Chapter 5 #2
So about an hour later when she found herself looking out the nursery window to watch Dawson throw a football with the other kids, she couldn’t account for the fluttery feeling in her stomach. It was different from the burn of acidic fear that had been her constant companion for weeks.
It was almost pleasant.
“He’s cute, isn’t he?” Megan’s voice startled her. The sheriff and Mrs. Hasting had left them alone with Aiden.
Embarrassed to be caught staring, Bailey spun from the window.
“I don’t know. I guess,” she blurted. “He’s okay.”
“I thought you loved kids.” Megan tipped her head to one side to study her, frowning. Too late, Bailey realized that her friend held Aiden in her arms.
She’d been talking about the baby.
Realization hit Meg the same moment it hit Bailey. Her friend stood, crossing the large wool braid rug to stand next to her at the window.
A slow smile spread across her face.
“He’s okay is right.” Meg passed Bailey the baby, and she gladly took comfort in holding the warm, sleepy infant. “Something tells me you’re going to become a convert on the topic of foster kids.”
“I should have never said that,” she admitted. “But just because a boy is cute doesn’t mean...whatever you think it means.”
“Relax. I won’t tease you again about that—I promise.” Meg slung her arm over Bailey’s shoulders. “But after having dated J.D. myself, I can tell you how awesome it is to be with a real guy. A kind, decent, amazing guy.”
“I’m so not interested in being with anyone right now.” She couldn’t imagine trusting someone not to yell at her. Hurt her.
And even if she could? Who would want to date the town jailbird’s daughter?
“Don’t give J.D. that kind of power over you, Bailey. If you stop having fun because of him, he wins.”
Easy for Meg to say. She had been born kick-ass strong. But Bailey was just a normal, regular girl. She couldn’t just stop being scared because Megan said so.
And yet being scared didn’t have to mean she was powerless.
“He’s not going to win.” The fierceness of her words surprised even her. “Because we’re going to canvass the entire school starting tomorrow and find out if J.D. harassed anyone else.”
“We are?”
“Damn straight.” She whispered it, though, because she didn’t believe in swearing in front of children.
Not even sleeping newborns.
“Then you’d better put that baby in his crib so we can get a jump on that homework.”
Bailey did just that, tucking Aiden’s blanket around him before she moved to the stack of texts she’d carried inside. Only when she was sure Meg wasn’t looking did she risk one last glance out the window.
Dawson wasn’t out there anymore, which was just as well since she didn’t need any distractions. She’d probably only imagined that moment of connection when their eyes had met.
And even if she hadn’t? Once he found out who she was, he wasn’t going to like her anymore.
BABY CARRIERS WERE a godsend.
Sam vowed to write a personal thank-you to the creator of the invention. It kept Aiden safe and sleeping against his chest while leaving his hands free to hammer away on his laptop at the kitchen table. Finally—finally—he could get some work done at home.
Staying up most of the night, he’d inputted all the incidents of assault in a five-mile radius of the quarry into a spreadsheet.
He had already used it to confirm no incidents had ever been reported while Jeremy Covington was out of town—a narrow window at best since he only had access to a small portion of the guy’s vacation dates from the town council.
But, more interesting, he’d discovered a higher number of incidents during the annual social-studies teachers’ conference that Covington’s wife attended every year.
All circumstantial, of course, but given how little he had to work with, he considered every nugget a victory. Especially with almost fifteen years’ worth of data to look at.
He would begin cross-checking the cases against the list of victims they’d already interviewed, then identify anyone else he needed to speak to. He would review the MO of all the assaults and then double-check physical descriptions to see how many of them matched Jeremy Covington.
Sam emailed the file to himself to examine further at work just as his doorbell rang. Clamping a protective hand against the carrier, he practically sprinted to answer it, hoping Aiden would stay asleep a little longer.
Flinging open the door, he found...the mayor? Sure enough, Zach stood on his front step looking as disheveled as if he’d stayed up all night. In other words, he probably looked as bad as Sam.
“What the hell are you wearing?” Zach’s eyes narrowed as he took in the baby carrier.
“I believe it’s called a pouch sling.” He glanced down at the carrier, where Aiden was starting to stir, his face scrunching up in that pre-cry, wrinkle-puss expression that meant food would be required soon.
Sam rocked from foot to foot, trying to soothe his son while lowering his voice to a low hiss.
“And it works like nobody’s business to keep the baby asleep unless you have clueless friends who ring the doorbell. ”
“It’s purple, dude.” Zach squinted at the strap over one of Sam’s shoulders. “And plaid.”
“Right. And when you have kids you’ll be begging me to let you borrow it.” He stalked toward the kitchen to get a bottle started. “But I’ll just come over and ring your doorbell while your firstborn is sleeping instead.”
“Sorry.” Zach kept pace behind him, his leather shoes echoing on the hardwood. The guy still dressed more like a corporate raider than a small-town mayor. “I’m just not used to seeing you sporting anything from the lavender family.”
“Keep it up and I’ll pass you the bottle and the boy to see how you do.”
He shook the formula-and-water combination, glad he’d taken the time to do dishes earlier so everything was clean and ready.
It made for the fifth night in a row he hadn’t slept more than a handful of hours, but on the upside, at least he’d caught up on work.
“You’re going to wish we could go back to talking about purple baby carriers when you find out why I’m here.” Zach flung himself on a bar stool at the counter and turned his attention to Sam’s coffeemaker.
“Bad news?” Lifting Aiden out of the carrier, Sam cradled him in one arm and offered the boy the bottle. The kid latched on to it like he hadn’t eaten in days instead of hours. Would he ever sleep through the night at this rate?
“J. D. Covington walked out of juvie three days ago.” Zach concentrated on making the coffee as he turned on the water and filled the pot.
Sam managed to stop himself from uttering most of the curses that passed through his brain, not wanting to upset Aiden’s digestion.
“Why? And how come we’re only just finding out about it?” A message should have come to his department ASAP, damn it.
Did no one follow protocol anymore?
“You know the juvenile system. They write their own rules. Apparently, they had a detention hearing and decided he could be supervised at home until the pretrial screening, but someone must have forgotten to inform the arresting officer.” Zach dumped in some grounds and hit the start button.
“I only found out when I went to the quarry to see what kind of Wi-Fi connection I could pick up—long story.” He waved away that thread of the conversation.
“Anyway, I ran into the kid and his mother, and she told me the good news.”
“Meaning J.D. could have sent me that message on my phone.”
“Or his mother.” Zach shrugged, reaching for a mug. “She reminds me of the way my mom was when Dad went to jail—faithful to the end.”
Sam remembered all too well. Mrs. Chance had fallen apart when her husband had gone to prison for white-collar crime. But somehow he could understand her reaction. He had no idea how Jeremy Covington’s wife could forgive him for assault and sex offenses against teens.
“No luck pinpointing where that message came from?” He took a seat on a bar stool two down the counter from Zach, leaning an elbow on the granite to make it easier to feed Aiden.
“None.” Zach slid the phone across the breakfast bar. “If you get any more, don’t touch anything after it happens and bring it to me as fast as you can.”
“Right.” He ground his teeth together, anger building. “And how do you suggest I document threats that disappear seconds after they’re delivered?”
“You’re the cop,” Zach reminded him. “But I’d write down times and dates.”
“You say that like I’m going to have more than one.”
He stared down at the innocent face in the crook of his arm, hardly believing the boy was his. His ex-girlfriend might have found the baby overwhelming, but for Sam, the boy was already a part of him. The best part. “But I’m telling you now, there’d better not be another threat against my son.”
“We’ll find out where it came from.” Zach said it with a certainty that eased some of the defensive fury building in Sam’s chest.
Sam knew he meant it. And he trusted him. If there was any way to prove a digital crime or find a cybertrail, Zach’s company would do it.
“Good. I’ll assign someone to watch J.D.
now that I know he’s circulating again.” He set aside Aiden’s bottle and patted the baby’s back even though the boy was already falling asleep.
In the middle of the morning of course. Rarely at night.
“You didn’t need to come all the way out here to bring me my phone.
I’ve got to stop by the office later to set up some interviews with victims who reported trouble out in the quarry in the last few years. ”
He hadn’t forgotten about the spike in incident reports during the week of the teaching conference.
“I drove Heather to her sister’s house before I came in here.” Zach craned his neck to look out the kitchen window, maybe trying to glimpse the cabin from here. “I figured I’d talk to you until she was done over there.”