Carolyn McSparren - The Only Child

“Then why did she run away?”

MacMillan sighed. “I can only guess. I think she couldn’t bear to face us or prison or the world or perhaps most of all, her own guilt. She was used to running away from problems that she couldn’t buy her way out of.”

“But she didn’t leave Dulcy behind.”

“No.”

“You never suspected she planned to leave?”

He shook his head. “She was very careful. All the time we were worrying about how she would survive her prison sentence, she was setting up the mechanism to disappear. She was to be sentenced on Monday. On Friday afternoon, Zoe was baby-sitting Dulcy at the store. When Tiffany came to pick her up, she’d been drinking again, and she and Zoe really got into it. Zoe didn’t want to let her have Dulcy, but couldn’t really stop her. In the end, Rick drove Dulcy and Tiffany home in Tiffany’s car while Zoe followed in theirs. Tiffany swore she wouldn’t drink or drive anymore that night. Zoe and Rick had to be content with that. It was the last time any of us saw either Tiffany or Dulcy. When she didn’t show up in court on Monday, the judge issued a warrant for her arrest, but she and Dulcy had simply vanished into thin air.”

“The police couldn’t find her?”

“They came up empty. We found she’d raided her trust fund, so she had plenty of cash with her. The private detective we hired traced her partway. He’s the one who discovered that Dulcy—” MacMillan’s voice broke. He cleared his throat and continued in that same cool way he had before.

This time Molly wasn’t fooled. He wasn’t cool. He was being torn apart inside. She knew she couldn’t offer him sympathy. He’d hate it.

“Why do you think the child is dead?”

“I don’t think Dulcy is dead. I know she’s dead, dammit! Do you think that if I thought there was the slightest chance Dulcy was alive, I wouldn’t be combing the country—no—combing the planet, to find her?”

Molly raised her hands. “Okay, let’s leave that for a minute.”

He looked at her appraisingly. “You haven’t asked the usual question.”

“Which is?”

“Why Tiffany took the child when Dulcy would be better off with us.”

“I can guess the answer to that one already.”

“Because you’re a mother?”

“No, I used to volunteer at the university center for disturbed and abused children.”

Logan sat up very straight and said, “Dulcy wasn’t abused.”

“Not in the usual sense. But I’ve seen drunken mothers, drugged out on crack, hooking, with AIDS and TB. They love their children and will kill to keep them, even if they’re doing massive and irreparable harm to those children in the process.”

“It’s difficult for me to excuse a parent who would knowingly do something against a child’s best interests. Jeremy and Tiffany must have known what their alcoholism would do to Dulcy. They never managed to stop drinking even after Dulcy was born.”

“It seldom stopped the mothers at the center, either. Alcoholism is a disease, Logan, but it’s not like the mumps. You don’t get over it after a week of bed rest. It takes strength and a good support system. From what you tell me, Tiffany didn’t have either.”

“We were her support system, or wanted to be. Unfortunately, we weren’t enough.” He took a deep breath and stared at Molly as though seeing her for the first time. “You are a remarkable woman, Mrs. Halliday. I admit I underestimated you. Frankly, a woman who spends her days making dolls…”

“Let me finish for you. I make dolls, I hide in the woods, I live in a log cabin…”

“Hardly a cabin.”

“Not a suburban ranch, either. Come on, admit it, you thought you were meeting Beatrix Potter.”

“Actually, you have a great deal in common. I seem to remember she retired to a farm.”

Molly laughed, then said, “But she never worked again.” She shrugged and grinned at him. “Hey, I’m divorced, middle-aged and my only talent is my dolls. I didn’t choose harsh reality, it chose me. Now, tell me why you think Dulcy is dead.”

“The private detective we hired discovered that Dulcy had died of viral spinal meningitis at a small hospital in the Midwest. He brought us her death certificate.”

“You flew there? Saw the body?”

Logan shook his head. “My wife was in intensive care by that time. I didn’t even tell her. What was the point? Besides, the whole thing had happened three months earlier. Someone—I can only assume Tiffany—had abandoned. Dulcy at the local clinic. They tried to save her, but it was too late. They tried to trace her parents, but eventually they gave up and buried her there.”

“What made your detective think that was Dulcy?”

He shrugged. “He said he showed her picture to the nurses who had worked to save her. They identified the picture. It was Dulcy, all right.”

“I see.”

“They were certain. They had no reason to lie.”

“Nor do I.”

He leaned back and closed his eyes. The lamplight carved his face into its essential planes. Looking at him, afraid to speak for fear of disturbing his small moment of repose, Molly longed to model that face. Every ounce of grief and loss were carved into him. He had a massive head, and the short gray hair revealed the fine sculpting of his skull. His was a face constructed of angular planes—the angle of bone strong over the eyes, the high sharp cheekbones, the eagle’s nose, and finally, the strong jaw.

He sighed, shook his head and opened his eyes.

Molly felt the shock of his gaze deep inside her. Unfortunately for her peace of mind, the shock went to a part of her body she had thought long dormant. She was reacting to him the way a woman reacts to a man. Not possible. She didn’t even like him. The day her divorce was final, she stepped out of the sexual arena without a moment’s regret. The last thing she wanted was to climb back into the ring.

Not that it would be possible with someone like Logan. He was probably no more than two or three years older than she. Middle-aged men went for twenty-yearold trophies.

Now, one glance from those gray eyes of his sent awakening shivers straight through her body and straight as an arrow to her groin.

Hoping that he couldn’t detect the blush she felt spreading up her face in the lamplight, she found herself babbling. “You said you saw a death certificate. What name did it have?”

“Jane Doe. But the picture, Mrs. Halliday. They identified the picture.”

“Logan, I’m going to ask you something you are not going to like. Please don’t get angry.”

“I’m too tired to get angry.”

“Do you trust that private investigator?”

He drew himself up in the chair. “Mrs. Halliday, I have no reason to doubt the man. First, why would he end a lucrative contract? I had every intention of pursuing Tiffany until I either went bankrupt or found my granddaughter.”

“Yes,” Molly conceded. “There is that.”

“Second, he has a good reputation. My lawyer recommended him. He has been successful in several other cases. I checked his clients. They were satisfied.”

“Better and better. Still, either there was some mix-up about the picture and the identification, or something’s going on we’re not aware of.”

“I doubt whether the entire staff of a hospital would lie. What would be the reason? Some sort of misguided loyalty to a criminal?”

“We don’t know who made the mistake. Another thing that puzzles me is how Sherry was able to recognize that doll as Dulcy.”

“She and my wife worked together to decorate Sherry and her husband, Leo’s latest house. She saw a great deal of Dulcy when she was a baby, and she’s been a good friend ever since. She’s seen all the computer enhancements the detective produced. She’d have known Dulcy’s face at almost the same moment I did. What I don’t know is why she didn’t recognize the doll earlier.” He considered. “Or why Rick and Zoe didn’t.”