Page 6 of Child In Jeopardy
“My parents have hired PIs,” she told him, only so he wouldn’t be blindsided if one of them showed up in Saddle Ridge. “I have no idea who knows about that surrogacy contract or the Acknowledgment of Paternity, but if and when it comes to light, my parents will believe you’re Cameron’s father. In their eyes, that’ll make you a top suspect for Stephanie’s murder.”
“I’m not going to keep the papers a secret,” Slater was quick to say. “In fact, I’m taking you and the baby to the sheriff’s office so we can both do statements that’ll then be turned over to Austin PD.”
She was shaking her head before he even finished. “But what about Johnson? If he knows where the baby is, he might try tocome after him.” If that’s what the cop wanted, that is. Lana had no way of knowing if he did.
“You and the baby will be protected,” Slater said with absolute confidence that Lana didn’t feel, and she would have voiced plenty of disapproval about his plan if her phone hadn’t dinged with a soft alarm.
Lana’s heart dropped to her knees.
“It’s not a text,” she rattled off while she unlocked her phone screen. “It’s an alert from my security system. Someone’s broken into my house in San Antonio.” She’d set up the security system more than a year ago, and this was the first alert she’d ever gotten.
“Will the system notify the security company or SAPD?” Slater asked, moving closer to her as she pulled up the feed from the cameras she had positioned both inside and outside the house.
“The company will be the one to notify me,” she supplied just as she got a second ding from the automated monitor. Lana ignored it and adjusted the camera angle until she saw the person, the man, who was now in her living room. His back was to the camera, but there was no mistaking the cop’s uniform he was wearing. He had his gun gripped in his hand.
“Johnson?” Slater asked.
“Maybe,” she muttered and kept watching. The breath stalled in her throat when he turned, and she saw his face and name tag. “It’s him.”
“I’ll text Duncan to call the Austin PD detective in charge of your sister’s murder,” Slater said, though she heard the doubt in his voice. Like her, Slater probably figured Johnson would be long gone before a detective showed up.
But why was Johnson there?
The drawn gun was a sign that he probably hadn’t come for a friendly chat. Had he gone there to kill her? To take the baby?What the heck did he want, and had he truly been the one to kill her sister?
Lana continued to watch as the man made a quick check of the other rooms, and then he took out his phone. Lana automatically thumbed up the audio so she could hear, and after, Slater finished his text and moved back closer, no doubt so he could listen as well.
“She’s not here,” Johnson snarled to the person he’d called. Lana tried to shift the camera so she could see his phone screen, but the glare made it impossible for her to decipher the number. “She probably went to the deputy in Saddle Ridge.” He paused, listening, and Lana wished she could hear the other side of this conversation. “All right. I’ll go to Saddle Ridge, to the deputy’s place now, and take care of the kid and her.”
Her heart had already been racing. Her breathing, too, and that certainly didn’t help. This man was coming for Cameron and her.
Lana watched as Johnson slipped back out her front door and disappeared from view before she looked up at Slater. “We have to leave. I’ll take Cameron—”
“No,” he interrupted, taking out his phone again.
Again, she was ready to argue, but then Slater spelled out exactly what he intended.
“I’ll have someone take him and you to the sheriff’s office where you’ll both be safe, but I’m staying put. When Stephanie’s killer comes here, he’ll be walking straight into a trap.”
Chapter Three
Slater kept watch out one of the windows that would give him a good view of the road that led to his house. He wasn’t sure what the heck was going on, but he was hoping he could get some answers from “Officer Johnson” when he showed up to “take care of the kid and her.”
To prepare for that, Duncan had immediately arranged for a backup deputy to be with Slater and for Duncan and Deputy Sonya Grover to take Lana and the baby to the sheriff’s office in town. Lana had been plenty hesitant about leaving with Duncan and Sonya, maybe because she now had a distrust of cops or because the plan seemed too risky.
There was indeed a risk, but Slater wanted to face down Johnson when Lana and Cameron weren’t around to be hurt. Judging from the tone Johnson had used in that short phone conversation, he didn’t have good intentions.
Slater checked the time. It’d been nearly two hours since Lana had gotten that alert about the break-in, plenty enough time for Johnson to make the drive from San Antonio to Saddle Ridge. He glanced across the room at Deputy Luca Vanetti, who was keeping watch on the other side of the house.
“No sign of him,” Luca relayed, obviously noticing the glance Slater had given him.
“None here, either.” And the admission made Slater want to curse along with second-guessing himself.
He hadn’t officially alerted San Antonio PD about the break-in at Lana’s place because if Johnson was indeed a cop, Slater hadn’t wanted him to know they were onto him. Leaks could and did happen, so Slater had figured better to be safe thansorry. However, Slater had called his brother Ruston, who was an undercover detective with SAPD, and had asked Ruston to quietly monitor what was going on.
Ruston hadn’t even attempted to get to Lana’s house and intercept the intruder because Johnson had stayed less than a minute after telling the caller he was going “to Saddle Ridge, to the deputy’s place now.” In case Johnson had meant another deputy, all the cops in the sheriff’s office had been put on alert, and none were alone and without backup. Since everyone was texting Duncan every fifteen minutes, Slater knew Johnson hadn’t shown up at those other places, either. None of his fellow cops had been attacked or killed.
Slater felt the tightness come in his chest as the memories prowled into his head. He’d been a deputy for ten years now, and for the first nine years, he had, of course, been concerned about losing a family member or friend since two of his three siblings and his dad had been cops. But then his father had been gunned down, murdered by an unknown assailant, and the concern was much, much stronger.