Abducted (17 page)

A.J. AS COLLATERAL DAMAGE.

As they returned to the police station, the thought made Carly sick to her stomach. She’d only been able to listen to the rest of the debriefing and study the three wanted flyers. One of the men went by the moniker Boxer, just like Rivers had said, so Grant was telling the truth about him. Even though she was amazed that the feds detailed so much of their ongoing investigation, she couldn’t offer anything. And Garrison was really beginning to get to her. It was clear why he had been there: he was trying to prove he was in control, that he was a leader. To Carly he just looked arrogant and puffed up. And he called Sperry by his first name. When he’d made that comment, Carly remembered he and Conrad had been close when Sperry was a reserve. Back then, Garrison was a lieutenant in community relations, and it was his job to recruit for the reserve program. He spoke at a lot of business meetings and neighborhood watch functions and handed out applications for the reserves. Sperry was Garrison’s prize applicant at one time. More than once she’d seen the two of them together, chatting or having lunch. Did that have any bearing on the situation now?

She hated to think there were still bad apples on the force after what she had gone through with Drake and Tucker, but Garrison seemed to be a twisted advocate for Sperry. Could he be helping the dirtbag hide? The thought disturbed her, and she shifted in her seat.

“Any tips on Alex’s car?” Carly asked Harris when they were halfway back to Las Playas and she was tired of brooding about Garrison.

Harris nodded. “Yeah, people are calling in from all over. Not sure which tips are good and which are bad. The car has been seen everywhere from San Diego to Santa Barbara. CHP is on it. We transferred the tip line to them, and the car is in the system as a stolen vehicle.”

Nick looked over his shoulder at her. “We have the resources working. We’ll find them.”

Carly nodded, glad to see the old, optimistic Nick. But she had a bad feeling about the situation, and she couldn’t shake a thought that kept popping into her mind:
What if Garrison is sharing our information with Sperry?

At the station, Sergeant Nelson met them at the back steps. “I’ll see you upstairs, Pete,” he said before turning to Nick and Carly. “I’ve got some news for you two.”

Carly didn’t like the look on his face and braced herself.

“What is it?” Nick asked.

“Word from Garrison—he’s cutting out all extra personnel. Says the overtime well is dried up. Everyone goes back to their regular schedule, and if they’re over forty hours this week, then they’re off until the start of the next pay period.”

“What?” Carly stared at him, fists clenched. “But A.J. is still out there.”

“I know, I know, but the captain says with all the federal help, we don’t need as much local help. His exact words were, ‘Let the feds spend their money.’ I don’t like it and I know Lieutenant Jacobs tried to change his mind, but it’s his decision.” Nelson shrugged.

“That is so wrong.” Carly felt like stomping her foot and screaming. “Joe is one of ours. This should be our invest.”

Nick laid a calming hand on her shoulder. “Hey, the feds want Sperry as much as we do, maybe more.”

“Right, they want Sperry and the diamonds; they don’t care about A.J. Can we at least go check out the catch basin? It’s possible Mary Ellen is hiding there.”

Nelson considered her for a minute. “Pete and I were out there once. But you’re right; we should check it again. I’ll send a black-and-white out there right now and make the area a DCC—fair enough?”

Carly nodded. A district car check meant every downtown cop would make a point to check out the area a few times during each shift and log in whether there was anything to report. She had to be satisfied with that.

“My hands are tied on this,” Nelson said. “I’ve got your time sheets and you are both over forty hours, so you’re off as of now. Carly, you’re back to work in patrol Monday night, and, Nick, you’re back to report review.” He threw his hands up, turned, and went inside the station.

Carly looked away from Nick, hating that she felt like crying.

He spoke softly and soothingly. “I know you want to stay involved, but you have to trust that the investigation is in good hands.”

Trust
—a simple word that often meant an impossible action. She faced him, wanting to tell him her fears about Garrison but hesitating. What if she was overreacting?

“We have to leave it to the feds now, Carly.” He stepped close, and his presence calmed her. “We can pray, but we can’t be part of the invest. So why don’t we blow off some steam, and then I’ll buy you lunch.”

Folding her arms, she sighed. “What did you have in mind?”

“What do you say we go for a swim?”

“A swim?” She realized then that he’d been without his cane all morning.

“Yeah, we can fight the summer traffic and get in a mile or two in the surf.”

“Well, I need a good, hard swim. Are you okay to swim in the ocean?”

“Cleared and ready.”

“I hope you’re ready to eat salt water as I beat you.”

“We’ll see,” he said as he turned to walk down the steps to the parking lot. And he was walking better. This time she was positive.

THE PLAN WAS FOR CARLY
to go home and get ready. Nick would meet her at the apartment after he went to his house and picked up his swimsuit. He’d park near her apartment, and they’d walk to the beach for their swim. When she pulled into her space, she saw Andi’s car and next to it, in the loading space, a truck she didn’t recognize. But some of the boxes in the back looked like Andi’s, so she figured this must be her latest boy toy helping her move.

Carly started up the path to the front door feeling as if she were walking the green mile.

“Are you leaving too?”

She turned, surprised by the voice. It was Mrs. Shane. She was relaxing in her rocker.

“Not today. Just my roommate.”

“Is she getting married?”

“I don’t think so—just moving.”

The woman nodded, and Carly continued on to her apartment.

“That’s not mine; it stays.” Andrea’s voice was clear through the open front door as Carly reached it.

“You should mark your stuff.” The second voice, male, was familiar, but Carly couldn’t place it.

She stepped inside slowly, knowing she wouldn’t have picked this moment to talk to Andi, but now might be her last chance. She took a deep breath, wondering if there’d be a confrontation or any chance for her and Andrea to talk without the company of the helper.

“Hey, what’s going on in here?”

“Carly!” Andrea turned, a guilty look flashing across her face for the briefest moment. “I didn’t realize you’d be home so soon. I thought you were at work.” Andi stood at the kitchen counter, a plate halfway wrapped with paper in her hand.

“I got sent home, busted the overtime limit. So you found a place? Where?”

“Downtown. I found a great studio loft-type deal.”

“Good, glad to hear it. And you know, I would have helped you move if you’d let me know when.”

“You’ve been working a lot.” She looked away, finished wrapping the dish, and put it in a box. “Besides, I have someone helping me.”

Just then her friend walked into the living room, holding a box.

“’K, Andi, there’s room in here—oh, hi, Carly.” It was Sergeant Barrett, Carly’s supervisor.

“Hello, Sarge.” Carly stiffened and fought to keep shock from showing. Boy toy? Not only was Barrett not a boy; he was married with five kids, the oldest probably close to Andi’s age. Carly felt light-headed. Andi normally went for young and beautiful. While Barrett was fit, he was old enough to be her father.
He’s the one Andrea took the long break with?
Carly couldn’t get her mind around the situation.

“You can call me Hal; we’re not at work now.” He juggled the box to reach out a hand, and Carly shook it by reflex, her mouth dry.

With an ill-at-ease feeling, she remembered that Andrea would not say whom she’d been with on her long break. She was covering for Barrett? Carly saw her supervisor in a whole new light—a dingy one.
You’re letting Andrea take the fall all by herself!
How could a man so calmly cheat on his wife and act as though it were nothing?

“I don’t have anything else to put in that box. And there are two book boxes over there that are ready to go.” Andrea pointed to a pair of boxes in the corner.

Hal grinned ruefully. “Slave driver.” He was able to stack the two corner boxes on the one he already had. The two women watched him leave.

“He’s helping me some with the rent also, since my job is still up in the air,” Andrea said. “He’s a really nice guy.”

“Andrea, he’s married.”

“There we go with the judgment.” She threw her hands up and faced Carly. “He makes me happy! And I return the favor. What else in life is more important than being happy?”

“Happy at someone else’s expense? No thank you. How about morals and common sense? Do his wife and kids know?” Bile rose in Carly’s throat as she remembered being pierced through and through when she’d learned about Nick’s infidelity.

“Of course not. What they don’t know won’t hurt them. The life Hal and I share is different—it’s special in its own way. It has nothing to do with her or the children.”

“He’s doing the same thing to his wife that Nick did to me, remember?”

“Oh, stop; it’s nothing like that. That waitress wanted Nick to leave you. I’ve no intention of taking Hal away from his family.”

Carly struggled as Andrea turned into someone she’d never seen before. Part of her wanted to lash out at Andi and Hal, and part of her wanted to run away and pretend she hadn’t found out about this relationship.

“Andi,” she managed after a few deep breaths, “I can’t ignore this, because you’re my friend and I love you. You’re lying to yourself if you really believe what you’re saying.” Her voice was low and even. “Do you really think you can have an affair with a married man in a vacuum? Do the two of you have any sort of future?”

Andrea’s face scrunched with disdain, and she spoke in a harsh whisper. “You are such the prude now. Judging me when you think you can trust Nick. What makes you think I want to marry Hal? I just want whatever fun he can give me. I don’t have to live my life like you, waiting for marriage to a guy who is already a proven louse just so you can spout some Christian nonsense about forgiveness. You forget my mom’s second husband. You know, the churchgoing deacon who was a drunk? He kept begging my mom’s forgiveness for his drinking, saying he’d change. She believed him right up until the night he wrapped their car around a tree and nearly killed her!”

Carly, mouth agape, stared at Andrea. She had forgotten that. She remembered the crash, but back then she was not a Christian and she really didn’t pay attention to people who were.

“I had forgotten. I’m sorry.”

Andrea gave an angry wave of her hand. “My life is guys—as many as I want—parties as often as I like, and freedom. Just remember that. I don’t want your Christian narrowness!” She swept up the box she’d been packing and stormed out of the apartment. She passed Hal in the doorway and left him looking sheepishly at Carly.

“I guess we’ll come back for the rest later.”

“Yeah, that would probably be best.” Carly crossed her arms and tried unsuccessfully to keep the edge out of her voice.

Barrett turned and closed the door behind him. She stared at the door for a minute, the pain in her heart raging.

Someone knocked, and she lunged for the door ready to lash out at Barrett, only to find Nick there.

“Oh, it’s you.”

“Yeah, and I saw why you’re all wound up.” He shook his head, sadness on his face. “Never saw that coming.”

She invited him in and went to let Maddie in from the patio, where Andi had likely put her. “I can’t believe she’s with Barrett. It’s wrong on so many levels. But so is the fact that I forgot about her mother.”

Maddie bounded into the room, saw Nick, and charged him, tail wagging. Carly explained about the long-ago crash. “I guess there’s a reason for her anger. And it’s been festering for such a long time.” Carly folded her arms and leaned against the wall while Nick knelt down to play with the dog. “I so need a swim,” she said. “I could swim all the way to Catalina right now.”

Nick stood with his hands on his hips and faced her. He was wearing his swim trunks and a tank top Carly had given him one Christmas. “Sorry. I know it bites to have all this happen on top of Andi moving out. Doubly so that she’s with Barrett.” He glanced around the room.

“A proven louse,”
Andi had said, and a thought crossed Carly’s mind that burned:
Will Nick be like Barrett years from now? Once a cheater, always a cheater? Is it a blessing he’s been pulling away and a mistake to consider counseling?
Her throat tightened as she looked at him and remembered that word:
trust
. Then he did something that surprised her.

Nick stepped toward her and held out his hand. “Come on, let’s sit down and pray for Andrea and A.J. We can trust God to work out everything we can’t see or understand right now.”

As if a light came on and burned away all the darkness in her thoughts, Carly relaxed, thinking that maybe, at least where God was concerned, trust was not an impossible action. She took Nick’s hand and gripped it tight. They sat close on the couch, hands and hearts intertwined, and bowed their heads.

THE BEACH WAS CROWDED,
but Nick and Carly swam out beyond the recreational swimmers and body boarders and then turned parallel to the shore. In her element in the ocean, Carly kept ahead of Nick in much the same way he had kept ahead of her in the pool. She wondered about his hip, but since he didn’t seem to be hampered by it, she said nothing and pushed herself hard, knowing he pushed himself to keep up.

“Wow,” he said, reaching her side as she pulled up to indicate they’d finished. “Top form, babe, top form. I’m impressed.”

“This felt good. I have to confess that I was worried about more than A.J. and Andi.” While they treaded water, she told him about her fear of Garrison’s involvement with Sperry.

“He’s not dirty. He’s just not a leader, never has been. Rumor is, he’s losing his captain slot.”

“For sure?”

Nick was a sergeant; he heard gossip from people of rank and therefore usually had reliable tidbits.

“Yeah. Jake is going to be promoted. They’re not going to demote Garrison, but he’ll be given the option of retiring or moving to records. All that posturing for the feds—” he made a face and splashed—“I’m not sure what that was about, but I don’t believe he’s helping Sperry. They were friends before, but now the guy is wanted.”

“I feel better hearing that from you. . . . You know, you almost scored a hundred points today.”

“I didn’t realize today was a test, but since it was, where did I lose points?”

“You haven’t fed me. I’m starved.”

“Ha. So I have a chance at a perfect score?”

She nodded, and when he splashed her, she splashed him back before together they headed for shore.

They dried off, gathered their towels and Maddie, who’d been sitting patiently waiting for them, and started the walk back to Carly’s. Nick reached out and grabbed her hand, and Carly felt blissfully content. Then she saw the police car and the fire truck. She’d heard the sirens a bit earlier but never expected them to be heading to her apartment building.

“What now?” Carly picked up the pace, pulling Nick and Maddie with her. Ugly memories surfaced of a confrontation she’d had in her parking area with a masked man not too long ago. He’d tried to smash her head in, and she’d ended up shooting him dead.
Has there been another attack, this time in broad daylight?

“Carly! Sergeant Anderson!” One of the uniforms saw them coming and waved them over. He was an afternoon guy.

“Hey, what happened?” she and Nick asked simultaneously.

“We think it’s Joe King’s baby.”

“What?” Carly broke into a run, Maddie jogging with her. There in the courtyard were the paramedics, kneeling next to Mrs. Shane, who was still seated. In her arms was a squirming bundle. Bobby, the medic, was checking the child’s vital signs.

Carly reached them and stood speechless. It was Nick who appeared at her shoulder and asked what was going on.

“A young girl came walking in here with this sweet child right after you and your friend left.” The old woman beamed down at the bundle. “She was in a rush, didn’t want to wait for you. I told her I’d watch the baby until you came back.”

“She wanted to give the baby to me?” Back in the recesses of her mind, she wondered how Mary Ellen knew where she lived. But that troubling question was overshadowed by her elation at A.J.’s safe return.

Mrs. Shane nodded. “She said Officer Carly Edwards.”

“Who called the police and the medics?” Nick asked.

“I did. I watch the news. I know this is the child that’s been missing. I couldn’t stop the girl, but I could make certain the baby was okay. I guess the girl had a change of heart and wanted the baby back where he belonged.”

“He’s dirty, but he looks fine,” Bobby reassured them as he took A.J. from Mrs. Shane and held him as if he were holding his own child. The baby had started to cry. “We’ll get him to the ER and let the docs check him out. Will the parents meet us there?”

“Yeah, Lieutenant Jacobs is sending a patrol car to pick up Joe and Christy and drive them to the hospital so they don’t crash in their excitement,” the officer said.

Relieved but bewildered, Carly shook her head. “I don’t understand it, but I’m happy.” Numb and disbelieving this wonderful turn of events, she could only agree as Nick told the officer they’d follow the paramedics to the hospital.

Nick grabbed her in a hug. “Do you want to change?” he whispered in her ear. “Or you want to go to the hospital in your swimsuit?”

Laughing, she looked up at him. “Give me half a minute. I’ll change.” She reached a hand out to Mrs. Shane. “I can’t thank you enough.”

“I didn’t do anything but hold a precious baby for a minute. The girl certainly didn’t look like a kidnapper.” Mrs. Shane pointed to the uniformed officer. “I gave him the note she gave to me. It was addressed to you.”

The officer stepped forward. With gloves on, he held the note up for her to read.

Carly read the note aloud with Nick looking over her shoulder.

“‘I’m sorry I took the baby. You can see he’s not hurt. He may be hungry in a few hours, but he’s not hurt. I thought if I took him, it would save Stanley, but now Stanley’s dead. I’ll be dead too if they find me, and they’re after me. Right now I’m only one step ahead, but at least I know the baby will be okay. Please tell the parents I’m sorry for their pain. Mary Ellen.’”

Carly looked up at Nick, certain the astonishment she saw on his face was also evident on her own.