Tia prayed the TV plea brought in answers, that someone had seen her baby or knew who’d taken him and decided to do the right thing.
Ryder stopped at the diner and insisted she eat dinner, although she could barely taste the food for the fear clogging her throat.
An hour and a half later, he pulled into her driveway, the silence between them thick with tension and the reality that night had come again, another night where she would go into an empty house, with an empty nursery and an empty bed.
“I’ll come in and check the house.” Ryder slid from the SUV and walked her to the door. Tia swallowed back emotions as she unlocked the door.
Ryder flipped on a light and strode through the house, checking each room. “The house is clear,” he announced as he returned to the kitchen.
She nodded. She hadn’t expected the kidnapper to have returned.
Ryder hesitated, his dark gaze penetrating hers as he brushed his fingertips along her arm. She sucked in a breath.
“You did good during the interview, but—”
“If you’re going to tell me I shouldn’t have offered a reward, don’t bother. If the kidnapper took Jordie for money, this should prompt a call. And if not, maybe someone who knows where Jordie is or who took him might step up.”
“I just want you to be prepared in case we receive prank calls or false leads.”
“I know.” Despite the fact that she told herself not to lean into him, she did it anyway. “But we—I—have to do something.”
Understanding flickered in his eyes. “You are doing everything you can,” he said. “Trust me. We won’t stop until we find your baby.”
Tears pricked at her eyes. She needed to hear that, to know that she wasn’t alone and that he wouldn’t give up. She’d read about cases where leads went cold, other cases landed on their desks and police essentially stopped looking. Children were lost for decades.
Fear nearly choked her. Ryder must have sensed she was close to breaking. He wrapped his arms around her and held her tight.
“Hang in there, Tia.”
She battled tears, blinking hard to stem them as she nodded against his chest. His chest felt hard, thick, solid. His arms felt warm and comforting—safe.
His steady breathing and the gentle way he stroked her back soothed her.
But that was temporary. Nothing had changed.
Except that at least she wasn’t alone.
She lifted her head to look into his eyes. “Thank you, Ryder. I’m...glad you’re here.” She hesitated. “Working the case, I mean.”
“I’ll let you know if I hear anything.” He eased away from her, making her instantly feel bereft and alone again. “Try to get some rest.”
She nodded and bit her tongue to keep from begging him to stay.
He walked to the door, shoulders squared, his big body taut with control. “Lock the door behind me,” he said as he stepped outside onto the front porch.
She rushed to do as he said, then watched through the window as he climbed in his SUV.
* * *
RYDER PINCHED THE bridge of his nose as he drove away from Tia.
He didn’t want to leave her, dammit.
But he had no place in her life. Except as an agent working her case.
He checked his phone, but no messages or calls yet. He hoped to hell the TV plea and tip line worked. Or maybe Gwen would locate the woman on that tape at the hospital.
Dark clouds rolled above, thunder rumbling. Most people had tucked their children into bed by now so they’d be safe and sound for the night.
Like Tia had thought her baby was.
Predators were everywhere, though. Watching and stalking innocents. Waiting to strike when the victim let down his or her guard.
By the time he reached his cabin, his thoughts had turned to possibilities other than Tia’s ex or Wanda. What if the kidnapping wasn’t personal? What if it had nothing to do with revenge against Tia, but simply that she’d crossed paths with a desperate person who wanted a baby, and she’d become the target because she was a single mother?
Images of the agonized look on Tia’s face haunted him as he went inside. The rustic place was empty, a chill in the den. He shrugged off his jacket and holster but carried his gun with him, then planted it on the coffee table. The envelope of letters Cash had left was sitting in the center of the table where he’d left them.
He stared at it, struck by the pink rosebuds on the wooden keepsake. His birth mother’s doing.
Myra Banks was his mother. She’d rocked him to sleep when he was a baby and nursed his fevers and bandaged his skinned knees and...loved him as much as any mother could.
But this woman... What about her?
Cash insisted he read them, that he understand how much Grace McCullen had wanted the two of them.
He lifted the envelope. Just as Cash said, it was filled with dozens of letters and cards.
He thumbed through them. He didn’t know where to start.
Pulse pounding, he walked to the bar in the corner, poured himself a whiskey, then returned. He tossed the first drink back, then poured another and set it on the table.
The picture sitting on the table of him and Myra at Christmas last year mocked him. It had been four years since his father had died. They’d both missed him, although the last few years his father had let his own drinking get out of hand. He’d blamed financial problems, a backstabbing partner who’d cheated him out of half his building supply company.
Even if Ryder and his father hadn’t always gotten along and he’d been a bastard to his mother when he was drinking, Myra and Troy had been there for him.
Cash’s face, identical to his own, flashed behind his eyes. Cash, his twin, who’d been tossed around in foster care all his life.
Cash, who was now friends—and brothers—with Maddox, Brett and Ray McCullen.
Ryder heaved a sigh. He didn’t need a brother. Or to be part of that family.
Still...he had to know the truth.
He dug through the pile, checking the dates, until he found the earliest dated envelope. He opened it and drew out a photograph inside a folded sheet of paper.
He lifted the picture and studied the dark-haired pregnant woman. She was holding a basket of wildflowers. She had her hand on her pregnant belly, and she was smiling up at the sun.
This was the woman who’d given birth to him. She was beautiful.
Emotions flooded him, and he opened the sheet of paper and started to read. Her handwriting was feminine, soft, delicate—her words music to his soul.
Dear son,
This morning, I had an ultrasound and learned I was having twin boys. This is the most exciting day of my life!
I’m not only blessed with one more baby, but two.
As much as the McCullen men need more women around Horseshoe Creek, I honestly believe that God meant for me to have a ranch of boys. The world needs more good men and husbands, and I know you and your brothers will fill that role.
I’ve already experienced the joy and chaos little boys bring, and also the love and camaraderie they share. I can’t wait to add you and your brother to the McCullen clan.
Your father, Joe, is a tough cowboy, but a loving man and father, and you will be blessed by having a role model and leader to guide you through life.
I wish my own mama, your grandmother, could have lived to see this day.
I love you so much my heart is bursting and exploding with emotions. Just a few more weeks, and I’ll get to hold you in my arms.
Until then, I’ll sing you a lullaby each night while you nestle alongside your twin inside me.
Love always,
Mama
* * *
“MAMA LOVES YOU, JORDIE,” Tia whispered as she stepped into the nursery. The soothing blues and greens of the room reminded her of the day she’d painted the room in anticipation of her son’s arrival.
Ina had knitted baby bootees, and Elle had brought a basket of baby toys. She picked up the blue teddy bear Amy had given her, turned on the musical mobile of toy animals dancing above Jordie’s crib and hugged the bear to her as she sank into the chair.
The toy train, football, blocks, arts and crafts corner, puzzles, rocking horse and farm set were all waiting. She rocked the chair back and forth and began to sing “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” along with the musical mobile, pushing the chair back and forth with her feet as she cradled the bear to her like she had her son.
For a while, she allowed herself to imagine her little boy playing in the room. She saw him riding the little pony, drawing pictures to hang on the wall, learning to walk, running outside in the backyard and splashing in a rain puddle, then waving to her from the jungle gym at the park.
Of course he’d learn to ride and they’d have picnics and feed the horses and ducks.
A smile tugged at her mouth as she envisioned birthdays and Christmases and marking his growth on the wall chart that she’d hung by the door.
The Hickory Dickory Dock clock on the wall ticked another hour away. Another hour that her son was missing.
* * *
ONCE RYDER STARTED with the mail, he couldn’t stop himself until he’d read every letter and card. His mother poured out her heart, telling him how much she missed him every day, how she envisioned him and his twin and what they would have looked like, how she put flowers and toys and gifts on their tiny graves, how she quietly celebrated their birthdays.
Then there were disturbing letters where she chronicled her search for the twins. On pink flowered stationery with ink blurred from her tears, she’d written heart-wrenching descriptions of the nightmares that had plagued her. Sleepless nights when she’d wake up sobbing into the pillow because she could hear her babies’ cries.
Ryder rubbed a hand over his eyes. God.
Cash was right.
The words on those pages were not from a woman who’d sold her children to fund her and her husband’s ranch.
She told about the distance her grief had created between her and Joe, about his affair with Barbara, about how she’d forgiven him because they’d both sought comfort in different ways.
In each progressive letter, she’d promised not to give up looking for them, that she would find them and bring them back to Horseshoe Creek.
The last letter made his heart pound. She’d sensed someone following her. Had felt like she was being watched.
She’d been afraid...
Grief for the woman who’d given birth to him mushroomed in his chest. He traced his finger over her picture, and sorrow brought tears to his eyes.
Next came the face of the woman who’d raised him—Myra Banks.
Dammit. Had she lied about how she’d gotten him, or had the person who’d kidnapped him and Cash lied to her?
He stood and paced. He had to talk to her.
He checked his watch. Ten o’clock.
Dammit, she’d be in bed now.
He’d pay her a visit first thing in the morning. And he’d get to the truth.
* * *
TIA DRAGGED HERSELF to the bedroom, forced herself into pajamas and crawled into bed, hugging the teddy bear to her. She sniffed the plush fur, her son’s baby scent lingering.
She closed her eyes, but the dark only accentuated the quiet emptiness in the room and in her house.
Her chest ached so badly she could hardly breathe.
Fatigue clawed at her. Just as she was about to drift asleep, her phone trilled.
Tia’s pulse jumped.
She swung her legs to the side of the bed and snatched her cell phone. Her hand was trembling so badly she dropped the phone on the floor. Heart racing, she flipped it over.
The caller ID display box showed Unknown.
Panic snapped at her nerve endings, but she jerked up the phone and stabbed Connect.
“Hello.”
“I saw you on the news.”
Tia’s breath stalled in her chest. “What? Who is this?”
“Your baby is safe. But he won’t be if you keep looking for him.”
Terror crawled through Tia. Before she could ask more, the phone went silent.