Twisted Innocence (Moonlighters Series Book 3) (3 page)

“No,” she said. “I haven’t seen him in almost a year.”

“Ten months, to be exact?” Tynes asked.

How did they know all this? “What would make you come looking for him here?”

“When we learned he had just become a father, we thought he might be here with you. Are you sure he isn’t the one who hurt you?”

“Positive. Do you honestly think I’d defend the person who did this to me?”

She got to her feet, found Lily’s pacifier in her swing, offered it to her daughter. Lily took it, her little shoulders hunched.

Tears misted in Holly’s eyes as she strapped Lily in her swing, but she wasn’t sure if the tears were from anger or fear. “You’re barking up the wrong tree. He doesn’t know about
her. I never told him. I didn’t remember his last name until you said it just now. I don’t even have a phone number for him. Does he live in Southport?”

“Yes.” Their narrow stares indicated they didn’t believe her. Petri’s gaze broke, and he scanned her living room, registering her pictures, clearly looking for a shot with Creed in it. There weren’t any.

She flicked the music button on the swing. “You Are My Sunshine” started playing. Lily seemed content. Holly stood straighter and faced the two men. “Look, I hate this . . . I met him in a stupid bar when I’d been drinking too much, and I made mistakes. But this guy . . . I don’t know him. I don’t know anything about him. I’ve never seen him since. He has absolutely no idea.”

“Well, that’s where you’re wrong,” Petri said. “We learned of you through a message on his voice mail, left several days ago. It was from a man named Rio, telling Kershaw that you’d given birth, and that he had a daughter.”

She felt the blood draining from her face. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

“Do you know Rio Diaz?”

“Yes. He
used
to be a friend. He introduced me to Creed that night in the bar.” She had run into Rio once when she was pregnant, and he’d asked when she was due. She shouldn’t have told him. Had he counted up the weeks since her night with Creed?

Holly lowered to the edge of her rocker. “Look, I’m trying to change. When I realized I was having a baby, I tried to do better, you know? I didn’t want him to know because he seemed like bad news, like all the other guys I’m usually attracted to. The bad dudes I could never bring home to meet my sisters and brother. I figured he’d never know.” There was
no sign of sympathy in their eyes. How could they understand? “If he knows about her, I doubt he’d even care. Wouldn’t he have called or something if he did? And if he’s hiding, he sure wouldn’t come to me.”

“If you see him, if he shows up here, we need for you to call us right away.”

She took the card Petri offered across the coffee table. “Is he dangerous?”

“We believe he could be. By now, he knows we’re looking for him. He’s probably armed.”

They got to their feet, and Holly checked on Lily, who had drifted off to sleep. She walked them to the door. “So . . . you’ll keep this quiet, right? About Lily? If he hasn’t told his family, I’d rather they didn’t know.”

Tynes looked back at her. “I can’t guarantee his family didn’t hear the voice mail. They’ve been looking for him.”

Her heart plunged. “Great.”

“They’re just focused on finding their son right now.”

She nodded, hating herself.
Great job, Holly. You found the only murderer in the room, got drunk with him, and conceived a child. How does it get better than that?

She let them out and stood on the front stoop as they strode to their squad car. When they drove away, she went back in and studied herself in the mirror.

“Good job!” she bit out, angry tears rimming her eyes. “Look at you now.” She hated herself, from the tattoos on her biceps to the pink tips on her blonde hair. She wished she could shed her skin like a snake and become someone else, but she would still be a mess.

Lily’s pacifier fell, and the baby started to cry. Wiping her own tears, Holly shook herself out of her self-loathing and took care of her child.

CHAPTER 4

I
t took a couple of hours for Holly to find Rio Diaz’s phone number. She had to call friends of her friends until she found one who knew how to reach him. He didn’t answer when she called, so she left a message, trying to keep it upbeat so he wouldn’t duck her call. “Hey, Rio, how’s it going? It’s Holly Cramer. Listen, would you give me a call? I need to ask you something. Thanks!”

When he didn’t call back right away, she texted him. “Hey, Rio! This is Holly Cramer. Give me a call, will you? It’s important.”

While she waited for his return call, she walked Lily around the house, bouncing her gently. What should she do now? She had no intention of sharing this news with her siblings. Juliet would just remind her that her bad decisions had lousy consequences.

Holly knew about consequences. Hadn’t she had enough of them?

It was hard to convince people you were trying to change when you kept repeating the same mistakes. Pregnancy was like a neon sign saying, “You were right! There are consequences!”

But pregnancy had been the first thing that had ever made Holly want to change.

She didn’t want to drag it all up again with her sisters or her brother. Wasn’t it bad enough that one drunken, careless night had resulted in a life change? They already thought that picking up guys in bars for one-night stands was common practice for her. Truth be known, it wasn’t. She didn’t normally take strangers home. Even now, she didn’t know what had gotten into her that night.

And then . . . she’d tried to put it out of her mind until nausea began to greet her each morning. The reality of her pregnancy had hit her hard. She had fully intended to abort . . . but she couldn’t go through with it. The knowledge that there was a baby in her belly—a baby with fingers and toes and nerve endings and a developing brain, and even a personality and potential—had overwhelmed and defeated her plan to end this quietly.

Her siblings had been great about it. What could they do when a little life was involved? But she knew that they had pretty much thrown up their hands at her latest crisis. They’d teamed up to help clean up another of Holly’s messes. At this very moment, they were probably begging God not to let her fail at motherhood.

They all assumed she was so promiscuous that she didn’t know the name of the father. She had never told them that, but she let them believe it.

The phone suddenly rang, startling her, but her twitch didn’t wake the baby. She grabbed the phone. Rio!

She swiped to answer and put it to her ear. “Hey, Rio. Long time no hear from.”

She heard the hesitation in his voice. “Hey, Holly. How are you?”

She thought of skipping over the giving-birth part, but that would be suspect, since he clearly already knew. “Oh, I’m okay. Had a baby four weeks ago. Little girl. Getting used to motherhood and all that.”

He hesitated again, then said, “Really? I knew you were pregnant, but didn’t know you’d had it already.”

That made her angry, ripping her thin membrane of pleasantries. “Okay, cut the ruse, Rio.”

“What?”

“You know good and well I’ve had the baby, because you called Creed Kershaw. Where do you get off making the assumption that he’s the father and running to tell him?”

He sighed. “Have you heard from him, then?”

“No, I haven’t heard from him. He’s apparently missing and wanted for murder. Thanks for introducing us, by the way.”

“Holly, I didn’t know he was into anything illegal—and maybe he’s not. He’s just a person of interest, right? And besides, I wasn’t fixing you up with him. I just introduced you.”

“What made you think he had anything to do with my pregnancy?”

“The timing,” he said. “When I saw you pregnant and you told me the due date, I sorta counted back, and it seemed like it was around that time.”

“So?”

“So, I know you. You’re not the type to just . . . Even that night I was surprised. When I heard you’d had the baby, I decided to tell him. I figured if he was the dad, he needed to know.”

The thought made her sick. “What did he say?”

“Nothing. I left a message, but he never called back. If he’s hiding out and evading a murder charge, the baby might be the last thing on his mind.”

Her head was beginning to throb. “How did you even know I had her?”

“I heard it from Mattie at the Dock.”

The Dock had been one of her favorite bars, back when she was the party queen. “Yeah, she came to see me in the hospital.”

“She showed me a picture. Cute baby. Looks just like you, except for the pink hair.”

Holly couldn’t help the pride welling up in her heart.

“So the cops talked to you?” Rio asked.

“Yeah, they did, because of you. When’s the last time you talked to Creed?”

“It’s been a few months.”

“Did you tell anyone else about this?”

“No, nobody. I swear, Holly. I wasn’t even sure, so I only told him.”

“This isn’t just gossip, Rio. It’s my baby’s life. She deserves better, and I don’t want some stranger suing me for visitation rights.”

She knew how ridiculous this sounded. If he were such a stranger, why had she gotten so intimate? The irony didn’t escape her.

“I meant well, Holly. He was a good guy when I knew him in high school. I don’t know what happened.”

“Next time mind your own stinking business.” Her words got caught in her throat. “Whatever. Thanks for the info.”

She hung up and drew in a deep, ragged breath and dabbed
at her eyes. Now what? She rejected her first instinct to call one of her sisters or her brother.

She went to the window, peered out. Her street looked quiet. It had started to rain, so the road was empty of playing children and neighbors walking their dogs. She checked her locks, then armed her security system, the one that Juliet had insisted she have installed. Even if Creed didn’t come, she could always count on the meth heads showing up for an encore.

She got her gun out of her purse and made sure it was loaded.

Maybe the murder investigation had distracted Creed completely. Maybe a new daughter was the furthest thing from Creed Kershaw’s mind, wherever he was. But she couldn’t depend on that. And the dopers . . . they’d probably thrown away anything that couldn’t help them buy drugs right away. Still, her address had been in her purse. She prayed they wouldn’t use it.

Anger spiraled through her chest. She couldn’t just sit here waiting. She had to
do
something. She didn’t know where to find her muggers, but she might be able to help track Creed down.

She’d gotten pretty good at finding missing persons and tracking those who hid from creditors and ex-wives. Creed’s knowledge of Lily was a frightening thing, something she’d never expected. Making sure he was arrested for whatever he’d done was one way to ensure that he put no claims on her daughter’s life.

Then again, hunting him could be dangerous.

The police would find him eventually. But if she left it up to them, she might be looking over her shoulder for days, even weeks. No, she had to be proactive. Somehow she had to move this along and make sure Creed didn’t pop up when she least expected it.

CHAPTER 5

M
ichael Hogan grabbed a wad of trash and stuffed it into his flimsy garbage bag. It was raining, but the work wasn’t finished, so there was no way Lieutenant Rafferty would take the work crew back to the jail. Michael worked faster, hoping to get the job done. But some of the others continued to work slowly, as if they’d rather get soaked than go back to that place.

Being a trustee allowed to go out on the work crew was a privilege, earned only through months of good behavior. It broke up the hours of monotony, sitting in the cell with the same faces day after day, the same fights, the same insanity among the mentally ill, the same rage of hungry addicts, and the bitter, angry offenders who found themselves locked up.

Someone honked a horn, and Michael looked up. A car full of teenaged girls drove by, laughing and waving, mocking them. He looked down at his green-and-white-striped
Dr. Seuss pants, society’s assurance that none of the inmates would ever be mistaken for the general public.

When he got out of jail, he would never wear stripes again.

He was here for breaking the law, illegally using a firearm when he was a convicted felon. Though he’d been helping break up the biggest drug ring ever to work this area, and defending his friend and her kidnapped children, he couldn’t deny that he’d violated probation. There was a penalty for that, and he had to accept it. Juliet and her kids were safe, which made a year behind bars worth it.

He’d filled his bag, so he tied it up and left it where the garbage men could pick it up, then went back to the truck to get another one. The drivers waiting for the light to change kept their eyes focused ahead of them, as if afraid to glance in the prisoners’ direction. He heard a click—someone locking his doors.

Michael pulled a garbage bag off its roll, shook it out. “Hogan, cross the street and start over there,” Rafferty shouted.

Michael nodded. Rafferty wouldn’t let cars get between himself and most of the other inmates, but he trusted Michael. He’d known him back when Michael was a detective on the Panama City police force. He’d been one of Michael’s sympathizers when he was convicted, and he’d vouched for him and gotten him on the work crew at the earliest opportunity.

Michael went to the crosswalk and waited for the light to change again. It turned yellow, and cars turning left passed in front of him.

When the crossing light turned green, he stepped out into the street. But the approaching SUV didn’t slow, and Michael jumped back just as it rounded the corner. His gaze connected with the driver.

No way. It couldn’t be him!

Michael stared at the driver as the SUV passed. His hair was blond and longer than it had been before . . . He took a few steps in the direction of the SUV, memorizing the tag. LTH 425.

LTH 425 . . . LTH 425 . . . LTH 425. If only he had a pen.

He’d have to remember it. Heart racing, he crossed the street and worked on the road cleanup, repeating the number in his mind over and over as he finished his work, constantly glancing up to watch the passing cars. LTH 425. Black Lincoln Navigator, 2012 or 2013.