Harlequin Superromance September 2014 - Bundle 1 of 2: This Good Man\Promises Under the Peach Tree\Husband by Choice (20 page)

“Would he do this? Try to kill his own boy?”

“He killed my mother. It was in the middle of a fight. He hit her, she fell against the corner of a kitchen cabinet. But he was cold-blooded enough to set it up as an accident. I saw him pour some water on the floor to make it look like she slipped.”

Renner's harsh features hardened. “Then he's at the top of my list.”

“The Hales?” Reid had to ask.

Renner let out a huff of air. “I don't know. I'll talk to them and the other boy. Let me think about this, okay?”

Reid only nodded. He'd been doing a lot of that. It occurred to him then that his career was over if this all came out. He'd been breaking the law. He probably hadn't done anything he'd be charged for, although Roger and Paula would be, however fine their intentions and however much good they'd done. Reid would hate to see that. At the moment, he couldn't seem to make himself care about the fallout for himself personally.

Renner left then, and Reid stood watching until he went through the door and was out of sight. He not only had never been so scared before, he'd never felt so helpless.

CHAPTER TWELVE

R
EID
HAD
JUST
finished forwarding everything he'd gotten from Phil to Renner—with Phil's name and email address wiped out—when someone came out from the back to tell him Caleb was being moved to Intensive Care, and would he care to go to that waiting room instead.

Once he'd arrived there, a different doctor emerged to say they didn't believe Caleb had any internal bleeding, which meant surgery wasn't currently necessary. He did have multiple broken bones in his shoulder and upper arm, as well as his collarbone. They were attempting to immobilize much of his upper body.

“Of course, it's the head trauma that has us worried,” the doctor said unnecessarily. “The damage to his shoulder may be good news, in a way. Clearly it took a significant amount of the impact when he hit the road.”

Instead of his head.
Or,
Instead of
only
his head.

“I wish I could give you a prognosis,” he continued, “but it's too soon for me even to speculate. I know how hard this is, but all we can do is wait and see.”

Right now, Reid wouldn't let himself think about the possibility of brain damage. He just wanted his brother to open his eyes. Squeeze his hand.

“Yes. I understand.”

“Perhaps you should go home,” the doctor suggested. “I feel sure he won't regain consciousness before morning at the very least.”

“Not yet. I'd like to sit with him as much as possible.”

His expression kind, the doctor said they couldn't have him back there all the time, but would give him a few minutes perhaps every half hour.

Another nod.

Left alone, Reid paced. Despite near numbness, fury was a hot spark waiting to be lit by his father's arrival.

* * *

A
NNA
WAS
TROUBLED
by the time she left Diego to sleep. The caseworker from DHS had come and gone earlier, but Anna had stayed to try to mine more details from the boy. There was too much wrong with his story.

He and Caleb had “borrowed” the bikes, he said. They planned to return them later, after they'd ridden into town and found Caleb's brother. He claimed not to remember exactly where they'd borrowed them from. When she asked how the boys intended to return them, he mumbled, “Maybe we could find the place. Or leave them in front of the police station.”

Where Caleb's brother worked. Genius plan.

Diego was vague about where he'd been living since he disappeared over a year ago from his own home. Another mumble. “You know. On the streets.” He'd met Caleb in Portland, he said. Anna guessed it was possible that was where Reid's friends who'd taken in his brother lived. But how had he come to meet a street kid and become good enough friends for them to take off together? Why, since he was in regular communication with Reid, hadn't he just called him? Borrowed the money for a Greyhound bus ticket instead of hitching over here with some street kid? What did he expect from Reid?

And why the lousy memory? Was it an effect of trauma...or was there a whole lot Diego didn't want to tell her?

Once he was snoring softly, she'd taken the bag containing his clothes and everything he'd had on him out of the closet and dug through it. No wallet, no money, no keepsakes. There was absolutely zilch in his pockets. The clothes had gotten dirty and bloody in the accident, but otherwise appeared almost new, and she'd bet they had been freshly cleaned before he put them on this morning.

“We were sort of camping in the woods,” he'd said. “We left stuff there.”

Where was that? She offered to pick up their things to keep them safe. He'd pretended to fall asleep, a pretense that did, a few minutes later, become reality.

Wondering if he'd told Reid any more, Anna headed for the elevators. Last time she'd talked to Reid, he'd said there hadn't been any change in Caleb's condition. She could find him either in ICU with his brother or right outside. He told her a Sergeant Clay Renner from the sheriff's department was investigating the accident.

He sounded so remote, she ached for him. And, selfishly, for herself. Sometime during this wretched day, she had accepted that she was deeply in love with Reid.
Hopelessly
came to mind, especially if his brother died.

The moment she stepped out of the elevator, she saw Reid just outside the doors leading into ICU. He was talking to two men, one who, from the scrubs and a mask pulled down around his throat, must be a doctor. The other one was about Reid's age, also wearing a suit. He stood with his hands on his hips, which pulled the suit coat back, allowing her to see a holstered pistol. Maybe he was the sergeant Reid had mentioned?

She heard her heels clicking on the floor as she walked toward him. The other cop glanced her way, but instead of turning toward her, Reid looked down the broad corridor leading from the E.R. She had almost reached him when she saw the man approaching.

Oh, dear heaven. It could only be Reid's father. He was...not as tall as his son, she thought, and had thickened around the waist and acquired the beginnings of jowls. Something about his face made her think he was a heavy drinker. But otherwise...the resemblance was shocking.

In fact, the other two men were staring now, too. Reid stood absolutely still. She wasn't even sure he was breathing.

Driven by a sense of impending disaster, Anna hurried.

“Ah, this would be Caleb's father...?” the doctor began.

“How dare you show your face here?” Reid snarled. “Don't think I'm letting you get within touching distance of Caleb.”

Anna reached him, but if he noticed her, he didn't indicate it. He vibrated with fury. His lips were drawn back from his teeth and his hands were fisted at his side. She knew every muscle in his body was taut, ready to fling him forward.

“You tried to steal my boy,” his father snapped, “but you're not getting away with it. You're not speaking for Caleb. I am.”

Anna willed Reid not to attack. He needed to keep his cool. Devastate with words, not fists, however much he wanted to punish and hurt this man.

She took a chance and touched his arm. A jolt went through him and he looked down at her hand, then at her face. And then his furious stare returned to his father.

“Sergeant Renner here has questions for you,” he said in a voice that chilled to arctic. “You're now a person of interest in the attempted murder of Caleb Sawyer.”

Dean Sawyer's face suffused with dark color. “What the hell—”

“We already know you can kill, don't we, Dad? And so cold-bloodedly, you have no trouble staging the scene to look innocent.”

Reid's father flung himself forward. Anna had been oblivious to what the sergeant was doing, but with seeming effortlessness, he caught Dean Sawyer in a headlock and pulled him away from Reid.

“Captain Sawyer is correct. I do have questions for you. Attempted assault now will not help your cause, sir.”

Reid's father yanked free of Sergeant Renner's loosened grip. A stare filled with hate arrowed in on his son. “Threats will get you nowhere. I'm going to be taking Caleb home with me.”

“No.” All the tension was still there in Reid's body language, but he spoke calmly. “I will be filing for custody, and I will have no difficulty at all proving the horrific abuse you visited on me and Caleb. You're not at home now, where your cronies support you no matter what the evidence says. Home court, Dad. The judge here is going to hear the truth and believe it.”

With a face that was nearly purple, Dean looked as if he was going to have a stroke any minute. A vein throbbed in his neck. Whatever he saw on Reid's face had him retreating a step. “Any weight of truth is on my side,” he blustered. “Do your worst, and I'll slap you down in court as fast as I would anywhere else.”

“Yeah, you did a lot of that, didn't you, Dad? Except you tended to use your fist instead of your open hand.” Reid shook his head and looked at Sergeant Renner. “He's all yours.” Then he turned his back on his father.

The sergeant gripped Dean's arm and said, “Please accompany me now, sir. I do have some questions and will need to take a look at your vehicle.”

Reid's gaze seemed blind when it met Anna's. “I'm sorry you had to see that.”

She wanted to tell him she'd been right where she wanted to be: at his side. But he wouldn't like hearing anything like that. “I'm not,” she settled for instead.

Reid looked at the doctor, a thin man with salt-and-pepper hair. “I'm sorry you had to see that, too, Dr. Stafford. But I'm going to ask that Caleb's father not be allowed any access to him. First thing in the morning, I'll file for a restraining order.”

The doctor looked perturbed, but finally nodded. “I think I can agree to that. Although, given the accusations you made, you'd better be prepared with persuasive evidence.”

The muscles tightening in Reid's jaw was his only reaction. “I am.”

Anna turned her head to see Sergeant Renner escorting Reid's father away. After a few more reassurances about Caleb, the doctor vanished into the ICU.

“Would you like a cup of coffee?” Anna asked in lieu of the comfort she wanted to offer. “If you'd rather not go to the cafeteria, I'd be glad to get you one.”

His mouth quirked, but as smiles went it was weak. “How about a root-beer float?”

Almost choking up, she said, “Even better.”

He squeezed his eyes shut for an instant. “Let's sit down.”

Once they took a pair of chairs some distance from the only other occupants of the waiting room, a family group huddled together in a corner, Reid reached for her hand. He held on with a tight grip.

“I keep expecting—” He couldn't finish.

“Don't.” Anna bit her lip. “Do you have any updates?”

He shook his head. “They come out to talk to me every so often, but they're not saying anything new. ‘Wait and see.'” He said that almost violently.

“That's pretty normal for a head injury.”

His eyes met hers. “You should have seen him. Raw and bloody, and his head swollen grotesquely. He must have bounced like a goddamn basketball.”

Her stomach clenched. “How could someone do that? Just aim at a group of boys and run them over?”

He shook his head, obviously baffled, though, given his job, he must have seen as bad or worse repeatedly.

Anna couldn't bring herself to question him about Diego yet. Instead, they sat together, mostly quiet. He was allowed to go back to be with Caleb for a few minutes and told her she didn't have to stay, but when she shook her head and said, “I'll be here,” his relief was obvious.

Perhaps an hour after leaving, Sergeant Renner returned. He nodded at Anna, but said to Reid, “Walk with me.”

Anna pushed herself up from the chair. “If you'd like privacy, I can—”

Reid touched her shoulder. “No. Stay put.”

The two of them strolled toward the hospital proper, disappearing around a corner. Anna sat again, but tensely, worrying. There'd been something on the sergeant's face. He had something to say he didn't expect Reid to like. What?

Feeling fidgety, she got up and walked around herself, the tingling in her legs telling her she'd been planted on her butt too long anyway. Her entire being was concentrated on the hallway where the two men had disappeared. Reid didn't need one more devastating piece of news.

It was a good ten minutes before they returned. When they did, his face was utterly expressionless. Anna didn't kid herself it meant he'd regained some of his equilibrium.

He came straight to her, the sergeant still beside him.

“Don't look so worried. Sergeant Renner has been able to determine that it wasn't my father who ran down Caleb and Diego.”

“How?”

“A receipt for a gas purchase in Umatilla.”

Anna knew Umatilla to be a town just on the Oregon side of the Columbia River. If Dean had been driving down here from Spokane, the logical route would have taken him across the Columbia there.

“They looked hard at the front of his SUV, too.” He sounded almost numb. “There'd almost have to be some damage from hitting a pair of bicycles. Nothing there.”

She nodded, seeing compassion on Sergeant Renner's face. He took his leave, and Reid stumbled to a chair, sitting with his elbows on his knees and his hands gripping his head. His knuckles showed white. All she could do was sit beside him and gently rub his back. She didn't wonder why he wasn't glad that his father hadn't done this particular vile thing. Besides...now they were left with
no
idea who had tried to kill a pair of teenage boys.

Not much later, a woman Reid introduced as Lieutenant Renner from Investigative Services arrived. She seemed too young to be a lieutenant, and then there was the ponytail, bouncing as she walked.

Wait. Renner?

The lieutenant saw Anna's surprise. “You must have met my husband. He told me what's going on.”

“Oh. Yes. I didn't realize...”

She and Reid went for a walk, too. Anna was beginning to wonder what he knew that he wasn't telling her. She didn't like this feeling that she was being stonewalled not only by Diego, but by Reid, as well.

Maybe it was nothing that would affect how she handled Diego's case. Law enforcement officers did tend to keep quiet about details of an investigation.

Recognizable from photos and television news, Police Chief Raynor appeared next. He shook Anna's hand when Reid introduced them, and, gee whiz, the two of them left her, walking down the hall that ought to be developing ruts by now. Anna was less sure this time that Chief Raynor had anything special to say, beyond sympathy. An air of restless energy surrounded him, making her suspect he wasn't any better at just sitting than Reid usually was.