Delores Fossen - Nate

He had to do everything to get the babies out of there.

The sooner, the better.

“It’ll be okay, right?” Darcy asked without taking her attention from the infrared.

“It will be.” Nate tried to sound as convinced as he wanted to be.

“Noah will want his dinner soon,” Darcy whispered.

Nate knew where she was going with this, and he figured it had to stop. They would drive themselves mad considering all the things that could go wrong. He glanced at her. But stopped.

He heard a sound.

A snap, as if someone had stepped on a twig.

Nate turned, trying to get the rifle into position. But it was already too late.

The man stepped through the wall of thick shrubs, and he aimed the gun right at Nate.

Imagine a family tree that includes Texas cowboys, Choctaw and Cherokee Indians, a Louisiana pirate and a Scottish rebel who battled side by side with William Wallace. With ancestors like that, it’s easy to understand why USA TODAY bestselling author and former air force captain DELORES FOSSENfeels as if she were genetically predisposed to writing romances. Along the way to fulfilling her DNA destiny, Delores married an air force top gun who just happens to be of Viking descent. With all those romantic bases covered, she doesn’t have to look too far for inspiration.

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Lieutenant Nate Ryland took one look at the preschool building and knew something was wrong.

He eased his hand over his Glock. After ten years of being a San Antonio cop, it was an automatic response. But there was nothing rote or automatic about the iron-hard knot that tightened in his stomach.

“Kimmie,” he said under his breath. His fifteen-month-old daughter, Kimberly Ellen, was inside.

The side door to the Silver Creek Preschool and Day Care was wide open. But not just open. It was dangling in place, the warm April breeze battering it against the sunshine-yellow frame. It looked as if it’d been partially torn off the hinges.

Nate elbowed his car door shut and walked closer. He kept his hand positioned over his gun and tried to rein in the fear that had started to crawl through him. He recognized the feeling. The sickening dread. The last time he’d felt like this he’d found his wife bleeding and dying in an alleyway.

Cursing under his breath, he hurried now, racing across the manicured lawn that was dotted with kiddie cars and other riding toys.

“What’s wrong?” someone called out.

He snapped toward the voice and the petite brunette whom he recognized immediately. It wasn’t a good recognition, either.

Darcy Burkhart.

A defense attorney who had recently moved to Silver Creek. But Nate had known Darcy before her move. Simply put, she had been and continued to be a thorn in his side. He’d already butted heads with her once today and didn’t have time for round two.

Nate automatically scowled. So did she. She was apparently there to pick up her child. A son about Kimmie’s age if Nate recalled correctly. He remembered Kimmie’s nanny, Grace Borden, mentioning something about Darcy having enrolled the little boy in the two-hour-long Tuesday-Thursday play sessions held at the day-care center.

“I asked, what’s wrong?” Darcy repeated. It was the same tone she used in court when representing the scum she favored defending.

Nate ignored both her scowl and her question, and continued toward the single-story building. The preschool was at the end of Main Street, nestled in a sleepy, parklike section with little noise or traffic. He reminded himself that it was a safe place for children.

Usually.

He had no idea what was wrong, but Nate knew that something was—the door was proof of that. He prayed there was a simple explanation for the damage. Like an ill-timed gust of wind. Or a preschool employee who’d given it too hard a push.

But it didn’t feel like anything simple.

Without stopping, he glanced at the side parking lot. No activity there, though there were three cars, all belonging to the employees, no doubt. He also glanced behind him at the sidewalk and street where he and Darcy had left their own vehicles. If someone with criminal intentions had damaged the door, then the person wasn’t outside.

That left the inside.

“Why is your hand on your gun?” Darcy asked, catching up with him. Not easily. She was literally running across the grassy lawn in high heels and a crisp ice-blue business suit, and the slim skirt made it nearly impossible for her to keep up with him.

“Shhhh,” he growled.

Nate reached the front porch, which stretched across the entire front of the building. There were four windows, spaced far apart, and the nearest was still a few feet away from the door. He tested the doorknob.

It was locked.

Another sign that something was wrong. It was never locked this time of day because, like he had, other parents would arrive soon to pick up their children from the play session.

He drew his gun.

Behind him, Darcy gasped, and he shot her a get-quiet glare that he hoped she would obey. While he was hoping, he added that maybe she would stay out of the way.

She didn’t.

Continuing to be a thorn in his side, she trailed along right behind him with those blasted heels battering like bullets on the wooden planks. Of course, he couldn’t blame her. Her son was inside, and if she had any intuition whatsoever, she knew something wasn’t right.

Nate moved to the window and peered around the edge of the frame. He tried to brace himself for anything and everything but instead saw nothing. The room was empty.

Another bad sign.

It should literally be crawling with toddlers, the teacher and other staff members. This should be the last fifteen minutes of the play session, and the staff was expecting him. Nate had called an hour earlier to let them know that he would be arriving a little early so he could watch Kimmie play with the other kids. Maybe Darcy had had the same idea.

He lifted his head, listening, and it didn’t take him long to hear the faint sound. Someone was crying. A baby. And it sounded like Kimmie.

Nothing could have held him back at that point. Nate raced across the porch and jumped over the waist-high railing so he could get to that door with the broken hinge. He landed on the ground, soggy from the morning’s hard rain, and the mud squeezed over the toes of his cowboy boots. It seemed to take hours to go those few yards, but he finally made it. Unfortunately, the sound of the crying got louder and louder.

Nate threw open the broken door and faced yet another empty playroom. His heart went to his knees. Because the room wasn’t just empty.

There were signs of a struggle.