Page 5 of Remember Her Name

Releasing him, Josie laughed. “Considering that she thinks you’ve taken way too long to do it already, yes. I hope you’ve got something dramatic planned for the proposal because it’s ‘go big or go home’ with Trinity.”

Drake ran his hands through his hair again. “Uh, yeah, I’ve met her. It’s going to be hard to beat jumping off a cliff though.”

“My husband didn’tjumpoff a cliff. That wasn’t part of the proposal. I hope you got Trinity a ring you can see from space.”

Drake rolled his eyes. “Why do you think it’s taken me so long to propose? Government employees don’t make that much. I had to save up.”

Josie laughed again. “You have my blessing. I won’t tell anyone besides Noah. What is your plan?”

He told her.

Josie raised a brow. “Oh, you’re doing it this week? Here?”

He nodded and let out a shaky breath. He was nervous, which was kind of sweet. “So, will you guys help me?”

“Of course.”

Her ringtone sounded. She took her phone from her pocket and answered dispatch with a curt, “Quinn.” As she listened, her pulse fluttered. “On my way,” she said, hanging up.

Drake frowned. “Catch a bad one?”

Josie walked around to the driver’s side door of her SUV. “I’m not sure. Dispatch said there’s a baby sitting in a stroller in the city park with no parent to be found.”

TWO

The sound of a baby wailing set Josie’s teeth on edge as she jogged along one of Denton City Park’s wide asphalt trails. Sweat poured down the sides of her face as much from tension as from the heat. Here in the park, which teemed with foliage, flowers, and shrubbery, it was always significantly cooler, but the humidity added a suffocating type of heat to the mix. As she drew closer, she tried to determine what type of cry they were dealing with. Josie and her husband didn’t have children. Unable to have their own, they’d spent the last year wading through a lengthy process in order to be able to adopt. Last month, they’d had a successful home study and been approved. They were in the process of preparing their adoption profile in order to be put on the waiting list to match with a prospective child.

But Josie still knew the different types of cries that infants used to make their needs known. The I’m-hungry cry. The I’m-hungry-and-you-waited-way-too-long-to-feed-me cry that was so intense and scary that it always made her worry the neighbors were going to call 911. The change-my-diaper cry. The I’m-in-pain cry which came with a really fun guessing game as to whether it was due to gas, teething, colic, ear infection, orsomething more serious. The I’m-too-cold-or-too-hot cry. The I’m-overly-tired cry. The I-just-want-to-be-held cry. One of her best friends, Misty DeRossi, had given birth to Josie’s late first husband’s son almost eight years ago and Josie had been one of little Harris’s primary babysitters since his infancy.

Damp with perspiration, the back of Josie’s polo shirt clung to her skin. The trail curved twice in an S shape. The infant’s shrieks grew louder. Finally, the stroller came into view. It was the kind with the detachable car seat. Josie was glad to see its hood was extended, giving the infant protection from the sun. One uniformed officer—Dougherty—gripped the handle of the stroller and gently pushed it back and forth while peering down at the baby. His partner, Brennan, stood nearby, talking into his radio.

Josie jogged over to the stroller and muscled Dougherty out of the way.

“This poor kid,” he said, raising his voice to be heard over the yowls. “Won’t stop crying. I don’t know what to do. Brennan said try keeping the stroller in motion but that’s not working.”

She pushed the hood back. A red-faced infant waved her clenched fists. Her chubby legs flailed angrily. Given the flowered headband and pink onesie that proclaimed, “Mommy’s Mini-Me,” it was clear that the baby was a girl. The cry definitely had something to do with comfort. Josie unlatched the straps and lifted the baby into her arms. She held her against her chest. From her size and weight, Josie guessed she was about four or five months old.

Josie bounced her lightly until the wails subsided into breathy whimpers. “You didn’t try to pick her up?”

Dougherty shook his head. “I don’t have kids. I was afraid I’d drop her.”

“What’s going on?”

Dougherty pointed to the cupholder on the stroller’s handle where a cell phone rested. “A 911 call came in from this phone. It belongs to a woman named Cleo Tate. Thirty-three. Lives a few blocks from here.”

Brennan walked over. “She didn’t say anything on the call. There was nothing but dead air.”

But the police would still have been dispatched in case there was an emergency in which the caller was unable to speak. If Denton PD had arrived and found nothing amiss, they’d simply mark the call as unfounded and move on.

Dougherty said, “When we got here, we found the baby in the stroller. No Cleo. Her phone was in the cupholder here on the handle. The diaper bag is there.”

Josie followed his gaze to the side of the path where a pink diaper bag was tipped onto its side, onesies, diapers, wipes, and an empty bottle spilling out onto the grass.

All of them were streaked with blood. Ice shot through Josie’s veins.

“We called the ERT,” said Dougherty.

“We searched the immediate area,” Brennan said, waving a hand around them. “Called for her. When we couldn’t find her, I called in additional units. They’re searching the rest of the park now.”

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