She strode across the room and turned off the television.

"Charlene Ellen Polk, you know better than to-"

"Shut up, Mother." She put both fists on her hips.

"You need to pick up the phone and call Sheriff Rhodes. He's waiting on you. You need to tell him that Mike Taggart had permission to use the river house. And, so help me, if you take after Sheriff Rhodes for doing the right thing, I will be so disappointed in you."

"I will do no such thing. Mike Taggart and that half-breed child didn't have my permission to use the house. And do not ever come into this house and order me around, is that clear?" Mother said, elevating her chin.

"Mother, that house belongs to the Polk family. That means that we all share it. You, me, Aunt Charlotte, and Uncle Rob. I have a key, and I gave it to Mike and told him to make himself at home. So he had permission. You should have checked with other members of the family before calling the police. You could have asked him. And if you wanted, you could have asked him politely to leave. You didn't have to get him arrested. Do you have any idea how this must have affected Rainbow?"

"I know precisely how it affected her. I was there. I saw it all. She turned into a demon child. You should have seen the way she bit Deputy Chief Sherman. Why would we want a person like that to use our river house?"

"I'm sure the policeman scared Rainbow. She probably felt as if the cop were taking away the only solid thing in her life. You should have seen the way she reacted last night when Mike injured his head. She depends on him. I think she's come to love him. Honestly, Mother, I would have screamed and kicked and bit, too."

"You most certainly would not have done any such thing. We raised you better than that. And besides, that man isn't worth much. He's white trash. He's a gambler." This comment came from her father.

"He's a day trader, Daddy, and I think there's little difference between what your bank does and what he does. So you can get off your high horse."

"You will not raise your voice to me, young lady." By his suddenly red cheeks, Daddy looked as if he might work himself into a fit. But this time, Charlene didn't give a rat's behind.

"Mother, you will call Sheriff Rhodes right now."

"I will not."

"All right then, don't expect me to ever darken your door again."

She turned and walked away.

"Charlene, you come back here."

She turned around. "No, I'm never coming back here. I'm tired of your bigotry. I'm tired of your hypocrisy. I'm tired of the constant guilt I feel for all the things you talked me into doing. I'm tired of both of you telling me I'm a fine upstanding person in the community when I know I'm not. You're mean and cruel, and I hate you both."

She broke down in tears as she hurried back to her truck. She had just behaved like an out-of-control teenager. She didn't hate her parents. If she hated them, it would be easy to walk away from them. But this wasn't easy. Her parents were ripping her apart.

She climbed back into the truck and headed toward the Allenberg County Center and the county lock-up. On the way, she gave a call to Aunt Millie, who could be counted upon to restore peace in the Polk family whenever the yelling started.

"Hey, darlin', I've been expecting your call," Aunt Millie said as she came on the line.

"You have?"

"Yes, ma'am. I heard what happened to Mike from Ruby Rhodes, who heard it from the sheriff. Ruby called about half an hour ago, and I hope you don't mind, but I gave Thelma Hanks a call and Eugene is already on his way down to the munic.i.p.al building. Frances is wrong on this. There is no way I'm going to stand by and let her prejudice cost that man custody of his niece. I'm so glad to hear that you intend to go down there and tell everyone what really happened."

"Aunt Millie, I love you. Thank you so much."

"I love you too, darlin'. You get that boy out of jail. Let me take care of Frances."

They put him in an orange jumpsuit and held him in an empty holding cell with a stainless-steel toilet in the corner. He had not been interrogated. He had not been given a chance to make a phone call. They had read him his rights and fingerprinted him. He had demanded a lawyer, but so far no one had shown up at the jailhouse door.

He had also begged and pleaded with the arresting officer to call Charlene, but the guy had no interest in listening, especially after Rainbow had bitten his a.s.s.

Mike didn't know where they had taken Rainbow. He only knew that the arresting officer called for backup because Rainbow had been so out of control.

He worried that they might take her away from him. He worried that they might put her in some awful juvenile detention center, although rationally he had to a.s.sume that they didn't have juvenile detention for five-year-olds.

But rationality had flown out the window, replaced by a frantic, over-the-top fury that made him shake.

A man should not have his kid taken away like that.

So he screamed to let out the rage. And got little reaction for the first thirty minutes of his rant, until the door to the outer office opened. A big guy wearing a tan uniform with the words Allenberg County Sheriff's Department on the sleeve patch came striding down the hall.

Mike wanted to pop this guy in the mouth, and he pretty much told him so in a stream of profanity-laced verbal abuse. The guy stood there impa.s.sively.

Talk about poker faces. After Mike had pretty much used up his lexicon of filthy words, the man's mouth twitched. "Feel better now?" he asked.

Mike still wanted to pop him one.

"You could have saved your breath, Mr. Taggart," the guy said, "because I'm here to apologize." He pulled a big key ring from his belt and unlocked the cell door.

"You're letting me go?"

"I've heard from Charlene Polk. And, for the record, it was not my department that arrested you. It was the Last Chance police department, and Chief Easley is very embarra.s.sed. Royal Sherman is new on the force, and I think he doesn't quite get our laid-back method of policing. I'm sorry you were detained at all."

"Was Deputy Chief Sherman the guy who scared the c.r.a.p out of my niece?"

The big cop nodded. "I figure he's gotten what he deserves. Everyone's amused by the bite on his b.u.t.t. And I think this incident has taught him something important about community."

"Where is my niece now?"

"Come with me."

The sheriff turned on his heel and headed down the hall. Mike followed him through the same squad room where he'd been booked and fingerprinted and then out into the main lobby of the county government building, where Timmy and Dr. Newsome waited with Rainbow.

Someone had gotten the kid some clothes, because the last time he'd seen her she'd been wearing her Strawberry Shortcake bathing suit. Now she wore a pair of pink shorts and a frilly little top-the kind of clothes Rainbow hated. But in Mike's opinion, she looked like heaven itself.

"Hey, kiddo," he said.

Rainbow dropped the doctor's hand and ran toward him. He fell to his knees and she came right into his arms.

He buried his nose into the corner of her neck, hiding the tears that suddenly sprang to his eyes. There weren't that many, but they might as well have been a deluge, because they swept away the walls he'd built around his heart. He'd been piling up those bricks and stones for years and years, from the moment Colin Lake had walked out of his life to the time Mike had walked out of Angie's life. Those walls were protection against the pain of rejection and abuse, against the sure knowledge that love was unreliable. Love hurt.

But he couldn't fool himself any longer. He loved Rainbow. He didn't exactly know when it had started, but he loved her with every fiber of his being. The last two hours had been an agony for him. He squeezed her tight and renewed his vow to make sure nothing ever scared her again.

Then he picked her up and she straddled his hip, her arms still around his neck in a death grip. "Uh, I guess I need to thank you guys for being here for her," Mike said.

Andrea gave him a wide-eyed look. "Not just for her, Mike, but for you, too."

He shifted his gaze to Timmy and had another emotional shock. Tears glittered in his eyes. "Mike, for goodness' sake, the next time you want to go swimming, call me. I've got the keys to Martha's house."

"It's Sunday, and I a.s.sumed-"

"Don't ever a.s.sume I don't have time for y'all. I know I may have conveyed that impression the last few days. But the truth is the truth. You're family. And I had a good time yesterday, and I would have loved to join you this afternoon to give Rainbow a second swimming lesson." Timmy crossed the distance and gave both of them a quick hug.

You're family. Holy c.r.a.p, Tim had accepted the truth. But to him family meant way more than a label. And that blew Mike's mind. He'd never known a real family. Up until right this minute, his family had only ever given him deep, deep pain.

It didn't have to be that way, did it?

But before he could fully process that thought, Charlene came striding through the front doors, followed by a middle-aged man with a bad comb-over and equally unfashionable shorts and polo shirt.

"Mike, don't sign anything," she said. "This here is Eugene Hanks, and he's one of the best family lawyers in Allenberg County. He will-"

"It's okay, Charlene," the sheriff said. "Mike is free to go, and Rainbow is still in his custody, as you can clearly see. Hey, Eugene."

"I thought you needed Mother to call you and-"

"Nope. My momma set me straight, and y'all know how Ruby can be. So, I reckon I'll have to take my chances next election. I hope y'all remember this when voting day comes around."

Eugene Hanks nodded. "You got my vote, Stone. And since I don't appear to be needed, I think I'll get on home and get back to tr.i.m.m.i.n.g the boxwoods and finishing off the rest of Thelma's honey-do list." The lawyer made a quick about-face and headed back out the doors.

"I hope y'all have a much better day from here forward," the sheriff said. "Now I need to get going, because I've got my own honey-do list waiting back home." The sheriff strolled back through the door to the squad room.

"You called a lawyer?" Mike said, once the lawyer and the lawman had departed.

"Of course I did. I'm so sorry. My mother is" Charlene's voice cracked, and she wiped a tear from her eye. "I'm so sorry," she repeated, her chin quivering.

Mike longed to cross the s.p.a.ce between them and give her a big hug. The kind of hug that lasted for more than a few seconds. But he restrained himself. He'd come way too close to kissing her last night, and this moment seemed far too emotional to get too close to her.

Besides, hugging Charlene would send the wrong message to his brother.

Mike still believed that Timmy and Charlene and Rainbow belonged together. His libido needed to get down with that program and accept the fact that he was destined to be the uncle in this family.

"No one's blaming you, Charlene," Dr. Newsome said. She didn't have any problem bestowing hugs, because she laid one on Charlene and then handed her a wad of tissues that she magically pulled out of her purse.

Therapists must go through a ton of tissues.

Charlene wiped her eyes and blew her nose. "Uh, Mike, if you want, I can take you back to the river so you can pick up your car and other stuff. Mother tossed everything into the trash, but I rescued it."

"Sort of like you rescued me?" The words popped out of his mouth. Maybe they would subst.i.tute for the hug he really, really wanted to give her.

"A rescue mission should not have been necessary, Mike. I'm so embarra.s.sed and" her voice wobbled again, and Mike really needed to do something to stop her pain.

"It's okay. I kind of like being rescued." The words left his mouth before he fully evaluated them. But they seemed so right. And so true. A whole group of people had come together to rescue him. Dr. Newsome, Timmy, Rainbow. And Charlene, who'd brought a lawyer with her. Bless her heart, as Elsie would say.

But Charlene continued to cry. And right then, Mike recognized the price for smashing the walls around his emotions.

Charlene's tears nearly broke his heart.

CHAPTER.

17.

Dr. Newsome had a talent for heading off awkward moments. The moment Charlene started bawling, she dug for more tissues and suggested that it might be good if everyone got together for a late lunch at Pizza Hut, Rainbow's favorite eatery.

There were no two ways about her suggestion. It was mandatory.

And before long, the doctor had managed to create a s.p.a.ce where everyone could decompress. The lunch turned into a debriefing as much as a family get-together.

For Mike, the family connection seemed to overwhelm all the other emotions he'd experienced. If he'd been told two hours ago that he'd end up here with friends and family who deeply cared about him, he would never have believed it.

He'd never had anyone who watched his back. If anything, the back-watching had always fallen to him. He'd certainly watched Timmy's and Angie's backs when Mom got nasty. But he'd failed them somehow. So it came as a big surprise that anyone would be willing to come to his rescue when the c.r.a.p started flying.

But they had. And that changed him in ways he couldn't yet fathom.

After lunch, Dr. Newsome suggested that it might be best if Rainbow didn't return to the country club to collect Mike's car. So Timmy drove Rainbow home, since he had a booster seat in his car. And Charlene agreed to take Mike to the river house to collect his car and clothes.

She apologized about six times in the first ten minutes of the drive. Clearly she needed to forgive herself. Mike understood that emotion. He sure hadn't forgiven himself for what happened to Angie, and he bore a lot more responsibility for that than Charlene did for what had happened today.

He turned toward her. She gripped the pickup's steering wheel so hard that her knuckles had turned white. "Stop apologizing," he said. "What happened today was not your fault. Let's just get that straight, okay?"

She kept her gaze fixed on the two-lane road. "It was my fault. All my fault. At the least, I should have told Mother and Daddy that I was letting you use the house. But, really, knowing Mother and Daddy, I should have had my head examined for even giving you the key. They are bigots, Mike, and I'm so ashamed."

He'd seen the bigotry on display this afternoon. He still couldn't quite understand how a person like Frances Polk could have raised a woman like Charlene. It didn't compute, somehow.

"Look, just because your mom sent that cop after us doesn't make you responsible. Her views are hers and hers alone."

"You don't understand, Mike. You're not from around here. There are a lot of people like her." Her voice sounded fragile but she remained dry-eyed.

"So far, I've gotten the impression that Last Chance is just about the best place I could dream up for a kid like Rainbow. I mean people seem to care about her, and there are a lot of folks who don't seem to notice her race. White people like Lizzy Rhodes and Maryanne Carpenter at the Bible camp seem to care deeply about her and all the other kids. And Elsie Campbell and Flo Johnson, who are black, care about her, too. Then there is you."

"Me?"

"Yeah, you. You bring her books. You let her play with your kittens. You got her to eat broccoli and fried chicken. You've connected with her in some way I can't understand. She talks to you, Charlene. The only other person she talks to is her friend Ethan. So explain to me how this isn't some kind of wonderful place for a kid who is mixed race."

A tear leaked from the corner of her eye. "I think it might be better if I backed off a little."

"d.a.m.nit, Charlene. Stop. You don't want to back off any more than I want you to. You're good for Rainbow. And, the truth is, Amanda told me just this morning that she thinks Rainbow is good for you. So what's this all about?"