Читать книгу Search And Seizure - Julie Miller - Страница 11

“What am I supposed to do with it?”

The Fourth Precinct’s briefing room was generally empty on a Saturday morning. But drawn like bees to a dewy flower, a surprising number of plainclothes and uniformed officers alike had gathered around the front table. Some of them weren’t even on duty. Grown men spouted nonsense words; professional women cooed. Stories about kids and grandkids and kids some hoped to have one day filled the air like a party.

Dwight hovered near the back of the room, staying well away from the happy throng. His all-night marathon of answering questions about the baby’s mother and what the blood in his office and on the note might mean made him testier than usual. “There’s no way I’m taking it home with me.”

“He’s not an it, Dwight,” A. J. Rodriguez insisted. “His name is Tyler, and even though he’s only been around a couple of weeks, he’s still a living, breathing human being. You have to deal with him.”

“No, I don’t,” Dwight enunciated, in case there was someone on the planet who didn’t yet know just how little he wanted to be responsible for the welfare of a child. “I bought him a bag of diapers and some formula. I gave you my report and turned over all the case files you requested. The Department of Family Services is on the way to take care of the kid from here on so he’s not in any danger. If they can’t locate any family, they’ll find someone else. I’ve done my part.”

“Nice speech. But I don’t think you really believe that you can write off that kid.”

Dwight didn’t even blink. “Believe it.”

The Latino detective wore his guns, his badge and his usual cool-under-fire expression. Dwight hadn’t rattled him one bit. “If what the note says is true, that baby is the grandson of a man who murdered his wife and terrorized his family. Maybe he is in some kind of danger.”

“Then it’s a good thing I turned him over to you.”

“What happened to the bulldog prosecutor who goes to the mat for victims who don’t have the right kinds of allies? Where’s the man who had the cajones to back me up when the DA said my wife had only imagined that bastard hit man who was after her? People count on you, counselor. That baby’s counting on you.”

“That baby doesn’t know me from Adam.”

“His mother knows you.” A.J. held up the handwritten letter that had been sealed in plastic and labeled as potential evidence.

Dwight already had the desperate adolescent words memorized.

Dear Mr. Powers,

I wanted to talk to you in person, but I can’t stay any longer. It’s probably better this way. I always bawl at goodbyes.

Let me introduce you to Tyler. He was born August 2nd. I have something important to take care of, so I can’t be a mom right now. But I need to know that my son will be okay.

I don’t know how to say this so a judge will believe it, but I’m giving him to you. I remember my aunt reading an article in the newspaper a long time ago that said you had lost your son, so I figured there’d be room at your house. Please take care of him. You can change his name if you want, though I think Tyler Powers sounds pretty cool. Don’t forget to tell him how much I love him.

You saved me from Daddy when no one else could. Now I’m asking you to save my son, too.

Someday, I hope

The last sentence had been scratched out without being completed. Then the letter was simply signed

Thanks!

Your friend,

Katie Rinaldi

Dwight pulled back his jacket and splayed his fingers on his hips. He breathed deeply, trying to ease the tension that corded his shoulders and arms. Troubled as he was by the letter, the blood and the abandoned baby, he was hardly equipped to play the role of savior. “According to my files, Katie can’t be more than seventeen years old. She probably just contacted me because I’m the only attorney she knows.”

A.J. didn’t buy the argument. “She doesn’t want an attorney. She thinks you’re some kind of superhero who’s gonna save the day.”

Dwight edged toward the door when the kid began to fuss and the buzz of conversation turned to who wanted to hold the baby next. A superhero he wasn’t, not if an infant’s needy cries could turn him inside out like this.

“Hell, A.J., I barely know this girl. I prosecuted her father four years ago. Outside of my office and a few minutes in the courtroom, I’ve never even had contact with her. It doesn’t make any sense to leave the kid with me.”

A.J. pulled out his notepad and glanced at a notation. “When I ran Rinaldi’s name through the system, I found out that MODOC moved him to its mental-health facility in Fulton, Missouri, for psychiatric testing. His sentencing said he’s not to have any contact with his daughter, right? Maybe some paperwork got mixed up in the transfer or there was a glitch in supervision and he found a way to get a message to her.”

A chill of suspicion temporarily cooled Dwight’s pulse. “I just saw Warden Vaughn yesterday at a parole hearing. He would have mentioned if the Department of Corrections had had any trouble with Rinaldi.”

Unless he’d been so focused on keeping the man who’d ordered the murder of Dwight’s wife and son in prison that Ralph Vaughn hadn’t wanted to bother him with details on another prisoner. Dwight swiped a hand across his scratchy jaw. He needed a shave, a shower and a few hours of guilt-free sleep.

Yeah, right. Like that was gonna happen.

But he sucked it up, voided his own needs and gave A.J. the relevant feedback he was seeking. “It’s worth looking into, I guess. Rinaldi tried to pass himself off as some kind of Ichabod Crane in the courtroom. He tried to convince the jury that a skinny guy with glasses couldn’t possibly have committed murder. But there was something missing when you looked him in the eye. Like a conscience. It wasn’t any mild-mannered accountant who cut up his wife like that.”

A.J. dotted an I and closed his notebook. “So if this potentially crazy, definitely violent dad did somehow contact his daughter, that could spook her. Make her fear for her own life or her son’s. Make her turn to someone she trusts for protection—namely you—whether that threat was real or perceived.”

Dwight worried about the possibility of Katie Rinaldi being in danger, even as he shook off the notion that he could serve as her protector. “I’ve got issues of my own right now, A.J. I need to be out of the picture.”

“We can handle the investigation and keep tabs on Rinaldi’s activities. The mom’s already on our missing-persons list. But until we hear differently from family services, this document states that you’re the baby’s guardian.”

“That letter would never stand up in court.”

“Forget the legalities for two seconds.” A.J. thumped him in the chest. “What’s it telling you, right in here?”

Dwight absorbed the flick against his skin like a heavyweight punch. Sure, with Joe Rinaldi as a father, Katie had been given a bum deal. Her abandoned son wasn’t getting such a hot start in life, either. But Dwight couldn’t fix those kinds of problems.

“You’re killing me, A.J. Give me murderers, rapists and drug runners to deal with any day. But not that kid.” He searched for logical reasons to back up his emotional claim. “I’m forty-three. Old enough to be his grandfather. I’m single. I work hellish hours. I have enemies. He needs…” Dwight fisted his hand in a frustrated plea. But he had to say the words. “The kid needs somebody who can be a father to him. That isn’t me.”

Damn the man. A.J. never even batted an eye. “When are you gonna let go and move on, amigo?”

A vein ticked along Dwight’s jaw, the only betrayal of the emotions he held in check. “Maybe when I find something to move on to.”

“I think you just did.”

The baby cried, right on cue. And while half a dozen police officers surged forward to help, Dwight slipped out the door into the hallway. There were consequences to caring that he wanted no part of ever again.

He squeezed his eyes shut against a gruesome image that was half memory, half imagination. Had Braden cried out like that, lying in his car seat on the edge of that deserted road next to his murdered mother? Had Dwight’s son suffered any pain that fateful night? Or, like Alicia’s, had Braden’s death been mercifully quick?

“Counselor.” A.J.’s low, emphatic voice cut through the haze of guilt and grief.

He should have known his friend wouldn’t give it a rest.

“I know. Live in the present, not the past. Fill your life with meaningful work, acknowledge your fears and all that other crap.” With a little embellishment, Dwight could recite the advice he and his trauma-recovery therapist had been discussing on and off for over five years.

But recovering from grief and guilt was a hell of a long way from being recovered.

Katie Rinaldi and A.J. were asking too much of him. “Tell you what, if that kid needs legal help, I’m your man. Pro bono, no questions asked. If I can’t handle the case personally, I’ll hook him up with the best attorneys in the business. I’ll pay for his care—hell, I’ll pay for his college—if I have to.” Dwight leaned in, using his size, strength and crisp, deep voice to make his point. “But I am not letting some panicked teenage girl turn me into a daddy again. I’m not responsible for that kid—period. End of discussion.”

The screech of a metal-chair leg sliding across the floor punctuated Dwight’s closing argument and diverted his attention down the hall into the main room. Normally a bustle of activity, the baby in the conference room and the weekend hours had left the detectives’ desks practically deserted.

Except for one young, exasperated officer. “Ma’am—”

And one shapely, compelling woman who’d shoved her chair aside to pace a circle around his desk. “That’s it? He’s going to look into it?”

The detective scratched the back of his shaved head. “Captain Taylor said he’s taking it to the commissioner herself. You just have to be patient.”

The woman spun around, the fires of anger and frustration coloring her cheeks. “No, I don’t have to be patient. I’ve been patient for twenty-nine days.”

“Ma’am—”

She raked her fingers through her hair, scattering the shoulder-length waves. “I’ve been patient all my life. And where has it gotten me? Waiting here, twiddling my thumbs, while you get permission to launch an investigation. I’ve seen for myself what’s lurking out there on the streets. And a lot of it isn’t pretty. I don’t know that waiting is an option my niece has, so don’t ask me to be patient!”

Dwight wasn’t sure if it was the woman’s distress that caught his attention or the color of her hair. It was a memorable shade, like a shiny copper penny, and it fanned against her shoulders and neck. He knew that hair. The last time he’d seen it, though, it had been twisted up, under control—prim, even—not free and flowing and bouncing with every shake of her head as it was now.

Dwight rarely forgot a name, and he never forgot a face. Though the packaging was different, there was something familiar enough about the thirtysomething female that he instantly started sorting through remembered details until he could place her.

“She’s an underage girl,” the sturdy redhead went on, articulating her words in a precise, passionate voice, “out there on her own.”

“Ma’am—”

“What if she’s hurt? Or worse? You have to do something now.”

“Ma’am, I—”

“Quit ma’aming me!” Red stopped her pacing, took a deep, steadying breath, and squeezed her palms to her temples. “Oh, God, I sound like that hooker now.”

Hooker? A.J. nudged Dwight’s elbow. “Looks like Bellamy’s got his hands full.”

Dwight was still processing the details.

“I know you’re upset—” Bellamy tried again.

“You think?” The woman braced her hands against a rounded set of hips and prepped for round two of the battle she was fighting. “What does it take to get you people off your butts? What if you’re already too late to help Katie and her baby?”

Katie. Bingo.

Baby. Salvation.

The band of tension squeezing Dwight’s chest eased with the satisfaction of details finally falling into place. At the same time, a layer of guilt lifted from his conscience and he almost—almost—smiled with relief.

Though he’d never have suspected she had a mouth like that, he remembered the woman now. Four years ago, she’d worn a bland, shapeless dress instead of curve-hugging jeans and a sheer-sleeved peasant blouse. She’d been so soft-spoken and stoic on the witness stand that he’d had to ask her to speak up.

There was a fire in her now he hadn’t noticed four years ago. Or maybe it hadn’t been there. Maybe that tight clench of desperation lining her full mouth had ignited the flame inside her.

Dwight didn’t believe in coincidence, but he knew enough about how lives interconnected and twisted around on themselves to know that the Joe Rinaldi case, the baby in the conference room and this woman were all connected. Something was up. Something big. He just had to figure it all out.

And Red was going to help.

“Excuse me a minute, A.J.” Dwight was already moving toward the argument in the main room.

Some men might see a woman in need of a gallant rescue. Others might walk on by, thinking her size and attitude meant she could take care of herself. Dwight saw his chance to do right by Tyler Rinaldi without exposing himself to the emotional risk of caring for the child.

Dwight smoothed his lapels and straightened his collar as he went, donning an air of authority he wore as easily as his tailored suit. Shading his voice with a pinch of arrogance, he addressed the detective while the redhead paced away from the desk. “Is there a problem, Detective?”

Cooper Bellamy was a good three inches taller and more than a decade younger than Dwight. But the bald detective seemed relieved that backup of any sort had arrived. He offered a deferring nod. “Sir.”

“Yes, there’s a problem. I’m—” Red spun around but halted mid-charge, swallowing her words on a quick, stuttered breath “—oh, um, you.”

Though Dwight tried to see her as nothing more than a means to an end, he got caught up in the darkening tint of her deep blue eyes. Two seconds ago, she’d been circling Bellamy’s desk like a lioness in her cage. Now the energy seemed to drain from her like a popped balloon.

Her breasts heaved and a blush of color started beneath the drawstring at her cleavage and crept all the way up her neck. Her hand and Dwight’s gaze went to that same stretch of creamy, rosy skin. Despite his ill-timed fascination with the generous dimensions of her figure, he was more intrigued to see her backbone sliding into place as she overcame whatever had temporarily sidelined her and extended her hand. “Mr. Powers. You probably don’t remember me. I’m Maddie—”

“I know who you are, Mrs. McCallister.” Dwight wrapped his bigger hand around hers, liking the firmness of her grip. “You sat with Katie Rinaldi at her father’s murder trial. Offered key testimony. You stood up to his threats and helped me put him away.”

With her pale, alabaster skin, she couldn’t hide the remnants of her temper. Or was that embarrassment staining her cheeks now?

“Wow, you do remember me.” Her grip trembled before she pulled away. She tucked her hair behind her ears and offered him a wry smile. “Mrs. McCallister was my mother, though. I’m just Ms. I’m Katie’s legal guardian now.”

“Even better.”

Those blue eyes narrowed. “Better than what?”

Instead of giving her the satisfaction of a straight answer, Dwight took her by the elbow and gestured toward the conference room. “Ms. McCallister? I have someone I’d like you to meet.”

WITH A NOD TO A.J., Dwight cleared the conference room and closed the door. He hung back, leaning against the door frame to watch Maddie and Roberta Hays, the DFS caseworker, verbally duke it out. Mrs. Hays—a skinny sixtyish woman who seemed to have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed that morning—had arrived twenty minutes ago. She flashed an ID from family services and announced that she was here to take the baby.

Dwight might have been content to allow the authorities to handle the kid’s placement if he hadn’t already gone to the trouble of introducing Tyler to his great-aunt. But guilt made a mean conscience. And while he wanted nothing to do with that baby, leaving Red to fend for herself against the State of Missouri felt like abandoning a client in the middle of a case.

Aunt Maddie, as she’d called herself when picking up the boy, was a natural talent in the maternal department. She’d cried when he first told her Tyler was Katie’s son. Tears of overwhelming emotions that couldn’t be contained. Tears that turned her eyes a deep shade of midnight-blue and made him squirm with the urge to say or do something to make her pain go away.

When she’d finally smiled, caught up in her grandnephew’s bright gaze, that tight fist of discomfort inside him released its grip. Then she’d cried some more before wiping her tears and getting down to the business of tending to the infant. She’d fed him a bottle, changed his diaper and soothed the little one to sleep with a gentle, husky tune that had pricked Dwight’s nerves into an uneasy state of awareness.

Sturdy was not, perhaps, the kindest—or most apt—word Dwight could have used to describe Maddie McCallister. This more mature, more vibrant version of the plain, quiet woman he remembered filled out the curves of her jeans and gauzy blouse. Yet she wasn’t poured into them, trying to pretend she was something she wasn’t. His eyes lingered longer than they should have on the plump breast where she cradled the infant as she answered the caseworker’s questions and asked a few succinct queries of her own.

“Who else would he be?” Maddie argued. “I don’t understand why I can’t take him home with me.”

Roberta Hays tucked her spiky salt-and-pepper hair behind her ears and shrugged an apology. “It’s a matter of proper identification. DFS needs irrefutable proof that this baby is Katie Rinaldi’s son before we can turn him over to a family member.”

Maddie adjusted Tyler onto her shoulder and patted his bottom. “What kind of proof?”

“Blood tests. DNA. A birth certificate would be nice.” Mrs. Hays packed the items Dwight had purchased into the diaper bag she’d brought with her. “You’d be surprised at how desperate some people are to have a child, Ms. McCallister.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“They’ll bypass legal-adoption channels and claim abandoned babies as their own.” She continued on when Maddie would have protested the veiled accusation. “Ever since that Baby Jane Doe’s body was found in the city dump last year, the demand for babies in the Kansas City area has skyrocketed. Everybody wants to save a child.”

“Baby Jane Doe was murdered,” Maddie pointed out through clenched teeth. Was she afraid that would be Tyler’s fate, too, if she let him out of her arms? “I would think you’d be glad that people are stepping forward to accept responsibility to keep our children safe.”

“Not if it means separating a child from his real family.”

“I am Tyler’s real family.”

Roberta shrugged. “Your last name’s different, your niece isn’t here to verify—”

“Because she’s in trouble.”

“You have to admit, dear. You look suspicious.”

“What?”

Roberta shook her head, then grimaced as if even that small movement made her weary. “You’re an unmarried professional woman. Childless. A little past your prime, if you’ll pardon the expression. Your biological clock must be ticking off the wall.”

“Excuse me?” Shock and frustration colored Maddie’s skin and Dwight shifted squarely onto his feet, half obeying the urge to join the fight.

“I’m just saying you fit the profile of someone who raises a red flag when it comes to custody and adoption. It’s not a flat-out no, but our policy is to do some extra research into the prospective caregiver in a situation like this. We don’t want the legal parents to show up and have to tell them their child is gone.” Raising her hands in a placating manner did nothing to soothe Maddie’s defensive expression.

“If Katie could be here, I’d give her Tyler in a heartbeat. In the meantime, I would hope that she’d be a little less worried about whatever she’s going through if she knew her son was safe with me.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but my hands are tied. You might get a judge to rule in your favor but not until the courts open on Monday. And then you have to get scheduled on the docket and get tests done and paperwork filed. In the meantime, Tyler’s in the custody of DFS. I have to place him in temporary foster care.”

“He’s already lost his mother—for the time being,” Maddie emphasized. “He shouldn’t lose the only other family he has.”

Maddie McCallister was a fighter. But she was losing an uphill battle.

Dwight stepped forward and interrupted the debate. If his conscience dictated that he be here, he might as well be doing something useful.

“Mrs. Hays.” The older woman faced him, her hangdog expression and fatalistic tone indicating a need for lunch, sleep or, perhaps, early retirement. Dwight offered her an easy way out of having to maintain her tough stance. “As Katie’s legal guardian, Ms. McCallister has the credentials to be a qualified foster parent.”

“Of course.” Maddie’s blue eyes perked up. “I was Katie’s foster mom before the court awarded me full custody after the trial.”

Roberta was slower to catch on to his logic. “That’s all well and good, Mr. Powers, but that doesn’t prove she’s family.”

“You have to place Tyler in temporary foster care—for the rest of the weekend, at least.” He tilted his head toward Maddie. “She’s your temporary solution.”

“Well, I suppose I could call my supervisor to check Ms. McCallister’s license. If her name’s already in the system—”

“It is,” Maddie chimed in. “My foster-care license should still be valid.”

“And I’ll vouch for her personally,” Dwight stated in a deep dare-you-to-contradict-me voice that had swayed juries and now prompted a pair of deep blue eyes to gape at him in surprise.

Roberta’s skinny frame seemed to gain strength at the prospect of someone else shouldering her responsibilities while she got the rest of her Saturday off. “I suppose.” She turned to include Maddie. “The boy seems to like you, at any rate. But just until Monday. Then I will have to insist that we do everything by the book as far as any long-term placement goes.”

“Sounds like a fair compromise.” Dwight nodded his agreement.

“Yes.” Maddie’s hopeful energy eclipsed the taller woman standing beside her. “I’ll contact a judge on Monday, do blood tests, whatever you need. Thank you. I promise I’ll take good care of him.”

“You’d better.” The hint of a smile subtracted years from Roberta’s face. She glanced from Maddie to the baby, then back to Dwight before grabbing the cellphone and a pack of cigarettes from her purse. “Just let me make a couple of calls. My supervisor, Mr. Fairfax, will be out on the golf course today. It’ll take me a few minutes to track him down.”

Dwight watched the older woman scuttle past him out the door, wondering how long it would take her to place the calls and get her nicotine fix before she returned. Wondering how long it would be before he could clear this crisis from his life and get down to some serious, solitary paperwork.

“Thank you, Mr. Powers.”

Dwight dragged his attention back to Maddie. She was smiling again. Not that weary expression of relief that had marked Roberta Hays’s features but a bold, full-lipped curve of unabashed gratitude. Her azure gaze boldly held on to his from across the room, and her wide smile transformed her plain features into something remarkable. A chink in Dwight’s defensive armor scraped open, exposing the strangest desire to smile back.

But, no, that would only encourage conversations and connections. And she was too into her momness for him to be able to handle anything other than this brief, businesslike transaction.

Dwight cleared his throat, breaking the expectant silence and flattening her unanswered smile. “Well, if that’s all you need, I’m out of here. It’s been a long night.” He thumbed over his shoulder to the door. “The detectives or Mrs. Hays will answer any other questions you have. Good luck with everything.”