The Truth About Comfort Cove

clearly for a moment. “He’s not afraid of being roughed up. He’s afraid of being seen as something he is not.” “The man feels no compunction for what he did to your mother. Or any other women he may have violated through the years—”

“Because chances are good my mother’s not the only one. I know. Amber’s all over Wakerby’s past, looking for other victims.” Amber Locken. She had to call her associate and let her know how the meeting went.

Problem was, she wasn’t quite sure how it went. And she couldn’t have Locken, or anyone, know that. The one thing Lucy had always been confident about, the one thing she’d never doubted, was her ability to get the job done.

“Sloan Wakerby has Sloan Wakerby’s back,” she said. “His safety and security comes from his own belief in himself. His weakness is being accused of being someone he isn’t—or of a crime he didn’t commit. That’s one thing he can’t tolerate.”

“He’s also not smiling anymore.” Ramsey’s words came from directly behind her.

She’d noted the lack of a smile. And chancing that her reading of the situation was accurate, as opposed to wishful thinking, she said, “I’m getting to him.”

“Mmm-hmm.” Ramsey walked step by step beside her on the way to the car.

She clicked the remote entry on her key ring, unlocking their doors. “I’m not going to get a confession.”

“You just got one.”

Dropping her purse on the floor behind her seat, Lucy took her time getting in the car. And then, seat belt buckled, she looked at Ramsey. “I got a confession?”

How could she have missed it? What hadn’t she seen?

“Wakerby didn’t sexually violate your sister, but something about what happened to Allie bothers him. Otherwise, he’d be laughing his ass off at you.”

Lucy froze. Too stunned to care that she’d missed something so obvious. “He knows where my sister is,” she said slowly. Had she been at this too long to believe that she might actually succeed? “He knows what happened to Allie.”

“Yep.”

“I…” She didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know how she felt. About anything. Lucy stared at Ramsey.

“You’re too connected to the case for your cop instincts to kick in full swing, or to get a purely professional reading on him. Your personal emotions get in the way.”

“You think I should pull out?”

“You aren’t in. Not in any official capacity. Everything’s in order. Your captain saw to that. And he respects you enough to let you move forward where you must. I’m just saying that you need to go easier on yourself. No one expects you to be on the top of your detective game, here. And even with that, you just conducted a superior interview.”

More confused than ever, Lucy started the car, thinking that it was a good thing that she still felt like she knew how to drive.

Everything else in her world was in total upset.

Most particularly the fact that she had a distinct feeling that she’d just been nurtured by Detective Ramsey Miller.

And she’d liked it.

T he first thing Ramsey did when he landed in Boston on Wednesday was get on the phone to start the ball rolling for a warrant to seize Jack Colton’s bank accounts. He had to provide enough circumstantial evidence to convince a judge that the warrant for Colton’s current affairs was in order, although he had nothing but hunches and theories and conjectures based on testimonies from witnesses with twenty-five-year memory lapses to give doubt to their accuracy.

Getting the warrants for the UC records had been easier. Those records pertained to the time period during which the crime had taken place. There was reasonable expectation that they might have turned up evidence that Jack Colton could be a kidnapper and baby dealer.

Still, Ramsey had used his time on the plane wisely. Rather than spending it thinking about his hostess from the past two days, he’d done what he always did when life tried to get messy on him—he’d sunk himself in his work.

He knew his limits. Personal relationships were outside the scope. He failed at them. Every time. Being a good cop, a good detective, was the limit of what he had to offer the world.

By Wednesday afternoon he had the warrant that he needed. And by Wednesday evening, he was in possession of a long night’s worth of work.

He showered Thursday morning with the intimate knowledge of Jack Colton’s financial affairs. L ucy was at the desk she shared with Todd Davis early Thursday morning. She was investigating a series of gas-station robberies that had been taking place in Aurora. She’d also put in a call to Lori Givens, the friend who worked in the private DNA lab in Cincinnati. Lori had donated her time to do all of the scientific work involved in setting up the DNA database for all of the babies involved in the Gladys Buckley case.

Lucy wanted some more information on the Claire Sanderson DNA match with evidence stored from the Buckley mansion. What color was the ribbon on which they’d found Claire’s DNA? How long was it? Most importantly, what was it made out of? If she had to trace hair-ribbon makers from twenty-five years ago she would. She was determined to give Claire back to Emma—as if by doing so she could somehow ease the ache of not finding Allie.

But Emma and Claire weren’t her case.