Part 42 (1/2)
Is this my sign? Emma wondered.
”No, I'll take it here. Thanks.”
She swept her hair back and picked up the handset.
”h.e.l.lo?”
”Hi, is this Emma Lane?”
”Yes.”
”Emma, my name is Jack Gannon. I'm a reporter with the World Press Alliance in New York. I'm sorry to impose on you at this time but I need to speak to you briefly. It's important. Do you have a moment?”
”Yes, what's this about?”
”Thanks, I'll get to that, but first I need to confirm that I've reached the right person. Again, my apologies, but I have to ask this. Are you the Emma Lane whose husband Joe and son Tyler were in a recent car accident?”
Emma took a breath.
”Yes.”
”And have you had any dealings whatsoever with the Golden Dawn Fertility Corporation in Los Angeles California?”
A s.h.i.+ver rattled up Emma's spine. She stifled a sob, covering her mouth with her free hand, feeling tears cascading over her fingers.
”We were clients.”
She glanced at Joe and Tyler's picture on her nightstand.
”Please, tell me what this is about?”
”Your case at the clinic surfaced in a story I'm working on.”
”Our case? How? What kind of story?”
”It's complex, Emma. I need to talk to you. I think you might be able to help me. Would you talk to me if I came to Wyoming to see you?”
Emma was overwhelmed by what was happening. After all she'd been through, was this call real? Before she answered Gannon, he asked another question.
”Emma, have any other reporters contacted you, anyone from the Was.h.i.+ngton Post or the L.A. Times?”
Gannon's sobering tone cut through the haze that had nearly swallowed her. She felt Joe's s.h.i.+rt, felt Tyler's stuffed bear, felt a hand pulling her out of the abyss, felt her breathing quicken as she squeezed the handset.
”No. You're the only one who's called. I'll meet with you if you answer my questions,” she said.
”I'll try.”
”If I help you, will I find out what happened to my son?”
”I'm not sure I know what you mean.”
”I don't think he was killed in the crash, I think he was stolen from it. Now, given what you know, is it possible someone took him? Or am I crazy?”
She waited for his answer. Everything depended upon it.
”Given what I know, anything is possible.”
”I have one more question,” she said.
”All right.”
”How fast can you get here?”
52.
”Six miles south, you got the ruins of the old wooden fort where the Eighth U.S. Cavalry was posted for a time.” Ned Fuller nodded to the sweep of flat land that reached to the sky and mountains. ”Big Cloud's just up ahead.”
Fuller had become Jack Gannon's tour guide after picking him up at the airport in Cheyenne where he'd held up a small sign bearing Gannon's name in block letters. He had a firm handshake and gunmetal eyes that drilled into Gannon's when they met.
”This had better be for real because my niece has been through h.e.l.l.”
”It is, sir,” Gannon a.s.sured him before they left the terminal.
Now as they drove, he listened to Fuller point out landmarks. The mid-nineteenth-century storefronts and the munic.i.p.al buildings evoked the frontier. As they cut through town, Gannon reminded himself of what he was pursuing, of what he'd endured and how far he'd traveled since Melody Lyon had first put him on this story.
Last night, after telling her that his call to Emma Lane was a strong lead, Lyon had urged him to fly to Wyoming and follow up. ”We've just learned Reuters is sniffing around Adam Corley's murder in Morocco.”
The pressure for Gannon to break the full story was mounting.
”Want me to drop you at your hotel, or do you want to go straight to the house?”
”I'd like to get started,” Gannon said.
After they parked in the driveway of Emma's bungalow, Gannon grabbed his computer bag and approached the house with Fuller. Aunt Marsha met them at the door. Gannon smelled freshly brewed coffee and a faint hint of soap as he entered.
”Welcome, Mr. Gannon. I'm Marsha Fuller, Emma's aunt.” She shook his hand and gestured to the sofa. ”We hope you had a good trip--all that way from New York, goodness! Would you like some coffee?”
”That would be fine.”
”How do you take it?”
”Milk and sugar, thanks.”
He set his bag near the sofa and before sitting, turned to a woman about his age who'd entered the room.
”I'm Emma Lane.” She held out her hand. ”Thank you for coming.”