When the Bough Breaks (Rose Gardner Investigations #6) - Denise Grover Swank Page 0,88
like you normally would. There’s no shame in saying this is too much.”
I was tempted. I hadn’t had any run-ins with criminals in months, and I felt like I was off my game. My edge had softened. Plus, Dermot was right—the fastest I could move was a brisk walk. I hadn’t even been able to run after Muffy the night before. There was no way I could run for my life. And yet, Vera had been trying to talk to me for months, and her message had indicated she could bring me to Ashley and Mikey. How could I not go?
“No,” I said slowly. “I have to do this. I fully admit that I’m scared, but I need to do this.”
“There’s no shame in admittin’ you’re scared. In fact, I’m relieved to hear that you are.”
“Then feel plenty relieved.” I sucked in a breath. “There’s something else I need to tell you.”
“I’m listenin’.”
“As much as I loathe to get into my personal life, part of the reason I went to see James last night was to find out if he had anything to do with the break-in at Mr. Gilliam’s office, but the other was personal.” I took a breath, brushing a few strands of hair from my forehead, and told him about the paternity papers I’d drawn up and James’s refusal to sign them. “When I asked him about it last night, he refused to address it. But when Neely Kate and I were at Merrilee’s this morning, Carter showed up and said his client had a change of heart, but there were two conditions. One, I give up on finding whatever was stolen from Violet’s attorney’s safe, and two…” I paused and steeled my back. “That I spend forty-eight hours with him, with no contact with anyone else. Before the baby is born.”
“I see…”
“After I took Neely Kate back to the nursery, I went to see Carter. He gave me a number to a burner phone so I could contact James to arrange our get-together.”
“And did you contact him?” he asked, his tone not giving anything away.
“Yes, although in typical Skeeter Malcolm fashion, he didn’t tell me squat. I told him I’d give him a few hours, not forty-eight, but he told me it was an all-or-nothin’ deal, then hung up.”
He didn’t respond for several seconds.
“Well?” I asked.
“We already know he had something to do with that break-in, so that one’s no surprise. And the second…” I heard an edge in his voice. “I know it sounds like a personal matter, and it likely is, but if he’s lookin’ to start something back up with you, it seems like odd timin’.”
“He said that I could have come to see him sooner and was pissed that it was something about kids that made me reach out to him again. He seemed bitter, so I can’t imagine that’s what he wants.”
“And he won’t tell you why he won’t sign the paternity papers?”
“No.”
“How adverse is he to havin’ a kid?”
“His attorney tried to give me a twenty-thousand-dollar check to abort and had an appointment already set up in Little Rock. That should tell you.”
“And you declined, of course.” He paused. “And he didn’t take that well.”
“No. He said I’d chosen an unplanned baby over him. He mentioned again last night that I’d chosen the baby over him.”
“So what if he doesn’t want to rekindle your romance? What if he wants to take the baby from you?”
“What?”
“Skeeter Malcolm is a ruthless man. He sees your choosing a baby over him as a betrayal. He doesn’t tolerate betrayal.”
I shook my head before realizing he couldn’t see it. “No. He would never do that.”
“Didn’t he already try? He pushed you hard to get an abortion.”
“But he thought the baby was nothing then. Now it’s a baby, and he told me that he’d never tolerate abuse of children.” He’d left J.R. Simmons’ good graces when he’d refused to murder a child.
“Who says he’s gonna kill the baby? You obviously want this baby, so what better punishment than to take it from you?”
I gasped in shock.
“You’re two weeks from delivery, so you’re safe to deliver at any time. And forty-eight hours is plenty of time for him to bring someone in to induce labor and take the baby.”
I stumbled backward and sat on the edge of my desk. “No. He wouldn’t do that.”
“Maybe the man you knew wouldn’t do that, but the man he is now…I think he might.”