AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She swung the carriers around, to show the faces of the tiny babies. They were red from crying, and the two infants were probably scared. “Which one?” she asked, and despite her determined exterior, she seemed to waver a bit, her eyes actually shimmering with tears.
“What?”
“Which kid do you want?” Her voice actually cracked as she pointed from one carrier to the next. “Adam or Ariel?”
* * *
No, no, no!
Whatever Didi was doing out here was wrong, so damned wrong. And she had to be stopped. Remmi was sure of that. It’s up to you. No one else is out here. Frantically, she stared through the slit in the back seat and the windshield to the space in the desert between the two cars where her mother and some guy were squaring off. The baby carriers were now on the ground between them, an open briefcase near the man’s feet.
For the love of God, it looked like an exchange of some kind.
Didi was trading her babies? To their father? No, no . . . that couldn’t be right, Remmi thought frantically. She wouldn’t be . . . selling her own children. But what then?
Hadn’t Didi said recently that things were going to get better? When pressed, she’d been cryptic and only laughed to say, “We’re about to win the lottery, honey,” and Remmi had chalked it all up to her mother’s fantasies about the damned tickets she’d purchased every week for as long as Remmi could remember.
But this . . .
No, she wouldn’t. Couldn’t.
Then what?
Frantically, she pressed the release to the back seat. Nothing happened. She tried again, her hand slick with sweat. Again a no go. “Come on, come on,” she gritted, clawing at the damned release as she realized that without a special key, she couldn’t get out. When the doors to the Caddy locked, so did the secret compartment. Fresh panic washed over her. Somehow, she had to stop this . . .
But she was trapped.
* * *
“You want me to choose?” Brett said, staring at the twin carriers. The girl, dressed in pink, was sniffling, as Didi had carefully leaned down and placed a pacifier in her tiny mouth, while the boy, in blue, had stopped crying on his own and was watching his mother and blinking. “That’s crazy.”
“You’re paying for one,” she said, straightening.
“I thought there was only one.”
“Your mistake. If you want the second one, it’ll be another two-fifty.”
“You greedy bitch. You’re certifiable.”
“Am I?”
“You can’t sell your own kids.”
“Sure I can. You’re their damned father. You can . . . you can think of me as a surrogate, okay?”
“That’s not how I think of you.”
“Doesn’t matter,” she said, though she flinched a little. Then she was all business again. “So, who do you want? Adam?” She pointed to the infant in his blue blankets. “Or Ariel?” Her manicured finger moved to the baby swathed in pink and lavender. “Your choice.”
“I’m not making a . . .” He let his voice trail off. She had him over a barrel. They both knew it. A muscle in his jaw worked, and he wondered what would happen if he just took both kids. Would she call the cops? Claim kidnapping? Then what about the money?
“Or I can make the decision if it’s too hard for you.”
“The boy, then,” he cut in, and she nodded as if she’d expected the answer. “You said I had a son.”
“And I wasn’t lying.”
“But you didn’t mention the girl.”
