Lakota Baby. Elle James

does it say?” Joe asked.

      Del glanced at Maggie. “‘Go away, white woman.’”

      Joe stared at Maggie, his lips tightening into a thin line. “Any idea who might have done it?”

      “Could have been one of a dozen.” A bucket of white paint still sat in the storage room waiting for her to cover the hateful words, but so much had happened since that day she’d completely forgotten.

      Joe glanced at her. “I thought you had a rapport with them.”

      “Things change. Besides, it’s a long story.” One she was entirely too tired to get into. “Shouldn’t we concentrate on finding Dakota?”

      “That’s what I’m doing.” He softened his words with, “I need to know everything that’s gone on in your life for the past few months, maybe even year.”

      “You mean since you’ve been gone?” Her gaze met his, unwavering for a few long seconds before she dropped hers. What was the use? He had never loved her.

      “Yes, since I left. With the kidnapping of your son following the accidental death of your husband, I wonder if Paul’s death wasn’t as accidental as we’d originally assumed.”

      Maggie struggled with the words teetering on the tip of her tongue. Would the facts she’d withheld make a difference in Joe’s investigation, or would they only cloud the issue of finding her son?

      When she didn’t say anything, he continued. “Do you know if Paul was involved in any unusual activities?”

      Gritting her teeth, Maggie shook herself and concentrated on Joe’s question. He didn’t need to know any more than he already did about Dakota. As the head of tribal police, he had a lot of influence within the tribe. It was enough for him to know his stepbrother’s son was missing. “Unusual? What do you mean?”

      “Was he acting strange, had he altered his habits? Did he hang out with anyone in particular?”

      Maggie shook her head. “I don’t know. Paul didn’t tell me about his life outside our home.” She swallowed against the lump rising in her throat. He hadn’t told her because she hadn’t let him. Paul had loved her and had married her when she’d been desperate. What had he gotten from the deal?

      Nothing.

      As the only white man she’d halfway trusted on the reservation, she’d gone to him to seek help in preserving her secret.

      From the beginning, Paul knew Maggie still loved Joe but he’d married her anyway. Maggie had been the one to insist on a marriage in name only. Although Paul would have liked it otherwise, he’d abided by her wishes, agreeing to wait until after she’d given birth to persuade her otherwise. He’d slept in a separate bedroom down the hall from her, and he’d come and gone as he pleased. All this was information Joe didn’t need to know.

      No one knew. As far as the Painted Rock Indian Tribe was concerned, Paul was the father of her baby.

      “He worked nights at the casino and I worked days at the youth center. We didn’t see much of each other.”

      Joe’s eyes narrowed. “Not much of a married life,” he muttered, but he didn’t ask any more questions about Paul’s friends or activities. He turned to Officer Toke. “Check Paul’s phone records and get out to the casino and ask around.”

      The officer nodded. “Will do.” He tipped his head at Maggie. “Ma’am, let us know if you hear anything from the kidnappers.”

      A rush of panic pushed Maggie forward and she laid a hand on Joe’s arm. “You have to find him, he’s your—” She bit hard on her tongue until she tasted the bitter, metallic tang of blood. “—nephew,” she finished in a rush. How close had she come to telling him the one thing she couldn’t? Based on his belief that Indian children should be raised in the Indian culture, he wouldn’t understand. He might demand custody of her baby if he knew Dakota was his son.

      Chapter Two

      While Officer Toke stood outside on her porch smoking a cigarette, Maggie paced her tiny living room more times than she cared to count, chewing through every last fingernail. Joe had gone to the police station with the others, promising to be back soon.

      The more time that passed the more the walls seemed to close in around her. With Joe there, she could handle almost anything. Without him, she felt the black hole of loss sucking her down. She couldn’t just wait around for his return, she had to do something to find her baby.

      But who would have taken him? And why?

      She sat on the couch and closed her eyes, focusing on everyone she’d been in contact with in the past six months. A person who could be malicious enough to steal a baby from his bed. It had to be someone who knew which room her baby slept in and that she would be the only adult in the house.

      Who? Who? Who? She tapped her finger to her forehead. Faces swam in her mind of all the boys and girls she worked with at the youth center. She’d never invited any of them to her house, but one of them could have spied on her just as easily as someone had painted graffiti on her walls while she’d been away. As if her mind was on a continuous loop, she couldn’t slow her thoughts enough to wrap around an individual. None of the teens surfaced as mean enough to steal her baby.

      Was it even one of the teenagers she’d been working with? Could it be someone who knew Paul? If so, she was at a complete loss. For once, she wished she’d been closer to Paul than strangers in a shared house.

      She pushed to her feet and strode to the window. When would Joe get back? He would know where to begin. He’d know who to question, who to call.

      God, she prayed he did.

      After one more circle around the living room, she stopped at the entrance to the hallway. From Dakota’s doorway, light spread in a triangle on the carpet in the hall. As if drawn by an irresistible force, Maggie walked toward the room she’d avoided since the police left. The closer she got, the more her chest squeezed until she was gulping short, shallow breaths. The walls pressed in on either side of her. She didn’t want to go in but she had to know, to see for herself, that her child really was gone.

      This wasn’t a dream.

      The officers had tried to clean up their mess before they left, but she could still see the faint traces of dust from where they’d lifted fingerprints from the walls, window-sill and furniture.

      Baby blankets and sheets had been stripped from the crib and sent to the state crime lab along with the blue cloud curtains that used to hang in the window. She’d made them herself from a piece of fabric she’d found in Rapid City last Christmas.

      With an icy lump of pain lodged in her throat, Maggie struggled to breathe. Yet her eyes remained dry, almost too dry, with that achy, hollow feeling she couldn’t blink away.

      Longing to hold her child had become a physical need, just like breathing. And now that she was completely alone in her house, worry set in with a vengeance.

      Was Dakota warm enough? Was he hungry? Were they changing his diapers and holding him so he wouldn’t be afraid? She prayed whoever had taken her son wouldn’t hurt him.

      A sob rose in her throat and she pressed her fist to her mouth to keep from wailing aloud.

      Then she noticed a powder-blue teddy bear lying forgotten against the wall. The plush, pillow-like toy was Dakota’s favorite. He liked to sleep with it at night.

      Maggie sank to her knees and gathered the plaything to her breast, inhaling the scents of baby powder and milk.

      Why her child? He didn’t like going with strangers, preferring only those he recognized, his mother and his caregiver, Mrs. Little Elk.

      Please Dakota, don’t cry too much. With all the child abuse and neglect she’d witnessed in the year and a half she’d been on the reservation, she hoped whoever had Dakota wasn’t one of the abusers.