Laurie Paige - The Baby Pursuit

Dev walked out from under the overhang and stood looking down the three-story drop into the ravine, where the creek ran swift and cold over the limestone boulders.

“A long ways to go for water,” he remarked.

“Not really. Come on, I’ll show you.”

She walked around the ledge that narrowed as it curved past the shallow cavern. Up the trail a few feet was a water seep. She removed a pan hanging on a nail pounded into a pine and placed it so it would catch the drip from the trickle of water. The drops made a friendly patter against the aluminum until the water was deep enough to cover the bottom of the pan.

“All the comforts of home,” she pointed out. “Are you ready for lunch?”

He nodded, his eyes searching the area above the trail.

She returned to the horses and removed food from the saddlebag on her mount. She handed Dev the chilled container of lemonade when he joined her. Back in front of the cave, she divided the food she had prepared for their picnic when he had requested the ride up the ridge.

“How many times have you done this?” he asked.

She weighed the question. “Jealous?”

A flush lit his lean cheeks. “Hardly.”

“You are,” she said softly, wishing he would admit it.

He snorted. She laughed when one of the horses did the same as if mimicking him.

They ate the sandwiches made from roast beef, sliced homemade pickles and spicy mustard, then sipped the lemonade from tin cups taken from a rocky shelf in hers and Victoria’s childhood pantry.

Dev was aware of the quiet that surrounded them. They were alone for all practical purposes, and it bothered the hell out of him. He should have insisted that Cruz Perez or one of the hands show him around the ranch. Being with the daughter was too disturbing for his comfort.

Her gaze stirred something inside him—a place where hope lingered, foolishly believing the promises that life dangled in front of a person. But he knew about promises, knew that, like dreams, they were never fulfilled. He had no desire to be around to see the glow die when life slapped her down one time too many. Then she would know, too.

He concentrated on the details of the case. He had a good idea where everyone had been located and who they’d been with at the moment of the kidnapping. He knew which people correctly remembered events and those who had been mistaken…or had lied. There were loose ends, of course. Not everyone was accounted for by someone else.

Maria Cassidy, for one. However, Vanessa had seen her in the courtyard at the probable time of the kidnapping.

Lily Cassidy, Maria’s mother and the fiancée of Ryan Fortune, said she had spoken to Rosita Perez about serving the champagne for the toast, but Rosita thought that was before the christening, not afterward.

Cruz Perez was also unaccounted for.

The horse trainer had said he’d gone to the stable to check on a mare having difficulty foaling. Clint Lockhart, brother-in-law to Ryan Fortune through the rancher’s first wife, Janine, insisted he’d been outside at the time and hadn’t seen Perez at the stable.

Lockhart had a cowboy who could vouch for him, but the man had finished his temporary job the day before the christening and had been at the bunkhouse only an hour or so to pack up his belongings the day of the kidnapping. Lockhart didn’t know where the cowhand was now. Perez said he hadn’t seen Lockhart when he’d crossed the road to the stable.

One of them was lying, Dev was sure. Or their timing was off. The local cops hadn’t been able to locate the missing cowhand to verify Lockhart’s story.

He was at a stalemate.

“Have you found any clues?”

Dev shook his head, then went back to staring out over the land. In the vast pastures that spread beyond the creek at the foot of the ledge to the horizon, he could see hundreds of cattle grazing peacefully.

Fifty thousand head. Five thousand horses. Anywhere from fifty to a hundred cowboys, according to the season. But most of them were scattered around the half-million acre ranch, too far away to have been involved in the family’s affairs.

When she laid a hand on his thigh, he nearly jumped out of his skin as lightning sizzled through his veins. He pushed her hand away.

“I’ve written a profile of the kidnapping,” she said.

She pulled a slip of paper from her breast pocket and handed it to him. It was warm from her body and burned his fingers with the magic fire that came only from her. He forced himself to read her notes.

Well-planned and executed, indicating insider information.

Two people, possibly three or four, involved.

Leader is crafty and willing to play games for bigger stakes. Controls accomplices who are probably younger and willing to take more risks.

Someone used to children is taking care of baby and may have called Matthew. This could be their weak link.

Her handwriting was neat with evenly looped letters, but the impatience was revealed in the flying slashes that crossed the t’s and the dots that were near the i’s but didn’t line up with them. There was strength and decisiveness evident in the bold strokes, a certain confidence that could edge over into family pride—or perhaps snobbishness, although he admitted that wasn’t really true of her—in the tall capital letters, a gentleness as well as an unexpected vulnerability in the rounded strokes. He would have known it was her handwriting without being told.

And that her background was privileged, that she was used to getting her own way and that she wasn’t for him, no matter what wild imaginings occupied his dreams. He sighed and finished off the lemonade in the battered tin cup.

“Let’s go,” he said, and stood.

She took the cups and rinsed them out in the pan of water from the seep, then replaced them on the rocky shelf. Every move she made was poised and graceful. If he didn’t watch it, he would stare at her, spellbound when he was supposed to be concentrating on finding clues. Vanessa Fortune wasn’t good for his investigative abilities.

She turned and looked at him at that moment. Her eyes were tear-bright. “If we don’t find him, Baby Bryan will never know the ranch or how to ride. He’ll never know his family… He may never grow to manhood or know his first kiss…” She shook her head helplessly.

“We’ll find him.”

“How?”

He looked away from her despair. “We start with everyone who had an opportunity. Then we assign motives, no matter how bizarre, then we see who fits the picture.”

“We look for a pattern.”

He realized she’d had enough psychology to grasp his thinking. “Yes. No one does anything out of the blue, as most people seem to think. There are plenty of warnings. In this case, the puzzle pieces are there. It’s up to us to find them and put them together.”

“So we start with opportunity and motive.”

Her eyes brightened with determination once more. Something in him that he hadn’t known existed, that had been tight and concerned each time he saw her distress, suddenly breathed easier. He pulled back from the emotional brink. “I start. You stay out of my way.”

This time he ignored the way her expressive eyes darkened with hurt. He had a kidnapping and enough Fortunes to contend with to last a lifetime. He didn’t need her.

Vanessa joined her father and Lily in the courtyard at six o’clock. She poured a cool glass of champagne and took a seat across from Lily. “How are things going for you?”

“Fine,” her stepmother-to-be replied with a kind smile. “You look tired. Your father said there’s nothing new in the case. It must be doubly discouraging for you.”

Her father sat beside Lily on the swing and dropped an arm around her shoulders. Their glance at each other was filled with love and mutual concern. Vanessa felt tears well near the surface. She blinked them back with an effort and took a sip.