“To give him a test. I am a nurse.”
Then why hadn’t she been told? And why was the woman who called herself a nurse wearing leather sandals? “In the middle of the night?”
The woman paused, then said, “There are no set hours during a crisis. Now if you’ll pardon me…”
Amelia walked closer, faster, holding out her arms. “Let me carry him so he won’t be frightened. He’s more familiar with me.”
The woman’s body tensed, her eyes going hard. “I think not, since I am his mother.”
Shock rooted her feet to the floor. That couldn’t possibly be true. Could it? “Your baby?”
“Yes, this is my son. I thought we had lost him in the earthquake, but see now?” She cradled the back of his head possessively. “He is fine. Is he not, Doctor?”
This woman’s timeline just didn’t add up, since Aiden and Lisabeth had already adopted Joshua before the earthquake. Amelia considered calling the woman on the lie right then and there, but the woman was holding Joshua in a fiercely tight grip. Risking a scene, anger, and God knows what else didn’t seem wise.
So, what to do?
She sifted through all the information coming at her when her balance was already seriously compromised from her encounter with Hugh. Guilt swamped her. If she hadn’t indulged herself so selfishly, she would have been with Joshua. None of which she could change right now.
Shoving aside the distracting guilt, she narrowed her focus, calling up her prosecutorial skills to get to the bottom of what was going on with this mystery woman—if she could possibly be Joshua’s real mother. “If you’re his mama, then why did you pretend to be hospital personnel?”
“Because of your paperwork.” She picked at her scrubs nervously.
Instincts shouted that the woman was holding something back—and she had Joshua in her arms, which made confronting her more than a little problematic. Amelia looked around for help in the deserted hallway. Crap.
The case file on Joshua stated his mother had died and his father had taken him to an orphanage. She had no reason to doubt the adoption agency. She had been laboriously thorough in researching them, knowing there were definitely some suspicious operations out there.
But she’d heard horror stories of babies being stolen from their mothers. Or mothers persuaded to give up a child for money or a so-called better life for the baby.
Or the woman could be grief stricken, mistaking Joshua for her own lost baby. In which case, she would be unstable. Volatile.
Joshua whimpered, reaching out a chubby fist. Amelia’s heart twisted with love—and fear. She gauged the distance between them and decided to continue to bluff rather than risk an all-out confrontation.
“Actually, he is not okay. That’s why he had the IV in.” Oh God, the woman must have pulled out the needle. Where were the nurses? Why hadn’t someone stopped her? “You need to give him to me now so I can get him hooked up again.”
She kept her voice low and calm, her body language as loose as possible with every cell within her screaming out in protest.
Amelia held out her arms. “I’ll be careful with him and have him right back to you. In fact, you can stay with us if you would like.”
And, please God, they would find some other hospital staff, maybe even one of those guards carrying around a big machine gun. Or better yet, this would be the perfect time for Hugh to come around the corner—unless he’d already left through another exit to avoid her. He could already be long gone.
The woman hugged Joshua closer with one arm and called over her shoulder. “Oliver?”
Another person? The time had come to act before the odds went against her. She needed to grab Joshua and start screaming bloody murder.
As Amelia lurched forward, a man stepped from behind a stack of pallets and shoved the woman and Joshua behind him. He wore dirty camouflage with patches from some other country, his red hair slicked back, and long, for someone in uniform.
Amelia opened her mouth to shout—
A survival knife gleamed in his fist, jagged blade kissing her neck. “The boy belongs to us now, and if you want to keep your pretty face unscarred, you’ll shut up.”
The other woman peered around his shoulder. “What are you thinking, Oliver? The Guardian gave us our orders. Get the kid and get out. Now kill her, and let’s go.”
Oliver’s grip on her arm tightened while he stroked back her hair with the blade. “The Guardian understands the importance of a profit margin to keep a business going, and this woman’s worth almost as much as the baby. The blonde bitch? She’s coming with us.”
Chapter 7
A distant shriek echoed down the corridor, stopping Hugh in his tracks as he stepped out of the closet. A cry of pain? Certainly not unheard of in a hospital. He moved deeper into the hall, peering around a corner. A solitary nurse in an open office filling out charts merely lifted her eyes for half a second.