Save Her Child
A completely gripping and suspenseful crime thriller
CJ Lyons
Books by CJ Lyons
Jericho and Wright Thrillers
The Next Widow
The Drowned Woman
Save Her Child
Fatal Insomnia Medical Thrillers
Farewell to Dreams
A Raging Dawn
The Sleepless Stars
Lucy Guardino Thrillers
Snake Skin
Blood Stained
Kill Zone
After Shock
Hard Fall
Last Light
Devil Smoke
Open Grave
Gone Dark
Bitter Truth
Angels of Mercy Medical Suspense
Lifelines
Catalyst
Trauma
Isolation
AVAILABLE IN AUDIO
Jericho and Wright Thrillers
The Next Widow (Available in the UK and the US)
The Drowned Woman (Available in the UK and the US)
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Hear More from CJ
Books by CJ Lyons
A Letter from CJ
The Next Widow
The Drowned Woman
Acknowledgments
We are all in the same boat, in a stormy sea, and we owe each other a terrible loyalty.
G.K. Chesterton
Prologue
She woke before dawn, screaming in pain.
No, no, no. It was too soon. The pain stole her breath until she was gasping, swallowing any air she could get, doubled over, her hands cradling her swollen belly. Not now, not here, not now; the words became a bizarre mantra.
Then the pain released its grip.
She was all alone, stranded in a wilderness—a log cabin, of all things. He’d thought it was so cute, romantic, even. Most of all, safe. Their enemies would never find her here. And he had a plan. All they needed to do was follow the plan and everything would be fine: the baby would be safe, they would be rich and, best of all, they wouldn’t need to spend the rest of their lives looking over their shoulders.
He was going to save her and the baby. He swore to it.
But he wasn’t here.
Another wave of pain left her writhing on the floor, fighting to find any position that eased the pressure building inside her. He’d said no calls, that it was too risky and the phone was only for emergencies, only if things went wrong, but they weren’t going to go wrong because he’d thought of everything and he had a plan…
Drenched with sweat, her hair falling into her face, she crawled across the cabin to the phone. She didn’t care about his damn plan; all she cared about was her baby. Because something was wrong, something was very wrong.
She reached the living area. The rustic end table shifted against her weight, so she grabbed hold of the itchy plaid couch beside it, heaving herself onto it. Panting, trying to get as much oxygen to her baby as she could, she took the cell phone from the charger. She turned the screen on, to be greeted by a red light: low battery.
Low battery? They hadn’t even used it—it was for emergencies only. Like now!
She glanced at the cord leading from the charger to the wall outlet and realized the plug wasn’t fully in the socket. The table must have wobbled sometime during the two weeks that she’d been trapped here.
Another wave of pain had her cursing, gripping the phone so tight she thought she might crush it. This time when the pain eased, it left a strange sensation in its wake. She looked down and saw a trickle of blood going down her leg.
The baby! She needed to call for help—to hell with his rules and their enemies and bloody vows of revenge—she would not allow her baby to continue to suffer, not for another moment.
She tried to dial but realized there was no signal.
She would have to go outside, leave the safety of the cabin.
She stood, blinked back the wave of red-spotted dizziness that rushed over her, and shuffled toward the door, her feet numb against the rough wood floor. Her vision swam; the door seemed so close, within reach, then impossibly far away. But she gritted her teeth and kept moving, inching toward it, holding onto the phone with one hand, the other cradling her baby inside her swollen belly.
Halfway there, just as she reached the threadbare braided rug, pain slammed into her, so fierce that she realized the first waves had been mere ripples compared to this tsunami. It threw her to her knees, then face down on the floor, convulsing through her.
She screamed. But there was no one to hear her.
And then, like a drowning person going under for the last time, the world faded away, beyond her grasp, the light surrendering to black.
One
Despite the August heat stifling the night, the corpse didn’t smell too bad. Not yet, anyway. Detective Naomi Harper knew that wouldn’t last long.
Avoiding broken glass and puddles of undetermined origins, Harper crouched on the pavement of a narrow alley on the east side of Cambria City’s Kingston Towers. Around her came camera flashes and the chatter of the crime scene techs as they worked the perimeter of the scene, leaving the body to the coroner’s investigator and Harper. She settled her weight on her heels as she hovered over the young woman’s body.
Maggie Chen, the death investigator, pulled back the bloody length of plastic sheeting that had been found draped over the body. Harper got her first look at the victim. Tangled cornrows, blood coating her face, bruises, swelling, and obvious broken bones combined to create a monstrous profile—Harper doubted even the girl’s own parents would be able to recognize her in her current state.
Harper’s gaze traveled down the body, noting more bruises and damage, apparently inflicted by a brutal, prolonged beating. Mostly along one side, so probably all from a single attacker, she thought. The girl was dressed in shorts and a camisole, nothing too flashy or outrageous, but there were very few reasons why a girl her age would be in this alley at night—and they all had to do with sex.
“Any phone or purse? ID?” Harper asked Maggie.
“No. Nothing.”
Damn.
