“I was upset. Then the grandparents showed up and I thought that was the truth. We all did.”
“Will you two lower your voices,” Kat whispered. I can’t hear what’s going on. If you’ve got something to work out- work it out later. Much later.”
Erin hovered in front, her ear to the door. “I wish this thing had a little window. I thought all stairway doors were supposed to have windows.”
“Apparently not.” Kat moved beside her, leaned against the door and cupped her hands around her ear.
“I’m sorry,” Mark whispered. This was no time to be arguing about a damn note. “I should have spoken up anyway. It was ridiculous to think I could keep this secret forever. That another time wouldn’t come up when I’d need to step forward.”
Mark started to reach out, wanting to brush his hands along Anna’s arms, reassure her, but it wasn’t his place. Not anymore.
“Yes, you should have.” Anna blinked up at him. “But knowing the truth wouldn’t have stopped this.”
“We’ll get her back. You’ll see. Everything will be fine. It has to be.” Mark resisted the urge to fold her into his arms. But he wanted this. All of this. Marcia. Anna. For the three of them to ride off into the sunset.
So what if Anna was a career woman? So what if she thought he was a jerk? They were good together. Somehow they could make it work. If he could only convince her to forgive him for his own stupidity...
A crashing sound in the distance shattered the silence in the stairwell. Anna jerked back and bumped against Kat, Kat stumbled against Erin and Mark steadied all three of them. A loud thump, followed by a shrill scream, sent all five people flying out into the hallway.
At the opposite end of the corridor, arms and legs thrashing, a berserk woman scrapped with a police officer, screaming at the top of her lungs. “You’ll never have her. I won’t let the devil win. Not this time. Train up a child in the way she should go and she’ll--”
“Oh, my God.” Anna’s fingers flew to her mouth at the sight of Amanda Prescott wrestling a policeman.
“I should have remembered.” Mark blew out a heavy sigh. “She was a nurse. Sid said she signed away her rights. I never thought.”
Anna looked over her shoulder at him. “None of us did.”
The two scuffling bodies tripped over some low-lying machinery and crashed into a row of metal bins. The sound of radios crackling filled the air as two officers came barreling down opposite ends of the hall.
Jabbed across the face by a free flying arm, a newly arrived officer grabbed the assailing wrist and flipped Amanda roughly against the wall.
“No! You have to see.” Amanda’s struggled to escape her captor’s grip. “Her mother’s a whore. She needs me.”
Holding her face plastered sideways while the other officer cuffed her, the second policeman recited her rights. “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say...”
“Thou shall present thyself holy and without blemish unto the Lord,” Amanda shouted over the officer’s steady recitation.
“I don’t see Marcia,” Anna whispered through fingers that still covered her face.
“Neither do I.” Mark dropped a hand on her shoulder. A warm wave washed over him when, without looking back, she raised her hand to cover his. Maybe. He closed his eyes. Dear God, please.
With her hands behind her back, still kicking and fighting, the two officers dragged a maniacal Amanda to the elevators. Her face red with fury, she shouted out, “Hate that which is evil.”
Pushing her way into the hall, Catherine Gibbons rushed up to the officers. “Where’s the baby?”
“We’re still looking.” The taller of the two officers answered. “Found this one hiding in an electrical closet.”
“Give yourself fully unto the work of the Lord,” Amanda yelled over her shoulder, glaring at Dr. Gibbons.
“My guess is she thought she could wait out the lockdown, that we’d eventually give up the search and she’d be scot-free.”
“Oh, God.” Anna squeezed Marks hand more tightly.
Without thinking he spun her around and wrapped her in his embrace. “It’s okay. They’ll find her. She’s away from that woman now. She’ll be fine.” He hoped.
“It won’t be long,” the officer encouraged. “Every available man is searching.” Then with a nod they practically carried Amanda, still spouting scripture at them, into the elevators.
“Depending on what that woman gave her, Marcia could be out cold for hours.” Dr. Gibbons looked at her watch, glanced at the other adults, then scanned the distance. “If you wanted to save and protect a little baby, you wouldn’t leave her just anywhere.”
Mark’s gaze remained fixed on the closing elevator doors. “That woman isn’t rational.”
“No,” Dr. Gibbons agreed. “But she didn’t keep Marcia with her in the cramped electrical closet. She left her somewhere else.”
“Somewhere comfortable?” Erin suggested with a hopeful note in her voice.
“And safe,” Kat added, her shoulders losing some of their slump.
Anna slipped loose from Mark’s hold and looked around, her eyes scanned the three hallways that fed off a small area by the elevator like spokes of a wheel. “But where?”
“We have to find her.” Dr. Gibbons paused, examining the same three options. “I don’t like not knowing what drug and how much of it she was given.”
“You don’t think --” Anna stopped mid sentence. “Let’s split up. I’ll go this way.” She pointed to the hallway on her left..
Mark spun around to face her. “I’m coming with you.”
“We’ll go this way.” Kat and Erin took off down the middle hallway.
Doctor Gibbons nodded and hurried along the last remaining corridor shouting over her shoulder, “Yell if you find anything.”
Mark felt like a rat in a maze scurrying after a morsel of cheese. The basement lighting was dim at best. He could see several doors scattered along the long hallway. He stopped and tried the first doorknob. “This one’s locked.”
“She couldn’t have put Marcia in a locked room.” Anna’s gaze fixated on the deadbolt. “Could she?”
“The woman is crazy as a loon. Where would she get hospital keys? Let’s keep going. I’m sure the police are getting keys for the locked doors anyhow.”
Anna’s gaze lingered briefly on the lock before she hurried to the next door. Quickly she and Mark stepped into a broom closet. Finding the switch they surveyed the tiny space.
Shaking his head, Mark flipped off the light and started for the next door, his step a beat faster.
“I never realized how big this place is.” Anna picked up her pace to match Mark’s.
“And this is only one wing of the complex.”
“Oh, Mark. Where is she?”
He reached for her hand. “Wherever she is, she’s fine.”
They turned the corner. The next door opened to a spacious room filled with large canvas laundry bins. At the rear, in opposite corners, two police officers methodically searched each bin.
One looked up at the sound of their footsteps. “You’ll have to come back later, this is a police--”
“They’re the parents.” The young blond officer who they’d followed down the stairs interrupted. “I thought I told you to wait in the stairwell?”
“We couldn’t stand around doing nothing,” Mark answered, quickly shoving aside the momentary shock at he and Anna being referred to as Marcia’s parents. “Which bins have you already searched?”
Anna hadn’t waited for a response, she was already in the corner searching the first bin in the row nearest the door. Following her lead, Mark moved to the following row and began sifting through sheets and towels.
“I’m sorry,” the older officer straightened. “You’re going to have to go back upstairs. We’ll notify you as soon as we find something.”
“Mark,” Anna screeched, cradling a large mound of sheets. Before he could react she’d turned
and run into the hall.
“Let me take her.” Mark rushed beside Anna, reaching for the little girl swaddled in hospital sheets.
Anna tightened her grip. “I’ve got her.”
As they turned the bend Mark didn’t remember the hallway seeming so long when they’d come from the other direction. “I’ll run ahead, get the doc.
Anna nodded.
Further down the hall, Mark shouted for Dr. Gibbons. By the time he reached the elevator she was running toward him at a fast clip followed by Kat and Erin.
“We found her. She was in a laundry bin.”
Without skipping a beat, Catherine Gibbons was racing in the direction Mark had come from. Considering he had nearly a foot on the woman, he was surprised to find himself hurrying to keep up with her.
“Is she okay?” Flanked by the two policemen from the laundry room, Anna held out the little girl wrapped in white linens. The doctor lifted Marcia’s eyelids and flashed a light in her eyes, listened to her chest, then held her wrist, keeping an eye on the clock. “Pulse is thready. Let’s get her back upstairs. Now.”
CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT
What seemed like the entire staff appeared to be waiting for them when the elevator doors opened upstairs.
“Unresponsive to stimulation but heart rate normal. Respiratory efforts appear mildly distressed,” Dr. Gibbons called out as they took Marcia from her arms, placed her in the crib and hooked her up to an IV. “Get her back on the monitor, and I want respiratory to set up a pulse oximeter immediately so we can follow her oxygen levels.”
“The police retrieved an empty vile of Versed from the discarded scrubs,” a voice announced from somewhere in the huddle of people scurrying down the hall.
Dr. Gibbons blew out a short breath. “Good. If they didn’t overdose her, she should be coming out of this within the hour. I want a full chem panel run stat.”
Whatever else the woman said floated in one and ear and out the other. All Anna could think was Marcia was safe. Her baby girl was safe.
Two hours and an eternity later, Marcia was awake and laughing in Anna’s arms. With the exception of the first few minutes after she’d awakened, when she was passed from aunt to aunt and Mark, Anna hadn't let go of the child.
“You can’t play patty-cake all night.” Kat shook her head. “You’re going to have to put her down sooner or later.
Anna couldn’t bring herself to let go. Right now, not even a bigger brighter office with a shiny new name plate and a nice fat raise to go with it seemed more important than keeping this little girl safe and happy.
“Excuse me,” a petite nurse Anna didn’t recognize interrupted. “With all the commotion I forgot to give you this.”
Anna slid Marcia over to one hip and received the folded piece of paper. Quickly reading it, her jaw dropped and her wrist snapped so she could see the time.
“What’s the matter?” Mark stepped closer to her.
“My mother.”
“Your mother?”
“Is here,” Sofia Bartiglioni announced from the doorway. “What’s the point of having a cell phone if you don’t check your voice mail?”
Anna looked up stunned. “Mom?”
“Mrs. B,” Erin and Kat echoed, rushing to hug the smiling woman.
Anna’s mom returned the affectionate hugs then stuck her hand out. “You must be Mark.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
Instead of shaking his hand as offered, she pulled him into a warm embrace. “The pleasure is all mine.”
“I didn’t know you were coming.” Anna shifted Marcia on her hip.
The picture of her daughter holding a baby brought a grin to Sofia’s face as wide as the Hudson River. “Not my fault. Left you two voicemails and a message at the nurses’ desk. After half an hour waiting at the airport I decided I was wasting time that could be better spent with my new grandbaby. So here I am.” The woman moved forward, kissed her daughter on the cheek and slipped the baby from her arms.
Marcia giggled and kicked her feet in a show of enthusiasm.
Kat rolled her eyes and plopped into the seat by the window, mumbling, “Fickle kid.”
“Not that we’re not happy to see you,” Erin explained, “but why the sudden trip?”
“Been looking for a way to get out here to help for weeks. Last week when Uncle Frank’s sister Lucia called to check on my sister Mary’s hip replacement, I answered the phone. She noticed I sounded out of sorts. Turns out she had no idea you were having a hard time of it here in California and needed me.” Mrs. B. turned to Mark. “That Frank is a good man but as short on words as a day is long. Never once told his sister a word about all this. Though I suspect deep down he was just scared she’d do exactly what she did.” Sofia nuzzled her nose in Marcia’s belly and turned her attention to her daughter. “Anyhow, Lucia needed a few days to close up her house. With her settled at Aunt Mary and Uncle Frank’s I flew out here the next day. Didn’t want to tell you till I was sure nothing would go wrong. I called from JFK.”
Anna blinked. “Close up the house?” She shot a nervous glance in her friends’ direction. “Ma, how long are you planning to stay?”
“As long as I’m needed.”
“Ma,” Anna whined. “You haven’t left the kitchen all day.”
Two days after the kidnapping the hospital gave Marcia a clean bill of health. They’d brought her home that morning and Sofia had spent all of it fussing at the stove.
She’d already moved Marcia’s playpen from the den to the middle of the kitchen, and Kat hadn’t turned the TV on once all day. She’d spent most of it grazing at the kitchen table. Anna wondered how long it would be before she’d find her mother had put plastic on all the furniture.
“Aren’t you going to join your friends outside?” Sofia spoke to Anna as though she were six years old again.
“In a minute. Why don’t you come outside too? The counter is clean enough.”
“I’ve got some gravy simmering and I want to keep an eye on it.” Her mom dried her hands on her apron, spun around to face Anna and leaned her rear against the counter. “Want to talk about it?”
“Gravy?”
“Don’t be obtuse.”
“Mom, you can’t spend your whole life in the kitchen.”
“Why not?” Sofia crossed her arms. “I like the kitchen.”
“So did Julia Child, but even she got out once in a while.”
“I get out. I’m here aren’t I?”
“In the kitchen. You come all the way to California and for two days you’ve either been at the hospital or in the kitchen. Do you even know what the other rooms look like?”
“Of course I do. Barbara had wonderful taste. The rooms are very charming, and my bed is quite comfortable. I happen to like the kitchen. I enjoy cooking for my family.”
Anna stared at her mother.
“Nothing gives me as much joy as seeing your eyes light up with that first taste of pasta fasul. The smiles when I make pizzelles. Listening to everyone laugh around the table. You kids playing poker with your dad, watching him to see if he was that lucky or if he cheated. The whole time, nibbling on my sprinkle cookies.”
Anna smiled at the memory. “I’m surprised I didn’t weigh a ton.”
“I like taking care of you. Seeing you happy, makes me happy. Nothing is more important.” Her mom smiled at her, stepped over to stir the gravy, then turned back again. “So. What are you waiting for?”
Seeing her family happy made her happy. A simple concept. Nothing complex to grasp. Not torture, sacrifice.
Nothing in the world meant more than keeping Marcia safe and happy. She’d thought that at the hospital over and over, willing to play patty-cake until her arms fell off.
How blind could she be?
Giving her mom a peck on the cheek, she smiled. “Yeah Mom, I’m ready. Thanks.”
As she slipped out the back door, Anna heard her mother’s soft words. “Smart girl.”
Marcia sat on the blanket stacking her sponge blocks in color coordinated rows. Days passed where Mark doubted she’d ever be well enough to play. Then for hours he worried he’d never see her again. Now he wondered if there’d ever be a right time to tell Anna what he really wanted.
With her mom around, Anna had become distant. Not quite the polar ice cap she’d been when she thought he’d had an affair with Barb. No, more the way she’d been when she first arrived - friendly, but unavailable. He wasn’t sure what to make of it, or how to deal with it, and he was terrified any minute now she’d announce she’d be leaving for New York. Going home to her new job. Her great new job. The one she’d spent her entire career working toward.
“I don’t think she’s supposed to be able to do that yet?” The porch door slapped shut behind Anna.
Kat looked up from the lounge chair. “What’s your mom cooking now?”
“Gravy’s simmering. Not sure what’s in the oven.”
“Oven.” Kat’s brows shot up. “Have I mentioned no one cooks like your mom?”
Anna nodded, watching her friend sprint toward the door. “Leave some for Erin. Her flight leaves at six and she’ll be lucky if she gets a bag of peanuts.”
“I don’t understand how Kat eats so much and still looks good.” Mark scooted to one corner of the large blanket.
“Good genes.” Anna shrugged. Folding her legs with a graceful ease Mark had come to love, she sat beside him, pointing at Marcia. “I really think she’s supposed to be older before she can do patterns like that. I wonder if she’s going to be an architect like her dad?”
Not sure if she was referring to Tom or himself, Mark was still too surprised she’d sat next to him to waste much time contemplating which architect. “Her mom was an architect too.”
“True.” Anna nodded. “Of course, they say if you live with someone long enough you start to pick up their traits. Maybe she’ll get her sense of color from me.”
Well, that answered at least one question. Anna didn’t plan to return home alone. Biology or not, she’d be taking Marcia with her. “I’ve been thinking.”
The Champagne Sisterhood Page 30
