Stolen Goods: A Secret Baby Romance (7 page)

BOOK: Stolen Goods: A Secret Baby Romance
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12

 

 

 

They’d arrived in
Barre Vermont by lunchtime on the third day of their travels. In spite of
knowing he shouldn’t, Nolan procrastinated for as long as he could, and made
damn sure Weslyn ate before he took her to the police station.

Everything
happened fast, and Nolan didn’t like it. He was used to being involved in as
much of the process as he wanted, or as much as his superiors forced him to be,
but Barre’s finest didn’t need or want his help. When the police tried to throw
a major extortion charge into the mix, Nolan finally had enough and made a call
to the Burlington office for a little federal backup.

Aggravating the
locals, the FBI swooped in and stole the art forger right out from under the
police chief’s nose. Nolan pulled a few strings and got Moon a lawyer, then
tried to pull a few more to get her seen by a judge and bonded out the same
day, but he failed in that mission. There were a few confusions that had to be
cleared up before Weslyn could get a bail hearing—namely, who she belonged to
as a prisoner. She was the most exciting thing to happen to either state or
federal offices in Vermont in a long time.

Nolan had no
choice but let Weslyn go, and warned every agent in earshot that the mother of
his child had better be treated as well as possible. He kissed her goodbye and
dared anyone to say anything.

Then Weslyn Moon
fell through the cracks.

“What in the
fuck
is the problem?” Nolan gripped the short hair on his head and glared at his
supervising agent.

“The problem is
Barre’s police chief. He made a real strong case concerning Moon’s crime in his
jurisdiction.”

“Bullshit. He’s
the judge’s golfing buddy.”

“That, too.”

Nolan took a deep
breath that did nothing to quell the rage, panic and frustration chewing on his
heart. “She’s been in lock-up for over a month and hasn’t even been arraigned
yet!”

“The judge
declared her a flight risk—”

“What happened to
a fair and speedy trial?” Nolan demanded. “This is unconstitutional!”

“Take it up with
the ACLU.” The agent in charge of Nolan’s new office leaned back in his padded
desk chair. “Look, Findley, we’re doing all we can to get the ball rolling. The
chief’s got a bug up his ass over the way you called in the big dogs and took
away his bone.”

“That’s too
goddamned bad,” Nolan snarled. “This is exactly the reason I did it, too. That
man had it out for her, and now he’s doing his damnedest to see that she stays
behind bars for as long as possible.”

“She’s going to
serve time anyway,” the other agent cautioned softly.

Weslyn definitely
had to pay the price for her artistic deceits, but the confusion of multiple
crimes had become a way for Barre’s police department to get a little of their
own back at Nolan. He’d used the FBI to pry Weslyn out of the clutches of the
overeager police chief and in doing so muddied the waters of the court. Now
Weslyn was caught in the middle of a law enforcement pissing match that was
threatening to send Nolan over the edge of rationality.

He was ready to
commit murder and mayhem, to get her out of the women’s correctional facility
she’d been languishing in. Chittenden Regional may not be anything close to
Sing Sing, but Nolan still wanted Weslyn out of there and into better
accommodations with greater access to prenatal care.

Again, Nolan
dragged in a massive breath. “I talked to the people at the Barre Birth and
Reproductive Center. Went to their Board of Directors with my lawyer.”

“You strong-armed
them into dropping all charges.” His supervisor nodded. “I heard.”

“Easy enough to
do, considering my sample was a case of fraudulent storage anyway.”

“Doesn’t help with
the judge, though.”

Nolan gritted his
teeth. “Tomorrow I’ll be visiting with the State’s Attorney General. Enough is
enough. I want her out of there.”

Guilty
.

The word haunted
Nolan. In his sleep it echoed in his head, and when he was awake it twisted in
his gut. He couldn’t escape it or the way it shook his heart and locked around
his lungs. He carried the weight of it with him everywhere he went.

When it finally
came, when Moon finally got her day in court, he’d been certain the judge would
declare her sentence complete. After all, she’d been lost in Chittenden for
nearly two months. Surely the rest of her time could be spent on house arrest.

The judge didn’t
agree. But he did let her remain where she was.

Nolan visited
Weslyn every Saturday. He managed to get to South Burlington for almost all of
her doctor’s appointments, too. The baby was healthy. Weslyn was slightly less
so, but everyone had assured him that was normal for incarcerated mothers, and
that the doctors were keeping a close watch on her.

Nolan’s previous
obsession with Weslyn Moon paled in comparison to what he felt for her then.
And what he felt only deepened as the weeks flew by and her belly grew larger.
It was a new brand of torture, every time he had to leave her in jail. A new
level of frustration when he saw her again, gaining weight but not the glow
everyone claimed a pregnant woman should have.

His little mouse
was unhappy.

Nolan was furious.

The state of
Vermont wanted to take their baby away.

 

13

 

 

 

The contractions
were coming faster, harder. Pain deeper than any Weslyn had ever known drew her
body taut, lifted her spine from the thin mattress and held her in a terrible
arch as she struggled to find breath. Still, she could bear it—she’d known pain
much worse, and less rewarding.

The handcuffs were
annoying, and the sound they made clinking along the metal rails of the
hospital bed scraped her nerves raw, but she could deal with it. She gritted
her teeth and breathed the way she’d always seen in movies, and let the fierce
wave of heat roll through her.

When her body
found a small respite, she asked her nurse, “Where is Agent Nolan Findley?
Please, did anyone tell him I was in labor? I need him. He’s the father.”

In the months
since he’d picked her up in Chicago, Nolan had become the one person Weslyn
depended on for laughter…happiness. For the first time in her life, she felt
protected and cared for, and she’d loved seeing him, even though she wore
shackles to their weekly meetings.

She been lost in
the system for a while, fought over and bartered for. The judge kept allowing
the state to postpone her trial, but then Nolan saved her from that, too.
Whatever strings he pulled, whoever he talked to, once her court appearances
started, the whole process moved quickly. But she was still in jail. Sentenced
to a year for art forgery, she’d expected her time to be spent on house arrest
like her lawyer and Nolan had assured her. It wasn’t, and while Chittenden
wasn’t a hardcore prison, she was still uncomfortable. Nolan had become the one
bright spot in her life.

Meeting after
meeting, sitting across the table from him and talking to him about everything
under the sun had done something to open her heart. Memories of their nights
together, the two motel stays that had brought her so much pleasure, kept her
warmer than she should have been. Some days she’d been lost in a dreamy fog,
others she felt like a girl with her first crush, imagining the way life
could
be—with her, Nolan and their child together and happy.

The nurse ripped
Weslyn’s fantasy apart with a simple statement. “No one else is allowed to be
in here. You’re a prisoner.”

“What does that
have to do with anything?” Another pain swept through Weslyn, and she gritted
her words out in a strangled scream. “He’s the father. He needs to be here!”

The nurse shook
her head. “That’s not how it works.”

He wasn’t there
and couldn’t come. Weslyn’s thoughts spun, but she held on to hope and her
dream. Later he would come, after the baby was born. They would call him and
Nolan would rush to her side, tell her he was taking care of everything.

Through the night,
she held on to that delusion. She’d seen something special in his photograph, and
she’d experienced it firsthand when he found her in Chicago. He was beautiful
inside and out, a true gentleman, a good man. A rare breed.

She loved him. In
the moment of tearing pain and agonized relief when her child slipped from her
body, Weslyn experienced love in a way she’d never done before. She was dizzy
with it, panting and gasping, reaching for it with shaking arms. Bright spots
spun in her vision.

She wanted Nolan
to share in her joy. Needed him.

“My baby,” she
whispered. “Nolan’s baby. Let me see.”

But she couldn’t
see. The bright spots grew brighter, bigger, hotter. Somewhere far, far away, a
nurse screamed for a doctor and machines beeped incessantly.

Weslyn passed out
before she could hold her baby.

Life descended
into darkness. Pure darkness without light or hope. Only the pain of broken
dreams and wishful thinking found a home in the empty void that Weslyn had
become.

She knew she was
on suicide watch, but there was no need. She didn’t have the energy for such
trouble. The only thing she had the energy to do was cry.

So she cried.
Long, slow silent tears.

She cried at never
having held her baby before they took him away. She cried for the pain that
still racked her body and ripped into her heart. She cried for herself.

Because Nolan had never
come.

Sometimes, in the
long, lonely darkness, someone fed her pills and whispered of post-partum
depression. Weslyn didn’t have the energy to care about that, either.

BOOK: Stolen Goods: A Secret Baby Romance
5.55Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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