LITMIR.BIZ

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Of course, they’ll have to get legal custody.” She let it drop there. She’d miscalculated twice already—once in delivering the baby during a party and next in assuming that the Johnsons wouldn’t report the baby. She’d simply assumed they’d enfold the child into the bosom of their family. In that she’d been wrong.

      “Is something the matter?” Susie asked.

      Lily instantly smiled. “Of course not. Everything’s just like I said it would be. Now you have to concentrate on getting up and moving. We have to get you out of the city, Susie.”

      The woman turned her face away. “And go where? He’ll find me. He said it didn’t matter where I went, he’d always find me. And he’d make me pay.”

      Lily felt the bracing power of anger. “He can say anything he wants, but he isn’t omnipotent. He doesn’t control Washington. I’ll get you out of this town. There’s a big world out there, Susie. And there’re lots of nice people, too. Like you.”

      “He has his finger in every pie in town. Half the police force seems to be on his private payroll.”

      Lily felt dread course through her body. Mel Haskin. The word on the street was that Mel couldn’t be bought. But the old saying was that every man had his price. If Mel ever got a hint of who baby David really was, disaster would surely follow.

      “Look, Susie. Don’t worry about that now. Rest. I’ve got to go to the newspaper and finish a story. I’ll come back with some food and then you’re going to get up and walk. Remember. That’s what the midwife said. Walk, walk, walk. But wait for me, okay?”

      “Why are you doing this? If Wayman finds out you helped me, he can make your life a living hell.” Her voice broke. “If there’s any life left in you. He’ll kill you, Lily.”

      “He won’t find out.” Lily wiped the tear away from Susie’s cheek. She was so weak, so beaten down. The trace of a bruise still lay under the skin of her cheek. What had it been, a week ago that Wayman Bishop had thrown his nine-months-pregnant wife into a wall because his coffee got cold before he drank it?

      “He’s so mean.” Her voice was barely a whisper.

      “I can be mean, too. If I have to.” She smiled and patted Susie’s head. “I know judo, karate, and I won the kick-boxing championship. Lemme at ’im.”

      Her bravado was rewarded with a weak smile from Susie. “I wish I was half as brave as you are.”

      “You are, Susie. You saved your baby. That took incredible courage. You gave that little boy a chance for a life of love, even though it meant you had to lose him.”

      “Wayman would have ruined him. He would have beaten him, or he would have turned him into a mean bully. Either way, I couldn’t stand it.”

      “Hush now. Just rest. I’ll be back in no more than two hours.”

      THE HOUSE is settling down for a much-deserved nap. Even Clotilde is yawning, but I can see that she has something on her mind. There’s one thing about cats—once they focus in on something, there’s no stopping them. I’ve seen foolish humanoids attempt to train a cat to stay off a counter. Newspaper, water pistols—hah! Tools of an incompetent! There is nothing that can dissuade a cat. The only thing to do is to remove whatever object has drawn the cat’s interest. Voila—problem solved.

      Unless, of course, the cat just happens to enjoy toying a bit with the bipeds in the house. That’s been known to happen more than once. And then there are those cats who worry about their humanoids. Like Clotilde. I can tell by her twitching tail that she’s in a twist.

      “What is it, Clotilde, my love?

      “You’re worried about your humans? You think they’ll fall in love with baby David and then he’ll be taken away from them?

      “You want me to do what?”

      Geez, I’ve just come off a case, and now she wants me to track down the humanoid who gave birth to baby David. That isn’t going to be an easy thing to do. Women who dump babies generally don’t want to be found. And already Detective Dick Tracy is on the case. Boy, did he have an attitude or what? I could see it from a mile off. Every time he looked at that baby he got righteous.

      Yet he seemed to have a real tender spot. Maybe he just didn’t want to work an abandoned baby case. Probably a step down for a homicide detective. Me, on the other hand, I like it when all the players in the game are still alive.

      But who says the mother is alive? Holy moly, what if she was murdered and the baby taken and then dumped? I can see that Clotilde is reading my expression and not liking a single thing she sees. Humanoids think that I’m inscrutable, but Clotilde can read me like a book. So I’d better change the content of my thoughts.

      “Nothing, love. I was just thinking about how to find David’s mama. The blanket and basket are good clues. Dick Tracy noticed them also. And he took them with him when he left. If I wait around, he’ll do the legwork for me….

      “What, precious? You want me to start tonight—before the police find her? And you’re going to help me?!”

      Aye caramba—why do I suddenly feel like Ricky Ricardo when Lucy decided to help him with his career? But the best thing to do is smile and play along.

      “That would be great. We could work together. Familiar and Clotilde. Yes, that does have a nice ring to it.”

      Brother, I’m in way deep now. I guess we’re going out to search the backyard for additional clues.

      MEL CLOSED the files on his desk with a sigh. Within the time frame he’d established, he couldn’t find a single record of a baby of David’s size and gender born in any of Washington’s hospitals that wasn’t accounted for.

      So that meant a midwife or some other type of health-services delivery. Private clinic. He’d heard of places where wealthy women went to have their children; places with all the frills of a health spa plus the benefit of top physicians. Lots of celebrities opted for these exclusive, and very private, facilities.

      Or there was the possibility of the extreme opposite—cheap hotel room and midwife. Somehow, though, that just didn’t fit with baby David.

      This case was going to take a lot of legwork. And, suddenly, he didn’t want to pursue it. Hell, the baby had a good home. He was safe and wanted. If the system acted in a logical way, David would soon legally be David Johnson, only child of loving parents.

      Maybe he should drop it.

      Sitting in the busy police station, Mel looked down at his scarred desk. When he’d been three or four, he’d eaten at a table that was nicked and scarred. Him and six dozen other boys. They’d eaten three meals a day there, even when money was short and the food served was oatmeal—morning, noon and night.

      It wasn’t the food that Mel remembered with a clenched stomach. It was the long nights of being afraid, of wondering if his mother would come for him. She’d promised him that she’d come back for him. Soon. But weeks had passed. Then months. Then years. And she never came back.

      He’d never seen her again. She was just a memory—a tall, slender woman walking down the hallway, her legs moving as fast as they possibly could as she hurried away from him. As she got near the end of the hallway, she’d begun to run—right into her new life. Leaving him behind. An orphan. A child that no one wanted.

      No, he couldn’t drop it. Not on his life.

      “Hey, Mel. What’s going on?” Sonny Caruso dropped his coat on the chair by the desk next to Mel.

      “Not much.”

      “You looked like you were planning a bombing, or at least a hijacking. Very big thundercloud on your forehead, buddy.”

      Mel forced a smile. Sonny Caruso was a handsome, dark-haired detective who had more natural intuition that most women. And the one thing Mel didn’t want was Sonny poking into his past.

      “Got

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