Page 33 of The Sheriff's Baby

Hell. That got Duncan hurrying out into the yard to help them.

“The cover’s been moved recently,” Slater said, still focusing on the task. “You can tell from the grass around it. But whoever moved it put it back in place.”

Duncan growled out another “hell,” aloud this time. And he hoped if Molly was in there, she was still alive. By the time Duncan reached them, Slater and Ronnie had already dragged the cover to the side.

“Molly?” Slater called out, looking down into the gaping hole in the ground.

The opening was definitely wide enough that a person could be shoved in there, but if Joelle’s dad had had it capped up like this, it had to be deep. Probably deep enough to kill a person if they fell or were pushed in.

“Molly?” Slater shouted again.

No response. Not from the well, anyway. But Duncan heard something coming from the outbuilding. Not a voice but a barely audible thump. It was enough to get the three of them running toward it.

“Woodrow and Sonya, keep an eye on Joelle,” Duncan told the deputies who had just come out of the barn. They’d obviously been searching it for more gunmen and Molly.

Slater reached the outbuilding first, and Ronnie and Duncan both readied their weapons while Slater threw open the door and then immediately darted to the side in case someone was about to fire at him.

But no shots came.

A sound did, though. Another of those thumps, and when Duncan looked inside, he saw Molly on the floor.

Alive.

Duncan couldn’t add the “and well” part to that, though. Her eyes were wide. Her forehead, smeared with dirt and maybe even some blood. Her hair was a tangled halo around her face. But she was very much alive.

He quickly saw that Molly was gagged and tied up, and she was bumping the side of her leg against the tire of an ATV, the only movement she could have managed, considering the way she was positioned in the shed. That bumping had likely caused the sounds they’d heard. They would have no doubt found her in the search, but that had allowed them to get to her even sooner.

Slater hurried to her, easing down her gag while Ronnie got to work on the ropes around her feet. Duncan called 911 for an ambulance. The moment the gag was off her mouth, Molly cried out in pain.

“Hospital,” she managed to say. “I’m in labor.”

Chapter Nine

The images came at Joelle hard and fast. The blood. So much blood. And it was on those photos she had seen in the yard at the ranch. The ones she’d been forced to walk through when the kidnapper had her.

Joelle groaned and tried to yank herself away from those images. She had to climb her way out of this nightmare because she couldn’t be here. She couldn’t—

“Joelle,” someone said.

Duncan.

And she thought that was his hands on her arms. It was enough to yank her back, and her eyes flew open. Yes, Duncan. He was right there, hovering and looking very concerned.

“I’m okay,” she managed to say. “It was just a nightmare.”

A nightmare she’d lived when the kidnapper had her. Oh, this was going to stay with her for a while, and she didn’t need any new horrific memories to blend with the others she already had.

“No, you’re not okay,” Duncan said, sitting beside her. “But you soon will be. Just level your breathing. In and out,” he instructed.

She tried to do that. Tried, too, to push away the lingering bits of the dream. Then, she remembered the rest of what happened. Remembered where she was as well. She was in a hospital bed. Not because she’d been injured. No, both the baby and she were fine. The doctor had told her that during the exam he’d given her after they’d arrived at the hospital.

With Molly.

Molly wasn’t okay. Joelle had seen the cuts and bruises on her face, and she remembered Molly had been in labor.

“Did Molly have the baby?” she asked. “Are they all right?”

“She’s okay. She’s still in labor so the baby hasn’t come yet.” He dragged in a weary breath, and there was plenty of worry on his face. Some of that worry was no doubt for her and their own child. “The doctors have assured me that six hours isn’t that long when it comes to labor.”

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