Man of His Word

He didn’t even realize that he’d clasped her hand in his until he felt her twine her fingers more tightly into his grip. But he couldn’t pull away. Her hand in his fit too neatly, too right.

“It’s a tough job. I’m sort of in the same boat, what with keeping my guys fit and healthy and safe. They don’t see the need for the exercise program I’ve insisted on, or the regular home-cooked meals. You know the number one killer of firefighters in the line of duty? Heart attacks. Not burns, not smoke inhalation, not heat stroke. Heart attacks. Every time I see a fast-food sack in one of my guys’ hands, I can almost picture him keeling over in the middle of a structure fire.”

“But they respect you. I could tell that. Today. They listened to you, they didn’t argue.” Something in the way Kimberly said it made Daniel sure that she didn’t enjoy the same rapport with Marissa. “So how do you keep them safe and not make them hate you?”

“Ultimately it’s easier with guys who need a paycheck,” Daniel admitted. “With kids... Honestly? I don’t know. When I was Taylor and Marissa’s age, I thought I was ten feet tall and bulletproof, too. Still, even with kids... I mean, she’s almost twelve, right? So you can ease up. She knows, Kimberly. She gets it, even if you don’t think so. I see that in Taylor. She may carp and complain, but when someone offers her something to eat, she’s the first one to say, ‘No label? No, thank you.’”

Kimberly snuggled deeper into the cushions of the swing—and tighter against Daniel—as she slipped off her shoes and tucked one foot under her. Daniel’s breath caught in his throat as he noticed the petite perfection of that foot, with the pale pink polish on the toes. Inwardly, he shook himself.

This woman would be gone by tomorrow. What they had here was some sort of fake chemistry, some tenuous bond because of their link to Marissa. It wasn’t real. And even if it was...

Kimberly yawned. In a drowsy, distracted way, she said, “It’s hard to believe, isn’t it, that Marissa is just four years younger than her birth mother when she gave birth to her?”

Daniel’s body stiffened. It was as if a page to a fire had sounded, her words zapping through him and setting every nerve on high alert. How to answer that? Was this Kimberly’s sneaky way of worming more information out of him?

“What do you know about her birth mother?” Daniel asked in way of a reply.

“Well...not much,” Kimberly said. “I have a copy of the police report. And when DFCS gave me custody of Marissa, they provided me with their own incident report. Maybe the social worker shouldn’t have, I don’t know, but it gave me the bare outlines of the events. Although...I didn’t know Marissa was actually born at the fire station until you told me.”

Again, Daniel was taken back to that day, to that one peaceful, amazing moment when, amid the chaos, he’d held the baby snugly against his chest, astonished that any mother could willingly let anything that perfect go.

Miriam’s pleas came back to him... She’s not safe, Daniel! She’s not safe! He’ll kill her! I know it!

He had turned out to be the baby’s grandfather—Uriel Hostetler. And though Daniel had at first thought Miriam was overly dramatic, the minute he’d spied Hostetler in the hospital’s waiting room, he had to admit he’d never known anyone to have eyes as cold as the tall, hulking man in broadcloth and suspenders. With a flowing head of golden hair and a full beard to match, he’d resembled nothing so much as a lion on the prowl for a hapless gazelle.

Standing in that waiting room, Hostetler had lorded over the entourage that had accompanied him—over Miriam’s own parents, who seemed henpecked and browbeaten and in no way capable of offering the support and protection Miriam so badly needed.

Hostetler had turned out to be the baby’s grandfather, and the leader—some might say tyrant—over the small Amish community that had relocated here.

Daniel had known lots of people of the Amish and Mennonite faith—good, honest folks who worked hard and showed compassion and mercy in their everyday lives.

Uriel Hostetler? He didn’t deserve to be named in the same class of people.

Kimberly’s next question, not to mention the gentle squeeze to his fingers, brought Daniel back to his present dilemma.

“So? Are you ready to tell me?” she asked. Her eyes were huge and seemingly bottomless, filled with hope and pleading as she gazed up at him. “About Marissa’s birth mother? It’s not idle curiosity, I promise. And you of all people—I mean, you understand how it is to have a child in the family with health issues. I have to know. I have to help Marissa.”

A wrenching pain tore through Daniel’s very soul. It would be so easy to say the two words Kimberly desperately wanted—needed—to hear. They were on the tip of his tongue, a nanosecond, a very exhalation away from being uttered.

Miriam’s face floated through his memory, eyes that had pleaded as much as Kimberly’s. She’d trusted him with the most important secret of her life and her baby’s, and had come to that fire station in need of sanctuary.

“Kimberly...I can’t. Legally. Ethically. I can’t. I am so sorry.”

Her pleading eyes turned stony. She leaped up from the swing as though the seat cushions had suddenly ignited beneath her.

“Ethically? You have the nerve to talk to me about ethics? When my daughter’s health—her life—is at stake?”

He rose and tried to take her hands in his, but she shook him off. “Kimberly, you have to see things from my position. There’s a reason that we have safe-haven laws. It’s to protect the babies. Without a safe haven to turn to, Marissa might not have even been alive if—”

“And she might not stay alive if you don’t help me! Don’t you get that, Daniel? What if someone held back information on, I don’t know...a fire, and how bad it was. Maybe it was started with hazardous materials that could kill your—”

He cut her off midsentence. “I get it. I get why you need to know. But can’t you get why I can’t tell you? Just for two seconds, see it from where I’m standing. I’m bound, Kimberly. Legally. The State of Georgia says I can’t.”

Why did he even try to make her to understand? To approve, even? She was never going to.

Sure enough, Kimberly shook her head in disgust and grimaced. “I think I’d like for you to take us back to our hotel now. No. I know I would.”

With that, she strode across the creaking porch boards and slipped in the house without so much as a backward glance.

CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_782844cd-3b0b-56e0-8099-dd1f99397e68)

KIMBERLY RUBBED HER eyes and started over with the pocket calculator. A few keystrokes later and the grim truth emerged. The red-alert figure the calculator had coughed up had not been a mistake. Her checking account really was running on fumes.

Medical bills. And now this trip, which had taken longer and required more money than she’d bargained for. The gas, the rooms, even in a no-frills interstate landing spot, the fast-food meals...

Kimberly allowed herself the luxury of remembering the meal at Daniel’s the night before. Not only had it been free, but it had also been delicious: grilled pork chops done to a turn, homemade baked beans, coleslaw, potato salad and homemade strawberry shortcake. Most of it had come from the family’s farm—she would have paid a fortune for the same meal done at a farm-to-table restaurant in Atlanta.

More than that...it had been the way it was served. Kimberly’s main memory of baked beans was cold out of a can for dinner, liberated with a manual can opener while her mother was out working—or partying. Sometimes it had been hard to tell the difference, really.

“What’s the point of going blind studying? Have fun while you still can, honey bunch,” her mom would tell her, trying to pry her loose from her work. “None of those books will do you good when you get out in the real world. Life’s a grind and then you die.”

How crazy was it that Kimberly had envied the friends who had parents who went nuts over a B on a report card? Or who actually came home and cooked dinner? And when Marissa had dropped into her life like the miracle she was, Kimberly had been determined that the little girl would know stability and routine and dinner on the table every night.

The Monroes, though... She hadn’t known families like that actually existed. They’d laughed and teased and joked...and she could see hints of deeper emotions, too. The care they took with Taylor, the way they looked over each of those kids. And Ma... Oh, Ma, how she ruled over the whole brood with such a gentle but firm spirit.

To have a family like that. To belong.

Because honestly, Kimberly had never felt like she belonged to anybody except for Marissa, and lately, what with all the emotional upheaval, sometimes Marissa didn’t seem to want to belong to her.

Last night had been a beautiful reprieve. She hadn’t even realized how much she had been starved for the rowdy good humor of a large family. But, and now she glanced back down at the LED numbers on her calculator, she couldn’t afford to linger too much longer.

A day longer, maybe two, was really all she could afford. Back in Atlanta, she had bills to pay, and school would be starting soon enough—the first week of August. If she wanted to save money and time enough to make the trek out to Indiana to have Marissa seen by the world-renowned specialist on PAI-1, Kimberly couldn’t waste seventy dollars a night on a hotel room in a town with no real answers.

If only Daniel would tell me what he knows...

She closed the checkbook and pulled out her list of people to talk to. She would start with the police officer listed on the incident report.

Galvanized by the hard look at her finances and priorities, Kimberly called out to a sleeping Marissa, “Hey, sleepyhead! Time to get up, okay? We need to start seeing some folks.”

Kimberly rooted around in her bag. Yes, there it was, the folder with the incident report and the scant information she had about Marissa’s birth. And the responding officer, Timothy Clarke. With any luck, Officer Clarke would still be working for the police department, and maybe he could help her—or at least point in the direction of someone who could.

Which was more than Daniel was willing to do.

Be fair. He’s an honorable man. He doesn’t want to break the law.

But if the spirit of the law had been to protect children, then surely, to help Marissa, bending it would be okay.

“Fifteen more minutes. Please, Mom, please.” Marissa burrowed deeper into the covers. “I. Am. So. Tired.”