The Homecoming. Anne Marie Winston

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СКАЧАТЬ headed for the phone in his office. Picking up the handset, he punched the talk button. “Danny here.”

      “Danny.” It was Trent, as he’d anticipated. “How are you?”

      “Good,” he said cautiously. “How are you?”

      Trent laughed. “I’m fine. You sound like you think I’m coming through the phone to bite you.”

      “Well, you don’t usually call unless there’s something urgent,” Danny pointed out. “What’s up?”

      Trent hesitated.

      Danny felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. A shiver rippled down his spine. He had no idea what his brother was about to say but something in the constrained quality of that momentary silence raised every alarm he possessed. “What is it?” he demanded.

      “Sit down,” Trent suggested. “I have some news that is going to weaken your knees.”

      Danny sat. “All right. Tell me.” His mouth was so dry he had to try twice before the words came out. They found Noah’s body. He knew before Trent spoke again what his brother was going to say. His son was dead, just as he’d feared for the past four endless years.

      “Robbie Logan is alive.” Trent’s voice was hushed.

      The words didn’t register for a long moment. Uncomprehending, Danny said, “It’s not about Noah?”

      “God, no!” Trent was suddenly more animated. “I’m sorry, Danny, I should have realized what you were thinking.” More gently, he said, “There’s still no news of Noah. This is about Robbie. Your friend Robbie’s been found.”

      Robbie. Found. “But Robbie’s dead.” He still couldn’t grasp it. “He can’t be alive. He was buried a long time ago.”

      “Robbie Logan is alive,” Trent repeated. “He’s already had testing done that proves it. And, Danny, there’s more. He was arrested in Portland under the name Everett Baker.”

      “Arrested?” He felt as if he’d followed Alice down the rabbit hole.

      “Yes. Apparently he’s been involved with a scheme to kidnap babies for resale to wealthy families. He worked for Children’s Connection and used his contacts there to set up the snatches.”

      “My God.” Danny was horrified. Kidnapping babies. How could he? He was a kidnapped child. And even worse, the Logans were ardent supporters of Children’s Connection. Had he known who he was all along? Had Robbie deliberately set out to sabotage his parents’ project? If he hadn’t, it sure was a huge coincidence.

      The talk of kidnapping and baby-snatching inevitably led to an image of his son, Noah, bald as a billiard ball, waving his little arms and squealing with pleasure as Danny lifted him high in the air. Drool glistened on his chin and several tiny white teeth were plainly visible through his grin.

      True, this story was different from his own situation in that the babies were being provided to the wealthy instead of taken from them, but still… Where had Robbie gotten those babies in the first place? Somewhere, some parents’ lives had been changed forever when their child was stolen. The similarities made his stomach churn.

      “Where has he been all these years and why didn’t he ever come home?” Anger was beginning to curl around the edges of the shock. “How could he let them—all of us—think he was dead?”

      “From what little I know, I don’t think he knew he wasn’t Everett Baker until the woman he thought was his mother passed away a few years ago. He must have been treated pretty badly by the people who had him, and by the time he learned who he really was, he believed the Logans didn’t care about him.”

      “But he was six years old when he was taken!” Danny protested. “How could he not remember his family?”

      “We don’t know what he went through, Danny.” Trent was quietly reproving. “And you know firsthand the living hell an adult can put a kid through. Maybe he had to forget to survive.”

      Danny fell silent. Trent had hit a nerve. Their own mother was a sick, abusive witch. She’d damn near succeeded in making him believe he was worthless, so Trent was right: He shouldn’t be judging Robbie.

      Robbie! He couldn’t believe the little boy had lived. For years they’d thought he was dead. The police had even found a child’s body along the Willamette River that had been widely accepted to be Robbie’s. And now here he was, alive!

      He had another moment’s pity for some other family still waiting in vain for their little boy to come home. Maybe now that they knew Robbie was alive, the Logans would exhume the child they’d buried. Surely DNA testing was sophisticated enough to figure out who that little victim had been.

      “God,” he said slowly. “This creates a host of issues to resolve, doesn’t it?”

      “Sure does,” Trent said. “But I’m mostly concerned about how it’s going to affect you.”

      Danny shrugged, then realized his brother couldn’t see him. “I don’t think it’s going to, in any significant way. I mean, I’m glad he’s alive, but it’s not going to change my life.”

      “No, but it should give you hope. Doesn’t it make you think it’s possible that Noah is still out there somewhere?”

      “I don’t think about Noah,” Danny said flatly. “I can’t. It’s terrific that the Logans have found their son, but let’s face it. Most children abducted by strangers are killed within the first few hours if they aren’t found.” And besides, with Noah’s heart defect, he didn’t have much of a chance in the first place. Even if whoever took him hadn’t killed him, they wouldn’t have known that he desperately needed surgery within the next year.

      What he didn’t tell his brother was that he knew Noah wasn’t still alive for another reason—because he’d had the misfortune to be Danny Crosby’s son. Danny knew that the therapists he’d once seen would say it was ridiculous, but even now he couldn’t shake the gut-deep certainty that his son’s disappearance was a cosmic payback for his failure to save his little friend all those years ago. And even learning that Robbie had been found alive didn’t alleviate the feeling. Because he hadn’t acted quickly enough, Robbie had been through God only knew what, and he and his family had lost an entire childhood together.

      He realized suddenly that there was a strained silence from the other end of the line.

      “I do appreciate the call, Trent,” he said. “That’s really good news.” And then he disconnected.

      Sydney was still sitting on the lanai having a cup of decaf coffee when her rescuer returned from his telephone call. As Daniel Crosby walked toward her, she studied him from beneath her lashes.

      Her host was definitely a hottie. He looked like a young god from a Greek story, with his golden hair and blue, blue eyes. And his build did nothing to detract from the image. He was tall, with wide shoulders that tapered to a slender waist and strong thighs that showed beneath the khaki shorts he wore today with a white sport shirt that hugged his chest, hinting at even more hard, muscled flesh.

      She wasn’t looking for a man, but if she were, she’d look twice at СКАЧАТЬ