The Legend of Smuggler's Cave

The boy was asleep on the sofa beside Briar, curled up under a crocheted throw. Dana had offered to take him to his bed, but Briar hadn’t wanted to let him out of her sight. Dalton wondered how she would handle it the next evening when she had to leave him with someone so she could work her patrol shift.

He could solve that problem for her, he realized, the solution weaving itself into place in his sleep-deprived mind. Staying here at this cabin, in the middle of nowhere, only made her and her son more vulnerable to further attacks. Attempts, he corrected himself silently. Tonight hadn’t been an attack so much as an attempt to steal Logan away from her.

The question was, why?

Chapter Five

The front door opened without a knock, and Doyle Massey walked in, his eyes widening as he spotted Dalton. Briar watched warily, prepared to jump in if crisis prevention was needed, but Doyle simply let his gaze slide past his half brother and crossed to where Nix and Briar sat. Dana moved from her standing position by the fireplace to join them.

“What’s he doing here?” Doyle asked quietly.

“He witnessed the attack,” Briar answered in a tone that didn’t invite further questions.

Doyle tipped her chin up with his forefinger to get a good look at the bruises on her throat. “Are you and Logan okay?”

“We’re fine.”

He gave a little wave of his hand toward her injury. “Anybody look at that?”

“I did. In the mirror,” she answered flatly. “Just bruises.”

Doyle glanced at Nix, as if seeking a second opinion. Nix gave a shrug. Doyle looked back at Briar, his eyes hooded in thought. Then he looked at Dalton Hale across the room and gestured with his head for Dalton to join them. He moved aside to make room for Dalton to join the circle.

Briar glanced up at the county prosecutor, curious to see his reaction to Doyle’s silent command. His gaze met hers briefly, then turned toward the chief, who had begun to speak.

“It’s too dark for a search party to do us any good.” Doyle’s voice lost its earlier gentleness. This was his police-business voice. “Neither of you recognized the two men. No soft ground to allow for footprints. Briar said both men wore gloves, so looking for prints is pointless.”

“Are you saying there’s nothing you can do to find those guys?” Dalton looked frustrated. “You don’t think for a second they’ll stop trying, do you?”

“What do you think they want?” Doyle asked him.

“I wasn’t here last night, so I can’t be sure about what motivated those particular intruders,” he answered, his tone measured. “But tonight what I saw was two men trying to take Mrs. Blackwood’s son out of her arms. They came here for the boy.”

Briar couldn’t stop a soft groan from escaping her sore throat at Dalton’s confirmation of her worst fear. She’d known the truth the second the man outside her Jeep tried to pull Logan from her arms.

They had come here tonight to take her son.

“I wish I could say I had enough officers available to post a twenty-four-hour guard here,” Doyle told her.