Rita Herron - Unbreakable Bond & The Missing Twin

Through the haze, more footsteps rumbled, then a firefighter appeared and scooped her up. “My baby,” she cried. “I have to get her.”

“We’ll find her,” he said. “Just let me take you outside before the whole wing is engulfed in flames.”

Tears trickled down her cheeks as he carried her through the blazing hallway, dodging flames and more falling debris. She gulped in the fresh air as he burst out the front door and raced down the steps to the lawn. Blinking her stinging eyes to clear her vision, she searched the haze and chaos.

Firefighters were scrambling to help victims and extinguish the flames, but at least half the hospital was ablaze. Patients, hospital employees, doctors, nurses and visitors ran, crawled and helped each other from the burning building.

She spotted one of the neonatal nurses unconscious on a gurney, and two nurses holding infants, and hope shot through her. The firefighter carried her toward an ambulance, but she pushed against his chest. “Let me down.”

“Ma’am, you need to see a medic. You’ve been injured.”

She didn’t care if her head was bleeding, that her stitches had popped or her leg was throbbing. She had to make sure her daughter was safe. “No, not until I find my baby.”

She managed to get on her feet, then stumbled toward the nurses. But her heart sank when she realized neither of the babies was Peyton.

“Where’s my little girl?” she cried. “She was in the neonatal unit.”

One of the nurses frowned, and the other one shook her head with worry. “I’m not sure. Maybe one of the other nurses got her.”

Another baby’s cry rent the air, and she turned and raced toward the sound. A medic was holding the infant, but when she neared him, she realized the baby was a boy.

Panic clawed at her, and she ran from medic to medic, from nurse to doctor to orderly. Screams and cries flowed freely as people were carried from the hospital and the body count began to rise. More sirens and cries reverberated as police, friends and relatives of the hospital employees and patients arrived, each searching for loved ones.

Finally she found one of the nurses who’d cared for Peyton lying on another stretcher, and she hobbled toward her. “Where’s my baby?”

Sorrow filled the nurse’s eyes as she looked at Nina. “I don’t know. I thought someone else rescued her.”

The sound of the NICU exploding rent the air, and Nina’s legs gave way, a sob of terror ripping from her.

Dear God…

Where was her baby?

Eight years later

FINDING MISSING CHILDREN was the only thing that kept Slade Blackburn going. The only thing that kept him from giving into the booze that promised sweet relief and numbness from the pain of his failures.

That was, when he found the children alive.

The other times…well, he locked those away in some distant part of his mind to deal with later. Much , much later when he was alone at night, and the loneliness consumed him and reminded him that he didn’t have a soul in the world who gave a damn if he lived or died.

Voices echoed through the downstairs as the agents at Guardian Angel Investigations entered the old house Gage McDermont had converted into a business and began to climb the stairs.

Slade’s instincts kicked in. He’d arrived early, situated himself to face the doorway in the conference room so he could study each man as he entered.

Not that he hadn’t done his research.

Gage had started the agency in Sanctuary and recruited an impressive team of agents.

The moment Slade had read about GAI in the paper, he’d phoned Gage and asked to sign on. Leaving his stint in the military had left him wired and honed for action, yet the confines of the FBI or a police department had grated on his newfound freedom.

Too long he’d taken orders, followed commands. Now he was his own man and wanted no one to watch over, not as he’d had to do with his combat unit.

But he needed a case.

Bad.

Being alone, listening to the deafening quiet of the mountains, remembering the horrific events he’d seen, was wreaking havoc on his sanity.

He refused to be one of those soldiers who returned from war damaged and suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome.

He would not fall apart and become needy, dammit.

And he would keep the nightmares at bay.

By God, he’d survived his childhood and Iraq, and he wouldn’t go down now.

Still, returning to the small town of Sanctuary, North Carolina, held its own kind of haunts, and when he’d passed by Magnolia Manor, the orphanage where his mother had dropped him off without looking back, he’d questioned his decision to settle in the town.

Gage McDermont strode in and took the head seat behind the long conference table while the others filed in. Slade maintained his stoic expression, honing his self-control.

Gage gestured toward Slade. “This is Slade Blackburn,” he said. “He just finished his first case and returned Carmel Foster’s runaway daughter to her.”

The men surrounding the table nodded, then Gage gestured to each of them as he made the introductions. Slade analyzed each one in turn.

Benjamin Camp, a dirty-blond-haired computer expert with green eyes. Brilliant techy, he’d heard. Slade would bet he had a shady past. Maybe a former criminal with skills that could come in handy in a pinch.

Levi Stallings, former FBI profiler, black hair, military-style haircut, dark brown eyes. Intense, a man who studied behaviors and got into a killer’s mind. He cut his gaze toward Slade as if dissecting him under his microscope, and Slade forced himself not to react, to meet him with an equally hard stare.

First rule of engaging with the enemy: Never let on that you’re afraid or intimidated .

Not that he was, but he didn’t like anyone messing with his mind or getting too close.

Adopting his poker face, he angled his head to study the man, seated next to him, whom Gage introduced as Brock Running Deer.

“Running Deer is an expert tracker,” Gage said in acknowledgment.

A skill that would be needed in the dense mountains. He was also big, slightly taller than Slade’s own six feet, had shoulder-length brown hair, auburn eyes and was part Cherokee. He scowled at Slade as if he were permanently angry, but Slade shrugged it off. He hadn’t come here to make friends.

“And this is Derrick McKinney.”

Slade nodded toward him.

Next Gage introduced Caleb Walker, who also looked mixed heritage. He had thick black hair, black eyes, and wore a guarded expression. Gage didn’t elaborate on his particular skill, which made Slade even more curious about the man.

Gage gestured to the last man seated around the table. “This is Colt Mason, a guns and weapon expert.” Slade sized him up. Short, spiked black hair, crystal-blue eyes, sullen and quiet. He had that military look about him, as well, as if he’d stared down death and it hadn’t fazed him. Probably former Special Ops.

The door squeaked open and a petite brunette with hair dangling to her waist and large brown eyes slipped in.

Gage’s face broke into a smile. “This is Amanda Peterson, our newest recruit. Amanda is a forensics specialist, and we’re glad to have her on board.

“Now that we’ve all been introduced, I want to get you up to speed on the latest case and the arrests made in Sanctuary. Brianna Honeycutt, now the wife of Derrick, adopted an infant son when the baby’s mother, Natalie Cummings, was murdered. Our investigation revealed that Natalie learned about a meth lab in town that was connected to the creators of a lab eight years ago, the one that caused the hospital fire and explosion that took dozens and dozens of lives.”