Hometown Honey

“My mother—well, she’s my foster mother—lives nearby. She’s retired and I know she’d love taking care of Adam while I’m at work.”

Beverly looked expectantly at Cindy, who had managed to school her face. “Is this arrangement satisfactory to you?”

“It’s not ideal,” she said. “But I’d rather that than foster care.”

Beverly’s eyes flickered with worry. “Do you have concerns about Deputy Rheems’s ability to adequately care for Adam?”

Cindy shook her head. “No. He’s very responsible. It’s just—oh, never mind. It’s fine.”

Beverly smiled. “Very good, then. I’ll get some information from you, then I’ll check back in a day or two to make sure everything’s A-OK.”

“Thank you,” Luke said, meaning it. Beverly took down some pertinent information about him—address, phone, work schedule, his foster mother’s name and address. Then she turned her attention back to Cindy.

“Now, then. Is there anything I can do to help you? Do you need food? Diapers?”

“I’m not some welfare mother,” Cindy said indignantly. “I’ve always paid my own way and I’ll continue to do so.”

Beverly seemed to frost over. “Excuse me, but I used to be a ‘welfare mother,’ as you call it. Everyone needs help now and then. Don’t let your pride get in the way of common sense.” She gave Adam a look of pity, tousled his downy hair, then saw herself out.

Luke and Cindy stared at each other in silence until the sound of Beverly’s heels thump-thumping on the wooden dock receded into the distance.

“Are you out of your mind?” Cindy reached for Adam, who had started to fret.

“I should think you’d be thanking me. I kept that woman from taking Adam away, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, with a huge lie! What’s going to happen when she finds out the truth?”

“She won’t find out.”

“Of course she will! She’ll go back to whoever made the complaint and tell them Adam’s going to live with his father, and then she’ll find out Adam’s father is dead and all hell will break loose.”

“Cindy, listen. Social workers have to adhere to privacy laws. If she tells the complainant anything, she’ll simply say that the matter is taken care of. Don’t worry.”

“Don’t worry?”

Adam’s fussing got louder. Luke theorized the baby was responding more to the escalating tension than his hunger, but Cindy moved into the tiny galley and fished around in a box while jiggling Adam on one hip the way all mothers instinctively learned how to do. She produced a jar of baby cereal and a spoon.

“Don’t worry—right.” Her voice dripped with sarcasm. “That woman’s going to be back, and she’s going to expect to find Adam all cozy in your house, with his granny taking care of him.”

“That’s what she’ll find, all right.”

“Over my dead body. Just because you’re a deputy sheriff doesn’t mean you can take my kid away, so just get that out of your head.”

CINDY PULLED SOME ORANGE juice from a cooler of melting ice and poured it into a Tommy Tippee cup. Adam eagerly reached for the cup, the juice magically silencing his fretting.

She wished Luke would just go away. He was too big for this little boat, his presence too overpowering. Even Beverly, a complete stranger, hadn’t been immune to his sense of authority and the way his feet practically grew roots wherever he stood.

Cindy imagined Beverly hadn’t been immune to Luke’s sex appeal, either. What living, breathing woman could miss it? Though Beverly was at least ten years older than Luke, she’d batted her eyelashes at him like a teenage girl with a crush.

He was impossible to ignore, though Cindy was trying her hardest.

“Maybe you missed what just happened,” Luke said tightly, “but I’m trying my best to keep you and Adam together, not strip him away from you.”

Cindy knew what he said was true. That was what Luke was all about—keeping families together. He was the best lawman Cottonwood had ever seen. And though he was adept at solving crimes—the few there were in their little town—his main priority had always been helping kids, keeping them in school, keeping them off drugs. He volunteered a ton of hours at schools and churches and rec centers, organizing after-school sports programs and homework study groups.

“I’m sorry, Luke,” she finally said. “This whole thing has just thrown me so off balance. I feel like a stray mother cat, hissing and clawing at anyone who comes near, even people trying to help.”

She reclaimed her seat on the banquette, opened the jar of cereal and quietly began to feed Adam. Just recently he’d started grabbing the spoon on his own, trying to shove food into his own mouth. Today she didn’t have the patience to clean up the results of such efforts, so they both held on to the spoon, managing to get most of the cereal into Adam rather than onto his shirt. He had bibs, but she didn’t know where they were.

“You can’t just ignore me and hope I’ll go away,” Luke continued. “You have to start dealing with the reality of your situation.”

She sighed. “I know.”

“I have an idea. There’s a carriage-house apartment behind my house. It hasn’t been used in years, but if memory serves, it has a bathroom and a kitchenette.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I can’t afford rent.” It was the first excuse that came to mind. What she really couldn’t afford was to install herself so close to Luke. She was not immune to his appeal, despite all the years that had passed since they’d been lovers. Eight years of marriage, a baby plus her whirlwind affair—what else could she call it?—with Dex/Marvin, and she’d never once gone to sleep at night without at least a fleeting thought to her first love and what might have been if they’d wanted the same things out of life.

She didn’t need that right now. Lord knew, the last thing she could use in her life was a man, even if he was promising to help her out of a jam. Anyway, she didn’t trust herself. She had the good judgment of a fungus, given her recent history.

“Did I say anything about rent? Come on, Cindy, the apartment’s just sitting there. It’s not much, and it’ll have to be cleaned out and fixed up a bit, but it should make Social Services happy.”

“I really wish you’d just leave me alone.”

He stared at her, challenging, for a few seconds before dropping his gaze. “Yeah, I’ll go. But you’ll have to answer a few questions, first.”

“Whatever.”

“What should I tell Beverly Hicks when she comes calling tomorrow or the next day?”

“Tell her we changed our minds.”

“Uh-huh. And when she comes back here? She will, you know. It’s her job. You might think she’s a nitpicking pain in the butt, but she cares about children or she wouldn’t be in that line of work. And she’s not going to sweep this under the rug. She’ll be back, and next time she will take Adam. And if you won’t give him up willingly, she will summon the law—me—to enforce her decision.”

“Can she do that?” Cindy asked, feeling truly afraid for the first time.

He nodded grimly, his fists so tight he could feel his skin tightening over the knuckles. “It happens all the time. It happened to me, Cindy. And my mother never got me back.”

Chapter Four

Luke didn’t like bringing up his past. In all the time he’d known Cindy, even when they’d been in love and inseparable, he’d revealed little about his life before arriving in Cottonwood at age fourteen. Whenever she’d prompted him, he’d found a way to avoid giving her any real information.

As far as Cindy knew, Luke’s life had begun at age fourteen when he’d landed with Polly Ferguson, the only foster parent who’d known how to handle him—the only one he’d ever stayed with longer than six months. He considered her his real mother now, and his foster brother, Mike Baskin, was as close as any flesh-and-blood sibling.

So, no, he didn’t like dredging up the more painful memories. But that had seemed the only way to shake Cindy out of her complacency. And it had. She’d agreed to move into his carriage house, though he could tell it had galled her to accept what she saw as charity. But better that than losing her son, even temporarily.