Читать книгу Dylan and the Baby Doctor - Sherryl Woods, Sherryl Woods - Страница 9

Even as the words came out of his mouth, even as he mentally tried to justify them, Dylan cursed himself for the impulsive suggestion that he and Kelsey team up. Wasn’t it enough that he was already operating cheek-by-jowl with a sheriff? Now he wanted to add an amateur into the mix. He was breaking every one of his long-standing, ironclad rules tonight.

Maybe it was because she’d purposely baited him, deliberately tried to establish boundaries. Hell, he liked boundaries. Loved them. And now he was pushing at them as if he couldn’t wait to see them topple.

Oh, he recognized it for what it was. It was a male-female thing and this was definitely not a male-female situation. This was a job and he did not involve amateurs, especially clients, in his work. They lacked skill and objectivity, damned dangerous shortages. There went another hard-and-fast rule. Obviously, he’d lost it. He figured it had to be the eyes. He was a sucker for sad, sea-green eyes.

Truthfully, though, Kelsey didn’t seem any more pleased by the idea than he was. In fact, she looked shocked.

“What do you want me to do?” she asked, regarding him with justifiable wariness.

He decided to back off in a hurry, just for the moment, not as if he were running scared, but just to establish a few of his own boundaries. There were things she could do to help…just not in the same place he was heading.

“Right now I’m going to the police station to run some checks. I want you to sit tight here. Make a list of questions to ask your ex when he calls. If he puts Bobby on the line, even for a second, ask what he’s had to eat. Maybe he’ll say something about a burger place we can trace or maybe he’ll mention a specific diner. Ask what the room looks like or what he can see. Kids notice more than we give them credit for. And in case your husband is listening, try to make it sound as if you’re just interested in hearing how Bobby’s getting along. Know what I mean?”

Chin up, she nodded. “I think so. Post-preschool conversation, right? The sort of thing we’d talk about over milk and cookies?”

“Bingo. You catch on quick.”

“Believe me, I am highly motivated.” For an instant she looked lost again and very, very frightened. “I can’t mess this up. I just can’t.”

Dylan tried to steel himself against the sympathy he was feeling. Still, he couldn’t seem to prevent himself from giving her hand a reassuring squeeze. “You won’t. You’re doing fine, Kelsey.”

She was, too. He was impressed with her despite himself. She was bright and tough. Love for her son, concern for him, radiated from her, but she hadn’t allowed herself to give in to hysterics except for that one brief moment after her ex-husband’s call. Nor was she giving in to Dylan’s pressure to reveal whatever secret she was determined to keep. He didn’t like it, but he had to admire her tenacity in clinging to whatever misguided principle she felt was so important.

He figured, though, that he’d gotten everything from her he could for the moment. He needed some distance to sort through what he’d learned, put it into perspective, and maybe get some cold, hard facts about Paul James from the computer at the sheriff’s office.

“Want me to clear out some of these people before I go?” he asked.

She shook her head. “They just want to help. Lizzy will get them out later.”

Another woman who could manage a small nation if she put her mind to it, he thought wryly. Lizzy had the Adams strength, as well as the family’s fierce loyalty and protectiveness. He was definitely leaving Kelsey in good hands.

He ripped a piece of paper from his notebook and jotted down his beeper number. “If anything turns up, if you get another call, if you think of something, or if you just need to talk, call me.”

She took the paper, holding it as tightly as if it were a lifeline. “Thank you.”

“Get busy on those questions,” he reminded her. “Be ready, in case he calls back.”

“I will.”

Dylan found himself fighting an odd reluctance to go. He knew there were better uses for his time, but he wanted to stay right here, offer whatever comfort he could. But Kelsey didn’t need comfort from him. She needed his help in finding her son.

“I’ll be in touch,” he said and headed for the door, tucking his notebook into his back pocket as he went.

At the small but well-equipped sheriff’s office, he was greeted by the dispatcher, who’d clearly been expecting him.

“Justin said you could use anything you need,” Becky told him. “The computer’s in his office. We’ve got several lines, so you won’t be tying things up if you need to make calls. Don’t worry about charges since you’re making ’em as part of a case we’re handling. You need anything, holler. There’s coffee in here by me. It’s strong and there’s plenty of it.”

“Thanks. I think I will have a cup. It could be a long night.”

She poured it into a mug and handed it to him, then grinned. “Part of the service this time. After this, you’re on your own.” She winced as the radio screeched static. “Whoops! Got to go. I swear Billy Ray does that just to shoot my nerves to hell.”

Dylan went into Justin’s office and settled into the chair in front of the computer. He flipped through his notebook until he found the instructions Justin had given him for logging on. For the next few hours, he searched for any trace of Paul James, any mention of him no matter how insignificant. Credit information showed a man who paid his bills, mostly on time. He had no police record. There were no mentions of him in the Miami press.

He got on the phone and called a contact who could trace any credit-card activity. He woke the man out of a sound sleep, but by dawn he had a callback. Paul James wasn’t using his credit cards, at least not so far. His last charge had been made a week ago, in Miami. He’d bought three new suits on sale at an upscale department store.

“Anything?” Justin asked, coming in and dropping wearily into the chair opposite Dylan. He looked as bad as Dylan felt.

Dylan shook his head. “Nothing. The credit-card trace was a bust, though I have to wonder why a man who planned on kidnapping his son would go out and buy three expensive new suits.”

“Maybe he figured his next shopping trip would be a long time coming,” Justin suggested.

“Or the sale was just too good to pass up,” Dylan said lightly.

Justin’s expression turned thoughtful. “Almost sounds like a man who doesn’t intend to be gone all that long, doesn’t it?”

“He can’t be planning to take his son back to Miami,” Dylan protested. “He’d go straight to jail for violating the custody agreement.”

“Right. So, either he is just trying to scare Kelsey, or he wants something from her, or we’re dealing with a nutcase who has no intention of taking his son anywhere except away from his mother.”

“To punish her,” Dylan said, following Justin’s logic with a sick feeling in his gut. “I hope to heaven you’re wrong about that.”

“So do I,” Justin said. “So do I.”

“Kelsey, you have to get some sleep,” Lizzy said at dawn.

“I can’t. As long as I don’t know where Bobby is, I can’t sleep. What if he calls again?”

“I’ll wake you,” Lizzy promised.

“No. I don’t know how Paul will react if someone else answers the phone. He might hang up. He might get angry and hurt Bobby.”

“I just don’t see him hurting Bobby,” Lizzy countered. “That hasn’t been his pattern, Kelsey. It’s the one thing I don’t think you need to worry about.”

“I can’t help it. He sounded so edgy before. If he’s been out of pills for a couple of days, he’s probably in withdrawal. People do crazy things when they’re coming down, things they otherwise might not do. Even the fact that he took Bobby in the first place is out of character. Paul never broke a law in his life until he got hooked on the painkillers. I never even saw him jaywalk. Heck, he’d dash two blocks just so his parking meter wouldn’t run out. On the rare occasions when he got a parking ticket, he paid it the same day. Now he’s violating a court order. That’s the pills at work.”

Already jittery from nerves and lack of sleep, she jumped when the phone rang. She snatched it up. “Bobby? Is that you?”

“Sorry,” Dylan said. “It’s just me. I wanted to check in.”

“Oh,” she said, sighing heavily.

“Anything happening over there?”

“Nothing.”

“Did you get any sleep?”

“Not a wink.”

“Kelsey, you’re not going to do Bobby any good if you collapse. If you don’t want to go to bed, at least nap on the sofa for a bit.”

“I can’t,” she said simply. “Have you found anything?”

“Not yet, but I will,” he said with reassuring confidence. “You just hang tight. Is Lizzy still there?”

“Yes.”

“Let me talk to her a second, okay?”

Kelsey handed the phone to Lizzy, then listened openly to her end of the conversation. Lizzy’s gaze settled on her and she nodded several times, murmuring agreement to whatever Dylan said. Kelsey figured she was the primary topic of conversation.

“I’ll try,” Lizzy promised before hanging up.

“I suppose you’re to try to get me to get some sleep,” Kelsey said.

“He has a point. I was saying the very same thing before he called.”

“I can’t sleep,” Kelsey protested.

“I could give you something.”

“Absolutely not,” Kelsey said, horrified. After all, it was pills that had gotten them where they were now. The tranquilizer she had agreed to take the night before was one thing, but sleeping pills were another. Add in something to wake her back up again and she’d be on a roller-coaster. Who knew where it would end up? She could be in worse shape than her ex.

“You’re not going to get hooked like Paul,” Lizzy said, as if she’d read her mind.

“How do you know?”

“Because you don’t have the same kind of obsessive personality he has.” Lizzy clasped her shoulders and gazed into her eyes. “Sweetie, you need some sleep. If and when Paul does call again, you have to be thinking clearly. You can’t be all strung out with exhaustion.”

“And I can’t be groggy with sleep, either.”

Lizzy uttered a sigh of resignation. “Okay, at least go take a nice, warm bath.”

Kelsey didn’t want to leave the phone for a second, but she could see the sense in Lizzy’s suggestion. A bath might relax some of the tension. And she would feel better in some fresh clothes, more in control.

“Okay,” she agreed. “But I’ll take the portable phone up with me.”

Once she got upstairs, she considered taking a nice, invigorating cold shower instead, but the lure of a bath was more than she could pass up. She filled the tub with bubbles and sank into it up to her chin. The scent of lilacs, a distant memory from childhood summers in Maine, surrounded her. The water felt wonderful lapping gently against her skin. Her eyes drifted closed.

A soft tap on the bathroom door snapped her awake. Glancing down, she had just noticed that the bubbles were also a distant memory now, when the door inched open and Dylan poked his head in.

“You okay in here?” he asked, his gaze settling on her face for an instant, then drifting down.

Kelsey felt her nipples pucker under the intensity of his stare. A gentleman would have turned away, but he seemed to be frozen in place. There was enough heat in his gaze to warm the now-chilly bathwater. She couldn’t seem to muster up the required indignation. Finally, he swallowed hard and backed out.

“I’ll be out here when you’re dressed,” he said, his voice sounding choked.

As if her brain had finally clicked into gear, it registered that he wouldn’t be there unless something had happened. Kelsey scrambled from the tub. Without bothering to dry herself, she pulled on a heavy terry-cloth robe and belted it as she flung open the door. Dylan was standing guard just outside, leaning against the wall.

“Why are you here? What’s happened?” she demanded, standing toe-to-toe with him.

He put his hands on her shoulders. “Shh,” he soothed. “It’s okay. Nothing’s happened. I just came over to relieve Lizzy for a bit. She said she’d sent you up to take a bath. When you didn’t come back down, I thought I’d better check on you.”

“Are you sure that’s all?” she asked, still shaky.

“That’s all. I swear it. If we find out something, I’ll tell you,” he promised, his gaze locked with hers. “I won’t hide anything.”

“Even if it’s bad?” she insisted.

He nodded. “Even if it’s bad.”

She believed him. There was something in his expression, something in the way he held her that made her believe that Dylan Delacourt would never lie to her. She had the feeling he was the kind of man who told the unvarnished truth, even when it was painful. She found that reassuring.

“Sorry I overreacted,” she apologized.

“Sorry I intruded on your bath,” he said, though the glimmer in his eyes suggested otherwise.

Disconcerted by the attraction that was totally inappropriate given the circumstances, Kelsey backed up a step. Dylan allowed his hands to fall away from her shoulders. She almost regretted that, but she faced him squarely.

“You look like hell,” she observed. His cheeks were shadowed with the beginnings of a beard. He looked exhausted. “Give me a minute to get some clothes on and I’ll fix breakfast. You can tell me what you did all night.”

“Take your time. I’ll cook,” he said. “Have you got eggs and bacon? Scrambled okay?”

“Just toast for me.”

“You need the protein,” he said decisively and headed for the stairs.

Kelsey stared after him. She’d never had anyone around who showed the slightest inclination to take care of her. After all, she was a cool, competent doctor. Everyone knew she was the caregiver. Dylan apparently hadn’t caught on to that yet. But he would, she thought with a sigh. For now, though, it was rather nice to take a few extra minutes dressing and know that when she got downstairs breakfast would be waiting.

Even if she wasn’t hungry. Even if she had no intention of eating it.

Well, that was sweet, Delacourt, Dylan thought to himself as he marched back downstairs. Ogle the woman in her bath, why don’t you? But he hadn’t been able to tear his gaze away. Kelsey was an attractive woman and that baggy T-shirt and shorts he’d seen her wearing earlier had done nothing to enhance her natural beauty. Out of those, with all of her on display, so to speak, it was evident that she was a sensual, voluptuous woman. What man wouldn’t look?

One who was concentrating on his job, he retorted mentally.

Kelsey James was a single mom whose boy was missing, not a potential pickup in some bar, he scolded himself as he went through her refrigerator, collecting eggs, bacon and butter. He found a pitcher of fresh orange juice and took that out, as well. By the time Kelsey joined him, he had breakfast on the table and his libido firmly in check.

That didn’t mean he didn’t cast a surreptitious gaze over her—just to make sure she was handling things okay, he assured himself. There were shadows under her eyes and her complexion was pale, but beyond that she appeared to be in control.

“Sorry about losing it for a minute upstairs,” she said.

“Don’t apologize. You’re entitled to lose it every once in a while.”

She glanced toward the phone, her expression forlorn. “Why doesn’t he call back?”

“He will.”

“The waiting is the worst. I’m used to being in charge, to being decisive. I make things better. I don’t just sit around waiting.”

“Always?” Dylan asked skeptically. “Aren’t there times when even you can’t control the rate at which a patient responds to treatment? Haven’t you ever told a parent they just need to sit tight and wait?”

She frowned. “Okay, yes. I guess the difference is that I know how long it’s likely to take for a medicine to kick in. I expect the delays. With this…” She shrugged, her expression helpless. “I don’t know anything.”

“What would you tell the parent of a sick child?”

“To be patient. To have faith. Pray.”

“Don’t you think maybe the same thing applies now?” he suggested.

Her expression brightened ever so slightly. “Yes. I suppose you’re right. Patience and faith,” she reiterated, as if he’d just given her a new mantra to recite. “Patience and faith.”

She gazed at him then. “Thanks.”

“Kelsey, let’s establish a couple of ground rules. No more thanks. No more apologies. Deal?”

She nodded, started to say something, then cut herself off. “Sorry. Force of habit.”

He grinned. “Caught yourself, huh? That’s a start.”

“How do you stand it?” she asked then.

Dylan wasn’t sure what she was asking. “What?”

“Searching for a missing kid?”

He hesitated. He didn’t want to lie to her, but for some reason he also didn’t want her to lose confidence in him. Funny, when a few hours ago he would have given anything not to be involved in this case.

“I don’t do it often,” he said, choosing his words with care. “I usually prefer to turn this sort of case over to another private investigator.”

“Why?”

“It’s not my area of specialty, that’s all.”

She seemed shaken by that, just as he’d feared. “Then why did you agree to help?”

“Because I was here and it’s best to get started immediately in a situation like this. There wasn’t time to get another private eye in here.” He leveled a look straight into her eyes, regretting the doubts that he had put there. “I won’t let you down, Kelsey.”

She kept her eyes locked with his, then nodded. “I know. Is that why you seemed so—I don’t know—reluctant last night?”

So she had noticed that, had she? He’d have to remember that she was good at reading people. She probably had to do that a lot with kids who couldn’t—or wouldn’t—describe what was going on with them. He realized now that he wouldn’t be able to hide anything from her.

Because he didn’t want to get into the other reason for his reluctance, he took the easy way out and said, “Yes, that’s exactly why.” He rocked back in his chair. “But I’m in this now, Kelsey. We’re going to find Bobby and bring him home.”