The Baby Thief (7 page)

But if he was careful, nothing bad would happen. He almost had enough money salted away now to move to Florida, live on a boat, and spend his days fishing. It was a dream that kept him going through a lot of dark days. And it was coming true thanks to the Reverend and his flaky little church. It wasn’t that Carmichael paid him enough to save any. He spent that little pittance going into town every once in a while. Zeke had embezzled sizable chunks of cash from the donations over the years, and Carmichael never knew. The man was a decent preacher, a great twat doctor, and quite the ladies’ man, but a real dingbat when it came to money. He’d put Zeke in charge of bookkeeping when they’d moved out to the compound so the Reverend could play God in his embryo lab. Zeke never had any formal training as an accountant, but compared to Carmichael, he was a natural. Other people’s money had always come easy to him.

Zeke crossed the bridge into Springfield, wishing they were out of town already. He looked over at the Reverend, who seemed to be praying. Zeke wouldn’t be able to relax until they reached the compound. Life in the compound had been all right for the first few years. Nice, actually, compared to jail or the crappy foster homes he’d grown up in. The church women were not exactly his type with their baggy skirts and plain faces, but after doing without for thirteen years, pussy was pussy. And the isolation had kept him away from booze and out of jail. But now the boredom was wearing him down, making him have crazy thoughts about robbing the bar in Blue River just to feel the adrenaline rush. That kind of thinking could get him in trouble faster than anything. Except maybe kidnapping. This was serious shit.

The Reverend had given him some song and dance about the woman’s rich parents and how they wanted her off heroin so badly they were willing to pay fifty thousand to have her picked up and forced into detox. The fifty grand had caught his interest. If he could filch the whole fifty, add it to the $46,932 he already had in the bank, he’d have enough to buy himself a nice boat. He could be in Florida before the Reverend even knew the money was gone. What could he do about it? Call the police? Zeke didn’t think so.

Picking up this woman changed everything. She’d seen both of them. Even though Carmichael swore on his Bible that the drugs would mess up her memory, Zeke was skeptical. An eyewitness was a ticket to the slammer. He’d learned that the hard way. Zeke had never killed anybody during a robbery, but he wished he had. It would have saved him thirteen years of hell. He couldn’t let this witness walk away. The thought of killing her revolted him, but she was a threat to his freedom, the dream he’d worked and waited a lifetime for. There was no turning back. He’d already traded her life for fifty grand.

* * *

Drowning. She’d always known it would be the worst way to die. Exhausted, Jenna struggled against a ton of water that crushed and filled her lungs. The ache was unbearable. She was losing, she knew, fading in and out as her oxygen supply dwindled. Despite years of childhood lessons, she’d never been a good swimmer and had a tenacious dread of getting into water over her head. Now she was drowning, taking her last breath in black liquid hell. A soft light above the surface beckoned and she floated upward, no longer struggling, at peace with her destiny.

For a few minutes, she floated in and out of consciousness, then finally opened her eyes and blinked at the hard metallic gray above her. The earth rolled and she braced herself to keep from falling. A sharp pain behind her eyes brought clarity. She was in the back of a moving van, not dead or drowned but alive and headed who knew where with a couple of psychopaths. For a moment Jenna longed for the serenity of darkness. Drowning was not so bad. Not compared to the images that popped into her mind with vivid, horrifying detail.

She would be raped, tortured, and killed. Why else would they take her? There was no ransom money available, no political points to be gained. Jenna’s eyes darted around frantically, but her head, which seemed to be squeezed in a vice grip, would not move. Her heart and lungs kicked into gear, pumping oxygen to her paralyzed limbs. She cringed at the merciless hammering of her heart, hundreds of bruising blows against tender ribs. Small mewling sounds escaped her throat and hot tears built up behind her eyes. Jenna had read of people dying of fright, and now she understood. Her heart would soon explode from the pressure of being all worked up with nowhere to go.

Jenna closed her eyes and thought of her mother, whose secrets she would never know, including the identity of the man who fathered her. There would be no future McClures to worry about the family tree and missing branches on one side.

The sound of her own whimpering disgusted Jenna and she fought for control. She held her breath as long as she could, then let it out slowly. She repeated the action over and over until her heart slowed and she could think somewhat rationally. The drug they’d hit her with was still in her system and Jenna had trouble focusing. She tried to move her arms and legs but couldn’t. She pressed her head slightly forward and glanced down the length of her body. Completely covered with a brown plaid blanket, Jenna couldn’t tell if she was tightly restrained or paralyzed from the drug. She willed herself to be patient, to start with her fingers and wiggle them until they responded. She’d rather die trying to save her own life than give them the satisfaction of taking it from her.

The tingling began in her lower left calf, just above an old tendon injury. Excited, she wiggled all her toes until the stinging sensation surged up through her quads. Her fingers and arms had been tingling for a few minutes, but Jenna hadn’t tried to use them yet. The pain she could handle. Discovering she was tightly bound would be devastating.

She waited until her fingers felt almost normal, then began flexing them until they lost that stiff, first-thing-in-the-morning feel. She felt around and discovered she was strapped to a homemade plywood gurney. The three straps crisscrossing her body seemed designed to stabilize rather than restrain her, and they came unbuckled easily. She moved slowly under the blanket, afraid to attract the attention of her captors.

She could hear their voices now that the buzzing in her head had cleared some. They were arguing in very controlled, almost deferential tones. A shiver ran up the back of her neck. Jenna recognized the voice of the man in the passenger seat as the one who’d shown her the map and asked for directions right before sticking her with something sharp. The driver, whom she’d barely seen before she blacked out, mumbled, “I really think you ought to get back there and secure the package.”

“Relax, Zeke, the ketamine will keep her unconscious until we reach the compound and carry her down to the clinic.”

Jenna scrunched forward as far as she could without lifting her head above the back seat and unbuckled the last strap. Pushing the blanket off, she scooted toward the back door. She knew it would be foolish to jump out while the van was cruising at what she guessed to be around fifty miles an hour, but she wanted to be ready. The route they were taking seemed to wind slowly uphill, and she hoped the van would slow down at some point for a sharp curve. Jenna suspected they were heading out Highway 126 toward Blue River, but they could have been on any one of a dozen back roads.

“What could it hurt to spend a minute tying her hands together?” the driver argued. “Drugs don’t have the same effect on everybody. We’ve seen that enough times to know better.”

The other man laughed. “I’ve never had to restrain a woman before. They usually do what I expect without argument, But I suppose you’re right. This one is different.”

Jenna heard a soft crackle of plastic and the rustle of fabric on the move. He was coming. It was now or never. She grabbed the handle and leaned against the door.

Nothing happened.

Damn!
It was locked. Jenna pushed to her knees and instantly felt dizzy. Groping blindly, she searched for the lock as the van braked and slowed for a sharp corner. She spotted a red strip near the handle and hoped it was the lock.

Suddenly his hands were on her, pulling her back. Jenna struggled pointlessly for a moment, then lunged for the back door, pressing the red knob and the handle at the same time. The door popped opened just as the van curved sharply left. Jenna fell sideways and out the back, dragging the man, who still had a grip on her shirt, with her.

The pavement jerked up and smashed into Jenna’s shoulder, an agonizing blow that left her blinking in and out of consciousness as she rolled off the road and into a drainage ditch. The chill of mountain water trickling under her back and the jagged four-inch rock pressing into her left buttock kept her from passing out. Slowly, Jenna shifted sideways. Her arms and legs were numb, and her shoulders felt as if they’d been nailed to the ground. Even the air she pulled into her lungs was heavy. The silence was overwhelming, as if time had stopped.

Slowly, Jenna eased herself into a sitting position. The blood seemed to rush from her brain, and the trees above her swayed. She let her shoulders fall forward, easing the nausea for a moment. Then she opened her eyes and noticed the blood oozing from her black Lycra running pants, which were ripped open from her hip to her knee along one side. After a few deep breaths, Jenna pushed the material aside and examined the wound, relieved to discover it was only the worst case of road rash she’d ever had. Her shoulder felt dislocated, but her legs looked okay, no bones sticking out that she could see. Jenna looked up for the first time, blinking her eyes against the bright sun that had come out of nowhere while she was unconscious in the van.

The van—oh shit—where was it?

The world around her suddenly kicked back into life. A cool breeze licked Jenna’s face, and the sound of a roaring engine filled her ears. Frantically, Jenna looked around for her assailant, hoping against all odds he’d been seriously injured in his fall from the vehicle. It was her only chance of escape. Even being an experienced runner, with a bum shoulder, she’d need a good head start to get away. She pushed herself to her knees. The sun disappeared, leaving a cool shadow on her back. Jenna looked up, and there he was.

Overcoming her fear, Jenna lurched to her feet, prepared to fight for her life. The man was a stranger, strikingly handsome, and dressed in gray slacks with a pink button-up shirt. Except for the tear in his shirt and the small smear of blood on his cheek, he looked more like an advertising executive than a psycho kidnapper. Jenna stepped back, suddenly unsure of where she was or what had happened to her.

“Don’t be frightened,” he said quietly, his blue eyes probing her mind and sensing her confusion. “I’m a doctor. Let me help you.” The man eased toward her.

“Don’t come any closer,” Jenna shouted, panic returning full force. “I don’t know who you are or what you want, but if you touch me again I’ll kick your balls so hard you’ll wish you were dead.”

He smiled and gently shook his head. “That won’t be necessary, Jenna. I don’t intend to hurt you, nor do I intend to let you hurt me. Let’s get back in the van and get you the medical attention you need.”

He knew her name. That frightened her more than anything she’d experienced yet. Jenna bolted. The searing pain in her shoulder knocked her off balance with a force equal to a hearty shove. She stumbled on her injured leg and went down with a painful thud.

The man was on her instantly, jabbing a needle into her upper arm. Jenna managed to roll over just in time to see him smile before the world went dark again.

Chapter 8

Saturday, Oct. 28, 4:05 p.m.

Elizabeth hummed softly to herself as she tossed a small vial of sperm in the trash. The sample had DNA markers for muscular dystrophy. No need to test it further.

She tried not to think about the dozen things that could have gone wrong with the kidnapping. There had to be a problem, or David would have called like he promised as soon as he got back to the compound. Had he and Zeke been arrested?

No. She refused to even consider it.

Elizabeth forced herself to concentrate on her work. If she didn’t find a suitable donor soon, the whole plan would be jeopardized. Fortunately, using polymerase chain reaction and a DNA thermal cycler, she could test potential fathers for chromosomal abnormalities and single-gene defects in a matter of hours. The sperm had already been screened by the clinic for AIDS and other infectious diseases, then categorized by physical description and abilities. Elizabeth was limiting her search to donors who were blue-eyed, artistic, and intelligent. She was determined to find the perfect father, genetically superior in every way. Her only limitation was time. She had only a week left.

Why hadn’t David called? She should have heard from him hours ago. Had they been delayed? Were they still following McClure and waiting for a better opportunity?

Elizabeth got up from the counter and headed for her office, the acid in her empty stomach churning into a fiery knot. David better have a damn good reason for not letting her know what was going on, she thought for the hundredth time. He knew how important this was to her. She opened the freezer unit and reached for a vial of sperm. It was the last of the batch she’d recently smuggled out of the Assisted Reproduction Clinic, an extension of the hospital, where she acted as a consultant two mornings a week in addition to her position as director of genetic science.

It was ridiculous to be this anxious this early in the process, she chided herself. Even after McClure was secured and sedated in the compound, Elizabeth still had to get through a week of waiting for her sister to ovulate. That was the easy part. The two weeks following the egg transfer would be the worst, when she was crossing her fingers and hoping her pregnancy test would be positive. If the transfer didn’t take, the entire perilous endeavor would have been for nothing. She had to relax or her nerves wouldn’t make it.

Elizabeth shook her head at the irony. She’d never been really relaxed in her whole life, not since she was a child, before her mother died. Even her marriage had been stressful, with John pressuring her to put her career on hold and get pregnant right away. Then months of trying and not being able to conceive, followed by the devastating discovery that she couldn’t.