nodded, and her breath shattered. “Someone took her. And that dead man was my best hope at finding our daughter.”
April felt the fresh wave of panic slam into her like a Mack truck.
First the baby. Then Deanne’s death. Now this.
The emotions were too raw and strong, overpowering her so much that they were hard to fight. But April knew she had no choice except to keep fighting.
If she gave in to it, her baby might be lost forever.
Despite possibly destroying evidence, April rifled through the dead man’s pockets. Looking for anything that would tell her where he was holding the baby.
No wallet. No ID. No photos. No scraps of paper with details of any kind.
Nothing.
Tamping down the panic, she forced herself to get to her feet. Chase helped by taking hold of her arm. April didn’t have to look at his expression to know that he wanted answers. And he wanted them now.
However, April didn’t have some of those answers, especially the ones Chase would want most.
Even though Chase still had hold of her, April started toward Deanne. Yes, she knew the woman was dead. April had seen her fall after taking the bullet. Had also seen her talking with Chase moments before it looked as if she took her last breath. April didn’t know what, or how much, Deanne had told him, but she figured she’d soon find out.
“Who has the baby?” he snapped. “And when was she taken?”
April had to shake her head again, and she motioned toward the dead man. “Whoever he was working for took her. Around midnight two masked gunmen broke into my house, held me at gunpoint and demanded to know where Quentin was. When I said I didn’t know, they kidnapped the baby.”
A sound came deep from within his chest. Not a good sound, either. Pure anger. “And you didn’t call me?”
She’d braced herself for the question, and the anger. Or so she’d thought. Hard to brace herself, though, for that kind of emotion.
“The kidnapper said if I contacted you, anyone in your family or anyone in law enforcement, I’d never see the baby again.” She hadn’t wanted to believe that, but April hadn’t been able to dismiss it, either. “They said they’d be in touch soon and left.”
“So, you called Deanne instead.” Chase didn’t sound happy about that at all. Of course, nothing about this situation was going to make him happy.
“Yes, I thought it would be safe for her to come. I figured no one would be trailing Deanne to get to me. Especially after things ended so badly between us.”
Well, it’d ended badly between Deanne and April’s brother anyway. Deanne had been the one to turn Quentin in. Of course, in doing so Deanne had turned in April, as well.
“As a CI, Deanne dealt with dangerous thugs like the ones who took the baby,” April explained. “And she did come right away when I called her.”
“Because she felt guilty for what happened,” Chase supplied. “She shouldn’t have. Both Quentin and you made your own beds.”
Since it was true and there was no way to make Chase see the legal shades of gray that had gotten her to that point, April just continued with her explanation. “I waited for a ransom demand, or any kind of communication from the kidnappers. And about an hour and a half ago, someone finally called and said for me to come to the Appaloosa Creek Bridge, that there’d be instructions for getting the baby back.”
Chase didn’t come out and tell her she’d been stupid, but what he felt was written all over his face.
A face that shared a lot of features with their daughter.
Same light brown hair. Same deep blue eyes. It both broke April’s heart and warmed it to see those features on her precious baby.
“I guess Deanne got spooked and called me?” Chase asked.
Chase was not going to like this, either. “Not quite. When I got to the bridge, the kidnapper was waiting for me. The same one you just killed. But he said he wouldn’t give me the baby unless you came to the bridge, too. I tried to talk him out of that, but he insisted it was the only way.”
She’d been right. Chase didn’t like that. Because it meant she had lured him there.
“So, you had Deanne make the call,” Chase said.
April nodded. “I knew if I called, you’d have too many questions, and I wouldn’t have had time to get into it. Like now.” She paused. “Are your brothers on the way?”
Chase didn’t jump to respond, but he did follow her as she approached Deanne’s body. “Yeah. They should be here any minute. How safe are we out here?” He took out his phone and fired off a text. To one of his brothers, no doubt, so they could find them in these woods.
“I’m not sure if it’s safe at all,” she admitted. “I’m sorry. I hadn’t wanted to get you involved in this, but I didn’t have a choice.”
“You had choices. Everybody does.”
They weren’t just talking about the baby now but her past. A past that Chase was probably sorry had included him.
“Now tell me what the hell happened here,” he insisted.
She would. But where to start? The past sixteen hours had been one nightmare after another. Though Chase would want to know the details prior to that. Especially one detail.
The baby.
The one they’d conceived nine months ago when they’d had to face yet another nightmare. Landing in bed with him had been a lapse in judgment. Or Chase would consider it a lapse, anyway. Yes, they’d been attracted to each other since they first met, but Chase considered her a common criminal. And in many ways, he was right.
“I gave birth two months early,” she said.
April tried to rein in her emotions. The fear. The hatred for the person who’d put all of this in motion. Hard to rein in anything, though, when she knelt beside Deanne and touched her.
Dead.
Of course, she already knew that, but it sickened her to confirm it for herself. The tears came. No way to stop them, but she tried to brush them away. Later, she’d grieve for the woman who’d lost her life way too soon and had died trying to help April.
Later, April would do a lot of things.
After she figured out how to untangle this mess that could cost her the baby.
Chase knelt, too. So they were face-to-face. And even though he tossed some glares at her, he continued to keep watch around them.
Always the lawman.
A
