Stork Alert (9 page)

“What would Denny Russell have been doing here at the ranch?” Nick asked her.

She shrugged. “Maybe checking on me. But he didn’t say anything about driving out here.”

It wasn’t unreasonable that a friend would want to keep an eye on Kelly. But what bothered Nick was the secretive way he’d gone about it. “Do you trust him?”

“Of course,” she said without hesitation. “He was my husband’s former partner and friend. He’s helped me out a lot since Louis’s death. Besides, if you’re thinking Denny’s behind these kidnapping attempts, he has no reason to do that to me.”

“Oh, he had a reason,” Nick concluded. “He might kidnap you to keep you away from me.”

She opened her mouth, probably to protest that, but she slowly closed it. “Eric is our suspect. Not Denny.”

“But Eric’s not working alone. Someone is helping him.”

“What about Cooper?” she fired back. “Do you trust him?”

“Not anymore,” Nick admitted. He shifted a squirming William so he could do a computer search of Cooper’s recent files.

Kelly kissed Joseph’s cheek and began to rock him. “And then there’s Paula and Todd, the visitors who were here just a little while ago.”

Nick stared at her. “You think those two bandanna-wearing gunmen were Paula and Todd?”

“I just don’t know. Do you trust them?” Kelly countered.

Nick debated how much he should tell her, and he decided she needed to hear this. Especially since it might be
this
that had precipitated the attacks.

He got up and shut the door. “Paula and Todd are Justice Department agents. And I’m helping them find evidence that they can use against Eric.”

Judging from the way she sucked in her breath, she hadn’t expected him to admit that. “How long has this been going on?”

“Weeks. But things escalated the night of the party. The night you were here. Eric’s former secretary, Rosalinda, showed up and told me that she would help me find solid proof that I could use to have Eric arrested.”

“And you believed her?”

“Yes. Eric’s also her former lover. He dumped her for another woman. I think she’d do just about anything to get back at him.”

Kelly shook her head. “And Eric might be willing to do anything to stop her. Do you think he found out she’d visited you?”

“Maybe. I try to keep security tight here, but after what happened today, I wonder if I have any security at all.” That would change. By the end of the day, he’d have a complete overhaul of the system.

That would likely include a new security manager.

“Who knows that you’re helping the Justice Department?” Kelly asked.

“Paula, Todd, their boss, you and me. Needless to say, I don’t want anyone else to find out.”

The phone buzzed, and Nick shifted William again so he could hit the speaker function.

“Rosalinda McMillan will be here in a few minutes,” Esther informed him. “She was already on her way to the ranch to talk to you. Sheriff Cross is here, as well. He wants to speak to both of you.”

“Send him to my office,” Nick instructed. Hopefully, he’d be done with the sheriff before Rosalinda arrived.

“I will. One more thing—Ms. Manning has a call from Denny Russell on line two.”

Nick looked at her, to see what she wanted to do. Kelly didn’t eagerly grab the phone. In fact, she hesitated. Then she finally reached over and pressed the button for line two.

“Denny,” she greeted.

“I tried your cell phone, but you’ve turned it off. Is everything okay?”

She groaned softly and rubbed her hand over her face. “It’s not a good time to talk.”

“Well, you’ll want to hear this. I just got back the first set of preliminary test results, and you were right. You’re William’s mother.”

There it was. The truth. The DNA test had only proven what Kelly had felt deep within her soul.

William was her baby.

Her heart filled with love and joy, but her stomach sank with loss and grief. She’d lost the first year with her baby, but if she’d had that year, she wouldn’t have become Joseph’s mother.

And she
was
his mother.

He was as much her son as William was, she thought as she disconnected the call.

“I’ll give you some time,” Nick said, standing. “Besides, I need to talk to the sheriff.”

Kelly needed to do the same. At the least, she’d have to give a statement. Heaven knew how long that would take. She didn’t want to spend one moment with the sheriff. She wanted to hold her babies and sit down with Nick so they could come to terms with what they’d just learned.

“William will always be my son,” he mumbled and headed for the door.

Greta was there, waiting, and she took William from him. The woman’s gaze met Kelly’s. “I’ll watch them both while you talk to the sheriff,” she offered.

Kelly nodded, followed her to the nursery and deposited Joseph on the floor so he could play. Greta did the same with William. The two boys played together happily. Side by side.

Her babies.

One brief glance at Nick, though, and Kelly knew it would be a huge fight to claim her biological son. And Kelly wasn’t even sure she had the right to do that. Nick was the only father William had known. He’d been a good father, too. Did she have a right to try to take William away from him? Perhaps not. But that wouldn’t stop her. She couldn’t imagine a life without a child she’d carried and given birth to, just as she couldn’t imagine a life without Joseph.

Nick didn’t say a word as they made their way to his office. But he broke his silence to introduce Kelly to Sheriff Clayton Cross. He wasn’t exactly what Kelly had been expecting. With a name like his, she’d thought the small-town Texas sheriff would be more of a cowboy. He wasn’t. He wore khakis, shoes, not boots, and there wasn’t a Stetson in sight.

“Nick, Ms. Manning,” he greeted. “I suspect you’re both upset, maybe even in shock right now. Are either of you hurt?”

Kelly shook her head, hoping Sheriff Cross didn’t expect her to speak. In the past hour someone had tried to kill her and she’d learned that William was her child. She was well past simply being upset.

“My deputies are checking out the area now,” the sheriff continued. “I’m going to join them after I’m done here. We might get lucky and find some evidence that can help us identify these guys. While I’m going over the grounds with them, I’d like both of you to write down an account of what happened. I’ll read them, and if I have any questions, I can call you later today.”

“Thanks.” Nick shook the man’s hand, and the sheriff made a quick exit.

Kelly considered his exit a gift. Nick and she had to talk about what Denny had told her. But she didn’t get a chance to even start the conversation because she heard the voice over the intercom.

“Rosalinda McMillan is here,” Esther said. “She wouldn’t wait in the sitting room as I asked her to do. She’s on the way back to your office. And she doesn’t seem to be in a very good mood.”

“Great,” Nick mumbled.

“There’s more,” the housekeeper continued. “Cooper called. He said he has an important meeting and he won’t be back until morning.”

This time Kelly mumbled, “Great.” Just when they needed him most, the security guy wasn’t around.

There was a knock at the door.

Kelly groaned softly and sank down into the chair across from his desk.

“This won’t be a long visit,” Nick promised her.

Good. Even though Kelly knew this meeting would be important, so was the conversation that she needed to have with Nick.

He opened the door, and a tall, leggy brunette came rushing into the room. The housekeeper was right. Rosalinda McMillan was not in a good mood. Her eyes were red and swollen, and she looked as if she’d just had a long cry.

“Eric has someone following me,” she announced. Then her attention landed on Kelly. She became even more agitated. “Who is that?”

“Kelly Manning,” Nick introduced, lifting his hand in her direction. “She wants Eric behind bars, too, so anything you can say to me, you can say to her.”

“Really?” There was skepticism and distrust in Rosalinda’s body language and tone.

Kelly nodded and made direct eye contact with the woman. “I believe Eric wants me dead.”

Rosalinda shrugged. “And that’s the reason I should just trust you?”

“No. You should trust me because we both want and need the same thing—to stop Eric. If we don’t, he’s going to hurt a lot of people. He’s not only put Nick’s and my life in danger, he’s endangered my baby.” Kelly waited until she saw the resignation and maybe even a little empathy in Rosalinda’s expression. “You said that Eric had someone following you. Did the person follow you here, as well?”

“No. But I’ve been driving around for the past hour, just so I could lose the guy.” Rosalinda touched a rumpled tissue to her nose. “I think Eric knows that I’m looking for evidence against him. And he’s put some kind of eavesdropping equipment in my car and house. I can’t find any bugs—I’ve looked—but I’m positive they’re there. That’s why I didn’t want to tell you this on the phone.”

Nick gave a heavy sigh. “What makes you think all of this?”

“Eric called me,” she explained. “He didn’t come out and say that he knew I was looking for evidence, but he made references to some casual phone conversations I’d had with friends. Then he threatened me. He reminded me of a confidentiality agreement I’d signed when I went to work for him. He said if I talked to anyone, that he would sue me or something.
Or something,
” Rosalinda repeated. “You and I both know what that
something
is.”

“Then, it’s too dangerous for you to continue to help me,” Nick insisted.

Kelly added her own mental sigh of frustration. That wasn’t what they wanted to hear, but she knew why he’d told Rosalinda McMillan that. Eric would kill her if he found out she was betraying him, and neither Nick nor Kelly wanted this woman’s death on their hands.

“I need some kind of protection from Eric,” Rosalinda continued.

Nick nodded. Just a nod. And with that same heavy look on his face, he called someone he didn’t identify by name and asked the person to come to the ranch to assist with witness protection for Rosalinda.

Because Kelly was watching him so closely, she saw his body language change. His jaw muscles tightened. He didn’t say anything to the person on the other end of the line, but Kelly was positive he’d just heard more bad news.

“Thank you for arranging that,” Rosalinda said when he finished the call. She obviously hadn’t picked up on Nick’s body language.

Nick waited a moment, as if trying to shake off the effects of that call. “Someone shot at Kelly and me a little while ago. By any chance, do you know anything about that?”

Rosalinda frantically shook her head. “No. Why would you think I did?”

“Just covering all bases,” Nick assured her.

“It was Eric’s men who tried to kill you, wasn’t it?” she asked.

“Probably. But I don’t have any proof.”

She flattened her hand on her chest. “God, what have we gotten ourselves in to?”

“You’ll be fine,” Nick promised.

Kelly wondered if that was true. Had Nick learned something about the shooting from the caller?

“But you won’t,” Rosalinda concluded. “Eric despises you. He’ll look for any excuse to come after you and kill you.”

Because Nick didn’t respond to that, Kelly stood and took the lead. “If you think of anything we can use against Eric, please call Nick.”

Rosalinda nodded, and the tears started again.

“Why don’t you wait in the sitting room?” Nick suggested. “The people who’ll be handling your protection will be here soon, and Kelly and I have to do incident reports for the sheriff.”

“Of course,” she said, her voice trembling as she walked out.

Nick shut the door, leaned against it and cursed like a sailor.

“This has been a hell of a day,” he grumbled.

“And it’s not over,” she reminded him.

He looked at her, and a thousand things passed between them unsaid but fully understood.

“The incident reports can wait,” Kelly whispered. “So can whatever you just learned from that phone call. We need to address what Denny told us.”

He pulled in a long breath, walked back to his desk and sat on the edge it, directly across from her so that their legs were practically touching. Kelly didn’t let the physical contact cloud her mind. This was too important.

“Before you say anything,” she started. “I think you should know that I sent both William’s and your DNA to the lab to be tested.”

She watched his intense gray eyes as that registered. “The water glass I used in your kitchen. You sent it to the lab.”

She nodded.

“Hell.”

That was it. His only verbal reaction. But they both knew that she would soon know the full truth.

“Well?” she prompted.

He reached out and slid his hand over hers. “We’re past the point of lies. But in this case, the truth isn’t going to set us free.” He paused. “It’s true.”

Kelly’s heart began to race out of control. “What’s true?” She didn’t want to assume anything here. She wanted it all spelled out.

“Everything you suspected. William is your son. And Joseph is mine.”

She didn’t have time to react to that because Nick continued.

“There’s more. The Justice Department found out that someone hacked into the computer files of the lab you used about two hours ago and copied all the results of the DNA tests.”

Each word felt like a fist pounding against her heart. “Oh, God.”

“Yeah,” Nick whispered. “Oh, God.”

M
ORE THAN THE NUMBNESS
and the bone-deep exhaustion, the number-one thing Nick felt was fear. Hell, it was hard for him to admit that, even to himself. He’d spent his life trying to be fearless. But this wasn’t fear for himself.

This was fear for Kelly and their sons.

Because Nick knew that once Eric had proof of Joseph’s paternity, he wouldn’t just go after the child, Eric would go after all of them.

He glanced at Kelly, who was staring at her dinner plate. Actually, she was pushing food around with her fork. “You should eat,” he reminded her.

She glanced at his own full plate—a perfectly grilled medium-rare t-bone, baked potato and spinach salad—and lifted her eyebrow.

“I’m not hungry, either,” Nick said.

She stood, tossed her napkin onto the table. “I’m going to check on the boys.”

Fatigue and worry was apparent throughout her entire body. Especially her eyes. But then, it’d been the day from hell.

Nick stood, too, tossing his napkin next to hers, and followed Kelly to the nursery. She opened the door slowly and peeked inside. Both boys were sleeping in their cribs, which had been moved practically side by side. Greta wasn’t with them, but he knew she was no doubt within earshot of the baby monitor. The woman believed in being on the job twenty-four/seven.

“I want to stay in here with them for a while,” Kelly whispered.

Nick nodded, went to the monitor and let Greta know that Kelly and he would do baby duty for a while. He clicked off the device so they’d have some privacy.

“I’m waiting for you to yell at me,” Nick said, keeping his voice low so that it wouldn’t wake up the babies. “After all, I did lie to you about the DNA results.”

Kelly sat on the floor, her back against the wall. “This lie is acceptable. You did it for all the right reasons. To protect us.”

Surprised and pleased that there wouldn’t be an argument and that they might get some down time, Nick sat next to her. She didn’t object and didn’t give him an uncomfortable look when his arm brushed against hers. In fact, she leaned against him, putting her head on his shoulder.

“You have a generous attitude about my lie,” Nick told her.

“
Generous?
Right. I won’t mention all the unkind thoughts I had when I realized you hadn’t told me the truth.”

He frowned. “How unkind?”

“You don’t want to know.” She paused, glanced at him.

That glance and slight turn of her head put them even closer. Practically breath to breath. Nick didn’t move away.

“Once I got past the unkind thoughts, I remembered something important,” she continued. Her voice was silky now, and she didn’t take her gaze from his. “You’ve been a good father to my son. I’ve been a good mother to yours.”

He couldn’t disagree with that. “You’ve been a fantastic mother.”

She blushed and fought back a smile. Then she shrugged. “Of course, despite all this good parenthood talk, we’ve already said we aren’t going to give up the child we’ve raised. That leaves us…where?”

“Between a rock and a hard place,” Nick grumbled.

She chuckled, but it was laced with fatigue. “So many questions and no answers. We’re dealing with custody issues, Eric and lots of people we can’t trust.”

Among other things.

Nick leaned over and kissed her. It wasn’t long. Just a few seconds. Just enough time to give her a physical reminder of their biggest obstacle.

“Oh, and the lust,” Kelly added. Her voice wasn’t just silky, it was hot liquid. “We’re dealing with that, too.”

Nick liked the sound of her voice, and he liked the flush of arousal on her cheeks.

“You’d forgotten about it?” he accused. Nick ran his tongue over his bottom lip and had the pleasure of tasting her there.

“Hardly. I can’t get my mind off you.”

Nick stared at her. “You’re admitting that?”

“Why not? I’ve blabbered about everything else including my lack of sexual experience.”

She had at that, and during that particular conversation, she’d mentioned something that’d snagged his interest. “You said your husband was the only man you’d slept with. Why?”

“Well, since his death, there just hasn’t been time or anyone I wanted to be with.”

“I can understand that, but you’re an attractive woman. What about before you met your husband?”