His Case, Her Baby. Carla Cassidy

hot it gets in Kansas in July. Besides, you have to meet some new friends in order to invite them.”

      “I know, and I will,” Peyton replied. “Now that I’m finally settled in and Lilly is getting older, I plan on getting out more.” Peyton had been reluctant to take Lilly outside and around strangers while she’d been so small, and she’d had the work of settling in to keep her from going out and socializing.

      “Did Rick stop by last night? You mentioned that he was planning on driving out to visit with the baby.”

      “No, he didn’t make it. He’s working some big trial and scarcely has time to breathe right now.” Rick Powell was an assistant D.A. Handsome and ambitious, he and Peyton had dated for six months, and ironically Lilly had been conceived on the night they mutually decided to break up.

      “He could have married you,” Kathy said with a touch of censure.

      Peyton laughed. “I didn’t want to marry him. We had a great time together, but I realized I wasn’t in love with him. Besides, Rick is already married to his work.”

      Lilly finished her bottle and yawned around the nipple. Almost immediately she closed her eyes and fell asleep. Peyton put her back in the cushioned seat in the center of the table and brushed a strand of the pale blond hair away from her forehead.

      “She’s such a doll baby,” Kathy said, then frowned and raised a hand to her temple. “You don’t happen to have anything for a headache, do you?”

      “Nothing stronger than an aspirin,” Peyton replied.

      “Could I have a couple? I have a killer headache.”

      “Sure, hang on and I’ll be right back. I’ve got a bottle under the sink in the bathroom.”

      “Great, thanks.”

      As Peyton walked through her living room with its gleaming polished surfaces and simple furnishings, she thought of how far she’d come from her roots.

      She’d done it. She’d climbed out of the filth and the fear of her childhood. She was in a place where she couldn’t get evicted, where filth would never exist again.

      The guest bathroom in the hall was decorated in cool shades of mint-green and white. She straightened the hand towel next to the sink before she bent down to look for the aspirin bottle.

      She was on her knees when she looked up and saw Kathy standing in the doorway. “Here you are,” she said as she grabbed the bottle and began to rise.

      “And here you are,” Kathy said, and she slammed something into the side of Peyton’s head. Peyton reeled backward, unable to keep her balance. What? Why? These two words exploded in Peyton’s brain just before her head hit the edge of the bathtub and everything went black.

      Consciousness came in bits and pieces. The faint scent of pine cleaner filled her nose and she winced from the nauseating pound of a headache. She opened her eyes and saw the mint-green bathroom rug beneath her face. She frowned in confusion. What? How did she get on the floor?

      Kathy. Kathy had come into the bathroom and attacked her. Kathy had hit her. As she got to her feet it all came back to her. Why? Why had her friend attacked her? It didn’t make sense.

      Lilly! She had to get to Lilly. The baby wasn’t crying. Maybe she was still napping. Peyton’s heart crashed against her ribs, like an off-balance washing machine on the spin cycle. Please, God, let her still be napping.

      Woozy and unsteady on her feet, she stumbled down the hallway. She needed to call for help. She’d been attacked. But before she could do anything she needed her baby in her arms.

      As she stepped into the kitchen she froze. The infant seat was in the center of the table, the receiving blanket a swath of rose color against the empty seat.

      “No.” The word whispered out of her as her knees buckled. Horror pressed against her chest, making it difficult for her to draw breath. Where was Lilly?

      She reeled out of the kitchen and ran down the hall to Lilly’s bedroom. Kathy must have put her in her crib. Even though Peyton knew it made no sense, that nothing made sense, she clung to the hope that Kathy had tucked Lilly into her crib before she’d left the house.

      She clung to that tenuous, fragile hope as she raced into the small bedroom she’d decorated with pink ruffles and teddy bears. She stopped in the doorway and stared at the empty crib.

      And screamed.

      Sheriff Tom Grayson pulled his car into the driveway of the neat little ranch house and got out before the engine had completely shut off. His youngest brother, Caleb, waited for him on the lawn, his khaki deputy uniform the same color as the sunburned dried grass beneath his feet.

      “What’s up?” Tom asked. The late July heat felt as if it seared his lungs with each breath he took.

      Caleb’s brown eyes were darker than usual, a sure sign that he was troubled. “A missing baby.”

      Tom’s stomach flipped. In all his years as sheriff of Black Rock, Kansas, there had never been a child missing or murdered.

      “Details,” Tom demanded.

      “The woman, Peyton Wilkerson, says she was entertaining a friend and she went to the bathroom. She says the woman attacked her and knocked her unconscious, then stole the baby. But, I got to tell you, Tom, it all seems pretty fishy. Her wounds look superficial, she just had a new patio poured yesterday, and the kitchen smells like bleach.”

      Bleach, the best thing to use to clean up traces of blood. Tom tried to keep his mind open as he nodded and went into the house.

      He stepped into the living room, and his first impression was one of obsessive neatness and order. The furnishings were simple and the room smelled of lemon furniture polish and glass cleaner.

      He heard the sound of his brother Benjamin coming from the kitchen. It didn’t surprise him that Benjamin was the one in the kitchen with the potential victim while Caleb had been the one pacing the grass outside.

      Benjamin had an affinity for anyone he thought might be a victim of a crime. Softhearted to a fault, he would be consoling Peyton Wilkerson. On the other hand, impulsive, impatient Caleb was always ready to believe the worst in a situation, always ready to investigate and arrest.

      Before going to the kitchen, Tom turned down a hallway and stepped into the first bedroom he came to. It was obviously a nursery. Decorated in shades of pink, it was tidy and held the faintest scent of baby lotion.

      He left that room and went farther down the hall, passing a bedroom and coming to the master bedroom. Decorated in yellow, white and green, it gave the aura of a peaceful garden with sunshine. As with all the other rooms, nothing appeared out of place. Even the nightstand held nothing more than an attractive reading lamp.

      Tom frowned as he thought of his own nightstand, which often held the remainder of a bedtime snack, whatever book he was currently reading and little notes to himself of things he thought of just before drifting off to sleep.

      He touched nothing; he was just trying to get a quick feel for the person who lived there. So far he learned that Peyton Wilkerson definitely took pride in her surroundings and probably had more than a touch of obsessive-compulsiveness.

      The first thing Tom noticed as he stood in the doorway to the kitchen was the faint, underlying scent of bleach. The second thing he noticed was that Peyton Wilkerson was a stunner. Even red-rimmed eyes from crying and an angry gash on the side of her forehead couldn’t detract from her fragile beauty.

      Both she and Benjamin sat at the kitchen table. In the center of the table was an empty infant seat covered in pink material and ruffles.

      Tom knew most of the people in the small town of Black Rock, but he’d never seen Peyton Wilkerson before. If he had, he definitely would have remembered.

      As he stepped into the room she jumped up from her chair. “Thank God,” she said, tears shimmering