"She's got something in her mouth," Beth said. "It's a bag, Daddy. I wonder what's in it."

"Don't touch that!" Warren snapped. "It's dirty."

Laurel turned from the sink as though moving underwater, certain even before she saw it that Christy had retrieved the Walgreens bag from behind the hedge. Survival instinct drove her toward the dog, but it was already too late to bury this evidence.

"I'll throw that away!" she said, but by then Warren was taking the bag from Christy's mouth.

As he opened the bag, an urge to bolt from the house almost overcame Laurel, but she forced herself to stay put. Warren looked into the bag, and his eyes narrowed in puzzlement. "Christy must have knocked over the tall container," he said. "I didn't know she could do that."

Laurel felt like a cartoon character staring helplessly upward as a thousand-pound weight hurtled down from a cliff top. She was every bit as stupid as the Coyote- "Wash your hands, Beth," Warren said. Then he walked to the trash compactor, opened it with his foot, and tossed the Walgreens bag inside. "Use the pantry sink."

"Aww, they're clean." Beth stroked Christy's orange back as the dog ate noisily from her dish.

"Go!"

Beth jumped up and vanished into the pantry.

Laurel stood motionless before the island, recalling an afternoon in college when a bolt of lightning had blasted apart a tree just forty feet away from her on a golf course. The very air had seemed to ignite around her, and she'd stood in the ozone-tinged aftermath like an air-raid survivor, too dazed even to be thankful for her life.

"My water?" Warren said.

She looked down at the tumbler in her hand. "Oh." She handed him the gla.s.s, her hand shaking.

"I guess I'll get my own ice," he said, going to the freezer.

"I'm sorry."

As he shoved the gla.s.s into the automatic ice dispenser, Laurel realized that the dog, rather than almost delivering her destruction, might have delivered her salvation instead. Her plan would be risky, but she saw no safe way out of this trap.

"Warren? I have something to tell you."

He took a thoughtful sip from his gla.s.s. "What is it?"

"I wanted to tell you this morning, but you were so upset about the audit-or that's what I thought, anyway-that I decided to wait. But now that I know about"-she lowered her voice-"your illness...you need to know this. It just might change how you feel about everything."

He set his gla.s.s on the table and folded his arms across his chest. "What are you talking about?"

Laurel suddenly sensed that she was making a mistake. But what other gambit did she have? "I'm pregnant," she said simply. "I just found out this morning."

He blinked once, slowly, like a lizard in the sun. Other than that, he gave no sign of having heard her.

"Did you hear what I said?"

"We've only had s.e.x twice in the last month."

She prayed that Danny wasn't hearing this. "It only takes once, you know. It only took once with Grant."

Warren looked down at her belly, but of course she wasn't showing. If anything, she looked thinner than she had a month ago.

"More lies," he said.

She somehow managed a confident smile. "Open the trash compactor. Look inside that bag Christy brought in."

He stared at her awhile longer. Then he opened the compactor and fished out the Walgreens bag. Out came the tampon carton.

"Keep going," she said.

He looked into the empty bag, then opened the tampon box. He stared for several seconds, then drew out the e.p.t box, and his expression changed from irritation to a kind of wonder. Pulling the used test strip out of its little baggie, he studied it for a while, then looked up at her with suspicion.

"When did you take this test?"

"I told you, this morning."

"Why did you hide it?"

"Because you hadn't even come to bed the night before, and you were obviously upset. I decided to wait until you'd resolved the audit."

Warren stared at her like a parent listening to a lying toddler. "If you're pregnant, the baby's not mine."

He seemed so utterly convinced of this fact that Laurel's smile faded. "Why not?"

"Because I can't father a child anymore."

There was a roaring in her ears like the birth of an avalanche. "You...why not?"

"Because of the drugs I'm taking. Ma.s.sive doses of steroids, plus some experimental compounds Kenneth Doan prescribed for me. He got me into a Genentech trial. I'd be surprised if I have even one viable sperm left."

"You must have!" she said quickly. "There's no other explanation."

"Of course there is."

"All clean!" Beth announced, bounding into the kitchen with her wet hands held high. She patted Christy on the back, earning a warning growl, then climbed onto a chair and started rolling a Tech Deck across the table.

"Let's continue this later," Laurel said, wringing her hands. "Please."

Warren eyes looked even more reptilian than they had before. "Beth, honey?"

"What?" She twirled the little skateboard in a circle.

"Mommy's got a surprise for us."

Beth looked up from the board, her eyes on Laurel. "What is it, Mommy?"

"You're going to get a new brother or sister soon," Warren said.

Beth's mouth and eyes opened wide. "A baby sister?"

"Maybe," Warren said. "We don't know yet."

"I want a baby sister! No more boys!"

Warren set the Walgreens bag gently on the counter. "Do you have any more surprises, Mom?"

"It's your baby," she whispered. "There's no other option but virgin birth, and I'm no virgin."

"That's for sure."

"Where's Grant?" Beth asked. "I want to tell Grant we're getting a baby sister!"

"Grant's spending the night with Gram," Warren said, his eyes never leaving Laurel's face. Gram was Laurel's mother; she lived thirty-five miles up the river in Vidalia, Louisiana.

"I want to stay with Gram, too! No fair!"

"Hush, Elizabeth," Warren said. "We'll see about that later."

"Does Gram know about my baby sister?"

"Quiet!"

Beth's head snapped down, and she went back to twirling the skateboard.

Warren stepped close enough to Laurel to kiss her. "If this baby was mine, you would have told me as soon as you heard I was sick. After I got off the phone with Danny."

"Who's sick?" Beth asked. "Is Daddy sick?"

"Quiet, baby," Warren said in a silky voice.

"Please don't do this," Laurel implored.

"You were trying to give me hope before. You would have told me about it then, if it was true."

She answered with quiet urgency, trying not to communicate her growing panic to Beth. "I wasn't sure if it would make things better or worse. I was afraid you'd feel you were missing that much more."

"A man lives to pa.s.s on his genes. You know that." He lifted his hand and tenderly brushed a strand of hair from her eyes. She shuddered. "There's only one reason you would have kept this secret from me."

"You're wrong."

He picked up the Walgreens bag and slapped her with it.

Beth screamed.

"Dad, stop it!" shouted a voice from the hallway.

Everyone froze as Grant stepped from the hallway into the kitchen. "Stop yelling at Mom! She hasn't done anything!"

Warren looked his son from head to toe, and Laurel saw pride in his eyes. "There's my son," he said. "It's written all over him."

It was true. Grant had Warren's muscular body and regular facial features; but it was her eyes that looked out of his face.

Warren took three steps toward Grant and held out his right hand. "I knew you'd come back, Son. You had the wrong idea before."

Grant drew back, but then Warren raised his hand, and Grant slapped it in some kind of high-five ritual. "There's guys outside with guns," Grant said. "Lots of them, and some of them are mean. We have to get ready."

"Yes, we do," Warren said calmly. "We're all here now, just as it should be. I want you kids to go into the safe room."

Laurel shivered at the name.

"Are you and Mom coming?" Grant asked.

"In a minute, yes."

"I'll wait until you go, then."

"Mind me, Son."

Grant looked back at his father with a combination of disappointment and defiance. "I'm not a little kid anymore, Dad. I want to help. I can do stuff now. Grown-up stuff!"

Warren looked appraisingly at his son, then knelt and beckoned him closer. When Grant came forward, Warren spoke softly into his ear. Grant nodded several times, then hurried past Laurel into the pantry.

"Where's he going?" Laurel asked.

Warren smiled. "Don't worry about it."

Chapter 21.

Danny was so stunned by the revelation of Laurel's pregnancy that he could hardly think. He and Sheriff Ellis sat shoulder to shoulder in the helicopter, headsets on, with the rotors already whirling at full rotational speed.

"I don't think we can wait until Carl gets a clear shot," the sheriff said, his worried face illuminated by the c.o.c.kpit lights. "I know you want to, but I can't risk Shields barricading his family in that panic room. He could cut their throats and laugh at us while he was doing it."

"He hasn't done that yet," Danny pointed out.

"No, but he's coming apart in there. I didn't like the sound of his voice. I've got that Jim Jones, Kool-Aid feeling."

Danny wanted to argue, but his mind kept jumping back to the fact that Laurel had lied to him about sleeping with her husband. This morning she'd told him flat out that she hadn't. But she had.

"Shields doesn't believe her about that pregnancy either," Ellis added. "I think that pushed him over the edge." He elbowed Danny. "You think Shields is the father of that baby?"

Jim Jones, Danny thought, twenty seconds behind the conversation. Kool-Aid. "I don't know. Might be the guy who wrote the letter."

"Shields is a doctor, so he must know what he's talking about. He says he couldn't have got her pregnant. Aw...in five minutes it won't matter anyway."

Danny closed his eyes, trying to work his way to the heart of what had really been going on in his life.