Page 82 of Secret Baby for Mr. Grump

“I don’t know.” I heard her swallow and try to restrain the panic enough to give me the information. “We got home, and I locked the doors. I swear I did. Then Caleb was watching TV, and I went upstairs to take a quick shower. But when I came down, he wasgone.” Her voice choked on the last word. “I thought maybe he went outside, even though I told him not to do that anymore. So I went out to yell for him. I even went over to Mrs. Winchester’s, and she said she hadn’t seen him. And then I saw it.”

“Saw what?” The sinking horror was making my chest tense, my voice harsh. Sean could sense the immediate change in the atmosphere because he stopped pretending to sift through the papers and turned his full attention to me.

“Footsteps. Footsteps other than Caleb’s. They were in my driveway,” she gasped. “His jacket was gone too. Someone came into the house and took our son!” And then she dissolved into loud hacking tears that tore at my sanity.

That was the last straw.

The chair I was sitting on flew back as I shot to my feet, and everyone jumped at the sudden movement. They all gave me a wide berth as I stormed to the entrance, a savage kind of fire roaring inside me. It was all their fault, whoever the fuck was doing this, and all the people who hadn’t caught this guy in the first place but had tried to pin it on me.

Well, they succeeded in one thing.

They were determined to turn me into a monster, and a monster was what they would get.

Because whoever took my son, I was going to tear them limb from limb.

“They won’t survive this,” I growled. I could hear Sean hurrying behind me, and he skidded to a stop when I did. A faint thread of rationality had me stopping to turn and glare at the older officer, who was no longer playing video games on his phone. He cowered before my gaze.

“My son is missing. I want every available officer you have looking for him. You’re not going to like what I do to you if you don’t find him. Do you understand?”

I must have looked like one scary motherfucker because he didn’t even give me any lip service. He simply nodded and grabbed the police radio on his table, barking out orders.

I had no recollection of storming into the parking lot and getting into my car, but suddenly, once I was there, I didn’t waste any time as I zipped out of the parking lot. Sean was in the seat beside me, but he was sensible enough to remain silent. I think he knew I was liable to bite anyone’s head off at this point.

And I still felt like that as I drove.

Thankfully, we arrived at Allie’s home in one piece. The door tore open the minute we pulled in, and Allie ran out in a T-shirt and sweats, her hair a mass of wet curls around her head.

She flew into my arms, and I caught her, holding her as she sobbed into my neck. My heart squeezed so hard that it was painful.

“Our baby,” she cried helplessly. “They took our baby, Marcus.”

“Ssh,” I consoled, running soothing hands down her back even as violence bubbled and stewed inside me. “We’ll get him back, I swear.”

I glanced at Sean, gesturing with my chin. He got my meaning, immediately whipping out his phone. I knew he would contact his PI friend to see if there was anything they could find out about the kidnapper. We needed all the information we could get.

As I held Allie, I refused to give in to the climbing despair. We still had no clues thus far, nothing to indicate who had fucking done this. Was it the same man who killed Old Man Clancy? Did he want me to leave town to hide his tracks?

Or was it one of the countless other townspeople who hated my guts?

The sudden ringing of my phone distracted my morose thoughts.

I pulled it out, frowning at the caller ID. It was my mother. I answered in case it was an emergency.

“It’s not a good time,” I said to her.

“I caught him,” she announced smugly. “The bastard who’s been sneaking around here.”

I growled. “There is someone?”

“Yup. I told you, yet you didn’t believe me. But I wasn’t crazy. You should come over and see him. He says he has a message for you.”

“He can get in line. I’ll call the police first to get him for trespassing.”

My mother was quiet for a little bit, too, before she said, “I think you should come. And bring your girlfriend too if you want. He insists that whatever he has to say is really important and pertinent to the murder all those years ago.”

I frowned. I didn’t have time to entertain any bullshit right now, but just in case he had information, I needed to know what it was. Plus, my mother didn’t live too far away.

“We’re on our way,” I told her, relenting.

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