On the Doorstep

Though he tried to focus on the crime scene alone, something kept drawing his attention back to the ambulance where Pilar stood. This time she wasn’t paying attention to him at all. She only had eyes for the baby who was giving the EMT hearing damage as he tried to get a heart rate.

Zach figured from the baby’s healthy cry that he was going to be fine, but Pilar’s expression was stark and anguished. Was that just her empathy for the baby who had lost a mother that morning?

For a few sick seconds, Zach was jealous of that baby. He wondered how it would feel to be the recipient of Pilar’s empathy or her compassion. Then he grabbed hold of his wayward thoughts. He didn’t need anyone to care about him. People who cared got hurt, felt losses so profoundly that their hearts seemed to have been riddled with bullets.

Though he didn’t need it himself, Zach still valued the kind of compassionate care Pilar brought to her work. As a police officer, he’d seen far too few people who truly cared for their fellow human beings. The children of Tiny Blessings Adoption Agency were fortunate to have someone like Pilar on their side.

Chapter Two

Pilar took several long, deep breaths as she waited for her world to stop spinning. The knowledge that the baby appeared healthy wasn’t enough to slow this Tilt-A-Whirl she’d been riding on and couldn’t get off. If she looked up the word “surreal” in the dictionary, she would find a photograph of this scene outside the Tiny Blessings building. She would see flashing lights and uniformed emergency workers and a crying baby.

And she would see the man she’d secretly mooned over for the last two years standing not ten feet away from her and still looking past her as if she was invisible. Obviously, the crisis hadn’t changed anything.

She’d been overwhelmed enough just discovering the abandoned child, but that was before Zach’s deep voice had rolled into her ears and jolted her pulse. He was so out of context away from the church that it had taken her a few seconds to get her bearings. Not that she wouldn’t have recognized his voice anywhere, as many times as she’d overheard him talking with church friends and had wished he’d been laughing with her instead.

She glanced at him over her shoulder, careful not to get caught staring again. She’d been humiliated enough the first time. He looked so strong and proficient, taking charge of the scene and offering direction to the young uniformed police officer standing next to him. Usually the one to volunteer to head projects, Pilar felt relieved to leave the situation in Zach’s capable hands.

The wind was whipping through his wavy brown hair, forcing him to shove it out of his eyes. He wore his hair a tad longer than the current extreme styles, so it fell low across his forehead and curled the tiniest bit at his nape. Zach marched to his own fashion drummer, as well, even now looking endearingly rumpled in his sport jacket matched with a pair of khaki slacks that had never known a knife crease.

When she’d already watched him longer than she should have, Zach glanced back at her. The most startling pair of cornflower-blue eyes in, well, the history of cornflower-blue eyes, trapped her in their examining stare. Her breath hitched, and goose bumps appeared on her forearms, but she couldn’t look away.

At first he didn’t, either—his eyes wide. What did he see when he looked at her? Just another witness to interview? A case number? A day on the job? She hoped he didn’t see her yearning. She’d hidden it so well before just as all secret crushes should be carefully guarded, but her resistance was down this morning, her self-protection compromised. She exhaled when he finally looked back at his fellow police officer, but she felt oddly disappointed.

A hearty laugh pulled Pilar back to the commotion next to the ambulance.

“This one’s got a pair of lungs on him,” said one of the EMTs.

The other one laughed with him. “He’s just offended that you’re poking at him. I would be, too.”

“You take him. I’ll call in his vitals.” Before the second guy could protest, the first was off with the radio.

Gabriel continued to wail, his face becoming reddish-purple and his feet beating against the blanket. She couldn’t help smiling at him. He’d been dealt a tough blow that morning, but he was a fighter. He was going to be okay. She just knew it.

Pilar touched his head once more, her fingers tracing a path through the sweaty fuzz, and then the paramedic took him inside the ambulance. Her eyes and nose burned. She should have been praising God that little Gabriel appeared to be all right. He would be fine, and Zach would locate his mother for him. That was what she wanted, right? With surprise and a fair amount of guilt, Pilar realized she didn’t want Gabriel’s mother to be found.

As the ambulance pulled away from the curb, its precious cargo inside, Zach turned back to Pilar, anxiety heavy on his chest. He should have taken the easy-out clause Sergeant Roy Hollowell had offered him when he’d called in. The sergeant knew Zach’s history and was trying to save him some grief by not assigning him to the case, but Zach had insisted. Now he wondered why he’d volunteered to suffer.

He scribbled again on his notepad, taking down crime scene details. Hopefully, he would find enough leads this morning to keep him busy all afternoon. He turned to Pilar, who was walking back toward him, the wind blowing dark bangs into her eyes. She shoved her hair back from her face and rubbed her hands up and down her upper arms.

This time he didn’t bother worrying about offending her. Chivalry wouldn’t die under his watch if he could help it.

“Here, take my jacket,” he said, already descending the steps and lowering it onto her shoulders.

She started to speak, but he waved away her protests. “Don’t worry about it. I need to ask you a few questions, and I don’t want you to freeze while I’m doing it.”

But she wasn’t listening to him as her gaze was focused on his shoulder holster and the .40-caliber semi-automatic that until then had been hidden under his jacket. He asked his first question to distract her.

“Can you tell me the approximate time when you first noticed the baby?”

Pilar’s head jerked until she met his gaze again. She chewed her lip for several seconds and then shook her head.

“Sorry.”

“That’s okay, but try to think back. Do you know how long you waited after discovering the child before you called police? Dispatch recorded your call at 0724.”

Her gaze darted from the basket to the office entry and back before she turned to him, again shaking her head. Zach gripped his pen tighter but refused to become frustrated. Pilar was going to be helpful to him. He only needed to ask the right questions first.

“Let’s start with something else. Did you see anyone suspicious-looking around the building just before or just after you found the victim?”

Pilar rubbed her chin and looked at the ground. For a third time, she shook her head.

Zach’s jaw tightened. Was she purposely being difficult, or did she really not remember anything? From everything he’d ever sensed from or heard about the ultratogether Pilar Estes, he would have expected her to be able to relate the story in minute detail. Was she hiding something? And if so, why?

The basket drew his attention then, as full of questions as it was empty of its earlier contents.

“Can you show me exactly where you found the infant?”

This time she didn’t hesitate at all. She climbed the porch steps and peered down at the open basket, the cashmere blanket folded inside it. Her posture relaxed, and she pressed her lips together as if holding back a smile. When she glanced back at him, she raised an eyebrow though she easily could have said “duh” at the lame question, worthy of a rookie cop.

All right, Fletcher, pull it together. Her opinion of the way he conducted the investigation shouldn’t have mattered, but it did.

“Of course. The basket,” he muttered. “Did you move it, or did you find it right there on the porch?”

“Right there.” She studied the container for several seconds more, and then her gaze shot up. “You said there was a note. I didn’t see one, but then I never thought to look for one. Where did you find it?”

Who was asking the questions now? It was his turn to raise an eyebrow. “In the basket.”

She really smiled this time, an expression so warm it could have melted ice along the banks of the James River. The smile gave him the same jolt he’d experienced when he’d caught her staring earlier. She’d met his gaze squarely then and hadn’t bothered to look away.

Mirth danced in her glistening black eyes now, but earlier he’d seen something else entirely in them, intense and soulful at the same time. Perhaps he’d only reacted to Pilar’s need to connect with another human being on a day when she’d witnessed a tragic side of humanity, but he’d felt her reaching out to him. Stranger still, he’d been tempted to reach right back.

That fact alone should have sent him hightailing it back to the station so he could ask the sergeant to reassign the case. He didn’t do relationships of any kind, let alone the male-female kind. He liked being alone. He was good at it. And people who were good at being alone didn’t have to risk losing anyone important to them.

And yet Pilar’s smile drew him in. That shouldn’t have surprised him. He’d seen at church how adults and children alike gravitated toward her as she met each with her welcoming smile. This time, though, she’d directed her grin at him, and he liked that more than he cared to admit.

“Why didn’t I think of looking there?” she said when the lull in the conversation stretched too long.

“You were too busy making sure the baby was okay.”

“True.” Her smile was gone.

Why did he suddenly want to perform clown tricks or do a stand-up routine to make her smile again? Still, he had a job to do, and he didn’t have time to kid around.

“The note was buried under the blanket. We’ll see if we can pull any prints from it. Want to see it?”

He slipped back on the plastic glove from his pocket and opened the brown paper sack he’d placed the letter in. He carefully unfolded the piece of thick, ecru stationery.

“It’s addressed to the staff of Tiny Blessings. It says, ‘Please find my baby boy Gabriel a good home full of love. And tell him I love him.’”

When Pilar didn’t say anything, he decided he couldn’t blame her. He was having a hard enough time scaring up sympathy for this mother who claimed to love her baby, and he didn’t work in a field full of childless couples desperate to adopt. He could only imagine the mixed feelings Pilar must have felt.

“Gabriel.” She nodded, her gaze distant. “It’s perfect for him. He’s named after an angel. You know that story, of how Gabriel appeared to Zechariah to tell him his elderly wife, Elizabeth, would have a son, right?”

Zach shot a sidelong glance at her, convinced he hadn’t heard her right, but she wasn’t laughing.

“The same angel who appeared to Mary later, telling her she would give birth to Jesus,” he said to prove he did know what she was talking about. He wanted to ask Pilar what her point was, but he doubted she had one. Why were they reciting biblical stories when they should have been out finding Gabriel’s mom and protecting her from making mistakes that couldn’t be fixed?

“Yes, his name is perfect,” she said, nodding her agreement with the choice.

The conversation was so strange that Zach wasn’t sure how to respond. Maybe she just needed him to cut her some slack since she’d been through a harrowing morning. She wasn’t herself, and probably needed a friend. Though he knew better, he was tempted to volunteer for the job.

“Pilar,” he said in his gentlest voice, “you do see that Gabriel’s life isn’t perfect, don’t you? You have to see that he needs his mother.”

She stiffened and looked past him at the street, which was beginning to fill with cars as the rest of Chestnut Grove headed to work.

“She probably had very good reasons for leaving her baby,” she said, but didn’t sound convinced.

“We don’t know what her situation is, but it’s my job to find her.”

“And arrest her?”

She had him there. Personally, he might want to find Gabriel’s mother to make sure she was okay, but the state of Virginia wanted him to find her so it could charge her with a crime. Zach opened his mouth and closed it again. What could he say to that?

“I just wouldn’t want to see her face more misery if she’s located,” she said. “She’s done a good thing by putting her baby in place where he could be found. Now he can have that good, loving home she wrote that she wanted for him.”

“But she might be in real trouble, bigger trouble than facing criminal charges. We don’t know if she received proper prenatal or postnatal care or if she even delivered in a hospital.”

“Zach, how do you know she even wants to be found?”

“She might not, you’re right. But I have to find her and not just because of child welfare laws.” He tried to take a breath, but his lungs only ached the same way his heart ached.

“I just don’t want her to end up like—” Zach stopped himself, amazed that he’d been about to say “Jasmine.” He’d told no one about his past, except his superiors at work, and he’d only informed them out of necessity. It was too painful, too private. Yet he’d nearly bared his scars to someone he hardly knew. What was wrong with him?

“Like what?” Pilar asked.

Zach shook his head. It was so clear that he shouldn’t have taken the assignment. If he had any sense at all, he would go back to the station and ask for it to be reassigned. But he wouldn’t, because to him this was more than an assignment. He felt a calling here to help, no matter how much it hurt. He might be the only chance that Gabriel’s mother had.

Lord, please give me the strength to do the right thing. Please be with the baby’s mother. Show her that You care and that others care, too. Zach would have said “Amen,” but he got the feeling this situation was going to require a lot more prayers.

“Like what?” Pilar asked a second time, apparently guessing he hadn’t heard her.

“Like other women who’ve made mistakes.”

He would have explained that he, like her, wanted the situation to be okay for the baby and for his mother, if Kelly Young hadn’t rushed up the sidewalk then, her long dress coat fluttering behind her like a superhero’s cape.

“Why was the ambulance here? Is there anything wrong? Are you all right?” Her multitoned blond hair fluttered in the wind as she peppered Pilar with questions.

Zach stepped forward to take charge as he was accustomed to doing, but Pilar, her posture straight, moved past him to the agency’s director. The jacket he’d placed around Pilar’s shoulders was now draped over her arm.

“Everything’s fine, Kelly. I just found an abandoned baby on the steps this morning.”

“Just?” Kelly’s eyes were wide as she repeated Pilar’s word. “You just found an abandoned baby? This is all we need.”

Pilar looked back and forth between them. “Uh, Kelly Young, this is Zach Fletcher, a detective from the Chestnut Grove Police Department.”

Zach nodded at the always-professional director. “Miss Young.”

“Detective Fletcher,” Kelly responded before turning to Pilar. “We’ve met.”

Pilar breathed in suddenly as she realized how the two had met—first during the investigation concerning the falsified birth records discovered at the agency, and again following the recent arson and vandalism investigation. As much of a revolving door as Tiny Blessings had been for police personnel the last two months, it surprised Zach that he and Pilar hadn’t crossed paths there before.

Distress still lined Pilar’s face, but Kelly showed no outward sign of it. Just as she had during the earlier investigations, Kelly Young appeared professionally concerned but personally untouched by the surrounding chaos. Figuring the director was probably like him, adept at detaching herself from things that might clutter up her emotions, he filled her in on the details.

“We’re not sure how long the infant was on the step before Miss Estes arrived.”

How strange that he was back in his distant professional mode, when earlier he’d called Pilar by her first name. He offered the excuse that all members of their church were on a first-name basis, but even he didn’t buy it.

“The infant is being taken to Children’s Hospital in Richmond,” he explained.

Kelly didn’t say anything, seeming to quietly absorb the information.

Pilar rested a hand on her boss’s shoulder. “Don’t worry. I think everything’s going to be fine. The baby—his name is Gabriel—seems healthy. The Department of Children and Families will find him a good home.”

Zach figured that if the director was worried about anything under all that composure, it would have involved damage control, rather than the foundling’s health and prospects. Pilar, on the other hand, seemed too intent on adopting out the baby before he even had a chance to locate the mother.

“We’re still a long way from that happening,” he reminded her, but wasn’t sure she was listening.

He let Pilar fill Kelly in on the rest of the story, listening in case she revealed more details she’d neglected to tell him. Still, the director remained calm, though even he recognized that the last thing the agency needed was to end up in the news again.

“I thought I might visit the hospital later today, just to make sure the baby is okay,” Pilar was saying as Zach tuned back into the conversation.

“Sounds like a good idea,” Kelly said before turning to Zach. “Is there anything else you’ll need from us?”

“Not at the moment. But I’ll probably want to talk to Miss Estes again after I’ve followed up on a few leads.”

With a quick glance toward her boss, Pilar handed his jacket back to him. “Thanks for that.”

Kelly looked back and forth between them but didn’t say anything.

“Sure thing.” After slipping his jacket back on and adjusting his shoulder holster, Zach pulled a business card from his pocket and handed it to Pilar. “You’ll call me if you think of anything else, won’t you?”

He offered a hand, and she took it. Her hands were small and soft, but her grip was sure and firm, like the woman he’d imagined her to be. He couldn’t imagine, however, why he was reluctant to let her go.

Because thoughts like that were unacceptable in the safe world he’d created for himself, Zach did release her hand and moved on to shake hands with Kelly. He needed to put some distance between himself and these people as soon as possible. Bending, he retrieved the basket and headed down the walk.

Like the unwanted publicity for Tiny Blessings, there were plenty of things in this world over which none of them had control. Illegal activities that occurred at an agency before most of the current staff were born. A sister whose loss was neither explainable nor forgivable. Even mothers whose lives reached some desperation point where abandoning their children seemed like the only alternative.

Zach could do nothing about any of these things, but there was one thing he could do, and he refused to stop until he’d finished the job. He was going to find little Gabriel’s mother.

Chapter Three

Kelly closed the door to her office and slumped behind the desk, able to breathe for the first time since she’d driven up the street toward work. Nothing like seeing an ambulance in front of her office, its lights flashing and siren blaring, to get the old blood pumping. What now? she’d wondered then. Now she just wondered why so many rotten things had to happen at one place.

Her biggest mistake wasn’t in assuming that the situation at work couldn’t get any worse. It was getting out of bed today at all.

“Why here?”

But even as she spoke the question aloud to her office’s four walls, she knew the answer. She worked at an adoption agency after all. Many people probably assumed that a private adoption agency could take in a foundling and find him a good home. Few knew that the duty fell to the Department of Children and Families.

Kelly cringed over the publicity that was sure to come. Local reporter Jared Kierney probably would jump on this in a minute. Even if he took the human-interest angle, the agency couldn’t bear more attention, especially anything associated with a crime.

Tiny Blessings had seen enough print the last several weeks to last a lifetime. First, there was the story Jared had broken about the falsified birth records she, Pilar and Anne Smith had found behind that false wall in the office.

Kelly gritted her teeth and wished again that she had fired the office cleaning lady, Florence Villi, months before she’d had the chance to leak that information to the press. But the front-page article about the arson fire that destroyed most of those records topped even that.

She could just imagine this newest headline: Baby Found. Discovery Adds to Agency’s Woes. She might as well kiss new donations goodbye after all this, and as a nonprofit organization, Tiny Blessings couldn’t afford to lose a single gift. Who could blame the Richmond Gazette for publishing the articles, though? Scandal made for good copy, and it sold newspapers.

Still, it broke her heart to think of the huge black mark Barnaby Harcourt had painted on the agency’s reputation. For the right price, he’d helped wealthy families make their daughters’ problems go away through illegal adoptions. She still couldn’t understand how the money was worth violating the public trust. Tiny Blessings had done so much good over the years, placing children in wonderful, loving families. She ought to know—she was one of the first children placed by the agency.

Someone knocked on the door just as a shaky feeling settled inside her and goose bumps appeared on her arms. She needed to get control of her emotions. Allowing this situation to become personal would be a mistake, and she couldn’t let that happen. She had a job to do, and she would do it, no questions asked.

“Yes?” She pulled the sweater off the back of her office chair and draped it across her shoulders.

Pilar entered the office. “Hey.” She stepped inside and closed the door behind her.

Neither needed to point out the subtle workplace difference that morning. On ordinary days, Kelly’s office door was open unless she was meeting with adoptive parents or a mother considering adoption as an alternative. This would be no ordinary day for anyone at the office.

“Sorry, I didn’t get the coffee made,” Pilar said as she slipped into the chair opposite her boss’s desk.

Kelly laughed, appreciating Pilar, who was always trying to make those around her feel better. “Well, could you get on it?”

“Right away, boss.” But Pilar stayed seated.

Neither of them needed caffeine to wake up this morning, anyway. With her rolling stomach, Kelly doubted she would be able to choke down even half a cup.

“Some morning, huh?” Pilar said finally.

“That’s the understatement of the year.” Kelly took in the way Pilar was wringing her hands. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. A little shaken is all.”

Shell-shocked was more like it, but Kelly didn’t call her on it. “I’ll write up a press release this morning. I’m also going to have to give Jared that interview he’s been begging for.” She shook her head. “And to think that last year we were dying for publicity.”

Again, the room grew silent as each curled into her own thoughts. But Pilar leaned forward and rested her forearms on Kelly’s desk.

“What about you? Are you okay?”

“Why wouldn’t I be? I wasn’t the one who just found a baby—”

“You know what I mean. Did it make you wonder about your birth mother?”

Kelly shook her head, but straightened in her chair. “Of course not.”

For the umpteenth time, she wished she’d been alone when she’d come across her own altered birth records, and her friend Ben Cavanaugh’s, among the dozens in the hidden box. It was information she’d never needed nor wanted to know, and she wished her employees didn’t know it, either.