Banging on his door woke Cooper. He pushed up on his arms and looked at his phone beside the bed to find that it was just after five in the morning. He twisted to get out of bed and grabbed his head as it throbbed in time to the pounding on his door.
“All right, all right!” he shouted angrily. “I’m coming. Just stop knocking.”
He couldn’t remember getting home last night, which meant that he had drunk more than usual. Cooper wasn’t concerned, though. He knew his friends had gotten him home safely.
As he opened the door, he found Jace leaning against the doorjamb, dangling Cooper’s keys on his finger. Jace’s grin broadened as he raked his gaze down Cooper. “I didn’t strip you to your undies when I tucked you into bed last night.”
Cooper glanced down at himself to find only a pair of black boxer briefs covering his body. He turned around with a groan. “You’re early.”
“I tried to get you to sleep at my place last night, but you demanded I bring you home,” Jace replied as he walked into the house and shut the door behind him harder than necessary.
Cooper winced, but he didn’t say anything. He shuffled his way to the kitchen and pulled out some orange juice, drinking it straight from the carton.
“Hair of the dog, my friend.” Jace tossed the keys on the counter and shook his head. “You know from experience, the only thing that’ll dull that ache in your head is a swig of alcohol.”
After Cooper finished the OJ, he reached for the bourbon in his pantry and poured a shot. He drank it and then replaced the bottle before he turned to Jace. “Tell me I didn’t do anything stupid.”
“You mean besides talking about Marlee all night?” Jace twisted his lips and shook his head. “Nope.”
“Wonderful.” Cooper pivoted and went to the bathroom to grab some ibuprofen. He took two and shut the door. “Going to take a quick shower,” he called.
He heard Jace’s laughter as he turned on the water. This wasn’t the first time he’d been hungover. He and Jace traded places every couple of months with who was laughing at who the next morning. If only he hadn’t bumped into Marlee the night before. Maybe he wouldn’t be in this predicament.
By the time Cooper stepped out of the shower, he felt much better. He dressed and walked back out to Jace, who had cooked bacon and made some toast. He handed a piece to Cooper, and he didn’t hesitate to eat.
“You were pretty upset last night,” Jace said as he joined him at the table.
Cooper shrugged. “Damn straight, I was. Can you believe anyone would think that about Brice and Naomi?”
“Was that really what upset you?”
Cooper froze with a piece of toast halfway to his mouth. “Yeah.”
“I’m not so sure.”
“I think I would know what I’m pissed about.”
Jace shrugged. “Not always. You forget I’ve known you for nearly our entire lives. You were angry about Brice and Naomi, yes. But deep down, what really upset you was that you thought Marlee wasn’t interested in you. That she just wanted to get information about our friends.”
“You’re wrong.”
“I’m not, but you can’t see it now. You will, though,” Jace stated and shoved a piece of bacon into his mouth.
Cooper shook his head and went back to eating. He didn’t want to get into an argument right now with his head still throbbing. They ate in silence for several minutes. Jace bobbed his head as if listening to music, and Cooper kept thinking about what his friend had said about Marlee. He didn’t want it to be true, but dammit if it wasn’t.
“I’d like to do some digging into who Marlee is,” Cooper said. “If she’s nosing around us, then I want to make sure she’s legit.”
“She is.”
When Jace didn’t elaborate, Cooper stared at him. “You want to tell me what you know?”
“Sure. Just as soon as you ask nicely.”
Cooper looked at the ceiling and slowly blew out a breath. He had a cool temperament, but Jace knew how to push all his buttons. Though Cooper knew how to rile him just as easily. That’s what happened with friends who had known each other for as long as they had.
“Please tell me what you found out about Marlee,” Cooper asked.
Jace grinned. “See? That was easy.”
Cooper rose and took their empty plates to the sink to rinse them. “Thanks for breakfast.”
“What are friends for?” Jace asked with a shrug. “Now, to get to your question, you really intrigued both me and Ryan last night. The more you drank, the more you talked about Marlee. So, Ryan looked her up. Turns out, Marlee Frampton is a PI. She was once a cop in California.”
“She was a cop?” Cooper asked with a frown.
Jace folded his arms across his chest. “Look, I’m going to tell you that I completely agree with how you reacted yesterday. I’d have done worse, I’m sure.”
“But?”
“You’ve had some dealings with PIs.”
Cooper blew out a breath. “You’re speaking of Cash.”
“Yep. He’s able to get the tough jobs done.”
“I know. What does he have to do with Marlee?”
Jace dropped his arms to his sides and shifted his feet. “Marlee isn’t just any PI, Coop. She specializes in kidnapped children.”
“Okay,” he said slowly, letting that sink in. “Wouldn’t there be easier money in other things like finding cheating spouses and such?”
“No doubt. But Marlee got involved because of an incident in her past. Her sister was eight months pregnant when she was murdered, the babe cut out of her and taken.”
“Ah, shit.” Cooper couldn’t imagine having to deal with such a loss.
Jace ran a hand down his face. “As a cop, Marlee did all that she could. The Feds took over when another pregnant woman was killed, and her baby stolen in another state. Unfortunately, they didn’t get anywhere.”
“Marlee decided to find the answers herself,” Cooper finished.
“It didn’t take long for Ryan to find out that Marlee is good at what she does. Very good. She brings closure to families one way or another.”
“And her sister’s case? Was it solved?”
Jace shook his head. “No.”
“How long ago was that?”
“Ten years.”
Cooper shrugged. “I know what we’d do if this was one of our friends.”
“We’d jump in with both feet,” Jace said with a grin.
“You game?”
“Just try and stop me.”
Cooper laughed. “Let’s go find Marlee and see if we can lend a hand.”
“Actually,” Jace called before Cooper reached for his coat, “I’ve got another idea.”
“What’s that?”
“Marlee is looking for a kidnapped baby. While I get why she’s focusing on Brice and Naomi, they can’t be the only ones with a newly adopted child in the area.”
Cooper frowned because he couldn’t agree with or refute the statement. “We might be biting off more than we can chew.”
“Maybe. But you and I both know Brice and Naomi would never have gotten involved with an agency that sells babies on the black market.”
“No, I know they wouldn’t. At least, not knowingly.”
“You think the agency might have slipped a baby in?” Jace frowned as he wrinkled his nose. “Naw. Not with how thorough Brice and Naomi were in their research. Besides, the agency did a background check on them.”
Cooper had forgotten about that. “So, they knew Brice and Naomi were well-off and had connections to the East Ranch.”
“No way the adoption agency would’ve pulled a fast one on them.”
Cooper shrugged. “Though, who better to give such a child to than a couple like them?”
Jace sighed loudly. “I know why Marlee does this job, but damn. I don’t know how she handles it.”
Cooper did. She put up walls. Not because she was afraid of people, but because she had suffered a tragedy the likes of which few understood. Her way of dealing with things was to find the missing children.
“I know that look,” Jace said. “You’ve got an idea.”
A slow smile pulled at Cooper’s lips. “I do.”
“You sure? You don’t think Marlee might get upset?”
“If her end goal is to reunite the stolen kids with their families, I don’t think she’ll mind.”
Jace thought about that a moment. “Maybe so. You want to bring Danny and Ryan in on this?”
“Danny’s wedding to Skylar is approaching. I don’t want to add anything to his plate. We’ll keep Ryan in the loop, but let’s do this just between us.”
“Then you need to catch up on some news.”
Cooper’s brows snapped together. “What are you talking about?”
“Yesterday morning, your mom and I were talking about the last woman who was killed and her baby stolen.”
Cooper couldn’t believe he’d forgotten that. “That was where? Houston?”
“Dallas.”
He cleared his throat. “Look in the drawer to your left. There’s a map of Texas.”
While Jace got that, Cooper found a blue marker. They spread out the map on the table as they both looked at it.
“Yep. That’s Texas,” Jace stated. “She’s awfully big.”
Cooper rolled his eyes. “You said I needed to catch up on the news, so catch me up. Let’s mark where these murders and kidnappings have taken place.”
“Ah. To see if they have a favorite place.”
“Yep.”
Cooper leaned over the table and marked Dallas as Jace read the news brief from the day before. Over the next hour, they had more than a dozen spots marked at Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, and Houston, with some sprinkled between all the cities going back over a decade.
There had to be a relationship between them, but Cooper couldn’t see it. He straightened to stretch his back, then froze as he caught the pattern.
“What are you doing? I’ve got another one,” Jace said.
Cooper pointed to Clearview, which was situated nearly right in the middle of all the cities.
“That can’t be right,” Jace said.
Cooper tossed down the marker. “This is going to take a lot more digging than we realized.”
“And the cases keep going further and further back. Coop, what the hell have we stumbled onto?”
“I don’t know, but I think we’re about to find out.”