Stolen Goods: A Secret Baby Romance Read Free

was off, the current inventory different than the records you had in your
personal files.”
    “I knew
immediately that something underhanded was happening,” Trentham agreed.
    Nolan saluted her
with his coffee cup. “I bet you did.”
    Doctor Trentham
adjusted her posture and cleared her throat. “Without informing the staff of
anything—after all, we do have signs posted warning that the premises are under
surveillance—I had the real cameras installed.”
    “Hidden behind the
dummy ones you’ve got strewn about this place. The staff never knew the
difference.” Nolan pointed to the fake recording device bolted to the top of
the wall in the corner behind the doctor. “You hoped to figure out who had been
stealing semen samples, but instead caught an illegal IVF procedure?”
    The police chief
nodded a single time. “Doctor Milliken is in custody. He claims the procedure
was the first he’s performed outside proper protocol, and he says he was
blackmailed by the patient.”
    “Did he now?”
Nolan’s fingers clenched, causing real damage to his paper cup. He willed his
grip to ease before he spilled his coffee.
    “Apparently,” the
chief explained, “Milliken got his nose out of joint back when he and his wife
got divorced. The court ordered them to sell all the possessions they’d bought
together and split the proceeds, except Milliken had a Lepine he was pretty
damned attached to.”
    Nolan hefted a
brow. “A Lepine?”
    “It’s a painting.”
    “Actually,
Stanislas Lepine was an artist, but, please, continue.” Nolan waved the man on.
    “Well, Milliken
didn’t want to get rid of an original work of art, so he hired a forger to make
a new one to sell.”
    “Netting him the
money from the forgery and allowing him to keep the original.” Nolan nodded as
the crime started taking shape in his brain.
    “Milliken claims
the woman he saw last week was the forger, name of Moon, but that’s all he
knows about her. He says she threatened to let it be known that the painting he
sold for a hefty, five-digit sum was, in fact, a forgery, and that he knew it was a forgery.”
    “That does make a
difference in sentencing, yes. If he specifically commissioned the forgery for
the sole purpose of sale, duping the buyer, well, that comes with extra
penalties.” Nolan mentally ran through the ramifications. “Okay, so he was
blackmailed. He still committed a crime.”
    “And we’re looking
into that,” the chief agreed.
    “Uh-huh.” Nolan
spun on his heel and gulped his coffee. “You didn’t catch the sperm thief,
though.”
    “No. Just Doctor
Milliken’s illegal procedure.” Director Trentham grimaced. “In his confession,
he confirmed that the woman, Moon, chose your sample for the insemination.”
    Nolan came to a
stop in front of Trentham and slammed his paper cup down on her desk. Leaning
low, he braced his hands on the edge and purposefully gave her his most
intimidating glare. “For the record, I’ve never donated a sample to this
clinic. I’ve never signed anything that gave permission to store my little
army, or to give it up to my bitch of a lying ex-wife who must have
forged my fucking signature so she could hold on to a goddamned pipe dream .”
    “We didn’t know.”
Trentham shook her head, remaining calm in the face of his anger. “I didn’t
know. All I have to go by are the papers in our files.”
    “That is the sole
reason I haven’t ripped you a new one by now.” Nolan straightened. “But you
better fucking believe my lawyers will be contacting the board that runs this
place.”
    Trentham slowly
got to her feet. “Fair enough, Agent Findley. Would you care to see the
security footage now?”

    The picture
quality was excellent. Nolan sat in his chair doing everything he could to keep
his breathing even, in spite of how his lungs had seemed to turn inside out. To
help ease his agitation, he whipped out his pad and took notes.
    The woman came
through the side entrance