your time? It's dreadful of us to show up without calling first. But I was afraid you wouldn't agree to see us if I called ahead." "See you about what?" Tony Anderson's voice took on a distinct edge that indicated he already knew what they wished to see him about. He placed a protective arm around Candace. Melina said, "Your son's abduction."

  Candace's chin lowered nearly to her chest. Every trace of friendliness vanished from Tony's demeanor. He turned hostile. "Are you a reporter, Miss Lloyd?"

  "No, I'm a victim. Or at least my sister was. She was murdered just a few days ago."

  "I read about it in the newspaper." Candace raised her head and looked at Melina. "She was your twin."

  "Yes. I think your son's kidnapping and her murder are connected." Candace looked at her quizzically. "Gillian was also a patient at the Waters Clinic."

  "That's it? That's the connection?" Tony said harshly. He reached for the door. "I don't think so."

  Chief stepped forward. "Could we please come in?" Celebrity had its benefits. He rarely exploited his fame, but this instance warranted it. "Please. It's very important to Melina. Possibly to you, too."

  "We won't stay long," she added.

  Tony looked down at Candace, who gave a slight nod.

  The couple showed them into a room off the kitchen. They'd apparently just finished dinner. Dishes were still on the dining table. The den was a lived-in room with a large-screen TV, shelves full of books, and a golden retriever who lay curled up on the hearth of the fireplace. The dog gave Melina and Chief a lazy glance, then resettled into his nap. As they took seats, Tony politely muted the TV.

  He sat down on the sofa near his wife and took her hand, sandwiching it between his own. Trustingly, she tucked her shoulder beneath his. Plainly they were devoted to one another.

  Except for the visible pain of their loss, Chief envied them. He liked this cozy room, the dog, the obvious physical and emotional intimacy the Andersons shared. For every move she made, he made a harmonious countermove, as though their bodies were accustomed to adjusting comfortably against one another. They could communicate with a look. A touch spoke volumes. Their relationship was indeed enviable.

  And costly, Chief reminded himself. In order to coalesce with another person on that level, one had to let down all his defenses.

  Tony began by saying, "We really don't like talking to strangers about Anthony's kidnapping. Not unless a person has information that might help us find him."

  "Unfortunately, I'm here seeking more information than I'm able to divulge," Melina admitted.

  "I don't know how we can help you."

  "My sister Gillian had been artificially inseminated at the Waters Clinic less than twenty-four hours prior to her murder. Colonel Hart and I think there's a link between her murder and the clinic."

  Tony turned to him. "Where do you fit in?"

  "Fair question. I spent most of the night with Gillian. She left my room in the wee hours and was killed shortly before dawn."

  Tony looked abashed for asking, but Candace asked, "Were you her sperm donor, Colonel Hart?"

  "Call me Chief. And no, I wasn't."

  "My sister used an anonymous donor," Melina explained. "Forgive my bluntness, but I must ask. Was your sperm used to conceive Anthony?"

  "I don't mind your asking," Tony replied. "I lost all sense of shame a long time ago. The day a couple enters a clinic that specializes in infertility, they should check their pride and modesty at the door. Because of the techniques you use in order to conceive, the tests you're put through, the frankness with which you must answer the most personal questions about your sex life and private habits, you are eventually desensitized.

  "In answer to your question, no. I'm sterile. They believe because of medication I was given as a child. But in any case, I have such a low sperm count as to be negligible. I had no qualms about using donor sperm. In fact, when all our other options had been exhausted, I was the one who suggested it.

  "The donor's physical traits and interests were matched as closely to mine as possible, although at that point, neither I nor Candace really cared. We just wanted a healthy baby. Except for that one biological technicality, Anthony was my child. My son."

  Both Chief and Melina pretended not to hear the emotional creakiness in his voice. The tears in Candace's eyes were more difficult to ignore. "I'm very sorry to put you through this," Melina said earnestly. "If it wasn't terribly important, I wouldn't."

  "It's all right," Candace said. "After Anthony was taken, we sought answers, too. I understand your needing and wanting to know exactly what happened to your twin."

  Then she recounted for them what they already knew. On his second day of life, the healthy and perfectly formed seven-pound eight-ounce baby was kidnapped from the hospital.

  "We were in a private birthing room," she explained. "Tony had gone out for some lunch. Anthony was asleep in a crib beside my bed. It was almost time for a feeding, so I decided to use the rest room before he woke up. I went into the toilet. I wasn't in there for more than two or three minutes. When I came out, the crib was empty."

  The last four words were barely audible. She was holding on to her composure by a mere thread. Chief noticed that Melina was also having a difficult time keeping her emotions in check. Her throat was working with the need to cry, and she had pressed her fingers against her lips as though to keep them from quivering.

  Tony picked up the story. "Security cameras recorded a woman dressed in scrubs going into the room and carrying out a bundle of what looked like soiled laundry. We assume she had Anthony
wrapped up in those linens. She was smart enough to keep her face averted from the cameras, like she knew where they were positioned. But enough of her face could be seen to determine that she wasn't someone on staff.

  "The FBI ran the photos of her through all their databases. They did computer analyses that could determine race, approximate age, and so forth. But nothing came of it. She didn't match the description of any other abduction suspects."

  "Also, anyone that clever and audacious could easily have altered her appearance," Candace interjected.

  "None of the cars parked in the hospital lots that day provided leads. Local and federal investigators followed up each one. It was surmised that someone picked her up at or within walking distance of the hospital and drove off with her and Anthony. It would have looked so normal that no one paid any attention. In any case, there were no witnesses to anything unusual on the hospital campus."

  "You never received a demand for ransom?" Melina asked. "Whoever took him wanted the baby, not money." Chief leaned forward and asked kindly, "What makes you say that, Candace?"

  "Because I know he's alive. I know it."

  "There was an extensive search for his... his body," Tony said with difficulty. "They thought somebody might have a grudge against me, or that maybe some radial group who protested AI were behind it. Not a trace of him was ever found. No hospital blanket, diaper, identification bracelet, nothing. Candace and I feel that he was taken for the purpose of acquiring a baby. Someone's got our baby."

  Again his voice cracked, and this time it was Candace who comforted him. She pulled her hand from his and placed her slender arm across his shoulders, hugging him against her and shushing him tenderly.

  Chief saw that Melina had given up her effort not to cry and was allowing tears to flow freely down her cheeks. She looked extremely vulnerable just then, crying silently but co- piously, her heart breaking for the Andersons and probably a little for herself, too.

  In the short time he'd known her, she had demonstrated extraordinary bravery, determination, self-control, and just plain guts. It was easy to admire a woman with that much strength. It was even easier to admire one whose compassion could move her to tears without any evidence of self-conciousness.

  For a time no one spoke. The dog got up and ambled over to the couple. As though accustomed to these emotional outbreaks, he whined and propped his large head on Tony's thigh. Reflexively, Tony rubbed the dog's head and scratched him behind the ears. Then the dog returned to the hearth and lay back down, resting his head on his front paws and dolefully watching his owners.

  Saddened, Chief's eyes moved from the loyal animal to the flickering TV screen. A house fire with three casualties was the lead story on the muted newscast.

  Melina eventually wiped away her tears and broke the awkward silence. "The man who killed my sister was named Dale Gordon. He was an employee at the Waters Clinic."

  "I read that," Candace said. "But I don't remember anyone by that name working there."

  "Tall, skinny guy," Chief told them, remembering how Gordon had looked as he and Gillian entered the taco restaurant that night. "Thinning blond hair. Thick eyeglasses. Kind of gawky."

  "Oh."

  Candace's exclamation brought all eyes to her. Her face showed more animation than it had since they'd arrived. "Him! I remember him. He made a point of speaking to me whenever I had an appointment at the clinic." Turning to her husband, she said, "You remember, honey. He brought the teddy bear to the hospital?"

  Tony registered sudden recall. "That guy?"

  Chief exchanged a quick look with Melina. "Gordon came to the hospital with a gift for the baby? He was in your room?"

  "Yes. He was very sweet. He took a picture of me holding Anthony. From the start, when I first became a patient, he seemed to express a genuine interest in..." Candace Anderson's face paled almost to stark white. On a filament of breath, she finished her thought. "A genuine interest in me."

  "In Gillian, too," Chief said, noticing that Melina looked incapable of speaking at the moment. She was hugging herself as though chilled. He told the Andersons about his and Gillian's encounter with Gordon and how strange the man had acted. "Apparently he got upset when he saw her with me. He wound up killing her for what he must've perceived as her unfaithfulness. He had assumed some kind of proprietary claim on her."

  "I got that same impression," Candace said. "Except that he seemed overjoyed when the Al worked and I conceived."

  "He got very emotional when he saw Anthony," Tony said. "Like he was about to cry. It was embarrassing for us."

  "I felt sorry for him," Candace continued. "I thought he was just a lonely man who took a personal interest in the clinic's success stories because he had no family of his own."

  Tony cut to the chase. "Do you think he had something to do with Anthony's kidnapping?"

  "It's feasible, isn't it?" Melina replied.

  "But he committed suicide, didn't he?" Her distress growing, Candace gripped her husband's hand. "If he knew where Anthony is, the information died with him."

  "Not necessarily," Chief said somberly. "That clinic holds the key to all this."

  "What are you talking about?"

  "How do you know?"

  Melina looked at him with puzzlement.

  "Tony," Chief said, "disengage the muting on the TV, please. We need to hear this."

  Anderson reached for the remote, and they caught the voice track in midsentence.

  "...body was discovered this evening when she failed to join friends for a weekly bridge game." A tearful woman blubbered into the microphone poked into her face. "She never missed. When she didn't show up this evening, we knew something was wrong. We came over and found her."

  Turning back to face the camera, the newswoman reported that no motive for the killing had been established. "Investigating homicide detectives have said that the victim appeared to have been bludgeoned to death, probably with the ordinary household hammer found near her body."

  The camera pulled back from a close-up of the reporter's face to a wider shot that showed activity in the background. A gurney with a body bag strapped to it was being wheeled to-ward an ambulance. "Police are still investigating and questioning neighbors, but no one claims to have seen… "

  Suddenly Melina gasped, seeing what had drawn Chief's attention to the story—a house that looked like Snow White's. Linda Croft's cottage with the mullioned windows and arched front door.

  Melina turned to him, her expression one of horror and disbelief. The tears now making her eyes shine were tears of outrage. "Those bastards!"

  He came to his feet and reached down for her hand. He pulled her up beside him and said to the Andersons, "You don't know us. For all you know, we're a couple of fruitcakes. But I assure you we're not. That murder victim..." he said, pointing to the TV. "We visited her today. She worked at the Waters Clinic. She's the one who breached professional ethics to tell us how to locate you. Someone didn't want us to get together and compare notes."

  Candace pressed her fingers against her colorless lips. "Which means Dale Gordon wasn't the end of it."

  Chief bobbed his head. "Whoever is behind all this is bigger than that pathetic pervert. I suggest you get out of here tonight. Get your dog and clear out."

  "What about the police?" Candace asked. "Shouldn't we call them? Notify the FBI?"

  "Good idea, but I'd do it from another location. Agent Tobias is—"

  "From Washington? We know him," Tony said. "He questioned us once."

  "You'd recognize him, then?"

  "Sure. Handsome guy."

  "Good." He gave them a condensed version of what happened at Melina's house that morning.

  "Tony?" Candace clutched her husband's arm in fear.

  But he was already convinced. He moved to a desk across the room and scribbled something on a Post-It, then tore it from the pad and handed it to Chief. "My cell phone number. Only Candace knows it. Wherever we are, we'll have it with us. Keep us informed
."

  He gripped Chief's hand to shake it, but he was looking at Melina as he said, "If you find out anything about our son, whatever it is and no matter how bad, we want to know."

  "You have my word."

  Once they were in the car and under way, Chief said, "Thank God they trusted us enough to get the hell out of Dodge. I liked them."

  "So did I. Very much. I liked Linda Croft, too. Why didn't we warn her of potential danger?" She covered her face with her hands and sobbed, "Oh, God, Chief. We got her killed."

  "We didn't kill her, Melina. Not me. Not you." He reached across the front seat of the car and gripped her knee. "I feel as badly as you do about it, but we didn't kill her any more than we killed Gillian. Somebody else went into her house and hit her with a hammer."

  "Our FBI imposters?"

  "They'd be my first guess."

  Thinking of how helpless and afraid Linda Croft would have been against the two men, she lost it and began to wail. "She was so sweet and guileless. That's what makes this all so confounding," she cried out in frustration. "It's innocent women and children who are the victims of these crimes. My sister. Slaughtered while she was sleeping, when she was most defenseless. The Andersons' little boy snatched like an... an apple from the street market. Who could do that? What kind of monster could deliberately cause so much heartache?" She clenched her hands into fists and pounded them on her thighs.

  "Melina—"

  "Those poor people. Those poor, beautiful, young, healthy people are miserable! And it isn't as if they're being punished for some terrible wrong. Their only sin was wanting a baby," she cried, her voice tearing.

  "Melina, stop this!"

  "I can't, I can't," she sobbed.

  "Yes, you can. You can."

  Whether it was the calm strength of his voice or the tight, almost painful pressure he applied to her knee, she gradually came to her senses. The hysteria and wild fury abated, and after several deep breaths, she looked across at him and nodded to let him know that she was once again in control.