Another Deception (28 page)

“What was it? I don’t remember.”

“Alton Glen, but he was called Glen.”

“Alton.”

“Yes.”

“Hmmm, I think I like it. Alton. We would of course call him Al, you do know that.”

     Jacks shrugged,

“Al is not bad, is it?”

     Honey reached over and kissed his cheek.

“Al is not bad at all.”

     She smiled at him.

“Why don’t you go see what good stuff everyone is saying about our little Al? When you do, find out when they are going to bring him back to me!”

“Okay, you rest and I will do that.”

     He started whistling as he left the room. When he got to the nursery, the window was closed, and all the people were about to leave.

“Well? What do you think about our little guy?”

     He got so many responses that he could not process them all so he laughed and told them, “Thank you for all the compliments and Honey thanks you too. Right now, she is having a fit to get him back into her arms, so I got to give the nurses a heads up.”

     He took time to ask his mother if she got a good look at Alton and she looked at him in surprise.

“You gave him his grandfather’s name. How nice of you to do that….Jessie, did you
hear?
Honey and Jacks are calling the baby, Alton!”

“I hear, and I think that is a wonderful thing to do, Jacks. He is a doll baby and Abby is going to be so thrilled to have a little cousin.”

“We had to name him something. Because we opted not to know the sex beforehand, we never did decide on a name for boy or girl. We really wanted to wait and see what fit. Sorry, but I have to see those nurses back there. Honey cannot bear to be apart from him. See you at dinner Mother, Jessie.”

     He took off back around the corner to knock on the door to the nursery. It took two tries before someone answered.

“Hi, I just wanted to tell you that my wife is waiting for the baby to come back.
The Jackson baby…boy baby.
You should be done with him here and we did request that he stay in the room with her.”

“Oh, yes sir, Mr. Jackson. Someone has already gone with him. He should be back with Mrs. Jackson by now.”

“Okay, thanks!”

    Jacks found that he was beyond excited to get back and hold the little
guy
, himself. He went down to first floor the hospital’s gift shop first. He bought a bunch of balloons geared toward boy babies and a bouquet of flowers for the new mommy. Feeling like he was the happiest man alive, he headed back to the room where Honey was propped up watching the TV. She opted not to have anything for the birthing so she was wide-awake from excitement. She laughed when Jacks came through the door with his hands full. Seeing the little rolling bed still empty he said,

“Where is our son? The nurse said they were bringing him back before I went down to the gift shop. He should be here by now.”

     Honey turned off the television, while he placed the flowers on the table and the balloons out of the way. He sat down on the foot of her bed.

“No one has been here since you left.”

“I asked and the woman said another nurse had already left to bring him back. I guess she got me mixed up with someone else after all. I will just call down there.”

     Saying this, he reached for the room phone and dialed the hospital operator.

“Hello, would you ring the nursery for me. Thank you.”

     He leaned over and kissed Honey while he waited and mouthed the words, ‘I love you.’

“Yes, this is the Jackson baby’s father. Someone told me that he left the nursery already and that was a while ago. She must have confused me with another father… Sure, I can wait.”

     Turning to Honey, he laughed,

“They are checking…like there were dozens of babies in there and I only counted eight…yes, I am still here. Of course, I am in the room with his mother, where did you think I
was?
No, the mother

has
not seen him since the nurse took him away. Fine, but if my baby is not in that nursery then somebody best be finding him and bringing him to us!”

     Slamming down the phone, he looked at Honey’s panicked face and tried to assure her the baby would be there any moment.

“Look, these things happen all the time. Babies
get
mixed up and nurses get confused. I am going to walk that way. Will you be okay?”

     Honey could only shake her head and tried
to not be
alarmed, but there was something inside her screaming that nothing about this was okay.

     Jacks almost ran the length of the hall where around the corner was the nursery. Outside the door were four people in deep conversation. When they saw him, they stopped talking and one of the men who looked like a security person, greeted him.

“Mr. Jackson?”

“Yes. Where is my baby? I will take him myself to the room. Bring him to me.”

“Mr. Jackson, would you come to my office please?”

     Jacks gave a funny sound meant to be a laugh but fell short.

“No, I want to take the baby to his mother, she is waiting for him. He should have already been there….what has happened? Where is he? Where is my baby
!?
”

     His voice got louder and louder and he fought the need to grab the man and shake him, hard.

“We are looking for him Mr. Jackson. We will find him. There has just been a mix up, we will find him.”

“That means you have no idea where he is. How can you lose a baby? Move, I want to see for myself he is not in that room.”

     The man nodded and the other people moved aside to let him go in. When he came back out, he was pale and felt sick. How was he going to tell Honey that the baby she delivered just a couple of hours ago was nowhere to
be found
?

      “The sheriff is on his way and the city police have all entrances to the hospital blocked.
No one in and no one out.
I promise you, we are doing everything we can.”

     Two of the people had left and the other was the administrator, if Jacks remembered correctly. This man pulled a chair from somewhere and tried to get him to sit, but he refused.

“Dear God, that means you think he has been stolen…kidnapped? I have to go back to my wife without my son. I said I do not want to sit. I want to find my son.
You are idiots
,
you are all idiots
! How can something like this happen? Find him! I don’t care what it takes, find him!”

     Turning away from them, he started walking back to the room wondering how he was going to tell Honey that their baby had mysteriously disappeared.

    When he walked through the door, Honey knew something was wrong and the first thing she thought was the baby was dead. She had heard of that happening to people before. Having a perfectly normal baby and next thing they knew, it died of some malady or other. She did not wait for Jacks to say anything but started crying hysterically.

“He was perfect! How could this happen? How could he just die? I cannot bear it, Jacks! Help me, for I cannot bear it!”

     Jacks rushed to her, holding her as tight as he could and tried to comfort her, though he needed consoling himself,

“Listen to me Honey, he is not dead!
Honey!
Look at me! He is not dead!”

     She raised her tear streaked face to look at him, not believing what he was saying.

“Where is he then and why do you look so frightened?”

“He is not dead, they just cannot find him.”

     His voice cracked and he thought he was going to lose his mind but he had to stay sane for Honey. If they did not find their newborn son, he was not sure if either of them could handle it. How could a baby just disappear like that? It was not a large hospital, how hard could it be to find him. Who would do such a thing, anyway?

     Honey looked confounded as she asked,

“They lost our baby? How ridiculous! You do not lose babies, Jacks. People steal babies they do not lose them! Dear God, someone has taken our baby! That is what you mean,
isn’t
it?
Isn’t it!”

     Jacks head was hanging down and he could not look at her. She started screaming and he tried to hold her, but she clawed at him.

“Give me my baby! Go get him. You let them take my baby…” 

   Jacks let go of her and got up. She was right. It was his job to protect his family and he had failed.

     He looked at her, raging and screaming so loud that the nurses came running. Word had spread about the missing baby and the whole hospital
was turned
upside down with searching every inch of the building. One of the nurses ran back to the station for a sedative, as the other tried to calm Honey down. When the first one came back with the injection, she fought them wildly so that one held hr down while the other gave it. Almost immediately her body relaxed and her head started swimming with the medication and her screaming turned to whimpering as she pitifully cried,

“I want my baby. Jacks, make them give me my baby….”

     Jacks had stood to the side watching helplessly. When she succumbed to the sedative, he walked out of the room. He had no idea what to do now.
God, what to do, what to do!

     Sliding down the corridor wall he sat outside Honey’s door until someone asked if he would
come
talk with the Sherriff. Getting up he followed the male nurse to an office on the first floor. He was feeling weirdly calm now, as one can when in a state of shock. He entered the room, shook hands with the burly man, he was familiar with from court, and even managed to answer the questions he
was asked
, but none of it felt real. He kept thinking about the tiny little baby who came out screaming but when placed in his mother’s arms was quiet and peacefully knowing on his fingers looking for suckle. Had that only been no more than two hours ago?

“Jacks!”

     Jacks jerked,

“I am sorry, what was it you were saying?”

“I asked if you have any enemies. In your line of work it would stand to reason that an angry parent might look for a way to retaliate if they thought you cost them a child or children.”

“Yes, I understand what you are saying but no, there have been no cases which would stand out in my mind.”

     Then he thought about Asa.

“Could we do this later? I really need to make some phone calls.”

“I have enough for now. Go ahead. Jacks, I am sorry about this and I want you to know we are going to do everything we can to find him. You have my word.”

“Thank you, I know you will.”

    He stopped at the room to look at Honey and she looked so peaceful laying there. He hoped she would sleep for a long while and when she woke back up, the baby would be there safe and unharmed. He eased the door to and hurried down the hall. He passed by the nurses’ station and he could feel the pity. The front entrance still had uniformed cops watching, but now
was opened
back up for people to come and go. That meant the baby was nowhere in the hospital building.

     When he reached his pickup, he got in and called Dwight. He desperately needed to talk to someone and when Dwight answered the
phone,
he managed to tell him what had happened without breaking down. Then he asked,

“Do you think it could be Asa…Garrett?”

     Dwight was shocked to hear that someone had walked into the hospital and taken the baby without
being seen
. How do you smuggle a baby out like that, was what he was thinking when Jacks mentioned Asa.

“It could be, but we haven’t heard anything of him since you have been back from New York. You think it is
revenge?
Surely he would not hurt an infant!”

“Would you and Sheila watch over Honey for me?”

“We will do anything to help. What are you planning?”

“I am not sure yet but I will keep you posted. I cannot just sit and do nothing while my son is in the hands of some crazy person or if he is with Garrett.”

“Okay buddy, we got you covered in prayer, God go with you!”

    Jacks got off with Dwight and immediately called Detective Cranford. Unfortunately, he had retired and Jacks could not think of the other
guy’s
name. He pulled his wallet out and searched for a card he remembered
being given
at the hospital in New York. He found it…the name was Frank Dear.

    He called the number and waited for it to ring…once…twice…three times, and then it went to voice mail. Not what he wanted, but Jacks message implored Frank to return the call immediately. “Please, my baby is missing and I believe Garrett may be responsible.”

    He started the pickup and headed to see Jessie and Millie. He did not want to tell them over the phone. Millie was doing so much better but years of
being drugged
had taken a toll on her health and she was somewhat of a recluse. Jessie was just beginning to find herself and was working at the clinic where Honey worked as a receptionist. Abby was blossoming in the school and making friends, something she never indulged in before as she was home schooled by Jessie. A few months after they got home, a house down the street from theirs became vacant and they snatched it up before it
could even be put
on the market. Things were good and getting better for them all, and now…