Love at First Sight - By B. J. Daniels Page 0,47

saw there. “Vandermullen had to be in on it.”

“In on what?” Jack demanded.

“I don’t know,” Denny admitted. “But I don’t think the baby’s dead. I think Liz was actually telling the truth. She was looking for our daughter. I think that’s what got her murdered.”

“Why would anyone murder her over an adoption?” Jack asked.

“To cover up what they’d done,” Karen piped in. “If Denny is right, then Liz and Carl had wanted the world to believe their baby was dead. But at least one other person, the man Liz saw with her baby, knows the truth. I would imagine neither man wants that truth coming out now.”

Jack shook his head. He should have known not to bring her. Didn’t he realize she’d get involved in this? Hell, she was already involved. She’d seen the man with Liz. Whoever he was.

“Think about it, Jack,” Denny argued. “The baby was born here. Liz met Vandermullen just weeks after breaking up with me, married him and moved to Columbia Falls.”

“But Vandermullen kept his house here up in Rattlesnake,” Jack pointed out.

“All right,” Denny said. “Maybe Liz came back to Missoula to have the baby, hoping Vandermullen wouldn’t realize how far along she’d been when she met him. Maybe he followed her. For some reason, she had a home birth.”

“Did you ever think she might have come here to tell you about the baby?” Karen suggested.

That stopped them both. Denny stared at her. It was obviously something he hadn’t considered. Nor had Jack.

All of it was just speculation, but he had to admit, a lot of it did make him wonder.

“Maybe Vandermullen never even knew the baby was mine,” Denny said.

Jack stared at the two of them, a bad feeling in his gut. “Or maybe Vandermullen did know.”

They both turned to look at him.

“You think this Dr. Vandermullen wouldn’t have wanted the baby if he’d found out it wasn’t his?” Karen asked. “That he made her give it up for adoption? Illegally, to hide the truth?”

Jack shrugged. He’d heard a little about Vandermullen. Enough to think that could have been the case. “Look, for all we know the baby died at birth. No mystery.” That didn’t, however, explain Liz’s ad but then he wasn’t sure any of them could explain Liz’s last days let alone hours. They may never know what happened.

“Oh, Jack, the man Liz met at the hotel could be the mystery man she saw with her baby,” Karen said. “If he is and the girl’s alive, then he might know where she is.”

“I think Karen’s right,” Denny said. “I think Liz got into more than the wrong bed.”

Jack moaned. He was looking for Liz’s killer. If she really had been looking for her child, then the two paths might have crossed.

“We may never know who that man was,” he said to Karen. “Or where your daughter is—if she’s still alive,” he added for Denny’s sake, hoping all the time that he was wrong about that.

His friend didn’t say anything for a moment. Jack knew Denny had a plan and that he wasn’t going to like it.

“You’re probably right, Jack,” he said finally. “But there is at least one person who knows the truth. Dr. Carl Vandermullen.”

DR. CARL VANDERMULLEN had a large upscale home in Rattlesnake Canyon just minutes outside of Missoula.

Going anywhere near the doctor was a form of professional suicide that wasn’t lost on Jack. Baxter would get wind of it. Although Missoula was the third-largest city in Montana with a population of forty-three thousand, the entire state was like a small town when it came to the speed with which gossip traveled.

Bringing Karen along was an even worse plan. But low on options, Jack wasn’t about to leave her unless he absolutely had to. At least with him, he knew she was safe. He also wanted to gauge Vandermullen’s reaction when he saw her.

But the real reason Jack drove to the palatial home of the good doctor was for Denny. To find out what he could about the baby. And for Karen. There was still a killer out there who wanted her dead. If Vandermullen had any of the answers, Jack planned to get them.

As he pulled down the long stately drive into Dr. Vandermullen’s, Jack looked over at Karen. She seemed quite happy sleuthing with him, even knowing her life was at risk. It startled him to realize it was because she trusted him. Worse yet, he liked it. Too bad he wasn’t trustworthy, he thought as he