Birthright

  get out to the site.”

  “Okay.” He began repacking Frannie’s gear. “But we’re going to go through the others first chance we get.”

  It only took Doug a day and a half to track down what he considered a reasonable lead. His advantage over the professional investigator, he concluded, was that he was no longer looking for Marcus Carlyle. All he wanted was any connection to the man, however peripheral, that might lead to another, and another, like a circle narrowing.

  He found that old, thin link in Maureen O’Brian, who had worked at the country club where both Carlyle and his first wife had been members.

  “Goodness, I haven’t seen Mrs. Carlyle for twenty-five years,” Maureen replied as she stepped outside the salon and dug into the pocket of her smock for a pack of Virginia Slims. “How in the world did you think to find me?”

  “I asked questions. Mrs. Carnegy at the salon at the country club gave me your name.”

  “Old dragon.” Maureen drew on the cigarette, blew out smoke. “Fired me, you know, because I missed so much work when I was pregnant with my third. That would be, oh, about sixteen years ago. Dried-up old bitch, if you’ll forgive me saying so.”

  Since Carnegy had described Maureen as a flighty, irresponsible gossip, Doug didn’t mind a bit. “She told me you’d been Mrs. Carlyle’s regular manicurist.”

  “I was. I did her nails every week, Monday afternoons, for three years. She liked me, and tipped well. She was a fine woman.”

  “Did you know her husband?”

  “Of him, certainly. And I saw him once when I went to their house to do her nails before a big gala they were going to. Very handsome man, and one who knew it. He wasn’t good enough for her, if you ask me.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  Her mouth went prim. “A man who can’t be faithful to his wedding vows is never good enough for the woman he made them to.”

  “Did she know he cheated on her?”

  “A woman always knows—whether she admits it or not. And there was plenty of talk around the salon, and the club. His side piece, she’d come in now and then herself.”

  “You knew her?”

  “One of them anyway. Word was there were more. This one was married herself, and was a doctor of all things. Dr. Roseanne Yardley. Lived up in Nob Hill in a big, fancy house. My friend Colleen did her hair.” She smirked. “The doctor was not a natural blonde.”

  Natural or not, she was still blonde when Doug found her finishing her rounds at Boston General. He supposed she was what people called a handsome woman. Tall, stately, that sweep of blond hair perfectly coiffed around a strong, square face, Roseanne had a clipped, Bostonian voice that made it clear she took no time for nonsense.

  “Yes, I knew Marcus and Lorraine Carlyle. We belonged to the same club, moved in the same social circle. I really don’t have time to discuss old acquaintances.”

  “My information is that you and Marcus were more than acquaintances.”

  Her eyes were a cool blue that went frigid in a finger snap. “What possible business is that of yours?”

  “If you could give me a few minutes in private, Dr. Yardley, I’ll explain how it’s my business.”

  She didn’t speak, but after a hard look at her watch, clipped down the hall. She strode into a small office, moved directly to the desk and sat behind it. “What do you want?”

  “I have evidence that Marcus Carlyle headed an organization that profited from fraudulent adoptions by kidnapping infants and selling them to childless couples.”

  She didn’t even blink. “That’s perfectly ridiculous.”

  “And that he used and employed members of the medical profession in his organization.”

  “Mr. Cullen, if you think you can accuse me of participating in some fictitious black-market ring, frighten me enough to be extorted or blackmailed, you couldn’t be more mistaken.”

  Doug imagined her simply flattening him, or any irritating underling, with a single blow. “I don’t want money. And I don’t know whether you were involved or not. But I do know you had an affair with Marcus Carlyle, that you’re a doctor, that you might have information that will help me.”

  “I’m quite certain I have no information whatsoever. Now, I’m very busy.”

  Doug didn’t budge, even when she pushed to her feet. “My sister was stolen when she was three months old and days later sold to a couple out of Carlyle’s Boston office. I have proof of that. I have evidence linking another Boston doctor to that event. That evidence and information have been passed to the police. They’ll work their way around to you eventually, Dr. Yardley. But my family is looking for answers now.”

  Very slowly, she sat again. “What doctor?”

  “Henry Simpson. He and his current wife left their home in Virginia abruptly, very abruptly, after this investigation began. His current wife was one of the OB nurses on duty the night my sister was born, in Maryland.”

  “I don’t believe any of this,” she retorted.

  “Maybe you do, maybe you don’t. But I want to know about your relationship with Carlyle. If you don’t talk to me here, I’m going to have no problem making what information I have so far public.”

  “That’s a threat.”

  “That’s a threat,” Doug agreed easily.

  “I won’t have my reputation impinged.”

  “If you had no part in illegal activities, you don’t have anything to worry about. I need to know who Marcus Carlyle was, who he associated with. You had an affair with him.”

  Roseanne picked up a silver pen, tapped it gently on the edge of the desk. “My husband is aware of my relationship with Marcus. Blackmail won’t work.”

  “I’m not interested in blackmail,” he repeated.

  “I made a mistake thirty years ago. I won’t pay for it now.”

  Doug reached in his briefcase, took out a copy of Callie’s original birth certificate, a photograph of her taken days before she was stolen. He set these on Roseanne’s desk, then took out the forged adoption papers and the photograph the Dunbrooks had provided.

  “Her name’s Callie Dunbrook now. She deserves to know how it happened. My family deserves to know.”

  “If this is true, if any portion of this is true, I don’t see how my regrettable affair with Marcus has anything to do with it.”

  “Accumulating data. How long were you involved?”

  “Nearly a year.” Roseanne sighed and sat back. “He was twenty-five years older than me, and quite fascinating. He was charismatic, commanding, attractive and attentive. I thought we were very sophisticated and modern to have an affair that seemed to satisfy us both and hurt no one.”

  “Did you ever discuss your work, your patients?”

  “I’m sure I did. I’m in pediatrics. A major part of Marcus’s practice was adoption. We were both dedicated to children. It was one of the things that brought us together. I certainly don’t remember him ever trying to draw specific information from me, and none of my patients was kidnapped. I would have known.”

  “But some were adopted.”

  “Of course. That’s hardly surprising.”

  “Were any of the parents who brought newly adopted infants to you for care sent by his recommendation?”

  Now she blinked. “Yes, I imagine. I’m sure there were a few. We were, as I said, acquaintances, then intimate. It would be only natural—”

  “Tell me about him. If he was charismatic, compelling and attractive, why did the affair end?”

  “He was also cold and calculating.” She fingered the photos and papers on her desk. “A very calculating man, and one with no sense of fidelity. You may find that odd as we were having an extramarital affair, but I expected him to be faithful while we were. And he wasn’t. His wife certainly knew about me, and if she had any trouble with that she put on an excellent public front. Word was she was slavishly devoted to him and their son, and turned a blind eye on his other women.”

  Her lips twisted, making it
clear what she thought of such a woman. “I, however, preferred clear vision. When I discovered he was having another affair while we were involved, I confronted him. We argued, bitterly, and broke it off. I could tolerate quite a bit, but learning he was cheating on me with his secretary was just a bit too much of a cliché.”

  “What can you tell me about her?”

  “Young. I was nearly thirty when Marcus and I became involved. She was barely more than twenty. She dressed in bold colors and spoke in a quiet voice—a contrast I mistrusted as a woman. And once I knew about her, I remembered how she’d so often greeted me with a little smirk. I have no doubt she knew about me long before I knew about her. I heard she was one of the few from his practice here Marcus took with him when he went to Seattle.”

  “Do you know anything about Carlyle or her since?”

  “His name comes up from time to time. I heard he divorced Lorraine, and was surprised when he remarried it wasn’t the secretary. I believe someone told me she married an accountant, had a child.”

  She tapped the pen again. “You’ve intrigued me, Mr. Cullen. Enough that I may ask a few questions in a few quarters myself. I don’t like being used. If it turns out Marcus used me in this way, I want to know about it.”

  “He’s dead.”

  Her mouth opened, then closed again with her lips a long firm line. “When?”

  “About two weeks ago. Cancer. He was living in the Caymans with wife number three. I can’t get answers from him directly. His son is reluctant to take our evidence seriously.”

  “Yes, I know Richard slightly. He and Marcus were estranged, I believe. Richard was, and is, very devoted to his mother and his family. Have you spoken with Lorraine?”

  “Not yet.”

  “I imagine Richard will slap you legally, in whatever way possible, if you try. She doesn’t get out socially as much as she did. From what I’ve heard she’s quite frail. Then she was always frail. Will you be in Boston long?”

  “I can be—or I can be reached wherever I am.”

  “I’d like to satisfy myself about this. Leave me a number where you can be reached.”

  Doug settled into his hotel room, searched a beer out of the minibar and called Lana.

  The man’s voice that answered simply said, “Yo!”

  “Ah . . . I’m trying to reach Lana Campbell.”

  “Hey, me too. Is this Doug?”

  “Yeah, it’s Doug. What do you mean? Where is she?”

  “Keeping at arm’s length so far, but I’m hopeful. Hey, sexy lady, phone’s for you.”

  There was some noise, some giggling—which he identified as Ty—then a very warm female laugh. “Hello?”

  “Who was that?”

  “Doug? I was hoping you’d call.”

  Something that sounded like an ape, followed by hysterical childish laughter drowned out her voice. He could hear movement, then the background noise dimmed.

  “God, it’s a madhouse in there. Digger’s cooking. Are you in the hotel?”

  “Yeah, just. Sounds like quite a party.”

  “It was your idea to install Digger in my house without asking me, I’ll point out. Lucky for you, he’s a very reassuring, not to mention entertaining, presence. He’s wonderful with Ty. Thus far, though it’s a struggle, I’ve been able to resist my lust for him. Though he warns me it’s a losing battle.”

  Doug dropped down on the bed, scratched his head. “I’ve never been jealous before. It’s lowering to have my first experience with it over a guy who looks like a garden gnome.”

  “If you could smell the spaghetti sauce he’s got simmering, you’d be insane with jealousy.”

  “The bastard.”

  She laughed, then lowered her voice. “When are you coming home?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve talked to some people today, hope to talk to more tomorrow. I might fly out to Seattle before I come back. I’m just playing it by ear. Does that mean you miss me?”

  “I guess I do. I’ve gotten used to you being here, or a few miles away. I never thought I’d get used to that sort of thing again. I suppose I should ask you what you’ve found out.”

  He stretched out on the bed, basking a little in the idea that she missed him. “Enough to know Carlyle liked women, and more than one at a time. I’ve got a gut feeling the secretary is a key link. I’m going to try to focus in on finding her. I meant to ask, am I supposed to bring you back a present from Boston?”

  “Of course.”

  “Okay, I’ve got something in mind. Any news I should know about?”

  “They spent hours cleaning up the site. I know the team’s discouraged, and shaken. I think there are some serious concerns the funding might be cut off—at least temporarily. If the police have any leads, they aren’t sharing.”

  “Take care of yourself, and Ty-Rex.”

  “You can count on that. Come home soon, Doug. Come home safe.”

  “You can count on that.”

  At three A.M., the phone beside the bed rang, and shot his heart straight into his throat. It was pounding there as he grabbed for the receiver.

  “Hello.”

  “You have a lot to lose and nothing to gain. Go home, while you still have one.”

  “Who is this?” He knew it was useless to ask. Frustratingly useless as the line went dead.

  He set the phone down, lay back in the dark.

  Someone knew he was in Boston, and didn’t like the idea.

  That meant there was still something, or someone, in Boston to find.

  Twenty-five

  It wasn’t just the long hours, or the fact that her work was both physically and mentally demanding. Callie had worked longer hours, and under much more arduous conditions.

  Here, the weather was sliding gracefully from summer toward fall, offering warm days and cool nights. But for a few scattered hints of yellow on the poplars, the leaves were still lush and green. The sky remained bold and blue.

  Under other circumstances, any other circumstances, working conditions would have been ideal.

  Callie would have traded those balmy September days for baking heat or torrential rains, for clouds of biting insects and threats of sunstroke.

  Because her thoughts leaned that way, she knew she came home exhausted every evening not because of the work itself. It was her scattered focus, the fractured concentration.

  She had only to look over at the charred ground where Digger’s trailer had been to relive it all.

  Intellectually, she knew her reaction was exactly what they wanted. But the core of the problem was not knowing who they were. If an enemy had a face, she thought—she hoped—she could and would fight it. But there was no one to fight, and no place for her to gather and channel her anger.

  It was the sense of uselessness, she knew, that brought on the dragging fatigue.

  How many times could she study the dateline she and Jake had put together? How often could she reconfigure the connections, scrape at the layers of people and years and events?

  At least Doug was doing something tangible by talking to people in Boston. Yet if she’d gone in his stead, given herself the satisfaction of action, she’d have let the team down when they needed her most.

  She had to be here, going through the routine, hour by hour and day by day. The facade of normality was essential, or the project would erode like her own morale.

  She knew the team looked to her to set the tone. Just as she knew they were talking about details of her personal life. She’d noted the glances shot her way, the whispered conversations that stopped abruptly when she walked into a room.

  She couldn’t blame them. Hot news was hot news. And the gossip