Chapter One

      In the fifteen minutes it had taken detective Nick Slater to go down the street to Hurley’s Homestyle Kitchen to pick up his lunch order of a roast beef po’boy with a side of spicy slaw, someone had left an infant in a blue-and-white baby carrier on his desk.

      Nick froze in the back doorway of the otherwise empty Blue Gulch Police Station, staring at the baby and mentally taking stats.

      Newborn, one month, maybe six weeks old. Boy, according to all the blue. Healthy, from the peaches-and-cream big cheeks and the rosy bow-shaped lips, slightly quirking. Cared for, given the cap and clean outfit, the hand-knit blanket tucked around him in the sturdy, padded carrier. Sleeping—for now.

      All that had been on his desk when he left were his frustrating notes on the Jergen burglary case, half-finished paperwork for Farley Melton’s seventh disorderly conduct arrest of the year, a “just because” card with two folded twenties and a ten that he was going to send to his sister at Dallas City College, and a scrawled note from himself that he was running out to pick up lunch, back in ten.

      Now there was a baby.

      “Hello?” he called out, expecting the parent or caregiver or someone, anyone to appear. The Blue Gulch Police Station wasn’t very big. Aside from the main room with the long reception desk, and Nick’s and the other two officers’ desks, the chief had a private office next to the two jail cells and a break room that served as conference room, interrogation room and lunchroom.

      “Hello?” he tried again.

      Silence.

      Nick kept one eye on the baby and walked over to the break room—empty. Chief’s office—empty. Jail cells—one empty, one containing the sleeping form of Farley Melton.

      Cynic that he was, he walked over to his desk, put the bag containing his lunch on his chair and lifted up the baby carrier to see if the cash was still in the card. It was. He set the carrier back down.

      Okay, so the baby’s mother came in for some reason to talk to an officer or lodge a complaint, saw no one was around and set the carrier down while she went to use the restroom.

      Except both restroom doors were ajar, the lights out.

      Nick glanced out the windows at the front of the station to see if anyone was sitting on the steps or the bench. No one.

      “Hello?” he called out again, despite the fact that clearly no one was there. Except for Farley snoring in his jail cell and the gentle hum of an oscillating fan in the corner, the