Stolen Goods: A Secret Baby Romance Read Free Page B

footage rolled on. There were times Nolan became so uncomfortable he could
hardly breathe, but he sat like stone and waited it out. His belly flipped like
a circus act, but he watched the whole process and ignored the demanding ache
in his balls. And the squeezing around his heart.
    “It seems like
that should take longer,” he whispered, only half-aware he spoke out loud.
    “It’s outpatient
surgery,” Trentham explained. “I will admit we usually do this with a bit more
finesse and a qualified anesthesiologist, but this was an illegal procedure, so
that should be taken into account.”
    “She wasn’t
comfortable being alone with him, half-naked.”
    Trentham nodded.
“I noticed.”
    “It makes me
curious about her.”
    “Agent Findley,
I’m sure there are many things that make you curious about the woman. Do you
think you’ll find her?”
    Nolan took a deep
breath and felt determination fill his lungs in equal measure with oxygen. His
heart pounded and his blood heated, his answer was grim. “I won’t stop until I
do.”

 

    3
     
     
     
    It took two days
to get his first lead.
    Nolan only
flinched a little when the file folder landed on his desk with a flat thwack that indicated there wasn’t much inside. He glanced up to see one of the newer
agents standing in front of him.
    “Weslyn Marie
Moon,” his coworker said cheerfully. “You got lucky. The San Diego office had a
grainy photo. They believe she’s responsible for an art forgery connected to a
murder they were looking into a couple years back.”
    “A murder?” Nolan
snapped up the folder. “They think she’s involved?”
    “Not anymore.” The
other agent shook his head. “Guy commissioned a painting from her. A few days
after she dropped it off, he turned up dead. He had a cheap security camera
watching his premises and San Diego PD picked up the surveillance footage.”
    Nolan lifted a
brow in his comrade’s direction. “Did they bring her in?”
    “Didn’t find her
and they’re not wasting time looking.” The other man shook his head again. “I
talked to the agent in charge of the case. Lot of money involved, but it’s low
priority. Nobody can even say for sure if she’s the artist, but her name came
up.”
    “Low priority?”
Nolan scanned the first few sheets inside the folder he held. “It says here she
was wanted for questioning concerning a forgery of a Hobbema masterpiece.”
    The other agent
nodded. “The guy gave a fake Hobbema landscape to his dope supplier, but the
supplier obviously wasn’t satisfied. Local police caught the guy’s thugs
responsible for the murder and nobody seems to know who the girl is. She’s only
on the hook for forging art.”
    “Doctor Milliken
commissioned a fake Lepine from the lady. Guess she’s got a thing for nature.”
    “If that’s what
you call it. I mean, where are the ‘happy little trees’ huh? The pictures in
that folder look like the drab things my grandma used to hang over the back of
her couch.”
    “Have a little
more respect for great art.” Nolan’s exhale ruffled the edge of the paper he
held. “Why would a drug dealer want a phony landscape with a lesser-known Dutch
Master’s signature on it?”
    “He was a very
high end dealer. He had twelve forged paintings and drawings in his house, but
only the Hobbema was from Moon.” The other man winced. “San Diego PD put it
down as coincidence. She wasn’t involved in anything else.”
    “Nothing but
forging art and stealing jizz.” Nolan flipped through the meager contents of
the folder to find the woman’s photo.
    He stared at the
picture, but it didn’t have the answers he sought. It was hard to see anything
noteworthy in the photo at all, considering the quality of the print. Only the
side of the woman’s face was visible and the background was nearly too dark to
make out what she was wearing. Still, the curve of her jaw seemed like a match,
and the angle of her chin could possibly be the