Undercover Marriage (7 page)

“You think?” The sarcasm dripping from his words could fill a bucket.

“No need for you to get nasty with me,” Serena snapped.

He exhaled noisily. “Sorry. It’s just...”

“I know.” She’d never seen Josh get this riled before. For six months they’d been doggedly following leads and clues only to fall short of putting together a firm case against the Munderses. Because someone within the Marshals Service was clueing the bad guys in and keeping the marshals from doing their job. But not this time.

They were taking precautions, keeping this assignment so tight to the vest that there was no way the betrayer could interfere. “We have to be patient. We’ve got this. We’re close to obtaining the solid evidence we need to bring the Munderses down. Have some faith.”

He glanced at her. “You constantly surprise me.”

“What?”

“You always seem to know what I need. Thank you for the pep talk.” He rolled his shoulders. “Teacups?”

So he had noticed. Wistfulness filled her. “It was something my mother started when I was a young girl. Every Sunday afternoon we’d have tea parties while Dad and Daniel had their ‘boy’ time. Every once in a while Mom would surprise me with a new teacup.” She shrugged, hoping to cover the sentiment behind her words. “Now whenever I see a teacup I like, I buy it.”

“How long has it been since you’ve seen your mom?”

“Daniel’s funeral.” Serena stared out the window at the passing cityscape. The Gateway Arch drew her gaze, its bright silver steel gleaming in the summer sun. “Of course, she and Dad had a fight.” Her throat constricted.

Josh threaded his fingers through hers. Startled, she jerked her gaze to him.

“Daniel told me how awful your parents’ fights could get.”

“Did he?” She wasn’t surprised. Daniel had thought of Josh as a brother.

They’d been best friends as well as coworkers. She’d never had a relationship like that with anyone but Daniel.

She stared at her fingers, entwined with Josh’s. His hand was so much bigger and stronger than hers. She knew she should draw away from him. There was no reason for him to be holding her hand when they had no audience for their performance as Susan and Jack Andrews.

Certainly there was no reason for her to be hanging on as if she was afraid she’d fly away on a gust of grief. Still, she allowed their hands to remain exactly as they were, unable to break the connection.

And she had no idea why.

Josh’s cell phone rang.

Telling herself she was relieved, she slipped her hand away. “Want me to get that?”

“Please. It’s my personal cell.” He took the phone out of his suit pocket and handed it to her.

She pushed the answer button. “Josh’s phone.”

“Summers, it’s Harrison.”

“Hello, sir.” She pressed the speaker button. “I have you on speaker. Josh is driving.”

“Good. Head to the airport. You’re flying to Minneapolis. We found Lonnie, Baby Kay’s mother. I want her in protective custody now.”

* * *

“She could be the one to link all the pieces together.”

The intensity in Serena’s voice reverberated through Josh. At the stoplight, he glanced at her. His gaze snagged on the slender lines of her neck below the soft curls of her auburn hair, distracting him for a moment from her comment.

She appeared comfortable in the pretty dress she’d worn to see Mrs. Munders. She looked appealing, carefree and so much more relaxed and less repressed in the casual clothing and sandals. Not so angry with him. Of course he could be imagining the softening.

But...she’d given him that pep talk about the case, whereas before she might have condemned him, saying he was getting what he deserved.

Which he still deserved. She had every right to be angry with him. He was angry with himself.

He turned back to the road in time to see the light change to green. He stepped on the accelerator. “Lonnie’s in danger. We need to bring her in and get her somewhere safe.”

“That’s for sure.”

The road congestion would make the fourteen-plus-mile drive to the Lambert–St. Louis International Airport take longer than it should.

Despite the powder-blue sky overhead and the fresh air swirling through the open windows, anxiety knotted in Josh’s chest. He’d removed his suit jacket and loosened his tie, but he was still uneasy. Lonnie and her baby had been targeted once, and Baby Kay had been kidnapped. The people responsible might believe Lonnie could identify them.

“It will be interesting to hear her story,” Serena said. “What possessed her to leave her baby with Emma Bullock?”

“We’ll know soon enough.”

Serena flipped on the radio. The newscaster talked about Missouri congressman Peter Simms’s upcoming appearance in St. Louis. Rumor was the state’s golden boy would be announcing his bid for the presidency.

Josh glanced in the rearview mirror and noticed a white van two cars back. He couldn’t see the license plate, so he couldn’t be sure it was the same van that had escaped from the warehouse yesterday. But his gut told him something was up. To get a handle on the situation, he changed lanes quickly. So did the van.

“We have a tail,” he stated calmly. They’d been through this drill numerous times in the course of this investigation. “The white van two cars back.”

Serena twisted in her seat to look out the rear window.

“Call SLMPD,” Josh instructed as he picked up speed.

“On it.” She made the call and gave the police dispatcher their location.

Josh turned down a side street that he knew had one way in and out, hoping to trap the van between them and the police.

The van continued straight, whizzing past like a cloud.

“Guess you were wrong,” Serena said softly without any censure.

Unease tickled the fine hairs at the base of Josh’s neck. He hadn’t thought so, but maybe...

He went around the block and rejoined the flow of traffic. Up ahead the light turned red. He brought the vehicle to a halt, his gaze searching the area, checking the rearview mirror. Nothing. The white van had disappeared.

The light changed. He stepped on the gas. Halfway through the intersection a flash of movement in his peripheral vision jerked his gaze to the left. The white van ran the red light in the cross traffic and sped toward them.

With his heart in his throat, Josh floored it. But he was a moment too late.

The van struck the SUV, sending the vehicle spinning. The sickening thud, crunch and squeal of metal on metal and the tinkling of shattering glass mingled with Serena’s scream echoed inside Josh’s head.

Fearing for Serena, he reached out a hand, trying desperately to save her from the impact.

SEVEN

T
he world spun. Or was it only inside her head? Serena blinked, trying to focus, but her head hurt as if someone had mistaken her for a block of ice and was repeatedly stabbing the sharp tip of an ice pick into her brain. She felt the blows all the way to her bones.

Aches and pains screamed from various points all over her body. The seat belt pressed across her chest, pinning her to the seat. An acrid chemical smell made her gag, and a fine dust filled her nostrils. The deflated air bag lay in her lap.

A moan sounded on her left. Josh!

Alarm pummeled her insides. She dragged her gaze to him. He held his head in his hands. The steering wheel air bag lay in a clump across his thigh. She touched his shoulder. “Are you all right?”

He lifted his head and met her gaze. His nose dripped blood, and his cheeks were red and abraded. “Yeah, you?”

“I’ll live,” she said, thankful for that fact.

They’d been broadsided. She remembered seeing the grille of the van bearing down on them, and then the horrible sounds of the crash and the vehicle spinning. Thankfully, she’d had her seat far enough back that she hadn’t been hit in the face with the dashboard as the air bag deployed. She sent up a silent prayer of thanks.

Sirens punctuated the air. An ambulance roared to a halt a few feet away, followed by a police cruiser and a fire truck. Heroes to the rescue. She tried to smile but it turned into a wince.

The paramedics removed them from the wreckage and checked them over.

“It’s a wonder you both aren’t hurt more seriously,” the EMT said as she put her gear away.

“Not a wonder—a blessing,” Serena replied. Every muscle ached as she rose and stretched, but she pushed through the pain. She would not show any weakness.

She glanced at Josh. The paramedic had given him an ice pack to put on his nose.

He winced when he stood. “Thank you.”

Moving closer to him, Serena had to force herself to refrain from touching him to assure herself that he was all right.

His smile peeked out from behind the ice pack. “Nothing broken.”

“I’m glad,” she replied, meaning it.

Tipping his chin toward the officers milling around the crash site, he said, “Let’s see what they’ve found.”

Josh introduced them by their cover names. Serena knew their boss would square away the accident report once the undercover assignment was finished.

The police officer acknowledged the introduction with a nod. “Witnesses saw the van whip a U-turn and pull to the curb, where he sat idling. When you entered the intersection the van shot forward to run the red light and headed on a collision course straight for you.”

“I saw it out of the corner of my eye,” Josh said. “I floored it, hoping it would go past us.”

“From all accounts it was aiming for you,” the officer said. “Witnesses say the driver bailed out at the last second, rolled a few feet and then jumped up and ran down the street, and disappeared.”

“Figures,” Serena muttered. How had the guy found them?

Josh thanked the officers, then cupped Serena’s elbow and propelled her into the shadow of a building. “I’ll call the chief. He’ll want to know what’s happened.”

Serena leaned against the side of the building, her gaze alert for any signs of the man who’d tried to kill them.

Josh hung up. “The chief is on his way. He’ll take us back to the house.”

They didn’t have to wait long. Chief Harrison pulled to the curb in his personal vehicle, a hatchback coupe.

Lines of worry bracketed his blue eyes. “You two okay?”

“A little banged up,” Josh said.

“Unfortunately the BMW didn’t fare as well,” Serena said.

The chief waved a dismissive hand. “I don’t care about the vehicle.”

“What about Lonnie?” Serena asked. “If the leak in our department finds out she’s been found...”

“I called in Colton Phillips. He and FBI agent Lisette Sutton are headed to Minnesota. They’ll escort Miss Bogler here. Once she arrives I want you two to interview her.”

“Good idea, sir,” Josh said. “Colton can be trusted. He proved himself with the Baby C case.”

They’d met U.S. marshal Colton Phillips a few months back when he’d been moved to the Denver office. He had been instrumental in rescuing a baby from the clutches of an unscrupulous criminal who later escaped and disappeared. The baby, dubbed Baby C by the marshals, was reunited with her mother when Dylan McIntyre had come forward with information about Munders’s illegal adoption scheme. Unfortunately all the incriminating evidence provided by McIntyre had disappeared from the marshals’ office. Which was why Serena and Josh needed to keep their current assignment under tight wraps.

“Where are we on Operation: Undercover Marriage?” the chief asked as he signaled to change lanes.

Serena’s lips twisted with wry amusement. She remembered how irritated she’d been when this assignment started. Now...she wasn’t sure how she felt. Which was weird for her. She was usually pretty cut and dried.

Josh gave the chief a verbal report.

“You’re making good progress,” the chief said. “But we need to speed things up. Can you push a little harder?”

“We will, sir,” Josh promised.

Serena wasn’t sure the promise would yield much in the way of results. Mrs. Munders seemed to move at her own pace. Getting her to move quickly might prove difficult. “Sir, Mrs. Munders exhibits some strange behavior patterns.”

“Like?”

“Mistaking me for her dead daughter. Forgetting the topic of conversation midsentence. Staring off into space.”

“It’s becoming harder to imagine she’s the mastermind behind the illegal adoptions,” Josh chimed in.

“Her husband?”

“According to Dylan McIntyre, Fred Munders is probably knee-deep into the illegal activities. The judge who signed off on the adoptions was investigated, but there wasn’t anything to suggest he was involved,” Josh stated. “But as for the mastermind...the man they call ‘Mr. Big’...” He shrugged. “We won’t know until we have enough evidence to arrest the Munderses and question them.”

The chief’s gaze met Serena’s in the rearview mirror. “What has Linda been able to discover from the photos you took?”

Frustration bubbled. Serena had hoped the pictures would be helpful. “Last we talked, the ledger was undecipherable. Some sort of shorthand code known only to Mrs. Munders. As for the photo gallery of babies, Linda’s been running them through facial recognition to see if any pop with missing person’s reports. So far nothing. We’re also keeping an eye out for a baby with a mark on her cheek.”

Emma had said the baby Lonnie had given her to hold—she remembered the child’s name was Kay—had a small square strawberry mark on her cheek.

Harrison drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “And the neighbor family with adopted children?”

“We’ll be meeting them on Saturday,” Josh answered. “So far they check out. They adopted their kids through a different organization. One with a stellar reputation.”

“Mrs. Munders is coming to the cover house for a home inspection,” Josh said. “As part of the adoption process.”

“I want to thank you both for taking on this assignment,” Harrison said as he stopped the car in the driveway of the cover house. “I don’t know who else in the department I can trust right now.”

A rush of anger swept through Serena.

Any of the dozen or so people in the St. Louis office could be the one working for the bad guys. Serena hoped it would be only a matter of time before she and Josh brought them to justice.

* * *

The doorbell chime filled the house and sent Josh’s heart into overdrive. He glanced at the clock. Mrs. Munders was right on time for their home inspection.

Linda wiped her hands on the apron tied around her waist. “I’ll answer the door.” She marched out of the kitchen as if she was about to do battle.

He slid off the barstool in the kitchen and held out his hand to Serena. “Here we go.”

She hesitated a second before slipping her hand into his. Her shoulders were hiked to her ears.

“I don’t know why I’m so nervous.” She let out a stiff laugh. “It’s not like I’m really concerned what she thinks of our home.”

Our home.
Josh liked the sound of that way more than he should. Over the past day and a half they’d done everything they could think of to prepare for Mrs. Munders’s visit. Even going so far as having a mock wedding photo taken.

Linda had visited a local thrift store and bought a wedding gown for Serena. Josh had worn the tux he kept for formal occasions. Using her high-tech camera and Photoshop, Linda created a realistic-looking picture of Josh and Serena posing on the steps of a white-steepled church. She’d then blown up the photo, framed it and hung it in the entryway.

Every time Josh passed the image his heart did a little double take, and he had to remind himself it was all a charade.

But hidden inside, in a place he tried to ignore, was the longing for this all to be real. He longed for a loving wife, for a normal, healthy marriage. To raise a family.

To wipe away the torment of his own childhood and do better than his father ever had.

Maybe it was the fake photo or the way they’d been together these past few days, but he could easily imagine Serena in that role. He could imagine working together during the day and coming home together at night.

Whoa! Back the bus up.
What was he thinking?

Clearly he wasn’t. At least not rationally.

Mentally taming his wild thoughts, he forced his focus onto the woman at his side. Serena bit at her lip. Tender affection flooded him. He tucked her hand in the crook of his elbow. “Hey. Don’t worry. Nerves will lend credibility to our cover.”

“Right.” She squared her shoulders, let out a breath and plastered a smile on her face. “Here we go.”

They found Linda and Mrs. Munders seated on the sofa in the living room.

“Mrs. Munders, welcome to our home,” Serena said, gliding forward to take the older woman’s hand. “I see you’ve met Jack’s aunt Linda.”

Josh marveled at the transformation. No one would have guessed moments before Serena had been a nervous mess. Now she appeared confident and hospitable. His admiration and respect for her grew.

“Indeed I have.” Mrs. Munders patted Serena’s hand. “Hello, Jack. You look well.”

“As do you, Mrs. Munders.” He and Serena sat on the love seat and faced the two women.

“Can I offer you something to drink?” Linda asked.

“No, no. I’m sure you’re all anxious to get this over with.” Mrs. Munders pushed to her feet. She swayed for a moment.

Serena jumped up and held on to Mrs. Munders elbow. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, dear. Must be the heat.”

Josh didn’t think it was warm in the house. The air-conditioning was pumping out cool air, keeping the house at a comfortable temperature.

After a tour of the house and yard, Mrs. Munders closed her notebook with a satisfied snap. “All seems in order. I love your plans for a backyard play structure. Children need plenty of time outdoors away from electronics.” She
tsked. “Life is so different today with all the gadgets that keep kids occupied. You’ll need to get your nursery in order soon.”

“So you have a baby for us?” Serena asked. “A girl or boy? How soon could we meet the birth mother?”

Mrs. Munders held up a hand. “Soon. Very soon. We don’t know the gender yet.”

Serena frowned. “But earlier it seemed you had a specific baby in mind. One that was nine months old.”

Mrs. Munders cocked her head and blinked at her, and then without replying to Serena’s statement, turned her sharp-eyed gaze on Josh. “I relayed your desire to meet with Fred, but he is extremely busy at the moment, so you’ll just have to be content to deal with me on the deposit.”

If he gave her the money they might never have an excuse to meet Fred. “I’m sure Mr. Munders could make some time for us. Money’s not an issue. However, I do need to look over the contract before making a payment.”

Mrs. Munders breathed in, her nostrils flaring. “Well, I will explain this to Fred. However, waiting on him might put a crimp in how soon we can give you a child.”

“You’ll talk to your husband, though?” Serena said, her voice rising slightly with the appropriate amount of desperation.

“Yes, dear.” She consulted her notebook. “I will need to come back next week.”

“But you said you’d have a baby for us by the end of this week,” Josh said, his voice hard.

“Without the deposit...” She shrugged. “You understand how it is. We must be paid up front before we can proceed.”

“Fine. I’ll give you half the deposit now and the other half when I can meet face-to-face with Mr. Munders and review the contract,” Josh stated.

“I’ll get the check,” Serena said and hurried away.

“She’s a sweet girl,” Mrs. Munders said into the awkward silence.

“Yes, Susan is a gem,” Josh replied.

Serena returned with the check in hand. She gave it to Mrs. Munders but held on for a moment. “Please. You’ll find me a baby.”

“Of course, dear. You can count on me.” Mrs. Munders pocketed the money and left.

“Now what?” Serena asked, leaning against the closed door. “We just wait for her to decide we’re desperate enough to pay the rest of the money?”

Waiting was never one of Josh’s strong suits. “I’m calling Fred Munders. This cat-and-mouse game is already old.”

Serena pushed off the door. “I know the chief said to push, but what if we spook Fred?”

“I’m willing to take that chance.” Josh hoped she’d support him in this, but chances were she wouldn’t. She’d made it clear she didn’t trust him. He doubted she’d trust his judgment, either. A twinge of hurt made him hesitate. Disgusted with this sudden need for her approval, he took out his cell phone. But he couldn’t dial the number. Frustrated he looked at her, waiting for a reaction.

Slowly, she gave an approving nod. “Make the call.”

Gratified by the encouragement way more than he should have been, he made the call only to be told by the answering service that Munders was out of the office and would return his call on Monday.

“If he doesn’t call by the end of the day on Monday, I’ll call again,” Josh vowed.