Free Wild Stallion by Delores Fossen Page A

Jackson pointed out. “Instead you opted for a face-to-face meeting, with my adoption attorney no less. How do you two know each other?”
    “She called me out of the blue last night,” Ryan jumped to explain.
    “I’d read he was your attorney,” Shannon continued when Ryan didn’t add anything else, “and when I realized that SAPD still considered me a suspect, I called Ryan.” She huffed and looked at Bailey. “SAPD has questioned me more than a dozen times. The same questions over and over again. And I still have the same answers. I didn’t take your baby. I didn’t even see you during the hostage standoff. The first chance I could, I got out of there and haven’t been back since.”
    Bailey lifted her shoulder. “Then if you’re innocent, why call Ryan?”
    “Because I learned from a cop friend that SAPD was questioning Ryan, too. At first I thought that was good, that I was no longer a suspect. But then I realized they were trying to connect me to Ryan and some moron who tried to break into your estate yesterday.”
    “An armed moron,” Jackson supplied. “Who had called you just hours before he came here.”
    “So the police said.” Shannon moved to the edge of her seat so she was closer and eye-to-eye with Bailey. “I don’t know the man who came here. I never spoke to him, and I have no idea why he called me.”
    Bailey was about to suggest a reason—because Shannon might be neck-deep in all of this—but Jackson spoke before she could say anything.
    “You didn’t know the gunman, and you didn’t know my adoption attorney. Am I supposed to believe that? After all, you’re here together.”
    Shannon mumbled something under her breath, then said, “I’d never met or spoken to Ryan Cassaine before last night. I said I needed to clear up some things with you and asked him to drive me out here. I wasn’t sure you’d let me in if I came alone.”
    “I wouldn’t have,” Jackson assured her.
    Shannon snapped back her shoulders and stared at him.
    “Shannon didn’t give me a stolen child,” Ryan explained, sounding more frustrated with each word. “No one did. And everything about that adoption was perfectly legal.” He paused, then shook his head. “Jackson, I can’t believe you’d think I would do something like that. You asked me to find a baby. A private adoption. And that’s exactly what I did.”
    Bailey didn’t blindly accept that. “You don’t think there’s any chance, even a slight one, that Jackson’s adopted son is my missing baby?”
    “No.” But Ryan had no sooner said that when he dodged her gaze.
    Mercy, was the man hiding something?
    “You were with Caden’s so-called birth mother when she delivered him?” Bailey pressed Ryan.
    “Of course not. Jackson asked me to find a baby, so I did some checking. I put out a lot of feelers, and soon I got the call from the birth mother. And she’s not ‘so-called.’ She is his birth mother.”
    “Go over the details of that again,” Jackson insisted.
    Ryan huffed, louder this time. “She called me hours after she gave birth and told me that she wanted to give up her baby for adoption. A healthy baby boy. But she had no insurance and a lot of medical and credit card bills. She also wanted to go back to college. So, as you know, I contacted you, and together we came up with a sum to compensate her.”
    “How much compensation?” Bailey wanted to know. And she looked at Jackson for the answer.
    He shrugged. “A million to the birth mother, and then there were Ryan’s legal fees.”
    A million dollars. That was probably a drop in the bucket for Jackson, but Bailey figured there were many people who would have sold a baby for that amount or less.
    Her baby.
    She turned to Ryan. “What proof do you have that this woman actually gave birth to Caden?”
    “The usual documents. Hospital records. The application for a birth certificate. A statement from the midwife who assisted with the delivery.”
    “They could