Buch lesen: «Surrogate Escape»

Chapter One

Officer Jake Redhorse turned into his driveway and caught movement in his periphery by the line of pine and sticker bushes to his left. The fatigue must be affecting his vision, because when he turned toward his neighbor’s yard, there was nothing there.

Jake put his police unit into Park in the usual place, behind his silver F-150 pickup. That was when he noticed the red cloth hanging out of the back of his truck bed. That had not been there when he’d pulled in from his last shift sometime Thursday night, which was two days ago. Shifts had been unpredictable since the dam breech.

He stared at the red fleece. Someone had been messing with his truck.

“They better not have busted into my tools,” he muttered and left his police unit, using his fob to lock the car. He needed to remove the shotgun and his personal gear from the trunk and take them inside, but first he had to see what the vandals had done to his vehicle.

Since the collapse of the Skeleton Cliff Dam just this week, there was an uptick in petty crime, including a number of break-ins of the houses left behind in the ongoing relocation effort, and apparently being a cop did not exempt him from vandalism.

His small police force of seven struggled to keep order and so, five days after the explosion, his tribal council voted to accept the help of the National Guard to keep order in the tribal seat in Piñon Forks. The council also agreed to allow FEMA to provide temporary housing for the low-lying communities along the river. And now the Army Corps of Engineers was helping plan a more stable temporary dam to support the pile of rubble that had stopped the water and saved his people. But the outsiders were not allowed to venture past the river town. So his small police force was stretched over the two remaining communities of Turquoise Ridge and Koun’nde, on the Turquoise Canyon Apache Reservation, where he lived. Even with outsider help, his shifts were still way too long.

“Ah, not my drill,” he said, hope butting up against apprehension.

When Jake left his vehicle and approached the tailgate of his truck, he had the distinct feeling of being watched. A sweeping search of his surroundings showed no one. But the hairs on his neck remained raised like the scruff of a barking dog. He could still see his breath in the cool mountain air. Late September was like that here. Cold nights. Warm, dry days.

“Hello?” he called and received no answer but the autumn wind. Jake turned his collar up against the chill.

He glanced over the tailgate into the truck bed, now recognizing the red cloth. It was a polar-fleece jacket his mother had given him. He disliked red for several reasons—for one, it reminded him of a target, which, as a police officer, he already was, and for another, it reminded him of the iconic red trade cloth his people, the Tonto Apache, had once tied around their foreheads to keep the Anglos from shooting them by accident during the Apache Wars. His tribe had fought with the US Army in that one. Finally, the cloth reminded him of Lori Mott, as it was her favorite color.

The jacket was wet. He glanced down at the fabric, which was wrapped around something. At first he thought it was a child’s doll. Then the doll moved.

Jake jumped back, hand going automatically to his service weapon, a .45 caliber, as his brain tried to make sense of what he had seen. He had his flashlight out in a moment and shone it on the bundle.

The tiny forehead wrinkled. It was a baby, ghastly pale, its skin translucent with something that looked like a sheet of white tissue hanging from it. The baby’s mouth opened, and a thready sound emerged.

Jake jumped back again. Someone had left a baby in the bed of his truck. A baby!

He lifted his radio from his hip and called for an ambulance. The reply came from the volunteer fire station back in Piñon Forks, who answered calls after-hours. Unfortunately, the tribe’s one ambulance was currently out on a run all the way up in Turquoise Ridge, so they told him to call the urgent-care clinic.

At twenty-one, Jake was the tribe’s most recent hire, and his utility belt was so new that the leather squeaked when he replaced the radio to the holster. He drew out his mobile phone and called his brother Kee. The eldest of the family, Kee had been recently certified in internal medicine—the first board-certified physician in many years. The phone rang five times and then flipped to voice mail. Jake left a message before disconnecting. There was always the chance that the clinic might still be open. If any of the women of his tribe had given birth last night, the maternity ward and nursery would be staffed. If not, they wouldn’t open until nine o’clock in the morning. Jake’s emotions warred with one another. He needed help. But there was a possibility that his help might be Lori Mott.

She’d come back last September and had done a very effective job of letting him know that bygones would not be bygones. She seemed mad at him, though he didn’t know why. Their one encounter had been consensual, though they had both been underage at the time. The resulting unplanned pregnancy was certainly both of their faults. He’d done the responsible thing. Everyone said so.

Jake blew out a breath and dialed the number.

Not her. Not her. Not her. He chanted the words in his head like a prayer, hoping to will Lori from answering his call.

Lori worked at the clinic most days and nights as needed, along with Nina Kenton, Verna Dia and Burl Tsosie. Everyone was working long hours since the dam collapse. But even after all this time, speaking to her roiled up his emotions and made his stomach flip. The quicksilver attraction to Lori was still there, at least for him, but it was tempered by her obvious dislike of him. He didn’t understand it. Everybody liked him—everyone but Lori.

His heart rate increased as he clutched the mobile phone, scowling that his body reacted to just the possibility of speaking to her. How many times did a man have to stick his finger into a light socket before he figured out what would happen next?

“Jake?”

Lori Mott’s familiar voice came through. His number would have displayed his name, giving her fair warning, yet he was rattled at the control in her voice. His body flashed hot and cold, the desire that lived just beneath his skin and the regret that clung to him like pine pitch.

His heart beat faster.

The surprise was gone from her voice, and her tone now held an edge of warning. “Jake.”

“Hi, Lori.” He felt as if his mouth were full of pebbles, and he couldn’t quite speak past them. Instead, something like a gurgle emerged from his throat. He stared at the newborn lying in his truck bed and plunged on. “I found a baby, and the ambulance is out at Turquoise Ridge.”

“Possible heart attack,” she said. “They’re going to Darabee.”

She tied his stomach in knots quicker than a Boy Scout going for a merit badge. He could picture her, standing in those scrubs she always wore, with her long hair scraped back in a high ponytail for work. Often she wore no makeup. Not that she needed any.

“Did you say you found a baby?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Where? When?” Her voice took on a breathy air that made his skin tingle.

“Just now. Someone left it in the bed of my pickup.”

“Outside?” Her voice rang with alarm. “Is it breathing?”

“Crying.”

“Is it cold?”

“I haven’t touched it.”

“Jake. For goodness’ sake, pick it up.”

He closed his eyes, recalling the last infant he had held, cold as marble and gray as a tombstone. He started sweating.

“I don’t know how to pick up a baby,” he said.

“I’m on my way. I’ll bring my kit. Is it a newborn?”

“It’s really small. Like the size of a doll. And wet.”

“Wet?” She told him how to pick it up. He lifted the infant and the red fleece all together, supporting the baby’s tiny head.

“It’s warm,” he said, juggling the phone as he cradled the newborn. “It’s got blood on it and some skin or something.”

“Take it inside. Wrap it up in something dry and wait for me. Did you call Child Protective Services?”

At her question, he recalled that his training included instructions to call the state agency, and that he had the number saved in his contacts on his phone.

“Not yet.”

“I’ll do it.” The phone went dead.

Jake held the still bundle and the phone. He glanced around one last time.

“Hello?”

The morning chill seeped under his collar as he stood holding the infant before him like a live grenade. He thought he might be sick as past and present collided in his mind. Lori was coming. Sweet Lord, Lori was coming. He squeezed his eyes closed. The sound of movement made them flash open, and he turned toward the rustling.

“Is anyone there?”

Nothing moved but the little baby pressed against his chest.

* * *

LORI DROVE TOWARD Koun’nde in the rising light before dawn. Burl had arrived quickly to relieve her, and so she was only a few minutes away from having to face Jake Redhorse. Since her return, she had mostly avoided him. It was infuriating how he could still make her tremble with just a smile. One thing was certain. She was not falling for his charm twice.

As she approached his home, the anxiety and determination rolled inside her like a familiar tide. If she had not been good enough for him then, she was now. Only, now she didn’t want him, the jerk.

She’d learned what he really thought of her after the baby had come. Not from him, of course. Oh, no. Mr. Wonderful would never insult a woman. He’d left that to everyone else.

Damn him.

Her face heated at the shame of it, still, always.

She pulled into the drive, wondering if she had the courage to make the walk to his front step. As it turned out, she didn’t have to. Jake hurled himself out the front door without his familiar white Stetson or uniform jacket and charged her driver’s side like a bull elk.

“Hurry,” he said.

Lori grabbed her tote and medical bag and followed as Jake reversed course and dashed back into his home. Lori ran, too, her medical bag thumping against her thigh as she cleared the door. Once inside, she heard the angry squall of a newborn.

Jake stopped in the living room before a dirty red polar fleece, which sat beside a couch cushion on his carpet. On the wide cushion was a baby wrapped in a familiar fuzzy green knit blanket, its tiny face scrunched and its mouth open wide as it howled. Lori’s stride faltered. She knew that blanket because she had knit it herself from soft, mint-colored yarn. She glanced at Jake. Why had he kept it?

Jake pointed at the baby. “It’s turning purple.”