to me,” he commanded.
He tipped her chin up until she was forced to face him, forced to choke back another sob that threatened. He dug a clean handkerchief out of his pocket and silently handed it to her, then waited a minute until she was calmer.
“That was your ex?” he asked then.
She managed to nod. “Bobby first, then Paul.”
“Good. Then we know what we’re dealing with, who we’re looking for. We know it wasn’t a random act by a dangerous stranger, just a dad wanting to see his child.”
She blinked back a fresh batch of tears. “That is good, isn’t it?” she echoed, desperate for hope. Then she considered the rest of what he’d said, the faint note of sympathy in his voice. She didn’t dare tell him he was wrong, that this wasn’t about Paul’s love for Bobby at all.
“The best news we’ve had all evening,” he confirmed, giving her hand a squeeze. “We can narrow the search down from the get-go. It’s a good sign, too, that he’s willing to communicate with you, rather than simply disappearing with his son. We’ll get a tap on the phone. Justin’s already got an expert on the way. We can trace the next call, if you can keep him on the line.”
Kelsey recalled Paul’s abrupt hangup. She sensed it had been more than an attempt to keep her from asking more questions, from demanding to speak with Bobby again. “How long?” she asked. “I think he knows he can’t stay on the line very long. That’s probably why he hung up on me just now.”
“You’ll do the best you can,” Dylan told her. “Sooner or later, he’ll make a mistake.”
That’s it? Kelsey wanted to shout. They were going to wait for Paul to make a mistake? Didn’t they know that Paul didn’t make mistakes? He was the champion of doing every last thing right.
Except for the pills, of course. She had caught him at that. She consoled herself with the memory. He was only human. He could slip up. She realized that Dylan was studying her intently with those deep blue eyes of his. They’d gone almost navy in the fading light and once more they were quietly assessing her, leaving her more shaken than she had been. She had a feeling he was doing it deliberately to unnerve her.
“What?” he asked eventually. “What aren’t you telling us, Kelsey?”
“Nothing,” she insisted, aware of the hint of defiance in her voice. “I’ve told you everything.”
He shook his head. “I don’t believe you.”
She forced herself to meet his gaze, to not look away. “I can’t help that.”
“You want your son back, don’t you?”
“Of course.”
“Then you have to tell us the truth.”
“I am, dammit.”
“The whole truth,” he added with emphasis.
“I am,” she said again, but without the same vehemence.
Naturally Dylan didn’t miss the difference. She could see it in his eyes. He knew she was lying.
What if she told him about the pills? She almost did, then caught herself. For if Paul found out she had broken her promise and told anyone, who knew what he would do? It wouldn’t matter to him that he had broken their agreement first by coming after Bobby. No, she reassured herself again, she had to keep silent, for all their sakes.
Dylan wanted to shake the whole truth out of Kelsey James. She was obviously a bright woman. She had to know that forcing him and Justin to operate blindly just made everything twice as difficult as it needed to be.
The noise level in the living room climbed as neighbors discussed the call that had just come in. He saw Kelsey’s gaze seek out Lizzy, probably for moral support, and realized he needed to get her alone, just the two of them. He had to find a way to gain her confidence, so that she would trust him with the whole truth.
“Let’s go,” he said.
“Where?” she demanded, balking.
He latched on to her hand and urged her back in the kitchen, then shooed everyone else out and shut the door. Kelsey looked as if she might protest, but then she sighed and sank onto a chair and accepted the cup of tea he handed her. She sipped automatically and stared warily at him over the rim of the cup, as if she sensed his displeasure. Dylan concluded that she was terrified enough without him coming down on her as hard as he wanted to. Tact wasn’t his long suit, but maybe it was worth a try.
He turned a chair around and straddled it, took out a notebook and pen. “Okay, let’s try this another way. Tell me about your ex.”
She blinked rapidly, then studied her cup of tea as if it were the most important thing in her universe.
Dylan’s short supply of patience was dwindling. “Kelsey, help me out here. I need to get a fix on this guy, get into his head.”
“I know. It’s just…” She shook her head. “I don’t know where to start.”
He bought her confusion. He sensed she really was struggling to sort through the information and put some order to it. He didn’t need order. He needed raw facts. Still, he kept his tone mild as he suggested, “How about the beginning? Where did you meet? How long did you know him before you got married?”
She closed her eyes for a minute, as if the memories were painful. “He was a stockbroker,” she began finally.
“Which firm?”
She named one of the biggest.
“Still there?”
“As far as I know.”
He made a note, then nodded. “Go on.”
“One of Paul’s clients was a doctor at the hospital where I was in med school. We were just finishing rounds when he came in for an appointment to go over the man’s portfolio. The doctor got called away on an emergency so he asked me to take Paul to the cafeteria and keep him company until he could get there.” She regarded him wearily. “How is this helping? It’s ancient history.”
“Trust me. It will. So, was it love at first sight?” Dylan asked.
“Hardly,” she said with a touch of wry humor. “I thought he was way too full of himself. A lot like you, in fact.”
Dylan shrugged off the jibe. It wasn’t the only thing he and Paul James had in common. He wondered how she would feel if she knew the truth about that.
“And?” he prodded.
“I never thought he would look twice at me.”
“Why?” Dylan asked, genuinely incredulous at the suggestion that she wouldn’t catch a man’s attention.
“Let’s just say I was a very bookish student. I didn’t spend a lot of time with my appearance. He was very slick, very handsome, the ultimate yuppie. When I was studying, I was lucky to remember to put on lipstick and matching socks before I went out the door.”
Dylan tried to reconcile the image she was painting with the woman seated across from him. He couldn’t. Even in her shorts and T-shirt, her feet in sandals, she radiated both inner beauty and confidence. Her hair framed her face with the sort of tousled curls a man’s fingers just itched to untangle. She had a scattering of freckles across her nose, but otherwise her complexion was near perfect. And those eyes—a man could sink in their glittering sea-green depths and go down for the third time happy. A sudden rush of heat told him he needed to avoid spending too much time gazing into those eyes.
“If you two were such a mismatch, how did you wind up together?”
“I don’t know,” she said with apparent bemusement. “Somehow we just clicked. Not overnight. It took a few weeks, but suddenly everything changed. Then things moved