Cross My Heart (Alex Cross 21)

My wife squinted. “You mean, the way a barren woman might?”

“Could be. Or maybe she just wants to care for him long enough to sell him to some couple desperate to have a—”

I caught movement out of the corner of my eye, looked at the top of the staircase, and saw Dr. Lancaster staring at us with a horrified expression. “Sell?” she said. “Sell my baby?”

Chapter

41

It took us almost an hour to get the Lancasters to calm down after they’d overheard my frankly stupid remark. There was a chance that Kelli Adams had stolen the babies in order to sell them, but I should have had t

he good sense not to say so inside their house.

“The first scenario is much more likely,” I kept telling them. “This is probably a woman who has a history of psychiatric problems and infertility.”

“That’s right,” Mahoney said, and Bree nodded.

But the damage had been done. When my wife and I left around seven thirty that evening, I could see that both parents were still chewing on the idea that their baby boy was about to be sold to the highest bidder.

Mahoney stayed behind, repairing the damage.

I followed Bree back to police headquarters. I thought about going upstairs to get some more work done, letting her have my car and taking a cab home, but after parking, Bree climbed in the passenger side with me and said, “Let’s go find Ava.”

My wife had that look about her that indicated this was not a negotiable idea, so I nodded and said, “I’m going to need something to eat first.”

“Henry’s?” she said.

“That’ll do it,” I replied, and set off.

Ten minutes later we pulled up outside Henry’s Soul Café at Seventeenth and U Street. All the food’s good at Henry’s, but the fried chicken and sweet potato pie are the best in DC. And there’s something about the smell of the place and the good vibe of the people who work there that reminds me of a similar joint back in Winston-Salem, where I spent the first nine years of my life.

Bree covered my shirt in paper napkins and handed me pieces of fried chicken and an ice-cold Coke as we headed toward Anacostia. We were crossing the bridge when my phone rang.

“Are you purposely avoiding me, Alex?” Nana Mama said in greeting.

“Me? Never.”

“I haven’t seen you in days.”

“Late nights,” I said.

“Tonight?”

I glanced at Bree and replied, “About an hour or so.”

“I’ll wait up for you,” Nana Mama said. “I want you to see what they’ve done to the kitchen floor.”

“Who did what to the kitchen floor?”

“The workmen,” she said. “They ripped up the old floorboards today. It’s all gone!”

“Oh,” I said. “Uh, that was supposed to be a secret.”

“What?” she cried.

“I’ll explain when I get there, Nana,” I said, and hung up.

Bree said, “Told you not telling her was a bad idea.”