LITMIR.BIZ

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      Stef sank onto the floor and pulled Keely into her lap, committing to memory the tropical scent of her hair, the perfect peanut shape of her nose and the snug heaven-on-earth feel of her compact body. How could she bear losing this darling child? “Mommy’s very sad, Kee. But when I hold you everything’s better.”

      To Stef’s dismay, Keely started to sing their “I love you” song. The tears Stef had been struggling to hold back burst out in a torrent.

      She rocked Keely tightly in her arms. “I love you, too, baby. I love you, too.”

      SHE WAS CRYING.

      Mitch stiffened as his every muscle tried to deflect the sound of Stephanie Shelton’s anguished sobs. His stomach felt as if it were coated with hot tar. The only thing that made the situation bearable was the hope that she’d soon be reunited with her own lost child.

      Mitch knew what a gift a mother like her would be to that child. Everything his own mother had never been.

      He’d give Stef a few more minutes, then gently prod her into action. Time wasn’t on their side—there was no way of knowing when the kidnapper would again make contact with specific instructions for the ransom. For all they knew, whoever had switched Riana and Keely could have another plan in the works to switch them back.

      Flexing the tight muscles in his shoulders, Mitch unclipped the cell phone from his belt and punched in The Guardian’s phone number.

      “The Guardian,” G.D.’s militarily brusque voice said.

      Mitch’s lips curled in wry humor. Uncomfortable with his new boss’s curt directive to address him as sir, he’d quickly dubbed The Guardian “G.D.,” which stood for goddamn. As in goddamn he couldn’t believe he’d handed in his gun and his badge because The Guardian had asked him for assistance with this case.

      Mitch had wanted to be a detective since he was twelve, when he’d gone to live with his grandfather who worked as a janitor in the Parker Administration Building of the L.A.P.D.

      On days when Paddy’s back had pained him from his shrapnel injury—a nasty souvenir from the Korean War—Mitch would come along to pick up wastebaskets and mop the floors in the Detective Headquarters Division. He’d never thought about not being a police detective. He’d thought he’d probably drag his last breath on the streets of L.A.—a fitting way to go for the life he’d chosen.

      Mitch angled a surreptitious glance at Stef who was guiding Keely toward the bedrooms. His heart tightened at the paleness of her face and the moist path of tears on her cheek. For the first time in two years he had no doubt whatsoever that he was right where he was supposed to be.

      He could almost hear Paddy telling him to keep soldiering on. It never gets any easier, son.

      His chest filled with an echo of longing for the gruff man who’d given him the only home he’d ever known. Who’d given him clumsily wrapped Christmas presents and had taken him to Dodger games to celebrate his birthdays where he’d slipped Mitch sips of his beer. They were not the kind of memories that made sappy movies, but they were incredibly precious to a kid starved for attention.

      Mitch realized his thoughts were drifting when G.D.’s voice rumbled, “Who’s calling?”

      He snapped back into focus. “Operation Bassinet. It’s Halloran, G.D. I just spoke to Mrs. Shelton. She’s devastated, but she’s on board.”

      Concern edged The Guardian’s tone. “Is Riana okay?”

      “Right as rain. We should be back in the city tonight. By the way, the husband is dead. Two years ago. In a rock climbing accident. Think there’s anything fishy in that? It could be a coincidence, but whoever abducted Riana from the hospital knew how to rappel.”

      When Mitch had accepted the job one day after the ransom demand had been received, The Guardian had apprised him of the details of Riana’s kidnapping. The suspect was a Caucasian male who’d sneaked into the maternity postpartum wing during visitor’s hours using a stolen visitor’s badge and a hospital identification bracelet similar to those given to the new dads. He’d hidden in an unoccupied room and zapped the nurse, who’d been returning Riana Collingwood to the nursery after a late night feeding, with a stun gun.

      Within minutes the kidnapper had bound the nurse and made his escape with the baby through a hole he’d cut in the second floor window to circumvent the hospital’s state-of-the-art alarm system and the high-tech baby identification bracelets equipped with receivers.

      By the time the staff realized the Collingwood heir had been stolen, the kidnapper had been long gone.

      “I’ve already assigned some men to do a background check of the family. I’ll ask them to dig up what they can on the husband’s death. Brad Shelton would have been in a perfect position to switch the babies. If a man walked into a hospital carrying a baby, who’d question him if he walked out carrying one?”

      “We’re on the same wavelength, G.D.”

      “Will you be able to get the husband’s DNA sample?”

      “I’m on it.”

      “Excellent. We don’t want any doubts as to the identity of the child the kidnapper has. I’ll be waiting for you and Mrs. Shelton at the hotel.”

      The Guardian disconnected the call, but not before Mitch heard the distinct cry of a baby in the background and the soothing murmur of a woman’s voice.

      That was odd. He hooked his cell phone back onto his belt and went to check on Stef. Had The Guardian been with another client? Or did G.D. have a personal life?

      G.D. was a man cloaked in mystery and Mitch was determined to at least learn his name. A man who didn’t know who he was working for was a fool of an employee.

      He’d already had a buddy in L.A.P.D.’s Scientific Investigative Division lift G.D.’s fingerprints from the paper on which he’d written his ridiculously high offer to Mitch. But all he’d discovered was that The Guardian’s lily-white fingerprints weren’t on file. Figured.

      Mitch walked down the hall and found Stef and Keely in the tiny master bedroom, which was crammed with a walnut double-bed, a matching chest of drawers and a sewing machine in a cabinet. Keely was petting scraps of orange fur on the floor near the sewing machine and calling them “kitty” while Stef rummaged through the closet.

      Mitch took in the intriguing view of Stef’s jeans-clad bottom as she reached for the jumble of clothes, luggage, shopping bags and shoe boxes piled up on the closet shelf. “Careful,” he warned as Stef stood on her tiptoes and tugged on a shoe box.

      Too late.

      A landslide of shopping bags, sweaters and shoe boxes slid off the shelf in slow motion, raining down on her.

      Keely giggled and clapped her hands. “Oopsie, doopsie, all fall down, Mommy!”

      Stef rolled her eyes and Mitch heard the tears hovering in her voice. “It’s not supposed to all fall down on Mommy, Kee. Now we have a real mess on our hands.”

      Shoulders hunched, Stef plucked a royal-blue ball cap from the debris field and held it out to him, her face flooded with color that made her seem even more vulnerable. Mitch was consciously aware he was treading into no man’s land, becoming too hypersensitive to her emotions. He gave himself a mental kick in the butt.

      “Will this do? Brad wore it for company ball games.”

      Careful to allow her some dignity, he kept his gaze averted from her moist eyes and examined the inner headband of the Office Outfitter’s cap. It was stained with sweat. “This’ll do.” He gestured at the mess on the closet floor. “Since you’ve already got your luggage out, pack a bag for you and your daughter.”

      “Why?”

      Mitch made the mistake of looking at her. Her green-gold eyes were as dangerous as a riptide and fringed with long sooty lashes.

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