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Chelsea assumed he’d heard the wind, which had been buffeting the truck, but she rolled down her window all the same. Gust-driven raindrops pelted her face.
She shivered from the wet cold and started to roll it up again when she heard crying. At first she thought it must be a cat in distress, but the more she listened, the more human it sounded.
“That’s a little child’s voice!”
“You’re right,” he murmured, “but where?”
Sensing a mystery, Chelsea opened the door to investigate. Before her new Italian leather heels touched the ground, she could see a woman beckoning to them from across the road, shouting frantic cries for help. Her body was nothing more than a silhouette in the downpour.
Max levered himself from the cab, their personal war put on hold in the face of this unexpected crisis. Chelsea chased after him. In case she couldn’t get to the station in time to report the story on Camille and the baby, maybe she’d find nuggets of a new drama unfolding here.
Arms flailing, a panic-stricken young woman no more than twenty-one, twenty-two, met Max halfway. Water ran down her pretty features and dripped off her dark blond braids. The rain had plastered the corduroy jumper against her thin body, revealing every shiver.
“Thank heaven y-you heard me!” she cried. “I need h-help!” Her hands gripped his hard-muscled forearms. “My baby wandered away from me and f-fell through some boards. I tried to go after her, but the framework is c-crumbling. I’m afraid to make a move or everything m-might cave in on top of her!”
Another trapped child.
As the sickness welled up in his gut, Max closed his eyes tightly for a moment.
Chelsea watched his reaction, stunned by the distinct pallor of his complexion and the way his body had tautened. Something earthshaking was going on inside him. But what?
“It’s going to be all right,” she heard him murmur at last. “What’s your name?”
The mother seemed to hesitate for a moment before she said, “Traci Beal.”
“Traci? How long has your daughter been down there?”
“I d-don’t know. A half hour m-maybe. You’re the first p-person to stop.”
The poor woman’s teeth were chattering. This was the perfect heartbreaking child-in-distress story, but a lot of good it was going to do Chelsea without a camcorder. She flashed him a look of outrage for destroying her camera. But his attention was focused on the mother.
“You haven’t phoned for help yet?”
The young woman shook her head. “I don’t h-have a phone and didn’t dare leave the baby to run to a neighbor’s house. Please…you’ve g-got to help me!” She sounded on the verge of hysterics. “If anything happens to Betsy…”
In the next instant Max left them to climb inside the excavation, where the child’s incessant crying was louder. Chelsea noticed that no matter how much care he took, more material caved in.
As she watched him move around and lift debris, Chelsea held her breath. She couldn’t think of another man who would dive into a precarious situation like this with no thought for his own life.
When she reflected on the constant stream of disgusting men who had flowed in and out of her mother’s world, living off her money, she couldn’t imagine one of them putting a child’s crisis ahead of his own selfish needs.
After a few minutes Max climbed back to them, his face grim as he addressed Traci. “She’s crawled into a main drainage pipe for the subdivision. It’ll take a team of experts to help me reach her. But your daughter has a powerful set of lungs. As long as she’s crying like that, you know she’s all right, just frightened. I’ll call for help from the cell phone in my truck. We’ll get your daughter out safely.”
Of course! Chelsea could phone her office and ask her boss, Howard Percell, to send someone out here on the double with a camcorder. They could still get the exclusive scoop if she acted fast!
Unmindful of the rain, she wheeled around and hurried across the road. Max called to her, but she ignored him. It was vital she tip off her boss before Max tied up the phone. She had an idea he probably kept it in his glove compartment.
No sooner had she opened the passenger door to reach inside it than Max flung open the door on the driver’s side. After sending her a murderous glance, he pulled the phone from the top of the sun visor and started punching buttons.
His mouth had formed into a tight line of anger. Despite the heavy tension between them, she observed that even in the rain his brown hair, dark as rich loam, stayed in place. Like James Bond, he managed to look quite splendid no matter how harrowing the moment.
“Spare me the lie that you were going to call nine-one-one.” His voice grated.
She stood her ground. “With your links to the police department, I planned to leave that up to you. I only intended to take a few seconds to let my office know where I am.”
Lines darkened his face before he let go with a string of colorful swear words. “It’s shot!” The phone landed on the seat between them. “I’ll have to find another one. While I’m gone, you’re going to do something unselfish for once in your life and offer support to Traci until help arrives.”
So many stab wounds in one day had cut Chelsea wide open.
Using her superior tone she said, “When there’s a breaking story right here, why would I want to go with you?”
His head reared. “Why, indeed.”
She enjoyed shutting the door in his good-looking face. But when she came around from the back of the truck, she received a surprise. He shoved a folded camper-green tarp into her arms.
“There! That should give you some protection while you’re both waiting.”
“How thoughtful! Thank you.”
Though she almost staggered from the weight of it, she refused to let him witness her struggle as she crossed the road.
MAX PUT his truck in gear and barreled down the road in search of a house or a business of some kind. Whatever came first. With a tiny child’s life at stake, there was no time to lose.
Haunted by Betsy’s cries, which still resounded in his head, he increased his speed on the isolated road. To his relief the rain had turned to drizzle. The idea of a frightened little girl caught and possibly lying injured in cold water plus who knew what else left a pit the size of a boulder in his gut.
Was it asking too much to come across a road crew with a phone? Maybe plane radar would pick him up and put a patrol car on his tail.
Tears smarted in his eyes as he remembered the little boy who’d died inside a laundry chute last year. Neither Max nor his partner, who’d been on duty with him, had been able to save the toddler. Since then, the joy had gone out of his life.
The media had sensationalized the tragedy. As usual, Chelsea Markum had been one of many TV reporters who’d criticized the police department’s response time in getting to the scene of the accident.
Though he and his partner had been cleared of any wrongdoing, the horrific incident had caused a blackness to creep into Max’s existence until he’d doubted his ability to be a good cop. Once his confidence had deserted him, he’d felt immobilized and took a leave of absence from his job.
During the time off, he’d gone for professional counseling to deal with his grief. Though it was pointed out to him there was nothing he could have done to prevent the boy’s death, Max didn’t believe it. A little child had died under his watch. He couldn’t handle it.
After a month, he’d still been too shaken by the experience to go back on active duty. Despite the urgings from his superiors to remain with the department and take a desk job for a while, he couldn’t see himself sitting at a computer eight hours a day. Not when it was his nature to live life on the edge.
Eventually he resigned from the force and went to work as a PI. It meant he could handpick cases in which children weren’t involved. Or so he’d thought.
He pressed on the gas, realizing he might have to drive all the way to Reiser to find a phone. The unincorporated hamlet of less than two hundred people had a German pub. On more than one occasion, he and his best friend, Michael Lord, had driven out here for a beer on their off-duty time as police officers—before Michael had gone to work for Maitland Maternity Clinic. It had been a great place to kick back, shoot a little pool.
At moments like that they’d shared a few laughs and talked shop. The subject of women was taboo. Michael was a confirmed bachelor. As for Max, the high school sweetheart he’d planned to marry had been killed in a car accident.
That painful period eventually passed, but it had left him changed. Though he enjoyed women as much as the next man, he had no desire to settle down. After working so hard to save the little boy who’d died despite all efforts to save him, Max had been running on automatic pilot.
As the memory of that failed rescue attempt assailed him once more, he broke out in a cold sweat. He still suffered nightmares because he’d reached the child too late.
Evidence of civilization ahead jerked his torturous thoughts to the present. A tiny general store with one lone gas pump materialized on his right, and he pulled in.
With the motor still running, he leaped from the cab. God willing, he wasn’t about to lose Betsy!
“TWINKLE, TWINKLE, Little Star,” was a tune Chelsea hadn’t heard for years. “Do you like the song Mommy just sang to you? I’m right here, Betsy, honey, and I’m not going to go away. You’re being such a brave girl, Mommy’s going to sing you another song. Would you like to hear ‘Jumbo Elephant?’”
Huddled with Traci beneath the dry side of the tarp, Chelsea listened to the young woman’s tireless efforts to comfort her baby. As long as she sang, the little girl didn’t cry as much. The connection between the two of them was strong and touched Chelsea deeply. She’d never experienced that kind of bonding with her own mother. Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to ward off more painful memories.
It seemed as if Max had been gone forever. Though the rain had stopped, it was cold enough that the tarp created much-needed warmth. Chelsea was grateful Max had provided them with this much protection against the elements, even if she had been furious with him at the time.
And hurt.
But she refused to think about the pain he’d inflicted. Right now both the mother and child were frightened. Hunkered down as they were directly above the place where they heard Betsy crying, Chelsea could observe Traci Beal at close range. What she saw disturbed her.
The extreme pallor of the young mother’s skin, stretched tautly over sharp cheekbones, and the heavy circles beneath her lusterless blue eyes convinced Chelsea she had been suffering long before the accident had happened. She looked exhausted and ill-nourished.
Chelsea shuddered to think of Traci’s innocent, helpless little child caught down there beneath all that old lumber. Some of the boards had creaked and settled more during the worst of the downpour, making her realize how unstable everything was. No wonder Max had gone for help before he attempted any kind of a rescue.
Wanting to be useful, Chelsea took off her jacket and placed it around Traci’s thin shoulders, hoping to infuse her with some of her own warmth and strength. If only the other woman would stop shivering.
At first Traci stiffened, then relaxed a little. Encouraged because she didn’t try to pull away, Chelsea kept an arm around her and rocked her back and forth, singing to Betsy herself. Anything she could think of.
Since Traci had exhausted every English nursery rhyme, perhaps something different would distract Betsy for a while. Chelsea started out with “Frère Jacques,” one of a dozen little French songs she’d learned in her youth at her boarding school in Switzerland.
“Those were pretty,” Traci whispered as Chelsea ended with “Sous le pont d’Avignon.” “You like that, don’t you, Betsy!” she called to her child. They couldn’t hear any baby noises. “Betsy?” she cried louder.
Chelsea clasped her a little tighter. “I’m sure she fell asleep for a few minutes.” I pray that’s all it means. Max, where are you?
“Traci? I have an idea. Why don’t you run home for a coat and get something to eat. I promise I’ll stay right here and keep singing to Betsy.”
“No! I’m not leaving my baby!” Terrified blue eyes stared into hers.
Chelsea heard—felt—Traci’s fear.
How foolish of her to suggest the other woman leave the site when it was obvious this child was her very life! But then Chelsea had to remember that not every child had Rita Maxwell for a mother.
“You don’t have to go anywhere. I’ll go up to the house and fix you some food and bring it back along with a jacket or a blanket. It’s probably going to rain some more.”
“No!” she cried again. To Chelsea’s surprise she felt the younger woman clutch her hands in a death grip. “Stay with me!”
“But I’ll only be gone a few minutes. You need help, Traci.”
“I’m f-fine.”
The more Traci protested, the more Chelsea knew the woman’s fear wasn’t only about her child. Something else was going on here.
Traci’s behavior reminded Chelsea a lot of herself back in Hollywood when she’d had to keep quiet about her fear of the men who lived with her mother. Especially Anthony.
Chelsea’s horrific experiences had given her uncanny instincts about people, and right now they were telling her Traci needed rescuing every bit as badly as her child.
Playing a long shot, she said, “Will your husband be getting home from work soon so you can take turns watching over Betsy?”
Traci’s features froze before she shook her head.
“A boyfriend then?”
“No. There’s just Betsy and me.”
The definitive response sounded like fighting words. But there was a tragic forlornness in her voice that reached a secret place in Chelsea’s heart.
“I’m here for you.” She felt compelled to assure Traci, then gave her another squeeze. “Max will get your baby out of here soon.”
“Max?” The younger woman sounded abnormally jittery. Almost paranoid.
“Mr. Jamison. The man who went to call for help. He used to be a police officer. Now he’s a very fine private investigator here in Austin, and a friend of mine,” Chelsea added, afraid to alarm this anxious young mother any more than necessary.
Not by any stretch of the imagination did Max consider Chelsea a friend or anything close to it, but Traci wasn’t to know that.
“He and I had just come from a case he was working on when we saw you.”
Traci’s frightened gaze found Chelsea’s. “Who are you?”
The tremulous question meant the other woman hadn’t recognized her from her television show. It proved her fright stemmed from something or someone else.
“I’m Chelsea Markum, a television journalist here in town.”
Like a wounded animal emerging from the forest who’d been blinded by headlights, the woman stared at Chelsea while her thin body shook helplessly.
Chelsea recognized the look of fear well enough. Throughout her life she’d seen its reflection in her own mirror often enough before she put on another face to meet the world.
“I’m not going to hurt you, Traci,” she vowed in a firm tone. “If you’ll give me a chance, I’ll prove to you I can be trusted.” Grasping the other woman’s hand, she said, “Shall we sing another song? I think I can hear Betsy. She must have wakened again.”
CHAPTER TWO
WHEN JANELLE SAW PETEY come out of one of the dozens of farmacias along the busy, noisy street, she reached across the seat and undid the car door’s electric lock.
“Get in quick!”
As he slid behind the wheel, Janelle glared at the small sack. “You were supposed to buy enough baby food and diapers to last us a couple of weeks! What happened?”
“We’re in a lousy border town full of scalpers, honey. Our funds are going to have to last for a long time. There’s no way I’m paying the prices they’re charging. I got us enough stuff until we come to another town farther inland to do our shopping.”
“We’d better find one soon!” she shouted, then turned her head to the back seat to see if she’d wakened Chase. Relieved he was such a sound sleeper, she darted Petey another glance. “By now Megan has the FBI on our tail. We step one foot on Texas soil and that’s the end for both of us.”
He revved the engine before moving into the mainstream of traffic. “Then you shouldn’t have brought the kid along.”
“I stole him for us, you stupid idiot! Megan wants him back. She’ll pay any price we name. What we need to do is hide out for a few weeks. That ought to up the ante. When she’s at her most vulnerable, that’s the time we’ll make contact.”
“Well, we sure as hell aren’t sleeping in this car another night. I figure if we drive a hundred miles south, we can find us a nice little hacienda to hole up with maid service and all the tequila we can drink.”
“First we’ve got to get more baby food and diapers!”
