His Child

“Hold it right there. That’s the part I want to talk about now. Exactly how did they use you?”

She made a sound of outrage and bolted to her feet as if ready to tear out of the room. But she didn’t go anywhere. She pressed both hands to the sides of her head and sagged back down to the sofa.

“Dizzy?” he asked.

She tossed him a you think? look. “I guess it’s just one of the little joys of my condition.”

“Well, I suppose it’s time we broached that subject. Would you like to explain exactly how you think I got you pregnant? Afterward, I can blow anything you say right out of the water.”

“They inseminated me.” She didn’t even hesitate. “On your orders, I’m sure.”

Jake froze. That wasn’t the answer he wanted to hear. All right, so he couldn’t blow anything out of the water just yet. He had to think about that for a moment. Then he discounted it. “That’s impossible.”

“No, it’s not. I’ll spare you the exact details of how they did it, but I know what happened to me. And so do you.”

He paused, reconsidered it. But discounted it again just as fast. There were holes a mile wide in her story. “Let’s suppose for a minute that someone did inseminate you. What makes you think I was involved in any way?”

Again, she didn’t hesitate. “Your name was on the vial they took out of that weird bucket. I saw it. I don’t think they meant for me to, but I did. They’d given me a drug, and I guess they thought I was unconscious. I wasn’t. Plus, I heard them mention your name.”

Yes, in her dreams she’d probably heard someone mention his name. “This is a real cartload of bull you’re telling me, Miss Briggs. What I can’t believe is that you had the nerve to come here with it.”

“Are you saying you don’t have semen stored somewhere?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“At Cryogen Labs right here in San Antonio,” she clarified. “That’s what it said on the vial, along with your name and the numbers 6837. I’m not an idiot, Mr. McClendon. I’ve read about your Hodgkin’s disease. I know you stored semen before you went into therapy. Do you deny that?”

So, she did know about his illness six years ago. It didn’t make him believe her story. It just meant she’d done her homework. “I don’t deny it, but what you couldn’t have read in the newspaper was that my vials were accidentally destroyed nearly four months ago. Only a handful of people know that.” He paused so she could grasp that. “Would you like to leave on your own, or do I need to toss you out of here myself?”

Her eyes widened for a second, and then narrowed just as quickly. “The number on the vial was 6837. Call Cryogen Labs and see if that matches what they say was destroyed.”

Oh, she was good. Really good. Coming up with the number of the vial was a nice touch, but it wouldn’t make him believe her. “I’ll call them in a minute—but first I have another question. Hypothetically speaking, let’s say someone did inseminate you. You’re sure you became pregnant?”

“I heard them say so, yes. I didn’t see the test results, but I’m having some symptoms that make me think they succeeded in what you wanted them to do.”

“You said they drugged you. Your symptoms could be from that.”

Her eyebrow rose sharply. “Not these symptoms. And they didn’t keep me drugged all the time, just locked up. They only drugged me when they did those, uh, procedures on me.”

He didn’t want to delve into that any further, not when he had so many other things to discuss. “Another hypothetical question, then. Why would anyone want to do this?”

“That’s what I want you to answer. Trust me, I’ve been giving it a lot of thought. Maybe you wanted some surrogate mother and you didn’t want to go through the hassle of doing it the legal way.”

He shook his head. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“It does if you didn’t want the publicity because of your campaign. Some people are opposed to surrogate pregnancies. You probably didn’t want to risk offending any ultra-conservative voters. This way, you could adopt the child and pretend you’re still a good guy who’s giving some orphan a chance to be raised by a millionaire rancher-turned-congressman. You’re the winner all the way around.”

Jake still didn’t believe her story, and that theory was just plain asinine, but he could definitely see this from a different angle. A much different angle. If, and that was a Texas-sized if, there was any truth to what this woman said, it could be a plot by someone out to get him. Suppose someone wanted to use the child to embarrass him or to hurt his campaign? Even in this day and age, conservative voters wouldn’t care much for a future congressman having an illegitimate child.

She raked her tongue over her bottom lip. “But something must have gone wrong, because I heard them say they were going to kill me. Thank God I was able to escape before they could get around to doing that.”

“They said they were going to kill you?” Jake repeated. “Well, that shoots holes in your surrogate mom theory, huh? Why would I go through all that trouble to inseminate you, and then kill you before I even knew for sure if you’re pregnant?”

“I don’t know. I told you, that’s why I’m here. I need answers.”

“Well, you came to the wrong place, lady. Let me correct that, you came to the wrong man. I’m not buying any of this, so why don’t we just cut to the chase and you spit out exactly what you want. Money up front? Or are you doing this for blackmail so you can drag out the payments for years? Because either way I don’t intend to give you a dime.”

She tipped her head to the phone. “Make the call to Cryogen Labs. Vial number 6837.”

Jake looked at the phone, and then her. “All right, I will.” It was about time he called her bluff. He walked across the room, using the mirror to keep an eye on her. “I don’t suppose you know their phone number?”

“No.”

“No,” he mimicked sarcastically under his breath.

Jake didn’t know what to make of that. A con artist would have known the number. A victim of the crime she’d just described wouldn’t. Of course, she could be a very good con artist who was pretending she didn’t know. There was only one way to find out.

He got the number from directory assistance and called the lab. Jake wasn’t even sure the place would be open, but someone picked up on the third ring.

“This is Jake McClendon. I wanted to verify some information about specimens I had stored there.” The woman who answered the call asked him to provide some identifying data. Once that was out of the way, he got down to business. “I need to know about the six vials I had in Cryogen Labs. I want to make sure they were indeed destroyed.”

“Oh, yes, they were, Mr. McClendon. Didn’t someone contact you about it?”

“They did.” He glanced at Jessie. She stepped closer and stared at him. Her eyes darkened like storm clouds. “Equipment failure, the person said.”

“I’m afraid all the samples in that particular tank were destroyed. You are eligible for compensation from our insurance carrier.”

He wasn’t interested in insurance. In fact, before today Jake hadn’t been interested in the vials at all. He’d stored them at Cryogen in case the treatment for his Hodgkin’s Disease left him sterile. Since it hadn’t, he had forgotten they even existed. Until he got that call four months ago.

“I need the vial numbers,” he explained to the woman.

“Certainly. I have that right here in the computer.”

He heard the clicking of her fingers on the keys, and made another spot-check on Jessie. Now she was looking around the room. For her gun, no doubt. She wouldn’t find it. Jake had wrapped it in a plastic dry cleaner’s bag and put it in the closet in the bedroom. Later, he wanted someone to check the weapon for fingerprints. That was probably the only way he would find out who she really was.

“Okay, here we are,” the woman finally said. “The vials were numbered consecutively from 6851 through 6855. As I said, they were all destroyed.”

So, there was no 6837. But Jessie Briggs had been damn close. Jake was about to end the call and confront his visitor, when he realized the numbers that the woman gave him only accounted for five vials.

“There were six specimens,” he pointed out.

“Oh, yes. I see what happened. The first vial was the one you originally gave us. The other five were collected later at your physician’s office and then transferred here.”

“And the number on that first vial?”

“Let’s see. That would have been 6837.”

The muscles tightened in his chest. Jake refused to allow himself to react beyond that. This meant nothing. There was a reasonable explanation. All he had to do was find it. “And where is that vial?” he asked.