The Chosen Child Read online

  “Exactly my point.” Cody looked at her as if she were dense. “You cope your way, now let me cope in mine.”

  “So, what you’re saying is that once you’ve tracked down the hit-and-run driver and put him away, things will be A-OK again? Everything will just go back to normal?”

  “You know that’s not what I mean.” He pursed his lips and shook his head. “And women say men don’t listen.”

  “I’m listening, Cody. You’re the one who’s not.” Tears burned her eyes, and her throat tightened as she struggled not to cry. “I’ve found a healthy outlet for my feelings. Revenge isn’t healthy. You’ve got to find a better way than that to move past our little girl’s death. Regina can help us get back on track and work through this together.”

  “I’m not so sure that’s the answer.” The look in his eyes chilled her.

  “What are you saying?”

  He was silent a moment before he answered. “I’ve been thinking about moving in with Jordan for a while. I need some time and space.”

  Fear gripped her. “You don’t mean that.”

  “Yes,” he said. “I do.”

  Nikki fought to control her panic. She’d never been one to let emotions overrule good judgment. “Please don’t.”

  “I’m not giving up, I just…” He let the sentence trail away. A fly landed on his discarded sandwich and he flicked it away, scowling. “I’m just taking a step back, Nikki. I think it’s best.”

  Best. Not the word she’d use to describe what he proposed. “Please, Cody, just…wait.” God, if he moved out there might be no turning back.

  “Wait for what?”

  For us. For whatever it took to stop this hell they’d lived in for the past four months. She took a deep breath. “When I talked to Amanda on the phone last week, she asked me to come to Tennessee for a visit.” The accident had left Amanda unable to cope with her job as an RN in the maternity ward of the local hospital, or with anything else for that matter, including the tension between the three of them. She’d fled Colorado and now lived in the hills of Tennessee, in the cabin where their granny had taken care of them for the better part of their childhood. “I’ve been thinking I might take her up on her offer. I had planned to talk to you about it today, after our session with Regina.”

  Now it was Cody’s turn to look apprehensive. “You’re going to fly out there?”

  She shook her head. “Drive.”

  His eyes widened. “Nikki, it’s fifteen hundred miles to Boone’s Crossing.”

  “I know. That’s why I want to drive. It’ll give me some time to think.” She stared at the tabletop. “If I leave in the morning, I can be there by Saturday. I don’t want Amanda to face Sunday by herself.” She felt his gaze on her, and out of the corner of her eye, recognized the set of his jaw.

  Sunday, June twentieth, would’ve been Amanda’s due date.

  Cody would talk about little else besides his need for revenge. He had yet to open up and talk to her about their baby girl.

  “Amanda’s been through hell,” he said quietly. “And you need to be with her, too.”

  It hurt Nikki to admit that she couldn’t let herself lean on him. She nodded. “And when I come back, you and I can decide what our next step should be.”

  “How long will you be gone?”

  Her job as a kindergarten teacher left her with the summer months off, school having let out last month, the end of May. “I don’t know. Two weeks, maybe three?”

  Cody’s jaw muscles tightened and she knew he wasn’t happy with the idea. “I really hate for you to be out on the highway alone like that. Especially after…” His words trailed away, but she knew what he’d been about to say.

  After what had happened to Amanda.

  “I’ll be fine, Cody. I’ll take my cell phone and check in with you.”

  “Sounds like your mind’s made up.”

  “It is.” She hadn’t fully realized it until now. But maybe this was best. Time apart might give them both a chance to cool down. Maybe when she got back home, Cody would be more willing to talk.

  And less willing to simply give up and move out.

  “All right.” Cody turned his hands palm up in a gesture of resignation.

  “Will you wait until I get back to discuss moving in with Jordan?” Her heart raced, and she held her breath.

  He nodded. “Yeah, I’ll wait.”

  “Okay then.” She got up from the table. “Guess I’d better start packing.”

  Nikki headed for the bedroom, half hoping Cody would call out for her not to go. To instead stay with him.

  But he said nothing as she left the room.

  THE DRONE of the dispatcher’s radio faded into the background as Cody tried to focus on the paperwork at hand, a task he normally hated. But he didn’t want to go home.

  Nikki had been gone only two days, and already it felt like forever. He hated the emptiness of their house without her. It felt as if his life had suddenly veered south to hell the minute she’d driven away. One minute he’d had it all, right down to the proverbial white picket fence and family dog—if you could call a retired police dog with an attitude proverbial. And now he sat looking for excuses not to go home.

  He scooted his chair closer to his desk and bent over it a little more intently. But his thoughts circled back to Nikki.

  He’d called her on her cell phone so many times he’d lost count and had been relieved to know she’d made it to Boone’s Crossing safely. But when he’d hung up after their last conversation, he’d felt alone and empty, as though a lifeline to her had been broken.

  He hoped her visit to Amanda would help Nikki. She felt so much guilt for having asked her sister to act as a surrogate in the first place.

  And he knew he needed to call Amanda himself to apologize for the horrible things he’d said to her before she’d left Colorado, running from demons of her own.

  How could you be so stupid, Amanda? So irresponsible. Stopping on a dark highway like that, for God’s sake!

  He hadn’t meant it. In the pain of losing his baby girl, he’d lashed out at everyone. The fact that Amanda had pulled over to offer her cell phone to Caitlin Kramer—stranded on the side of a mountain highway with a flat tire—was typical of Amanda’s generous and caring nature. She couldn’t have known what would happen. Dear Lord, it had taken him longer than it should have to realize the depth of Amanda’s suffering. Baby Anna had been hers as much as she’d been his and Nikki’s.

  The thought instantly caused Cody’s self-imposed safety mechanism to kick in, the one that kicked in every time his thoughts veered too close to little Anna. The hurt was still too great, too fresh. Instead, he tunneled all his energy, his grief, into revenge. He’d find the scumbag responsible for tearing apart his family if it was the last thing he did, and see to it that the guy went to prison.

  “Man, now I know you’re desperate.”

  Cody looked up at the sound of his partner’s voice. Jordan Blake had been with the Deer Creek PD a year longer than Cody, his tenth anniversary around the corner. A beefy man with a deep voice, Jordan had a way of putting the fear of God into a suspect with nothing more than a sharp word or two. He’d cover your back with his life, and Cody couldn’t think of anyone he considered a better friend.

  “Yeah, well, it beats going home to my remote control and a cranky police dog that only understands German.” The dog had been trained in non-English commands so that a perp couldn’t distract him.

  Jordan perched on the corner of Cody’s desk, his dark eyes sober. “You know the invitation to stay at my place is still open. You can even bring Max. I think I’ve finally figured out what kind of dog biscuits he really likes.”

  Cody laughed, then shook his head. “That I doubt, but thanks.”

  Jordan sat there a minute, as though fishing for something more to say. Apparently, he came up empty. “I’m out of here,” he said, standing. He gave Cody’s shoulder an affectionate cuff. “Don’t stay too long, cowboy. Go home and take a ride. You know what they say…nothing better for the inside of a man than the outside of a horse.”

  Cody nodded. “I might just do that.” The horses could always use a workout, and riding usually helped clear his head and bring things into perspective. Only this time, he was afraid there were no answers.

  A short time later, he made his way to the parking lot. The sun beat down on the blacktop, the evening temperature still hovering high enough to make him glad his squad car had air-conditioning. He strode toward where it was parked off to one side of the building. And did a double take.

  A boy who looked to be perhaps ten or eleven crouched in front of the car, a can of spray paint clutched in his hand, and as Cody watched, he reached up to finish the job he’d already started. Red initials—DH—big enough to read even from this distance, spread across the hood of Cody’s squad car as the kid’s finger depressed the button on the paint can.

  “Hey!” Cody sprang forward. “What the hell are you doing!”

  The boy’s eyes widened as he cast a hurried look over his shoulder. Then he ran. Thin as a whip, he wasn’t very tall, but the kid could move. He sprinted from the parking lot and into a field of unmowed grass behind the police station. The mountainous, rural area that surrounded Deer Creek offered plenty of places for a boy to hide. If Cody didn’t catch the kid quickly, he’d be out of sight and long gone.

  The boy sped on like a downhill train. He ditched the paint can in a clump of bushes and vaulted over a six-foot chain-link fence at the end of the field as if it were nothing. Berating himself for spending a lot less time at the gym lately than he should have, Cody kept after him. He clambered over the fence but, as he hit the ground, the toe of his shoe caught in a tangle of deep grass, and down he went.

  His knee slammed into a rock hard enough to bring a string of creative curses to his lips. With a grunt, Cody scrambled to his feet, feeling like an idiot, hoping the kid hadn’t seen him fall. Even madder than he’d been moments before, he took off again, trying to ignore the fresh shot of pain through his knee. Great. He gave chase as the boy zigzagged through the quiet neighborhood, down a side street.

  “I’m warning you, halt!” Cody shouted. Or what? He couldn’t exactly draw his gun on a kid who’d been armed with nothing more than an aerosol can. The boy cast a glance back at him, but made no move to slow down. He wore baggy jeans that exposed colorful boxer shorts, and Cody couldn’t see how he could possibly run without his pants falling around his ankles. Shaggy hair stuck out from under a black ballcap, bill tilted at an angle, and a yellow basketball jersey with the number twelve bunched above his skinny hips.

  Cody swerved, taking a shortcut across the front lawn of Old Man Parker’s place—a retired Navy admiral well-known for his dislike of children. The kid was already headed toward the backyard, ready to rocket over the fence, where he could cut across the alley and likely lose Cody by ducking through the next yard, then on into the sagebrush of the surrounding countryside. Cody’s heart flew to his throat, knowing what was on the other side of Parker’s fence.

  Luckily, the enormous Doberman pinscher hit the chain-link before the boy did. Teeth bared, the dog barked in a way that said he meant business. The boy skidded to a halt and turned to run the other way, too late. Cody caught him by the arm and spun him around. “Hold it right there!” Fuming, out of breath, he glared at the child.

  For a moment, Cody saw fear flicker behind the boy’s brown eyes, but then it was gone, replaced by defiance. The kid squirmed in his grasp. “Let go of me, man.”

  “What the hell were you doing—spray-painting my squad car?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Breathing rapidly, the boy shrugged from Cody’s grasp and tried to bolt again.

  Cody caught hold of him, simultaneously reaching for his handcuffs. “Oh, really? I suppose that red paint on your hands got there by itself.” He snapped the cuffs on the kid’s scrawny wrists.

  “Hey! What the hell are you doing, dude?” The kid squirmed and twisted, tossing a fiery look of resentment over his shoulder.

  “That’s Officer Somers to you, and I’m placing you under arrest.”

  Panic snaked across the boy’s features before hiding behind a defiant mask once more. “You can’t arrest me. I didn’t do nothin’.”

  “Tell it to the judge.” With a not-so-gentle push, Cody set the boy walking, back toward the station.

  The kid cursed loudly and vehemently.

  From the yard, Parker’s Dobie barked with renewed fervor, and the old man jerked his door open to see what the commotion was about. “Everything’s under control, Admiral Parker,” Cody said. He hurried the kid away before Parker could utter a word. Given the choice between facing the dog or facing the old man, Cody would’ve chosen the Doberman.

  Limping along, he sighed, still holding on to the boy, whose face looked vaguely familiar. “What’s your name, son?”

  “I ain’t your son,” the kid spat, “and I don’t have to tell you a damned thing.”

  “Thank God for small favors,” Cody quipped. “If I had a kid like you…” If he had a kid like this boy, he’d be so grateful for a child of his own, it wouldn’t matter what sort of discipline problems arose.

  The boy, looking younger and more frightened by the minute, set his jaw and scowled. “Damned dog.”

  “Yeah—a damned good dog. Thor lets Parker know when somebody’s up to no good—like when someone spray-painted the side of his garage last week. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?”

  “No.” The boy smirked. “I could’ve outrun you, if it weren’t for that stupid dog.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” He hated to admit the kid was probably right. His knee felt as though someone had wedged a grapefruit beneath his skin.

  “Maybe you oughta lay off the doughnuts.”

  Cody’s already stretched temper snapped. “And maybe you ought to lay off with the smart mouth.”

  The kid glared at him, and suddenly Cody remembered where he’d seen him before. He’d been in Nikki’s kindergarten class a few years ago. Dustin Holbrook. Child of an alcoholic mother and a father who’d left shortly after the boy was born, Dustin had been in the foster care system for the better part of his life. Cody hadn’t seen him in a year or two, but if memory served him right, Dustin was eleven. Naturally, he’d grown and changed as he neared puberty. But when Cody looked for it, he could still see the face of the little boy Nikki had taught and cared so much about.

  Dustin’s slight build made Cody feel like a big bully, shoving him along down the street. But the kid refused to walk under his own steam. “You know,” Cody continued, shooting Dustin a smirk of his own, “you might want to be thinking about what your foster parents are going to say when I call them.”

  “How do you know—” Dustin began, then clamped his mouth shut.

  “That you’re in foster care?” Cody gave him a piercing stare. “I know a lot of things, including your name, Dustin.”

  Dustin scuffed his toe against the ground as they walked. “Big deal. My foster parents will ground me for a couple of days, maybe take away my video games. Who cares?”

  “You’ve got a lot more to worry about than having your video game privileges revoked.”

  “What do you mean?” Dustin tried to hide behind his air of bravado, but he looked worried.

  “You’re going to juvie.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  NIKKI TURNED INTO the driveway, with mixed emotions at being home. The three weeks she’d been gone had felt like an eternity. Her pulse picked up speed as she parked in front of the garage. Cody’s squad car was in the driveway. She hadn’t talked to him for a couple of days. The fact that he had kept in touch with her on the drive to and from Tennessee showed he still cared. Yet her stomach churned at the thought of walking through the front door to face him. She wondered if he’d made up his mind about moving in with Jordan.

  “One way to find out,” Nikki mumbled. She climbed from behind the wheel of her Saturn and retrieved her luggage from the trunk. Suitcases in hand, she strode up the front walk, frowning. She’d thought Cody would at least come outside when he heard her pull in. It wasn’t like him not to help her with her luggage. The house was quiet and empty when she unlocked the door and pushed it open. Not even Max came to greet her. Which meant one thing. Cody was out on a ride. He often took off for hours on one of the horses when something was on his mind.

  Nikki carried her suitcases upstairs to their room. Ignoring how empty it seemed without him, she began to unpack. She couldn’t stand to leave things in a mess when she traveled. Had to unpack right away, before she could allow herself to relax.

  As she sorted through her clothes, hanging the clean, tossing the dirty into a pile to be toted to the bathroom hamper, Nikki glanced out the second-story window of the ranch house. It offered a view of the mountains, which encircled the one-hundred-year-old house like a lover’s embrace. For as far as the eye could see, the lush, gold-green pasture stretched out behind the ranch, rising to meet public BLM land beyond. There the grass gave way to sagebrush, and the ground grew rocky as flat became hills and hills became mountains. Aspen and blue spruce dotted the distance with color, and somewhere out there Nikki imagined her husband rode, lost in thoughts of his own.

  On an impulse, she abandoned her unpacking. No matter what their differences, she’d missed Cody, and she didn’t want to wait one more minute to see him. She’d stalled, putting off the return home for far too long. Whatever their marriage had come to, she needed to stop running from it. She traded her shorts and blouse for jeans and a T-shirt, her sandals for socks and cowboy boots.

  Minutes later, she made her way to the eight-stall barn, white with blue trim, that stood behind the house. Armed with a halter, lead rope and a handful of treats, she exited a stall through one of the connecting paddocks and walked out into the pasture. A shrill whistle snagged the attention of the four horses in the distance. Always game for a treat, they raised their heads and cast a hopeful look in her direction. “Come on!” Nikki called. “I’ve got cookies. Come on Cheyenne! Dancer!” She took a step toward them, noting that Cody’s gelding, Raven, was not in the group. Her movement was all the encouragement the horses needed. They trotted briskly toward her, then broke into a lope. She smiled, loving the way their muscles rippled beneath their well-groomed coats. There was nothing more beautiful than a quarter horse in motion.