 
### The Boy Who Appeared from the Rain

by Kevin David Jensen

Published by Kevin David Jensen at Smashwords

Copyright 2014 Kevin David Jensen

### Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your enjoyment only, then please return to Smashwords.com or your favorite retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

### Acknowledgements

Special thanks to each person who contributed their time, insight, home, good looks, or French fries to the development of this book. Thanks in particular to my wife, Jenny, for bearing through my distraction toward writing, and also to (in no particular order) Colton Buermann, Karly White, Monique Love, Mark & Larissa Wardrip, Cherry Jensen (thanks, Mom!), Mark Lockwood, Gary & Rosemary Pointer, Miah Robert, Jamie Robert, Jonathan P. Grizzle, our local McDonald's, and the Market Diner at Pike Place Market in Seattle, Washington, where the fries are soft and flavorfully seasoned. May you ever enjoy the delights of rain, French fries, and the great outdoors.

### Table of Contents

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

Epilogue

Personal Note from the Author

About this Author
Chapter 1

A brown-haired boy in worn blue jeans and an orange T-shirt snuck the phonebook out of the drawer in the adult's bedside cabinet, glanced over his shoulder toward the door, and began turning pages. He flipped past maps and emergency phone numbers to lists of names beginning with _A._ He continued on to _F,_ then located _Fl,_ then _Fle._

There it was, the name he was searching for— _Fleming_. His pulse quickened. It was really there! He traced a trembling finger down the list of Flemings: Aaron, Adam, Amanda, Anthony and Janelle... There were a lot of people named Fleming. He was looking for two in particular.

His finger slid further down the column, then stopped. His breath caught. _"Fleming Craig and Kara,"_ he whispered, his blue eyes going wide. They were real. They were alive. For several seconds the boy stared at their names, checked every letter, reading and rereading the single line. He sweated with excitement. They were alive!

Their address—Who knew you could find an address in a phonebook?—it was there, just as he had been told. _6050 Spindler Avenue._ He had found their address! The boy almost whooped aloud for sheer joy.

A clatter of dishes being stacked in the kitchen startled him out of his concentration. He stuffed the phonebook back in its drawer and crept across the hallway into his own scantly-furnished bedroom. Footsteps vibrated the floor a moment later and shuffled into the bathroom. The bathroom door shut behind the feet.

The woman would be doing her makeup. He still had time. Tiptoeing back to the adult bedroom, he reclaimed the phonebook and found that name again— _Fleming Craig and Kara._ He whispered their address to himself—"6050 Spindler Avenue"—repeating it until he had it memorized.

Now to find it. There were maps at the front of the phonebook, and he found them again. They included a list of streets. He tracked down Spindler Avenue. It was surprisingly close to his school. He could be there in minutes once class let out. _6050 Spindler Avenue._

He envisioned how he would get there—right from the school, then left. No, he was thinking of his route from the wrong side of the school. Left from the school, then left again. The house would be somewhere on the next block...if it was a house. It might be an apartment, or maybe...a mansion! It could be a tent—he didn't care. He was going to find Craig and Kara Fleming, and that was all that mattered.

Breathing hard with anticipation, the boy set the phonebook in its drawer once more and hurried back to his room. When the woman emerged from the bathroom a minute later, he gathered up his backpack without being told and strode down the hall to the front door. She stood holding it open for him. Despite the momentous day—for both of them—she said nothing, but merely followed him to the car, started it up, and drove him to school. She would not miss him.

He would not miss her, either. She was fine—he did not dislike her. But she was insignificant now. Craig and Kara Fleming lived at 6050 Spindler Avenue. This afternoon, as soon as school was out, he would find them. This was going to be the most amazing day of his life.

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, handled a picture frame with care as intent green eyes surveyed the portrait within it through slits in a dark pullover hood. _I didn't break in here to steal pictures,_ the man beneath the hood reminded himself. He set the frame back precisely in its place, checking the faint dust lines around the it. They were untouched; no one would know.

He looked over the photos once more, snapshots of the residents, Craig and Kara Fleming, from youth to adulthood to marriage: young Craig fishing, a teenage Kara laughing, the happy couple now in their thirties and holding hands at the beach. The photograph he had picked up and set down drew his eyes again—a brown-haired, grade school boy in a light blue Little League uniform. It had startled him at first, made him wonder if this couple had somehow discovered... But that was impossible, of course. It was merely a portrait of Craig in his childhood. The eyes were the wrong color. Even so, had the figure felt any hesitation about proceeding with his plan, that picture swept it away.

He refocused on the task at hand; he could not risk time-consuming distractions. He surveyed the front part of the house: the rectangular table on which the photographs were displayed was situated to the figure's left as he stood in the entryway. Extending from the left of the entryway was a hallway, and to the right a kitchen that blended into a small dining room. There was a den just ahead on the left, and the figure moved into it.

It was cozy, with an inset fireplace resting cool and dark in one corner. Over the fireplace hung a large portrait of Craig and Kara surrounded by relatives, obviously from Craig's side of the family. There were children in the picture, but only with the other couples. With Craig and Kara, there were none. That fact ambushed the figure, provoking an unexpected sense of regret.

The home was modest and neatly-kept, tidy enough without that unfriendly feeling he had found in some of the more upscale homes he had recently...visited. A book lay out of place on the couch, a small mess of papers covered the computer desk; he sorted through them, leaving no trace. Not everything was perfectly in order here. These people were not the type to nitpick at every detail. They _lived_ here. This was a home, not a showcase.

He moved silently to the kitchen. Breakfast dishes lay unwashed beside the sink and the morning's paper waited unopened on the stand-alone counter in the center of the room. He rifled through every cabinet in seconds, searching, careful to precisely replace anything he moved. He found nothing out of the ordinary.

A door led from the kitchen to the garage, and another out the side of the house to the yard beyond. He peeked out the side door window. There were a patio and green grass outside, with a golden Labrador snoozing in the shade of a wooden shed. Unlocking the door, the figure eased it open and placed one foot on the patio, just far enough to look around. The dog lifted its head and eyed him curiously, but did not bark. A garden space had been tilled at one edge of the property, and from it grassy back yard stretched out perhaps a third of an acre. It was a large lot for this neighborhood. A few well-pruned trees lined the far fence.

Everything was normal here, at least so far. This was what the figure needed to know. Craig and Kara did not appear to be the kind of dubious people the figure usually associated with when he donned his gloves and pullover hood. They were decent folks; he parried another stab of regret.

The yellow dog stretched, rose to its feet, and loped lazily across the grass to meet him. The figure didn't pet the dog, though the urge struck him. He was not here to relax. He needed to stay focused.

_Information,_ he reminded himself as he stepped back inside. _That's why I'm here._ His plan would unfold in a few hours; for it to succeed, he needed specific information, needed to know what life in the Fleming home looked like from the inside. He swept back through the house, observing, noticing. Not taking, not today—just looking. _Information._

Usually, with both occupants away at work and no alarm system in place, a short visit like this would have been intended for gathering something more tangible than mere data. Even so, this was too consequential a job to hire out to a lesser— _what, thief? I'm not a thief, not today. More of a...spy? A detective?_

_Perhaps a thief after all,_ he decided, _but not of the usual sort. Like Robin Hood, stealing from the rich to give to the poor. Yeah, Robin would be proud. The purpose is noble. But I couldn't steal from these people._ He grimaced. _Not anymore than I already have._ He quickly suppressed any further pangs of guilt. What was done could not be undone.

He stepped past the front door and into the hall, studying everything: the wall to his right, dividing the hall from the den, lined with cabinets from floor to ceiling, each packed with (he sifted through their contents swiftly) linens, cleaning supplies, and the sorts of albums and sentimental objects that families collected; a perfectly normal-looking bathroom on his left; bedrooms up ahead, two of them at the end of the hall.

The bedroom on the left was the master bedroom, complete with a small bathroom of its own. The bed was unmade, the curtains were open, and a pair of dirty socks—Kara's, it appeared—had been tossed aside on the floor.

He perused the room without disturbing anything, then moved to the second bedroom, a guestroom as he judged by the bed, desk, and sitting chair. But the furniture was nearly obscured by tools—rakes, shears, a hedge trimmer, a box of mismatched nails, a chainsaw...and much more, too much to examine closely, half of it piled atop the bed. At last, the figure had found something unusual here; Craig's landscaping work had apparently overrun their guestroom. The figure wondered vaguely how Kara felt about that.

Something shifted in the house. There was a sound at the front door. Either Craig or Kara had come home. That was unexpected, unusual for them so early in the day.

Not good.

He glanced around, his pulse quickening. There was no time. He would have to escape through the window.

Or there might be a better option. The hall made an L, the short leg providing passage from the two bedroom doors to a laundry room. The instant he heard the front door crack open, he slipped into the laundry room and found a back door there.

He would have preferred a little more time, but no matter. The information he had gathered would suffice. This afternoon he would put it to use, setting gears in motion. His work here was done.

He placed a black-gloved hand on the back doorknob, anticipating the proper moment, adrenaline surging through his veins. Just as he heard the front door swing open fully, the figure swung the back door inward. He slid noiselessly outside, eased the door shut behind himself, and without further delay, hurried around the corner of the house and down the block, out of sight.

*****

Craig Fleming stepped through the front door just ahead of Ben Carpenter, his brother-in-law. He froze so suddenly, mid-sentence, that the shorter, stockier man had to swivel awkwardly to the side to keep from colliding with him.

"What's wrong?" Ben asked.

Craig lifted a finger to his lips, and both men listened. Silence persisted through a long moment before Craig moved. "I thought I heard something." The house was still, the doors were shut—everything seemed to be in its place. Craig took a peek into the den, but all looked normal there, as well. He headed down the hall toward the bedrooms and glanced into his own room, then the guestroom, then ducked into the laundry room just to check the back door. It was shut. That sound he'd heard must have been his imagination. Nothing was amiss.

Craig released a breath and relaxed. "You need loppers?" he asked Ben, motioning him into the guestroom.

"As many as you can spare," Ben replied, surveying the room and scratching his balding head in amazement at the disarray. "Our first big volunteer day at the Children's Home this year, and we didn't even think about tools. So naturally I called you."

"Not a problem," Craig replied. "I was headed this way anyway. I need to run by Grover's and pick up some trees."

Ben picked up a set of red-handled lopping shears that had been resting on the bed. He leveraged them open and closed.

"Go ahead and take those," Craig said. "The guy I bought this stuff from must have collected them. There are several in here...somewhere." The disorder was such that he couldn't see any more loppers right off. "Take some of the little ones, too—the hand pruners. The more you take, the happier Kara will be."

Ben, stooping over to scoop up more loppers, shot him a playful glance. "She's been nagging you, huh?"

"You have no idea," Craig said, but then shrugged. "Actually, you probably do, since you grew up together."

Ben gave a half-grin as he dug through the various instruments on the bed. "Anything I can do to help."

Craig sorted through the junk in search of hand pruners. He found three sets and placed them beside Ben's growing stack of loppers.

Ben stole a furtive glance at Craig. "I still feel a little sad when I come into this room."

Craig straightened from his scavenging and ran a hand through his chestnut-brown hair, wavy at the ends and only just recently beginning to show signs of thinning. "Still worried about us?"

"Well, not like I used to be. But I know my sister. She was pretty upset. Not at you. She just really wanted to have kids, you know." He grimaced as Craig shot him a frown. "Sorry. I didn't mean to open an old wound. I was just...remembering."

Craig shook his head over the handle of a rake. "Look, Ben, we're not going to be jealous because you and Lia have four great kids. I mean, you gave me and Kara four nieces; we love that. Besides, Kara actually got over it before I did. She could enjoy having dinner with you and Lia and the girls without asking 'what if' every time, after a while. I did too; it just took me longer."

Ben's aquamarine eyes connected with Craig's for a moment, then looked away to locate another pair of loppers. These had handles of green paint mostly flaked away, the metal blade bearing one small chip—probably too big to be sharpened smooth, but Craig thought he might have a go at it later just to see.

Craig gathered up the rake, a small shovel, and a few other tools he thought Ben's crew of volunteers might find useful. Ben didn't say any more, but Craig could hear his thoughts in the silence. "So you want to know if we're going to adopt before we get any older."

"I guess so, yeah."

Craig rolled his eyes. "You and my mother."

The other man shrugged. "It's just... You and Kara moved into this house hoping this room would be more than a guestroom. And it still could be. The children's home, they've got some great kids who just need a place. The two of you, you're wonderful with the girls. It'd be a shame not to at least give it some thought."

"I'm not really interested in going through all that again." Craig spotted two more hand pruners and a sharpening stone and set them in Ben's growing pile. "To be honest, we're pretty happy as we are right now. We love Seattle. Kara likes her job. The business is going well. We have a good home. And on a good day I can even tolerate my brother-in-law." He tossed a pair of gardening gloves to Ben, who snorted. "So...I don't know if I want to risk changing that."

"These will be enough, I think," Ben announced, and he gathered up an armful of the loppers and hand pruners along with the gloves. Craig took up the remainder. They hauled the collection to Ben's SUV parked in the driveway. Ben popped the rear hatch. "So you _don't_ want kids?"

"I didn't say that. But we've already tried." Craig unloaded his share of the tools, stepped back, and scanned the broken clouds above. They were building toward a good rain, just like the weatherman had predicted. Sometimes weathermen's forecasts were actually right. Of course, rain in Seattle in the springtime was always a pretty safe bet.

Ben was waiting for more.

"I don't know," Craig finally admitted, brown eyes no longer seeing the sky. "That miscarriage was tough, Ben. Being pregnant really got her hopes up, even if it was brief. They told us we might have a chance, so we tried. And then they said there really wasn't much chance after all, but we had to try anyway. Then Tiffy... That pretty much wiped us out. Once that was over, we were just...done."

Ben set his tools in the vehicle and listened.

"And between the IVF treatments and getting ready to adopt Tiffy, we stacked up a lot of debt. Plus Derek and I were just getting the business up and running. The business expenses, the mortgage, the medical, not to mention all the stuff for Tiffy—trying again wasn't an option."

"And now?"

Craig sighed and shrugged. "I don't know. Things are better, but we're older, we've moved on... I just don't think we need it like we did."

Ben watched him. Craig almost expected to receive a short sermon on the need to care for orphans, and another preacher might have supplied it. But his brother-in-law turned away instead, shut the hatch, and graciously shifted the topic to something more pleasant. "Do you have another game this week?"

Craig nodded. "Tonight. A dozen eager nine- and ten-year-olds throwing the ball away and swinging for the fence at pitches six feet high. Great entertainment. Want to come?"

"I can't today," Ben shrugged, "but I might come out and see one later."

"We fairly often need a first-base coach," Craig invited.

Ben shook his head. "All I know about baseball is that there are three bases, a bat, and a ball."

"Four bases," Craig corrected. "Home plate is technically a base."

Ben waved a hand. "See what I mean? Thanks for the tools. I'll get them back to you Sunday."

Craig watched Ben climb back into the vehicle and depart. Then he closed up the house and hopped into his old, gray Mazda pickup with "D&C Landscaping" painted on the side. _Would we adopt at this point?_ he wondered. He wasn't sure. Kara might want to. But on top of the expense, who had the energy to go through the months or years of hassle? And then, of course, one could only hope that the adoption went through, that all the effort involved was not wasted.

He let the thought drift away. The old hope they'd had was gone now, but life with Kara was good. They _had_ moved on. They were content now...content with the way things were.

*****

Craig eased his pickup into the lot at Grover's Grove. The place wasn't busy; only a few parking spaces were occupied. He passed through the storefront and out the back, where potted flowers lined his path until they gave way to a hundred varieties of roses, followed by a wide assortment of shrubs. He continued on past the shrubs to trees stationed like pillars in long rows, their roots bound in burlap and tucked into beds of soft mulch.

He sought birches, and they were easy to locate; their white bark gave them away. Angling down their row, he examined each specimen, gauging their ages and vigor, assessing the arrangement of their limbs for both aesthetic value and strength.

A nursery worker approached from the other end of the row—a woman in her mid-thirties, slender and strong, auburn hair tied back in a ponytail, maneuvering an eight-foot-tall maple in his direction. Facing the row behind Craig, she settled her tree in an open slot among the other maples and kicked some mulch around the balled-up roots.

"Can I help you find something?" she asked, inspecting the maple briefly before looking over her shoulder at Craig.

Craig motioned toward the trees he was examining. "I need a birch. Which one would you recommend?"

She moved to stand beside him shoulder to shoulder—rather close, actually. "Where are you going to put it?"

"We're landscaping around a restaurant. Plenty of vertical space, needs a tree without too much canopy spread..." She didn't move away. Her shoulder actually bumped his for a moment.

"I'd say this one might work well for you, then," she said, indicating the tree he had been studying. "It has all the basics. A good, strong trunk; thin is flimsy—you want firm, strong, round."

She was facing the tree as she spoke the words, but Craig caught her peeking out the corner of her eye at his chest and torso. He cocked an eyebrow at her.

"And then," she continued, "it needs to have sturdy limbs..." She ran two fingers along one of the lower, thicker branches, but her eyes were back on him, measuring his biceps. "Good leafage is important, too," she said. She fingered a leaf, but spied his hair as it shifted lightly in the breeze. "Of course, that depends on the season. Eventually, the leaves fall out—er, off."

Craig frowned; his hair hadn't thinned that much, not yet.

"And never ignore the roots. If you and your tree are going to be spending a long time together, you want to make sure he has plenty of stability."

"You mean, 'make sure _it_ has stability'..." He raised both eyebrows at her too-innocent expression, then turned his attention back to the tree. "So this one has it all, huh? I guess I'll take it. If you could just carry it to my pickup for me..."

She backhanded him in the gut, making him grunt. "Carry it yourself, bozo! I give advice. I don't carry trees for big, strong men who can do it themselves." She spoke with a grin that was downright flirtatious. "What else are you looking for?"

"Uh, a blue spruce. But I didn't see any as I came in."

"They're back that way," she told him, nodding behind him. "You walked right past them. I'll give you a hint—they're blue."

He returned her sarcastic smile.

"What else?"

"Vine leaf maple? Four of them?"

"We can do that."

"Will you pick out the best ones for me?"

She thrust fists onto her hips. "If you can't do it yourself."

He chuckled. "And if you could carry that blue spruce to the pickup, too..."

She scowled at him. "You're trying to get hit again, aren't you?"

"I just like it when you touch me."

"You're a scoundrel. What would your wife do if she could see you now, flirting with some woman from the nursery?"

Craig turned to face the worker directly. She was still very close to him. "She would murder me. She's terribly mean, my wife. Violent, even. Hit me just today."

"Did she now? I bet you deserved it." The woman placed one hand and then the other around Craig's waist, her hazel eyes peering into his brown ones as she pulled him close.

A motorized cart rattled by at the near end of the row, towing a wagon filled with flowering shrubs. The aged driver, hands gnarled like old tree knots, yelled down the row at them in a gravelly voice as he drove by. "No kissing the customers, Kara! We're not that kind of establishment!"

In his view, Kara kissed Craig anyway. It brought a grin from both Craig and the old fellow as the cart and wagon rolled away.

"Did you get Ben's message?" she asked.

Craig stepped back and lifted the birch they had selected. "I did. We dropped by the house a few minutes ago and got him some tools."

They turned and walked together to the end of the row, the tree in tow. "You _are_ a scoundrel, you know, distracting me from my work like this."

"You like it when I distract you," he quipped in reply.

She rolled her eyes playfully and trotted ahead to the blue spruces a few rows away while he took the birch to his pickup. By the time Craig returned, she had picked one out for him. "You find the vine leaf maples, I'll go ring up the order," she said. "And I'm not carrying them to the pickup for you, you scoundrel." With that, she turned and made her way back to the storefront.

"Put it on the business account!" Craig called after her.

"I know!" she called back.

Craig shook his head. She was so attractive when she was playful. Something came alive in her eyes so that they laughed at him. He gripped the blue spruce and carried it out to the Mazda.

A few trips later, the pickup bed now stocked with a foursome of vine leaf maples alongside the trees, Craig returned to the storefront. From behind the counter, Kara handed him an invoice. "So, you want to get together for dinner tonight?" she asked.

"Sure," he replied. "My place or yours?"

"Whichever. What time is the game?"

"Seven."

"Okay. I'll have dinner ready by 5:30, then."

"I'll be there."

They exchanged a quick, parting kiss, and Craig headed for the storefront's open double doors. The aged man from the cart walked in past him just in time to growl at Kara, "If you keep kissing the customers, we'll get mobbed with people wanting equal treatment, and they'll trample my plants!"

"If she quits kissing _this_ customer, Grover, I'm finding another place to shop!" Craig returned over his shoulder as he strode out into the cloud-filtered sunlight.

"Oh, yeah?" the old man bellowed behind him. "When I was your age, customers came to the nursery to buy _plants!"_

With glance back and a chuckle at Grover's good-natured scoff, Craig continued on to the pickup, climbed in, and drove away.

*****

Kara watched fondly as her husband left the shop. Then she turned to a slight Hispanic woman who was helping her three children set armfuls of pansies and marigolds on the counter.

"What are you going to do with all of these beauties?" Kara asked the kids as she rang up the pansies.

The youngest, maybe three years old, responded first. "We're planting a flower bread!"

_"B_ _ed_ _,"_ the oldest, a girl of perhaps nine, corrected her. "We're planting them by our apartment."

"That sounds like fun," Kara encouraged.

"This one's mine," said the three-year-old, pointing a finger at a blue pansy.

"And the orange ones are mine," chimed in the boy, probably five. He pointed to the half-dozen marigolds.

_"All_ of them?" Kara asked.

"Yep!" he answered with enthusiasm.

"You have an eager group of gardeners," Kara commended the mother.

She wrinkled her nose. "They're replacing the flowers they trampled yesterday." She looked as though they had discussed this situation at some length. "And from now on, chasing each other is not allowed in the front. Only out back."

The older two children had the dignity to look ashamed, but the younger merely watched with interest as Kara rang up the total. The older girl offered Kara some cash; apparently the children were paying for their misdeeds, literally. Handing back the change, Kara admonished, "No more stepping on the flowers, now. Take good care of these little guys"—she handed the plants back to the kids in turn—"and they'll bloom all summer."

Kara gazed after them as the mother herded her group outside. It didn't ache to be around children anymore, not like it had for a few years. It was pleasant now.

Even so, there was something distantly sad there—a regret, perhaps. It would have been nice to have given Craig a child or two. And of course, there was Tiffany—Tiffy, Craig had called her. What a shame. Craig would have been an excellent father, stern but fair. And after being reluctant at first, he had grown so eager.

But a different path had been ordained for them, and it was okay. Not her first choice, nor entirely devoid of sadness, but okay. As the mother with her three children disappeared from view, Kara sighed and returned to her work.

*****

_6050 Spindler Avenue..._ The boy in the orange shirt fiddled with his pencil, staring absently at the assignment on the desk before him. _Left, then left again... Fleming Craig and Kara..._

The final bell sounded, and his classmates gathered up their backpacks on cue. The boy collected his as well, scooped up his assignment paper, and joined the queue to the teacher's desk. It dissipated quickly; within seconds he stood before Ms. Faber, handing her his worksheet.

She frowned at it. "Is this all you finished?"

He shrugged meekly, still reciting the address in his head. _6050 Spindler Avenue..._

"You've been distracted all week, young man," Ms. Faber told him sternly, though not without compassion. "What's bothering you? Do you want to talk about it?"

She met his eyes, and he looked away. Sighing, she slid the worksheet back to him. "Well, take this home with you and finish it tonight. Bring it back tomorrow. And bring your concentration, too."

He nodded without really hearing, slipped the paper into his backpack, and hurried out of the classroom into the throng flowing through the halls to the busses and cars waiting outside. Out of habit, he stopped on the sidewalk and scanned the traffic for his ride, then caught himself. It wouldn't be here, not today, not anymore. That was what he had been told. He looked anyway, just to be sure.

He was relieved— _ecstatic_ —when his ride did not appear. Heart pounding, he launched himself down the street to the left, walking quickly. _Left, then left again._ It was raining, and he realized dimly that in his excitement that morning he had left his jacket at home. He didn't care. The rain on his shoulders and head felt wonderful, like freedom. _Fleming Craig and Kara..._

He ran down the street and turned left at the first intersection. He ran some more, checking the numbers on the houses—6032, 6036, on the other side of the street a 6041... 6046, 6048, 6052...

The boy came to a sudden halt and stared. There was no 6050! 6048 and 6052 were separated only by a chain-link fence, with no space for a 6050 between them. He gaped, trying to understand. Craig and Kara Fleming were real, the phonebook said so—they lived at 6050 Spindler Avenue... But there was no 6050!

Orange T-shirt now damp from the soft rain, the boy ran to the far end of the block. The numbers continued to increase. At the next intersection he discovered green street signs up on a pole, identifying "24th Avenue South" and "Clipper Street." He frowned at them. This wasn't Spindler Avenue!

He retraced his steps back to the corner where he had turned left. The signs there agreed that this was not Spindler Avenue. But he had followed the directions he had found in the phonebook! Left from the school, then left at the first street... He had been so careful. How could he have gone the wrong way?

Gathering determination in one deep breath, the boy dove deeper into the neighborhood, completely ignoring the rain. He had to find Craig and Kara Fleming. The magnitude of that goal filled him with hope and terrified him at the same time. What would they look like? Would they like him? Would they send him away?

Spindler Avenue had to be somewhere nearby—he must have read the map wrong somehow. He would check every street sign until he found the right road, and then he would find the house, and then he would find _them..._

Undaunted, he jogged from street to street, turning at random intervals, searching but not finding Spindler Avenue. After perhaps an hour he paused to rest against a light pole. The rain was harder now—it had drenched his clothes and was streaming down his hair into his face—but he paid it no heed. He studied the unfamiliar intersection at which he had stopped. He did not recognize it at all. He was thoroughly lost.

Even so, adrenaline coursed through him. He would press on until he located Spindler Avenue and found Craig and Kara Fleming. They were out here somewhere, at 6050 Spindler Avenue, somewhere in the city...

*****

An hour later, Craig held the blue spruce upright as Derek Hopper shoveled dirt into the hole around its roots, which were now loosened from their burlap bindings. He glanced at his watch—just after five o'clock, right on time.

Craig watched as the larger man, dark-skinned with dark hair and eyes, worked soil up to the top of the hole, stomped it down, and piled the excess up higher. As Derek finished, Craig released the tree and moved to gather their tools.

"Another good day's work," Derek declared cheerfully as he tamped down the last of the dirt. "And just in time, too." He peered up into the misty rain that had resumed moments ago. "Doesn't look like you're going to get your game in tonight."

"Hard to say," Craig replied, scanning the increasingly gray sky himself. "We're on one of the fields you and I fixed up. It can take a little rain."

He received Derek's shovel and stowed it with his own in the trailer hitched to Derek's pickup. Derek followed behind Craig, pushing a wheelbarrow. "That reminds me," he said as he lifted the wheelbarrow and set it in the trailer upside-down. "Look what I saw on my way here this morning." He slid his phone from his pocket and pulled up a photograph. It showed a baseball field the two of them had improved earlier that spring. The infield looked healthy, its grass lush and well-trimmed. But the outfield—

"Oh, that's just great!" Craig exclaimed. Shallow trenches crisscrossed the outfield; streaks of mud showed where only green should have been.

"Motorbikes," Derek said. "Lots of tire tracks. A couple of kids out having a good time, probably."

With his hands on his hips, Craig frowned at the picture. "We can level out the tracks, but that grass won't grow back properly for a while. I suppose we could reseed it, but there's really no point, since they have games on it every night."

Derek nodded sympathetically.

"I guess I'll swing by there Saturday if the weather's good and see what I can do. Are you busy that morning?"

Surprisingly, Derek—ever the optimist—sighed. "Actually, I need to talk to you about that." He breathed deeply and looked around before continuing, as if hoping to spot reinforcements before engaging in battle. "You know how, when we started this business, we said I'd be more the muscles, for obvious reasons"—he patted one of his massive biceps—"and the plant specialist, since I studied agriculture, and you'd be more the corporate brains, since you have the business degree and all, and—"

Craig stopped him with a hand. "You're rambling. What's bothering you, buddy?"

Derek shifted uncomfortably. "So, see, Shanice and I have been going around and around about this for two weeks..."

"Oh, no," Craig groaned. "She doesn't want you to quit, does she?"

"What? No!" Derek answered. "No, she's a lot more supportive than when we started. Making enough to live on changed her mind. No, she likes us having our own business now, except..."

"Except what?" Derek was nervous, and it was making Craig nervous, too.

"Except we're coming up to summer, and she's remembering _last_ summer, and she doesn't want it to be like that..."

"Like what?"

"She says I neglected her and the kids too much. I told her summer's when we make the most money because that's the only time it's not raining in Seattle, but she said—"

Craig interrupted him. "How many hours did you work last summer?"

"About sixty a week, according to her. Sometimes more." His expression looked as guilty as he sounded.

"That's a lot of hours when you have a family," Craig observed. "So she wants you to cut back?"

Derek nodded. "So I can be at home more for her and the kids." Head bowed, he glanced sheepishly up at the shorter man, tightly-curled hair beginning to catch drops of rain that sparkled in the cloud-dimmed light.

Craig laughed with relief. "Wow, you were starting to scare me! Of course you need to be there with Shanice and your kids. That's great—they want you at home! You actually argued with her about that?"

Derek added a grin to that sheepish look and shrugged. "Not about wanting to be home. But it's going to drop our bottom line, you know?"

"Our bottom line is fine, Derek, has been for three years. We can cut back a little this summer, it won't hurt us any. I didn't realize you were spending that much time away from your family."

"It's just that—see, you and Kara were really struggling to pay off all those bills, especially the medical bills from trying—"

"Wait a second," Craig interrupted again. "You were doing all that extra work last year so Kara and I would have enough money?"

Derek shrugged again, eyes still concerned. "I didn't want to embarrass you and ask how you guys were doing. But you know—you weren't spending a lot, Kara was still working..."

"It turns out she loves the job," Craig said. "I don't think I could make her stop. She loves to grow things." He clapped a hand on his friend's shoulder. "But we're doing fine. The only debt we have now is the house, and we're ahead of schedule on that." He felt a measure of tension leave Derek's shoulder. "We don't need the extra right now. At the worst, it'll be like winter—a little less income, but enough to get by on."

"You're sure?"

"Hey, if you were in my shoes, wouldn't you tell me to go spend more time with my kids?"

Without hesitation, Derek nodded. "Yes, I would." He reached out and wrapped Craig in a bear hug, his six-foot-four football player bulk fully engulfing Craig's own slender but solid six-foot frame. Stepping back, Derek smiled, much more at ease.

Craig glanced at his watch again. "Look, if Shanice wants you home earlier, you might as well impress her and start now. And forget Saturday—I'll take care of the ball field."

"Okay. See you tomorrow." Derek turned toward his pickup.

"And don't show up early!" Craig watched Derek climb into his truck and drive away.

*****

It was 5:50. Kara loitered at the stove, swirling stir-fry around the wok with mild annoyance as she noted the time. Of the two of them, Craig was the less likely to be late. But late he was, and the rarity made her all the more impatient.

The vegetables were ready and had been for several minutes, so she reached back to the stand-alone counter in the center of the kitchen and fetched up a bowl of ham she had sliced into cubed strips. She tipped the bowl, sliding half of the ham into the wok, mixing it in with the vegetables.

Content with the mixing, she pulled a few odd ends of ham out of the remaining half, carried them to the door that led to the side yard, opened it—and looked curiously down at the knob. She hadn't unlocked the door; it had been left unlocked. That was strange.

Paws, smelling dinner cooking inside, was already at the door, wagging his tail hopefully. She offered him the bits she had brought, and he licked them up as she rubbed his head. It was still raining lightly; the patio was wet and the wind had picked up a little, chilling the air just a bit after a warm day. She stepped back inside and shut the door behind her.

The rest of the ham she covered and stowed in the refrigerator. Through the kitchen wall she heard Craig's pickup pull into the garage. _It's about time,_ she thought, glancing toward the table. All was ready, which was good since he would need to leave again shortly.

Craig hurried through the door to the garage and immediately noted her scowl. "I'm late, I know," he greeted her. He had been expecting the scowl—good for him. He had a hands-free cell phone, and he ought to have used it. "Traffic on I-5 was even worse than usual. Twice I sat in one spot for five minutes without moving an inch."

"And you didn't call?"

"The next exit was ours," he explained. "I thought I'd be home in ten minutes."

"And when you weren't?"

He sighed. "You're right, I should have called... Why are you grinning?"

She found that she was. She hadn't been able to hold the scowl for long, not with what she knew that he didn't know yet. "I'll show you in a minute."

"Show me? What is it?"

"You'll see." She brought the steaming wok to the table and set it on a hot pad between sliced cheese, a bowl of fruit, and a pitcher of iced tea. "Go wash up."

Eyebrows drawn in blended curiosity and suspicion, he ambled off to the bathroom. As soon as he was out of sight, Kara collected the day's mail, already opened, from the counter and stacked it beside his plate, careful to hide the last envelope beneath the others.

When Craig returned, hands and face freshly scrubbed so that the dirt patches they always carried after a day's work had vanished, they sat across from each other. "I know what the secret is," he offered. "Your mother called and said she won't be able to make it out to visit next month."

Kara took a bite of white cheese and spoke between chews. "She did call, actually, but just to confirm that we won't be too busy for her to stay with us."

"And you reminded her that summer's my busiest time, right? That I'll have to work at least eighty hours that week?"

She laughed and took another bite of cheese. "I told her you would be busy. I don't think she took me seriously, though. She just likes you, you know."

"That's because when I said 'I do,' she thought I was talking to _her_ ," Craig remarked. Kara grinned as he lifted more vegetables to his mouth.

He chewed for a moment. "Derek told me today that Shanice wants him to cut back on his hours this summer. I guess he was away from home too much last year, and she wants him to spend more time with her and the kids."

"I remember her complaining about how much he was gone."

"But do you know why he was working so much? He thought we still needed the money."

"So he was trying to bring in revenue..."

"...so we would have enough to get by," Craig finished. He poured himself a glass of the tea. "I told him we're doing a lot better than we were. I think he was relieved."

"Good. Oh, hey," she said, pointing through the kitchen, "you left the side door unlocked when you and Ben came by earlier."

He turned and looked thoughtfully at the door. "No, we didn't go out that way. We went straight to the guestroom and found the tools he needed, and then we left. We didn't go out to the shed."

Kara furrowed her brows. "I remember locking it this morning before I went to work..."

"Speaking of Ben, though," Craig said, "he brought it up again today..."

"Brought what up?"

"He wanted to know why we never adopted." He looked up from his plate.

Kara shook her head slowly. "He feels guilty because he has kids. What did you tell him?"

"That we're not jealous. And that we just couldn't do it at the time, emotionally or financially."

Kara considered. "Well, that's true. I couldn't even think about adopting then."

"Neither of us could."

"So did he want us to take one of the kids at the children's home?"

"He was hoping we'd be interested."

"Are we?" Kara asked.

Craig swallowed, though he'd had nothing in his mouth at that moment. He met her eyes, but still hesitated. He was thinking, calculating. "If you want to, we could look into it," he began. "But for myself...I'm all right as we are." Unconsciously, he scratched the tip of his nose with the end of his thumb. "It's not like we don't have nieces and a nephew we can go see when we want to." Still absently, he set down his fork and picked it up again. "What about you?"

Kara gave him a small smile, a little regretful, but still genuine. "I'm okay," she shrugged. His tone had been less sad than she might have expected; that was a good sign. "And there are advantages to 'us' being just the two of us."

"Like what?"

She grinned mischievously. "Like having you all to myself whenever I want." That happy thought reminded her—"Hey, take a look at the mail."

"What's in there?"

"You'll see."

He glanced through the envelopes. "Bill...bill...another advertisement for satellite TV. Do they never give up?... A postcard from the nursery. Is that what you're so happy about?" He flipped it over to scan the sale announcement on the back.

"No, Grover sent that ad out to the whole neighborhood. Keep going."

The last envelope caught his eye. "The Mariners?" he asked with predictable surprise. "Do they want us to buy season tickets or something?"

"Just look inside."

He pulled out the contents and dropped the envelope on the table, the logo—a baseball layered between a pair of offset compass roses—facing upward. He unfolded the letter and began to read.

"From the Director of Public Relations?" He lifted an eyebrow at Kara, then read aloud:

Dear Mr. Fleming:

The Seattle Mariners have recently learned of your several years of time, expense, and effort donated to improve local Little League baseball fields. In recognition of your hard work, and in conjunction with our salute to Little League baseball during the month of August, we would like to invite you, along with Mr. Derek Hopper, as co-owners of D & C Landscaping, to be our guests at our game on the evening of August 12. We also invite you both to throw out the honorary first pitches.

We will be contacting you and Mr. Hopper by phone in a few days to speak with you about this opportunity. We hope you and your families will be able to join us for that game.

M. Pecking, Director of Public Relations

"Is this a joke?" Craig looked with narrowed eyes at Kara over the letter. "Did my dad send this?"

She grinned back at him and shrugged.

He picked up the envelope again and touched the embossed logo gingerly. Then he held the envelope up to the light, assessing its authenticity. "Huh..."

"Why don't you give Derek a call?" Kara suggested.

Craig gazed at her with a vague, bemused expression. "Right, I should." Leaving his dinner and taking the letter with him, he drew out his phone and hesitated. "You talked with Shanice already, didn't you?"

Kara laughed. "She called a few minutes before you got home. That's why I opened it."

Craig dialed Derek's number. When Derek picked up on the other end, Craig wandered off into the hallway. From his tone, it sounded like Derek had found his matching letter, and the two men were as excited as fish discovering water for the first time.

Heart light, Kara turned back to her meal.

*****

The rain that evening was spotty—a light drizzle for a few minutes followed by a single minute's hard downpour and then a wet mist, if that, until the drizzle returned. _Typical Seattle weather in the springtime,_ Kara thought as she dished out a bowlful of food for Paws on the patio. The sunlight seeping through the clouds was just beginning to fade.

After Craig had left for his Little League game, she had considered pulling weeds in the flower beds until dusk; but the soil was too muddy tonight. So instead she collected the half-dozen containers of miniature roses she had purchased from Grover a couple of weeks ago and left to grow on the patio. Small as they were, it was time for them to be repotted into larger containers. A few more weeks with a little more space for their roots to spread and they would be perfect, ready to give away.

She brought the roses inside and set them on the table, then braved the rain outside to collect the empty pots she needed and half a bag of potting soil from the shed. She had expected Craig to be home by now, considering all this precipitation, but the rain could be inconsistent like this some days—drenching you here, but dropping little or nothing just a couple of miles away.

Inside, she set her load next to the flowers on the table, careful not to soil Craig's letter. He had left it lying open there when he had departed for the game; after talking with Derek, he had handled it almost reverently. Unfortunately, it didn't say exactly when the ball club would call; Craig would hardly be able to focus on anything else until he heard from them. Kara moved the letter gingerly into the den and set it atop Craig's latest novel on the couch.

_What a memory that's going to be,_ she thought, imagining the two guys' excitement when August 12 arrived.

The doorbell rang. Kara circled the long wall that separated the den from the front entryway and hall. She peeked out the entryway window as she reached for the doorknob. A police officer stood on the doorstep, hat and jacket glistening from the rain, black hair spilling neatly to her shoulders. She was not a large woman, but sturdy, her brown face no-nonsense without lacking compassion.

At her side stood a boy nearly as tall as the officer's shoulders, nervously biting his lower lip. His plain, orange T-shirt was soaked through at the top and down to his chest. Rain dripped from his disheveled hair and striped his cheeks.

Kara opened the door.

The boy looked up with wide, earnest eyes as she came into view. "Hi, Mom!" he said.
Chapter 2

Kara was taken aback. "Sorry—what did you say?"

The police officer spoke. "Officer Garrenton, Seattle Police. Are you Kara Fleming?"

"Yes," she replied.

Her hand on his wet shoulder, Officer Garrenton steered the boy to stand between them. "This charming young fellow has been wandering Seattle in the rain, trying to find his way home. I found him nearly all the way to the Pacific Medical Center. Actually, _he_ found _me._ Hopefully he didn't get my upholstery too wet." She grinned fondly down at the boy.

Kara offered a smile of her own, an apologetic one. "I'm sorry, officer. You must have the wrong house. We don't have any children."

Officer Garrenton gave a single, understanding nod. "If one of my boys, when they were his age, had gone wandering off, gotten all soaked, and had to catch a ride home in a police cruiser, I wouldn't claim him, either."

"Really, though," Kara maintained, "I don't even recognize him." That might not have been entirely true. There was something about him...but not enough to place him.

"Well, that's the hair, ma'am," the officer remarked playfully. "He's been out in the weather a long time this afternoon. But a little work with a blow dryer and a comb and you'll have the fine-lookin' young man in that picture over there back as good as new." She pointed behind Kara.

Kara turned—and gasped. The face of the boy at the door smiled back at her from a photo tucked for years among several shots of her husband in his youth, all arranged on the rectangular entryway table opposite pictures of herself. Here, fishing with his father; there, receiving his high school diploma. And this one—Little League, age ten or eleven, posing with bat in hand, face framed between a light blue jersey sponsored by Ted's Pool Supplies and a light blue cap to match, photo framed in a gold-edged oval.

She spun back to the boy. It was uncanny, the resemblance. The dimple on his right cheek. Straight hair in a simple cut, slightly wavy at the ends, mussed from the rain. The same brown eyes—no, the boy's eyes were the same, but blue. Even so, Officer Garrenton was right: dry him off, comb his hair, maybe trim it a little, put a light blue hat on him...

What an odd coincidence.

The wind gusted and a little rain dodged the overhang to sprinkle the two guests in the doorway. Kara breathed, suddenly aware that she had stopped, and looked back at the officer. "Would you come in, out of the rain?"

"Just for a moment, thank you," the officer replied. She followed the boy inside, and Kara closed the door behind them. The officer regarded the picture again. "Yep, just look at that dimple!" She laughed and patted the boy's shoulder.

Kara stared at the picture once more. _Incredible, the resemblance..._

Officer Garrenton went on. "He did the smart thing—he asked for directions to get back home. I thought I'd better bring him myself, with it getting dark and him being so far away. I'm sorry I didn't have anything to dry him off with; he's dripping all over your floor." She was still smiling, but now her eyes awaited a reply that would indicate—well, probably gratitude.

Kara bit her lower lip. "I just can't, I'm sorry—"

"I'll get a towel," the boy said suddenly, and he walked right around Kara, cut into the hall, and turned sharply left into the bathroom.

"Er, excuse me?" Kara called after him, but the boy was already back in the hall. He held a beige towel in both hands and began to dry his face, then stooped to dry the floor.

Officer Garrenton spoke to the boy. "Zach, before you go running off, isn't there something you should say to your mother?" She didn't sound angry, just a mom of boys who knew when enough silliness was enough.

"Oh. Sorry, Mom," he intoned, now wiping the rain off his arms. "I meant to be here sooner. I guess I went down the wrong street and"—he paused to wipe his face off again, though to no avail; his hair was still dripping—"and then I didn't know where I was." He raised his eyebrows in a penitent look. His shirt was still dripping water lightly onto the floor.

Kara's heart slammed against her ribs. This was a simple mix-up—so why the jolt of nerves all of a sudden? If only that penitent look didn't remind her so much of Craig's when he had done something fun on the sly, like going golfing with Derek when he ought to have been working. This boy, feigning apology, was delighted to be here.

"Officer," she choked out, "I—honestly, I've never had a son. Or a daughter, for that matter. But if I did—a boy, I mean—" Something clicked and brought Officer Garrenton's words into focus. "Did you say his name is _Zach?"_

Crinkling her eyebrows just a bit, Officer Garrenton reached into her jacket pocket and brought out a school ID tag on a pale orange lanyard with Zach's photo printed at the top of it. "He was wearing this. He must have gone roaming straight out of school. We thought you'd be nearly panicked by now, but you seem to be taking it well." A smug smile appeared as she glanced back down at Zach; she seemed to have mistaken Kara's look of confusion for worry. "I looked up the address he gave me, and sure enough—residence of Craig and Kara Fleming."

Kara spoke—"Yes, that's me...us..."—but without hearing herself. Her eyes and mind had locked onto the ID tag:

ZECHARIAH FLEMING

BRIAR POINT ELEMENTARY

FOURTH GRADE — MS. FABER, ROOM 14

She gaped at the photo on the tag: it was the same boy as in the old baseball portrait, except with blue eyes to match the boy standing before her. The child in the school photo was dressed in a faded gray T-shirt, hair dry and relatively straight. And the name: ZECHARIAH FLEMING. Not the most common name. Not like Jimmy Smith or something.

Three million people in the greater metro area... How many Zechariah Flemings, age ten-ish? With eyes like Craig's, eager and penetrating at the same time? And that misleading look of penitence? With that dimple on the right side, and brown hair...and who just happens to know where to find a towel on the first try, without asking?

"Mrs. Fleming, are you all right?"

"What? Oh...yes." She was answering too slowly. She must sound dazed. What odd coincidences.

"Ma'am, is your husband home? I might like to talk to him." Dimly, Kara noted that Officer Garrenton was growing concerned.

"Er...no, he's gone to a game—er, coaching. Little League. This is _his_ picture. See, their eyes are different colors." She pointed to the brown-eyed boy in the blue ball cap.

Officer Garrenton was watching her closely now. "Except for the eyes, your son is the spitting image of his father. Dad must be proud."

"But I never had a ba—"

Zach took off again, this time stepping directly into the kitchen.

"Hey—um, Zach?" Kara called, and she followed him, Officer Garrenton trailing behind her. Without the slightest hesitation, the boy opened the cabinet over the counter beside the refrigerator and fetched a glass. He hadn't needed to search; he knew where the cups were.

"Zach, what are you doing?"

The boy glanced up innocently. "Just getting a drink of water." He stepped across to the sink and filled the glass.

Kara could only stare, flabbergasted. "He's beautiful."

"Ma'am?" Officer Garrenton asked.

Kara flinched as she realized that she had whispered aloud. What a ridiculous thing to say! But he looked just like Craig when he came home from working in the rain...

She stammered a moment until a new voice interrupted her, crackling from Officer Garrenton's radio. It announced a stream of numbers and designations—police code. "Three vehicles, possible injuries," was all Kara caught as she watched Zach gulp down his water. He finished just as the voice cut off, and set his glass back on the counter.

"Another accident," Officer Garrenton groaned, eyes taking on a new focus. "I'll need to go, it's only a mile from here. But if it's all right, I'll check back with you in, what, an hour? Where did he go?"

Kara turned just in time to see Paws prance delightedly into the kitchen, the boy leading him. Paws had been outside. Her jaw dropped. What would this boy not do in a stranger's home? This beautiful boy...who knew where the dog was... He leaned down and let Paws lick his face. Paws loved kids.

Officer Garrenton eyed Kara thoughtfully. Then she leaned toward her and whispered into her ear. "Mrs. Fleming, what is your dog's name?"

"Paws," Kara whispered back. "It's short for Santa Paws, like the movie. Craig got him for me at Christmas."

Officer Garrenton straightened. "Zechariah?"

Both boy and dog looked up.

"What is the dog's name?"

"Santa Paws." He didn't even stop to think.

Kara froze. There was no possible way—

"Well, that's enough for me," Officer Garrenton announced, though just a hint of concern remained in her eyes. "I'll check back on you in one hour. Zach, don't you cause your mother any more grief tonight."

"I won't." He rubbed Paws' head as he watched her go. She strode quickly back to the door.

"Wait!" Kara blurted out, following her. "You can't just l—" The closing door cut her off. "—leave him here...with me..." Through the entryway window, Kara watched helplessly, hands dropping limply to her sides, as Officer Garrenton drove away. Mouth hanging slightly open, she could only stare. What had just happened?

Paws barked once from the kitchen, and the boy laughed. Kara pulled her eyes from the window and, with one deep breath, willed her feet back the few steps into the kitchen. Someone else's child knelt there, playing with her dog _(whose name he knows!),_ acting right at home _(he knows where the glasses are!),_ helping himself to what he needed _(he knew where the bathroom was!)..._ calling her "Mom" and looking startlingly like Craig, wet hair and all...

She held her head in her hands. "What do I do now? Call the police?" The thought brought a wry grin.

The towel had been tossed onto the kitchen counter. Not knowing what else to do, she scooped it up and bent over the boy. "Well, if you're going to be here for an hour, what do you say we at least not have you dripping all over the floor?" He hadn't done a very good job of drying himself. He tensed as she dabbed at his neck and arms. "Oh, look at your shirt."

The boy did, and squeezed a few more drops out of it. The top of it was still drenched.

"I guess you'll survive until we can get you home. Just don't catch a cold, okay?"

"Can I play with Santa Paws some more?"

The dog seemed eager enough, swinging his tail back and forth. But Kara shook her head. "No, you and I should talk, I think. Outside, Paws!" She opened the side door, and with a grateful look back at the boy, he exited.

The rectangular, six-person dining table beside the kitchen was half-covered with the roses and empty pots she had just brought inside. She scooted them off to the floor and pulled out a chair. "Here, have a seat." The boy sat down as Kara stepped to the cupboard and pulled out a small platter. "You've been out in the rain all evening, huh? I'll bet you're hungry."

"Yeah."

"Hmm, let me see what I have..." She opened the refrigerator. Taking some slices of ham and white cheese, she asked, "How does this look to you?"

"Sure," he nodded gratefully.

She filled the platter with the meat, cheese, and some long crackers from the cupboard, and placed it all in the middle of the table, settling herself opposite the boy. He reached for a slice of cheese first, then a slice of ham. He put both between a pair of crackers and ate them as a sandwich.

"Could I have some more water?" he asked.

"Oh—yeah, you bet." She retrieved his glass, filled it, and set it before him. "You must be part fish, to be out in the rain all day and still want more water."

He grinned and took a drink. She could hardly take her eyes off of him, he looked and moved so much like Craig. Not exactly the same—yet how strange that a boy like this would show up on her doorstep...

She took a bit of cheese for herself and nibbled at it. "So, Zechariah Fleming... But you go by Zach?"

He nodded as he chewed.

"Tell me about yourself."

"Like what?"

"Like whatever is interesting. At this moment, you are the most important person in the world to me, and I want to know whatever you'd like to tell me. You have my full attention."

The boy's eyes widened a little, maybe in surprise, but he didn't seem uncomfortable. "Um... I like dogs..."

She nodded. "Okay, that's a good start. Do you have a dog at home?"

"Just Santa Paws, I guess."

"I mean at _your_ home, not mine. Do you have any pets?"

He shook his head. "I've never had any pets. Santa Paws is my first."

Did the boy think he was moving in? Was he planning to stay? She would address that issue later. Better to make him comfortable first, get him to let his guard down—except that he didn't seem to have any guard _up,_ he was so...again, so at home...

"We just call him Paws," Kara said.

"Oh, okay. He's a nice dog."

"He loves kids... Tell me, Zach, how did you know his name?"

"It's on his tag." Of course. He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Yes, it is. I should have figured that out. So... What else can you tell me about yourself?"

"I don't know."

"You like dogs and you're part fish..."

The boy grinned again at the tease.

"How old are you?"

"Ten." He reached for his fourth cracker sandwich already. He really was hungry.

"When is your birthday?"

"April third." He scratched the tip of his nose with the tip of his left thumb. Kara's eyebrows drew together as she saw it, but the boy didn't appear to notice.

"So you had a birthday last month. Did you have a party?"

"At school. Ms. Faber brought cupcakes. She does that for all the birthdays in our class."

"But no party at home, huh?"

"No." He didn't seem sad about it.

"Is that normal?"

"I never have a birthday party at home anymore, not since I turned five."

"But you used to?"

"Yeah, until Grandmother moved away. She gave me little parties, just her and me. After that I always had nannies, and they never gave me parties. One of them used to bake me a birthday cake, though."

_He has a grandmother._ Now they were getting somewhere. "Where did your grandmother move to?"

"I don't know. I never saw her again, and then she died." He _had_ a grandmother. He might have been a little sad saying that, even as he reached for more crackers.

"And who do you live with now?"

"With you." He swallowed another bite.

"Okay, um... You realize that since you've never been here before, and you and I have never seen each other before, that Craig and I have to agree that you can stay before you really can." She was diving deep a little earlier than she had intended, but something told her he was ready for it.

"Yeah, I know."

"And you understand that we have a responsibility to get you back to your home as soon as possible?"

At this the boy's demeanor darkened just a little, a touch of urgency appearing in his eyes. He forgot the food for a moment.

"You don't want to go back?" she inquired gently.

"I can't."

"Why not?"

He hesitated.

"Zach, it's better to tell the truth than to lie. I don't think you've been lying, but if we're going to get along, you'll have to be completely honest with me."

Unconsciously, he scratched his nose with his thumb again. Why must he keep doing things—little things, without knowing it, like showing her Craig's eyes, only blue—that cried out that he belonged here, even though such a conclusion was utterly absurd?

"Why can't you go back home?" she urged gently. "Has someone hurt you?" He didn't look hurt, nor did he have the wary look of a child accustomed to abuse.

"No. I just—The nanny left this morning, and the only place I could go after school was here."

"Why did she leave?"

"She's going back to Mexico. Today was her last day. She's going back to her family."

"I see." She didn't see at all. "And will there be a new nanny?"

"No, she was the last one."

"Hmm."

The boy didn't munch anymore.

Kara spoke again. "How did you know to come here, to this address?"

"I looked it up in the phonebook. I found your and Dad's names—"

_Dad?_ "How did you know our names?"

"I've known them since I was little. I thought you might be dead, but you're not."

"I'm glad to hear that. I always like it when I wake up in the morning and I'm not dead. Who told you our names?"

"Grandmother used to tell me. She wanted me to know because she said someday I could live with my mom and dad. She told me your middle names, too."

"Really?" That was unlikely. Kara crossed her arms. "So tell me my middle name."

"Ruth. And Dad's middle name is Herbert."

Kara unfolded her arms and gaped. There was no way, unless his grandmother had known them, and known them well... It was unlikely—but so were that resemblance to the photograph in the entryway, that falsely penitent expression, that knowing where the glasses were. Those were all coincidences, surely. But specific information like this... And he conveyed it with absolute certainty.

He watched for her reaction.

"You're right," she admitted. "I don't know who your grandmother was or how she knew, but she got our names right." She stood to get herself a glass of water. She needed the pause in the conversation to give herself a moment to think.

"Zach... I asked you to be honest with me. It's only fair if I'm honest with you, too. This is really hard for me to figure out, because—" How had it come about that she was saying this to a ten-year-old whom, up until a few minutes ago, she had never met? "You say you're our son, and you do look a lot like that picture of Craig in the hall, but..." She put a hand over her belly. "See, Zach, I've never given birth. I've never even been pregnant. Well, not long enough to have a baby. Not that we didn't try..."

His eyes, so certain a moment ago, now hinted at worry, and also confusion. "But how do you know you didn't...you know, have a baby without knowing it?"

Kara laughed straight out before she could catch herself. He had asked it so straightforwardly. Could this ten-year-old really be so sheltered from such biological complexities?

He blushed, all the more for not knowing why he should be embarrassed.

"Sorry," she apologized. "No, that's okay. It's a fair question. Have you ever known someone who was expecting a baby, Zach?"

"No."

"Okay... Um, here's how it works. The baby starts out really tiny, just a few cells, and it grows inside the mother's tummy for nine months, getting bigger—"

"How does it fit in there?"

Another fair question, though it made her want to laugh again. "It sort of pushes everything else out of the way as it grows. And it makes the mother get fat and round in the front." She illustrated with her hands.

The boy's eyes went wide. "Does it hurt?"

"Sometimes, yes," Kara answered. "So if I ever did have a baby, I would definitely know it, because—well, there's really no way not to."

He got it. His face fell just a little. A fault line had appeared in his rock-solid assurance that he was where he ought to be—there was a chink in the armor. "But maybe there's some other way..."

"I doubt it, Zach." She felt sad for him, for the disappointment that crept across his face. Curiously, it wasn't guilt she saw there, as if he'd been caught making up a story. It was disappointment, a glorious dream slipping away.

"Still," Kara mused, "for some reason, here you are, at least for another"—she glanced up at the clock on the wall—"45 minutes. And somehow you know more about me than I know about you. And for goodness' sakes, you do look like my husband."

Her mind began to sift through possibilities she had never considered. Could the IVF procedure have worked? Was it possible that one embryo— _just one_ —had been viable after all, that they had conceived a child only to have the embryo given to the wrong mother? She could believe it, looking at this boy. _But,_ she recalled sadly, _they had warned us that our chances were slim at best._ The doctor hadn't been able to pin down the cause of her infertility except to say that she and Craig were, in his words, a challenge. Not that that had kept them from trying, for a while.

_What if Craig was unfaithful ten years ago?_ No—any man could be unfaithful if he let his guard down, but Craig never had. _I would have known,_ she thought with a touch of good humor. _He's such a terrible liar._

Another idea occurred to her. "Could you be related to us?" she thought out loud. "A nephew, maybe, that we somehow never knew about?" It was a stretch, but she had ruled out the most rational possibilities.

The boy considered. "Grandmother always said _you_ were my mom and Craig was my dad. That's what she always told me."

"And she died."

"Yeah."

"Hmm... Okay." _Maybe Craig will know something. It would clearly be his side of the family._ Hadn't one of his cousins had a child about ten years ago? "What about other relatives? Do you have a grandfather?"

"I did, but he was always traveling for his work. That's why I had to stay with a nanny. I hardly ever saw him."

"Where is he now?"

"He died a few months ago."

"Do you know any of your other relatives?"

"No."

Again, Kara felt sad for this boy. For a nice kid like this to be left so alone in this vast, crazy world—what a shame, if it were true.

They sat and stared at each other silently for a minute. Zach reached for another piece of cheese and took a sip from his glass.

Kara broached another question. "How did you know where to find that glass? And where the bathroom was?"

"I thought it might be in the hallway."

"The bathroom? Why?"

"A lot of houses have a bathroom there."

"Does your house?"

"No. But other ones do, sometimes."

"And the glass?"

"That was where I thought—"

"Thought it would be, got it. Hmm."

An engine rumbled into the garage. Craig had returned.

"That's my husband," she told the boy.

He sat up straight and looked anxiously toward the door to the garage.

A moment later, Kara strode to that door, reaching it just as Craig walked in. "Hi," she said, embracing him.

"Hey," he replied, and kissed her cheek. He carried a sports equipment bag over his shoulder, the knobs of a few aluminum baseball bats protruding from the top.

"You got the game in?"

"It only sprinkled on us a little," he said. "Most of the showers went around us."

"Did you win?"

"We did, believe it or not, despite walking six batters in a r—" He cut off suddenly as he caught sight of the boy.

"Hi, Dad." The boy could have been welcoming his own dad back home.

"Er," Craig stammered, "that's...an unusual way to begin a conversation." He moved across the room to the boy and held out his hand. "I'm Craig."

"I know. I'm Zach." The boy shook his hand.

"Zach, huh? What's brings you to our home, Zach?"

The boy shrugged. "I'm your son."

Craig blinked, then glanced aside to Kara. She shrugged, too.

Craig took her seat, across from the boy. "Well, that's...quite a surprise, Zach."

"A police officer dropped him by a few minutes ago," Kara explained. "He had given her our address, and he knew our names. I told her we didn't have any children, but—"

"But she left him here anyway?"

"Well," she began, "he seemed to...fit right in here. He knew where the bathroom was, knew where the glasses were, knew Paws' name..." _They_ could _be father and son,_ she thought, seeing them across the table from each other. Not quite time-adjusted mirror images, but close.

Craig, right elbow on the table, reached up with his right thumb and scratched the tip of his nose. Uncanny, the resemblances...

"Look at this," she told Craig, sliding the boy's ID tag across the table to him.

"Zechariah— _Fleming?"_ Craig looked not at the boy, but at Kara. "That's an odd coincidence."

"That's what I thought, too," she replied.

"Why?" Zach asked.

"Because," Craig answered, "a long time ago we decided that if we ever had a son, we would name him Zechariah and call him Zach for short."

The two boys—even at 38 and acting his age, Craig still had an attractive boyish side to him—watched each other, Zach attentive, Craig considering, calculating. Kara could see him weighing the possibilities against the impossibilities.

The two needed to talk, and guys always talked better over food. She turned to the boy—the younger one. "Do you like ice cream?"

"I love ice cream."

She went to the freezer and pulled out two containers. "Looks like we have vanilla and butter pecan. Oh, and here's a little bit of chocolate left."

"Can I have chocolate?" the boy requested. "It's my favorite."

Another coincidence that made her pause in mid-motion, if only for a fraction of a second. Three kinds of ice cream in the freezer and he chose chocolate, his favorite. _Her_ favorite. Craig noticed, too, and met her eyes. But didn't most young boys like chocolate best? It didn't mean anything, of course—just another curious coincidence...

"Okay, chocolate coming up." She divided it into three bowls—Craig would not have a preference—and set two of them before the boys, keeping the last for herself at the place she took at the end of the table.

"So, Zechariah Fleming," Craig began, "if you are our son, it's great of you to stop by and introduce yourself. You're what, nine years old?"

"I turned ten last month."

"Cool. Ten. Why did you wait so long to let us meet you?"

"Grandfather told me you were dead. I didn't want to believe him, but I didn't know he was wrong. Then I found your names and address in the phonebook."

"So you found out we were alive and decided to drop by and visit?"

"I guess. Not exactly visit, though."

"He intends to stay," Kara explained.

The boy was enjoying his ice cream, scooping it up to his mouth with his spoon in—in his _left_ hand...

"I _have_ to stay," the boy corrected her. "Grandfather died, and the nanny left to go back to Mexico, and there won't be a new one. So I don't have anywhere else to go."

"And the nanny didn't take you to your relatives? Or to the police?"

"No." His eyes narrowed as if he had not considered those possibilities.

Craig sighed. "Look, you seem like a neat kid, but it's against the law for us to keep you here without your parents knowing."

"You _are—"_

"—your parents, right," Craig finished. "But we've never met you before. We could be in trouble for having you here right now. If the police found you here—"

"It was the police who dropped him off here," Kara reminded him.

Craig rolled his tongue inside his cheek. "That complicates things. Still, Zach, we have an obligation to try to get you back to someone. What was your grandfather's name?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know his name?"

"He never told me. Just Grandfather."

"Well, where did he live?"

"I don't know. We moved a lot. I don't know the address."

"Could you take us there?"

"I don't think so."

Craig sighed and looked back at the ID card. "You go to Briar Point. So you must live close to here."

"Not really. The nanny always drove me to school."

"How far is it from your house to the school?"

"I don't know—a few miles, I guess. It takes a while to get there."

Kara looked quizzically at Craig. Why would the boy go to school so far away from his home? To her knowledge, Briar Point was just an ordinary elementary school.

Craig thumbed the ID card and then looked up at her. Clearly, he was as stuck as she was.

"Tell you what, Zach," he said, looking back at the boy. "Are you up for a game?"

"What kind of game?"

"A game of speed, quick thinking. I'll ask you questions as fast as I can think of them, and you answer as fast as you can. See if you can keep up."

The boy seemed intrigued. "Okay."

"All right." Craig prepared himself with a bite of ice cream. "What's your middle name?"

"Timothy."

Craig's spoon slipped out of his fingers and clattered into his bowl. Kara choked on her own ice cream. Their eyes met again. Too many coincidences.

"Er—that's a good name," Craig managed. "Your favorite color?"

"Green."

"Your birthday?"

"April third."

"How many students are in your class at school?"

"Um...twenty-one, I think. No, one moved away. Twenty."

"Where do you live?"

"Here," he answered.

Kara grinned and shook her head. The boy was quick, and he was giving nothing away.

"Where did you live this morning?"

"At my old house."

"Which is where?"

"I already told you I don't know."

"So you did. At least you're consistent." Craig swallowed another bite. "Your favorite TV show."

"We've never had a TV."

"Really? No TV? All right, your favorite music group."

"Um, the Beach Boys."

"You're joking."

"Nope."

"They were around before I was born."

"Grandfather only had old music."

"Prove it, then—where was 'the little old lady' from?"

"Pasadena," he said proudly. _"It's the little old lady from Pasadena,"_ he sang, then grinned broadly. He was quick indeed. He was parrying Craig's thrusts deftly, and enjoying every second of it.

"Wow," Craig shook his head. "I thought I had you there. But where's Pasadena?"

He shrugged. "I don't know."

"How about... How long have you lived in Seattle?"

"All my life."

"Your grandfather's name."

"Don't know."

"Phone number."

"We've never had a phone. Well, the nanny did, but I wasn't allowed to use it. She never told me the number."

"No TV _and_ no phone? Any brothers or sisters?"

"I was hoping I had some here."

"I see. Do you know any jokes?"

"Jokes? Er..." The boy was stumped, but not for long. "I heard one at school... There was a prison way out on the prairie, and there was only grass all around it, except for three trees. One night, three of the prisoners escaped. They ran to the trees..."

The boy was scratching the tip of his nose with the tip of his thumb again. He grinned as he told the joke. Craig was grinning, too, amused at the boy's enthusiasm. The one's dimple was reflected in the other. Too many coincidences to be coincidental, but how could they be anything more?

The doorbell rang. Kara glanced up at the clock; it had only been half an hour. The boy was in mid-joke. "I'll get it," she told them, sliding from her chair and heading to the door.

It was Officer Garrenton again. "You're back early," Kara greeted her.

"A couple of extra officers swung by to mop up," Officer Garrenton explained. "How's Zechariah?"

"Everything's fine," Kara replied. "He's inside with my husband." She pointed to where Officer Garrenton could see Craig from behind and at an angle in the dining room, sitting across from the boy, whose grin widened as Craig laughed at his joke. They started in on another one.

"Good," Officer Garrenton nodded. "I was a little concerned by your reaction when I brought him home."

Kara had a decision to make. She glanced back at the boy sitting with her husband—and there were just too many coincidences surrounding him. "I was...confused, I guess," she told the other woman. "This is the first time Zach has ever shown up late, and with a police officer, no less. I'm sorry I worried you."

Officer Garrenton gave her an understanding smile. "I raised two rambunctious boys, always getting into some kind of trouble. There was more than one time I swore I didn't know them." Her smile turned wistful. "The oldest boy just gave me my first granddaughter. Cute little thing." She nodded toward Zach. "Don't worry, he will turn out fine. He's a delightful young man."

"Yes, he is," Kara agreed. "Thank you for stopping by, just to make sure."

"Anytime. Good night."

Kara watched as Officer Garrenton departed. Then she closed the door and fell back against it with her face in her hands. What had she just done? She hadn't said the boy was theirs. Nor would Officer Garrenton have believed her if she had said he wasn't.

She made her way back to the table, where she picked up the empty bowls and the spoons and carried them to the sink.

"Who was that?" Craig asked as his and the boy's mirth at the second joke subsided.

"That was Officer Garrenton, who brought Zach here. She was checking on him."

"And she left him here again?" Craig asked, incredulous. "What did you tell her?"

"I told her everything was fine."

"You let her think he belongs here?"

She looked over at the boy. He was watching intently, perhaps just a little apprehensive. "Craig," she suggested, "can we talk in the bedroom?"

"Yes, I think we should." Craig spoke to the boy. "Zach—we'll be right back."

Kara led Craig down the hall past the bathroom to their bedroom and closed the door.

Craig turned on her. "What were you _thinking?"_ he demanded in a loud whisper. "That boy is not ours! If a police officer brings him here and then takes off, that's one thing. But if she comes back and you let her think he belongs here—how is that different from kidnapping?"

Kara returned his volley. "That boy was not brought here by accident!"

"What? Do you think _God_ sent him here? Because his name happens to be—"

"Yes! Well, no, but _something_ is going on here. Somebody told him all about us. Even our middle names..."

"He could find that on the Internet."

"Our middle names? I doubt it. Anyway, he knew where the bathroom was without asking. And the glasses. And where to find Paws."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying someone sent him here on purpose!"

Craig considered. "Why would they do that?"

"I think he's related to us."

Craig tossed his head. "You can't be serious. He's ten years old and we've never even seen him before!"

"Look at this," Kara told him. She held up a finger for him to stay and slipped out the door to the hall. At the entryway, she picked up Craig's Little League photograph. The boy, twirling his ID card from its lanyard, looked over as she appeared.

She strode back to the bedroom with the photograph and thrust it into Craig's hand. "Who is this?" she asked.

"That's me, my Little Leag—" His mouth froze open mid-word. He saw it. He looked up at Kara and back down at the picture. "That's...remarkable."

"That's not all. You know how I always tease you about the way you scratch your nose with your thumb? He does it, too. I've never seen anyone else do that. And you know that look you give me when you've been out golfing with Derek instead of working?"

"He does that, too?"

"A convincing impression of it."

There was a pause. "So...you think he's related to us?" Craig asked.

Kara nodded. "That's the only explanation. And it has to be on your side of the family. Except—"

"Except what?"

"He chose the chocolate ice cream..."

"Every kid likes chocolate."

"He's also left-handed, like me. He held the spoon in his left hand."

"Some kids are. It's coincidence."

"Well, there have been a lot of coincidences in the last thirty minutes!"

"Kara, there is no way that boy can be our child!" Craig insisted.

"Of course he can't be ours, I know that! I couldn't maintain a pregnancy, and the embryos were low-quality... But don't you see why I say he has to be related to us somehow? It doesn't make any sense, but... Didn't one of your cousins have a kid about ten years ago?"

He nodded. "Elliott—at least, that was the rumor. And my sister, too, but we know her son. There's no way she had twins. And her kids don't look anything like me, anyway."

Kara frowned. "So maybe Elliott?"

"I don't know. Could be. Or another cousin. I have enough of them." He glanced down at the photograph again. "Pretty much has to be a cousin, but... There's no other way..." Craig was calculating again, working the problem. Suddenly his own eyes went wide, and there was fear behind them. "Kara, I promise you, I have never—"

She smiled and cut him off with a gentle hand flat on his chest. "I thought of that. But I would have known right away."

He grinned sheepishly. "That's true."

"So maybe a cousin."

Craig shrugged. "Maybe a cousin." He calculated a moment longer. "Did you ever tell anyone what middle name we chose for a boy?"

She tried to remember. Those hopeful conversations had been ten, twelve years ago and had long since been filed away. "I don't think so. First name, maybe. But not Timothy. We wanted to surprise my mom when we named him after my dad."

"I don't think I did, either. But we must have let it slip to someone on my side of the family..."

"We must have. Someone knew somehow. And they gave _our_ name to _their_ child!" She hadn't meant to allow that hint of bitterness into her voice. But it certainly reflected how she felt, now that she thought about it.

"You're right, he must be related to us." Craig suddenly looked tired, as if encumbered with a burden of responsibility he had not anticipated.

Kara took one of his hands in hers. "That's why I told Officer Garrenton that everything was fine."

"It's not."

"No, but if he's family, we need to at least keep him overnight. If he's hiding something—hey, he's ten years old. How long can he keep a secret?" She squeezed Craig's hand, as much from concentration as from affection. "And there's someone out there who sent him here on purpose. Even if it was his grandmother who died years ago, like he says, and he's just now come..."

"Why doesn't he tell us how to get him home?"

She lifted her free hand just a little, palm up. "Maybe he's scared to. Maybe he thinks we'll send him away, and he doesn't want to go back. Or maybe it's like he said—he has nowhere to go."

"Or maybe he just doesn't know. Maybe he thinks he came on his own."

"It would be hard for someone to send him here without him knowing."

Craig ran a hand through his hair and sighed. "All right, let's keep him here, just for tonight. I'll call Derek and tell him I need tomorrow off, and in the morning we can talk to Zach some more, figure out where to take him. Worst case scenario, we take him to the police department and explain what's going on."

Kara nodded silently. One night they could do.

Craig's forehead remained wrinkled in thought. He still seemed uneasy.

Kara shifted closer to him and wrapped her arms around his waist. "I don't know what else to do, either," she admitted. "But this is a good plan for tonight."

He pulled her against him, still holding the photograph of his younger self—or Zach, whichever it was—in one hand.

*****

"How do you feel about wearing a girl's shirt?" Kara inquired of the boy a few minutes later.

He sat on the edge of her bed, watching her shuffle through a stack of T-shirts in a drawer. She peeked over her shoulder at him, and he lifted his eyebrows uncertainly. "Is it pink?"

"If you like," she replied, amused. "I'm sure I have a pink one in here somewhere. Or I have blue, if you'd rather."

"Not pink," he said. "Blue's okay."

She tossed him a blue shirt and gray shorts. "There you go, then. They'll be big on you, but they'll fit better than Craig's. I'll get your clothes dried out and you can have them back in the morning."

The boy nodded, but didn't move. Strange—he just watched her...

"Oh!" she exclaimed suddenly. "Right—I'll just...go get the guestroom ready."

Then the boy moved, pulling his shoes off as Kara closed the door behind her. She stepped into the next room and chuckled. Kids. She really needed to spend more time with her nieces and nephew.

She looked around the room and groaned. "Craig, where are we going to put all of this stuff?" The guest bed was covered with landscaping tools and, she confessed to herself, a few of her own gardening supplies. There were tools spread across the floor, too. "I thought _I_ was supposed to be the messy one."

He replied from the den. "Hold on, I'm coming." A moment later he was there with her, surveying the challenge before them. "I was checking the Amber Alerts web site, just in case."

"Nothing there?"

"No qualifying children missing in the state of Washington," he said, scanning the room. "Wow, we picked up a lot of stuff at that sale."

_"You_ picked up. That was in February, Craig. It's been our live-in guest for three months. It's time for it to move out and get its own place."

"I've been meaning to sort through it. I guess now's as good a time as any."

"No, don't sort. Just relocate."

"Right. I'll put it in the shed."

"He's only ten—we should get him to bed before it gets much later." She rubbed a finger across a clear spot on the comforter and shook her head. "This is filthy, with all these tools on it. I'm going to pull the good quilt out for Zach." She headed to the cabinets in the hall as Craig began to gather up a load of the various items before him.

The boy, now clad in Kara's clothes, emerged from their bedroom after the first load and saw Craig picking up more tools. "Can I help?"

"Sure," Craig replied. "Grab whatever's on the bed and follow me."

Kara reached for the quilt on the top cabinet shelf as Craig and the boy slipped past her, arms full of saws and hand shovels. The boy had seemed relieved—but not surprised, exactly—when they had told him he could stay for the night. Kara had thought he might argue to stay longer, but he hadn't; in fact, he had offered to sleep on the floor, he wouldn't mind at all. They had assured him that he was welcome to their guest bed, once they unearthed it from all of Craig's treasures. Then he had offered to do the dishes or whatever they needed. He was eager to please, that was certain.

She was gathering clean sheets to go with the new comforter as the pair marched back into the guestroom for another load. "Craig, just set my garden tools out by the back—"

"OW!" Zach yelled.

Kara was in the room in an instant. "What happened?"

"He's okay." Craig was beside the boy before she was. The boy was bent over his clenched right hand, his face screwed up and eyes shut tightly. "He sliced his hand trying to pick up that saw. Never pick it up by the blade, pal."

"Like you didn't do the same thing just last week," she reminded Craig, who smiled abashedly. "Let me take a look, Zach."

Kara took the injured hand and tenderly pried the boy's fingers open. He winced at her touch. Blood smeared his palm and fingers. "Okay, let's go wash it off and see how bad it is."

She led the boy to the bathroom and turned on the faucet. "Here, put your hand in the water. It'll sting at first, and then the cold will take away some of the pain."

Hesitantly, with a glance up at her through eyes that were suddenly red, he placed his hand into the water, squeezing his eyes shut as it struck the wound and washed the blood away.

After a moment, Kara took his hand again and gently examined it. "Well, I don't think you'll die from it," she said.

"I'm glad," the boy answered through gritted teeth. "I like knowing I'm not dead yet."

Kara met his eyes in surprise. In spite of his pain, they teased back at her. She couldn't help but grin and tousle his hair.

He snuck a peek at his wound, where the cut crossed his middle three fingers on the palm side.

"Have you had your tetanus shots?" Craig asked from behind them.

"What are those?" Zach asked.

"Tetanus is a disease you can get from cutting yourself on metal. The shots give you a vaccine to stop it."

The boy looked anxiously from one adult to the other. "I don't know."

Kara drew a box of bandages from the cabinet. "You look pretty well-cared for to me. I bet you've had them. Nothing to worry about."

The boy patted his hand dry on a towel and opened and closed his fist a couple of times.

"Better?" Kara asked.

"Yeah. It still hurts, though."

"Okay. Let's get these bandages on there, one for each finger..." She situated the bandages over the wounds and the boy flexed his hand.

"It's better," he said.

"That-a-boy. Why don't you go help Craig again?"

He left the bathroom and Kara wiped up a couple of spots of red that had fallen onto the countertop. She gazed out the door after him, suddenly struck by the moment. _Parent for a night, by some weird twist of fate. I used to pray for a child to care for. If this boy needs to be here tonight for some reason, then I'm glad to stand in for his mother, bloody fingers and all. But I think I just did pretty well—so if I can do the job, God, why didn't you let us...?_

It was a futile line of thought, and selfish. _A lot of people's dreams get passed by in life. And I have plenty of other things to be thankful for._ That was a more virtuous thought. Still, the wrapping of those tender, young fingers left an ache.

*****

"You're right, it's a mess," Craig acknowledged.

Zach had just set the last load of tools on the shed floor. In some disarray already, the shed was now overflowing. Paws stepped carefully through the jumble, sniffing everything.

"Are you going to use all this stuff?" Zach asked.

Craig nodded. "A lot of it, anyway. I have a landscaping and yard care business, so things like this"—he held up a pair of loppers as an example—"come in handy. Anything that can cut, dig, rake..."

"Is this a chainsaw?" Zach picked up an old gas-powered device and examined the teeth on its blade.

"A hedge trimmer, for trimming bushes. It's not made for thick limbs. So its teeth are different, see? This is a chainsaw over here." Craig lifted the latter out of a pile and set it atop the clutter. If either of them worked—they looked as if they'd been gathering dust for a decade—it alone would be worth much of the little he'd paid for this whole collection of stuff.

Zach set the hedge trimmer back down. "You don't believe you're my dad, do you?"

His forthrightness impressed Craig. "No. Should I?"

The youngster considered. "Mom doesn't believe me because I didn't...you know, come out of her tummy."

"That does make it hard to believe."

Zach was silent for a moment, working the problem. And not letting it upset him. Good for him. Paws sauntered over to stand by his leg, and Zach rubbed the yellow dog's back.

Craig stepped outside the shed and leaned against its rough exterior. Paws and Zach followed. "So, Zach... If we're not your parents, who's your next best guess?"

"I don't have another guess," he answered. "You're the only people Grandmother ever told me about. But I think she was right."

"You do? Why?"

"Because of my name. You said I have the name you wanted to give me. I mean, give your son."

"Maybe it's just a coincidence."

"But I have the same name _and_ Grandmother said I was your son. And Mom—"

"Kara."

"Yeah—she said I look like your picture. So did the police officer." There was a little more stress in his voice this time. Was he nervous or just thinking hard? He made good eye contact; if he was lying about any of this, he was doing a convincing job.

Craig folded his arms. "Hmm." Another thought struck him. "Why did you come here _today?_ Why not yesterday or tomorrow?"

"Because today was the nanny's last day."

"Right, you said that. So why did she quit today? Why not go back to Mexico last week? Did she tell you?"

"She said the money ran out, so it was time to go," he reported.

"Who was paying her?"

"Grandfather. But after he died, the money started to run out."

"So she headed back home and left you here in Seattle all by yourself."

"Yeah."

"Did she tell you to come here to us?" Craig asked.

"No. She already knew I was going to."

"How did she know?"

"I told her. So she said goodbye when she dropped me off at school this morning."

"And that's it?"

"Yeah."

"Do you know how we can call her or find her before she goes back to Mexico?"

"No," Zach said. "She said she was leaving this morning."

What kind of person just left the child under her care at school and said goodbye? What kind of person didn't contact the folks she knew the child would reach out to? How come this story seemed so reasonable the way this boy talked about it, yet made no sense?

Kara called from the side door. "Craig? I have the guestroom ready."

"All right, we're coming," he replied.

Paws led the way back to the house, across the wet grass. It was fully dark now; this being early May, the sun was setting a little later each evening. It must be nine o'clock already. Kara would say the night was still young.

Paws gave way reluctantly at the door. He knew better than to bring his wet feet into Kara's kitchen uninvited. Zach and Craig wiped their shoes on the mat outside the door, then made their way to the guestroom. It was neat and tidy again, the queen-size bed fully made now, the upholstered sitting chair in one corner now free of junk, a desk with matching chair under the window, small lamps giving light from brackets on the wall over the bed.

Kara looked up as they entered. "Are you wet again?" she asked Zach. His hair was damp from the misty rain outside. "You really are part fish. At least this time you're not dripping." She waved him into the room. "Everything's set. You can sleep on the floor if you want to, but the bed is softer."

He eyed the bed with awe. "I've never slept on a bed that big."

Craig motioned toward it. "It's yours. Don't get used to it, though—it's only for one night."

With a glance at Kara, Craig moved to the bed and patted the edge of it. "Hop up here, Zach." He pulled the desk chair over for himself and sat down. "Let's talk."

Zach jumped up on the bed and sat facing the adults with his legs dangling off the edge, his hand gauging the spring of the mattress. Kara sat down cross-legged on the floor in front of him, to Craig's left.

"So here's what I'm thinking, Zach," Craig began. "Wherever you came from this morning, we're really not supposed to have you here."

The boy listened, eyes fixed on Craig.

"I don't think we would be in trouble, since a police officer brought you, but if we keep you past tonight, we could be. And look, if you ran away from home"—Zach didn't flinch; Craig had thought he might hit a nerve there—"then you could be in some trouble, too, maybe."

"Which is why we need to know where you came from and how to get you back there safely," Kara continued. "I feel terrible thinking that your mom and dad might be out there searching for you right now, wondering if you're lost or hurt or even alive."

Zach still didn't flinch. "I understand."

"But you still say you're our son?" Kara asked.

He nodded.

"So, Zach," Craig instructed after a moment's awkward silence, "get yourself a good night's sleep, and tomorrow we'll need you to tell us everything about yourself until we know what to do with you."

"Even if it takes all day," Kara added.

"Okay," Zach replied. "But I have to go to school first."

"Oh! Right," Craig managed. "Tomorrow's Friday. I hadn't even thought about school."

"We're not used to having kids sleep over on a school night," Kara confessed. "What time does school start?"

"8:45."

"All right," Craig said. "Your school's only two blocks from here. We'll have you there in plenty of time."

"Okay."

Kara stood up. "Is there anything you need before bed, Zach?"

"I don't think so."

"Okay then, under the covers."

The youngster pulled his shoes off and set them neatly on the floor at the foot of the bed. Leaving his shirt and socks on, he crawled across the bed, pulled the blankets back, and slid underneath them.

Craig replaced his chair and went to stand by the door as Kara moved to Zach's bedside.

She straightened the covers around him, then reached out and rumpled his damp hair. "Good night, Fish. We'll be in the next room if you need anything. And, obviously, you know where the bathroom is."

Zach looked quite comfortable under the covers. "Good night," he returned. He propped himself up on one elbow. "This is a great bed!"

"I'm glad you like it," Kara said with a smile. "Sleep well. It was nice to meet you tonight, Mr. Zechariah Timothy Fleming."

Craig flipped the light switch off as Kara met him at the door. "'Night, Zach," he said as they exited.

From the hall they made their way to the den and collapsed together on the couch. "You know what we need to do, Kara?" Craig said. "It's simple. All we need to do is go to the school tomorrow and get his contact information. We could say he stayed at our place last night, but we can't find his parents' phone number. That would be true, more or less."

"Do you think they'd give it to us? Schools have to be careful about privacy rules."

"If we take him into the office with us, maybe they'll trust us. Or maybe they would make the call for us."

"Okay. It's worth a shot." She slid next to him, pulled him toward her, and kissed him on the forehead. "What a bizarre evening. I'm going to get ready for bed and maybe read a bit. Are you coming?"

Craig stifled a yawn. "You know, what if Zach ran away from home and thinks we're going to take him back tomorrow? He might try to sneak out during the night."

"And then if the police come looking for him here tomorrow..."

"Right—that would be a problem. So I think I'll sack out on the couch tonight. That way if he tries to leave, I'll hear him and wake up."

"He seems determined enough to stay here that I doubt he'll try to run away, but okay. Better safe than sorry. I'll grab you a blanket."

With that, they set about making their bedtime preparations. Craig's mind raced through every avenue he could think of for determining which of his relatives might be Zach's mother or father. _Grant?_ Possibly. He lived somewhere in the area, though not in Seattle proper. _Marie?_ Not likely, but she did tend to keep secrets. He didn't know any of his cousins very well. What were the odds that there might be a picture of a young Zach hidden somewhere in the family photo albums? No, that was extremely improbable. Had they ever met a Zach in the family, Craig and Kara would have remembered.

Kara brought him a blanket, then said good night and left to read in bed. Craig stretched out on the couch, not to sleep yet, but to think through his options.

*****

In the guestroom, Zach snuggled under the luxurious covers, measuring the comforter's thickness between a finger and thumb. His injured fingers didn't hurt now unless he thought about them.

He liked it here. Kara and Craig were great. He loved calling them Mom and Dad, and meaning it. He could understand their confusion, all the more since Mom had never gotten...round and fat. But she _looked_ right—like she really could be his mother. And she was pretty funny, too, calling him Fish. So was Dad. Maybe Dad knew some good jokes. He probably did.

The bed was so amazingly soft that Zach wanted to stay awake and just enjoy it. He rolled back and forth a couple of times, savoring the smoothness of the bed sheets, feeling the warmth collect under the blankets. Finding a particularly cozy spot, he closed his eyes, just for a moment. Before he could open them again, he was asleep.
Chapter 3

Thin gloves, clean and black, fingered a windowsill outside the Fleming home in the predawn darkness. Light was just beginning to seep through the clouds and rain, hinting that morning might finally drain away the night. It was as dark inside as out, but the black-gloved figure, peering through the window, could make out enough to see that the guestroom cluttered with tools less than twenty-four hours ago had been cleaned out. Whether a child-sized shape lay in the bed he could not tell, but it didn't matter. The room had been cleared, and that was all the information the figure needed.

They had kept the boy.

Satisfied—thrilled, actually—the figure slipped back from the window and into the shadows. His mind was already working to determine his next goal, provided that his plan continued to proceed well.

There was one person who could thwart his plan. He was far away for now, but would not stay away forever. What would the figure do when that man returned?

That question was easily answered: blackmail. He would threaten to turn the man in to the authorities. Granted, that would mean turning himself in as well, but it would be no idle threat; despite his aversion to men and women with badges, he would make good on the threat if forced to. But that other man would not force him to; that man stood to lose too much. The mere _threat_ of blackmail would be sufficient.

The figure continued to refine his plans as he moved stealthily through the neighborhood. There were others—in addition to the one who could thwart him—who needed to pay for what they had done. Could he find out who they were? Probably. Then he would set about making things right, at least as well as he could. Even Robin Hood couldn't solve every ill of society, but he could fix some of them, make some things better.

The figure smiled to himself. His morning was off to a great start. His plan, in its opening phase, was proceeding well. They had kept the boy.

*****

Kara, wrapped in her bathrobe, her feet in slippers, noted that the guestroom door was still shut as she padded from her bedroom to the den Friday morning. That was good; the boy was still asleep. At the end of the hall, she spotted a porcelain bell dangling from the front doorknob. Craig's idea? She found her husband stretched out on the couch, the blanket bunched around his legs. She thought she was moving noiselessly, but he sensed her presence and shifted, lifting one eyelid halfway.

She knelt down beside him. "Hey, noble sentry," she said in a low voice, leaning over to kiss him on the forehead. The gray light of another cloudy morning drifted in through the den's picture window.

Craig sucked in a deep, waking-up breath and pulled himself upright, blanket still wrapped around him. "I hope you got more sleep than I did." He rubbed at his eyes.

"I slept okay. Did Zach get up during the night?"

"I didn't hear anything. Would've, too. I woke up every ten minutes."

"Sorry." She touched his arm consolingly. "What's the bell for?"

"For if he tried to go out the front while I was sleeping." Craig yawned and stood up.

Kara nodded. "I'll go check on him."

She tiptoed back to the hall, turned the guestroom doorknob slowly, and peeked inside. The bed sheets were rumpled and the comforter pushed off to one side, but the boy—he was gone.

She stepped over to the bathroom. He wasn't there, either. She glanced into her bedroom, but it was empty; so was the laundry room. "Zach?" she called, not too loudly, as she strode back toward the entryway.

Craig had moved to the kitchen. He met her eyes, already calculating. "He's not there?"

She shook her head.

"Oh, boy," he groaned. "I'll check the back yard, you check the garage."

They hurried to scan their areas, but met back in the kitchen moments later with grim faces. "Should we call the police?" Craig asked.

"Well, not yet. Did you look in the shed?"

"No." Craig moved back toward the side door.

"I'll check out front," Kara offered. She pulled the front door open—why was it unlocked? "Oh!"

The boy was sitting on the front step, watching the neighborhood. He looked up pleasantly as Kara appeared. "Hi, Mom," he said.

The words came so genuinely from his mouth that it took her a moment to fully register them. They stung—not intentionally, of course. It was just that they sounded so agreeable without her meaning for them to.

Rain was still falling lightly. Judging by the puddles and the general dampness everywhere, it must have rained all night. The boy's feet were bare and stretched out into the rain. At least the rest of him was dry.

"Zechariah," she began in a mothering tone that made her blink in surprise; how had she acquired that tone so readily? "What are you doing out here?"

He bit his lip, his eyes widening. "I'm sorry," he answered apologetically. "I thought it would be okay." His look wasn't Craig's falsely-penitent look he had displayed last night; this time the boy was genuinely concerned that he had done something wrong.

"No, it's all right," she assured him, "but we were worried when we couldn't find you. We just needed to know where you were."

He processed that information and relaxed. He gazed out across the street again. "I like being outside," he said. "I never got to go outside at home—my old home, I mean."

On a whim, Kara pulled her slippers off and handed them to Craig, who had come up behind her. He received them and stationed himself beside the door to listen. Pulling her robe tight around her, she sat down on the step next to the boy and stretched her bare feet out parallel to his. "Why couldn't you go outside?"

He splashed a foot in a tiny puddle of water on the sidewalk before them. "Grandfather wouldn't let me. It was one of his rules. One time we lived in a house with a big fence in the back, and I could play in the back yard if the nanny came with me. But not if Grandfather was there. He never came outside. So I had to stay inside."

"Oh. What about the front yard?"

"Never. It was against the rules."

Kara nodded thoughtfully. Maybe something would come of this gentle probing. "Did you ever sneak out?"

"No. If I didn't break any rules, I could have ice cream on Saturdays."

"Chocolate?"

"Usually. But I like other kinds, too. I just like chocolate the best." He stilled the one foot and began splashing the other.

"Zach, can I ask you something?" Kara asked.

The boy looked up at her. His hair was messed up and bent funny from his sleep, but he was still a beautiful child—all the more so for looking like he had just awakened, though he could have been out here for an hour already for all Kara knew.

"What would you have done if you couldn't find us? Or if we had turned out to be mean?"

The boy got that calculating look in his eyes that Craig got so often. He was facing her, but not seeing her at the moment. "I knew you wouldn't be mean."

"How did you know?" She sensed Craig shifting, leaning a little further out the door to catch their words.

The boy's eyes refocused on hers. "Grandmother used to tell me about you. She always said you were nice. She said Dad was strong and worked really hard."

"How did she know that?"

"I don't know."

Kara propped her elbow on one knee, chin on her hand. "So, what if she had been wrong? What was plan B?"

"Plan B?"

"Your backup plan. What would you have done next?"

"I didn't have another plan."

"You would have just stayed with us, even if we were mean?"

"I just knew you wouldn't be."

"Hmm." Behind her, Craig coughed into his hand. She looked over her shoulder at him; he pointed at his watch. "Oh, right. Zach, we'd better get you ready for school."

"Okay," he said, and he stood up—in the rain. He looked up and let it hit him in the face.

"Need to wet your scales a bit?"

The boy grinned. "I like it here," he said. "You don't get mad if I go out in the rain."

Kara pondered that comment a moment. How isolated, how regulated, had this boy's family kept him? It wasn't really any of her business, but it made her sad. Still, a little rain before school was enough. "I might be perturbed, though, if you get sick from sitting out here with bare feet and no jacket."

Taking him gently by both shoulders, she steered him around Craig and into the house. He stiffened when she touched him, but allowed her to direct him.

"Your own clothes are dry. I'll bring them in a second," she said as he headed toward the guestroom.

Before she followed him, she leaned over to Craig. "You didn't sleep much last night, huh?" she teased, patting his ribs playfully with the back of her hand. "Would've heard that bell for sure?"

Craig grimaced. "Maybe it's broken," he suggested. He stepped back inside, pulled the bell off the doorknob, and jiggled it. It rang just fine.

*****

As Kara fetched Zach's clothes, Craig dressed himself and went to the kitchen to start breakfast. Zach appeared before Kara did, sporting his own jeans and orange T-shirt again. He climbed onto one of the two stools beside the stand-alone counter and observed Craig, who was just putting the finishing touches on a skillet-full of scrambled eggs.

"What are you making?" Zach asked.

"My specialty," Craig replied grandly. "Breakfast. What do you like?"

The youngster eyed the eggs in the skillet. "I like those."

"Scrambled eggs? That'll work." Craig flipped some of the eggs upside-down. "How about oatmeal?" He set down his spatula and retrieved plates for himself and Zach. A single bowl of oatmeal sat waiting near the microwave.

"I've never had it," Zach answered.

Kara came into the room just then. "Oh, you should try some." She shot a teasing smile at Craig, who rolled his eyes.

"Don't do it, Zach," he warned. "It's not worth it."

Zach looked from one adult to the other. "You don't like oatmeal?" he asked Craig.

"Well, let's put it this way," Craig said as Kara set her bowl warming in the microwave. "If you liked oatmeal, that would be strong evidence that you're not related to me."

"And if you _didn't_ like it, I don't see how you could be related to _me,"_ Kara added.

"I could try some," Zach offered.

"A brave man." Craig saluted him with the spatula in his hand. He pulled a second bowl from the cabinet. "I'll give you a little. Since you know where the glasses are, why don't you grab some for us? And the juice in the fridge."

A minute later breakfast was served: oatmeal for Kara and Zach, plates full of eggs for Zach and Craig, and toast and orange juice for everyone.

"All right, Zach, give us the verdict," Craig encouraged, motioning toward the boy's oatmeal.

Zach dipped his spoon into the dish and sniffed it before lifting it to his mouth. He wrinkled his brows at the strange aroma, but took a bite anyway. He cocked his head to one side. "It's okay," he decided. "But I like eggs better."

"Looks like a draw," Craig declared. "He neither loves it nor despises it."

Kara scoffed. "That's not a draw! Clearly he decided in favor of the oatmeal, even if it's not his first choice. You'll have to try it with raisins sometime, Zach. There's nothing better than oatmeal with raisins in the morning."

"Better to stick with the eggs," Craig cautioned in a low tone. "Spare yourself the suffering."

Zach grinned at their bantering. He dug into his eggs, throwing in an occasional bite of oatmeal for good measure.

Kara looked over at Craig. "Did you call Derek?"

"Mm-hmm. I told him a family issue came up." Kara gave him a quizzical look. _"Extended_ family. I told him I'd explain later."

Kara nodded. "So, Zach," she said, turning to the youngster, "we'll need to talk with someone in the office when we take you to school."

Craig scooped up some eggs with his fork. "We're going to see if we can get in touch with your family. The school should have your contact information."

Zach gave a heavy sigh. "Okay," he muttered.

"What was that?" Kara inquired, narrowing her eyes. "Do you have a better suggestion?"

The youngster frowned and shrugged. "I guess not." He took another bite of his eggs. "It's just that if you do find my home, nobody will be there." He chewed a moment. "But at least we could get my other clothes."

"Just clothes?" Craig asked. "What about toys, video games, other stuff...?"

"I don't have anything else," Zach said. "A few books, that's about all. And a radio."

Craig looked at Zach with a degree of wonder. _Is he making all of this up, or is it true?_ He couldn't tell. The youngster's story was consistent, so far. But who would keep a kid caged up inside all day with nothing but a few books—yet send him to school? The pieces Craig had didn't fit together. Absently, he pushed his food around his plate with his fork, puzzled.

"Can we play that game again?" Zach asked with sudden interest.

"What game?" Kara responded.

"The one Dad and I played last night, where one person asks questions really fast, and the other one has to answer them really fast."

"Call me Craig," Craig told the youngster, "since I'm not actually your dad. What should I ask you about?"

"I want to ask _you_ questions," Zach said.

"Oh—all right. Go ahead." Craig cleared his mouth with a swallow of orange juice.

"Okay... When is your birthday?"

"October 21. I was due to be born on Halloween, but I came early, and on Halloween my mom dressed me up as a pirate."

"What's your favorite color?"

"Blue. Did you know some trees are blue?"

Kara gave a snort and rolled her eyes.

Zach missed the joke, of course. "Yeah, I've seen them. How did you get a weird middle name like Herbert?"

This time Craig snorted. "It's not weird. Lots of people are named Herbert. I was named after my mother's father, Herbert Lewis."

"How old is Paws?"

"He's—" Craig had to look to Kara for help.

"Four years old," she inserted between bites of oatmeal.

"That's 28 in dog years," Craig added.

"What if I am your son and you just don't know it?" Zach asked.

Craig stared for a moment; this boy had understood Craig's intent last night, and now he was using the game to his advantage. Fair enough.

"Hmm," Craig began, thinking. "Zach, it's...complicated...to explain why that's not possible." The boy's gaze did not falter. "All right, for the sake of argument... If you were my son, I'd have a lot of learning to do. Kara and I would be ten years behind. And then—well, I'd want to know where you've been all these years. And _then"_ —Craig paused for dramatic effect—"you'd be in huge trouble for not showing up earlier!" He feigned irritation, and Zach's eyes went wide. The youngster looked to Kara, and she instinctively gave him a comforting smile. Craig chuckled, and after a moment the boy smiled uncertainly.

Zach had another question ready. "Why couldn't you and Mom have kids?"

That one caught Craig by surprise. He gave a slow exhale and looked at Kara, who gave him permission with a sober nod. But how do you explain such things to a ten-year-old? "Well, see...the baby has to grow inside the mother, but the doctors couldn't get it to grow in there. Couldn't even get it to start. It wasn't her fault..." He offered Kara a supportive look.

She took up the story. "We don't really know what the problem was. There may have been something wrong with the cells my body would use to make a baby." She hesitated, pacing herself with a deep breath. "At first, when we tried to have a baby, it didn't work. A couple of years later, though, I started feeling sick, just like pregnant women do. I went to the doctor, and sure enough, I was pregnant! It was exciting...and scary. But the baby didn't live..." Her throat tightened up, and she couldn't continue.

"The baby died," Craig finished. "A miscarriage. It was still really tiny. There was some kind of problem with the baby—probably the cells it was growing from, the embryo."

"But we thought since I got pregnant once, maybe I could again—maybe the baby would live this time. So we tried, but nothing happened. Then we went to some doctors who help people have babies, and they tried to help us, but it didn't work. And they could never figure out why."

Zach listened silently. Craig could see him working the problem in his mind, trying to find some way he could still be their son. He wasn't, and there was no way around it, but he had not yet accepted that fact. So where _had_ this youngster come from? Thankfully, they would find some answers at the school shortly.

Kara stood suddenly, wiping one eye as she took her dishes to the sink. "We should get there a few minutes early. Down the hatch with the rest of that, Zach." She motioned toward the last of his food.

"I think I do like the oatmeal," he told her as he swallowed the last bite. "Could I try some again tomorrow? With raisins?"

"The likelihood of you being here tomorrow is very slim," Craig replied.

Kara smiled. "But we might like it if you came over to visit sometime—preferably dry and without a police officer."

*****

When they arrived at the school, the boy hopped out of the car first, the ID tag on its orange lanyard bouncing against his chest. He himself bounced with energy.

"You're pretty excited, Zach," Kara observed as she stepped out of the car onto the damp asphalt. "You like school?"

The boy grinned. "Yeah, I get to go outside here."

Kara shot Craig a perplexed look. Had this child really been so cooped up that going to school was rewarding for the opportunity to go outside?

"And I'm the only kid whose parents have never come to the school." He beamed up at them. "But not anymore."

Kara glanced at Craig, sharing an uncertain look.

"Take us to the office," Craig directed. The boy stepped ahead to lead them. Craig took Kara's hand as they followed. "This is awkward," he whispered, eyeing several parents with their children moving to and fro in the parking lot. "I feel out of place."

"Fish out of water?" Kara asked. That was how she felt.

"More like a giraffe in a fish costume, trying to blend in," Craig remarked.

Kara nodded. This was other people's turf, not hers and Craig's. A worrisome thought struck her. "Craig, what if we request his family's contact information, but they ask us for his parents' names?"

Craig gulped. "'Mr. and Mrs. Fleming,' maybe?"

Kara frowned doubtfully at him.

"I don't know. Tell them the truth?"

"That we think he's some unknown relative the police brought by last night and left with us? That he says we're his parents, but we're not?"

Craig shot her a worried look as they approached the front doors. "They're not going to buy that, are they?"

"I wouldn't."

He gulped again.

They followed the boy inside the building and abruptly found themselves surrounded by students who flowed around them like rapids around rocks and were just as loud. Through another door they escaped into the relative quiet of the office. Three teachers chatted in an adjacent room while a lone secretary worked at the long counter, talking on the phone and helping a girl a couple of years younger than Zach at the same time.

Another boy, quite blond and about Zach's age, wearing glasses, entered behind them. "Hi, Zach!" he said as he approached the counter and handed a pink paper to the secretary.

"Guess what, Cayden!" Zach announced with excitement. "These are my parents!"

Cayden looked up and noticed them for the first time. "Awesome! Can Zach come to my house?" he asked Craig.

"Er," Craig began.

Kara spoke up. "Actually, we have a couple of...family issues we need to work out first."

"That's okay," Cayden returned. "The nannies always tell him no, but I thought since you're his actual mom and dad, maybe you could say yes sometime, if you want to."

"Yeah, hmm, that's...er, something to think on," Kara replied with an uneasy smile that wrinkled her nose. "We'll talk with Zach about it."

Cayden left the room satisfied, and Craig sneaked Kara a relieved thumbs-up.

A few seconds later the secretary, a few years younger than Kara and heavier-set, though it suited her well, completed her call and turned to them. "Good morning, Zach," she greeted the boy. "Who is this with you?"

Kara saw Craig gear up to speak, but the boy beat him to it. "This is my mom and dad!" he declared happily.

The secretary stopped dead, her smile morphing into an open-mouthed stare. "Oh, my goodness!" she declared. "It is, isn't it? I mean, obviously—you look just like him. But it can't be! Oh—what a pleasure to meet you!" She reached across the counter to shake both Kara's and Craig's hands vigorously. "I'm Mrs. James. I'm so sorry Mr. Lopez isn't here—he and Mrs. Miloski, the counselor, are at the district office this morning. They would absolutely love to meet you!"

"Mr. Lopez?" Craig queried weakly, taken aback by her enthusiasm. Kara waved a finger toward an adjacent office marked with the name, "Javier Lopez, Principal." "Oh, right," Craig said simply.

"So, wow... What can I do for you?" Mrs. James gushed.

Kara looked over to Craig. He had regained himself and was calculating. It would be awkward, now that the boy had introduced them as his parents, to ask for his real family's contact information. The boy had blown their cover—except that the only cover they'd had was the truth.

Craig spoke before Kara could think what to say. "We, er, need to check Zach's contact information. We think somebody might be trying to, er, use our identity for some reason. Maybe a relative of ours."

Mrs. James nodded and pivoted toward her computer terminal. "No problem. You know, my uncle had the same thing happen last year—his ex used his name and stole seven hundred dollars from his bank account..."

"I doubt he had quite the same thing happen," Craig mumbled in Kara's ear.

Mrs. James pulled up the boy's information. "Here it is—Zechariah Fleming, fourth grade, parents Craig and Kara Fleming, 6050 Spindler Avenue..."

Kara's mouth fell open. Mrs. James went on to give their phone numbers and even Craig's email address. She suddenly felt as dazed as she had last night, when Officer Garrenton had pointed to that photo of Craig. A haze of futile denial clouded her thoughts. The school's records listed them as his parents and confirmed that he lived with them. This was simply not possible! _The names might belong to some other couple—it could happen... But our address, phone numbers, email? Craig and Kara Fleming, parents of Zechariah Timothy Fleming, the boy who looks like Craig and knew where the bathroom was without looking for it?_

Craig's face mirrored her astonishment. They both turned to the boy, who shrugged as if to say, _"What did you expect?"_

"That can't—" Craig began. "Are you sure that's right?"

Mrs. James repeated the address. "I can change it if it's incorrect."

"No, that's our address," Craig confirmed. "It's just—oh, brother," he groaned to Kara, "this just got a lot more complicated."

Mrs. James raised her eyebrows.

"It has to be a relative," Kara mused darkly; she couldn't think of another explanation; "someone who knows an awful lot about us." Craig nodded, as bewildered as she was.

The secretary looked on with brows now furrowed.

"Mrs. James," the boy spoke up, "can I take my mom and dad to meet Ms. Faber?"

Craig exchanged another nervous glance with Kara.

"Of course, Zach," Mrs. James encouraged, "she would love that." To Craig and Kara she added, "Will you come back later and meet Mr. Lopez?"

"It's...always good to meet your child's principal," Craig replied noncommittally.

Taking that as agreement, Mrs. James smiled and waved goodbye to Zach.

The boy led Kara and Craig out the door and down the hall, past the first few classrooms and to the right, into an adjoining hall. Kara peeked up at Craig as they followed. "Good job," she whispered. "That was quick _and_ diplomatic."

He puffed out his cheeks in response. "I thought it was awkward _before_ we came inside. Kara, the school thinks he's our son!"

"They and the police both," she moaned. "Why is it so hard to just say we're not his parents?" She carefully kept her voice low enough that the boy wouldn't hear.

A troop of girls rushed by, exchanging greetings with Zach, who ducked into an open doorway to his right a moment later. "Hi, Mrs. Marzo!" he said.

"Good morning, young Zach," a large, roundish woman inside replied. "Pizza today!" The school kitchen surrounded her, and an appetizing aroma wafted from the room as she moved a large pan of food from one counter to another.

"She's the cook," he explained to Craig and Kara as they resumed their course through the hall. "And that's Ms. Faulkner, the librarian," he added, pointing to a woman about Kara's age striding ahead of them and in the same direction.

Two teachers, both men, wished the boy a good morning as he passed them. With a smile and a wave, he greeted them, and Craig nodded to them. Kara distinctly heard their conversation falter as she and Craig trailed the boy, and thought she felt their eyes following them.

The young crowd around them thinned as they made their way further down the hall. The boy peeked inside a custodian's closet standing open. "Mr. Newstone?" he asked.

"Nope, just me, Zach," a voice answered. A man in his early twenties, with strawberry-blond hair and goatee and green eyes, emerged from the closet, holding a push broom. He noticed Craig and Kara and took a step back, startled. Regaining himself, he offered them his hand. "Sorry, I wasn't expecting tall people. Eddie, night custodian."

"Not today, though," the boy announced. "Sometimes he works in the morning."

"Mr. Newstone's the day guy," Eddie explained. "He's out of town." With his free hand, he pushed the boy's head away playfully. "This little tyke here likes to pester the custodians."

"I'm not a little tyke!" the boy protested. "I'm ten!"

"Ten's pretty little to me," Eddie teased. "But that's okay. You're big enough to work. Take this broom and go sweep the cafeteria."

"No way!" the boy laughed. Then he narrowed his eyes. "Maybe if you do my homework for me."

"No deal," Eddie returned. "I'll stick with the easy stuff."

The school bell rang, and the boy jumped. "Bye, Mr. Eddie!" he called, waving as he rushed down the hall, beckoning Kara and Craig to follow.

"You have a good son there," Eddie whispered, leaning toward Craig and watching the boy depart. Then he reddened. "Sorry—I assume you're his parents." He blushed even more and looked sheepishly up at Craig. "A dumb thing to say, huh? I mean, there's really no question. He looks just like you."

Craig and Eddie both seemed trapped in the awkward moment until Kara broke in. "You're right, he's a great kid. Nice to meet you, Eddie." She smiled politely, and she and Craig slipped away after the boy.

He was waiting for them at his classroom. "I feel like we're at a family reunion," Craig whispered to Kara. "If we stay much longer, Zach might introduce us to the whole school."

"For him, these people _are_ his family," Kara observed.

The boy led them in to his teacher, a tall woman with graying hair and beauty wrinkles around her eyes. She was leaning over a girl's desk, talking her through an assignment.

The boy rushed up to her. "Ms. Faber, meet my mom and dad!"

"Zach, it's not polite to interru—" Looking up at them suddenly, she forgot the girl and rushed over to them with open arms. "You cannot be Zach's parents!" she welcomed them.

_That's certainly true,_ Kara said to herself.

"Please, come in!" the teacher went on. "I'm Ms. Faber."

"Craig Fleming," Craig introduced himself, "and my wife, Kara."

"Oh my, you really do exist!" the teacher exclaimed. As she spoke, a girl seated almost directly behind Ms. Faber poked the boy beside her with a pencil. "Mika, put the pencil down!" Ms. Faber ordered. Mika, startled that she had been spotted behind the teacher's back, obeyed instantly.

Ms. Faber turned her attention back to Kara, Craig, and Zach. "Zach has mentioned you to us, but unless I'm mistaken, I'm the first of his teachers to ever get to speak with you in person! Or maybe at all..." She paused, anticipating a reply.

"It's, er, good to be here," Craig returned uncomfortably.

Kara couldn't find any words. Police officers and school teachers thought she was this boy's mother... The school's records confirmed it...

"Is this what you've been so excited about, Zach?" Ms. Faber asked the boy.

He nodded earnestly.

"He's been so distracted these past few days," Ms. Faber told Craig and Kara, "but he wouldn't say why. Now, Zach, it all makes sense."

The boy beamed with satisfaction.

"We're just getting started," Ms. Faber said, waving a hand toward the class. "The students are working on their opening assignment, so I have a few minutes free. Can we talk?"

"Well, I think—" Kara began.

"Can I show them my desk?" the boy interrupted.

"If you like," Ms. Faber answered.

The boy began to lead them toward it, but Kara hung back. "I think I _will_ talk with Ms. Faber for just a minute, Zach," she decided. Craig gave her a supportive nod and trailed behind the boy to the far side of the room.

"Thanks for coming in," Ms. Faber said quietly to Kara. Her eyes followed the boy. "Zach is a fine student. But we've always been concerned about his home life, ever since he started kindergarten." She waited patiently for Kara to speak.

"Truth be told," Kara replied, "Craig and I are concerned about that, too. I guess you know we've been rather"—she searched for a diplomatic word, truthful but revealing nothing—"disconnected..."

"Of course," the teacher nodded. "His grandparents. And the nannies. I understand his grandmother passed away some time ago. Ever since he started school, he's had this dream of being with the two of you again. We thought it was just a sign of trouble at home, wanting to be away from his grandfather—but," she indicated Kara with both hands, "here you are!"

"Yes," Kara smiled nervously, "here we are."

"Some children's parents aren't able to raise them at first; some never can. We've always wondered about Zach's situation." Ms. Faber looked hopefully to Kara for an answer.

Kara bit her lower lip. "I'm afraid I can't say much about that—there could be, er, legal implications. But Craig and I are starting to ask questions about his upbringing, too. Something has been going on that we weren't aware of, and we're worried about him. That's why we're here. Maybe you've noticed something? Something unusual?" There. Perhaps that would draw out information that could help pin down who his parents might be and how he had come to her and Craig—if Ms. Faber knew anything.

The teacher eyed her curiously and beckoned Kara to her desk in one corner of the room. They each drew up a chair in relative privacy from the ears of the students. Kara glanced over at Craig, who was receiving a tour of the classroom and seemed to be enjoying brief exchanges with the boy and his classmates.

Ms. Faber lowered her voice. "Something _has_ been going on. I don't know what. His grades are okay, but not for him. They would be better if he turned his homework in consistently. And," she whispered, "that's what got me worried. He always did his homework until January."

"What happened in January?" Kara asked.

Ms. Faber thought for a moment, hands in her lap. "Zach's previous teachers told me they've seen this before—sudden changes in his behavior maybe once, twice a year, ever since kindergarten. He will turn moody and stay that way for weeks, or he will suddenly break out of it and be his lighthearted self again for a while."

Kara folded her hands, interlacing her fingers. "Hmm."

Ms. Faber cocked her head. "Surely his nannies have mentioned this to you."

Kara felt trapped for a moment. "We've...really not had good communication with the nannies, or with his grandparents." Yes—nothing untrue there, but sufficiently vague. "So, since January..."

"He's been more down than usual—not everyday, but often enough. He forgets his homework, he interacts less with his friends..." She shook her head. "He's such a sociable child by nature that it's been obvious something was wrong."

Her eyes pleaded with Kara for an explanation, but Kara could only offer a sad frown in return. "Did he ever talk about his grandfather?"

"He mentioned that he had passed away."

"Yes," Kara confirmed, "that's our understanding." What had the boy told her about him? "His grandfather was often out of the country—that didn't help with communication any." Another vague, elusive truth.

"I see. I'm so sorry for your loss." Ms. Faber thought back. "Zach told me about his passing a month ago. He didn't seem disturbed by it at the time, but I thought afterward that it must have been his grandfather's declining health that was bothering him."

She leaned forward in her chair. "And then his mood improved abruptly just this week. He was one child on Friday when he went home, and a totally different child when he arrived back at school on Monday. And he's been more distracted everyday." She looked directly at Kara, meeting her eyes. "Especially yesterday."

Now they were coming to useful information, Kara hoped. "Because he knew he was going to his parents?"

"That must be it. He was off in another world all day. He forgot his jacket at home, and I could hardly get him to focus on his assignments. He couldn't wait to leave school. And that's strange, too. He never wants to leave. Sometimes we have to tell him two or three times to go catch his ride. But not yesterday—yesterday he left so quickly he forgot his backpack." She pointed across the room to his desk, where a dark green backpack was strapped over the back of his chair. "Of course, since he forgot his backpack, I assume he also did not do his homework."

"No, he didn't," Kara affirmed. If she knew nothing else about the boy, she knew that. "Have his parents—I mean, have _we_ never..." She stopped and took a deep breath; she didn't like playing the role of mom to some other woman's child. "He never explained why we haven't visited the school before?"

"Never." Ms. Faber gave her an odd look. "I don't mean any offense, Mrs. Fleming, but now that you're here, I have so many questions. Ever since Zach was in kindergarten, the school has tried to make direct contact with you and your husband, but we could never reach anyone. And he needed so much special attention at the beginning."

Kara rubbed a hand across her forehead as if to ease a sudden headache. "What kind of special attention?"

The teacher shifted her weight, thinking back. "I remember Zach when he first came to kindergarten. He didn't know how to act. He did well with the women teachers, but around the men he was...awkward, even scared. And around the other children—well, he didn't know how to relate to them at first. He loved to learn—he was clearly intelligent—but it took a while for him to develop the social skills that most five-year-olds have well in hand by the time they come here. So we tried to call you, but all we got was voicemail. Mr. Lopez sent letters, but no one answered. The school counselor even tried to go to your home once that first year and speak with you, only to find that you had recently moved."

Ms. Faber watched the boy for a moment before turning back to Kara. "So if you'll forgive me, I've always wondered what his story is."

Kara searched for an explanation that might satisfy Ms. Faber. "I think it's fair to say we haven't known Zach nearly as well as a boy's parents should." She grimaced; acting the part of a concerned but distant mother was coming to her disturbingly easily. It made her all the more _un_ easy. "I wish I could tell you the whole story," she managed, "but the legal issues—I just can't right now. And there's still so much that Craig and I ourselves haven't made sense of yet. But it sounds like Zach has come a long way."

Craig and the boy, having slowly circled the room, now approached Ms. Faber's desk.

The teacher stood up. She clearly was not content with what she had heard from Kara, but she offered a gracious smile, all the same. "I understand, Mrs. Fleming. And I am grateful that you stopped in. Please come by again soon. It's so good to finally meet you."

Kara shook Ms. Faber's hand in farewell. Then, instinctively, she put a gentle hand on the boy's shoulder.

He flinched, but smiled up at her. "See you later, Mom."

"Have a good day, Zach," Craig said. He seemed to want to say more, but thought better of it.

"Don't get your fins too wet if it rains during recess," Kara told him. "Remember, you're only _part_ fish."

He returned her grin, then hurried to his seat. Craig and Kara left the room and made for the nearest exit.

"Did you find out anything useful?" Craig asked Kara as they reached the parking lot.

"A little," she said. "Basically what he's already told us—he lived with his grandfather, but nannies took care of him." She filled him in on what Ms. Faber had shared with her.

They arrived at the car. "How about you?" Kara inquired. "Did you learn anything?"

"Well, he's friendly. He introduced me to the whole class." Craig cocked his head a little to the side and furrowed his brows. "What's the matter? You look upset."

She was, she realized. An unsettling thought had just occurred to her. "Craig...if we had a child, and he didn't come home on a school night, and we searched all night and couldn't find him—obviously, we would call the police. But then, where would we look the next morning?"

Craig's expression darkened.

"Nobody was here looking for him! No one had even called the school to tell them he hadn't come home last night! There was no police officer here. No one was here waiting desperately for him to show up. No one..." Her tongue tangled around the last words. She slammed a fist weakly on top of her car.

Craig stepped beside her and took her in his arms. He held her close; her head fell onto his shoulder.

One angry tear dropped from her eyes. "I know he's not ours, but whoever he belongs to sent him away and doesn't want him to come home." She sniffed once and closed her eyes to cut off anymore tears.

"Which could mean," Craig spoke softly into her ear, "he was telling the truth—he really can't go back home, even if he knew how to get there."

This realization launched a new, bitter churning in Kara's belly. When so many women like her could never bear a child, how could anyone send such a beautiful young boy away? How could anyone be so calloused, so cruel?

There in the parking lot, Craig held her in silence for a long time.

*****

They were awkward, the phone calls that morning; Kara had tried to keep herself busy as she listened to Craig make each one. She was restless. She had searched online for information about a Zechariah Fleming, to no avail. There were plenty of men by that name out there in the world, but none matching the description of her Zach—not _her_ Zach, but the boy whose existence had been thrust upon her. All of the others were too old or too far away, usually with photographs that were clearly not of him.

She had looked at the school's web site. The boy's face had appeared in one photograph there, barely recognizable in a crowd of students singing in last year's Christmas program. Had anyone in his family cared enough to come to his performance? She had not spent much time looking at that photograph.

No other searches had turned up information about the boy, so at last she had given up and made lunch. Poor Craig had made several calls during that time, each one as uncomfortable as the last, trying to find a relative who knew how to track down his cousin Elliott or could confirm that Elliott had a son. He had continued making calls all through lunch and into the afternoon. Now, as Kara was repotting her third miniature rose—with the boy's appearance, she had not had an opportunity to get back to them last night—he spoke with his father.

"No, Dad, I don't think it's a joke. He really believes what he's telling us. And so do I, frankly, except the part about us being his parents." A pause. "No, I wouldn't put it past them either, not after the pranks you used to play on each other growing up. But why would they involve me?"

This was Craig's third call to his father today. With his father's help, he had gathered phone numbers for nearly all fifteen of his cousins. Eight on his father's side, seven on his mother's—he now lacked numbers for only the two children of his father's sister.

"Go ahead," Craig told his dad. He took down another sequence of digits. "What about Elliott? Did Uncle Pete give you his number?... Seriously?... How long ago?..."

Craig shot a hopeful look at Kara. That was a switch; he had been growing increasingly discouraged as the day wore on. "Why?..." A longer pause this time. "That's what we were thinking, too, Dad. Everybody always said Elliott and I looked like brothers."

Kara pulled her hands out of the potting soil before her and listened. "I'll still call Eloise," he was saying, "just to make sure. And maybe—... Right, if anybody knows what he's up to, she will." He looked over at Kara again, genuine hope in his eyes. "Sure, Dad, I'll let you know. Bye."

He hung up the phone. "Kara, it's got to be Elliott. It makes sense."

"Okay. Where is he?"

Craig grimaced. "He's in Asia."

"Asia?"

"Or was, the last time anyone heard from him. That was two years ago—somewhere in southeast Asia. Uncle Pete thinks he's either hiding from the law or studying to become some kind of monk."

"From what I remember of him, he could be doing either, or both," Kara remarked.

"Uncle Pete told Dad that Elliott did have a kid several years ago, but kept it quiet. I'm going to call Eloise and see if she knows anything." He dialed the last number he had jotted down.

"Will she be home?" Kara asked.

"Should be," he answered, "if she's been taking her medication."

His eyes shifted as someone picked up on the other end. "Eloise? This is your cousin, Craig... Yes, we're still married... You didn't, huh? Well, she hasn't sent me away just yet."

Kara gave an exasperated sigh. After all these years, Eloise still insisted that their marriage wouldn't last. That was just how she was.

"Listen," Craig continued, "a boy showed up at our house last night. He looks like he's related to us—looks just like our side of the family. And he says he _is_ family, but we've never met him before. Doesn't your brother have a kid?"

Kara prayed the answer would be yes. She wanted the boy to have a family, and she wanted to be...off the hook. She didn't like having some other woman's son in her care without the mother's knowledge.

Craig placed a hand over the receiver. "Kara," he whispered, "she says Elliott _does_ have a child—a son!" He spoke into the phone again. "How old, Eloise?..." He listened again, then nodded confidently. "Nine-ish is close enough!" he said. "This boy just turned ten."

"So he's Elliott's?" Kara asked.

Craig hesitated, listening to Eloise again, narrowing his eyes. "What?" he whispered again, surprise in his voice. "Now she thinks Zach is hers!"

"Put it on speakerphone," Kara suggested.

Craig did, and a woman's voice came through, breaking as she spoke, as if holding back sobs. "And when he ran away, I was so crushed, I didn't—I didn't know what to do... I called the police, but they wouldn't help... We couldn't find him anywhere... Please, please help me, Craig, send him home..."

_This doesn't sound right,_ Kara thought as she stood listening by the fireplace, next to Craig. A doubtful look began to appear on his face, too. _Eloise isn't trustworthy. Besides..._

Kara caught Craig's eye, and he muted the phone as Eloise rambled on. "Craig, how old is Eloise?"

"I don't know, twenty-five maybe? Twenty-six?"

"We knew her when she was in high school. She wasn't pregnant!"

Craig let out a long breath and nodded. At a pause in the rambling, he unmuted the phone and spoke into it. "Eloise, your son—is his name...Herbert?"

"Oh, it's really him!" she exclaimed. "My dear Herbert! I can't believe you found him! Thank you, Craig, thank you!"

Craig's eyes shifted right and left in frustration. "Eloise, have you taken your medicine today?"

"My what?"

"Your medication? You're making things up again. Go tell Brett you need your medication, all right? And say hello to him for us." She began to ramble on again, but Craig shut off the phone. He and Kara stared at each other for a long moment.

"So, what do we do now?" she asked.

"Well, Elliott has to be Zach's father," Craig answered. "That's a start."

"Who's the mother?"

"No idea."

Kara fidgeted a little. She was still feeling restless, like she should be doing more but was tied up, helpless to grasp answers they needed that lay just beyond her reach.

Craig replaced the phone in his pocket. "Whoever she is, she has to be out there somewhere. Maybe we can track her down."

"It'll take time. What do we do with the boy until then?"

Craig grunted. He seemed reluctant to answer.

"Yeah, not my favorite idea, either. But he's family. We can't just leave him homeless." She sighed. "And I don't like the idea of having the police pick him up and send him to a foster home. Better to keep him here for a few days."

Craig ran a hand through his hair. A moment later he turned and checked the clock hanging in the kitchen. "What time does school let out?"

"I don't know. Three-ish? What time do the neighbor kids walk home?" She turned to gaze out the big picture window with its panorama of the back yard. "We need to pick him up, don't we?"

Craig had that calculating expression again; the wheels were turning in his mind. "We'll need to keep him another night, maybe for the weekend."

She nodded. She had arrived at the same conclusion.

"We'll figure something out by Monday," he assured her.

"Okay," she agreed.

"We'll just...keep an eye on him until we can find his mother or contact Elliott, and then we'll hand him over."

Kara held back a flash of anger—barely. "How could she let him go like this, whoever she is?"

"We don't know that she did," Craig said. "Maybe Elliott had him living with some other relatives, or maybe friends. And when they didn't hear back from Elliott, or the money ran out, they sent him away..."

"To us?" Kara thought aloud. "Why to us?"

Craig merely shook his head in reply.

"And how did they give him that name...?" Kara huffed in frustration and glanced at the clock again. "What do we have, twenty minutes? Here, help me finish these roses." Striding into the dining room, she took Craig's arm and led him to the table. She was frustrated, edgy. She needed to do something with her hands.

*****

Kara guided her sedan around the corner and into sight of the school. Craig placed a hand on her arm. "Park over here," he said, pointing to the curb.

"Not at the school?" she asked.

"No. Let's wait here and see what he does."

She pulled over and shut off the engine. They were right on time. Students began to spill out of Briar Point. Most climbed onto busses; others located their parents in cars queued up in the school's driveway or parked in the lot. Still others crossed the street into the neighborhood to walk home.

"There he is," Kara said.

Zach in his orange T-shirt emerged from the school alongside Cayden, waved goodbye as his friend departed, and slung his dark green backpack over his shoulder, looking this way and that.

Craig followed her gaze and found him. She put her hand back on the key, but Craig caught her wrist gently, stopping her.

"But he's looking for us!" she protested.

"I know. But what if he actually lives close by? Maybe he'll go home. Or maybe someone else will pick him up."

"I don't think so, Craig. He believes we're his parents."

"Let's just watch and see."

_But I don't_ want _anyone else to pick him up!_ That sentiment surprised her. What right did she have to want to take him home with her? What if it _was_ a joke, as Craig's father had guessed, and the boy's family had known where he was all along? That would explain why they hadn't come looking for him at the school this morning. How would she and Craig ever know if they didn't wait and find out?

Several minutes passed. As the students around him dispersed and the last parents waiting in their cars loaded up their children and drove away, the boy scanned the street more anxiously. He paced the length of the sidewalk once to the end of the school building, then turned and came back the other way, tiptoeing along the sidewalk's edge.

"Craig, this is cruel," Kara whispered.

Craig pointed. "Look, he's leaving." The boy had secured his backpack over both shoulders and was crossing the street a few hundred feet in front of them. Reaching the other side, he turned and walked away from them at a steady pace.

"Is he going home?" Kara wondered aloud.

The boy passed through an intersection and continued straight ahead, making good time. They could still see him as he reached the end of that next block. There, he paused a moment, looked around, and turned to the right, proceeding down that street and out of view.

"Let's follow him," Craig said, "but not where he'll see us."

Kara restarted the car and crept to where the boy had turned. Already he was halfway down the block. When he reached the stop sign at the next intersection, he hesitated. He looked down the street to his right, then to his left. He turned 360 degrees, examining his surroundings.

"He's lost, Craig," she said. "He's trying to get somewhere, but doesn't know where he is."

"Looks like he's heading back this way." The boy was walking quickly again, retracing his steps.

"I'll turn us around," Kara said.

She drove a block further, turned around in a driveway, and edged slowly back to the intersection where they had last seen the boy. He had turned the corner and was making his way back to the school. "Why is he going back?" she wondered.

"No one came to pick him up, and he doesn't know where else to go. Poor kid." Craig frowned sadly. "I thought that maybe, if we didn't pick him up right away, he would just go home."

"He needs us, Craig," Kara said, feeling anxious for the boy. "Someone sent him away. They didn't come to get him at school this morning. He needs us."

"He hasn't needed us for ten years! Why now?"

Putting the car in park, Kara sighed and grabbed her head with both hands. "Argh! This makes no sense! If your cousin Elliott suddenly shows up, I'm going to kill him and then make him explain all of this."

As they watched, the boy reached the school and went back inside. They waited. Another minute later, Kara's cell phone rang. She pulled it out and checked the incoming number. Not recognizing it, she shrugged to Craig and answered it. "Hello?"

"Mrs. Fleming?" a young woman's voice spoke. "Wow, I've never caught you on the phone before! This is Mrs. James, the secretary at Briar Point. I have Zach here with me. He says he missed his ride."

"Oh..." Kara thought quickly. "Okay, um—we're running late, actually, but we're nearly there. Give us one minute."

Craig raised both eyebrows, but didn't object.

"No problem, Mrs. Fleming. I'll have him wait for you outside."

Kara ended the call. "The school secretary. Zach missed his ride."

"All right, then," Craig responded. "I guess he's ours a little longer."

Kara drove them the two blocks back to the school and pulled up next to the sidewalk, where the boy stood waiting for them. He slung his backpack off his shoulders and hopped into the back seat eagerly. "Hi, Dad! Hi, Mom!"

"Hey, Zach," Craig replied. "Sorry we're late."

"That's okay," he said. "It's just your first day. You'll get used to it."

Craig made an uneasy expression as Kara pulled the car forward again. "Tell you what, Zach," she said. "See which way we're going? Watch what we pass on our way home. We live really close by. Memorize how it looks, and you'll know how to find your way to our house if you ever want to come visit."

"I could walk home? By myself?" Zach asked. "Awesome!"

Kara glanced over at Craig with a look of mild astonishment, which he returned.

*****

The day was cloudy but dry, and Zach spent the rest of the afternoon in the back yard playing with Paws as Kara pulled weeds in the garden, keeping an eye on the pair. Craig mowed and edged the lawn, more to give himself something to work on as he thought about what they might do with Zach than because the grass needed attention.

After a while, Kara went inside to prepare dinner. Paws wore out and curled up contentedly on the patio just a minute before Kara announced that the food was ready—noodles with meatballs smothered in a Hawaiian sauce. Zach ate two full helpings with enthusiasm. After dinner, Kara had the good sense to prompt Zach to catch up on his homework, two days' worth since he had left his backpack at school yesterday. He sat at the dining table and worked on it willingly enough, though with several breaks to comment on how his day had gone.

Now, having put the finishing touches on his assignments, Zach returned his homework to his backpack. Craig strode to the hallway and opened one of the cabinets there. "Why don't you put your backpack away in the guestroom, Zach," he called to the youngster. "And then I'd like you to look at something." Zach complied and passed behind him on his way to the guestroom as Craig slid a stack of photo albums out of the cabinet. He carried the load to the dining table.

"What are you doing with those?" Kara inquired as she loaded dishes into the dishwasher.

"Checking to see if we can figure out how Zach is related to us, maybe verify the Elliott connection," Craig answered quietly.

The youngster returned to the room, and Craig pulled a chair out for him at the table. "Here, have a seat." Zach sat down, and Craig slid one of the albums in front of him. "We have a problem we need to work out, and I think these might help."

"What's the problem?" Zach asked.

"The problem," Craig explained, "is that we're pretty sure you're related to us somehow, but we haven't quite figured out how—although we did come up with a pretty good theory today."

"What's your theory?"

"I can't tell you yet," Craig answered. "We're going to test it first. If you can confirm it, we'll feel a lot better about having you here."

"Because then," Kara chimed in from the kitchen, "we'd know where you came from, maybe even why you're here." She added in a lower voice, "Not to mention what we're supposed to do with you."

"So," Craig continued, "here's the test..." He opened the album in front of Zach to the first page. "Look through these pictures and see if you recognize anybody."

Zach scanned the photos, giving a few seconds to each one. As Craig watched, he looked through pages of pictures showing Craig's sister's family. Craig had intentionally started him with these; this was the part of the family the youngster would be least likely to know. Thus they made the best test to see if he would be honest about whom he recognized. Later, he would come to the cousins' families, and eventually to Elliott.

Zach continued silently, concentrating. Craig sat down at the other end of the table.

After a minute, Kara set the dishwasher running and took a seat beside her husband. "Nothing yet?"

Zach shook his head in reply. "Who are all these people?"

"Relatives of mine," Craig answered. "If you and I are related, we ought to know some people in common, right?"

"I guess so," he said without looking up. He studied several more pages, coming into pictures of Craig's oldest cousin's family and moving through them to photographs of other cousins. "Who's this?" he asked, setting the album upright so Craig and Kara could see it. He pointed to a picture of a couple in their fifties.

"Do you know them?" Craig asked.

"No," he replied. "They're just older than the other people in these pictures."

"Oh." No recognition there. "Those are my parents."

"My grandpa and grandma?" Zach asked with interest.

"Only if you're my son, Zach," Craig responded, "which, as we've already discussed, is highly unlikely."

"Yeah, I know," Zach said in a matter-of-fact tone. "Are they nice?"

Craig grunted. "That depends on what you mean by 'nice.' My dad likes to play jokes, and my mom wishes I made more money."

"They're very nice, actually," Kara amended. "You'd like them."

Zach returned to inspecting the photos. Craig waited; Kara set her elbows on the table and propped her chin in her palms to watch. The youngster turned through several more pages, finding nothing. This was not looking good so far. He should have recognized someone by now.

Zach tipped his head to the side, studying one large photograph in particular, then looked up at Kara and Craig with excitement. "I know this person!" he announced.

Both adults dashed the six feet to Zach's end of the table and, standing on either side of him, leaned over the album together.

"That guy there." Zach indicated a man in his late twenties, wearing a blue sweatshirt and standing with some of the family outside Craig and Kara's house. "That's you, isn't it, Dad?" he asked with a wide grin.

Craig and Kara sighed together. "Yes, just me," Craig confirmed, a sudden surge of hope thwarted. "That was when we moved into this house. And hey, remember—I like it better if you call me Craig."

"Sorry, I forgot. And is that you, Mom?" Zach asked again, pointing now to a young woman at the edge of the picture.

"I go by Kara, actually. But yeah, that's me," she answered. "I think Craig meant for you to find _other_ people you recognize, though."

"You looked younger then."

"Did I?" Kara feigned offense, arching one eyebrow.

The boy missed her teasing. "But you look better now." He studied her for a moment. "You look...smarter, like you know more. More like an adult."

"Hmm, that's...interesting," Kara responded, with a playful frown.

"I think what Zach's trying to say," Craig explained, "is that you just get better looking with age."

"Knock it off, you scoundrel," she snapped halfheartedly at him. "No flirting in front of the child."

"What's flirting?" Zach asked.

"Never mind," Kara told him. She pointed at the photo album. "Back to work."

Craig smiled broadly. "This is flirting." He took both of Kara's hands before she could pull away. "Lovely lady, your eyes caught me from afar and beckoned me here, and now I'm trapped inside them, captivated by your love..."

Zach gagged.

Kara's reaction wasn't much different. "That was genuinely awful," she said, rolling her eyes. "If you had talked like that when we were dating, I would never have married you."

Craig laughed. "I did talk like that."

Zach returned to searching through the pictures. "I am _never_ getting married." Over his head, Kara narrowed her eyes at Craig in playful annoyance.

Zach continued on. "Who are you holding in this one, Mom?" He had come across a photo of Kara holding a baby girl, Craig standing proudly behind her.

Kara became suddenly somber. She reached out and touched the picture tenderly. "That's Tiffany. She lived with us for a little while. Fifty-one days."

Craig permitted himself a brief look at Tiffany; it warmed and stung him at the same time. He had not looked at a picture of her for ages—not that he wanted to forget her, not ever, but seeing her again brought pain. _She would look very different now, much older..._

Kara, beside him, sensed the tension in his silence and set a gentle hand on his back. Zach merely accepted Kara's statement and moved to other photographs.

He arrived at the end of the album and closed it. "I didn't recognize anybody but you and Mom," he told Craig.

"Me and _Kara,"_ Craig corrected.

"You and _Kara,"_ Zach repeated half-heartedly.

Craig selected another album from the pile and slid it across the table to Zach. "Try this one."

"A wedding?" he asked as he registered the first photos.

"You got it," Craig replied. "Our wedding album. There should be a lot of family in there."

"When did you get married?"

"Fourteen years ago," Kara told him. "I was the only woman who would take him."

Craig grinned. "I fell in love with her cooking, she fell in love with my good looks."

Kara smirked. "I took pity on him."

Zach turned the pages slowly, one after the next. "There's your mom and dad again," he said to Craig. "They're in a lot of these pictures." He continued on for another minute, then stopped as a new figure caught his eye. "Dad, this guy looks just like you, only different."

Craig slid over to look with the youngster.

"Someone you recognize?" Kara asked, joining them.

Zach shook his head. "He looks like he's Dad's brother or something."

"I don't have a brother, only a sister," Craig informed him. "You don't know him?"

The youngster shook his head again. "Who is he?"

"Look on the back of the picture," Kara advised.

Zach slid the photo out of its plastic sheath and turned it over. "Elliott Fleming," he read.

"Have you heard that name?"

"No."

"He's my cousin," Craig explained. "He's the main person I was hoping you'd recognize. If I had to guess, Zach, I'd say odds are pretty good he's your real dad."

"Why?"

Craig caught himself scratching the end of his nose with the tip of his thumb. He really did do that a lot, didn't he? "He's the relative who looks the most like me. Plus, I called most of my family today while you were at school. None of them knew anything about you. But Elliott—he has a son about your age somewhere. He's been out of the country for a few years—in Asia, we think. That might explain why you've never met him."

"Who do you think my mom is?" Zach asked.

"We don't know," Craig admitted. "Could be anyone."

Zach didn't look convinced. "Grandmother never told me about anyone named Elliott. And I think I look more like you than like him, anyway."

"That can happen," Craig insisted. "Sometimes cousins look more alike than brothers."

Zach still wasn't persuaded. He resumed scanning the photos. Turning to the next page, he discovered a picture of Kara in her wedding gown and Craig in a tuxedo standing together and facing the camera, smiles bright and smeared with chocolate cake. "Why did you have cake on your faces?"

Kara poked Craig in the ribs with a finger. "Because this guy stuffed cake up my nose, that's why! So of course I had to get him back."

Craig grinned at the memory.

Zach looked confused.

"See, the bride and groom feed each other the first pieces of their wedding cake," Craig explained. "I went too fast and got it in her nose instead of her mouth."

"On purpose!" Kara accused.

"Did not," he responded, his grin turning mischievous.

"Yes, he did," she assured Zach, who looked from one to the other, enjoying the game.

He turned back to the album and flipped at a leisurely pace through the last few pictures. Craig and Kara stood on either side of him, chuckling at a few of the photos, groaning at others.

"I was so scared that day," Kara confessed as Zach came to the last page.

Craig looked over at her. "Scared of marrying me?"

"No, scared you would change your mind. It was the only thing I could think about until—"

"Until I said 'I do?'"

"No, after that, actually. Until Ben said, 'Do you, Lia, take this man'..."

Craig laughed. He looked down to Zach, who was closing the wedding album. "Kara's older brother, Ben, is a preacher. He performed our wedding. It was his first one."

"He was so nervous," Kara recalled, "afraid he would mess it up. So then, when it was time to make our vows, he turned to Craig and said, 'Do you take this woman to be your lawfully wedded husband?' And Craig said, 'I do.' Some of the guests laughed, but the three of us were so nervous, we didn't even notice. So then Ben turned to me—"

"He turned to Kara," Craig picked up the tale, "and said, 'Do you, Lia, take this man'—and he just stopped... Lia is _his_ wife. So he just froze..."

Kara resumed. "And no one knew what to do. A hundred people there in the church, and every one of them was trying not to giggle. I looked at Craig—"

"And then we just burst out laughing! And everybody in the church started laughing, too."

"And poor Ben turned bright red. I think we must have laughed for a whole minute until Ben finally looked over at Lia and said, 'Lia, as your husband, I forbid you to take this man!' And everyone laughed again, and then it was all okay." She paused a moment, reminiscing. "And after that, I wasn't afraid anymore."

Zach watched them both with bright eyes, immersed in the story. He reached for the next album and opened it up. The first few pages passed uneventfully, but then he happened upon a picture of Craig and Derek, tools in hand, standing side by side and thoroughly covered in mud. "Wow, Dad!" Zach exclaimed. "How did you get so dirty?"

"Oh, just working," Craig replied nonchalantly.

"You were not!" Kara retorted. "You were wrestling in the mud!"

Craig grinned and shrugged. "Derek and I—he's my partner, you saw him in the wedding pictures—we were trying to plant trees by a house in pouring rain. There was mud everywhere. Derek slipped and fell into me and knocked me over. I grabbed him as I fell, and suddenly we were both lying in the mud."

"They had great fun," Kara added knowingly.

"Not at first," Craig corrected. "It hurt. Derek's a big guy. But the mud was great, so I shoved him back down in it, and then he shoved me down, and so on."

"That's awesome!"

"It was pretty great," Craig said, his lips curling up at the corners. "We got so muddy that we had to put tarps on the seats of our trucks so we could drive home without ruining them."

"And then when you got home..." Kara prompted.

"I got home and parked in the garage, and I took one step inside the door—"

"Right over there," Kara said, pointing to the garage door beside the refrigerator.

"—one step, and Kara saw me—and screamed!"

"You screamed?" Zach asked her.

"Loudly," she acknowledged. "I didn't recognize him. And then when I realized it was him, I made him go back in the garage and strip all of his clothes off—"

"All of them?" the youngster asked with a look of horror.

"All of them," she said sternly.

"Are you sure you want to claim this woman as your mother?" Craig joked.

"And I brought him the garden hose," Kara continued, "and made him wash himself off in the garage before he came inside the house. And then I made him go take a real shower."

The boy was enthralled, staring at them both with wide eyes.

"But that's not the best part," Craig continued. "When I hosed off my head, you know what got washed out of my hair?"

"Mud?"

"A worm," Craig declared proudly. "A nice, long one."

"Woah... It got in your hair?"

"With all the mud, yeah."

"What did you do with it?"

"I put it in the garden. That was years ago, but I still see it out there now and then. We have this sort of bond. I'll introduce you sometime."

Kara rolled her eyes at Craig.

Zach shook his head in wonder. He worked through the next few pages of photos and paused at another one, a picture of Kara lying face-up in the snow, feet attached to skis sticking up into the air.

"Why did you take that picture?" Kara asked Craig with a look of annoyance.

"Pure artistic instinct," he quipped. "It was her first time to go skiing," he told Zach, "and she had been in her skis for about—"

"About two minutes," Kara said. "And—oh, never mind. Let's just say skiing's not my thing."

Zach grinned appreciatively.

"Oh, but you'll like this one." Kara flipped a few pages ahead to a picture of herself standing beside a lake, fishing pole in one hand and the line in the other, an unusually large bass hanging from the line.

Zach took a close look at the picture. "Is that fish real?"

Kara grinned and shook her head. "Good eyes there. No, it's not. You know how Craig said his dad likes to play jokes? He took us fishing, and he and Craig were catching fish left and right, but I hardly even got a bite. So after a while I left my line in the water and walked to the car to get a book. When I came back, Craig's dad said I had gotten a bite while I was gone, and I should check my line."

"And you caught a fake fish?" Zach guessed.

"I reeled the line in, and it was pretty heavy."

"She kept saying, 'It's a big one, it's a big one!'" Craig chimed in with a grin.

"And it was," Kara said. "I pulled it out of the water, and at first I thought it was real."

"You did?" Zach asked incredulously.

"Mm-hmm. I went to take it off the line, and when I touched it, that's when I realized it was a joke." Zach grinned openly at that, and Kara chuckled at his reaction. "Craig's dad said that was the funniest fishing prank he had ever pulled."

Craig laughed, too, but inwardly he marveled at how easy it was for him and Kara to stand here beside this boy they had met so strangely just last night and laugh—just laugh together...

"Hey, Zach," he said, grabbing the last album and flipping it open, "take a look at this one of me and my sister when we were kids..."

For the next two hours, they looked at old photos together, laughing and telling Zach stories. Zach did not recognize anyone new in the pictures. But as the night wore on, none of them noticed.

*****

"Okay, let's see those fingers," Kara said to Zach as she stepped into the bathroom.

The boy was carefully pulling the third bandage off his injured digits. Setting it aside, he held his hand out for Kara to inspect.

She took it and looked at it closely. "They're healing up. How do they feel?"

"Okay," he reported. "They only hurt if I go like this." He balled his fingers into a fist.

"Good," she said. "Let's go ahead and bandage them for another day, just to be safe." She fetched the bandages, pulled out three, and began to position the first one on his index finger.

"You guys are really funny," the boy said as he watched her.

"Yeah?" she asked. "How do you mean?"

"Dad found a worm in his hair and you caught a rubber fish," he answered with a grin.

She grinned back at him as she secured the first bandage and began to place the second. "Hmm, I guess we are."

"Did Dad really put that worm out in the garden?"

"His name is _Craig,_ Zach."

"Fine— _Craig."_

Kara wrapped the second bandage around his middle finger. "He sure did put the worm out there. I watched him do it."

The boy's eyebrows rose. "When he didn't have any clothes on?"

Kara laughed. "The worm didn't care."

The boy gaped at her.

"Actually, he wrapped an old towel around himself. Nothing else, though."

The boy shook his head in amazement.

_How is this child so normal, so happy, when he's been abandoned?_ Kara wondered. _He should be scared to death!_ The thought surprised and sobered her.

"Is it still out there?" he asked.

"Is what still out there?"

"The worm? Is it still out in the garden?"

The question intruded on her sobriety, and she gave him a thoughtful smile as she finished the third bandage. "I suppose so, if it's still alive. I don't know how long earthworms live." She patted his hand. "There you go, Zach. Let's check those fingers again tomorrow."

"Okay," he replied.

"And now, off to bed. We probably shouldn't have let you stay up so late, but at least it's not a school night." She had a thought. "Is there anywhere you need to be tomorrow?" If so, it might lend them clues about him.

"No. Grandfather always made me stay home on the weekends."

_No help there._ "Hmm. Well, when you're done in here, climb into bed. Oh, and in case you'd rather not wear these clothes to bed"—with a hand she indicated his shirt and jeans—"I left my shorts and shirt on the desk in the guestroom. You're welcome to put those on again if you want."

"Thanks," he said, and reached to shut the bathroom door as Kara departed.

She made her way to the den, where Craig was reclining on the couch, still thumbing through one of the photo albums. She sat down next to him and leaned against his shoulder. "I'm trying to wrap my head around all of this," she told him. "Last night a police officer shows up and drops off this boy who says he's our son and happens to know where the glasses, the bathroom, and the dog are."

"And knows our middle names," Craig added.

"Mm-hmm. And looks just like you did at that age, only with blue eyes. And scratches his nose like you do."

"I caught myself doing that tonight," he admitted. "And then I saw Zach do it, only with his left hand."

"And then this morning we had a good plan, we really did—but the school thinks we're his parents and he lives here."

"Them and the police." Craig gave a small grimace. This was bothering him, too.

Kara sighed and shrugged, her shoulder rising and falling against Craig's chest. "I don't know which is worse: that somebody convinced him we were his parents and sent him away, or that I can't help seeing _you_ when I look at him." Her voice shook a little. "And I know we shouldn't let him call us 'Mom' and 'Dad'..."

"I tried to get him to stop. I should insist on that tomorrow."

"Me, too." Kara sighed again and shut her eyes tight. "But whenever he does it, there's a part of me that wants to believe... I just think, what if things had been different ten years ago..."

Craig squeezed her arm. "I know. He's a neat kid. Fun. Smart, too. He catches on to things right away."

"Yeah," Kara agreed. "I know in my heart there's no way he can be ours, but for goodness' sake—if I could get my hands on Elliott right now, I'd wring him out until he explained how he ever let a boy like that go!"

"Elliott might not have ever met him, for all we know. At least, Zach doesn't know Elliott."

Kara shook her head sadly. "I just can't fathom it, not after trying so hard to have a child of our own." She heard the boy move from the bathroom to the guestroom.

"What I can't figure out," Craig said, "is how he turned out so well. He's well-behaved. He's doing okay in school. Did you watch him tonight? He was having a great time."

"He thinks he belongs here, Craig. That's why he's happy."

Craig nodded solemnly. "I know."

"How is he going to feel when he finds out he belongs somewhere else?"

This time it was Craig who shook his head sadly. "We'll get this figured out," he said. "He's a relative, we know that much. So maybe, after we get him back to his parents or whoever, we can...have him over sometimes..."

Kara nodded. "Yeah." Zechariah Timothy Fleming—the name _she_ had chosen. Someone had stolen it and given it to this beautiful boy... She loosed herself from Craig and stood up. "I should go tell him good night."

Pondering, she walked to the guestroom door and tapped on it gently. "All clear in there?" she called through it.

"You can come in," the boy's voice came.

She pushed the door open and found him sitting cross-legged on the chair by the desk, again dressed in her gray shorts and blue T-shirt. "I forgot—I was going to get you the pink shirt tonight," she teased. "I hope you don't mind."

"I'll be okay," he assured her with ample certainty in his voice.

"As long as you're satisfied." He had left his own shirt and jeans on the floor in disarray, so she scooped them up, folded them, and hung them over the back of the desk chair. "Why don't you hop under the covers, then? It's late. You should be tired by now."

"I don't feel tired," he replied, but he stood up, clambered into the bed and settled in under the covers just the same.

"Snug as a bug?" she asked him.

"Huh?"

She gave him a small grin. "Just an old saying." She straightened the blankets a bit. "In the morning, if you wake up before we do, you can go out in the back yard and play with Paws if you like. Not the front, though, okay? For safety."

"Okay," he said, beginning to sound sleepy at last. _It's about time,_ Kara thought with amusement. He yawned widely, right on cue.

"Okay, then. Is there anything you need?"

"No," the boy answered, closing his eyes. But then he opened them again and looked up at her. "Just one thing."

"What's that?" Kara asked.

The boy hesitated the briefest moment. "I need you to be my mom. I know you don't believe me—"

"Zach," she explained patiently, "you're the sweetest kid, but you have a real mother out there somewhere who—"

"But Mrs. James at the school, she said you and Da—I mean _Craig—are_ my parents."

"Because somebody gave the school the wrong information—on purpose, I think..."

"But Grandmother always told me that you—"

"Zach, honey," she interrupted him miserably, "I'm so, so sorry... Your grandmother was wrong, Zach. I'm not your mom. And Craig is not your dad. Maybe a cousin, or a cousin once removed, whatever that is..." She hated that look of disappointment in his eyes. She knew that look. She had seen it in the mirror after the doctor had told her and Craig the last time...

She put a gentle hand on the boy's head and pretended not to notice when he blinked back an extra bit of moisture. His hair was dry—why should that surprise her? His blue eyes looked to her for some kind of reassurance.

"Zechariah," she said at last, "here's what I can do... I hardly know the first thing about being a mom, but as long as you're here—until we can find where you really belong—I'll do the best I can. Like when you have a substitute teacher at school. Mom with a _small_ 'm,' okay?"

The boy nodded reluctantly, lips pressed tightly shut. He rolled over to face away from her, but swiped a hand across one eye. It brought a tear to her own eyes.

She straightened his covers again, unnecessarily. "I think moms with a big 'M' are supposed to say things like, 'No more talking now, go to sleep.'"

His ear twitched; he sniffled, ignoring the weak joke.

She stepped quietly to the light switch. "Good night, Zach." He didn't answer. She turned out the light and shut the door behind her.
Chapter 4

Thin gloves, clean and black, located the desired sheet of paper and removed it carefully from its file. It was a paper that for years the figure had suspected existed, but had never needed to find. This morning he had desired it, and with its owner far away, he had located it without difficulty.

He perused the paper. There were names, the very sort of information he had been hoping for. There were dates, as well, though they were less vital to his plans.

He caught himself smiling. Already he was anticipating his next mission, one he had devised just last night, his most daring mission yet, and his most meaningful—and these names would make it possible.

The first name on the list— _McWrait._ It struck him as vaguely familiar. He would have to locate the man, then proceed with— _what, robbing him? Am I still a mere thief?_

No, no mere thief. Robin Hood—taking from the rich to help the poor. And to make amends for past wrongs.

If the figure himself could make amends, why couldn't others who were involved, who owed the same debt? They would never offer recompense willingly, of course—but he would see to it that each one paid appropriately in turn all the same. The boy deserved as much; anyone with an unworthy interest in him would have to pay.

The figure gave a little smirk. He would begin with this McWrait. The date beside the man's name was by no means coincidental—eleven years ago, when this whole affair had begun. There were others, too, but McWrait had been the first. It was fitting that he be the first to pay.

*****

Craig was finishing his breakfast and Zach was eating oatmeal—with raisins, no less—Saturday morning when Kara finally emerged from the bedroom and ambled into the kitchen, bathrobe wrapped snugly around her. The usual bowl of oatmeal awaited her beside the microwave, and with a grateful smile to Craig she set it warming, then pulled up a stool beside the youngster.

Zach turned to her. "You were right. It's way better with raisins."

"Ha, I win," she told Craig, shooting him a triumphant smile. She took a look at his clothes; he was fully dressed in work jeans and a T-shirt, boots on his feet. "You're working this morning?"

"Not exactly," he answered. "Some kids on motorbikes carved trenches all across the ball field by Derek's house. I'm going to see if I can repair some of the damage."

Nodding, she retrieved her oatmeal, now warm, and returned to her seat. "What's this?" There was a note on the standalone counter, written in a child's handwriting. She glanced at Zach and pulled it over, reading it aloud:

Dear Craig and Kara,

In case you're wondering, Zach is playing with me in the back yard. He is fun. I hope we can keep him.

Sincerely,

Paws

"I found that this morning when I got up," Craig told her. "Apparently, Paws has gotten attached to the stray boy we found."

Kara lifted one eyebrow. "We'll have to explain to Paws that we can't keep him. He's someone else's pet." She smiled at the youngster, who took the comment in stride. "But it sure was nice of Paws to let us know he was outside so we wouldn't worry."

Craig finished off the last of his juice and took his dishes to the sink. "I'm heading out," he told her. "I might as well get done early, and then we can work on finding Zach's family."

With her mouth full of food, Kara grunted her approval.

Craig went to the bedroom to grab his baseball cap, gray with olive green trim, then turned around to find her right behind him. She stepped close to him and whispered, "Take him with you."

Craig stopped mid-step, hand frozen on the bill of the cap. "What? Kara, I can't do that," he replied in a low voice. "He's not ours. What if we get out there and he trips over the rake and breaks his arm? What am I going to say when the doctor asks me how to contact his parents?"

Kara put her fists on her hips. "What if he stays here, slips and falls in the bathroom, and has to get stitches? He can get hurt here just like anywhere else. He already has."

Craig exhaled loudly. "But...what if someone comes looking for him?"

"You have your phone?" she asked.

He nodded.

"I'll call you. Besides," she frowned, "every hour that no one comes looking for him makes it less likely that anyone will."

Craig shook his head and rubbed his eyes with one hand. Kara was right—all indications suggested that the youngster really had been sent away, abandoned. Craig folded his arms across his chest. He met Kara's eyes for just a moment, then looked aside.

"What?" Kara probed.

Craig gazed out the window.

"Craig Herbert, look at me," she demanded, and he complied. "At this moment, you are the most important person in the world to me, and I want to hear what you're thinking that you're afraid to tell me."

It was no use beating around the bush when she talked to him like that—she would ferret out anything he tried to hide. But what was he hiding? He wasn't sure. What was his hesitation? "I—I just don't want to."

"Why not? You spend hours with the boys on the team every week. Why not this boy?"

He thought a moment, working the problem in his mind. "Because he's not ours. But he thinks he is. And—"

"And what?"

"And I keep thinking about what you said last night—what if things had been different... He looks like me, he acts like me, he has your taste in food..." His hesitation took a defined shape in his mind. "I'm scared, all right? It would not be hard for me to pretend that I'm his father. And I can't do that, not when he belongs to Elliott or some other guy out there."

To his surprise, Kara didn't object. Instead, she blinked thoughtfully. "A day and a half, and already this boy we've never met before has got us—I don't know. All mixed up, at least." She took her fists off her hips and folded her arms, mimicking Craig. "We can do this," she declared, still in a whisper. "Take him with you. If Elliott is his dad, he _needs_ a father-figure. While you're gone, I'll work on how we can track down where he came from."

Craig hesitated, then nodded.

She loosened her arms. "And Craig—it's okay to have a good time with him. He's just a boy. And he's family. We can love him like—I don't know, a nephew—until we figure out what to do with him. And then, like we told him, maybe we can have him over sometimes."

Craig met her eyes again—those earnest, sensitive hazel eyes. "All right. I'll take him with me."

"Okay," she said.

He fetched a second, matching cap from the closet and led the way back down the hall to the kitchen, building up his courage. _I've never been afraid of kids before,_ he thought. _So why now?_

Zach had placed his dishes in the sink and was standing in the den, contemplating the back yard through the picture window. Craig walked over to the side door, opened it, and beckoned Paws inside. "Want to go for a ride?"

Paws wagged his tail delightedly and hurried into the kitchen.

Craig turned to Zach, who had looked to see Paws enter. "You want to come, too?"

"Yeah!" he answered instantly.

"Is that okay with you, Paws?" Craig asked the dog.

Paws peered up at him and gave an enthusiastic bark.

"All right," Craig chuckled, "Paws says his stray boy can come."

"Where are we going?" Zach asked.

"Out to do hard labor."

Zach's eyebrows lifted as he tried to gauge whether Craig was joking with him again. "Outside?"

"You got it."

"Awesome!" Zach exclaimed, and he hurried to join Craig and Paws as Craig opened the door to the garage. Craig handed him the extra cap, and Zach turned it over, examining it excitedly.

"Have a good time, you three," Kara called after them.

"We will, Mom!" Zach called back, stuffing the cap atop his head.

Craig shot her a nervous look. She returned it with an attempt at a supportive smile, and then he followed Zach out the door.

*****

Two hours later, Craig and Paws watched Zach rake one last edge of dirt smooth, flattening the last of the wheel tracks. He turned the rake upside-down, pushed the dirt, and pulled it back, leveling the small hills and dips. Thankfully, most of the muddy motorbike tracks stretching across the baseball field had dried back into workable soil, making the job easier than it might have been.

Craig's eyes swept across the outfield grass as he leaned on the handle of a flat-bladed shovel. The field was much improved, though still scarred. "Maybe the grass will grow back."

"What if it doesn't?" Zach inquired.

"Then Derek and I will reseed it after the season is done, I suppose."

Zach set his rake teeth-down on the grass and leaned on the handle in imitation of Craig.

"You've been a lot of help this morning, Zach," Craig complimented him. "Want to play some catch before we head home?"

"Sure," the youngster replied. "But you didn't bring a ball."

"The good coach never leaves home unprepared," Craig answered. He trotted the hundred feet to the pickup and laid his shovel in the bed, then opened the cab and fished around behind the passenger seat as Zach stowed the rake. Under the seat he found what he sought: two gloves and a baseball.

He tossed a glove to Zach. "Know how to use one of these?"

"A little," Zach replied. "We play baseball at school sometimes." He turned the glove this way and that, trying—and failing—to get his right hand inside it properly. "I'm left-handed," he reminded Craig, giving up on the glove and offering it back.

"I forgot. Let me see if Kara's old glove is in here." Craig delved back under the seat.

"Mom is left-handed, too?" Zach asked.

"Sure is," Craig said, coming back out and tossing Zach a left-hander's glove this time. Zach slipped it on easily and flipped it open and closed a few times, testing it.

"I knew it."

"Knew what?"

"That she really is my mom." Zach opened the glove and punched it, loosening its pocket. "We're both left-handed."

"Lots of people are left-handed."

"But I'm left-handed like her _and_ I look like you," Zach contended.

"You look like me because you come from my side of the family. The left-handed thing is coincidence."

Zach held the glove up to his face, peering between the fingers at Craig. "I like oatmeal with raisins, too."

Craig shook his head. "The only thing _that_ means, Zechariah, is that you're nuts."

Zach grinned.

"But if you can catch and throw a baseball, there's still hope for you. Run out there." Craig waved the youngster out into the grass. Paws scampered out of the way and sat down to watch.

"I'll start you with easy ones," Craig announced, tossing a soft lob that the youngster snatched fluidly out of the air. "Nice grab. Now, can you throw?"

Zach replied with a decent toss back.

"Not bad." He threw several more lobs, and Zach tracked each one down without trouble. "All right, it looks like you're ready for some harder stuff."

He sent Zach a faster, flatter throw. The youngster put his glove out to catch it, but also jumped to the side to dodge it. The ball flew past him and came to rest under a tree ten yards away. Paws leapt up and chased it down before Zach could. He brought it to Zach's feet and dropped it with pride.

"Thanks, Paws," Zach told him, rubbing the dog's yellow head as he snatched the ball up with his glove.

"So, do you watch the Mariners much?" Craig asked him.

Zach paused in mid-throw, arm cocked so that the ball in his hand hung beside his left ear. He tipped his head to one side. "You're checking to see if I was telling the truth, aren't you?"

Craig laughed. "You're good, Zach," he admitted. "You're right, I'm checking to see if your story is consistent. You have to admit, it's pretty strange—no TV, no video games, no toys, no going outside... Then again, your whole being here right now is crazy."

"I've had a strange life," Zach said, nodding in agreement.

"What do you mean?"

The youngster tossed the ball back to Craig, another good throw. "All my friends get to do stuff. I have to stay home, stay inside. They get to watch TV, play games. I only get to read books and listen to Mariners games on the radio—after I do my homework."

"At least you get to listen to them on the radio," Craig observed. "What else is strange about your life?"

"Nannies," Zach replied, watching another ball sail past his glove. He waited as Paws ran to fetch it for him. "No one else at my school has a nanny. I've had fourteen of them since Grandmother moved away."

"Fourteen?" Craig repeated with astonishment.

"Yeah. At first Grandfather said I would have a nanny just until Grandmother came back, but she died. So then I always had a nanny."

"Why so many? Did you have several at a time?" The ball flew back and forth between them. Zach was either getting braver as he spoke or was distracted enough not to notice that Craig was still throwing the ball rather hard. He actually began to catch about half of Craig's throws, Paws getting his exercise on the other half.

"No, only one at a time," he answered. "Three of them were named Maria. One was Rosa, another was Elena, and—and I can't remember the other ones' names. Most of them didn't stay very long. But the first one was the best. She stayed for two years!"

Craig continued to probe as he tossed the ball. "Why was she the best?"

Zach caught the ball and threw it back too hard, so that it sailed over Craig's head. This time Paws retrieved it for Craig, but instead of stopping to deposit it at Craig's feet, he loped all the way back to Zach.

"She liked me," the youngster explained. "She played with me, and she didn't always follow Grandfather's rules. She took me outside sometimes. She even took me to church with her a couple of times. But one day they found out she had been taking me for walks down the street, and she got fired. She cried when she had to pack up her stuff and leave. I cried, too, because I was pretty little then. I was only seven."

Craig reached out to catch the next throw with his bare hand. "So why did you have nannies? Why not just stay with a relative?"

The youngster shrugged. "I don't know. Grandfather always had a nanny come when he left to travel somewhere, and then he always made them be gone when he came back. The nanny would take me to school that morning, and then Grandfather would pick me up when school got out."

Craig fielded a throw on a short hop and zipped it back to Zach, who darted out of the way once again, but miraculously caught the ball in the pocket of the glove anyway. He threw a high one back to Craig.

"So if you always had to stay inside, did you never get to go anywhere?"

Zach shook his head. "Not after the first nanny left."

"Didn't you get to do anything interesting?"

"I read a lot of books. And I got to meet some interesting people."

"Like who?"

"I don't know who they were. People from different countries. I remember a man who wore one of those big things wrapped on his head."

"A turban?"

"I guess. And there were Asian people, too—mostly Asian people. And Africans and other kinds of people. And sometimes Americans. Most of them were polite."

_Asian people?_ Maybe this boy _had_ run across Elliott at times, or maybe Elliott had sent people to check on him. "How did you meet these people?"

"Grandfather brought them. Usually three or four of them. He would always want me to meet them and answer their questions. Then he would send me back to my room, but at least I got to meet them."

"Right." The youngster's stories were consistent, but they grew ever stranger as new details surfaced. "Here, see if you can catch a pop fly," Craig challenged him.

He threw the ball in a high arc that Zach scampered to his left to track down. The boy stationed himself correctly under the ball—good baseball instincts, Craig thought—stretched his glove arm high, and—

_Whack!_ The ball missed his glove and struck Zach directly on the forehead. He swayed, fell, and landed flat on his back in the grass, arms and legs splayed out.

"Zach!" Craig yelled. A wave of panic washed over him as he ran to the youngster. _Not the hospital, please don't have to go to the hospital. Not even a doctor, please, I don't know where you came from..._

Paws reached Zach first and licked his arm, but Zach didn't revive. Craig reached him and knelt over him. "Zach—hey, Zach! Are you all right?" The youngster was breathing, but his eyes were closed and he didn't move.

The dog set a paw on Zach's chest and licked his face. The youngster's eyes shot open and he sat straight up. "Paws!" he scolded, pushing the dog away with his glove, wiping his face with his other hand. He was laughing.

Craig sat heavily on the grass and covered his eyes with a hand. "You definitely come from my side of the family," he remarked, shaking his head. "Did you miss the ball on purpose?"

Zach jumped back to his feet. "No, that part was an accident." He grinned at his cleverness until he pulled his cap off and pressed two fingers against his forehead. "Ow!" he exclaimed. "That actually hurts!"

"Serves you right, joker," Craig told him. "Now get that hat back on and I'll teach you how to catch a fly ball properly."

They played a while longer, until the first twinges of hunger prodded them to pack up and head home in search of lunch.

When they arrived, Craig sent Zach to return Paws to the back yard and fetch some water for him. He himself went inside to find Kara and share the further details Zach had revealed to him about his upbringing. Kara listened intently as she sat at the computer.

"I found some interesting information, too," she reported when he was done. Zach returned inside and made his way to the bathroom. Kara waited until he had closed the door, then continued in a low tone. "I tried to think of some way we could get definite information about Zach's parents. And I found something. Look at this," she said, pointing to the computer screen. It displayed a web page concerning birth certificates. "It turns out that Washington State is an open-record state."

"Which means?" Craig prompted.

"It means anyone can get a copy of anyone else's birth certificate."

"So...we can just drop by and request a copy of Zach's birth certificate?"

"Mm-hmm! If he was born in Washington. And," she added, "if we have the proper information."

"Like what?"

"His full name and the city or county of his birth..."

Craig nodded. "We might be able to guess on the county—probably here in King County."

"Mm-hmm. But here's the catch—we have to know his mother's maiden name."

"We only know his father's name."

"Right. Father is helpful, but they have to have the mother."

Craig rubbed his chin. "Would they track down his birth certificate for us if we could only give them Elliott's name?"

"I think we ought to find out."

"Are they open today? We could go right now."

"Nope, not until Monday."

Craig met Kara's eyes with conviction. "First thing Monday, then?"

"First thing Monday."

*****

That day was the most amazing day Zach could remember. First, of course, he had a mom and a dad! Even if they didn't believe it, it was still the greatest thing in the world to him. He looked like them, his dad's side of the family at least, and now he knew he got his being left-handed from his mom.

Then his dad had taken him and Paws to a baseball field to work and play catch. That was a lot of fun, even the working part, because he was working with his dad—though, he admitted to himself, getting hit in the head with a baseball was painful. But playing dead had been funny.

After they had come home for lunch, his mom had invited him to help her work in the garden, and they had pulled weeds for a while. He couldn't remember another day in his life that he had spent almost entirely outside. It was awesome. Even when he had accidentally pulled up two of Mom's bean sprouts, mistaking them for weeds, it had been okay; she hadn't yelled like Grandfather used to. She had just talked to him and explained how to tell the difference between them and the real weeds. She was like his teachers that way.

Dinner was great—Mom was a good cook—and then after dinner, Dad had asked if Zach wanted to watch the Mariners game with him...on TV! It had been even better than hearing their games on the radio. Dad had let him stay up and watch the entire game, since it was his first one. Even the commercials had been interesting. The game had gone into extra innings, though, and Zach couldn't remember anything after the top of the tenth. He had awakened the next morning, Sunday, to find himself wrapped in a pair of thick blankets on the couch in the den. Mom, rousing him, had explained with a grin that she had tried to get him up after the game to take him to the guestroom, but he had been too deeply asleep.

They had eaten and prepared to go to church. For Zach, that had meant exchanging his own orange T-shirt for a nicer, dark-reddish one from Mom; his own shirt was dirt-stained from helping both Dad and Mom the day before. His jeans had been a problem, too—they were even dirtier than his shirt. But Mom hadn't had anything longer than shorts that would fit him, and she had figured that while her shorts were fine on him in the house, they would not look right on him out in public. So she had made him hide in his room, in his underwear, while she scrubbed his jeans with a wet cloth in the laundry room to wipe away some of the dirt. After the scrubbing, his jeans still had dirty spots. Dad had said he looked a bit ragged; Mom had said it was the best they could do.

Now they were arriving at the church, and Zach peered out the window of Mom's car into the sunshine to see the building as they parked. It was big, and the lot was already filling up. People filtered between the cars on their way inside. Dad, Mom, and Zach joined them.

"Hey, Zach," Dad said in a low voice, "I need you to do something for us."

Zach looked up at him.

"Don't tell anyone you think we're your parents, all right?"

Zach opened his mouth to dispute the point, but thought better of it. They _were_ his parents, whatever they thought. He closed his mouth and nodded.

Dad spoke again. "We'll introduce you as my cousin's son, because we're pretty sure you are."

Zach just sighed. Grandmother had said his father's name was Craig, not Elliott. He didn't remember much that she had told him—he had been so young—but he remembered that.

They entered the building. People were milling about, some talking, others moving to and fro. A little girl who might have been old enough for kindergarten spotted them and ran up to Mom. "Aunt Kara!" she yelled happily as she wrapped her arms around Mom's legs.

Mom scooped her up and held her in both arms. "Good morning." Noticing Zach watching, she turned the girl toward him and said, "Jayda, this is Zach. He's staying at our house for a few days."

Jayda was too shy to say hello, but Zach smiled and waved to her.

"Zach," Mom continued, "Jayda is my niece—my brother Ben's daughter. Remember her from the pictures?"

"Oh, yeah—she was smaller then," Zach said. It suddenly struck him—this was his cousin! Mom and Dad might not believe it, but he still knew. He had a family—a mom, a dad, even a cousin! And if he remembered correctly, Jayda should have three more sisters. No brothers, though; that was too bad. Still, girl cousins were better than no cousins. And their parents should be here somewhere, too—Lia, his aunt, and Ben, the preacher, his uncle. This could turn out to be an even better day than yesterday. So far, every day since he had found his parents had been better than the day before, each one the best day of his life so far.

Lia—Zach spotted her across the room—approached with her other three girls, two of them teenagers and the third about Zach's age. Like Jayda, each of them shared Lia's narrow, Asian eyes and dark hair; all except the third shared her tall, slender build. The third was less slender and a little shorter for her age.

Lia greeted Mom and Dad, then took a look at Zach and smiled. "This is obviously one of _your_ relatives, Craig. I didn't know you were having family over this weekend."

"Neither did we, until Thursday night," Mom replied. "This is Zach. He's Craig's...cousin's son...we think... It's a long story."

Lia lifted one eyebrow. "Zach... _Fleming?"_

Mom nodded with a slight frown.

"Sounds like an _interesting_ story. Welcome, Zach. I'm Lia, Kara's sister-in-law."

"I know," Zach replied. "I saw you in the pictures."

"We showed him our family photos the other night," Mom explained.

"Well then," Lia said, "you probably already recognize my daughters. You've met Jayda. This is Jasmine"—she indicated the oldest—"and Brooke"—the other teenager—"and Marissa," she concluded, placing a hand on the girl about Zach's age.

"Hi," Jasmine and Brooke said together.

"I don't like boys," Marissa declared, glaring at Zach through narrowed eyes.

"That's not nice, Marissa," Brooke scolded her. "It's not his fault he's a boy."

"He still is, though," she countered.

"Actually, Marissa," Lia stepped in, "I was hoping you'd take Zach to his Sunday School class. He looks like he's about your age. I'm guessing fourth grade?"

Zach nodded.

Marissa gave him a superior look. "I'm in _fifth_ grade."

Lia looked sternly to her daughter. "In that case, Marissa, I expect you, being older, to model a gracious attitude." She turned back to Zach. "You and Marissa will be in the same class. If you want to go to Sunday School, that is."

Zach looked up at Mom. "Can I, Mom?" As soon as he said it, he turned red—he hadn't meant to mess up so soon.

Lia gave Mom an odd look. "Mom for the weekend," Mom explained with a shrug. "Sure, go ahead," she told Zach.

"Come on," Marissa commanded. She took his arm and led him away. He rolled his eyes at being pulled by a girl, but she ignored his expression and tugged him into a wide hallway and out of sight of his parents.

"You know why I don't like boys?" She didn't wait for him to reply. "Because they're mean, and disgusting, and dirty"—she glanced at his jeans—"and they talk too much, and—"

"We're cousins!" Zach blurted out. He realized he shouldn't have told her that, but it was too late. Not that she cared, anyway, as it turned out.

"No, we're not. You're from Uncle Craig's family, I'm from Aunt Kara's family. That means you and I are not actually related. Which is good, because there are too many boys in my life already."

They arrived at their classroom. Besides himself and Marissa, twelve children packed the small room, nine of them boys—much to Marissa's chagrin. She and the other girls huddled together on one side of the room for protection.

The class was fun. The teacher, an older woman with white hair tied up in a bun, told them a Bible story, and they played a game, and then their time was up. Marissa, in a good mood now despite having spent an hour among so many boys, grabbed Zach by the arm again and escorted him to the auditorium, where she located his mom sitting on a pew beside her own mother.

"There has to be some kind of problem in his family," Mom was telling Lia. "They sent him to us with no warning and without any hint how long he'll be with us."

"So you're a fill-in mom for a while," Lia responded.

"I guess so. Hopefully, we'll be able to get in touch with them tomorrow. But in the meantime, I need some advice. I don't have a clue what I'm doing."

"Actually, it looks like you're doing rather well," Lia said, assessing Zach as he and Marissa came up beside them, "considering that you weren't expecting him. Kids have always come naturally to you, Kara. Don't worry. Just take care of the basics—make sure he eats and sleeps, and brushes his teeth. And takes a bath. Clean clothes—"

"Yeah, we're working on that," Mom said with a wry grin. "I didn't think of him needing clothes for church until this morning. The only clothes he brought were the ones he was wearing. That includes just one pair of underwear... I hadn't thought to have him brush his teeth, either, or take a bath."

Zach raised his eyebrows doubtfully at that last part. He spoke up before they could say any more about baths. "Hey, Mom, did you know Jesus could walk on water?"

Mom chuckled. "Could he, now?"

"You did know," Zach stated flatly, his eyes narrowed.

Mom just laughed.

"Anyway, I think the teacher doesn't know very much about Jesus, because I asked her why he rode in boats when he could have just walked on the water, and she didn't know."

"Hmm, that would be a good question for Ben," Mom advised. She glanced at Lia, who grinned. "He ought to have an answer for that, being a preacher."

Satisfied for now, Zach sat down beside Mom. Dad joined them a moment later and teased Marissa about boys until worship began.

Zach enjoyed the church's singing, but found it surprisingly difficult to sit still with his head bowed and eyes closed during the prayers. He paid close attention, though, when his Uncle Ben stood up to preach. He had seen Ben from a distance earlier, but this was the first time he had heard him speak. Ben taught about a sheep that got lost and how the shepherd left all the other sheep so he could search for the lost one. From what Zach could gather, this story meant that everyone should go find people who got lost. That made sense, of course—no one wanted to stay lost.

When the worship assembly was done, Lia and Marissa said goodbye and Zach's parents chatted with friends, introducing Zach as Craig's cousin's son several times. One conversation at a time, they wound their way toward the exit.

At the door, they found Ben, who had just greeted one last church member. Seeing Dad, he pointed a thumb toward the parking lot, which had cleared out considerably. "Want your tools back?"

"Sure," Dad answered. "Come on, Zach. You can give us a hand."

"Do you know a lot about Jesus?" Zach blurted out to Ben.

He smiled. "Some. Why?"

"Because I don't think my teacher knew much about him," Zach replied. "I asked her why Jesus always rode around in boats when he could just walk on the water, and she didn't know."

"Hmm," Uncle Ben said thoughtfully, "that's a tough one. I've never thought about that before." He rubbed his chin, pondering, as they walked out to his car. "Maybe so his legs wouldn't get tired. It would be a long walk, all the way across the Sea of Galilee."

Dad grinned, but Zach tipped his head, considering. That made some sense. "But he made it so Peter could walk on the water, too, right?"

"Yes," Ben replied, "one time."

"Why didn't he ever make it so his followers could all walk on the water—you know, for short trips?"

Ben shook his head and chuckled. "I have no idea. Have you ever considered a career in ministry? You have great questions—might make a good preacher."

Zach wasn't sure what Ben meant by that, but since Ben was a preacher himself, he figured it was a compliment. He liked Ben—he was gentle like Mom, though he seemed rather different from her besides that. _I have an uncle._

They moved Dad's tools from Ben's car to Mom's, and then Mom, Dad, and Zach piled into Mom's car for the drive home.

After lunch, the adventures continued. "I need to run to the store," Mom announced. Zach and Dad both looked up from the books they were reading—Dad, on the couch, had a novel, and Zach, in an armchair, was looking through a picture book of Seattle, something he had pulled off the bookshelf at random. "Will you two guys be okay without me?"

Zach wondered—the rules were different here. There were rules, but they didn't always include staying home. He could ask...but he didn't want to make his parents angry. Especially not Dad.

He gathered up his courage. "Mom?"

"Hmm?" she responded as she scanned the contents of the refrigerator. Turning to the counter, she jotted something down on a slip of paper, then looked up at Zach.

"Could I...?" He hesitated.

"Do you want to come with me, Zach?" she asked curiously. He nodded, rather more eagerly than he had intended, and she wrinkled her eyebrows. "Sure, if you like..."

"Really?" He was suddenly aware that Dad was watching him, too.

"Have you ever been to the store before?" Dad asked.

Zach shook his head. Mom and Dad stared at each other for a moment, and for some reason they both looked concerned. "Is that okay?" he asked.

"Zach," Mom replied, "we're confused about why you've been so...sheltered. Before you came here, had you ever been anywhere besides home and school?"

"And I think you said church a couple of times," Dad added.

"Not much," Zach answered. "The doctor, when I was little. And I get to go on field trips with my class. One time we went to the Children's Museum."

"But your grandfather and grandmother—they never took you anywhere?"

"No."

"Do you know why they didn't take you places, Zach?" Mom asked.

He shook his head slowly, trying to recall whether he had ever heard Grandfather talk about it. "No," he said at last. "My friends at school all got to go places, but...that's just how it always was."

Dad set his novel on the couch, ran a hand through his hair, and sighed. "You're quite a mystery, Zach."

Zach didn't respond. He wasn't sure how he felt about being a mystery.

Gentle hands gripped his shoulders. His first impulse was to pull away, but instead he looked up and saw Mom smiling down at him—sadly, it seemed. The hands were hers, so he let them stay.

She quickly masked her sadness with a playful grin. "Come on, Zach. You can choose your own toothbrush. I don't think I'll buy you any underwear, though. We'll let your real parents take care of that."

Off they went then, the two of them, and from the moment they stepped into the store Zach had no doubt that this was definitely the new best day of his life. He had never seen so much food in one place, not even in the school lunch room. Fresh breads, cookies, and muffins welcomed them with warm aromas as he and Mom stepped inside through sliding doors that somehow opened by themselves. It was marvelous.

Mom selected a shopping cart and steered it in front of him. "Here, Zach. You can drive."

"Drive?" he repeated, taking the handle. The thing didn't have a steering wheel.

"Well, push, anyway," she laughed. "Follow me."

They passed through the bread section and into the meat department, where one entire wall was packed with shelves of all kinds of raw meat. He found beef, chicken, turkey, fish, and even—"Is this squid?" He picked up a package and showed Mom. The creatures inside were slimy and certainly looked like squid, just as the label claimed. Short arms stretched out behind their slimy bodies; creepy black eyes stared up at him.

Mom wrinkled her nose and returned to her perusal of the ground beef. "Yep, they sell squid here."

"Can we buy some?" he asked hopefully. "I've never had it before."

"Me, neither," she replied, "and I'd rather keep it that way, if it's all the same to you."

"Oh." He set the squid back in its place, crestfallen.

Mom set two packages of ground beef in the cart. "Tell you what, though, Zach. If all goes well, we should be able to find out who your real parents are tomorrow. But since it looks like you're with us for one more night, you can help me decide what we'll have for dinner. What's your favorite food?"

That was an easy decision. "Tacos!"

"Hard shell or soft?"

"Soft."

"We can do that," she said. "I've already picked up some beef, so we'll need—let's see...tortillas..."

"And cheese."

"We have cheese at home."

"Tomatoes, lettuce, sour cream."

"Onions?"

"Definitely not."

"Got it," Mom said. She was smiling—she was having a good time with him.

_She likes me,_ Zach thought. But if she liked him, why did she keep trying to find another home for him?

She set off at a steady pace, taking him down one aisle after another, each one packed with foods of a new sort, many of which were unfamiliar to him. He didn't ask for anything else after the squid; he didn't want to upset Mom. But he watched and learned. He noticed how she checked prices on little tags set beneath each item and how she compared products of different sizes. When they came to a section packed with an amazing assortment of fruits and vegetables, several of which he did not recognize, he watched her compare tomatoes and choose the best ones. She did the same with the lettuce.

On an aisle that smelled strongly of soap, they located the toothbrushes. Mom assessed their options. "Pick out one that's two dollars or less," she instructed. "When we find your home, you can take it with you."

After a moment's consideration, he slid a green one off its peg and set it in the cart.

Mom picked it up and handed it back to him. "Not the green," she said. "The pink is much better." But she was teasing—her eyes laughed at him.

They went on to collect all their taco ingredients, and also eggs, milk, and a case of pop for Dad to drink at work. The cart grew heavier, but he maneuvered it without any trouble until they eventually returned to the front of the store, paid for their groceries, and carried their bags out to the car.

"Well, what did you think of the grocery store?" Mom inquired.

"It's amazing!" Zach exclaimed. "Can we come back sometime?"

Mom grinned, but also looked at him with that strange kind of sadness in her eyes again. "Maybe, Zach," she answered. "But we'll have to wait and see what happens tomorrow."

They stowed their goods in the trunk of the car. As she closed it, she turned back to him. There was something sad in his own eyes, now—he could feel it, and she saw it. "I know you want to stay with us, Zach, but we can't keep you. I almost wish we could. But it would be wrong, so wrong for us to take you from—well," she sighed, "from Elliott or whoever you belong to. Someone out there loves you, Zach, and wants you back. I mean, look at you! How could they not?" She tried to make a smile, but it wouldn't quite come.

The tip of his nose itched, so he scratched it with his thumb. For some reason, Mom turned away abruptly and got into the car. Zach climbed in, too, and they drove home in silence.

*****

Rock music blared through the walls. Fingers tucked inside thin gloves, clean and black, tapped the beat on an immaculate oak table as the black-hooded figure surveyed the room. It belonged to Hugh McWrait, the man listed first on the paper the figure had found, the man who would be the first to pay. It was the man's very own bedroom, spacious and opulent, with its own kitchenette, wine cabinet, and oak dining table tucked off to one side.

Somewhere in this room there would be money hidden. Inexplicably, rich people always kept a stash in their bedroom. The figure would find it, and McWrait would pay for his interest in the boy.

That McWrait was hosting a Sunday evening party in his great hall was fortuitous. That his sentries at the front door had been amenable to a small...contribution...was doubly so. A few hundred dollars had permitted the figure entry, and once inside the great hall, it had been simple enough to slip away from the party and into the living quarters of McWrait's mansion. A brief search had turned up this room, and now the figure stood at the table, trying to guess where a man of McWrait's flamboyance would conceal his cash reserves.

The walk-in closet seemed too obvious; any ordinary thief would have ransacked it first and likely found little of value. No, McWrait loved indulgence, but for all his excesses, he also esteemed finesse. His personal treasure trove would be somewhere simple and inconspicuous.

The figure checked the tall, oak wardrobe beside the bed. McWrait apparently had a taste for oak. The garments inside—suits and sweaters, mostly—were exquisite, but a careful investigation around them revealed no secret compartments, no detachable panels. The figure closed the wardrobe.

Perhaps the cupboards in the kitchenette. Again, though, a quick but thorough search uncovered nothing. He knelt beside the oak table and peered up at its underside; once, last year, he had discovered a wad of cash strapped in such a place at the home of another man who was wealthier than he had a right to be. But here, the table concealed no secrets.

The rock music suddenly blared louder—someone was opening the bedroom door. The figure jumped to his feet and darted toward a sliding glass door that looked out onto a wooden deck and a fabulous nighttime view of Puget Sound west of Seattle—but too late.

"Hold it!" a man's voice cried as the bedroom door swung fully open..

One gloved hand on the handle of the sliding door, the figure turned. The man entering the room was McWrait himself, in his mid-fifties and somehow looking both rich and disheveled, the top buttons of his dress shirt unfastened as he stumbled into his bedroom. His eyes were too wide and his face was too merry; even from across the room he reeked of alcohol. A martini in his left hand sloshed as he stepped into the room and did not quite manage to remain entirely within the confines of its glass.

"W-What are you doing in here?" McWrait stammered, his enunciation slurred. "You don't clean the room during the p-party!"

The figure narrowed his eyes at McWrait, assessing the danger. He knew he should run while he had the opportunity, before McWrait called for the guards who policed his estate. But the man appeared to be too drunk to recognize a thief in his bedroom tonight, and another chance to search this room would be hard to come by—so the figure risked remaining a little longer.

McWrait took a clumsy sip of his martini and pointed a finger in the figure's general direction. "You're the—the new guy," he mumbled, as if to himself. "You don't know!" He thrust a fist into the air as if to make some proclamation. "You don't know that house staff do not clean during the party! You wait on— _the—guests."_

The figure's eyes widened now at the other man's display of inebriated bravado.

McWrait grinned at the figure. "Why do you w-wear that hood over your head? Are you really that ugly?" The man bellowed out laughter at his joke. Then his face darkened and his laughter broke off suddenly. "Turn around!" he ordered.

The figure merely stared at him.

"Around! I need to get something...personal. For my girlfriend. And you mustn't look..." McWrait chuckled as if this were a great game.

The figure played along, but kept his hand poised on the sliding door handle as he turned his back to McWrait; a quick escape could become necessary in a hurry if the "something personal" McWrait reached for turned out to be a weapon.

McWrait squatted beside his bed; the figure could see him reflected clearly in the glass door. There were drawers built into the frame beneath the bed, and McWrait drew out the one in the middle. Without glancing back to check on the black-gloved figure, he removed it completely, then reached into the space it had vacated and felt around inside the frame. He located what he desired and pulled it out—a large manila envelope. From it he withdrew a bracelet glittering with diamonds that, given McWrait's fortune, were assuredly real; then he returned the envelope to its place, reset the drawer, and stood again.

"Now you may look," he told the figure, as if doing him a favor. The figure turned back toward him. McWrait stepped unsteadily to his bedroom door. "No more cleaning, my man. To the party!" He glanced back as he reached the corridor, then shut the door behind him, leaving the black-gloved figure alone again.

The figure waited just a moment to be sure McWrait was gone, then quickly reenacted the man's removal of the drawer and the envelope—McWrait's bedroom treasure trove. The figure searched it swiftly, but it was not what he had expected—no cash, no valuables now that the bracelet had been removed. Instead, it contained a single sheet of paper with two lines of handwriting scrawled on it. The first line offered only the words, _"store #1," "office,"_ and _"ships."_ After these came a series of five numbers separated by dashes—a combination for a safe, perhaps.

The figure smiled, pleasantly impressed. McWrait did not keep his treasure trove here in his room, after all. He owned several stores, and his treasure would be in the first, inside the office—somewhere near ships? This was an intriguing mystery.

The figure drew a tiny notebook from the pocket of his jacket and copied down the information, then replaced McWrait's paper within the manila envelope, which he returned to its hiding place. When he had settled the drawer back into its proper position, he slipped across the bedroom and out the sliding glass door into the night, eager to search out and claim McWrait's treasure.

*****

The boy slept in his own bed in the guestroom again Sunday night. He must have slept well, because he bounced out of the room in chipper spirits the next morning. His breakfast consisted of oatmeal and raisins again, with a side helping of eggs. His own T-shirt and jeans—and underwear, too—were freshly washed, as was he himself, despite a mild protest the previous evening. He had not protested brushing his teeth, though, perhaps because of the brand new toothbrush, or perhaps because protesting the bath had availed him nothing.

No one mentioned the mission for which Craig and Kara were preparing. The boy did ask, though, as they dropped him off at school, whether they would pick him up later or if he should walk home. They decided someone would pick him up, unless they called the school to say otherwise. He seemed satisfied with that answer; the possibility that they might find and contact his real family to come and claim him did not seem to occur to him. The boy was utterly convinced he would stay with them.

The only office in the state where they could go to pick up a copy of the his birth certificate in person was in Tumwater, a suburb of the state capital, Olympia. It being only an hour's drive away, they considered this option preferable to waiting for the certificate to arrive in the mail. So after they dropped the boy off at school, Craig and Kara swung west to Interstate 5 and headed south, Craig maneuvering them through the rush hour traffic.

Wrapped up in their own thoughts, they didn't talk much as they drove. They had discussed most of their questions before the boy had gotten up. If Elliott were indeed the father, and if they could get the birth certificate on that information alone, they would look up the address and phone number of the boy's mother on Craig's smartphone as soon as they left the office and try to get in touch with her. If they couldn't reach her, they would call Craig's Uncle Pete, Elliott's father. He lived somewhere in western Washington state, so they could likely take the boy to him before the day was out. It wasn't right for the boy to be with them.

And if Elliott were somehow not the father...well, they would be back to square one, unable to retrieve the birth certificate unless the name of another relative they might suggest appeared on it. Kara tried not to think about how complicated finding the boy's family might be if they could not acquire that certificate. They would have to call the authorities sooner or later, and that would be awkward—both for the boy, who would likely be sent off to a foster home until his family could be found, and for her and Craig, who would be obligated to explain why they had been keeping someone else's child in their home. Somehow, "the police brought him here" and "the boy said we were his parents" did not sound convincing.

It was mid-morning when they reached their destination and pulled in to park behind the state's Department of Health building. Inside, they located the office they needed.

At its door, Craig stopped and turned to Kara. "Are we doing the right thing?" he asked her. Was he nervous? She certainly was.

"Yes," she answered with more determination than she felt. "He's family. We should do what we can." They had covered this ground already, but there was something reassuring about knowing Craig still felt as hesitant as she did. This was unfamiliar ground, each step tenuous.

They entered the office and found a counter where a clerk in his forties, his hair and mustache graying early, met them. "How can I help you?"

To her own surprise, Kara spoke first. "We need a copy of a birth certificate," she said. She had expected to let Craig take the lead; the boy was from his family. Why should she be so nervous?

"I'd be glad to get that for you," the clerk answered. "The charge is twenty dollars, and I'll need some information about the person listed on the certificate." Kara received his words with a nod. He pulled up a new screen on his computer. "First, let me get your name."

"Kara Carpenter—er, Fleming, sorry. Carpenter is my maiden name." She gave herself a tiny shake. She had not made that mistake for a long time. She must be nervous indeed.

"The full name of the person for whom you need the birth certificate?"

"Zechariah Timothy Fleming," Kara replied. "Zechariah with a Z-E."

He keyed in the information. "Birthdate?"

"April—" At the critical moment, she had forgotten the day.

Craig rescued her. "Third. And he's ten years old, so..."

"Got it," the clerk replied. He punched in that information. "Here he is."

A surge of adrenaline hit Kara, lifting her spirit. The man had found the record. Would he permit them to receive it?

"Before I print this out, may I see your driver's license, Mrs. Fleming?" he asked her. She fished it out and handed it to him across the counter. "Very good," he said, noting her name and returning it to her. "It'll take just a moment for the printer to do its work..."

Craig glanced at Kara. He was thinking the same thing she was. Did they not need to give the man Elliott's name? This was turning out to be a less complicated transaction than they had anticipated.

The clerk retrieved the printed certificate, stamped it with an official seal, slipped it full-length into a large envelope, and handed the envelope to Kara. He and Craig swapped twenty dollars for a receipt, and Craig and Kara departed, envelope in hand.

They made it all the way outside the building and into the sunlight before Kara could stand to wait no longer. She stopped and opened the envelope. Craig seemed as eager to view its contents as she was. She lifted the certificate out carefully and held it in the sunlight where he could see it, too, over her shoulder. "Okay, Elliott, who's the mother?"

She read the certificate silently—and nearly dropped it.

"No, no—Craig, this is wrong!" she gasped. Her first impulse was to turn around and march back into the office, but her husband put his strong hands on her shoulders to hold her where she was.

"They won't be able to fix it," he told her. "That's the information they have."

"But it's wrong!" she yelled at him, causing a passer-by to glance over at them in momentary concern.

"I know," he said grimly. "But they won't believe us. We'll have to track down the error before they'll listen." That calculating look appeared in his eyes; already he was trying to figure out how to do just that.

"Somebody put _our_ names on this certificate!" Kara spat. A part of her wanted to scream. "Ten years ago! That must be why he wanted to see my driver's license—to make sure I was the mother! That's why he didn't need the parents' names! Somebody gave the state our names, and then they told Zach, and that's why—"

"That's why Zach thinks we're his parents," Craig finished.
Chapter 5

Craig brought Zach home from school that afternoon. "Only after your homework is done," he told the youngster as they came inside together from the garage. "Paws is allergic to kids who haven't done their homework."

"Really?" Zach asked, walking to the dining table and setting his backpack on it. He looked over at Kara for the truth. Fascinating, how quickly kids picked up on such subtleties of personality.

"No, not really," she told him. "But Ms. Faber said you need to do a better job of turning your homework in."

"Oh," he said, dropping his eyes. He pulled his ID tag from around his neck and sat down to sift through his backpack, withdrawing a notebook from it. He began to open the notebook, but spotted a paper across the table and reached for it curiously. Craig, in the kitchen, noticed right away, but it was too late; Kara, at the computer, saw it, too, and one hand flew to cover her mouth—but he already had it in his hands. The birth certificate... They had intended to put it away before he came home.

"This paper has my name on it," Zach observed, intrigued. He read a little further down the page. "It has my birthday, too. And your names are on—wait... This says you _are_ my parents!" He looked up at them, full of hope.

"Yes, it does," Craig admitted.

Zach looked from one of them to the other. "So...you believe me now?"

Craig stepped into the dining area and pulled a chair out for himself, turning it backward and sitting with his arms crossed atop its back. "We need to talk about that, Zach."

Kara joined them, forming a triangle with him and Zach around one end of the table. Zach frowned. "You _still_ don't?"

Craig sighed. "I don't know what to think, Zach, except that someone lied about you to the State of Washington. And not recently—when you were born."

Zach looked back down at the paper. "It has my whole name on it. It says I was born at home. It says you're my father and mother!"

"It's a birth certificate," Kara explained. "We picked it up this morning so we could find out who your real parents are."

The youngster slammed his fist on the tabletop. " _You_ are my real parents! It says so!" He was angry, but not defiant—just trying to get through to people who ought to be able to make sense of something so obvious. Craig respected his tenacity.

"I could believe we're your parents, Zach," he confessed, "just from looking at you. You said it the other day—you're left-handed like Kara and you look like that picture of me when I was your age. And if I were anybody else, I might believe it because this birth certificate says it's so. Even the school says it's so. But I know for a fact that we've never had a child. Even with the doctors' help, we couldn't have children. So this birth certificate has to be wrong."

"And look at this, Zach," Kara said, pointing to a line on the birth certificate. "I've been trying all afternoon to find out who this person is—Della Apton. See where it says she was the midwife? That means she helped me have my baby. But I've never met anyone by that name. And I can't find anything on the Internet about a midwife named Della Apton. Also," she said to Craig, "while you were picking Zach up, I called the state's midwife association and asked them about her. They couldn't find any record of her."

"Nothing, huh?" Craig put his face in his hands and rubbed his eyes. A dead end, at least so far. He looked at Zach again, then at Kara. Their expressions were surprisingly similar, a look of staunch certitude blended with concern in the eyes of each.

He took a deep breath. "Zach, you want us to be your parents... All right, then. Look, at the very least, you're related to us. So you're part of our family until either we figure out what's going on here and get you to your real family, or else in a few days we have to call Child Protective Services, and they'll probably put you in a foster home until your family can be found."

Zach turned to Kara with a measure of trepidation. "I don't want to go somewhere else. I want to stay here."

"It's not that simple, Craig," Kara pointed out. "They'll look at his birth certificate first. They'll just bring him back to us. And what happens then? Do we get charged with trying to abandon our child? Does the birth certificate make us de facto parents? At the least, we would look bad, trying to dump our own child on the state."

"The birth certificate," he sighed. He had been doing that a lot since Thursday night. "Right, that's a problem." He slid the certificate over to himself and read through it for the twentieth time, then looked back up at the youngster. "Zach, I don't like this turning into an us-against-you contest. We don't want it to be like that."

"No," Kara concurred. "You're a really great kid. We like you a lot. We just can't figure out who said you're our son when we've never had a son. Why would anyone do that?" She paused. "Does that make any sense to you?"

The youngster nodded. "I guess. But I just know you _are_ my mom and dad. I can tell. I knew it when I first got here." His eyes rested on that birth certificate again.

"So there's our problem," Craig said. "All three of us want to know why someone told your grandparents and the State of Washington that you're our son." There was no need to mention that his grandparents could be the culprits; he would not accept that idea readily. "So I suggest we work the problem together—me, Kara, and you. We'll help each other until we find some answers. Deal?"

"Deal," Zach agreed. "I want to know why I had to grow up without you. I like you guys, too."

Craig lifted his eyebrows at that comment and glanced over at Kara. She bit her upper lip as she considered Zach.

"We'll need to be ready for whatever we might find out, though," Craig warned. He thought it best to begin preparing the youngster for disappointment. "What will you do, Zach, if you find out we're not your parents, that somebody lied about us and you have a family somewhere else?"

Craig could see the youngster thinking through that possibility with reluctance. "I would be sad. But I would want to meet them," he answered. "Could I still come and visit sometimes?"

"I think we would like that," Kara said immediately.

Craig nodded his agreement. "And what if we can't find your family, Zach, and we have to call CPS after all? They would ask you a lot of questions, probably put you in a foster home. Maybe they would bring you back to us. More likely, they would find out the birth certificate is wrong and send you somewhere else. Could you be okay with that?"

Zach looked down at his hands in thought. "If they let me come back, I would be okay with it. Otherwise, I don't know." He looked back up at Craig. "But what if we find out you _are_ my parents?"

Craig frowned. That question again. The youngster so desperately wanted them to be his mom and dad. "Zach," he said, "I can't..." But the youngster had answered Craig's questions, and now he waited. "All right. You know—I think I'd like having you around."

"So would I," Kara added.

Zach let out a slow, relieved breath. His eyes turned to Kara, then back to Craig.

"But you would have to do chores," Craig warned him.

"Like what?"

"I don't know. We'd figure it out. Maybe taking care of Paws, to start with. And you'd have to do your homework every night. Like right now."

Paws barked at something outside. "Yeah, better get to it," Kara encouraged. "Paws is waiting for you, and it sounds like he's getting impatient."

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, rotated a dial slowly, precisely. There was an art to withdrawing secret treasures from their hiding places, and a thrill to doing it with the requisite skill. He had long since learned the skill needed for this particular task. The security here was light; it was not the kind of place that one of his expertise would normally target. Ironically, that fact made his targeting it tonight all the more enjoyable.

The figure squatted in a tiny, dark office in the back of a convenience store that was, conveniently, closed for a few more hours. Flashlight lighting up the dial, he completed one final turn and lifted the lever on the door. The safe popped open. The combination he had copied down at McWrait's mansion worked.

He reached inside and released the safe's contents from their confinement. There was cash, and a lot of it. Maybe $50,000, even $100,000, he guessed, judging by the stack of $100 bills. He had found McWrait's hidden treasure trove indeed—using careful research, just as his father had taught him. Information was the key to many endeavors, and a little research first thing this morning had led him from McWrait's mansion last night to this small vault hidden in a low-security store in a dark corner of the city—the first store McWrait had acquired.

Why would McWrait, with all his millions, keep so much cash here rather than at his mansion? The figure mulled over the question as he scooped the loot into his satchel. McWrait would hardly miss such a small amount, but with all the harm his nefarious deeds—yet to be proven in court, but well attested in the city's darker circles all the same—had done to the innocent folks of this city, any injury that could be done to him in turn was a noble act. _Robin Hood again,_ the figure told himself, _robbing the rich and all that. Robin would be proud._

What to do with this money? A small portion of it he would, of course, put aside for himself as compensation for his efforts. But most of it he would deliver as anonymous donations to worthy organizations—the mission, the library, perhaps a museum. He did not play the thief to get rich; he had no such desire. His purpose today was simply to make McWrait pay for his involvement with the boy.

_A thief again tonight, and proudly._ He double-checked the safe for any loose bills. One curious item remained there—another manila folder, unmarked like the one he had found in McWrait's bedroom. He checked his watch—precisely one minute to spare. Simple the store's security system may have been, but it was not incapable of ruining his evening if he grew inattentive.

He opened the folder. The top paper, and several immediately beneath it, listed names, dollar amounts, and...purchases. Sales, too. Drug deals, big ones, the specific merchandise and quantities described in detail. McWrait's own name dominated the sheets. The police—all the more, the FBI—had sought information like this on McWrait for more than a decade. The fact that they had not acquired it was essentially the reason the man still walked free.

_So this is why he keeps the money here,_ the figure realized. _Drug money._ It had to come and go frequently and on short notice as McWrait's dealers managed the man's shadier transactions. To host such a steady flow of cash at his home would draw undesirable attention in the wrong part of town. But to keep it here in a place no one would expect must suit him well—a busy little store where his couriers could find it tucked away in a secret hole behind an old, cheap portrait of sailing ships on the office wall.

These papers—blessed information—might prove useful. The figure tucked them into the satchel alongside the cash, set the clasp, and withdrew a small note he had prepared in advance. _"For Zechariah,"_ it read—a simple message, so that McWrait would understand the purpose behind the theft.

He set it where the manila folder had been and closed the safe. A few seconds remained for him to reset the portrait and double-check lest he leave any trace of himself. Satisfied that he had left none, he negotiated his way out of the store, careful to avoid tripping the surveillance devices he had left functioning. The others would reactivate themselves momentarily.

Finished with his work here, he exited the building through the rear door right on time and disappeared into the thick darkness of the alley behind the store, his satchel firmly in hand.

*****

Craig sipped water at the dinner table Tuesday evening, Kara sitting at an angle to his right and Zach opposite her on his left.

"I thought of a way we could find out Grandfather's or Grandmother's name," Zach announced between bites of his hamburger. Apparently this was the first burger he could remember ever eating outside of school. "But it would never work."

Kara smiled encouragingly. "What's your idea?"

"I thought that if they put people's pictures on their graves when they're buried, we could go to the graveyard and look at the pictures until we found them. But I don't think they put pictures on graves."

"No, they don't," Craig agreed. "Good thought, though. I'm glad you're thinking about what we can do."

Kara tapped her fork against her teeth. "Actually, they print notices in the newspaper when people die, and sometimes they include a photograph." She stepped out of her chair for a moment to fetch the day's newspaper from the kitchen counter and opened it to the obituaries. "See?"

"But how are you going to get obituaries from months or years ago?" Craig asked her.

"The library has all the old _Seattle Times_ on their web site," she replied. "The question is whether his grandparents were listed in there."

"And whether the family included a photograph."

"Mm-hmm."

Zach was still reading the obituaries page—or, rather, the article beneath the obituaries. "Weird," he said, looking up at them both. "Somebody robbed a store last night, but didn't take anything."

"Then how do they know it got robbed?" Craig asked.

"It says the thief left the back door unlocked and turned off some of the video cameras for a while. Stores have video cameras?"

Kara grinned. "They do—to stop thieves."

"Sounds like this guy's pretty good," Craig said. "But he didn't take anything. Or maybe he had some other purpose. Either way, that's pretty strange." Craig finished his last bite, took another swallow of water, and stood up, glancing at the clock. "I'd better get going."

Kara looked at him a little too directly with eyes fully open and eyebrows raised, silently telling him something—but what? He lowered his own brows in confusion. So did Zach, watching them. She gave a slight nod to the side, toward Zach.

"Oh!" Craig exclaimed, getting it. He turned to the youngster. "Er... Kara wants me to ask if you would like to come with me."

"Yes!" he replied instantly. "Where to?"

"I have another Little League game to coach tonight. Come on, you can sit in the dugout with the team. Bring that hat I gave you."

Zach wolfed down the last of his meal, ran his dishes to the sink, and dashed off to the guestroom. Craig shared a look of wonder with Kara; the youngster didn't even care where they were going, so long as he could come, too. Maybe he really _had_ been kept inside all of his life.

He hurried back with his cap on his head, and a moment later they climbed into the pickup together. Zach buckled his seatbelt and turned to Craig. "Dad?" he asked.

"Yes?" He was getting used to being called "Dad," even if the title didn't fit. The youngster seemed so earnest about it.

"Can you and Mom read each other's minds?"

Craig backed the pickup out of the garage. "What do you mean?"

"You know, the way she looked at you and you knew what she was saying."

Craig laughed. "No, Zach, there's no man alive who can tell what a woman is thinking—even if she explains it to you."

"But you did," he contended.

"A lucky guess," Craig said. "It comes from being married a long time." He pulled the pickup into the street.

Zach thought about that for a moment. "Dad?"

"Hmm?"

"Can Mom read _your_ mind?"

"Yes, Zach. Women _always_ know what men are thinking, especially if you don't tell them."

The youngster turned and looked out the passenger window. "I am definitely never getting married."

*****

Zach had a great time at the game with Dad. The team won again, so the mood in the dugout was ecstatic for a few minutes at the end. Zach didn't venture out of the dugout much except to get a drink from the water fountain once; he knew it was silly, but he didn't want to risk not being allowed back inside. This was all a wonderful dream, and he didn't want to wake up.

After the game they returned home, Dad explaining the finer points of baseball on the way. Zach loved it, even if he only retained half of what Dad told him. He savored the attention. He liked being a family, liked the feeling of it. He hadn't felt that in a long time.

Mom had obituaries and photographs ready for them to search through on the computer when they came inside, and he helped her look through them for an hour before she announced that it was time to give up and "hit the sack," which, she explained, meant going to bed. He brushed his teeth, but thankfully he didn't have to take a bath, not tonight. The amazing, huge bed was as soft and warm as ever, and he fell right to sleep.

School was good the next day, but he noticed that he didn't crave it like usual. He had other things to look forward to now, like Dad telling him that since Mom had to work late, he would take a break from his own work and pick Zach up from school, and then Zach could come work with him and Derek. Dad even said he would pay Zach for his work, like an employee. Zach had never had money before. If this was a dream, it was a magnificent dream. He wanted to sleep forever.

They zipped along the freeway for a few minutes in Dad's pickup, then exited a couple of blocks from their destination, a preschool. Derek's truck was backed up to the playground, its bed loaded with a mound of woodchips. Derek himself, tall, strong, and dark-skinned, dressed in dirty jeans and a sweaty T-shirt, was standing atop the mound, pulling and shoving woodchips onto the ground with his rake.

"And there's the new employee!" he called heartily as Zach emerged from the cab.

"Hi," Zach responded with a wave.

Dad picked up two more rakes that had been set aside and handed one to Zach. "Mr. Fleming, welcome to your first day on the job. Follow me." With Zach behind him, he strode to the growing woodchip pile and began raking chips away from it and across a broad sheet of black plastic stretched atop bare ground. "Our job is to rake these chips out all the way across this plastic," he said, indicating the space around the playground equipment. "This morning, all of this was covered with grass. We dug it out so we could lay this weed barrier and these woodchips down. Are you ready?"

"Definitely!" Zach replied, and he began to rake enthusiastically. It was fun. He was getting paid for this? What was more, Dad got paid to do this everyday? Well, he did different things, too, of course...like planting trees and wrestling in the mud. Zach grinned at the thought of getting paid to wrestle in the mud.

Derek propped his rake on one end and rested for a moment, watching them. "You know, Craig," he said, "I was thinking about what you said about Zach, how he's got to be your cousin's son... You ought to do one of those DNA tests."

Dad glanced up at Derek as he continued raking woodchips out of the other man's pile. "You mean a paternity test? I already thought about that. But there's no way I'm his—"

"They can check for cousins, too," Derek interrupted. "My mother has a friend who is adopted, and she did one of those tests and found a brother and two cousins from her birth family."

At this, Dad stopped raking and gazed up at Derek in thought. "They can check for cousins?"

Derek nodded.

"How about cousins once removed?"

"I don't know," Derek answered. "Maybe they could make a good guess, anyway."

"That could help a lot. I wonder if we might be able to find some DNA from Elliott?" Dad turned to look at Zach. "What do you think, Zach? It might give us some real answers."

Zach didn't really understand, but he nodded anyway. "Yeah, Dad. We should do it."

Dad gave him a confident smile, shot a thumbs-up to Derek, and set back to work. Derek pushed more woodchips onto his pile, and Zach thrust his rake into them again, pulling them loose and spreading them, like his dad.

*****

"They can do that?" Kara's first reaction when she arrived home and heard Derek's suggestion was skepticism. She knew about tests for paternity, but for cousins?

Craig had researched it by the time she arrived home, though. "They can," he replied. "Take a look."

He stood and gave her the computer chair. She scanned the three web pages he had left open. They were very clear: first cousins, second cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews—all could be tested for kinship, with decreasing degrees of certainty as the distance of the relationship widened.

"Zach would be a second cousin once—no, first cousin..." Second cousins and cousins removed were so hard to keep straight.

"First cousin once removed, if he's Elliott's," Craig explained. "I figure that if they can do second cousins..."

"...they should be able to give us some idea how he's related to you." She considered the idea another moment. "How much does it cost?"

"I hadn't checked that yet." Craig clicked a link, and a chart with options and costs appeared. Scrolling down, he located the price of the test they would need.

"Wow," Kara said. "$800 and up... That's a lot of money for people like us."

Craig's face fell. "I didn't think it would be so much." He turned toward her. "Maybe this isn't such a good idea."

"No," she countered immediately with unexpected conviction. "No, we have to do it, Craig. There's no better way—" She glanced back to the kitchen, where the boy was preparing tacos; he had asked Craig if he could cook dinner tonight, and tacos were what he knew how to make. He was browning meat in the skillet, but with an ear turned toward her and Craig. She lowered her voice. "There's no better way to prove the birth certificate is wrong."

Craig nodded.

"Besides, _he_ needs answers, too. He's completely convinced we're his parents...and more so everyday."

Craig considered for a few seconds, then nodded again. "All right, let's call them first thing in the morning."

"Okay," Kara agreed. They would take a hit financially in the short-term, but looking up again at the boy now slicing tomatoes on the cutting board, her resolve increased. The boy needed to be where he truly belonged. He needed a home—and soon, before she decided that, like a lost puppy, she could keep him.

*****

The clinic that would perform the DNA test was located just a few minutes from home, in the downtown district. They opened early, so Kara roused the boy in time for Craig to take him there Thursday morning and still get him to school, with a quick stop for a doughnut breakfast along the way. Providing the DNA sample was remarkably simple: a single cotton swab of saliva each from inside their cheeks and they were done. Test results would be mailed to them in a few days, so there was nothing to do now but wait.

Kara and the boy continued to scour the newspaper's obituaries that evening for signs of the boy's grandfather, but without success. They checked all the photos within three months of when the boy had been told that his grandfather had died, but finding nothing, they turned to searching for his grandmother. This effort was short-lived, though, as the boy knew only that she had died sometime after he turned five and did not know where she had lived, whether within or outside of Seattle. Without her name, that made it essentially impossible to know where to look for her, and they had to give up.

Mr. Pecking from the Mariners called that evening, surprising Craig—apparently, with the appearance of the boy, he had forgotten about the letter they had sent. The man affirmed his invitation to both Craig and Derek to attend the ballgame—in excellent seats, no less, and all expenses paid—and to step onto the field to throw out the first pitch. Craig thanked Mr. Pecking profusely through the course of the call, and after he had hung up the phone and shared the news with her and the boy, he took the boy outside to practice his pitching until nightfall.

On Friday they enjoyed a quiet evening at home, the boy spending most of his time in the yard with Paws, Kara working in the garden. One would have thought that after a full day at Grover's she might prefer to stay inside, away from sun and soil, but in fact it was the opposite; these were _her_ plants, and all day she had looked forward to tending them. Craig spent a little extra time that evening finishing a job so Derek could be with his family. When he came home, the three of them curled up in the den to watch a movie, Kara and Craig snuggling on the couch while the boy lay on the floor beside Paws. Both dog and boy were asleep well before the closing credits.

The sun shone with a pleasant, near-summer radiance Saturday morning as Kara awoke. Craig began to stir just as she did.

"Do you have any plans today?" she asked him when he rolled over and opened his eyes.

He stretched and rubbed some sleep out of them. "Not really. Just odds and ends."

"Let's take your cousin's son out for a day on the town."

"Why?" He sat up and faced her, his legs still tucked under the bed sheets.

"Why not?" she replied, but he just looked at her; somehow he always knew when there was something more behind her words, sometimes even before she herself knew. Why _did_ she want to take the boy out? "They kept him locked up inside all these years. He's lived in Seattle his whole life, but he's never really seen it..."

"He's not ours, Kara. We can't just—"

"Yes, we can!" she maintained. "We can take him wherever we want. No one's looking for him, Craig, or they would have contacted the police and come for him by now. They sent him away. And of course he's not ours, but he is family..."

"And?"

"And he might only be with us a few more days, and...well, this is something special we can do for him before we..."

"Before we lose him?"

"Before we find out where he lives and send him home."

Craig got that calculating look again. She loved how he thought through difficult problems so fluidly, but sometimes it got downright irritating. "You don't want to, do you?" she groaned.

To her surprise, he didn't respond for a moment. He was quiet for so long that she finally reached up and ruffled his bed-flattened hair a bit. He sucked in a deep breath. "I do want to," he admitted. "It would mean a lot to him."

"Okay, then?"

"All right."

She pumped her fist and kissed him.

An hour later, the three of them piled into Kara's car and pulled into the street, Craig at the wheel. "So," he called out, "where do you want to go, Zach?"

"Anywhere I want?" he asked, still incredulous at their invitation.

"Anywhere in the metro Seattle area," Kara answered, "Maybe someplace you've heard about and always wanted to go."

The boy gazed out the window at the neighborhood around them. "The Space Needle?" he suggested cautiously. "Can regular people go up there?"

"The Space Needle it is!" Craig proclaimed, and he took them out to I-5 and followed it north.

A fifteen-minute drive, a parking garage, and a short walk later, the six hundred-foot structure towered over them. Its saucer floated directly above them, capping a central shaft flanked by four white legs that bowed inward, stretching all the way up to the saucer.

Bending his head back to stare straight up at it, the boy seemed suddenly apprehensive. "Having second thoughts?" Kara probed.

He hesitated before he shook his head.

Craig grinned. "Don't worry, Zach. It's entirely stable. Kara and I have been up there a few times. Even in the big earthquake back in 2001, all it did was sway a little."

The boy's eyes grew wider than they already were.

"Thanks, Craig," Kara said with a playful backhand slap to his side. "That was helpful."

"There's no danger at all," Craig continued. "It's only fallen down once, back in '89."

The boy's face tensed.

Kara threw Craig a scolding look. "It was a _joke,"_ she explained to the boy, "an April Fool's Day joke played by a TV show. They made a fake news broadcast saying it had collapsed. They made up pictures of it and everything. But it wasn't real."

The boy stared at her nervously for a long moment before gazing back up at the top of the tower.

Kara checked with the boy once more—he assured her, weakly, that he still wanted to go to the top—so they purchased tickets and waited for their elevator. When it came, he stepped inside ahead of them, and up they went. As the elevator climbed swiftly, the boy stiffened and grabbed Kara's arm. She grinned down at him and Craig put a hand on his shoulder. "Relax, pal," he whispered in the boy's ear. "People go up and down like this everyday." The boy nodded, and his grip on Kara's arm loosened just a little.

The elevator lifted them to a stunning view of the city. The boy gaped out the windows at the city skyline and the blue water of Puget Sound beside it. "Mom, this is awesome!" he said. He didn't release Kara's arm, though.

The elevator brought them to the observation deck, where tinted windows offered a stunning, 360-degree view of Seattle. The boy darted to the nearest window and stared out with amazement, his head sweeping right and left. Kara and Craig hung back and watched.

"Look at him, Craig," Kara said quietly. Several other children marveled at the view, too, and pointed at various landmarks with delight. But this boy—he simply stood and stared, engulfed in wonder at the vista before him.

Kara and Craig stayed out of the way of the other visitors and watched until the boy moved again at last, edging his way in a slow circle around the perimeter of the saucer. They didn't approach him until, ten minutes later, he turned and looked for them.

"What's that, Dad?" he asked as they came near. He stood at the windows facing south, pointing beyond the downtown towers. "The thing with a black, roundish top."

"That's Safeco Field, where the Mariners play."

"I thought so," the boy nodded. "I saw it on TV."

He continued along the circle of windows until he arrived back where he had started. There were people on a walkway outside the windows—he seemed to notice them for the first time. "Can we go out there?" he inquired.

"Sure," Craig answered, and he led the boy outside. The walkway was built a few feet lower than the observation deck that curved around the entire rim of the saucer, offering an open-air view of Seattle blocked only by lines of metal safety cords stretching horizontally every six inches or so from waist-height to directly overhead. The boy stood back away from the edge at first, but gradually gained confidence and crept toward the outer handrail as he stepped along the platform, again circling the saucer.

When he had made the full circle at last—somewhat more quickly than his circle in the saucer's interior—Craig stepped to his side. "Do you know what any of these places are?" he asked, sweeping his hand across the panorama.

"That's Puget Sound," the boy replied, pointing to the water; "Elliott Bay...downtown... Where's our house?"

Craig put a hand on the boy's back and bent over to look from the boy's eye level, pointing beyond downtown with his other hand. "See that airplane landing out there?"

The boy searched a moment and located it. "Yeah."

"That's Boeing Field. Most of the bigger planes use Seatac Airport, further south. But if you can find Boeing Field, you can find our house. We're on the hill above it to the east a little—that way." He shifted his finger to the left. The boy's eyes tracked to the left.

"How do you know which way is east?" he asked. "When the sun gets high up in the sky, I mean."

Craig, in full coaching mode, answered right away. "In Seattle, you just have to find a landmark you know. On a clear day like today you can see Mount Rainier"—he pointed toward the massive volcano, it's roughly-rounded, glimmering-white peak soaring above the city even from seventy miles away—"and you know that's southeast. So east has to be that way." He pointed to the left of the mountain. "Lake Washington is out that way. Puget Sound is west, and then the Olympic Mountains are beyond that. And from here, we're north of downtown, so if you're in our neighborhood looking past the towers toward the Space Needle, you know you're looking north."

The boy paid close attention. For the next half hour, he circled the outer platform again, this time pulling Craig along with him, asking about everything and absorbing Craig's responses. Kara tagged along behind them, wrapped up in the two boys' conversation—not the information, but the camaraderie that had developed between them. Had she and Craig really not known this boy a mere nine days ago?

And despite his blue eyes, he did look a lot like Craig. If Elliott had ever known he had a son and had shut him away in some house somewhere—well, he had better not ever show his face around Kara. She had never been prone to violence before, but this was different.

*****

When they finally descended from the Space Needle, Zach much more at ease on the ride down than on the ride up, Kara suggested that they take him to more of Seattle's distinctive landmarks. They rode the monorail that departed from beside the Space Needle and arrived downtown two minutes later, then walked from there to Pike Place Market.

They brought Zach first to see the salmon-throwing seafood merchants at the Fish Market. They waited among a crowd of onlookers for a few minutes until a customer came along to buy a salmon. Then, sure enough, with a rhythmic chant-and-reply to announce the purchase, one of the workers lofted a three foot long king salmon to another worker who caught the fish, wrapped it in wax paper, and handed it off to the customer. The crowd cheered, Zach along with them.

It was lunch time, so they settled down to eat at a tiny diner in the building across the street. It was no surprise to hear the youngster say it was his first time to eat out. He especially enjoyed the thick fries, lauding them as far more tasty than the skinny, overcooked fries they served at school.

After lunch, they led Zach through a corner of the market to Post Alley and its famous Gum Wall, a long expanse of brick plastered with every color of chewing gum from the ground up to arm's reach, the masterpiece of years of tourists. "That is so gross!" the youngster exclaimed. He reached out to touch it.

Kara quickly grabbed his hand away. "Gross is right."

They explored the nine-acre market's multiple levels of shops for a while, Zach showing no interest at all in buying anything, but nevertheless having the time of his life simply looking at all the new wonders before him—produce stands, craft shops, street musicians, and customers of every variety.

For the rest of the afternoon they explored the waterfront, walking up and down the sidewalk along Alaskan Way, checking out the shops lining Puget Sound. Zach was all eyes. Everything amazed him—the stores, the traffic, the monstrous Great Wheel that lifted passengers in a vertical circle over the water's edge. Even the seagulls excited him as they flew low overhead and swooped down to feast on morsels dropped by visitors on the piers.

The youngster became as talkative here as he had been silent in the Space Needle; he asked about everything he saw. Craig and Kara began to answer his questions in shifts after a while, lest he exhaust them verbally. He wanted to know what the massive cargo ships crossing the Sound carried, why a small plane that flew by sported floats instead of wheels, and how it could be that the ferries coming and going from the city could carry dozens of cars at a time and not sink.

"Can we ride the ferry?" he asked as they stood on a pier and watched one slip gently into its docking space.

"If you like," Kara replied—it was her turn to answer his questions—"but I was wondering if you might like to go to the beach for a while."

"The beach?" he answered with awe.

"It's not like going to the coast, where people surf on the big waves and all that, but it's still fun," she said. "You can find clamshells, build a sand castle..."

The youngster gazed longingly at the ferry. "Can we do both?"

Craig glanced at his watch, then up at the sun leaning halfway toward the western horizon. "I don't think so, pal. We're running out of time, and we need dinner yet. You'll have to choose."

"Can we ride the ferry another time?"

Kara nodded. "If you're still with us, or if you come back to visit."

"The beach, then," he determined.

The decision made, they journeyed back to the car, then headed home for a quick meal of leftovers. Bellies satisfied, they departed for the beach, bringing Paws with them.

Thirty minutes later, they pulled into a state park a few miles south of Seattle. "There are some nice beaches closer to home," Kara explained as they climbed out of the car, Paws leaping out first, "but dogs are allowed at this one. And besides, this one's special."

"Why?" Zach asked as they traipsed across the parking lot toward the water.

"This is where Craig asked me to marry him."

"Right over there," Craig said, pointing to a jumble of logs resting not quite parallel with each other where grass began to grow out of the sand above the high-tide line.

"We both lived in Portland then," Kara explained. "He took me to Seattle for the day, and on the way home we stopped here. He had brought a little picnic, so we sat on a log and ate and watched the sun set over the Olympic Mountains." She sighed, remembering. "It was nice. And then he knelt down on one knee in the sand and asked me to marry him."

"And you said yes?" the youngster guessed.

"I did," she said.

Craig stretched a hand out to Kara and she took it, and they led Zach and Paws to the sand. Small waves lapped gently onto the shoreline a hundred feet from them; the tide was out, so that there was plenty of space to walk without getting wet.

"You can find all kinds of shells here," Kara advised the youngster, "especially at low tide like this. Or you could play in the sand..."

"Can I go in the water?" Zach asked hopefully.

Craig chuckled and glanced at Kara.

"Er... Well, okay, I guess," she replied. "But leave your socks and shoes on a log and roll up your pant legs. And here—take Paws with you." She handed him the dog's leash. He and Paws ran to the nearest log, and seconds later were splashing together at the water's edge.

Keeping an eye on the pair, Craig and Kara strolled to the far end of the park's property—a short walk, but a pleasant one—and back again, not saying much. This was such a special place to them that it was enough to simply be there together.

Zach and Paws extricated themselves from the water and chased each other across the sand for a minute, then returned to splashing around happily.

Craig sat down on a log that could have been his and Kara's special one—with dozens of them strewn about, there was no way to be sure. Kara seated herself beside him. For a few minutes, they watched the youngster and the dog play together.

Craig broke the silence. "This was a good idea, taking Zach out for the day. He's had a great time."

"Yeah, it's been fun," she replied. Her face took on a wistful look. She gazed out over the Sound, toward conifer-covered Vashon Island a couple of miles across the water.

"What are you thinking?" Craig prompted. She had the look of wanting to say something, but was hesitant.

"I was just wondering," she began, "if this might be a good time for us to think about it again..."

"About what?"

Her eyes turned to Zach, who was reaching into the water to draw out some treasure he had spotted there. "About adopting..." She watched the youngster a little longer. "It's been fun, you know? Entirely bizarre—but fun."

Craig listened silently, still holding her hand.

She exhaled. "A week and a half ago, I was happy with the way things were. Now, when he has to leave...it just won't be the same."

"It wouldn't be like this all the time," Craig pointed out. "There would be problems, our kid would get sick sometimes... We'd have to go to parent-teacher conferences..."

"I could live with that."

"I don't know if we should adopt based on one week with a boy who's a relative and thinks we're the best thing since sliced bread," Craig cautioned, but his heart wasn't in it. As he watched Zach run through the water with Paws, he couldn't help but wonder if he might have sometimes enjoyed days with his own children as much as he had enjoyed this day.

"I'm only saying maybe we should look into it again, get some information from the children's home," Kara explained. "Not make any decisions yet."

Craig watched as Paws escaped from Zach, his leash slipping out of Zach's hand for a moment. The dog splashed away, and Zach charged after him, laughing.

"I could think about it," he said at last, "after we figure out what to do with Zach."

Kara squeezed his hand. They gazed together out over the water, contemplating the future as boats sailed by in the orange glow of the evening sunlight.

"Paws, no!" Zach yelled suddenly, and Craig looked just in time to see the youngster, the leash wound around his legs, topple over and disappear under the water as Paws tried to bound away.

"Zach!" Craig jumped to his feet and ran, Kara right behind him. Zach was out in deeper water than Craig had realized. Just as he reached the water, though, Zach popped up. The youngster was drenched, of course, and thrilled about it, judging by the expression on his face.

"It's freezing!" he exclaimed, trotting up to the sand with the dog in tow. Water streamed off them both.

Kara took his shoulders in her hands when he reached the dry sand. "You really are a fish, aren't you?" She wiped the excess water from his head and face. He started to pull away. "Hold still," Kara ordered, and he obeyed, standing stiffly. She brushed water down his shirt with both hands, not drying him, of course, but trying to make him a little less wet.

He blinked hard a few times. "My eyes hurt. I got water in them."

"Hmm, maybe not a saltwater fish, then." He shivered, and Kara looked up at the declining sun. "It's getting late, Craig. He's going to catch a cold out here."

A chill breeze was blowing across the water. The air was indeed cooling quickly as the sun settled atop the mountains to the west. "All right," Craig said. "Let's get you home, Zach. Did we bring any towels?"

Kara shook her head. "I didn't think of it."

"Neither did I," Craig said. "Some parents we are."

Zach dripped as they fetched his shoes and walked quickly back to the car, Paws bounding alongside them. Craig caught Kara grimacing toward the youngster as he climbed into the back seat, soaking it instantly. With a wry grin, he gestured toward Zach. "Are you sure you want to think about getting one of these for our own?"

She rolled her eyes. "Maybe one who's more inclined to stay dry."
Chapter 6

"Love you, too, Mom. Happy Mother's Day. Bye." Kara clicked her phone off and set it on the kitchen counter. After church and lunch, she and Craig had gone through their annual Mother's Day ritual, each calling the other's mother to offer greetings and then trading the phone off to the other for the second half of the call.

The boy sat on the dining table, dangling his legs and reading another book he had pulled off the shelf in the den. He would read anything, it seemed; after playing with Paws, and besides anything relating to baseball, reading was his preferred pastime.

"Off the table, Zach," Kara instructed him. "That's what chairs are for."

He glanced up at her just long enough to give her that falsely penitent look that reminded her of Craig, then jumped from the table, plopped into the nearest chair, and returned to his book.

His own clothes were back on him again, having been washed and dried last night after his tumble into the Sound. Kara had sent him to warm up in the bath while she washed them, then had made him wrap himself in her robe until they were dry—he could have borrowed her clothes again, but the underwear was a problem. It had only been washed once since he had arrived. Strange, the things you had to think of as a substitute parent, particularly if the child had arrived with only one set of clothes.

She walked down the hall to the laundry room and moved some of her own clothes from the washer to the dryer. Returning to the hall, she opened a cabinet and searched for an extra towel to add to the bathroom. She heard the boy's voice from the den. "Dad?"

Craig was probably still reclining in the armchair, reading his novel—getting toward the climactic ending, Kara thought. "More questions, Zach?" she heard Craig groan. The boy had been asking questions all day, ranging from how Seattle got its name to whether Paws had fleas. Craig and Kara were both ready for a break, Sunday afternoons being an ideal time for sitting around doing nothing. Apparently, the boy didn't see it that way.

"Zach, this will be the twenty-third question you've asked me since we got home," she heard Craig say. "I've kept count."

Having set the extra towel in the bathroom, Kara slipped into the kitchen and put away a couple of utensils left out from lunch. The boy, speaking to Craig at the armchair, noticed her and immediately dropped his voice so she wouldn't hear. He and Craig seemed to disagree for a moment, and then Craig shot a quick glance at her, looking away immediately. They resumed whispering. What were they plotting? It probably had to do with baseball, or with sneaking off to play golf.

Leaving them to their scheming, Kara exited through the side door, took a minute to visit with Paws, and strode with him to the garden. She scanned the young tomatoes and the beans that had sprouted; with some trepidation, she had let the boy weed around them last week, and he had done surprisingly well. Now, more weeds had grown up alongside lettuce, radishes, early carrots, cabbage, beets, broccoli, and cauliflower. She bent down and scooped up a handful of soil. It hadn't rained for a few days, but the soil beneath the surface still felt moist. She would not need to water today.

The boy stepped out of the house. Paws abandoned Kara to run over and greet him. "What are you doing?" he asked as he came to her through the vegetable rows. So much for her quiet break.

"The beans need to be weeded again," she told him. "The greens, too. And I thought I might plant some corn."

"I planted some flowers once," the boy said.

"Did you? What kind?" This was curious; the boy, as he described it, hadn't done much in his ten years except stay inside.

"I don't remember their name." He looked around the yard, checking the varieties of flowers that had begun to bloom. "Like those." He pointed toward a small patch of yellow flowers next to the house. "Only dark red, with black on them."

"Pansies," she said. "We sell a lot of those at Grover's, where I work."

"You like to grow things, don't you?"

She nodded. "I do. That's something Craig and I have in common. He's more into trees and landscaping, but we both like to grow things."

"I wish I could grow stuff," the boy said, "but my first nanny was the only one who let me plant things. After that, they always made me stay inside."

He followed Kara for a minute as she stepped carefully through the garden. "Do you mind if I help you?"

Kara took a deep breath. Was this what bona fide parents had to endure—constant questions just when they needed an hour of peace and quiet? They had spent the entire day with the boy yesterday, a wonderful day to be sure; did he now expect the same attention every day?

"Sure, Cousin's Son, you can help," she answered finally, with only a touch of weariness. "Want to plant the corn with me?"

"Okay," he agreed eagerly.

_At least Craig will be able to finish his book now,_ she thought.

They worked together for over an hour, the boy helping her with the corn, then pulling weeds, and then listening as she taught him how to identify the sprouts of basil, dill, and oregano that had achieved their first inch of height. He took in everything she told him as if it were the most important thing he had ever heard, as if she were the most important person in the world to him as this moment. He really believed he was home.

After a while he began to ask about the flowers, too, so she took him around the yard to see the varieties she and Craig had planted: pansies, roses, buttercups that grew where they willed. Several of the flowers they saw were new to the boy, and he asked about them all. Curiously, she found these questions not cumbersome, but pleasant.

They were transitioning to trees in the farthest corner of the yard when Craig poked his head out of the laundry room door and announced that dinner was ready. "Dinner?" Kara called back to him. "You didn't tell me you were making dinner." _It's a good thing he did, though,_ she thought, noting the time. It was later than she had realized.

She and the boy went inside and washed up together in the larger bathroom. Zach finished first and stepped out to the kitchen. As Kara followed him a minute later, she froze. Twin candles lit the table. Craig had set out the lace tablecloth, and he had broiled fish, spread French bread with garlic butter, and prepared a salad. He and the boy stood beside the table, awaiting her.

Kara looked at them suspiciously. "My birthday was in February, guys. What's the occasion?"

"Happy Mother's Day, Mom," the boy answered her.

Craig shrugged sheepishly. "He insisted."

Kara's throat tightened; she bit her lip. _No, this isn't right._ She shook her head. "This is really kind of you guys, but I'm not comfortable—"

"You said mom with a small 'm,'" the boy reminded her.

Craig chimed in. "He wanted to take you to dinner and a movie, but since it's Mother's Day with a small 'm,' we decided to do both at home." He scratched his nose nervously—with his thumb, of course. "Well, and because we were out all day yesterday."

It was impossible to argue with eyes like those—the hopeful eyes of both boys, seeking her favor; one pair brown, the other blue. Kara grinned in spite of herself. There was something funny about both guys standing there beside the fancied-up table, looking awkward as they waited for her. And there was something special about this whole scene, even if it was only substitute mom for a few days, with a small "m."

Still with some reluctance, she gave in at last and stepped to the table. Craig motioned to the boy with his hand, and the boy jumped and pulled her chair out for her. "Thank you, Zechariah," she said formally as he seated her.

He ran around the table to the chair opposite her. Craig offered a brief prayer, and they began to eat. The food was good, the boy didn't ask too many questions, and the guys were happy. All in all, it turned out to be a very pleasant evening.

*****

Craig jolted awake in the middle of the night. Someone was shaking him, calling his name—and _crying._ Tears rolled down her cheeks. It was Kara.

"Wake up!" she implored. "Craig!"

He lurched upright in the bed. "What is it? Are you all right?"

"Craig, we have to talk," she said.

He blinked at her, confused. "Right now? I was just planting California Redwoods in Hawaii. You know how hard it is to plant a three hundred-foot-tall tree on a beach? The crane alone took an hour to—"

"Please, I need to tell you," she begged. "It's really, really important."

Adrenaline suddenly reached his brain, shocking his mind into a measure of false clarity. "Zach! Is he still here? Where—"

"He's fine. He's still here." She swiped at the tears, but new ones took their places. "That's the problem."

She was trying to stay calm, but she was sweating. Craig reached out and pulled her close against his chest. He could feel her heart pounding, but next to him her breathing slowed a little. "Why's that a problem?" he asked.

"I—" She brushed her disheveled hair out of her face, drew in a deep breath, and started again. "I liked it too much, Craig. The dinner. Mother's Day. It was really special. That child in the guestroom calling me Mom and asking me about every plant in the yard. The Space Needle, the waterfront. Tucking him in. I love it all. And I hate myself for loving it."

"Huh," Craig said, as if pondering her words. He was thoroughly befuddled and still not fully awake.

"Because," she continued, "he could've been ours, Craig! Or maybe he would've been a girl, I don't care, just a baby of our own. But it didn't happen. And now this boy—"

_"Zach,"_ Craig corrected drowsily. "You keep calling him 'child' or 'boy.'"

"I can't start giving him a name!" she snapped. "If you name a dog, you end up keeping it!"

"Zach isn't a dog."

"That's not the point! The point is, I can't keep him. He's not mine. I cannot be his mother. But..." She sniffled and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. "I like...pretending...that I am."

"He's a great kid."

"That's not the point, either," she said. "Well, yes, I guess it is, in a way. He was so adorable, all soaked and dripping after he fell in the water at the beach. And when you two stood by that table this afternoon with dinner waiting... But there's no such thing as a small 'm', Craig. Not now, not with him. He never will be mine." She dropped her head into her hands. "I mean _ours._ Anyway, he has to go."

Craig sighed. A comforting answer eluded him. He held his wife, trying to corral his somnolent thoughts.

"We have to find his family," Kara said after a moment. "Whatever it takes, wherever they are—before I start liking this too much and stop trying."

"Yes," Craig said. It was all he could find to say.

Kara met his eyes, nodded, brushed the tears from her eyes again, relaxed a little, hugged him, and lay back down beside him. Within a few minutes, she began to snore lightly. Craig lay down and closed his eyes, but found it difficult to sleep.

*****

The results of the DNA test arrived on Monday. Kara found them in the mail after work, when she brought the boy home from school. She considered looking at them right away, but thought it more fitting to lay the envelope aside, unopened. The boy was, after all, Craig's relative, not hers, genetically speaking. It was only right that he see the results first.

The boy had finished his homework without being asked and was playing with Paws out back when Craig came home from work. She heard her husband pull into the garage and met him at the door, envelope in hand.

"The tests results?" he asked, receiving them from her.

"I thought you should be the one to open them."

"Where's Zach?"

She pointed to the picture window. "Outside." They could see him wrestling with Paws in the grass. The two had become best friends over the past eleven days.

"All right," he said. He took the envelope into the bedroom.

"Aren't you going to let Zach see them, too?" she asked, following him. "We told him we would be a team, the three of us."

He shook his head. "He's not going to like what it says. I'd rather he hear it from us first, not from a letter." He proceeded to open the envelope and lift out the paper tucked within it. His eyes wound their way down the page until they landed in the middle. They suddenly grew very wide.

"What?" Kara inquired, instantly concerned.

Craig didn't look up from the paper. "This is impossible, Kara," he said, his voice suddenly tense. "They messed it up. They got it confused with someone else's test. It's wrong!"

He handed her the paper. A boldfaced number in the center of the page caught her eye: 99.8 percent certainty that Zach was Craig's... _son!_

"They were supposed to check for cousins, not paternity!" Kara chided the paper. "He's Elliott's! How...?" But the fact was, he looked more like Craig than like Elliott, he scratched his nose like Craig, he enjoyed the things Craig enjoyed, oatmeal notwithstanding... Her mind became a blur, sweeping through the possibilities and impossibilities.

"I'm going to call them," Craig said sternly. He sounded angry. Why?

He pulled his phone from his pocket. Kara caught him with a hand placed flat on his chest. "Craig," she said, a little too calmly, "you are...my husband...and I love you no matter what you say next. We've had a lot of great years together since...since they told us we couldn't have a child— _I_ couldn't have a child. I just need to know... Are you absolutely certain—are you _sure_ —Zach is not yours?"

The thought terrified her. She had always adored Craig, ever since they had first met in college. She was convinced he loved her, too... But might there have been a time, ten or eleven years ago, when they were under strain financially, emotionally...? She remembered moments of concern for their relationship, but she had never doubted him. This new evidence, though—it was already beginning to haunt her.

Craig caught her tone and froze, for a moment not even breathing. He sat down on the bed and looked up to meet her eyes, but then stood angrily again. His voice was gravelly. "No, Kara! He's not mine, and he's not ours!" He pointed to the paper. "They got it wrong!" His eyes were aflame, and afraid, too—but afraid of losing her or of being found out?

When she said nothing, he sat heavily on the bed once more and moaned, "They got it wrong. This is not my fault."

She held his eyes, still silent.

"You have to believe me... What do you want me to do?"

What _did_ she want? She wanted the boy to never have appeared, so that she could keep hold of the absolute trust she'd had in this man ten minutes ago, trust that was now slipping away. She wanted to keep the boy and to have these test results say he was a cousin-once-removed or something like that. She wanted to keep the boy and believe her husband. But it made too much sense—a secret son, hidden away, only something had happened, something Craig had not expected, and those caring for the boy had sent him to them, to his true father...

Kara stepped to the wall and stared at it without seeing it. "Just don't do anything, Craig," she managed to say, "not yet." She turned and thrust the paper back to him less gently than she had intended. "And don't...don't leave this out where Zach might see it, okay?" She sniffled. Craig, still fuming at the paper but now furrowing anxious brows at her, reached out to take her in his arms, but she held up one hand. "Not right now," she said. "Right now, I—I need to think through this."

He withdrew his hands. She recognized pain in the motion. She didn't know how to take that pain away; she didn't know if she wanted to. If Zach was his, he deserved it, and more. The paper said he was the boy's father. 99.8 percent certainty. This paper could serve as evidence in court. People who performed DNA tests couldn't afford to make mistakes. She turned and walked away from her husband, back to the kitchen.

Dinner was nearly finished. She completed it in a haze. Without a doubt, this had been the most bewildering two weeks of her life: the night of the boy's arrival, the next morning at the school, last week when they had read the boy's birth certificate, and now this. She burned the biscuits—from distraction, not from anger. Certainly not from anger.

Her anger was cold, buried. At first, she had directed it toward whoever had sent the boy away, whoever had kept him indoors for so much of his life. Now, she didn't know who to be angry at. She wasn't even sure she wanted to know—not if it was Craig. She didn't want to be angry at Craig. He was a good husband...or she had thought he was.

All the same, when he finally emerged from the bedroom, she had a hard time not glaring at him in fury. _This isn't his fault,_ she told herself. _It was a mistake._ She wanted to believe that. But another voice within her whispered, _The boy looks just like him._ Which was more likely, after all—that the clinic had committed an egregious crime, giving away her and Craig's embryo when they didn't even have a viable embryo, or that her husband, in a moment of weakness, had had an affair?

The boy had known where the towels were, where the glasses were, had greeted Paws like an old friend, had greeted Craig like he was welcoming his own father home... Was it possible—she tried to push the thought away, but it wouldn't go—was it possible that Craig had known all along, that he had secretly brought the boy to their home when she was away at work or off in Spokane, visiting her mother? That would explain a lot...

She finished dinner and stepped outside to call the boy in to wash his hands. He zipped inside, sweaty and breathing hard from running with Paws, as she refilled the dog's food and water. Paws, at least, was innocent. She wasn't angry with him. He wagged his tail appreciatively as he lapped up his drink, oblivious to her distress.

The meal was quiet and awkward. The boy tried to make conversation for a while, but Craig and Kara responded only in short, subdued phrases, and after a while he gave up. He finished his last biscuit and excused himself to go read a book.

Craig gulped down the rest of his food and risked a look at Kara. "I'm going to have another company test me and Zach," he said in a low voice. "We need a second opinion."

Kara didn't return his gaze.

"We'll do it tomorrow, just a paternity test. That's a lot cheaper than—"

"Will it change anything?" she shouted at him in a whisper. _"Will it,_ Craig? Because if he's yours, no test is going to prove otherwise!" She braved a look at him. She had never seen his eyes so round, so sad...or were they terrified?

She leaned forward over her food and stared him down. "Who was she, Craig?" she demanded. "Did she have blue eyes? Because nobody on either side of our family that _I_ can think of has blue eyes! Where did he get those, huh? And those extra grandparents he talks about? It just makes a little too much sense, don't you think?"

Craig didn't take her bait. She wanted him to yell back at her, fight passionately for his innocence, defend himself so she could explode at him in a rage. But he didn't. He simply stared back at her, his eyes wide and sad. Was he trying to hide something or not? His reaction befuddled her.

_Why_ would _he want a second test if he knew he was the father?_ she wondered. _It wouldn't change anything._ The haze in her mind cleared a little.

She blinked that haze back—not away, but back to a corner of her mind. "I'm sorry," she told Craig. "I want to believe you. But that stupid letter..."

"I know." His hand flinched like he was going to reach for her, but he settled it into his lap instead. She wished he had reached for her.

Kara looked at her food. She didn't want it anymore. "Do the test," she told Craig. "Hopefully, they'll get it right this time. In the meantime"—she stood and took her dishes to the sink—"I'm taking Paws for a walk."

The boy heard that last bit from the den and poked his head around the corner. "Can I come?"

"No!" she barked. Her tone caught him by surprise, and he ducked swiftly back into the den. She fetched Paws' leash, fetched Paws, and strode out the front door without looking back.

*****

Craig didn't sleep much that night. He tossed and turned, and at the stroke of five he gave up on resting and went out to the garage. He hunted around for something to do with his hands and found a sharpening stone. The various pruning loppers he kept hanging on the wall didn't need to be sharpened, but he pulled them all down anyway, one at a time, and ran the stone along the edge of each blade until it was more finely honed than it had been in years, taking his time about it. It wasn't quite six o'clock yet when he finished, and Kara and Zach wouldn't be up until seven, so he wandered out to the shed and found the set of green-handled loppers he had loaned to Ben the day Zach had appeared, the set with the damaged blade.

He sat down on the damp grass with his back against the shed and began to scrape the stone along the chipped metal. The sky was already bright, the sun rising early this time of year, and he could hear neighbors beginning to stir. There was no breeze, but the air was moist, humidified and cooled by Puget Sound.

As he scraped, the chip in the blade diminished gradually. He wished he could scrape away his own problem. Perhaps this second test would resolve it. He liked Zach a lot; he could even wish Zach were his son. But the youngster had sure brought him plenty of trouble now. Had Zach not shown up that fateful evening, Craig would have been sleeping peacefully beside Kara this morning; they had been content then, and confident in one another.

But there was no turning back time or undoing what had been done. Craig understood Kara's confusion; now he could only wait—for the second DNA test, for the results, to see what would happen then. He continued to work the problem before him, slowly wearing down the chip on the blade.

The side door opened and Kara stepped outside in her robe. It was early for her to be awake. "There you are," she said.

"Woke up early," he replied, looking back down at the blade. He couldn't bear to see suspicion and doubt in her eyes, and the anger she had been trying to suppress last night.

She moved through the grass, the dew wetting her bare feet. In spite of the dew, she sat down next to him. She took his hand, stilling the sharpening stone. "I'm going in with you," she told him.

"To the clinic? Why?" he asked. "We won't be there but a minute."

"I'm going to have them test me, too," she said quietly, facing him.

He gaped at her. There was no suspicion in her eyes this morning. Instead, they were weary, and resolute.

"Why?" he said again. "What good will that do?"

"He could be ours."

Craig didn't know whether to laugh or tell her she was crazy. "No, he can't. We talked about that before. The embryos—they were all accounted for, their quality was too poor..."

"I know. At least, I know that's what they told us." There was a subtle anger in her tone, barely audible. "But what if there was one—just one?" Her voice was so low he had to listen closely to hear, even with her sitting right next to him. "They could have given it—could have given _Zach_ —to someone else, some other woman, and she carried him, she gave birth to him. A surrogate mother. He _could_ be ours."

"We didn't give them permission," Craig objected. "They would be shut down the minute it hit the news. Everyone involved would lose their medical licenses."

"And go to prison, I know. But that doesn't make it impossible."

"We saw the pictures of the embryos—the doctor showed us how abnormal they were. He explained why they couldn't attach to the womb, couldn't grow..." Craig's voice failed him.

"He always said he couldn't be a hundred percent certain they would fail. That's why we kept trying."

"What about the blue eyes?"

Kara shrugged wearily. "Some ancient ancestor, I guess. I'm sorry."

Craig felt his heart hammering behind his ribs. At least she wasn't angry at him anymore. He thought through this possibility anew. He didn't like it. The anger underlying her tone began to gather in his belly, too—just the crazy thought that someone might do such a thing to them...and to their son...

Kara was gauging his reaction. She spoke again. "Or maybe there _was_ an error in the DNA test. Maybe they tested your DNA twice, or his, instead of each of yours once. Or they mixed up the names with some other family, a real father and son. But there's only one way to find out for sure. Just—"

Craig moved to face her, waiting.

"Just promise me one thing."

Something shifted in the house, and he looked up, but it was nothing—a wooden beam creaking, a sound magnified by the still morning air. "Promise?" he prompted.

"If he's not ours, we need to find another place for him. Soon."

Craig fought down a sudden, strange surge of emotion. "But—"

"I know," Kara said, placing a finger on his lips. "That's the problem. We're falling in love with him." Her voice rose just a bit with tension. "It's been great, but it will have to end. He'll have to go somewhere else. Otherwise, he'll just break our hearts again. And I don't want that—not for us, not for him. I don't want him here if..."

"If it's going to be like Tiffy."

"Mm-hmm, like Tiffy."

Craig leaned back, resting his head against the shed. "And what do we do if..."

"If he _is_ ours?" Kara finished. She sighed. "I don't know. Love him, I suppose." She grasped a small twig from the grass and snapped it. "And hunt down whoever stole him from us."

*****

Zach pulled his ear from the side door, the one Mom had walked through to join Dad outside. The sound of soft crying had woken him. It had been her.

He had followed her to find out what was wrong. Now he knew. He hadn't been able to make out most of what she and Dad had said, but what he had heard made him want to cry, too. They were going to find another place for him. Mom didn't want him here, not really...

Clearly, she didn't want him to know. He would act like he didn't.

He tiptoed back to his room and fell onto his bed, stuffing his face into his pillow. A few tears wetted it, but one hopeful thought came to him. If he really was their son, maybe she would change her mind. Just maybe.

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, fingered the windowsill outside the Flemings' guestroom once again that afternoon. The figure knew he shouldn't be here—it was an unnecessary risk, silly, particularly in the daylight. But all three Flemings were away at work or school, and he had to know.

He scanned his surroundings for spying neighbors—noting the irony that they might be spying on his spying—and found none. He peeked inside the window. The bed covers were in disarray. He smiled—they had kept the boy. He knew that already, had known for days, but somehow seeing visible evidence put him more at ease.

Until now, the figure had been too busy tracking down McWrait's drug ring to check on the boy again. One dealer's name—Ditch—had been popping up a lot, and he intended to locate the man and follow his movements, see where they led him. He had already landed one blow against McWrait and hoped to land another for good measure.

In the meantime, his plan was proceeding well. There was no need for him to intervene. That was fortunate. He dared not be discovered—not by the Flemings, and not by the authorities.

The Flemings' yellow dog discovered him, though; it loped around the corner and stopped, eyeing him cautiously. It was time to go. The dog did not bark, but merely stood its ground and watched as the figure exited through the side gate and into the neighborhood, jogging away.

*****

Craig coached another game Saturday morning, but his heart wasn't in it, and that was very unlike him. Zach's was, though—this was the youngster's third game sitting in the dugout with the team. Today he had brought Kara's glove with him and played catch with the team during warm-ups. He fit right in with the other boys, and they were starting to accept him as an honorary part of the team.

Craig watched him. Kara was right—Zach _could_ be his son. They had a lot in common, he and Zach. These past days since the second DNA test had been quiet, Craig often simply observing Zach, Kara doing much of the same. They were wondering. Zach was certain, but they were wondering.

He went through all the motions as the game wore on, but his mind was on those test results that had not yet arrived in the mail. His team lost the game, and in the most exciting way, with an incredible diving catch by the opposing center fielder that stranded the tying run on second base. It was an amazing play for a ten-year-old, and Craig made a special effort to congratulate the center fielder. He always tried to model good sportsmanship for his players, and now for his son.

No—that was premature, and probably entirely wrong. It made more sense that the first DNA test had been flawed. The second test would clear things up. Life would be simpler if Zach were Elliott's son.

Zach talked about the game all the way home, and Craig tried to listen, both to the words and to the youngster behind them. But he was distracted, and his replies were vague. When they got home, Zach hurried through the house and out to the back yard to play with Paws. He never tired of being outside. Craig walked to the mailbox and checked it, but it was empty.

He headed inside, but did not find Kara in the kitchen or the den. He called out the side door to Zach, but the youngster reported that she was not in the yard, either. Craig checked out front again—her car was there, and the front door was unlocked, but she wasn't in their bedroom or either bathroom.

Nudging the guestroom door open, he found her sitting cross-legged on Zach's bed, a paper in her hand, an empty envelope beside her on the bedspread. She didn't look up as he came in or even as he settled beside her. She did hand him the paper, though, and he read it. It was the test results.

Zach was their son.

Over ninety-eight percent certainty for both paternity and maternity. The first test results had not been an error. And Kara wouldn't question his faithfulness anymore, not that she had since Tuesday morning.

Now they had a new problem. They had a son.

Craig didn't have any words to suit the moment; he was overwhelmed. He put his arm around his wife, and she leaned into him. They sat together in silence; no tears, no laughter—just silence. They had tried to prepare themselves for this possibility since Tuesday, but how could a person be prepared? He read the letter over again, then once more.

Kara looked at him; her hazel eyes seemed worn out, not like she had been crying, but like she wished she could. She reached up, took off his ball cap, and ran a hand through his flattened hair. She attempted a weak smile, but it faded quickly.

They heard the youngster coming down the hall, pounding a baseball into Kara's glove as he walked. He stopped short, seeing them on his bed as he entered the room, but recovered quickly. "Paws doesn't want to play today, I guess," he said. "He just wanted to be petted. I think he's—"

"Zechariah," Kara interrupted him, but he continued on.

"—still tired from yesterday, 'cause we ran around the whole yard at least twenty times, and—"

"Zechariah!" she demanded.

Startled, he closed his mouth, eyes wide.

"Come here," she instructed him gently. She slid a little to her right, away from Craig, and patted the open space between them. He hopped up into it with a curious look at Craig.

Craig handed him the letter.

Zach read it from top to bottom, where the verdict was given. Then he looked left to Craig and right to Kara. "Is this for sure, Dad?" he asked, looking back at Craig.

"It's for sure," Craig confirmed. "The DNA test proved it."

"Even if I didn't come out of your tummy?" he asked Kara.

She sighed. Her voice was strained with emotion, but kind. "You were right. And whoever told you—your grandmother, and whoever told her—they were right. I didn't believe it was possible until Tuesday..."

Zach looked at the letter again thoughtfully. "It's true. I knew it. So...this means I can live here with you?"

"Maybe," Craig told him. "We still need to find out where you've been all these years, and why. They might be expecting to get you back."

"They sent him away," Kara reminded Craig. "They _wanted_ us to have him." She rubbed Zach's head affectionately. "Don't worry, kiddo. We're keeping you."

Craig surprised himself with a sudden chuckle. "I guess Paws can keep his stray boy after all." Zach grinned. "Just..." Was he really saying this? To his son, _their_ son? "Just give us a little time to get used to being...you know, parents."

"You bet," Zach said, grinning at both of them. "This is awesome! We should do something. We should have a party!"

"I think," Kara replied with a little less strain in her voice, "the first thing we need to do is to buy you some new underwear. My son is not living with just one set of underwear."

_"Underwear, Mom?"_ Zach groaned, throwing up his hands. "You finally believe you're my parents, and you want to buy me _underwear? Really?"_

"You'll need shirts and jeans, too," she said. "And chores..."

"Definitely chores," Craig added. "And your own baseball glove."

"Awesome!" Zach exclaimed. "The glove, not the chores. But chores are okay, too," he added quickly.

Kara shifted on the bed and put her arms around Zach, embracing him. Craig stretched one arm around both of them. Kara spoke softly. "We didn't believe you, Zach—we couldn't—but now we do. We can't explain any of this, but we believe you. And we'll be the best parents we can be."

"Whether you like it or not," Craig inserted.

"And whatever happens, you will always have a home here, Zechariah Timothy Fleming. Always." She squeezed him tightly.

Strangely, the youngster tensed and didn't return the hug. But then, a lot of strange things had happened lately.
Chapter 7

Mom was serious about the underwear, as it turned out. After lunch she drove the three of them to a department store. The place was massive and magnificent, but Zach felt acutely self-conscious standing in the underwear aisle while Mom searched for just the right size for him.

Dad must have noticed. "Kara, he's ten," he whispered. "Underwear aisle—a little awkward. I'm going to take him to find a baseball glove."

"And leave me here looking at boys' undergarments by myself?" she retorted. "You think this isn't awkward for _me?_ I've been a mom for three hours! I ought to be looking for diapers, not underwear!"

Dad chuckled. "All right. Take him to the other clothes. I'll get the underwear."

Mom and Zach shared a relieved glance as they left that aisle. She led him to the boys' shirts, where both of them were much more at ease.

"Okay, Zach," she said, gazing around at a dozen circular racks packed with shirts, "I have no experience in buying clothes for a boy."

"Me, neither," he replied.

She eyed the racks nearest them with determination. "So, er... Why don't we start with a couple of shirts for school... And jeans. Better get you a jacket, too." She put her hands on her hips, sizing him up with her eyes. "You're expensive, young man. Three hours, and already you're messing up our budget."

Zach wasn't sure whether to feel guilty about that until she laughed and mussed his hair—he would have to get used to her doing that. She had done it four times since lunch. There seemed to be a lot of touching in families.

They got to work, and Mom quickly picked out three bright pink shirts for him to choose from.

"No way, Mom," he declared, rolling his eyes.

She held one up to his chest anyway, gauging the effect. "You'd look good in pink," she teased.

"I would _die_ in pink," he retorted. "I finally have a mom, and she's trying to kill me!" She grinned and returned them to the rack.

They picked out a couple of more reasonable shirts and were making their way to the shelves of jeans when Mom suddenly lowered her voice. "Zach, look over there. See that woman? _Very_ pregnant." She pointed ahead of them to a woman shopping with her young daughter. The woman turned, revealing a belly that was huge and round.

"She's as fat as Santa Claus!" Zach blurted out. Instantly, Mom grabbed him and yanked him out of sight behind the nearest shelf, just as the pregnant woman turned to look.

"Zach!" Mom shook her head at him sharply.

His eyes were wide with amazement. "She looks like she swallowed a basketball!"

Kara quickly placed a hand over his mouth. "Zach, it's not polite to talk about how fat pregnant women get. At least not where they can hear." He nodded his understanding and she removed her hand.

More quietly, he asked, "Does she really have a whole baby in there?"

Holding back laughter, Mom played with his hair again. That was the fifth time. "Yes. She's almost ready to give birth."

A new thought struck Zach. "If I didn't come out of your tummy," he asked, "where _did_ I come from?"

Mom crossed her arms over her chest. "Someone _else's_ tummy, Zach."

"How did I do that?" he inquired.

"Doctors who know how to help people have babies also know how to take cells from the dad and cells from the mom, put them together to start making a baby, and then put the new baby's cells inside another woman so they can grow. It's called having a surrogate mother." She peeked around the display to see whether the pregnant woman had moved on. "We didn't think they did that with you because they don't do it very often—and it's illegal, unless we ask them to do it, which we certainly did _not._ But that has to be what they did." Her voice became quieter, and sharper. "So I want to know who did this, and why, and...well, whose tummy you came out of."

Mom picked up a folded pair of jeans and considered them, though it seemed to Zach that her eyes weren't really seeing them. They were unfocused, and she frowned deeply. Suddenly she threw down the pair and snapped her head up toward the ceiling. "Why did you do this to us?" she demanded of it, still speaking softly, but angrily, so that Zach cringed involuntarily. "After all our hope was gone, you gave us a son, _but then you gave him to another woman!_ Did I do something to deserve this? Was she really that much better than me?"

"Mom?" Zach said nervously.

His voice brought her back to herself, and after a momentary glance at him and a deep breath, she knelt to pick up the jeans again. "I'm sorry, Zach." She studied him sympathetically, as if he were suffering somehow, which he wasn't. "I just... Why would God let someone else...?" She refolded the jeans and flipped them back onto their shelf with an angry flick of her wrist.

Zach fumbled for something to say to comfort Mom. She had only accepted that she was his mother a few hours ago, after all; it had to be confusing for her. "Maybe Uncle Ben knows," he offered.

It worked. Mom smiled weakly, rubbed his head yet again, and resumed her study of the jeans. She picked out three pairs, then sent Zach to the dressing room to try them on. They satisfied her, so he and Mom crossed over to the jackets next, discovered a cool green and blue one, and added it to the growing pile in their cart.

Dad returned with packages of underwear and socks that he dropped into their shopping cart. He had also found windshield wipers and motor oil. Mom was finished collecting clothes, so Dad took over. "I'm in charge of the fun stuff," he told Zach, and led them through the toy section.

"Sporting goods and baseball supplies are back here." He turned down an aisle, but Zach, trailing him, stopped dead. Baseball gloves lining the back wall beckoned to him, but the aisle in-between was pink—entirely pink. Dolls, princess outfits, castles, hairbrushes—he had never seen so much pink in once place. It was dreadful.

"Zach?" Mom came to a sudden halt behind him.

"Girl aisle!" he whispered, horrified. Mom gaped at him, then laughed. He backed out of the aisle red-faced and hurried down the next one instead—a much friendlier aisle, stocked with monsters and hideous space aliens.

He rejoined Dad among the baseball supplies, and they picked out a left-hander's glove. Zach didn't lay it in the shopping cart; as they moved on, he carried it on his hand, savoring the feel of it.

Dad offered to let Zach select a few toys he would like, so Zach explored up and down each toy aisle except, of course, the pink. He picked out a soccer ball, but beyond that he was overwhelmed. He had never had toys. He finally gave up and looked to his parents for help. After much thought, they chose a package of blocks and gears that connected in all different ways and a couple of puzzles that Mom said they could assemble together.

Zach didn't know what else to buy, so Dad handed him ten dollars in cash. "Maybe you'll see something you want later."

They headed to the front of the store to pay for their goods. "Dad," Zach asked as they joined a checkout line, "what if someone comes and says I have to go to a different home, like you said? What will you do with all this stuff?"

Dad looked down at Zach. "Send it with you, I guess. We've missed ten years of birthday and Christmas presents. The least we could do would be to give you a little something."

Birthday presents, Christmas presents. It had been a long time since he had received either. Zach felt rich as they headed home with new clothes and his own glove, among other treasures. That afternoon, he played catch with Dad, breaking in the glove, and then he pulled out his new soccer ball and played with Paws. Paws didn't really understand soccer, but he got in the way a lot, which made it fun anyway.

It was another amazing day—the baseball game (even though they had lost), the trip to the store, playing with Dad and Paws. But by far, the best part had been when Mom and Dad had finally agreed that they were his parents. Now the three of them could be a real family. Grandmother, he recognized now, had not really been his grandmother. Now, though, he had a real mom and dad, and they loved him. This was the best time of his life.

*****

"This is going to be the hardest time of our lives," Craig told Kara the next evening after dinner, shaking his head as they strolled arm in arm along the trail rimming Seward Park a couple of miles from home. Zach held Paws' leash and darted ahead of them, sometimes along the path, sometimes in the grass. Down a gentle slope to their right, Lake Washington glimmered lazily in the late sunlight. Woods of mixed deciduous and evergreen trees bordered the path on their left. The evening had turned unexpectedly cool, and only a few people were out walking. Zach, however, was delighted with the weather; it gave him a chance to sport his new jacket.

Kara squeezed Craig's arm. She hadn't taken her eyes off the youngster since they had arrived at the park. "So much for adopting. We seem to have acquired a child without asking to. I mean," she added with measured frustration, glancing up to the sky, "we asked years ago... He just arrived a bit _late..._ "

Craig was silent for a moment. "How do you feel about being a mom?"

Kara scoffed at him. "What kind of question is that? Do I have a choice?" Even so, she considered as they walked along. "Actually, Lia asked me the same thing when I told her and Ben this morning. I said I'd felt like a mom for two weeks already. I wasn't sure what I meant by that, but now I think I know. I watch Zach playing with Paws up there and I want to keep him away from the water, I want to tell him to watch where he's going so he doesn't run into something, I watch every stranger who walks by..."

"So you feel over-protective."

_"Responsible,"_ she corrected, slapping Craig's ribs half-heartedly with the back of her hand. "I feel responsible for him."

Craig nodded. "But I mean, are you okay with this?"

Kara stopped and turned to face him. "What am I going to do, Craig, wish he wasn't ours so we could send him back for a refund?"

With an unconvincing huff, she resumed walking, eyes on the youngster again. He was rubbing Paws' head. He jumped suddenly and ran away. The yellow dog bounded exuberantly after him.

"Besides," she continued, "look at him. He's beautiful. He reminds me of you." She watched him for another moment. "I just feel so far behind. We can't make up for ten years of not knowing he existed."

"No," Craig agreed.

Here Craig was, walking with his wife through the park, following their—he really was their son, wasn't he? Their son, who walked and played ahead of them. But even in this moment, Craig was working the problem of where his son had been these past ten years. Who had kept him from them, and why? Who had brought him into this world without their knowledge? He wanted answers, wanted them fiercely—if only he knew where to begin looking.

"How about you?" Kara inquired, squeezing his arm again. "How do you feel about being a dad all of a sudden?"

Craig had his answer ready; he had been thinking on it all day. "I'm conflicted," he admitted. "I'd like some time to prepare."

"We could ask Ben and Lia to keep him for a couple of days, give us time to think through things," Kara offered. "The girls would probably love that."

"No, I don't want him anywhere but with us. That's my conflict. Now that he's here, I'm not ready, but I don't want him to be with anyone else, either. There's so much he needs to learn from us, so much he's never experienced—normal kid things."

"Like baseball?" she teased.

"Yes," he admitted, "and having a dog"—Zach and Paws were still running ahead of them—"and knowing what a pregnant woman looks like, and going to the store, and to church, and to the park... Just life, Kara. Now that we know he exists, I want him to _live."_

They continued on in silence for a while. The path took them through a stand of evergreens, then opened up on another beautiful view of the lake. Zach and Paws ambled off the path, edging closer and closer to the shoreline, Paws straining at his leash, stretching toward the water.

Zach stopped and looked back at Craig and Kara.

"Go ahead!" Kara called ahead to him. "Leave your shoes and socks on the grass. Go be a fish!" Aside to Craig, she added, "I have a towel in the car. He'll need it."

But Zach didn't fall in the water this time. He and Paws splashed around for a while at the edge of the lake, and then he rejoined his parents. He sat down with them on a bench looking out across the water toward Mercer Island and dried his feet off with his socks, then began to put those socks back on.

"Zach, no," Kara admonished, stopping his hand with hers. "Just leave your socks off, now that they're wet. Wear your shoes without them."

He frowned as if that were a new idea to him, but tried it out and accepted it. "Mom," he asked, "can I call you Mom with a big 'M' now?"

She took a deep breath. "Yes, Zechariah, you most certainly can. And in exchange, you get a bedtime, and chores, and you have to take a bath every night."

"Every night?" he groaned, incredulous.

"Well, maybe every other night." She grinned at his less than enthused reaction. "You know, there's a lake here. You could take a bath right now." With a sly look, she jumped up and reached for the youngster. He stared, taken aback.

"Run, Zach," Craig advised him.

Kara pulled Zach off the bench and tugged him toward the water. He gaped at her in shock.

Craig repeated, "Run away, Zach, before she throws you in the lake!"

Catching on suddenly, Zach spun and slipped out of her grasp. Kara cackled mischievously and chased him around the bench. The youngster began to laugh at their game. Craig reached down to rub Paws' head as he watched them. _When did she learn to do this?_ He had never seen her act like this with their nieces and nephew—playful, yes, but this? This was new. He liked it.

Kara caught up with Zach and tackled him good-naturedly to the ground. The youngster squirmed away, laughing, and Craig smiled to himself. This really would be the hardest time of their lives, undoubtedly, with all the adjustments they would have to make and were already making. Zach surely still had a few surprises for them. One thing was certain: all three of them were launching into a brand new life. Craig and Kara had a son; Zach had parents. They were launching into a new life together.

*****

Kara eyed the large, brown paper sack at the edge of the dining table with anticipation. Craig eyed it as well, but was patient. It had to be hard for him. She gave him an encouraging wink before turning back to the boy—Zechariah, her impossible son. "Yes, you will need a bath tonight, for sure. Every other night, like we talked about yesterday."

The boy— _no, Zach;_ it was okay to think of him by his name, now that she knew he was hers—protested, predictably. "But I'm not dirty, Mom. Paws and I only played in the grass." He showed her his hands, and they were clean, but that was because he had washed them just before dinner.

"Zach, how come you love playing in the lake and the rain, but you don't like taking a bath?" she asked.

"Soap," he answered.

"Seriously?"

Craig shot her a knowing look. "It's a boy thing."

"Hmm." She would probably learn a lot of boy things in the days ahead. "Well, you do have to use soap. Oh, and Craig," she said, looking at him—he was fingering the sack—"I took Zach to the Social Security office today after school and got a 'replacement' card for him. They accepted the birth certificate, so they'll send us the card in a few days. I think that's all we'll need to get him on our insurance and to take him to the doctor."

"The doctor?" Zach asked warily.

"Mm-hmm," Kara nodded. "If you get hurt or sick, kiddo. It's one of those things parents have to think about."

"I haven't gotten sick in a long time," he mused. "I got sick a lot when I was little. I always had to go to the doctor."

Craig leaned forward slightly. "You don't happen to remember your doctor's name, do you?"

Zach shook his head. "I only remember he was a man. And he had a big fish tank."

Craig leaned back in his chair. "Well, I called the police department today to see if there's anyone out there looking for you, Zach, or anyone who says you belong to them instead of to us. They're going to look into it."

"What if there is?" he asked. "Will they come and take me away?"

"They might try, but they'd have a hard time taking you from us at this point. Giving you to another mother without our permission was illegal. I would think any judge would want you to be with your rightful parents."

Zach seemed to accept that prospect without worry; Kara wished she could say the same for herself. The thought that there might still be someone out there hunting for this boy who was her son haunted her.

"Zach," she changed the subject, "what are your responsibilities this week?"

"Feed Paws everyday," he replied dutifully, "and go to bed at nine o'clock."

"And don't forget Paws' water," Kara added. "And nine o'clock is for school nights. Maybe a little later for other nights."

Craig, with a glance at Kara, finally took the paper sack and slid it across to Zach. "I got you another shirt," he said. He spoke nonchalantly, but Kara glimpsed the excitement beneath his calm demeanor. "We thought you could use one more, if you want it. If you don't, you can give it back."

With appropriate curiosity, Zach opened the sack and pulled out a gray T-shirt with olive green-trimmed edges. "Grover's Grove" was printed across the front. He gave it a wondering look, glanced up at Craig, and peeked further inside the sack. He drew out a matching pair of pants and gray socks and stared at them, puzzled.

"Dad," he said at last, "this is a uniform from your team!" He looked at Craig, mouth and eyes stuck open.

"Larry's mom called me at work today," he said. "They're moving to Texas tomorrow. I didn't know they were moving so soon. So we have an opening. And since you're my son, I can put you on the team. But only if you want to."

Zach felt the texture of the jersey with awe. His mouth moved, but no sound came out.

Craig cocked an eyebrow. "Why don't you go try it on," he said, "see if it fits. You already have the hat. If you like it, the next game is tomorrow."

"The next game?" Zach caught his meaning a second later, jumped out of his chair, and ran with the uniform to the guestroom—his bedroom, they had begun to call it.

Craig looked over to Kara. "Well, I think he likes it," he shrugged.

From back in his bedroom, Zach let out a sudden whoop. Kara broke into a laugh. "Yeah," she said, "I think he does."

When Zach rejoined them a minute later, he was fully dressed in the uniform, glove in hand, bouncing with energy. Kara pulled out the camera and had him stand still in the front yard long enough for her to snap a few pictures. Then Craig drove him, uniform and all, to the school, where there would be space to let Zach practice hitting live pitches.

Kara viewed the photos on the camera as the boys left. Was this really, truly her son? The first picture she saw confirmed it. _Put a light blue hat on him..._ A gray hat with olive green trim did the job sufficiently well. Even with the blue eyes, this was Craig's son, no doubt about it. And hers, as well. He wore his glove on his right hand. Her son, as well.

*****

Kara did not always attend Craig's games, but there was no way she was missing her son's first. She watched from the bleachers, camera ready, as he stepped up to bat for the first time. He had sat quite contentedly on the bench through the first three innings, just glad to be on the team, until Craig had called him to bat. Now he stood at the plate with two outs in the fourth. A look of intense concentration filled his features as he took a practice swing, carefully set his feet, and positioned his left elbow the way Craig had shown him last night.

"Mrs. Fleming?" a young man's voice spoke to her right. She turned and found the custodian they had met at the school standing alone beside the bleachers. "Eddie," he introduced himself. "We met at the school."

"Yes, I remember. Good to see you again," she replied. Together they watched as the first pitch to Zach sailed high—ball one. Kara yelled encouragement to Zach and then glanced to the young man again. "Do you have family in the game?"

"Zach invited me, actually," he answered. "He saw me at school today and asked if I could come see his first game. He seemed excited about it, so I thought I'd check it out. I hope you don't mind." Eddie graciously pointed her attention back to the field just in time for her to snap a picture of Zach swinging at a low pitch and missing badly.

"That's nice of you, Eddie," she said. "Zach really seems to like you."

He grinned. "Yeah, he's fun. I try to give him a little attention now and then."

The pitcher released another throw; this one was right down the middle. Zach swung with all his might, but too late. Strike two.

"Want to sit down?" Kara invited.

Eddie accepted her invitation and climbed into the bleachers to sit next to her.

"How long have you known Zach?" she inquired.

"Since kindergarten. We actually came to Briar Point at the same time. We have a sort of bond that way."

The next pitch sailed over Zach's head—too high to hit him, but he ducked down sharply anyway. He took an extra moment to reset his feet in the batter's box. Two balls, two strikes.

"How's he doing, being with you and your husband?" Eddie asked.

"We're still adjusting, but it's going well," she said. "Does he talk about it at school?"

"He loves it," Eddie told her. "He used to say school was the best time of his day. Now he can't wait to go home." The young man paused awkwardly. "Thanks for...you know, being there for him. Being his family, I guess. Dumb thing to say."

The pitcher wound up and threw a ball low and inside. Zach tried to spin away, but it struck him hard just below the right knee and he crumpled to the ground with a yelp. For a moment he rolled back and forth, holding his leg with both hands. Craig knelt over the boy in an instant, and Kara was surprised to find herself suddenly against the chain-link backstop, gripping it tightly as she peered through it. Tears striped Zach's face—he was hurt. She had to force herself to stay where she was and let Craig take care of him.

Zach rolled over into a sitting position, and Craig pulled up his pant leg and examined the injury. "I'm okay, Dad," Zach sputtered, wiping the tears off his cheeks with the back of one hand.

"I don't think so, pal," Craig replied. "That ball hit you really hard."

"Don't take me out, Dad!" the boy begged, his eyes pleading with Craig—pleading with his dad. "It's my first game. I want to play!"

Craig hesitated. "Er...okay. If you can jog to first base without limping, you can stay in."

Zach clambered to his feet, cautiously put some weight on his knee, and, wincing, jogged to first with only the faintest hitch in his step.

"All right," Craig said to himself, shaking his head. Noticing Kara behind the backstop, he shrugged, palms up, and returned to his place in the third base coach's box. Zach stood with his left foot on the base, his right foot lifted a couple of inches off the ground to rest the sore knee.

Kara returned to her seat in the bleachers, next to Eddie. They watched together as the next batter struck out on four pitches, stranding Zach at first base—which, in Kara's view, was fine; she didn't want him to test that knee running to second. Zach limped to the dugout, fetched his glove, and limped out to his position in right field. Thankfully, the other team didn't hit any balls his way.

In the sixth inning he came up to bat again, and while Kara silently praised him for bravely stepping up to the plate once more, she prayed that he wouldn't get hit again. He struck out looking this time, backing away as the third strike crossed the inside corner of home plate. Their team was ahead, though, and after taking the field once more, they walked off as victors.

Eddie and Kara met Zach at the bottom of the bleachers as the teams dispersed. "You looked good out there, little tyke," Eddie said as he approached.

"You came!" Zach replied.

"Saw the whole game. Even the part where, you know..." With a sympathetic grimace he gestured toward Zach's knee.

"I'm okay. We won!" Zach said—but Kara could see that he was still favoring that leg.

"Let me see it, Zach," Kara ordered.

He rolled his eyes. _"Now,_ Mom?" At her nod, though, he sat obediently on the lowest bench of bleachers and, with a wince, let her pull up his pant leg.

"Oh, Zach, that's really got to hurt," Kara groaned. It wasn't broken, but there was a little swelling where a purple, baseball-sized circle marked the point of impact just below the kneecap, thankfully on muscle and not on bone.

"Mom, can we do this later?" Zach implored. She touched the purple spot lightly. "Ouch! Mom, please?"

"We need to get some ice on that, Zach," she said. But he wasn't paying attention to his leg; he was looking around at the other boys, some of whom stood at a respectful distance, watching her examine him. "Oh. This is one of those boy things, isn't it?"

He met her eyes in response. Kara sighed and tapped the bill of his cap down over his nose. "Okay, kiddo. Go say goodbye to your team. I'll be a mom later."

"Hey, Mom?" he asked, pulling his pant leg back down and readjusting his cap.

"Yeah?"

"Did you see I got on base in my first at-bat?"

He was so earnest that Kara couldn't help but grin at him. "Yes, you did. I saw it." Here she was, worried about his injury, about him being afraid to go to bat again; to him the wound was merely the price of getting to play in the game. He hobbled off to talk with his teammates. _Boys._

*****

Kara and Craig sat down with Officer Garrenton at the dining table Wednesday afternoon, Kara leaving dinner half-prepared on the stand-alone counter.

"When I heard you had called on Monday," Officer Garrenton told Craig, "I offered to look into the situation for you, since I had met your wife and son. I didn't find anything unusual, though—no one claiming custody of Zechariah. I also called down to the county courthouse, but they had no record of anyone disputing custody."

"Good," Craig sighed, relieved. "See, my cousin—she's mentally unstable. On the phone the other day, she insisted that Zach is _her_ son. I just wanted to make sure she wasn't causing any legal trouble. Or any other relatives, either. We have some suspicions. Hopefully there's nothing to them."

"Hopefully not," the officer nodded, but she watched Craig closely, as though gauging his credibility. Kara gulped. Was Officer Garrenton on to them? Not that they had done anything wrong. Zach was their son, they knew now. They had a birth certificate to prove it—a fraudulent one, granted, but the results of the DNA tests were legitimate. Even so, this line of questioning could turn awkward quickly.

Officer Garrenton shifted in her chair. "How is Zach, by the way?"

Craig gestured to the picture window, through which they could see him lying in the grass, Paws nuzzling him with his nose. Zach sat up and gave the dog a vigorous rub. "He's doing well. He and Paws have been spending a lot of time together."

"I see that. No more wandering around the city, then?" Officer Garrenton asked good-naturedly, but her eyes betrayed her watchfulness. Kara got the sense that she was checking up on them.

"We've been keeping him close to home," Kara answered. "So far, so good."

The side door opened and Zach backed into the kitchen, one hand on Paws' head to keep the dog outside. Closing the door, he turned toward them. "Hey, Mom, did you know Paws can—" He spotted Officer Garrenton at the table and cut off abruptly. He went rigid, eyes becoming saucers. _"No,"_ he whispered. His eyes darted first to Kara, then to Craig, then back to Officer Garrenton. His surprise grew into panic, and he ran suddenly to the hall. A moment later they heard his bedroom door slam shut.

"What was _that?"_ Craig asked, turning to Kara and sharing a bewildered look. Officer Garrenton looked to both of them with concern.

Kara stood. "I'll go check on him."

She reached his door and knocked before entering. "Zach?" She opened the door slowly, but he wasn't there. She checked the closet—he wasn't there, either. _Where did he go?_ She heard a muffled whimper and knelt to peer under the bed; he was hiding there, curled up in a ball, his eyes moist.

"Zach, what's the matter?" She stretched a hand toward him. He edged away from her. "Zechariah, why are you hiding?"

He sniffled and rubbed at his eyes. "I don't want to go."

"Go where, Zach?"

"I don't want to go anywhere! I want to stay here, with you and Dad."

_He saw a police officer and thought—_ "But you _are_ staying," she assured him. "No one's taking you away. That's what Officer Garrenton came to tell us. She checked, and no one is trying to take you away from us. That means you can stay here."

He looked at her, but didn't move.

"So you can come out, Zach. It's okay."

He remained curled up under the bed. _That really scared him,_ she thought. _And now he's embarrassed._ She didn't want to drag him out by force. Maybe a different approach would help.

She returned to the dining table. Craig was showing Officer Garrenton the photo they had printed of Zach in his baseball uniform; beside it on the table was the old picture of Craig as a Little Leaguer. Both adults looked up at her expectantly as she rejoined them. "You should go talk to him, Craig," she said. "He's scared to death. He saw Officer Garrenton and thought she was going to take him away."

Craig gave her a puzzled look for a moment, then grimaced and left the table.

"Sorry," Kara told the other woman. "He's never done that before. I don't know what got into him."

Officer Garrenton offered her an understanding smile. "Your husband and I were just comparing these pictures." She turned her eyes back to them. "Amazing, the likeness—same dimple, same eyes, except for the color..."

"They do look very similar," Kara agreed. "I see it more everyday. How is your new granddaughter?"

The officer grinned appreciatively. She slipped a phone out of her pocket, opened a photograph on the screen, and handed the phone to Kara. "Here she is, doing great. Isn't she a cutie?"

"She's adorable." Kara smiled at the picture of a baby girl, eyes bright, resting in the arms of a man, probably her father.

"I just love baby pictures," Officer Garrenton went on. "I'll bet Zach was a beautiful baby, with that dimple of his."

_Uh-oh._ How was Kara to respond to that? She had only one printed photograph of Zach, and Officer Garrenton was already looking at it. "I'm probably a little biased," she said, thinking quickly, "but I thought he was beautiful from the first time I laid eyes on him." Yes, that was a good reply.

Officer Garrenton opened her mouth to ask another question, but was preempted as Craig brought Zach out from the hall and directed him to the table. He and Craig stationed themselves on either side of Craig's chair.

"There you are, Zechariah!" the officer said to him. "Are you all right?"

He managed to nod. His eyes were red, but he had wiped the tears from them.

"Why did you run away when you saw me?" she asked.

He dropped his eyes to the floor. "I was scared."

"Have you done something wrong?"

"No," he answered.

"There's no need to be afraid if you haven't done anything wrong." He didn't respond. "Zach," she prompted, and he looked up at her. "Your father was just showing me these pictures of you and him in your Little League jerseys. I think you look just like him. What do you think?"

Zach's eyes flitted to the photographs. "I'm a lot like him," he answered quietly. "And like Mom, too. We're both left-handed."

"So you take after both sides of the family." The officer looked at him for a long moment, then smiled and stood up from her chair. "Well, I should get back to the station."

Craig escorted her to the door. "We appreciate you checking on that for us. It's nice to not have to worry about it."

"My pleasure," she replied. Her eyes swept across Kara and Zach briefly. "If you need anything else, don't hesitate to call. That's what we're here for."

"We won't," Craig promised.

He watched her go, then returned to the table. Zach had taken a seat and put his head down on it, hiding his face in his arms. Craig placed a hand on his shoulder. "Don't worry about it, pal. You got caught off guard. It happens."

"Just talk to us before you run and hide, kiddo," Kara added. Zach needed something besides fear and shame to think about. "Hey, I hear you can cook a little. Come help me finish dinner. We're having tacos."

He hesitated a moment, then stood and accompanied her to the kitchen.

*****

A couple of blocks from the Flemings' house, Officer Garrenton parked her squad car along the curb and pulled out her phone. She dialed, put it to her ear, and worked through the menu options of the local Federal Bureau of Investigation office.

"Agent Nyler," a man's voice came on the line a moment later. Good—he was in.

"Clint, this is Jackie."

"Jackie! I haven't heard from you in a while."

"They moved me to a quieter part of town," she explained. "More nice people, fewer bad guys."

He chuckled. "Lucky you. They just keep sending me the impossible stuff. You heard about the break-in at one of Hugh McWrait's stores?"

"The one where they didn't take anything?"

"Yeah, well, we think what they didn't take was a nice stash of drug money that would have nailed him. We've been tracing his courier system for months and had it just about pinned down, but since that break-in his guard is up and the whole scene has changed. And guess who gets to rework the whole case?"

Officer Garrenton smiled. Clint Nyler loved the impossible cases. "Oh, don't worry. You'll have the case solved by this time next week."

"Yeah, don't I wish," he replied. "So, what do you have for me?"

"A strange one, Clint. Just a feeling, mostly, with circumstantial evidence."

"Sounds great. Something to occupy my spare time?"

"That's right. What would you think if you found a ten-year-old boy wandering the streets one evening, trying to find his way home, and so you gave him a ride, only his mother claimed she didn't know him?"

"Maybe she doesn't. It's the wrong house. Maybe the kid is up to something."

"Uh-huh. But then he walks straight to the bathroom like he's lived there all his life. Then he's thirsty, so he goes directly to the kitchen cabinet where they keep the glasses. And he knows the dog's name. Not to mention that he looks just like a picture of his dad that's sitting on the table."

"Okay, so...Mom's angry with him for wandering off, wants to teach him a lesson."

Officer Garrenton nodded to the phone. "Right again. So that's a couple of weeks ago. Then on Monday, the father calls the station and wants to find out if anyone has claimed to have custody of their son. He says he has this crazy cousin who might do just that. So I check it out, and there's nothing—all clear. I stop by today to let them know, and the strangest thing occurs to me..."

"Which is...?"

"They let me inside the house, and there are photographs of mom and dad all around, and a big picture of them and the relatives over the fireplace—but there are no pictures of their son. Not one. No, I take that back—they have _one,_ printed off the computer, a picture they took a day or two ago. That's it. I show them a picture of my new granddaughter and give them an opening to show off their son's baby pictures, but they don't bite."

"Because they don't have any? Or because they're weird? Being weird isn't a crime."

"It's only a hunch, Clint. Truth is, they're a lovely family. The boy is as sweet as can be. But something about this whole thing just sits wrong in my belly. Who ever heard of loving parents who didn't have pictures of their kid?"

"Huh. Okay, Jackie," Agent Nyler replied, clicking his tongue thoughtfully, "maybe I can look into it when I have a few minutes. Want to give me their names?"

Officer Garrenton shared their names and other tidbits of information she had gathered. Hopefully there was nothing wrong here; they really were a charming little family. But she had a responsibility to society to look into it if something seemed out of place. And something about Zechariah Fleming—something she couldn't put her finger on—seemed out of place.
Chapter 8

Kara stared at a four-story medical building in the Westlake district, just off the western shore of Lake Union north of downtown, as Craig parked behind it. She sighed; it had been almost nine years since they had last visited this place, and eleven since the first time. "I never thought I'd come here again." Craig grunted his agreement.

Memories flashed back to her as they crossed the parking lot—feelings really: hope, disappointment, courage, and more heart-wrenching disappointment. Now anger, bewilderment, and some trepidation danced with those old emotions. She had not wanted to return. It had been Craig's idea; they needed to find out where Zach had come from. Obviously, he had come from here. But after this place, where?

They entered the building and, recalling past visits, retraced a familiar path through the halls to the office where—she had believed—her doctor had worked so hard to help her and Craig have a child.

The receptionist, an older, graying woman surrounded by photographs of her grandchildren, greeted them with a pleasant, "Good morning."

Kara took a deep breath. "We don't have an appointment, but we'd like to see Dr. Lakatos just for a moment, if we could. I used to be one of his patients, and I was wondering if he could go over our records with us." She had trusted him; perhaps he would give her an honest answer if she asked him about Zach directly.

The receptionist gave her a sad look. "I'm afraid Dr. Lakatos passed away two years ago. Cancer."

Kara frowned with genuine sympathy. "Oh, I'm sorry." He had always seemed like a good man. And he would have been their best chance to find out how Zach had come to be.

"But would you like to inquire at our records office?" the receptionist offered. Kara accepted, and the woman stepped around the counter and led them down a long hall to a door appropriately marked _RECORDS,_ where a young man greeted them and, receiving Kara's name, quickly located their file.

Kara settled into a seat at one of two tables in the room, opened the folder and divided the papers between herself and Craig. One by one, they scanned them all. Long-buried memories of the twin cycles of hope and failure documented in the pages resurfaced as the minutes stretched on. Two embryos in the first cycle—enough to give them hope. But both had failed. No embryos in the second cycle. Not even one. That failure had broken her.

Kara drew in a steadying breath; things had changed. She had once felt that she would never be happy again, but the intervening years had been good. And now, so unexpectedly, she had a son... But there was no sign of him in the records before her—no embryos set aside, no surrogate mother, no embryonic adoption. Craig showed no indication of having come across a noteworthy find, either.

She continued through her share of the papers, skimming notes on why the doctor had thought she had been unable to become pregnant. The notes were uncertain; "unexplained infertility" was the diagnosis, the same as a lot of other women out there. In time they might have located the problem and overcome it. But she and Craig had been forced to stop trying—forced by debt and weariness and a pair of agonizing failures. There was sorrow in these records, but nothing suspicious. According to these papers, Zach could not possibly exist.

Completing their search, they returned the file to the record keeper. As they stepped back into the hall, Craig clapped his hands together. "Plan B," he said.

"We have a Plan B?"

His eyes were calculating—he had a new idea. "There was a doctor in one of the offices we passed."

He strode ahead to where an office door stood halfway open. Suddenly shifting into a more hesitant demeanor, he knocked. The doctor, a man a few years older than Craig, look up.

"Sorry to bother you," Craig said, "but I just have one question, and I hate, you know, to set up a whole appointment just for one question..."

"Are you patients here?" the doctor asked, rising and walking around his desk to meet them at the doorway.

"Yes—er, we were," Craig told him. "A few years ago, with Dr. Lakatos. We tried _in vitro_ twice, but it didn't work. We were wondering if we could try adopting an embryo."

The doctor folded his arms and leaned casually against the doorpost. "You could," he said, "but I might recommend against it since you've attempted IVF. It would depend on why your attempts failed. If there was a problem with the mother's womb, embryonic adoption might not work any better. You might want to consider a conventional adoption instead. Have you talked with anyone at a clinic that offers embryonic adoptions?"

"We thought _this_ clinic offered them," Craig responded.

Kara caught on to his strategy. "Or at least did a few years ago. We knew a family that adopted their child as an embryo here."

The doctor shook his head. "You must be mistaken. We've never offered embryonic adoptions. We only work directly with the biological parents."

Craig scratched the back of his head and furrowed his brows. "I'm sure they said this was the place." He turned to Kara. "What was their son's name? Zechariah?"

"Yeah, I think that was it."

The doctor betrayed no hint of alarm at the mention of Zach's name. He simply affirmed his last statement with a polite shrug.

"Could we maybe find a surrogate mother to help us?" Kara suggested. "The cost"—she forced herself to say it; perhaps they only supplied embryonic adoptions to clients who could pay well—"the cost is no concern."

The doctor remained patient but undeterred. "Another clinic might be able to help you, but that's outside our practice. Would you like me to look up a clinic you could contact?"

"No, that's all right," Craig answered. "We've taken up too much of your time already. We can find one."

The doctor nodded. "Good luck, then," he said, watching as they departed.

Kara and Craig left the building and returned to the car. Kara felt deflated. Why did every lead they pursued turn up nothing? "So...what's our next step?"

Craig put the car in gear and steered them toward the road. "We could hire a private investigator."

"We can't afford that."

"No, we can't." Craig glanced at her as he drove. He was calculating again. "Kara, we may never find out where Zach came from. I hate to say it, but that's the reality. Maybe we'll think of another plan, or maybe Zach will remember something...but if not, we may never know."

Kara didn't like that thought. Zach was their son, and she wanted to know how. And why. And who had given him birth, and nurtured him, and...for goodness' sakes, who, apart from sending him to school, had kept him locked away inside a house for ten years? Someone had been good to him, or else he would not have turned out so well to this point; but they had been terrible to him, too. But who?

And this was the thought that haunted Kara most: what if those mysterious people came back someday to lay claim to him, to demand him back as suddenly as he had come to them? She wanted to track them down before that could happen. If only she and Craig knew where to look next.

*****

No new clues concerning Zach's origins surfaced over the next two weeks, but Craig and Kara made plenty of discoveries concerning their son himself. For one, the boy loved French fries. Derek and Shanice took the Flemings out for dinner at their family's favorite restaurant—McDonald's—and after devouring his own fries, Zach helped Kara finish hers and then ate the bits that Douglas and Shauna, Derek and Shanice's kids, offered him. The three kids teased and laughed through the entire meal as the adults carried on their own conversations.

"Can't we go to their house for a while?" Zach grumbled when, after two hours there, it was time to leave. Kara took that as a good sign. He made new friends easily, at least with them.

She offered Zach a full row of precious garden space to plant some vegetables of his own the next day, and he accepted the offer with gusto, placing corn, pumpkin, squash, and sweet pea seeds in the dirt precisely as she instructed. He was thrilled when the first peas began to sprout a few days later, then the first of the pumpkins shortly after that. He checked his plants for weeds daily, usually staining his new jeans with dirt in the process. Kara rapidly developed a knack for getting the dirt out; oddly, she had never developed quite the same knack when cleaning Craig's work clothes.

Seeing how much the boy enjoyed planting—an inherited trait, to be sure—Kara took him to work with her on one of the rare Saturdays when Grover called her to duty. The boy was thrilled, though he had little idea what to expect. Kara put him to work helping her repot flowers, and within half an hour his hands, arms, and torso were covered in potting soil.

"That's how all my employees should look!" Grover barked at Kara when he saw Zach. "Makes you look like you've been doing something!"

Zach seemed uncertain how to take Grover's gruff facade at first. But Grover soon won him over: he called the boy away from Kara to wade barefooted into the nursery's koi pond to fetch some hard-to-reach water plants for a customer. The boy waded in up to his knees, caught them in a net, and brought them back undamaged, and Grover declared him a hero. From that moment, Grover and Zach were inseparable until Craig arrived to pick up the boy for their game that afternoon.

"I hit the ball, Mom!" Zach exclaimed when Kara came home from work that evening. Craig stood by, shaking his head in good humor as Zach went on. "First I struck out, and then I walked, and then I struck out again, and then I hit the ball!"

"Wow, you got to play the whole game?" Kara asked, glancing at Craig, who shrugged. Zach's leg wasn't swollen anymore, but he still had a bruise where the ball had hit him, and Kara was concerned that he not reinjure it.

"Yeah, Mom, and the pitcher threw me a perfect pitch"—Craig, out of Zach's line of sight, stretched out a flat hand a few inches higher than Zach's head—"and I hit it really hard, to the first baseman. He only barely got me out. I hit it, Mom!"

"He did," Craig confirmed, still shaking his head fondly.

"Way to go, Zach," Kara applauded him. "I'm proud of you." She would talk to Craig about being cautious with Zach's leg later.

The following Saturday, they took Zach on his first trip to the zoo. The first animal they spotted upon entering was a giraffe sixteen feet tall, striding in stately fashion. Zach's jaw dropped at the sight. "Dad, look!" he said, making sure Craig wasn't missing it. "It's so huge!" He was mesmerized by it, and was equally fascinated by the elephants, orangutans, insects, and even the sheep, pigs, and chickens in the farm exhibit. All of it was new and astonishing to Zach. He had never seen such creatures in person before. He marveled at them all and was still full of energy when they left at closing time.

He had so much energy, in fact, that Craig suggested they take Zach to his first movie. The boy was heartily in favor of the idea, so against Kara's better judgment they stopped at a downtown theater and purchased tickets to a new film, throwing in a tub of popcorn to fill out the experience.

By the time they left the theater it was after ten o'clock and Zach was finally worn out. He staggered to the car, eyelids drooping; Craig wrapped an arm around his shoulders to steady him. To Kara's surprise, though, he didn't fall asleep during the fifteen-minute drive home. He chattered about the movie the whole way. He only stopped talking when Kara finally tucked him into bed and bade him good night; she thought he might have been asleep even before she turned out the light.

Zach was definitely blurry-eyed at church the next day. He tried to pay attention to Ben's sermon about a young man named Eutychus, but sitting still on the pew was too much for his weary body to take. He suddenly slumped over, asleep, his head dropping onto Craig's shoulder. Craig and Kara shared a grin, and then gasped together as Zach abruptly slipped off the pew and hit the floor, snapping himself awake. He climbed back to his seat beside Craig, embarrassed, then leaned over against his dad and fell asleep again.

"No more movies on Saturday night," Kara reprimanded both him and Craig sternly the moment church let out. They took extra care to get Zach in bed by nine that evening.

That week was Zach's last week of school. On his final day, Kara arrived for the concluding hour of class, providing chocolate ice cream as Zach's share of the end-of-school party snacks. Thankfully, Ms. Faber was too busy to question her about Zach's background again, so Kara chatted with other parents as Zach cleaned out his desk and said his goodbyes. She met Cayden's mother, a short, sensible woman with long, dark hair, who looked nothing like her son because, as it turned out, Cayden was adopted. The woman kindly repeated Cayden's invitation to have Zach over to their house whenever it might be convenient. They lived only a block away, so Kara hesitantly agreed that he could go for a short visit the next day, there being no school. She was anxious about letting him out of her sight, but what could she do? She dared not try to explain how recently he had come to her and Craig.

Eddie, just showing up for his after-school shift, spotted Zach as they were about to leave for home. "Hey kid, have a great summer!" he called.

"You too, Mr. Eddie," Zach replied. "Can you come to more of my games?"

"I can try. You gonna hit a home run for me this season? 'Cause if you are, I want to be there to see it."

"Sure, okay," Zach laughed. "Maybe two home runs!"

Off he went then, oblivious to what Kara thought was a truly compassionate look from Eddie. She took a moment to shake the young man's hand. "He's going to miss you this summer, I think."

"Nah." Eddie looked down at the floor. "He'll be too busy having his best summer ever—with you and your husband, I mean. The nannies—they didn't do much for him, you know, not for the last two or three years. From what he's told me." He lifted his eyes to meet Kara's meekly. "I don't mean to be rude."

Kara blinked at him. Did he think he had offended her by critiquing the nannies? Of course—he assumed she and Craig had hired them. "No, that's okay. Craig and I might have our best summer ever, too." She swallowed, suddenly understanding why Zach liked Eddie so much. The young man's concern for the boy was so genuine. "I hope you'll come to another game sometime," Kara encouraged Eddie. "It would mean a lot to Zach."

Eddie nodded. "I will."

*****

Zach stood on the sidewalk with Mom two days later, taking in everything he could. She had brought him along on yet another exciting adventure—the Metro bus. Already they had dropped the car off at the mechanic's shop for a tune-up; traveled by bus to the library, where Mom had encouraged him to select his own books to check out; and journeyed from there to a department store, where Mom had done a little shopping and—with an odd grin—bought him a pair of winter gloves.

"Why did you buy me these?" he asked her, putting his fingers in and out of the gloves as they watched the traffic stream by. "It's summer."

"Oh, they're cheaper in the summer," she said with a sly grin. She checked her watch. "We're going to be late. I hope your dad thinks to put the chicken in the oven when he gets home."

They stood under a bus sign, as Mom had taught him that morning. In black it listed the bus routes that stopped there. "Why did you want me to get so many books?" he queried.

"Don't you like to read?"

"Yeah, but we have lots of books at home."

"For adults. I thought you might like to get some that were more interesting to you. Besides, you might need a few extras." She got that sly look again.

"When are you going to tell me what's going on, Mom? I know you're planning something."

"Later," she said simply. An orange and blue bus displaying route number thirty-six in electronic orange digits pulled around the corner and stopped almost at their feet, its door opening to them. "Beacon and South Graham?" Mom asked the driver.

"Yep, heading that way," she replied.

They boarded, Mom paid their fares, and the bus swung back into the street. She led Zach to a pair of seats near the middle of the bus and let him sit beside the window.

"Mom," Zach whispered, "that guy in the back of the bus has purple hair sticking straight up!" He twisted in his seat to look at the strange hairdo again.

With a hand on his shoulder, Mom pulled him back into a forward-facing position. "Don't stare, Zach," she told him. "And that's a girl."

A _girl,_ with spiky purple hair! He barely resisted the urge to look again. Instead, he studied the buildings and people that slid by as the bus journeyed down the street, stopping every few blocks.

"Thanks for letting me go to Cayden's house yesterday," Zach said, still gazing out the window.

"I guess you had a good time," she replied.

"Yeah. We played games—in his room, mostly. Their yard is really small."

"Well, his mother seemed like a reasonable person. I was pretty nervous, though. Now that you're here with me and your dad, I don't want anything to happen to you. But he and I agreed that you've been kept inside your own home too long. You need to be able to visit a friend's house now and then."

"Awesome," he said happily. "I won't go all the time, though."

"Maybe you could invite him over to our place sometimes."

Zach lit up; he hadn't thought of that. He watched out the window for another minute, then spoke again. "Mr. Eddie came to see my game yesterday."

"I saw him. He was proud of your bunt," Mom said.

"Dad showed me how to do that." It had been Zach's third game, and he had reached base on a sneaky kind of short hit that Dad had taught him a few nights ago. "Mr. Eddie told me he used to play baseball when he was a kid, until he quit."

"Why did he quit?"

"He was mad at his dad."

"That's a shame," Mom said. "Speaking of dads, why don't you give yours a call and ask him to put the chicken in the oven?" She handed Zach her phone.

He stared at it, frowning self-consciously. "I don't know how."

Mom smiled; she wasn't surprised. "Do you remember his number?"

Zach nodded. They had been drilling him on their phone numbers and email addresses every night at dinner; he already knew their address.

"Push the number buttons to type it in."

He pressed the number four, and a four appeared on the screen. He punched the other six digits and looked up at Mom again.

"Now the green button," she said.

He pressed it, and the word "calling" appeared on the screen. He glanced at Mom again and put the phone to his ear the way he'd seen her do it.

He heard Dad's phone ringing. After a moment, Dad's voice came on the line. "Hey, beautiful."

Zach lifted his eyebrows in surprise. "Dad? It's me, Zach."

"Oh—hi, Zach," Dad chuckled. "Mom let you call, huh?"

"Yeah," he answered. "She wants you to put the chicken in the oven when you get home. We're going to be late..."

He was talking on the phone, talking with his dad. This was great. He was riding on a Metro bus with his real mom, talking on the phone with his real dad. Life could hardly get any better.

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, dug their way into a crack between floorboards worn with age and felt for a grip. The gloved figure, hooded as always, was in Ditch's house—Ditch, whose name kept popping up in association with Hugh McWrait's favored drug ring. The figure had tracked him for the past three weeks until he knew the man's movements well enough to infiltrate his home an hour before daylight with some hope of searching it before Ditch returned from his nightly dealing.

The figure wasn't looking for money, but for something—drugs, evidence, clues—that would guide him deeper into McWrait's ring of dealers...and then let him tear the whole thing down. For McWrait's part in Zach's past, the figure intended to strike him fast and hard, make him regret what he'd done. Ditch could be the key.

So far, in all of three minutes inside, he hadn't found much. The home was a mismatched assortment of grime and dilapidation juxtaposed against high-priced furniture and entertainment systems, in the plural. Ditch apparently liked screens and speakers. A separate system was mounted in the living room and each of the three bedrooms.

The figure's fingers found a hold, and he lifted the floorboards. They pivoted on a hinge tucked beneath the floor—a hidden door. It was well camouflaged here in the second bedroom, but a minor oversight—it was the only place in the house where the floor didn't creak—had given it away. A quick check had revealed subtle lines in a square, and now...

A hole. A ladder. The figure activated the light on his phone and lowered it and his head through the hole. The light exposed an old cellar dug directly into the ground. Dirt walls encompassed an area maybe a third the length and width of the house, far enough across that his small light barely reached the farther edges.

There were crates there, along the farthest wall. Two, maybe three dozen of the basic grocery store type were stacked imperfectly from floor to ceiling. _There it is,_ the figure congratulated himself. Every criminal, like every person of wealth, had a secret stash somewhere. Did this one conceal money or drugs, or perhaps some new evidence he could use to get Ditch—maybe even McWrait—convicted?

With a quick check for sounds of Ditch returning home—there were none—the figure lowered himself feet-first into the hole, found the ladder, and descended into the musty darkness. Quick steps under a low ceiling brought him to the crates, and he combed through them. The ones on top were disappointingly empty of everything but cobwebs. He removed them and checked the next layer. It was empty, too, as was the next. He moved on to the bottom layers, but still—nothing. Dust and webs, nothing more.

The figure swung his light around the cellar. There was nothing else here. But there were shoe prints on the dirt floor, besides his own. _Someone_ had been here, and recently. Why, though? What would Ditch do with a dirt cellar that—

He was home. Ditch's loud laugh carried through the front door as it opened above. There was no time for escape. In an instant, the gloved figure scrambled up the ladder and pulled the secret door closed, tugging its top flush with the wood floor. Then he listened.

Heavy feet—Ditch was a large man—lumbered into the kitchen. Smaller feet followed, tapping after Ditch, stopping across the room from him.

"Time for me to move on, that's all," a woman's voice said.

Ditch laughed again. "No, baby, you're too valuable. You gotta stay with me. And you ain't got no place to go. I don't want to see you out on the streets. Bad things happen out there." Through a crack between floorboards, the figure saw Ditch directly above him—heavy and fair-skinned, with a ball cap covering light brown hair that was thinning to near baldness on top. "Hey, Belinda, don't look at me like that. You know I don't—"

Ditch's words muddled together as they moved beyond the bounds of the cellar, into the living room, making it impossible to eavesdrop. The figure glanced at his watch, then up at the cellar door, then sat down on a crate. It wouldn't do to climb out while Ditch might see him; better to wait until after sunrise, when Ditch typically slept. Just an hour...

The conversation continued, barely beyond the edge of comprehensibility, for another half hour until a pounding on the front door interrupted it. Ditch spoke some low command. His feet pounded out to the front as the woman's feet tapped quickly toward the bedroom with the cellar door.

The secret door opened and a shaft of light shot into the cellar. The figure froze—there was no place to hide here, except in the darkness. He slipped into the farthest, blackest corner.

Belinda, wiry and of average height, climbed down the ladder expertly, shutting the floorboard panel above her. In the darkness, the figure heard her step to the crates, pull one from the top, and settle herself on it with a sigh. He listened to her breathing as Ditch greeted the person at the door above and their feet clomped into the living room together, their conversation diminishing to an indistinct mumble.

The figure held perfectly still for a minute, then two... He had no escape route. _Brilliant,_ he thought. _I broke into McWrait's mansion, found his secret stash, and escaped unscathed only to die in this drug dealer's cellar._

After half an hour of keeping absolutely motionless, his gloved fingers began to twitch involuntarily. Slowly he flexed them and shifted his weight from one foot to the other, back and forth.

After a full hour, the woman suddenly spoke. "You might as well come out." In all that time, she had barely moved. "You're in the corner. I can see you moving."

"You can see me?" the figure asked. The room was totally dark. The barest seepage of light through the floorboards above almost let him see her silhouette, as if it were an apparition he couldn't be sure was fully there.

"Uh-huh. Saw you scurry away like a rat when I opened the cellar, too," she replied. "First time Ditch has ever sent me down here when he already had someone else hiding. You must've been here a while."

"You work for Ditch?" the figure asked.

"Not much longer, sweetheart," she said. "I'm gonna get my own place, an honest job... He's tied me up too long. It's time to be out on my own. Besides..." She blew out a long stream of air and clicked her tongue. "Have you ever had something you would do _anything_ for?"

"Like what?"

"Like freedom. I've been Ditch's delivery girl since I was fourteen. I'm ready to be free. And I'm _gonna_ be free. I'm gonna make Ditch let me go."

"How will you do that?"

"If he doesn't, I'll turn him in." She stood and moved around the room, suddenly restless; the figure heard her pace from one dirt wall to the other. "So what's your thing that you would do anything for? Everyone's got one."

The figure hesitated. He didn't care to get drawn into revealing conversation. "Revenge," he said at last.

Belinda stopped her pacing. The figure could feel her looking his way, assessing him. "Ditch doesn't know you're down here, does he?" she said. "You here to get revenge on him?"

"Not on him. It's complicated. Would you mind not telling him I'm here?"

She grunted. "If I did, he'd kill you. He's a loveable guy, likes everybody, but he'd as soon shoot you as hug you." She stepped into the corner where the figure stood. Her voice dropped to a near-whisper. "But if you don't tell him I'm turning him in, I won't tell him you're down here."

"That works for me."

"He doesn't know this, but I'm about to give him his last chance. He lets me go, or else. I have lots of dirt on him."

"Maybe I could help you," the figure said. Heavy footsteps sounded overhead; Ditch's guest was leaving. "I could use some dirt to—"

"Belinda!" It was Ditch, on this side of the house again. "He's gone. You can come on up."

Belinda patted the figure's chest in the darkness. "Gotta go. Sorry. Anyway, looks to me like you have plenty of dirt down here. I hope he doesn't catch you."

She climbed the ladder and departed through the cellar door. "You need to do something about those rats down there, Ditch," she called as she emerged into the bedroom. "There's a really big one..."

The figure grimaced, but Ditch just responded with some wisecrack that the figure didn't catch.

"Was that Albert K. again?" Belinda asked.

"Yep," Ditch replied.

"When are you gonna let me meet him?"

"He's not your type. He's a big-time buyer over in Issaquah. All business. Doesn't like distractions... Unlike me..."

"You're a creep."

"Hey, I got a delivery for you to take to McWrait's man downtown."

"I'm quitting. I told you that."

"Not until you find a new income. I'm not leaving you out on the street."

"You're not leaving me anywh—"

"Your birthday's in three weeks. Help me out 'til then. I got a friend who can get you a good job, something you'll like. It'll be a birthday present..." They moved into the living room, again out of earshot.

The figure seated himself on Belinda's crate to wait. She would leave on Ditch's errand soon, then Ditch would hit the sack, and then he himself would silently crawl out of this hole and sneak away.

Everything went according to plan—she left, he went to bed. But just before Ditch lay down in his room, he let in a friend, markedly drunk, who crashed in the second bedroom, right on top of the cellar door, and began to snore.

*****

"I know you guys are planning something," Zach said as he caught Mom and Dad exchanging poorly-hidden grins over dinner that evening. He took another bite of his oven-baked chicken. "You keep smiling at each other. What's going on?"

"Want to tell him?" Dad asked Mom. "It was your idea."

Mom cleared her mouth with a drink of water and turned to Zach. "What is the farthest you can remember ever being from Seattle?"

He thought back. "Bellevue? I think Grandfather took me there once to meet some guys from China. How far is that?"

"China? That's a long way," Mom teased.

"I mean Bellevue," he corrected her, rolling his eyes.

"Only a few miles," Dad said. "On the other side of Lake Washington."

Mom cocked her head to one side. "So you can't remember ever being out of the city?"

"No," Zach replied, scooping up some baked beans with his spoon.

"Well," she said, that sly grin returning, "we're taking you on a trip."

He sat up straight, forgetting his food. "Out of Seattle?"

"To Portland," she told him. "We're taking you to meet your real grandparents—your dad's parents."

Zach was speechless. All the way to Portland—all the way to Oregon, another state! In his mind, he might as well have been going all the way to Mexico or South America.

His eyes must have gone as wide as they felt, because Dad laughed and Mom grinned. "Is that okay?" she asked.

"Yeah, Mom!" he replied enthusiastically. "When do we leave?"

"Tomorrow morning," she said. "And then we'll stay there a couple of days and let you get to know them."

"Awesome," Zach said quietly, shaking his head in disbelief.

"We have a little stop we have to make on the way, though," Dad added.

"Where?" Zach asked.

Mom shook a finger at him as she chewed another bite of her food. "You'll have to wait and see."

It was hard to wait. He wanted to leave right away, but Mom and Dad insisted that they all get a good night's sleep first. In the morning, Mom roused him early with a gentle, "Wake up, Fish." Their supplies having been packed the previous night, they said goodbye to Paws—Marissa's older sister Jasmine, who could drive, would stop by to feed him—and hit the road. They headed out of Seattle on the freeway, Mom passing breakfast to Zach in the back seat. His library books were tucked inside his backpack beside him, but he wasn't interested in reading just yet. He had never seen the places they were passing—Seatac, where he spotted massive planes stationed at the international airport, then Federal Way, then Tacoma. He tried to take in everything at once—buildings, traffic, people—not wanting to miss any of it.

When they had passed through Tacoma, Dad took an exit onto another freeway that soon led to a smaller highway that, in turn, brought them into the countryside. Zach gaped in awe as the last neighborhoods disappeared behind them and they entered a wonderland full of nothing but farms. Vast, unbelievably open spaces stretched between the houses and barns. A tractor plowed dirt. Crops grew in rows in the fields. Zach spotted cows, horses, goats, and even a llama.

Mom turned and watched him; Dad, too, eyed him through the rear-view mirror. "Ever seen farms before, pal?" Dad inquired.

Speechless, Zach shook his head.

Dad and Mom began pointing out interesting things—a corn field, hay bales, a cow pasture, a dairy... They drove on past more fields and farms, then through a patch of forest to a large lake. Whatever scenery they passed, Zach couldn't pull his eyes away from it.

They drove on, and civilization faded into hills that grew larger until the flat areas between them disappeared altogether. After a long drive through endless forest, Dad slowed the car and stopped at a booth where a woman in a brown uniform stepped out to greet them. "Just staying for the day," Dad told her. He handed her some money and received a few papers in return.

He passed one of the papers back to Zach. It was a brochure entitled, "Mount Rainier National Park."

"Is this where we are, Dad?" Zach asked, astonished.

"Remember how your dad said we had to make a little stop on the way to Portland?" Mom replied, grinning.

The little stop was _Mount Rainier,_ the massive volcano? Dad drove on, and the road began to climb steeply, winding back and forth along the sides of hills as they ascended into the Cascades Mountains.

They came around a sharp bend, and a view opened up in front of them. "Mom, look!" Zach exclaimed. It was suddenly there—Mount Rainier, more massive than he had ever imagined, so huge it seemed to fill the entire sky. It looked different from this side—from the south, he figured, since the morning sun was shining from their right, in the east. The mountain seemed somehow shorter and far, far larger at the same time. They must have been very close to the bottom of the mountain, it loomed so near.

Dad drove a few more miles until they reached a parking lot. They stepped outside into cool air; Mom immediately fetched Zach's jacket for him.

"It's okay, Mom, I'm not cold," he assured her.

"You will be in a minute," she responded. "We're five thousand feet up in the mountains. Up here, winter is just ending."

_Winter?_ He looked around. Snow still lay on the ground in patches. Between the white places, small bushes had put out new leaves and bright green grass had sprouted. Evergreen trees not nearly as tall as the ones they had passed in the forest grew out of both snowy and green spaces.

"Let's go, Zach!" Dad called, already striding away along a sidewalk that accompanied the main road further uphill. He had put his own jacket on and swung a backpack over his shoulder. Zach grabbed his hat and hurried alongside Mom to catch up with him.

The sidewalk took them to a large visitor center. Dad went inside to ask about hiking conditions, but Zach remained outside with Mom, staring in every direction at once. "Pretty impressive, huh, kiddo?" Mom asked.

It was the most amazing place he had ever seen, even more than the Space Needle or the zoo. "Mom, there's so much... _outside_ here!" he said in a low voice. "You can see for miles!" He turned slowly in a complete circle, surveying the terrain both near and far. Close to the visitor center were three other buildings—a little spot of civilization dwarfed by a vast wilderness. He had read about places like this, but had scarcely been able to imagine them until now.

Was it always like this in families—one amazing day after another? He couldn't believe Mom and Dad had brought him here. It was too incredible. He wanted to run and run through this monstrous back yard and just stay out here forever. He wished he had found his parents years ago.

Dad rejoined them a minute later and reported that his favorite trail was passable, but that they would have to hike across some snow fields. Zach practically shook with excitement. Mom, however, insisted that they observe certain preparatory rituals before embarking on the hike: filling the water bottles in Dad's backpack, using the restroom, and putting on sunblock. Zach had never used sunblock before—he had never been out in the sun enough to need it before.

"Really, Mom?" he complained, pulling away when she smeared some on his face and neck. He didn't like the oily feel of it, or the pungent smell, either.

"You're at high altitude, Zach, on a sunny day. The sun is extra-bright up here, and the snow reflects it back up at you, so you get twice as much of it as in Seattle. I don't want you to get sunburned." Her explanation didn't satisfy him, so she added, "Look—you let me put this on you, and we can hike all day, okay?"

"All the way until dinner time," Dad affirmed.

"We can stay out here until dinner?" Zach was wowed by the thought. That "little stop" Dad had mentioned was turning into a huge adventure of its own. He let Mom finish the job.

A minute later they were off, discovering new wonders everywhere they turned. They stopped to view a waterfall just off the main trail, continued on through alpine shrubs beginning to awaken after their long dormant season, found bright yellow and white flowers blossoming low to the ground, and passed stands of trees and fields of huckleberry bushes where small birds flittered to and fro. A chipmunk ran across the trail ahead of them and scampered up a decaying stump to study them as they hiked by.

For over an hour they hiked higher and higher until they came to a broad patch of snow that hid the trail from view; thankfully, other hikers before them had left a clear trail to follow. Dad stopped to look around for a moment; Mom leaned over and whispered in Zach's ear, "Quick, put these on." He replied with a questioning look as she stuffed his new gloves into his hands; with all this hiking, his hands weren't cold at all.

Suddenly something struck him in the side, leaving a spot of snow on his jacket. He looked up just in time to spin away as another snowball flew from Dad's hand. He gaped. What had gotten into Dad?

Mom crossed her arms. "Zach, I'm not going to defend you. You have to stand up for yourself."

Still he gaped at Dad, who grinned and packed two handfuls of snow together into one supersized ball.

"He's coming for you, Zach!" Mom whispered urgently.

_The gloves—_ he got it. _Mom and Dad brought me all the way here for a_ snowball fight _?_

Dad's next, great snowball whizzed within inches of Zach's ear as he dropped to his knees and quickly pulled the gloves on. He squeezed together some snow like Dad had, shaped three snowballs at once, and chased Dad, launching his ammunition in a rush before reloading. Dad roared his approval and sent another snowball his way. They exchanged volleys for several minutes. Even Mom joined in the fray before Dad finally wore out and surrendered, laughing so much he could hardly breathe. Zach's ribs ached from laughter, too, and from exertion.

There was a large, bare rock nearby, and they sat down on it to rest. Its red-gray surface was warm from the sunlight and offered a pleasant contrast to the cool mountain air and the icy snow.

Zach gazed out across the surrounding peaks, many of which were lower than where he, Mom, and Dad were resting, seeing how far he could see. "I wish I could live up here," he told Mom. "With you and Dad, I mean."

Mom drew in a deep breath of the crisp mountain air. "We like to come here once or twice a year, to get away from the city. Seattle's great, but sometimes it's good to get out where there's no noise."

Zach listened; Mom was right—it was eerily silent up here. If she and Dad hadn't been here, it would have been scary. The chirping of a bird in some nearby tree was the only sound.

"There's so much outside here," Zach marveled. "What if we got lost? We'd never find our way back."

"Actually," Dad said, "from here we could just head downhill until we came across a trail or a road. Or water. Follow water far enough and you eventually find people."

"But if we _really_ got lost, like in the forest, we'd leave signs behind us," Mom added.

"Right," Dad concurred, "to mark where we'd been—rock piles, sticks, messages in the snow—anything to tell people who were searching for us, 'We were here, and we went _that_ way.' And we'd want to watch out for bears."

"Bears?"

Mom slapped Dad in the side and Zach knew Dad was teasing—though, he realized, there probably were bears up here in the mountains.

He let his eyes wander again across the mountainsides surrounding them. "This place is so big. And there are no houses or anything."

A second later, he grinned mischievously at Dad, then jumped to the ground and scooped up some snow. This time it was he who attacked Dad with snowballs, and they played a while longer in the snow, chasing each other across the icy crust, slipping on spots where the snow had turned solid and slick.

Eventually they continued on. They came to an overlook where other hikers had stopped to eat, and Mom pulled out some snacks for the family to munch on. Zach ate gratefully; he was getting hungry.

"Zach, look!" Mom exclaimed suddenly, pointing. On the rocky ridge above them stood a mountain goat, its shaggy hair a somewhat dirtier white than the nearby snow, sporting a white beard and short horns.

"Awesome!" Zach declared.

The goat bent its neck and nibbled at a spot of new, bright green growth, eyeing them warily as it chewed. For just a moment, Zach wished he could be the goat—wild, free to roam across this fabulous landscape, never having to stay inside in the rain or, in the goat's case, snow. _But I don't have to stay inside either, not anymore,_ he reminded himself. _At least not all the time._ And the goat, he realized, probably never got to eat tacos or play baseball—so maybe they were even.

At last the goat sauntered off over the ridge and out of sight, and Zach, Mom, and Dad finished their snack and hiked the rest of the trail. When their path eventually brought them back to the visitor center, Dad supplied lunch from his backpack and they ate and rested their feet before launching out again. They hiked all afternoon, returning to the visitor center just in time to buy dinner in the diner there before it closed. Zach requested French fries, of course; Mom granted his request on the condition that he eat a burger, as well. Fries alone were not nutritious enough for a growing boy, she said.

After dinner, they headed back to the car, and though Zach was eager to meet Dad's parents, he hated to leave. He waved a silent goodbye to Mount Rainier as Dad drove back into the surrounding hills. The mountain had been a great friend today.

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, jerked and stretched, then clenched as the figure remembered where he was.

There were voices.

"Promise me!"

"Fine, babe, I promise. I'll swear it on my mother's grave, if you want."

"You hated your mother."

It was Belinda, arguing with Ditch. The figure pulled himself away from the dirt wall where he had leaned, dozing. He was still stuck in Ditch's cellar. He checked the time—8:12 p.m. He had been here for sixteen hours.

Ditch stomped around upstairs, moving objects—boxes, it sounded like—stacking them near the front door. He preferred to do his work in the late afternoon and after dark. Maybe he would leave soon.

"You'd better keep your promise," Belinda persisted.

Ditch's feet paused in the kitchen. "Hey, how long have you known me? If you can't trust me, who can you trust?" Belinda snorted and began to speak again, but Ditch cut her off. "No more of this. After your birthday, you're free. Until then, you still work for me. So take this—"

She grunted as he handed her something. He strode out the door, his voice disappearing with him. Her tip-tapping steps followed. Ditch returned inside twice more, fetching the boxes.

Then his footfalls thudded into the second bedroom, where the hidden cellar door lay. "Yeah, I know you're in here," Ditch said roughly, and the figure drifted back into the darkest corner again. But Ditch didn't open the cellar door. Instead, he stepped over it and shoved something heavy to the side with his foot. The man lying on top of the door—he was still there. He mumbled something in reply, stumbled to his feet, and made his way unevenly to the living room.

Ditch followed him, scolded him, and left the house. A car engine rumbled to life outside, then drove away.

Stepping past the crates in the dark, the figure climbed the ladder silently and paused at the top, listening. The enormous TV in the living room was on and blaring full-volume; it would cover any sound he made.

He lifted the cellar door. No one was in the second bedroom, so he climbed out and closed the door behind him. _One person to get past. Would Robin Hood sneak by or make a run for it?_ Robin was more the sneaker-type, the figure decided.

He crept through the house to the edge of the large entryway, where the living room was set off to one side. A young man with a long, black, uncombed beard and hair to match lounged on the living room sofa, staring vaguely at the TV screen. He was facing the entryway. The figure couldn't cross the opening without coming into his full view.

Sixteen hours in the cellar having eroded much of his interest in caution, he strode boldly across the entryway. The other man glanced up.

"Hey," the figure said, waving a hand.

"Hey," the other man replied with a nod. His eyes swung back to the television.

The figure slipped out the front door and strode briskly down the street, checking behind him frequently, but the other man did not follow. Two blocks away he found his getaway car. He jumped in, cranked it to life, and slipped out of the neighborhood.

*****

When they arrived in Portland very late that evening, Craig introduced Zach to his parents, and they introduced themselves to the youngster as Grandmom and Granddad. Granddad then went on to explain, to Grandmom's chagrin, how Zach needed to keep a safe distance from the little creek out back during the night, lest the giant lobster that lived in it attack him in the dark. After hiking all day, Zach, though he had not slept a wink in the car, was so nearly unconscious that he accepted everything Granddad told him without question. They got the youngster into bed right away, and he fell straight to sleep.

Craig and Kara sat up with Craig's parents late into the night discussing Zach, puzzling over how, despite their initial suspicion that he must be Elliott's son, the DNA test results meant that he had been adopted out as an embryo, only to be sent to them ten years later. It was a bewildering story all the way around.

"So you still don't know where he came from?" Craig's mom asked.

"We didn't find any leads at the clinic," Kara replied. "And we've been too busy being a family since then to search anymore...if we knew _where_ to look."

"How did he get the name Zechariah?" Craig's dad wondered. "And Fleming, no less?"

Craig and Kara had no answers.

The next day, Granddad took Zach under his wing. He led the youngster out to the back yard, and Craig trailed them across the grass and down a gentle slope to the stream that cut between their property and the neighbors'.

"All right, young man, are you prepared to meet the giant lobster?" Granddad asked dramatically.

Zach had slept well last night and was fully awake today. "Don't lobsters live in the ocean?" he asked, suspicious.

"Most of them," Granddad admitted. "Not this one, though. She's adapted to fresh water." Feet clad in rubber boots, he trod into the creek. With a grave look, he turned to Zach. "Watch my back."

"Your back?"

_"Guard me,_ son," Granddad explained. "This old girl's sneaky. Huge, too. If you see her coming behind me, yell—and then get yourself to safety."

Zach narrowed his eyes, but scanned the water for danger upstream from Granddad all the same. Granddad bent over and hunted through the creek bed, lifting rocks and checking beneath them. Craig observed as his dad searched here and there and Zach kept watch from the bank. For a full minute Granddad worked, and then—

"Zechariah!" From the water he lifted a small creature, gray and brown, four inches long, and held it up for Zach to see. Zach ran the thirty feet to Granddad's side, eyes locked onto the animal. "This," Granddad announced, "has got to be one of the giant lobster's children." He paused for effect. "She must have laid eggs!" He was holding a crayfish, Craig saw, grasping it behind its pincers; the crayfish flailed mightily and in vain.

"Awesome!" Zach exclaimed, delighted.

"Newly hatched, I'd say. Highly dangerous. Want to hold it?"

The youngster didn't hesitate. "Yeah!"

"Okay, watch the claws there," Granddad instructed. He guided Zach's fingers to grip the crayfish safely around its abdomen and released it to him. Zach turned it upside-down, studying it, and tapped its tail with a finger.

Granddad chuckled. "Now imagine that little guy ten times bigger and faster, and it finds out you've got its baby..."

Zach glanced at Granddad for a moment, considering, and then turned his eyes back to the crayfish.

Granddad stepped back into the creek. "I'm going to turn over one of these big rocks and see if I can find the mother." Zach, however, paid no attention; he was immersed in examination of his crayfish. Craig watched his dad maneuver along the creek bed, peeking under stones, pretending to hunt the menacing, giant freshwater lobster.

"Argh!" Zach screamed suddenly. "My nose!" Craig spun to see the youngster hunched over, both hands on the crayfish before his face. Zach yelled in agony.

Granddad lunged desperately out of the creek. "Zach! Hold still, let me get it!"

Craig raced to Zach, too, but his dad reached the youngster first, just as Zach spun back toward him, straightening and holding the crayfish safely at arm's length. _It doesn't have him at all,_ Craig realized. _Why—?_

"I got you, Granddad!" Zach laughed, holding the crayfish high above his head victoriously. His nose was entirely unscathed.

Granddad stared at him for a moment, looked at the crayfish, and burst out laughing. "Why, sure enough, you did! You got me good!"

Zach examined the creature again. "What is this thing really?"

Granddad grinned with pride at the wit of his newly-discovered grandson. "That, young man, is a crayfish, a crawdad—a freshwater lobster, more or less. Truth be told, it's a good-sized one. And that was the best prank anyone's pulled on me in a year! No doubt about it—you're part of the family."

Zach glowed at the compliment and held the crayfish in front of himself again, looking it in the eye. "Can we keep it?"

"Absolutely," Granddad said. He gestured toward the house. "Let's put it in that tub by the back porch." He and Zach started in that direction.

Craig stayed behind and watched the water flow down the creek. Had Zach recognized his granddad's ploy all along? He shook his head. The youngster was undoubtedly his granddad's grandson.

*****

To the boy's delight, Granddad gave Zach his undivided attention all afternoon. They made a temporary home for the crayfish, and then he taught Zach to play Frisbee. After dinner, Grandmom took over, showing him quilts she had made and having him help her cook up a brownie mix for dessert. Over the brownies, of which she fed him several, she regaled him with tales about his dad as a boy—his first baseball season, how cute he had looked in his first Halloween costume (she was impressed when Zach recalled that he had been a pirate), how strangely he had acted when he had first fallen in love with Kara and didn't want anyone to know.

At bedtime, Kara sat on the edge of Zach's bed—Craig's childhood bed—as the boy scooted under the covers. He still had chocolate smudges from the brownies around his lips.

She traced her own mouth with a finger. "You have chocolate right around here." She reached out a finger to wipe the smudges off, but he pulled away from her. "Oh—I guess you're old enough to get it off by yourself, huh?"

He wiped it away with the back of his hand. "Mom, I thought Granddad might be a lot like Grandfather, but he's totally different. Grandfather who said he was my grandfather, I mean."

"Grandfather you grew up with," Kara nodded in understanding. "How is Granddad different?"

"He's really fun. He actually talks to me. Grandfather would only talk to me when he was telling me what to do. If I tried to talk to him, he would tell me to leave him alone. But Granddad likes it when I talk to him."

"He sure thought you were funny with that crayfish," Kara noted with a poke to Zach's belly.

"Yeah," Zach grinned back, pulling away from the poke.

Mom tipped her head to the side. "Do you ever miss Grandfather?"

"No," Zach replied easily. "He just worked on his computer and ignored me, or read his papers and ignored me—or got mad and yelled and then ignored me. So I mostly ignored him, too."

Kara frowned. Why had they—whoever _they_ were—given her son to a man who had paid him no attention? "What about Grandmom? What did you think of her today?"

"I like her. She's really nice. Why did she ask Dad if he's still running his own business? She sounded like that was a bad thing."

Kara sighed. "Oh, she always wanted him to get a job that made more money so we could—" She hesitated.

"Could what?"

Kara bit her lower lip. "Could afford to have kids—maybe adopt or something. She really wanted us to have children, but...kids are expensive." In a lower voice she added, "A little more money would have been helpful."

Zach processed this information for a moment. "But now you have me. So..."

"So...I suppose she's wanted your dad to do something else for so long that she's forgotten why. Still, now that she's met you, maybe she won't worry about it so much."

Zach turned his blue eyes—surely stolen from Craig, Kara still thought, in spite of the color difference—to her. "Do _you_ think Dad should get a new job?"

Kara shook her head. "No, I want him to do what he loves—working outside with dirt and plants, working with Derek. For him, there could hardly be a better job." She smiled. "Plus, he can get off work whenever he wants to. Derek covers for him, and he covers for Derek. That's pretty special."

Zach fluffed his pillow once and plopped his head on top of it, then pulled the covers up to his neck. "Thanks for bringing me here, Mom."

She smiled and began to tousle his hair, but he pulled away again. "You don't like it when I mess up your hair," she acknowledged.

He considered for a moment. "Why do you do it?"

"Because you look cute with it messed up," she teased, and he rolled his eyes. But there was more to it than that, and the boy waited for it. "I guess because...it lets me say I love you without actually saying it."

_I do love this boy, don't I?_ The thought was more a statement, a recognition, than a question. _Didn't I love him the first time I saw him standing on the front porch, dripping wet from the rain?_ He was her son—in someone else's care for ten years, perhaps, but rightfully hers. How could she not love him?

She smiled. "Maybe you'd rather I didn't mess up your hair."

"No, it's okay," he answered, though with a second's hesitation. "When it's _you._ And Dad."

"Okay," she replied tenderly. She smoothed his hair a little, but only a little; he accepted it with a blink. "I'll try not to overdo it. Good night, kiddo."

"Good night, Mom." He wiggled into a more comfortable position.

She left the door slightly ajar for him as she exited the room, wondering... A so-called grandfather who wouldn't talk to him, a so-called grandmother who had died a few years ago... Those mysterious people had nurtured this boy so well in some ways, neglected him in others. She wanted to understand so desperately... _But why?_ she asked herself. _Why not just let it go like Zach does? Why should it bother me when it doesn't bother him?_

But it did bother her. She was his mother; he was her son. She needed answers. He couldn't explain where he had come from, why he was the way he was—but out there somewhere was someone who could. Someone had the answers, if only Kara could figure out where to find that person.
Chapter 9

Craig exhaled sharply the next Thursday evening, his hands on his hips, and stared into the little crowd assembled in the bleachers and in lawn chairs arranged behind the backstop. The game was about to begin, but he was missing someone—a first base coach. One of his usual coaches was sick and the other was out of town. No other dads were at the game today, which left Craig in need of a coach.

So he searched through the group that had come to watch. There were several moms he could ask, including Kara, but he didn't think having a mom on the field would seem appropriate to nine- and ten-year-old boys. He looked for a man. Ben had just shown up—Craig gave him a welcoming wave—but as he would not likely know whether to send a runner on a pop-up with one away, Craig figured he should consider Ben a last resort.

Eddie walked up and seated himself on the front row of the bleachers beside Ben, who had taken a seat next to Kara. _There we go,_ Craig thought. He stepped up to the backstop and called through it. "Hey, Eddie—didn't you used to play baseball?"

Eddie looked up at him, surprised to be addressed. "A long time ago. I quit when I was twelve."

"Can you tell a sacrifice fly from an infield pop-up?" Craig asked.

"Sure," Eddie shrugged, curious.

"Perfect," Craig said. "I need a base coach. Want to help us out, just for today?"

Eddie seemed hesitant. He glanced toward the team gathered in the dugout, where Zach had heard Craig and turned to look. "Well...okay, I guess."

Craig clapped his hands one time. "All right, we're ready to go, then! Mitchell," he yelled, turning toward the boys assembled in the dugout, "grab a bat. You're leading off."

Eddie came around the fence and onto the field. "You take first, I'll take third," Craig told him. "Just tell the guys when to run and when to stay. Nothing too complicated."

"You got it, coach," Eddie replied. He jogged around home plate and took his place near first base.

From the start, he turned out to be the best first base coach Craig had had in five seasons of coaching. Mitchell hit the fourth pitch he saw into the outfield on a line; Eddie immediately spotted that Mitchell was fast and sent him around first to begin the game with an easy double. Mitchell scored on another hit a couple of batters later. In the dugout, Eddie struck up an instant friendship with the boys. Zach introduced him as the janitor at his school, and Eddie threatened to make any player who missed a catch sweep off all the bases. He teased each of them in turn, especially Zach, and cheered them all on when they came to bat.

Clearly, he knew the game well. When most of the team was in the field, Eddie stationed himself beside Zach, who was on the bench for the first three innings, and added to what Craig had already taught the youngster, explaining such subtleties as why the third baseman could play a step closer to the batter against lefties and how one could, upon hitting a single in the last inning of a tied game, run halfway to second and fall down if it might distract the other team and let your teammate score from third. Zach soaked up the attention and every word.

For Zach's part, when he got into the game, he struggled. He struck out in his first at-bat, missed a fly ball that came his way in left field, and hit into an impressive double play turned by the other team. Who knew ten-year-olds could turn a flawless 6-4-3 double play?

When his team took the field in the bottom of the fifth inning, Craig sat down beside Eddie on the bench. "Can I ask you something?" he inquired.

"You bet," Eddie nodded, watching the pitcher's warm-up throws.

"When you first met Zach, did you ever encounter his grandmother—maybe when she dropped him off or picked him up?"

"I almost always worked nights back then," Eddie answered. "I was just getting started there. Now I get more of a mix of days and nights."

"How about the nannies?" Craig asked. "Ever meet any of them?"

Eddie gave him a cautious, questioning look.

"We're trying to figure out how to get in touch with them."

Eddie shrugged. "Most of my interaction with Zach came inside the school. As far as I know, the nannies always stayed outside."

Craig cheered his team a bit as they played a ground ball and recorded the first out of the inning. "The principal called one day, just to talk. He said Zach had a hard time when he first came to kindergarten."

"I remember that," Eddie mused as the pitcher prepared to face the next batter. "He would hardly speak to any of the men in the school, even me. It took us a long time to earn his trust—especially for Mr. Lopez. I usually worked the night shift, like I said."

"Do you know why he wouldn't talk to the men?" The next batter pounded a ball into the dirt right in front of home plate. The catcher snatched it up and tagged him before he could run, and Craig and Eddie shouted their approval.

"Mrs. Miloski, the counselor, wondered if he'd ever had a male role model around," Eddie resumed. "He talked about having a grandfather, but—hey, Craig," Eddie interrupted himself, pointing to the batter, "this is the kid who launched that long shot to left in the second inning. You might have Zach back up a bit."

Sure enough—Craig would have noticed that, had he not been busy digging for information about his son. Funny, the ways being a dad could change your focus. "Zach!" he yelled. "Back up! You too, Kyle!" Zach and the center fielder each took a few steps backward until Craig signaled them to stop.

The pitcher wound up and threw a ball much too high. The next ball was outside and in the dirt. The third pitch, though, was straight and true—too much so. The batter hit it on the fat part of the bat, launching it high and deep toward left field. "Uh-oh," Eddie said, jumping to his feet just as Craig did. Zach backtracked a few steps, adjusted to his left, and stretched out his glove. The ball landed right in the pocket and bounced out again, but the youngster snatched it out of the air with his bare hand as it fell. He tripped over his feet, landed hard on his back, and jumped up again. He thrust his hand into the air, the ball firmly in his grasp. The team cheered, and Zach raced triumphantly to the dugout, where his teammates gathered around to congratulate him.

"Good call on the positioning there," Craig told Eddie quietly after each of them had saluted the youngster with a high five. That catch would have been impossible had Eddie not said something. This young man was intelligent, and even if he hadn't played in years, he certainly knew baseball.

After the game—they won again—Ben and Kara applauded Zach for his catch, and the youngster glowed. Craig, though, caught Eddie. "Hey," he said, "we only have one more game. I'd love it if you could help us out again. You knew what you were doing out there."

Eddie glanced briefly at Zach with his mom and uncle. "Yeah, okay," he answered. "I can probably get off work if I need to. My schedule is more flexible in the summertime."

"Awesome," Craig responded, clapping him once on the shoulder. _When did I start saying "Awesome?"_ he wondered, shooting a look at his son. "Next Friday, here," he told Eddie, "seven o'clock. Come a few minutes early."

Eddie shook Craig's hand, waved goodbye to Zach and Kara, and went on his way. Craig watched him go. Good rapport with the kids, good working knowledge of the game—Eddie might make a great assistant coach next year, if the opportunity interested him.

"Dad!" Zach hollered, running up to him. "Uncle Ben got a picture of my catch. Come and see!" Grinning, he ran back to Ben. Craig couldn't help but grin, too, and follow.

*****

"I was thinking I might move here when I retire."

"Oh, really, Mom?" Mom was talking with her own mother, who had just arrived from Spokane to visit for a few days. Dad was hiding in the den, where they couldn't see him from the kitchen. Zach, though, dressed in shorts and seated atop the dining table with his bare legs dangling over the edge, watched him sit up stiffly, attentively. He didn't look happy.

Mom must have read his thoughts—she glanced toward the den as if she had seen him. "When are you thinking you might retire?"

"Not for a few more years," responded Nana Maggie—that was what Jasmine, Brooke, Marissa, and Jayda called her. She was entirely different from Grandmom. Where Dad's mom was "pleasantly plump," as she had put it, Nana Maggie was slender like Mom, and almost as tall. They looked a lot alike, except for Mom being younger and Nana Maggie's hair starting to turn gray. And where Grandmom had gotten to know Zach slowly, cautiously, Nana Maggie had jumped in head-first, assaulting Zach with a massive bear hug the moment she had seen him. It had been so uncomfortable it had nearly hurt. There was truly a lot of touching in families.

"But it's hard being so far from my grandchildren," she explained to Mom, looking toward Zach. It wasn't uncomfortable when she looked at him, only when she hugged him. When she looked at him, it was like Mom looking at him, only...different. He liked her, but she wasn't quite the same as Mom. Mom was gentler somehow; Nana Maggie liked to, well, jump in head-first.

"Why don't you just move to Seattle right now?" Zach asked. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Dad grimace. Oh, yeah—Mom had said he liked her better in Spokane. It was probably because of the hugs; she had given him one, too.

"Tenure," Nana Maggie told him.

He wrinkled his eyebrows. "What's that?"

She came to the table and sat down in front of him. She could see Dad now; he instantly took on a more pleasant demeanor. "Tenure means I've been in my job long enough that I get the best pay, the best work times, all the best stuff. If I changed jobs, I'd have to start over."

"What do you do?" he inquired.

"I'm a physical therapist," Nana Maggie answered. "I help people recover from sports injuries."

"I have a sports injury!" Zach exclaimed.

"You do? How exciting!" She leaned forward with interest. "What did you injure?"

"My leg," he said. He stretched his right leg across the table. "See, right there." He touched the tiny purple spot that remained; it didn't hurt at all anymore.

"When did you get that?"

"A few weeks ago. I got hit by a pitch in my first game."

"A few weeks? It must have been huge then."

"Yeah, it was." He showed her the extent of the original bruise with his fingers. "And it hurt really bad."

"Until you wanted to stay in the game," Dad spoke up. "Then it suddenly got a lot better."

"It still hurt, though."

"Hmm..." Nana Maggie turned his leg this way and that. "Did it swell up?"

"No. It just made a big, purple bruise."

"And it feels okay now?"

"Fine," he said.

"It looks like it's nearly healed. But we'd better check it to be sure."

"Check it?"

"Mm-hmm. Hop outside. Let's give it a test." With a wink at Mom, she stood up and gestured for Zach to follow her. They went out the side door, where Paws joined them.

"Hello there, Paws," she greeted him in a sing-song voice. She gave him a bear hug, too; he licked her face. Apparently, Paws was okay with bear hugs. "Let's go over here," she instructed, pointing to the corner of the yard. "Now, I'm a professional, you understand, and we're going to do a professional examination here. I want you to run across the grass to the fence, touch it, and come back. If you can run faster than Paws, then I'll know your leg is healed."

That sounded like a strange professional examination, but what did Zach know about physical therapy? Nana Maggie looked entirely serious, so he prepared himself.

"Ready?" she said. "Go!"

Zach raced off at full speed. Paws galloped merrily alongside him. He reached the fence, turned back, and was only beginning to breathe hard when he reached Nana Maggie again. Paws came in a close second.

"Wow, you are very fast, Zach," she pronounced. "It is my professional opinion that you are all healed up."

Zach sat down cross-legged on the grass to rest. Paws stood at his side, panting.

"So," Nana Maggie said, kneeling down to face Zach, "where have you been keeping these finely toned muscles all these years?" She squeezed one of his calf muscles and whistled at how strong it was. Did he really have strong muscles for his age? He looked at his arms, wondering. She continued. "I've never had a grandson before—only granddaughters, whom I believe you've met. What do grandsons do for a good time?"

"I like to play with Paws and do stuff outside," he answered, "and read books."

"Hmm. Ever read books outside?"

He shook his head; that was a new idea. He'd have to remember that one later.

"Do you ever take Paws for a walk?"

"Only if Mom or Dad comes with me. I'm not supposed to go by myself."

"I can understand that." She looked up at the sky. It was clear, with no clouds at all that Zach could see. "I hear you met your Grandma Fleming last week. What did you think of her?"

"She was really nice," Zach replied. He told Nana Maggie about the quilts and the brownies, and about the card games she had taught him while he was there—Go Fish, which had been too easy, and Rook, which had been more fun.

"I met her at your parents' wedding," Nana Maggie said. "She was pleasant to talk with, just like your dad. He's quite a charmer. Your Grandpa Timothy and I liked him the first time your mom brought him home with her from college. He was shy at first, but very respectful. I always thought he would make a good father..." She looked at Zach questioningly when she said that.

"Yeah, he's great," Zach said. "He teaches me stuff all the time. Did you say my grandpa's name was Timothy?"

"That's right. I didn't know your parents were planning to name their son after him. He died three years after they got married. It would have been about a year before you were born, I guess."

They had not told Zach about Grandpa Timothy—not about his name, anyway. _I was named after my grandpa!_ "What was he like?"

"A lot like you, I'd say—curious, liked everybody. Strong muscles, too," Nana Maggie winked. "I fell in love with him because he was so kind. We were neighbors growing up in Idaho, and he used to shovel our driveway when it snowed in the winter. That's no big deal here in Seattle, but there we would get a foot or more of snow at a time. Timothy knew my father had a hurt back, so he helped us out. He was always doing things like that."

She pulled a phone from her pocket and touched the screen a few times, then handed the phone to Zach. "This was him just before he got sick." Zach recognized Grandpa Timothy from pictures Mom and Dad had shown him in the photo albums. His grandpa had gray hair streaked with dark brown, almost black, and the kind of easy smile that meant he smiled a lot.

He gave the phone back to Nana Maggie. "Tell me something, Zechariah," she said. "When did you decide to come to your parents? How long before you really did come?"

Zach considered. "A few days, I guess."

"Two? Three?"

Silently, he counted backward from the Thursday of his arrival. "Maybe three."

"But if you knew they were out there somewhere, why didn't you find them sooner?"

He shrugged. "I didn't know I could. I never thought about it until the nanny said she would have to leave."

"And you needed a place to go."

"Uh-huh. So I looked in the phonebook, and they were there."

Nana Maggie narrowed her eyes at Zach as if she suspected he wasn't telling her everything. "So all that time you thought those people who raised you were your real grandparents, and you never asked them about your parents?"

"Grandmother told me about them when I was little," Zach replied, "but then she died, and Grandfather would never talk about them."

"Hmm." Nana Maggie pondered that thought a while.

"Can I ask you a question?"

"Of course."

Zach hesitated; he could tell by the fact that Mom and Dad never talked about this subject that it was a sensitive matter. But maybe it would be okay to discuss it with Nana Maggie. She wasn't exactly like them. "Sometimes Mom and Dad talk about a baby girl they had—"

"Tiffany, yes. You want to know about her."

Zach nodded, watching Nana Maggie closely.

Her eyes drifted to the grass. She took a deep breath, then clicked her tongue. "Tiffany was a beautiful three-month-old girl, just gorgeous. Big brown eyes. Lots of hair. Very lively, like you." She grinned at Zach, but the grin quickly dissipated. "When your parents couldn't have children of their own, your Uncle Ben persuaded them to adopt. So they tried. It was very expensive, and they didn't really have the money, but they tried anyway."

"Did she die?" Zach asked solemnly.

"No. She's still alive and well out there...somewhere. No, your parents went through all the training to adopt a child, and all the arrangements were made. Tiffany's case manager met them and introduced them to her. They fell in love with her from the moment she smiled at them. They decided to adopt her, and the case manager helped them work out all the details. Then when Tiffany's foster parents couldn't keep her anymore, he even arranged for your mom and dad to be her foster parents until the adoption was finalized. They had her for—"

"Fifty-one days," Zach recalled.

"Yes, exactly. The adoption would have been finalized two weeks later."

"What happened?"

Nana Maggie kicked angrily at a leaf on the ground. "The case manager left for a new job, and another case manager took oversight of Tiffany. _She_ looked at your parents' finances— _and cancelled the adoption._ She said they didn't have enough _money."_ Nana Maggie spat that last word.

"Did they?"

"No. They were flat broke. They couldn't pay their bills without help from me and Ben and your dad's parents. They had gone into debt trying to adopt Tiffany. But they were _going_ to be fine once they got past all the initial expenses. And..." She inhaled sharply through her nose and blinked hard once. "And well, you don't take a couple's baby away at the last second because you think they _don't have enough money!_ If she had taken the time to get to know them...! Anyway," she continued after another breath, "the woman showed up on day fifty-one without any warning and took Tiffany away."

"Why didn't they stop her?"

"They tried, but she had full authority over Tiffany. There was nothing they could do. That was the last time they ever saw Tiffany. The woman wouldn't even tell them what family she went to."

Zach swallowed, feeling bitter toward the woman himself. _No wonder Mom and Dad didn't want to talk about it._

Nana Maggie suddenly grabbed Zach and hugged him faster than he could think to escape. "But _you're_ here now, and all that stuff about Tiffany—that was a long, long time ago. Now your parents have you, and you have them."

"Yeah," Zach agreed, cringing from the crushing embrace. "And Paws."

Nana Maggie pulled Paws into the hug. "Yes, and you too, Paws."

*****

The whole family came over for a barbecue two days later to celebrate Independence Day. Kara's mom was there, of course, and with Ben and Lia and their girls there, the house was full. The three mothers and Jasmine were crowded into the kitchen to prepare the meal; Craig could see them through the open side door. He and Ben stood around the barbecue grill, tending burgers.

"There's potential for discord there, I think." Ben nodded toward Marissa and Zach. Zach was trying to kick his soccer ball to Brooke, but Marissa stood in his way, taunting him and kicking the ball away from him. Jayda climbed on Paws, who lay off to the side, sprawled on the grass.

"Marissa really likes him," Craig observed.

Ben grimaced. "I told her it's fine to be excited about having a new cousin, but she needs to give him some space. Poor guy."

"Is she still saying she doesn't like boys?" Craig asked.

"Of course—and then she won't leave them alone."

"Brooke and Jasmine never did that."

"No, this is a hundred percent Marissa."

"Stop it!" Zach yelled suddenly. He was near the center of the yard, trying to pull away from Marissa, who was tugging on his arm. He kicked the ball hard, away from her pestering feet. The ball banged against the house only inches below the den's large picture window.

"Zach, be more careful!" Craig called to him. The youngster stopped immediately and looked. "Don't kick the ball toward the house, all right?"

"Sorry," Zach called back. Marissa chased after him again, and he ran from her.

Craig turned back to the burgers and flipped them over one at a time; they needed a couple more minutes yet. Ben continued to watch the kids play. "Any more clues to where he came from?"

"Nothing since the DNA tests," Craig answered. "We don't even know where to look. Someone at the clinic gave his embryo out for adoption—that's all we know. But they did it quietly; then they put _our_ names on his birth certificate. So how are we supposed to track down who gave him away and who took him?" He took a deep breath. "But that's not the most important thing right now. The important thing is figuring out"—he ran a hand through his hair—"how to raise him."

"It's weird, hearing you say that."

"Not half as weird as it is saying it. And you know what's even weirder? I _like_ it." Craig looked up at the kids again, particularly Zach. "My biggest fear now is that someone will show up with adoption papers and take him away from us."

"What would you do then?"

"Fight them, take it to court," he said, turning back to Ben. "We never agreed to give our child to anyone. And it's not like they gave him much of a home life. So the way I figure it, we should be able to get legal cust—"

SMACK! The soccer ball rebounded off the picture window, leaving the glass reverberating from the impact. "Zach!" Craig yelled. He was angry this time. The ball had nearly shattered the window.

"Zechariah!" came Kara's voice as she thrust her head through the doorway. "Craig, he could have broken that window!"

"Zach, come here!" he hollered, and the youngster came hesitantly across the grass toward him. "Did you kick that ball?" Zach nodded fearfully. "I told you not to kick the ball near the house! Do you realize how much it would cost to replace that window? You almost—"

He cut off as Zach turned abruptly and ran inside the house, past the women and toward the bedrooms. A door slammed. Kara looked at Craig in surprise.

"I didn't mean to—oh, good grief," Craig muttered. He stepped toward the house. "I'll go talk to him."

Ben caught his arm. "You might give him a minute," he advised. "At least, it helps with the girls."

Craig paused, looking after Zach, then nodded. "All right. Thanks. I don't really know what I'm doing."

Ben shrugged. "Zach doesn't know that."

Craig paced a circle around the barbecue grill. He flipped the burgers again. He ran another hand through his hair, thinking. What had he done to make the youngster run and hide? He hadn't meant to frighten him—well, not that much. Only enough to warn him to be more careful next time.

After a minute, he couldn't stand it anymore. "Long enough?"

"I'll watch the burgers," Ben answered.

Craig strode past the women to Zach's room, then slowed his pace, calming himself as he neared the door. They could replace windows, even expensive ones. He knocked on the door before he entered. He was not surprised to find the room seemingly empty. "Come sit beside me, Zach," he said, setting himself on the floor with his back against the desk, his legs stretched out in front of him. This approach had worked last time.

Zach was more hesitant this time, though; last time, Kara had spoken to him first. And this time the youngster knew he had done something wrong.

"Wow, you've lived here almost two months, Zach, and this is the first time you've gotten in trouble," Craig pointed out. "That's pretty impressive. When I was ten, I got in trouble everyday. Just ask my parents." The youngster peeked out at him from under the bed. Craig pretended not to notice. "We need to talk about what just happened, but I think we can work it out."

He waited. After a few moments, Zach emerged uncertainly. He had been crying; tears streaked his cheeks. Cautiously, he came and sat against the wall, with some space between himself and Craig.

"So, what's so interesting under the bed?" Craig asked, immediately regretting the poor attempt at humor. Zach remained silent. "Remember, we asked you not to run and hide."

Zach looked up at him through moist eyes. "I didn't mean to hit the window," he whispered.

"I know," Craig replied. He put a hand on the youngster's shoulder, but only for a moment. Kara had pointed out to him how hands made Zach uncomfortable. "And I'm sorry I yelled. I guess everybody makes mistakes, even you and me, huh? It might be best to put the ball away for tonight, though, pal."

Zach wiped away a couple of tears. "Dad?"

"Yes?"

"Can I still stay here? With you and Mom?"

Was that what had scared him? "Of course, Zach. Why wouldn't you?"

He shrugged. "Dad?"

"Yes, Zach?"

"Can you make Marissa leave me alone? She's driving me crazy."

Craig suppressed a grin. "I saw her. She really likes you, you know. She's excited about having a new cousin—Ben told me."

Zach rolled his eyes. "Why can't I have _boy_ cousins?"

"You have one—my sister's son, same age as you. But he lives in Alaska. Sorry. They only come to visit once a year, if that. In the meantime, you're stuck with girls." Craig gave the youngster a few seconds of silence. "I'll talk to Ben about Marissa. Are you all right?"

Zach drew in a deep breath. "Yeah. Can I just stay in here, though?"

"Sorry, pal," Craig replied as he stood up. "Five minutes. Then wash your face in my bathroom and come join us. The burgers should be ready by then. And you won't want to miss what comes after that."

"Fireworks?" he asked, perking up a little.

"Have you ever gotten to watch a live fireworks show?"

"In one house we lived in," he recalled, "I had a room upstairs, and I could see the fireworks from my window, just barely."

"Tonight you get a close-up view," Craig promised. Giving the youngster one more gentle clap on the shoulder, he left Zach alone in the room and returned to help Ben with the burgers.

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, activated a computer in a dark office. Through the window the figure glimpsed the traditional flashes of light and heard the thunderous explosions, but he resisted the urge to turn and watch the fireworks. He had a job to do, and he was least likely to be interrupted—well, caught—if he accomplished it during the show. The manager of this establishment had an irritating habit of coming in after hours to catch up on unfinished work.

The computer screen lit up at last, and the figure directed the system to open a familiar database, one that would display both recent rentals and reservations yet to be fulfilled. A long list of cars and their renters filled the screen. The figure scrolled down through it, scanning it thoroughly and efficiently. He noted each name, seeking any that seemed familiar.

None were. The man who could thwart his plan had not yet returned, nor had set up a reservation.

That was what the figure had anticipated, but he found himself releasing a long, relieved breath all the same. The later that man returned, the better—the more likely that the man would be helpless to foil the figure's plan for the boy. Sooner or later the man would come, but later would be better.

The figure shut off the computer and exited the building. He reached the center of the parking lot outside and froze. Fireworks blossomed across the sky a couple of miles away, dozens suddenly exploding one atop another in rapid sequence—the grand finale. Somewhere in the city, Zechariah was likely watching them. That was good.

When the brilliant embers finally faded away, the figure remained in place, dazzled by the magnificence of the display. Then he came to himself, glanced about to make sure no one had noticed him, and jogged off into the night.
Chapter 10

Kara could tell that Zach met the next day's obligations with some trepidation—he was less than thrilled to have to spend the day at Ben and Lia's house. She had to go to work, though, and so did Craig. Her mom was staying with Ben and Lia for a couple of nights before returning to Spokane, and Kara and Craig did not think it best to leave Zach alone at home just yet, so when Lia offered to keep him with their daughters for the day, Kara took her up on the offer.

"Mom, they're all girls!" Zach whined that morning at breakfast.

"So," she answered, "I'm a girl, too. What's wrong with girls?"

"You're not a girl, you're my mom," he countered. "They probably have pink all over the house. They'll want me to play with dolls and stuff."

Kara chuckled at the thought of Jasmine and Brooke wanting to play with dolls. A volleyball was more likely. They probably wouldn't say no to a game of tackle football. "Oh, I think you'll manage. Now finish your oatmeal. Eating slowly won't get you there any later, just hungrier."

All that day at work Kara kept her phone handy, just in case. She knew an experienced mother like Lia—not to mention Kara's own mother—could handle whatever came up, but she still felt more at ease with the phone close by. When her lunch break came, she barely resisted the urge to call Lia or to swing by the house to check on them. Zach would be fine. He would.

Craig picked Zach up on his way home from work, and they were playing catch and entertaining Paws in the back yard when Kara arrived. Zach, it turned out, had rather enjoyed his day. He had a new bruise on his arm from wrestling with Brooke. He and Marissa had gotten along okay, and Jayda had actually persuaded him to play with her and her dollhouse for a few minutes.

"Are you okay with going back tomorrow?" Kara asked him.

"I guess so," he answered nonchalantly. "They're all right, for girls."

Kara leaned to whisper into his ear. "Was there _pink_ in their house?"

"Not much," he admitted. "Mostly in Jayda's room. That's okay, because she's little."

Craig grinned at that, and the boys resumed their game of catch. They were preparing for Friday night's baseball game, the last of the season.

When Friday arrived, Craig took Zach to the game early; Kara picked her mother up from Ben and Lia's place and came along later. Eddie arrived just after they did. "Hey, little tyke!" he greeted Zach as he approached, giving Zach's head a playful shove.

"I'm not a little tyke!" Zach yelled back at him in mock-anger. Kara thought for a moment that he would return Eddie's playful shove, but he changed his mind mid-motion and tossed Eddie a baseball instead. "Throw me some long ones."

"No, sir," Eddie redirected him. "You need to warm up your arm with short throws first. I don't want to be responsible for any career-ending injuries."

"He's right," Kara's mom chimed in. "Get some blood flowing through those muscles."

Zach gave in and found a teammate to warm up with. When the game began, Eddie resumed his post from the previous game as first base coach. Having sat on the bench for half of the game last week, Zach got to play the whole game today, and he started well, hitting a line drive up the middle in the second inning. His team left him stranded on first, though, and the other team scored a crippling eight runs in their next at-bat. Craig and Eddie tried to encourage their players, but even their own stout hearts were discouraged by the sixth inning, the score now 12-0.

Zach had struck out in the fourth and came to bat in the sixth with one out and the bases empty. As he left the on-deck circle, Craig pulled him aside to whisper a few words of encouragement. Zach nodded and, bolstered by his dad's support, strode confidently to the plate. He took the first pitch inside and looked over at his dad in the third base coach's box; Craig nodded reassurance to him. Kara beamed at her husband who had become a father.

The pitcher stepped into his windup. Zach shortened his bat and fluidly bunted the ball softly between the pitcher and the third baseman.

"Run, Zach!" Craig yelled. Eddie hollered the same.

Zach raced toward first base, legs pumping hard. The pitcher reached the ball first, barehanded it, and launched a throw to the right of the first baseman, who had to dive off the base to field it. It ricocheted off his glove and into right field.

"Second! Second!" Eddie commanded, and Zach rounded first base and shot toward second. As one, the entire team jumped off the bench and out of their stupor, clinging to the fence between them and the field as they leapt and yelled to Zach.

Reaching second base, the boy spotted Craig wheeling his arm and yelling, "Third, Zach, third!" The right fielder picked up the ball and threw it. Zach steamed into third just as the throw came in. Craig held up both hands and bellowed, "No! No!" over the shouts of the team behind him. The third baseman caught the ball a few steps in back of Zach.

Zach did not stop, however, but sprinted around third all the faster and rushed toward home. "No, Zach!" Craig cried desperately, and then dropped his hands in dismay as the catcher, protective gear on and mask off, stepped in front of home plate and received a perfect throw from the third baseman. Kara gasped in disappointment—the catcher caught the ball, Zach slid, and the catcher brought his glove down on the boy's leg a full three feet in front of home plate. The umpire, stationed to the side of the play, raised his hand to signal the out, then hesitated. The catcher showed him his glove, but the ball was gone—it was rolling behind home plate.

"Touch home! Touch home!" Kara screamed through the other parents' and coaches' voices. As the catcher ran to retrieve the ball, Zach, on hands and knees, scrambled to home plate. He planted his hand on it just as the catcher dove back to tag him—too late.

"Safe!" cried the umpire. The whole team spilled out of the dugout to surround Zach, who looked suddenly torn between the thrill of racing around the bases and the trauma of so many hands slapping his back, shoulders, and head.

Finally, Craig and the umpire restored order, and they finished the game. It was a dismal loss, but at least the team had scored. Craig gathered his players on the outfield grass for a few words of reflection on the season, and then they disbanded one last time.

Zach ran to the bleachers. "Mom! Nana Maggie! I bunted a home run!"

"You were a blur out there," Kara's mom praised him. "Looked like that leg had never been hurt!"

"Way to go, Zach!" Kara said, grinning at the boy's exhilaration. "The crawling at the end was an especially nice touch. But," she added, "it looked like your coach told you to stop at third."

"Yeah," Zach laughed. "I thought he was saying, 'Go,' but he was saying, 'No!'" He ran off then to relive the moment with a pair of teammates.

Craig hauled a bag of equipment to the bleachers and set it down next to Kara. Eddie walked up to him. "Thanks for letting me help out, coach," he said, shaking Craig's hand. "It was fun."

"You did a great job," Craig returned. "Best base coach I've ever worked with. Could I talk you into helping out again next year?"

"I'd love to," he replied sheepishly, "when I can get away from work."

"Good. Why did you stop playing ball, anyway?" Craig asked. "You have a sharp mind for the game."

Eddie's face fell a little. "I had a good arm, too," he said. "My coach thought I might have been able to pitch in high school, maybe even college. But my father, he—well, I realized one day that I was playing baseball to try to make him love me, and it wasn't working. That was the day I gave it up."

There was an awkward pause as Craig searched for something to say. Eddie himself broke the silence. "It's refreshing, actually, to see you support Zach no matter how he does on the field."

Craig gave a small smile. "Thanks. That means a lot." He exchanged phone numbers with Eddie in the hopes that they and Zach might get together to play a little ball over the summer.

As Eddie departed, Craig moved next to Kara. "That's a good guy right there," he commented.

Kara kissed Craig on the cheek. "Mm-hmm, and here's another one right here. Good job, coach."

"We lost by eleven."

"You had a good season, though. And whatever you told Zach when he went up for that last at-bat," Kara said quietly, "you really inspired him. He went up there like he knew he was going to hit a home run. What a great dad."

Craig glanced over at the boy and shrugged. "All I told him was that the third baseman was playing too far back and he could bunt that way if he wanted."

Craig returned to the dugout for the rest of the equipment, leaving Kara to shake her head in bewilderment. She liked boys, but she wasn't sure she would ever understand them.

*****

The art museum was a flop. "Mom, this is boring," was Zach's sentiment, expressed for the fourth time. "And we've been inside all day."

"Inside things can be fun," Kara quipped as she surveyed a series of matching sculptures of various sizes, each piece exquisitely crafted but, admittedly, not very kid-friendly.

"Riding the bus here was fun," he complained. "This isn't. Actually, that picture's pretty cool." Along the wall, he had spotted one he liked. Maybe there was hope for the child to develop some artistic taste after all. After two hours, he had finally found a painting he could appreciate.

"Don't look at me like that," Kara snapped lightly at Craig. "And don't say you told me so, either. If I like the art museum, it was worth a gamble that my son might, too."

Craig chuckled and gave her shoulders a squeeze, which irritated her all the more. With their schedule free—her mother having left for Spokane that morning—she had thought Zach might find the museum interesting, but art was obviously not his thing. His dad encouraged him a bit, though, and he endured the rest of the museum patiently so Kara could enjoy it. He even found a few more paintings and a sculpture that he liked.

Dinner at a tiny downtown restaurant they discovered was a bigger hit. "Can we get more fries, Mom?" he asked as he swallowed the last of hers, his own having already disappeared with his cheeseburger.

"No, I think you've had enough," she replied. "I've told you before, French fries are not a staple of a healthy diet."

"I like them," Craig put in.

"You're not helping, bozo," she told him with a frown. He and Zach shared a quick grin in spite of her.

The next day after church and lunch, Zach disappeared quickly out back with Paws and his soccer ball, but Kara saw it and stepped outside after him. "Zach? Back inside, kiddo. I asked you to pick up your room before you play with the dog." Two months with the boy and already they had accumulated enough toys and childhood accoutrements for his room to devolve into a mess if she left it unchecked for a few days. "And you need to weed your row in the garden, too." He hadn't weeded it since before her mother had come to visit.

"I forgot," he explained as he dribbled the soccer ball back toward her.

"I told you fifteen minutes ago. You forgot already?"

"I have a short memory."

"I see. By the way, I have some chores for you to do tomorrow."

Zach looked up at her, aghast. "But we're going to the beach—the _big_ beach!"

"Hmm. Seems like your memory's just fine. Get in there." She gave him a little push inside, annoyed but also laughing to herself. How many times must Lia go through this routine with her four girls everyday? And here she herself was, getting irritated as she went through it for the first time. That was a strangely amusing thought.

The beach couldn't have been more perfect when they arrived the next day. This trip had been Craig's idea, and he had located one last available cabin—a rare find in mid-July—in Ocean Park, less than a four hour drive from home. They arrived precisely at check-in time that afternoon, unloaded their supplies, and launched out straight for the beach.

They hiked through tall grass bordered by a line of dunes and came to bare, flat sand that stretched eight hundred feet before them. Zach stopped dead and gaped at it in sheer wonder. Beyond it, the Pacific Ocean churned and tossed great bands of thundering waves one after another onto the shore.

Craig stared out at the sea with awe himself; he had always loved the beach. "Welcome to the ocean, Zach."

Reaching behind her with her free hand, Kara pulled her backpack from her shoulder. "Beach rules," she began. "Number one: get your scales wet. I brought towels." She patted the backpack. "Number two: take your shoes off first. Number three: try not to get your shorts and shirt too wet. Although," she added, looking up at the clear sky, "I guess it's warm enough that you'll be okay if you do. Number four: don't touch the jellyfish. Some of them sting."

"There are jellyfish out here?" Zach asked with excitement. He glanced toward the water as if to spot one there. "What do they look like?

"Like jelly," she deadpanned, winking to Craig. "They'll be washed up on the sand. Don't let Paws play with them, okay?"

"Okay. Are those all the rules?" he inquired, already pulling his shoes and socks off and handing them to Craig.

"Stay where we can see you," Craig added. "And Zach, this isn't Puget Sound. Those are big waves out there. They can pull you right out to sea if you're not careful. So don't go in deeper than your knees, just to be safe."

The boy listened with surprising solemnity and nodded. "I'll be careful, Dad. Can I go now?"

"Go!" Kara declared. "Go be a fish!" He went, running every step to the water's edge, Paws, unleashed, keeping pace beside him. He bounded straight in, and bounded out just as quickly.

"It's freezing!" they heard him yell over the pounding of the waves. But he was back in the water a moment later, chasing it as it receded, running away from it when it returned. Paws ran with him.

Kara, suddenly overcome with the moment, took her husband's hand, grinned, and gave a little jump. "This is _great!"_ she squealed to him. He raised his eyebrows at the sudden display of girlish delight, and she kissed him. "We're at the beach with our son! Our _son,_ Craig— _our_ son!"

He looked at her in astonishment and laughed, then glanced back out at Zach making footprints in the wet sand. "Our son... At the beach with our son..."

She gave his hand an affectionate squeeze, and they walked a while, watching Zach play. It just seemed right whenever the two of them ambled hand-in-hand along the water's edge, as they had the day he had proposed to her on that log beside Puget Sound. The wind off the ocean was cool, but not strong, and the summer sun above them was warm. It was a perfect day, absolutely perfect. They strolled slowly, tracing the water's edge for an hour, entertained by Zach and Paws and fully appreciating the moment.

The four of them took a break for dinner in the cabin, then returned to comb the beach while the tide gradually receded. Zach and Craig left her with Paws and hunted for treasure, coming back to present her with a small collection of seashells a while later.

"Look what I found, Mom!" Zach exclaimed, opening his hand to her. He held a snail shell; it suddenly lifted itself up, little legs extending and wandering the length of his palm. "It's a hermit crab! And Dad found a jellyfish, too, stuck on the beach. And Mom—this place is so _huge!_ The sand goes forever!"

"A lot of outside, huh?" she observed, watching him fondly, trying not to smile too broadly; her son, _her son,_ had found a hermit crab on the beach.

With the crab walking up his arm now, he stared out across the vast, undulating sea. Craig came up alongside him and set a hand on his shoulder. Kara saw Zach flinch—she had almost expected it—but he didn't pull back from his dad. Craig pointed west toward the sunset. "Sail that way far enough and you come to Japan, China, Russia. And there's nothing but water in-between." The two boys stared together, dreaming of far-off places. Paws, more locally-oriented, dug in the sand around their feet.

"Which way is Hawaii?" Zach wondered.

"That way," Craig said, pointing southwest across the waves.

The hermit crab tumbled off Zach's arm. "Better get that guy back to the water," Kara suggested, picking the crab up and handing it to the boy.

He dashed to the water and deposited the critter gently onto the sand. When he returned, the three of them walked and talked and laughed together for perhaps a mile, turning around and meandering back to the cabin only when the sun had finally slipped below the sea.

*****

Mom, smiling fondly, had said Monday was a pretty much perfect day. Tuesday morning, Zach awoke feeling like this day would be even better, another day of new adventures with his mom and dad.

He was the first person up, and he entertained Paws inside the cabin until Dad and Mom stirred and joined them. When they had eaten breakfast—dog food for Paws, but Zach and Mom both slipped him bits of sausage—they drove to a new beach a few miles south of their cabin.

The sun was bright and hot as they parked. Mom collected her backpack from the trunk, took one look at the sky, and pulled out the sunblock.

"No, Mom— _really?"_ Zach wailed halfheartedly, though he knew it was no use. "I've never been sunburned in my whole life!"

"That's because you've been _inside_ your whole life," she returned. "Besides, look..." She touched his arm.

"Ow!" Zach yelped; Mom touching him had actually stung!

Mom gave him an I-told-you-so look. "We forgot the sunblock yesterday—so there you go, your first sunburn. Just a light one, but still..."

"Wow," he said, admiring the reddish tint to his arm.

Mom began smearing sunblock on the back of his neck.

_"Mom!"_ he complained, twisting away.

"We'll be outside all day," she explained. "And you're not the only one; your dad and I need sunblock, too."

Zach continued to frown at her.

"Okay, then," she yielded, handing him the tube, "you do it yourself. I'll watch."

She did watch, so he applied the sunblock until she was satisfied. It was smelly and oily, but at least he would get to stay outside the whole day.

Zach breathed in a lungful of ocean air. It felt great. He loved his life now, with Mom and Dad.

This new beach was different—all the better for exploring. He and Mom ambled along the shoreline. Mom found an especially long, thick strand of seaweed and jumped rope with it a few times. Zach grinned appreciatively. Mom was being a little weird, but it was pretty funny anyway. She handed him the seaweed and he jumped it a couple of times himself.

A few minutes later they happened upon a dead crab nearly a foot across. "Awesome!" Zach cried, picking it up. "Look, Mom! It still has its pinchers! Can we take it home?"

For some reason, Mom didn't find it quite as impressive as he did. "Technically _pincers,"_ she said, screwing up her face. "And no, we are not taking any dead animals home." She shook her head, muttered, "Must be a boy thing," and walked off.

He and Mom wandered a while longer and then made their way slowly to Dad, who had hung back to let Paws explore wherever he wanted. When they had cleaned off their feet, they piled back into the car.

"Let's see," Dad said, "we've got some options here. We could go to another beach, go up to the lighthouse, do a little hiking through the forest..."

"I'd like to check out the kite museum in town," Mom put in. "Zach might enjoy it."

Zach raised his eyebrows doubtfully. "Another museum, Mom?"

"This one's different," Dad assured him. "Even I liked it last time. I might want to walk the boardwalk along the beach, too," he told Mom. "And maybe the whole Discovery Trail."

"That's over eight miles, Craig," Mom demurred. "It would take most of the day."

"Well, there's no rush. We have all week. Why don't we drive up to the lighthouse and see what we feel like after that? What do you think, Zach?"

"Yeah, okay," he agreed. He couldn't imagine getting enough time on the beach, with its vast, open space for running and exploring, but a lighthouse sounded interesting, too. Mom nodded as well, so Dad guided the car through the park and up a hill to a trail.

"Hey, Dad," Zach inquired as they locked the car and began the hike to the lighthouse, "can people ride horses on the beach? I saw some people riding yesterday."

"Sure," he replied. "There's a place near here that rents horses."

Mom and Dad had been so eager to let him do new things that Zach did not hesitate to ask, "Could we get some horses?"

"I haven't ridden a horse in years," Mom put in. "Sounds fun!" Dad agreed, and it was decided that they would ride horses that afternoon. Zach was thrilled. It would be another new adventure.

They walked most of a quarter-mile and came around a bend in the paved trail. Suddenly the lighthouse loomed up ahead of them, white with a red top. A few visitors walked to and from it on the trail.

"Look at _that!"_ Zach said suddenly, but—remembering the pregnant woman in the store—keeping his voice low, pointing ahead discreetly to a cluster of people standing at the base of the lighthouse. "Those people are talking with their hands!"

"Sign language," Mom explained. "Like this..." She moved her hands in front of her, making no sense that he could discern. He raised his eyebrows at her. "I just said, 'They're talking in sign language.'"

"You know how to do that?" Zach asked, impressed.

She nodded. "I don't know much—just enough to help a couple of deaf people who come to Grover's once in a while."

Zach tried to replicate with his hands what Mom had said with hers, but couldn't. "Can you teach me?"

"Sure. Go..." She modeled the motion, and Zach mimicked her. "...see... light... house..." With the fingertips of both hands, she drew the roof and sides of a house.

"You're amazing, Mom," Zach declared, trying to draw a house-shape with his own fingertips. It was harder than it looked.

Mom beamed and tousled his hair. "I'll teach you more later."

They were at the lighthouse. It was taller up close than Zach had expected. Paws didn't seem to care about it—he was busy tracking the sea gulls that crisscrossed above them, landing occasionally on the pavement and grass around the structure—but Zach thought it was fascinating.

"Can we go inside it?" he asked.

"You bet," Dad answered, "up to the top, if you want."

After riding the elevator to the saucer of the Space Needle, going to the top of this lighthouse would be easy. And the view from here at the top of the cliff was spectacular. Zach could see for miles to the south, west, and north. Only behind them, to the east, where the hilltop was covered by forest, was the view blocked.

"Come on," Dad urged, "let's see if it costs anything to go up."

They made their way around the structure to its front, where a doorway opened into a small building at the base of the lighthouse. Mom, leading them, had barely stepped inside when her cell phone rang. "Look at that," she remarked, pulling it from her pocket, "I've got reception up here." Receiving Paws' leash from Dad, she stepped back outside, took the call, and wandered toward a fence bordering the edge of the cliff.

Dad and Zach walked inside. An older gentleman manned a desk beside another doorway leading into the lighthouse tower. He was talking with a woman holding her small daughter, so Dad and Zach looked around for a moment, examining a few old beach photographs that dotted the walls.

Mom peeked in the doorway, one hand keeping Paws outside. "Craig?"

There was something wrong with her voice. Dad heard it, too; his head snapped up attentively. He stepped outside with her right away. Zach followed.

"Craig, that was Jeff over at Grover's." Her eyes looked at Dad with a tightness Zach had never seen in them before, and she spoke shakily. "They took Grover to the hospital this morning. His daughter is there with him, so they're shorthanded at the nursery. Jeff needs me to come in as soon as I can get there."

Dad ran a hand through his hair. "What's wrong with him?"

"He wasn't breathing right," she said. "They're running tests. It's something serious."

Dad exhaled heavily. "We can't just leave, Kara. We just got here. Zach and I were about to go up in the lighthouse."

"We'll have to come back another time."

"We can't get a refund on our cabin. You have to cancel seven days in advance. That's three hundred dollars for nothing, Kara! We can't just pack up and—"

"Craig," Mom pleaded, "Grover's in the hospital. Jeff's been by himself at the nursery all morning. We can run the nursery on three people when we have to, but one? He needs help; he'll need help all week. Milton is on vacation in Alabama. I'm the only person—"

"They could close the nursery, just for a few days."

"Somebody still has to take care of the plants. And Grover needs the mo—"

"All right, I get it," Dad responded testily. He thought for a moment. "Why don't you take me and Zach back to the cabin and drive home, and then come get us on Friday? That way, at least Zach can get to enjoy the beach for a while."

"And ride a horse," Zach chimed in. Mom turned to him with such a sorrowful look that he immediately wished he had kept quiet.

She shook her head. "I'll have to work everyday until Grover can take care of himself again. We can't assume his daughter will be back at work by Friday."

"Well then," Dad retorted, "send Lia to pick us up. Or we could rent a car."

"Craig," Mom implored him. She touched his arm. "I'm worried about him. He's like an uncle to me. I want you there with me. And Zach." Paws sensed her urgency and moved to sit on her feet. "Yes, you too, Paws," she added, ruffling his yellow fur.

Dad turned to gaze out over the ocean, shifting his weight. For several long seconds Mom watched him. At last she let out a long breath. "Okay, Craig, look—you're right. I know how much this means to you and Zach. Why don't you take me back to the cabin to get my things, and Paws and I will drive home. You guys can rent a car. I'll be okay for a few days."

"All right," Dad agreed reluctantly, running his hand through his hair again. He looked up at the top of the lighthouse and back down at Zach. "You and I can come back here later."

Zach gave a small, silent nod, and they hiked quickly back up the trail to the car and drove back to the cabin. Mom worked a minute to separate her belongings from Dad's—they had packed them into a single duffle bag—and Dad carried them out to the car for her. Zach collected Paws' food, leash, and bowls. He set them inside the trunk beside Mom's things and shut it.

"You guys have a good time for me," Mom said to Dad with a sad smile, putting her arms around his waist and laying her head on his shoulder.

"We will, Mom," Zach answered for him. It wouldn't be the same with Mom and Paws gone, but at least he and Dad would still be at the beach.

"Kara, I don't—" Dad's voice caught. His lips moved, but made no sound. He closed his mouth, gulped, and began again. "We'll...go with you." He grimaced at the words even as he said them.

"But Dad!" Zach objected.

Dad sighed and looked down at him. "Your mom's right, Zach. If she's going to be working lots of extra hours for Grover this week, she'll need us there to take care of her."

Zach gaped up at Dad, feeling betrayed.

Mom stretched up to give Dad a kiss. "Thank you," she whispered, and released him. "I know it's not what you want—either of you." She wiped a tear from one eye.

Dad turned to Zach. "Next time, all right, pal?"

Zach frowned. It didn't feel all right inside—he wanted to stay at the beach! They were supposed to have adventures all week! And he had put on all that smelly sunblock for nothing.

Mom looked at him and sniffled. "I'm sorry, Zach," she said, reaching out to mess up his hair. "I'm sorry." He didn't pull away, though he wanted to.

Mom's eyes found his, and suddenly Zach felt tears welling in his own eyes. A part of him wanted to complain, but instead he bit his lip and said nothing...for Mom's sake.

*****

They arrived home in time for Kara to work at the nursery for an hour, until closing time, and she worked all the next day, taking a lunch break just long enough to pick up Zach from Lia's house. She brought him to work so he could lend them an extra hand. The nursery closed at seven that evening, and Zach helped her the whole next day, too, until Craig picked him up on his way home from work. The two of them prepared dinner for themselves, and then Zach took a book outside and sat in the grass to read, leaning against the shed.

Kara came home late again that evening and collapsed into a chair at the table. Craig brought her dinner—roast and potatoes. "Where's Zach?" she asked, taking her first bite. She had to be famished.

Craig set a pair of plates inside the dishwasher. "Outside, reading. You must have worked him hard today. He didn't play with Paws very long before he wore out."

"We kept him running," Kara confirmed. "It was busy. We're so far behind. He really helped us, though." She sighed and leaned back in her chair.

Craig moved to stand behind her and began to rub her shoulders. "Tired?"

"Mm-hmm. And sore."

Craig felt her muscles loosen a little under his hands.

"I think I'll take a warm shower and go to bed early. It's going to be another long day tomorrow and again on Saturday. Thank goodness we're closed on Sundays."

"How's Grover?"

"Stable. They seem to be getting the pneumonia under control."

"That's good. Anything I can do for you tonight?"

Kara thought for a moment. "Make sure Zach takes his bath. And puts his dirty clothes in the hamper. He's taken to leaving them on the floor."

"Like any ordinary ten-year-old, huh?"

She smiled. "Hmm, yeah. Isn't that strange? He's becoming a normal kid."

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" Craig wondered aloud.

Kara reached up to catch Craig's hand on her shoulder for a moment. "You're still angry that I made you and Zach leave the beach."

The statement surprised him. "No, I'm not. Grover needs you here, and you need us. We can go to the beach anytime."

Kara leaned back to look up at him. "No, we can't, and yes, you are. But I understand." She rested with her head against his chest for a moment. "You know, that was the first time since we started dating that you've ever chosen someone else over me."

Craig stepped around her so he could make eye contact with her. "What are you talking about?"

"You said you would stay at the beach with Zach while I came back home." She lifted her eyebrows at him as if to ask, _Is it not so?_

Craig felt trapped, and for no good reason. It had been a reasonable option. "Kara, I didn't mean—"

She stopped him with a hand on his chest. She was laughing at him. "It's fine. Really." That weary hand stretched up to ruffle his hair playfully. "You're becoming a dad. I like it."

"Oh." He relaxed at her touch and her words. "I'm still...frustrated, I suppose. I wanted him to get to do everything at the beach. I wanted him to love it as much as I do."

Kara offered him an understanding smile. "He will, Craig. He does. He didn't want to leave, either."

Craig nodded and turned away to wash the dishes while she ate. By the time that task was done, the sun had sunk low toward the western horizon. He poked his head out the side door. "Hey, Zach?"

But the youngster did not respond; he was stretched out on the ground, his book open beside him, Paws lying against him and gazing up at Craig contentedly.

"Kara, come see this," Craig said, ducking back inside the door.

She joined him there, peeked outside, and grinned. "Let me get the camera," she said, darting into the den. "Our parents would enjoy a picture of this."

"I'm becoming a dad, and you're starting to sound like a mother," Craig remarked. "Poor kid."

Kara ignored Craig and took the photo. "Maybe we can forego the bath for tonight," she chuckled.

Craig watched her. She did sound like a mother. There was something attractive about that. It brought out a new side of her, this woman he loved.

He stepped out the door to carry his sleepy son inside.

*****

There was no question in Mom and Dad's minds the next morning that Zach needed a day off from the nursery, though Zach himself felt ready to go after eleven hours of sleep. He thought it was pretty funny that he had fallen asleep outside with Paws.

There was some question, however, about just what Dad would do with him. He had called Lia, but Jayda and Marissa were sick today, so taking Zach to their house was not an option. Zach would have to stay with him, it appeared.

"Why don't you take him out and do something fun?" Mom suggested as she prepared for work. "As a reward for helping out at the nursery. You were planning to be at the beach today, anyway." She thought a moment. "How about the Boeing factory? He would love that."

Dad tapped a finger on his chin and turned to Zach, who was finishing his breakfast. "What do you think, Zach?"

"A _factory?"_ he asked skeptically.

"Nothing spectacular," Dad shrugged, "just an airplane factory. And the whole thing's inside."

"Inside the biggest building in the world," Mom noted.

"Where they assemble jumbo jets," Dad continued, "but since it's inside..."

"Okay, yeah," Zach agreed with mild enthusiasm. "I like airplanes."

"All right, then," Dad said. "I'll give Derek a call and let him know he's on his own today." He kissed Mom goodbye, and she tousled Zach's hair before she left. That happened every time she went to work now; Zach was almost used to it.

Dad left a message on Derek's voicemail, and then they drove north half an hour through Seattle to the city of Everett, to the Boeing factory and airstrip on the western edge of the city. Zach had never seen so many planes in one place before. Some were small, but many were gigantic. Two dozen or more were parked outside the factory, near a runway where Dad said new planes that were being tested would take off and land from time to time.

Dad bought them tickets for the guided tour through the factory. He had to leave his phone in the car—phones weren't allowed on the tour—and then they joined a small group and rode a bus briefly to reach the massive structure. When they stepped inside the factory, it wasn't like being inside at all, the place was so enormous. They saw workers assembling sections of passenger planes so huge that Zach couldn't imagine how the machines could fly without falling out of the sky. Everything there was big, it seemed.

"You were right, Dad," Zach said as they finished the tour an hour and a half later and made their way back to the pickup. "That was awesome. Even if it was inside," he added.

Back in the pickup again, Dad retrieved his phone. "So, what's next, Zach? We still have all day. Mom won't get home before 7:30 tonight."

Zach considered a moment. "Can we ride the ferry, Dad?"

"Sure," he responded. "The ferry at last!" He glanced down at the phone. "Looks like Derek left a message."

Dad listened to the message before starting the pickup. Zach stared out the window at the tail wings of the planes parked in the distance as they towered above their surroundings. If he had known how much fun having parents would be, how many amazing things they would do together, he would have found Mom and Dad sooner—if he had known he could, that was. If only he had known sooner that they were still alive, that Grandfather had been wrong...

Dad got a worried look on his face as he listened to his message. After a minute, he hung up the phone, started the pickup, and cast a troubled glance at Zach. "Something's wrong with Derek," he said. "He wants me to call him, but I think we'll just swing by there on our way to the ferry. It's hard enough to get him to say what's bothering him in person, let alone on the phone."

They drove back into Seattle, and Dad took them to a neighborhood filled with large, impressive houses, stopping in front of one with a long front yard. Trenches freshly dug traced brown around its edges. Derek and his son Douglas were in the yard, near the house. Derek's arms and legs were covered in dirt. With an axe he was chopping at something in a trench he had dug part-way, Douglas holding his shovel for him a few steps to the side. New, white pipes lay in a pile in the center of the yard.

Derek looked over at Dad and Zach and wiped the sweat off his forehead as they approached.

"I got your message," Dad said. "What's going on?"

Derek slung the axe onto his shoulder. "Look down here," he told Dad, gesturing into the trench. Dad took a look and whistled. Zach bent over the trench, too—a network of long, thick roots had grown like a web over, under, and into the pipe that Derek was trying to dig out. "And that's not the worst of them," Derek said. "I already chopped out a couple of bunches twice that thick. And judging by those trees over there, I'm guessing we'll hit a few more before we get the rest of this old system out."

"So that's why they needed new sprinkler lines," Dad observed. "Do you need me to get you the chainsaw?"

To Zach's surprise, Derek, who was always laughing and joking about something, scowled at Dad. "No, Craig! I don't need you to get me the chainsaw! It's right there in my truck! I'd be using it right now if it would do any good. I need you to help me chop these roots out! I need you to help me get these pipes laid! They're expecting us to have this job done today, like you told them we would! Their daughter's wedding is next month, and they need time for the grass to grow back!"

Dad seemed confused. "I left you a message. Zach and I—"

"Hey," Derek interrupted him, "you accepted this job on Wednesday because we both thought that since you were back from the beach early, we could squeeze it in. Well, now we're squeezing. And I still don't have Mrs. Moonan's walkway finished yet, and you know she's going to be in a tizzy if we don't get it done. So I need your help!"

"Derek," Dad began—but he didn't seem to know what to say. He looked to Zach as if for support. Zach was taken aback, too. Derek never got angry—at least not when Zach had been around him. "Look, I'll come out and work on it tomorrow, but I need to do like you've been telling me, go be with my son. You need to spend time with your kids—I said so even before we met Zach. Now I need to spend time with my kid. We've got to keep our priorities right here."

Derek eased his axe to the ground and folded his arms. Somehow that made him look even larger than he really was. He took a step toward Dad, who bravely stood his ground, his hands on his hips.

"Craig," Derek rumbled, "I've been covering for you without complaining when you took days off to track down where your boy came from, and whenever you left work early to pick him up from school..."

"Wait a second," Dad argued, "you agreed that was—"

"Absolutely necessary, yes I did. That was fine. And did I complain when you said you'd be gone a couple of days to take him to meet your parents? Did I hesitate when you asked if I minded that you take this whole week off to show him the coast for the first time? Would I have even called you back today if we didn't have to get this done?"

"Now, don't make this a contest between the business and my son," Dad warned, but Derek just laughed—an angry, barking laugh.

"Craig, your boy is standing right here! So is mine! This isn't any contest! It's just what we have to do! We're still in business because we get the work done when we say we'll get it done. And because we do _good_ work. And you signed us up for this job, remember?"

Dad gazed into the trench again. "I didn't know about the roots," he mumbled weakly.

"And you thought Zach was going to be with Lia today, I get that. But I can't do this without your help."

Dad glanced down at his clothes, a T-shirt and shorts. "I didn't bring my work clothes."

It was a flimsy excuse—even Zach recognized that and raised an eyebrow.

With a sigh of resignation, Dad turned to Zach. "Well, pal, it looks like we're going to have to put the ferry on hold again."

Zach shrugged. He had accepted that conclusion already. "It's okay, Dad. I like helping you guys."

With that, Zach started to work, Derek sending him to grab a second shovel and instructing him to help Douglas dig as best they could through the mess of roots just below the surface of the soil. Dad attacked the larger roots with the axe, and Derek began ripping out old pipes, using loppers to cut out roots that had penetrated them and now held them in place.

Shanice showed up an hour later and dropped off sack lunches for all four of them. They ate quickly and hurried back to work, Dad and Derek occasionally complaining about how much the roots were slowing their progress.

Finally, having fought through the last of the tree roots, Zach and Douglas tore out the last piece of the old sprinkler line and tossed it aside. Douglas was fun to work with; like his dad, he made jokes about everything. He was a good worker, too, except when he would start making a joke and forget what he was doing. He always jumped right back to his duties, though, when Zach reminded him.

The two dads laid the last section of new pipe, measuring and cutting and gluing with expert speed, assembling sprinklers onto the pipes so that the sprinklers would hide just below the grass when it grew back. Zach and Douglas, each with a shovel, followed behind them and scooped dirt back into the trenches to cover the pipes.

At last they finished the job. Zach was starved; it had to be after dinner time.

"Zach," Dad said, handing him his phone, "give your mom a call while we're packing up our tools. Tell her we'll be home later than she will. We still need to finish Mrs. Moonan's walkway."

Stomach beginning to rumble, Zach called while Dad, Derek, and Douglas loaded the pickups, and they drove twenty minutes to Mrs. Moonan's house, a much smaller but tasteful place not far from the eastern shore of Lake Washington. The walkway was carved out, but Dad and Derek had to lay flat stones in it, fitting them together tightly and tucking mortar neatly between them. Zach found the process fascinating in spite of his aching stomach; he watched them work as he and Douglas took turns hauling stones to them from a pile by the side of Mrs. Moonan's driveway.

Dad and Derek finished the job just as the sun began to drop behind the Olympic Mountains, the light shifting slowly from orange to red. Douglas and Zach raced each other to see who could put away the most tools, and then it was time to head home.

"Derek," Dad said, approaching the taller man before they parted ways, "look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to leave you hanging today. I'm just, you know, getting used to this fatherhood thing."

Derek gave Dad a thoughtful look. "Hey... You're a new dad. It takes some getting used to. Just be thankful you don't have to change any diapers." He grinned at Zach and clapped Dad once on the shoulder with a friendly, "See you Monday, partner!" and hopped into his pickup.

Douglas clapped Zach on the shoulder in imitation of his dad, almost knocking Zach over. "Later, Zach!" he said, and climbed into the pickup beside his dad.

They drove off, and Dad and Zach lifted themselves into Dad's Mazda, worn out after a very long day. Without a word, they drove home in the deepening dusk.

*****

The Mariners, playing out of town, had a Saturday afternoon game on TV the next day, and that gave Craig and Zach excuse enough to lounge in the den, resting up from Friday night's labors. Since Kara was working at Grover's again, they let Paws relax with them; she didn't often let Paws come into the house. Zach paid close attention to the game and played with the dog during commercials. It was curious that the youngster didn't care for a lot of physical contact, yet enjoyed wrestling with the dog; Kara had pointed that out to Craig a few days ago, and she was right.

The Mariners won, so the guys' mood was light when the game ended, and they decided to surprise Kara by bringing her dinner to help her through another extra-long day of work. She surprised them, though, by calling just as they started on the food and letting them know she would be home shortly; Milton had returned from his vacation in time to spell her for the evening. So they prepared a meal for home, instead, and set it on the table just as she stepped through the door. She was tired, as expected, but glad to be home. With the nursery being closed tomorrow, as usual for Sundays, Kara was finally able to rest and unwind.

Dinner together was pleasant, and Craig was in the mood to play some catch with his son that evening, so he grabbed his glove and a ball and found the youngster lying on his bed, reading a book he had checked out from the library. "Heads up!" he said, tossing him a ball.

Zach dropped the book and caught the ball with two hands—good instincts there—then tossed it back.

"Let's go play some catch," Craig invited.

"I don't want to, Dad," he responded politely. "Thanks, though." He went back to reading his book.

Craig eyed him suspiciously. "Is the book that good? Or has some alien being taken over the body of my son? The real Zechariah has never not wanted to play catch."

"I just don't feel like it tonight," he replied. "I'm pretty tired."

"You've been resting all day," Craig countered, but to no avail. Zach ignored him.

Craig began to say more, but decided against it. He left him alone and wandered to the garage. One of his small shovels had suffered a split handle; he located the shovel and brought it inside to the den, where Kara was working at the computer. He settled himself into the armchair next to the computer desk.

She glanced up at him curiously. "Not playing catch?"

"He doesn't want to," Craig told her. "Said he doesn't feel like it."

Kara narrowed her eyes. "That's not like him. Is he okay?"

Craig shrugged. "Can you hand me the duct tape in the drawer?"

Kara located the roll of tape and turned it over in her palm before tossing it to him. "Craig," she said, eyes following the tape, "we're going to have to cut back on outings with Zach."

"Oh?" he asked. He wrapped some tape around the broken place on the handle. "You know, we still haven't taken him to ride the ferry. And I was thinking about maybe taking him up to the Olympic Mountains, or maybe to that wildlife park down by Eatonville." The tape tore when he released it, and he frowned at it; even double-layered, it wasn't strong enough to hold the split handle together.

Kara picked up the roll. "If you can believe it, we've had this tape since we got married. I think it's been left out in the sun and rain one time too many. It's pretty brittle." She went to the kitchen and brought back a new roll of duct tape. "Here—I finally gave up and bought this last month." She returned to her seat at the computer. "The ferry doesn't cost much, so that might be all right, but look at this—we've put well over three thousand dollars on the credit card." She pointed him to the computer screen, where she had pulled up their latest statement.

He finished wrapping the shovel handle with the new tape—it did the job—and whistled when he saw the bottom line. "How—?"

"That's what I've been checking," she explained. "The DNA tests, they're the biggie, of course; Zach's new clothes; toys; the trip to Portland, the zoo, the movie, eating out with him several times; the beach trip was another big expense, since we couldn't get a refund..." She swiveled to face him directly. "Craig, between this and that, we've spent an extra five thousand dollars since Zach showed up! I know kids are expensive, but we've got to rein this in." She slid the old duct tape back into its drawer.

Craig looked away from the computer, a bit stunned. "Well, he's more important than the money. He's our son, right? We've missed out on ten years with him. I don't want to miss anymore opportunities—"

"I'm not talking about opportunities, Craig, I'm talking about _expensive_ opportunities. We have to pay this off first. And with both of us taking so many days away from work these last few weeks, our income—"

"It doesn't matter," Craig maintained. "We can catch up later. Zach needs to get out and do things. Think about it: all these years he's been locked away in some house—well, several houses, I guess—and finally he has someone who will take him out and let him live a bit. What are we going to do, lock him up again because our credit card isn't paid off? I can't do that, Kara."

Kara looked at him strangely. "Aren't you usually the one concerned about our finances, the one who reminds me that we need to watch our spending? Didn't you go _fourteen years_ without buying new duct tape?"

"I'm just saying—" What _was_ he saying? It was going to be hard indeed to get that debt paid off anytime soon.

"Shouldn't we be _more_ careful with our money now that Zach's here," Kara pressed, "rather than _less?"_

Craig ran a hand through his hair. Was he doing that more now than he used to? "I just don't want him to miss out, Kara. He would love the Olympic Mountains, just like he loved Mount Rainier. I'd take him up there for a whole week if we could pull it off."

"We can do that, Craig, but not right now! Right now, we need to work and pay off this debt. Remember how long it took us to pay off all the expenses when we had Tiffany? That was really hard for us, and I for one don't want to go through that again! Look, we can find activities that don't cost anything, like taking him to the park. Later, we can—"

"No! I'm not interested in later! We're already _ten years_ later!" He shocked himself, speaking so boldly when Kara was being so rational. But he dared not admit that she was right about this.

"Hey," she said, suddenly quiet, standing to look him in the eye; he hadn't realized he had stood up. "What's scaring you?"

"What? I'm not—"

"I'm your wife. I know when you're scared. You're afraid you might not get to do these things with Zach. Why?"

Flexing his grip on the shovel handle, he stared out the picture window at the evening sunlight striking the tops of the trees at the edge of the yard. The sun would be setting soon.

_I don't want the sun to set,_ he realized.

Kara studied him, waiting for him to answer.

"Time," he answered finally. "I'm afraid we'll run out of time."

Kara bit her lip. "You're afraid...that someone is going to come and take him away from us. Like Tiffy. Is that it? And we'll miss our chance to spend this time with him?"

He found himself nodding. "The things we always wanted to do with our child," he replied, facing her again, "the things we used to dream about." She had beautiful eyes. What a distracting thing to notice at a moment like this.

Kara took a deep breath and slowly gathered him in her arms. "Zach's not Tiffy, Craig. He belongs to _us,_ right down to his DNA." She squeezed him close. "No one's coming for him. They would have come by now. Anyway, they sent him _to_ us. So...don't rush, okay? Do this the right way. We can just be a family. We have time."

With his free hand, Craig returned her embrace; it was comforting, even if her words struck him as more hopeful than certain. He hoped she was right. That was what he wanted more than anything with Zach—time.

*****

As church let out the next day, Kara thrust her keys into Zach's hand. "Quickly, kiddo," she told him in a low voice. "In the trunk of the car is the last pot of roses, the ones I was working on the night you found us. Bring it inside, and then—do you see that woman over there in the teal dress?" She pointed across the room. Six hundred people mingled and slowly exited around them; she hoped this one woman wouldn't exit too quickly.

"What's teal?" Zach asked.

"Sort of bluish-green," she responded, "like on the Mariners' uniforms."

"Oh, yeah, I see her," he said.

The woman was Hispanic, perhaps a year or two over thirty, a new member in their church who had started coming for the free English classes and had since stayed—and one who, Kara had learned, loved to grow potted plants on the porch of her apartment. She was just the kind of person to whom Kara liked to give the miniature roses.

"Her name is Rita," she continued. "Get the roses and take them to her, okay? Hurry—make sure you catch her before she leaves. And if she asks why you're giving them to her, just tell her, 'Welcome to our church.' Got it?"

"Got it," Zach replied confidently. He took off and exited through the main doors. He must have run all the way to the car and back, because he returned sooner than she expected, breathing heavily. His eyes hunted across the room and found Rita—she and her two daughters had moved toward another doorway and looked as if they were ready to depart.

He carried the potted rose to her boldly, as if he did this all the time. She received it with predictable surprise, her daughters caught as much off-guard as she. She spoke gratefully to Zach, and he started to turn away, but she suddenly stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

"Zach?"

Kara read her lips from across the room. Did this woman know the boy?

Rita bent down to look Zach in the eye. Suddenly, he recognized her, too, and gave her a huge, open-mouthed grin. Handing the potted rose off to her older daughter and taking both of his shoulders, Rita hugged him, but only very quickly, releasing him before he could pull away. She launched into conversation with him for a moment, and then he excused himself and ran back to Kara.

"Mom! Mom!" he cried. In his excitement, he grabbed her arm; he hadn't done that since riding the elevator at the Space Needle. "Mom, come on! Rita! It's her! The first one, the good one!" He bounced up and down, eyes bright with exhilaration as he tugged at her.

"The good _what,_ Zach?" she asked, befuddled.

"Mom," he declared, "she was my nanny!"
Chapter 11

"Do you still like tacos?" Rita asked Zach in her Spanish accent. Her English was improving every week, according to Kara.

"Oh, yeah, they're my favorite," Zach, sitting across the dining table from her, confirmed heartily. "Mom lets me make them sometimes."

Craig, slicing a tomato in the kitchen, listened in. He had only been able to blink, stunned, when Kara had informed him about Rita. Zach's nanny! How could she be right there in their church? Questions had piled into Craig's head, one atop the other—questions he wanted to ask her, questions that had tugged at him and Kara since they had met Zach. Supreme over them all was, of course, the question of who had given him birth.

Kara had invited Rita and her daughters over for lunch, and by the time they had stepped into the house, Kara had confirmed that Rita had indeed been Zach's first nanny and that the youngster had been locked away in the house most of the time. Craig ached to search out the details of the story, but he waited as patiently as he could, helping Kara prepare tacos while Zach and Rita got reacquainted at the table and Rita's girls got acquaint with Paws on the patio.

"I remember you always like the tacos," Rita continued. "Do you—oh, what is the word?" Rita broke into fluent Spanish, expressing the thought she couldn't convey in English.

Craig, slicing a tomato, moved toward the side door to call one of Rita's daughters in to translate for her; it was funny how kids picked up languages so much more quickly than adults. Suddenly, though, he froze. Zach spoke, replying to her—in Spanish!

As one, Kara and Craig turned and stared at their son. Without taking her eyes off the youngster, Kara whispered to Craig, "Did you know he could do that?"

"No... Did you?" he returned.

"No idea." For a full minute they stood and gaped at their son as he carried on a conversation with Rita in her native tongue. He stumbled several times, trying to find the right word or to say it the right way, and she helped him along graciously.

"Mom," he said, turning to Kara a moment later, "Rita's the one who taught me how to make tacos! When I was seven! I couldn't remember who taught me."

"He ask for tacos every week when I am his nanny," Rita laughed, "so I finally give up and teach him how to make his own. Then I get one night off from cooking every week!" She grinned at the youngster, and he grinned back. They were old friends reunited, reliving old memories.

Kara shook her head slowly. "How do you know Spanish, Zach?" she asked.

"Rita taught me," he said as if it were no big deal.

Kara just stared at him, dumbfounded.

They continued talking, alternating between English and Spanish, until the tacos were ready and Rita's girls had taken their places at the table. The older one, Isabella, was nine years old and a grade behind Zach; the younger, Sofia, was seven. Both had come from Mexico with Rita. Their father and brother expected to join them by winter. After only six months in the United States, their English already exceeded their mother's.

When the food had been passed around the table, Rita turned to Craig and Kara. "I am happy for Zach to have so good parents," she told them, not the least bit ashamed of her blunders with English grammar, "who take care of him and take him to church...and feed him tacos." She smiled at that. "And _muchas gracias,_ Kara, I love the flowers. I love all plants. In Mexico, I help my family work in the...er, the tree farms."

"Really?" Kara asked. "What kind of trees?"

_"Naranjas,"_ she answered, "oranges. We plant the trees, we cut the, er, branches, we pick the fruits. My dad, he work hard, he teach me. I come to the States to work on the apple farms in Yakima. But before I start, Zach, his grandfather find me and offer me a job and very good pay. He give me enough to live in Seattle and also send money to my family in Mexico. So we save up, and then when I lose the job, I go home to my family. This year we come back."

"Can you tell us about Zach's grandfather?" Craig requested between bites from his taco. "We never got to meet him."

"You never meet him?" Rita straightened in surprise. "I never meet him, either. How do you find Zach? His grandfather say his parents die before he hire me. That's why he hire me—no parents, his grandmother move away and then die in an accident, his grandfather have to travel much..."

Reluctantly—he wanted to collect information, not provide it—Craig shared the story of Zach's arrival, of their doubts about him, of the DNA tests that had swept away the doubts, and of their failed efforts to discover his origins, save that he must have been adopted out as an embryo. That last thought took some effort to communicate; Rita didn't know the word "embryo" yet, and the three children had no idea how to translate it.

Still, Craig could tell that Rita understood when her eyes went wide and she nodded. "Yes," she said, "that is very bad, if they do not tell you. But he is yours. I see it. He is very like you. He look like his _papá."_ She smiled at Craig. "And he is happy here; I see that, too."

"Do you know Grandfather's name?" Zach spoke up, having just finished the last of his tacos. "He never told me what it was. Or Grandmother's, either."

Rita shook her head sadly. "No, I never hear his name. Always he talk with me through a company—the company call, the company send my paycheck, the company tell me to call if I have problems... Always the company say, 'His grandfather want it this way, his grandfather want him to follow this rule to always stay inside.' I ask them, 'Who is the Grandfather?' But they never tell me. Only one time I see him. Always when he come, he send me a message to take Zach to school and then go to my own home, come back on a certain day. But one day I take Zach to school, and then I come back later to see if anyone pick up Zach. And I see Grandfather—he is in the car, an older man but not too old, and little Zachy know him and go with him."

"Little Zachy?" Kara repeated with a playful look at Zach, who blushed.

Rita grinned. "I call him that until one day, after he turn seven, he tell me he is only 'Zach,' because he is big now. I say okay, but big boys have to take their own bath— _with soap"_ —Zach blushed again—"and help with dishes, and take garbage out. He say that is fine, and we make a deal. After that, he is big Zach, no more little Zachy." She beamed as she told the story. "I think he like to take garbage out so he can play with the neighbor dog when he think I do not see."

Zach looked up at her, surprised and a little guilty. "You knew?" Rita just laughed again.

"So you never met his grandfather or grandmother?" Craig marveled.

"No," Rita replied. "Both of them I never meet— _met._ Grandmother move away before I come. Zach tell me about her, but I never see her, and there are no pictures. Then the company call with a message from Grandfather to say Grandmother die in a car crash. And never any pictures of Grandfather, either. It is very strange."

"Can you tell us what company his grandfather used to hire you?" Kara suggested.

"West Coast Nanny, with PO box in Tacoma," she answered. "But I think it is a very small company, because when I call, the same voice always answer. And I look in the phonebook, but it is not there. I go to the—" She paused to say a word to her daughters in Spanish.

"Library," Isabella translated, then returned to eating her salad.

"I go to the library and look on the Internet, but I find nothing. I don't understand, and I want to ask and find out more, but I am afraid to ask because I am very new in this country. I don't want to make anyone mad at me." She looked from Kara to Craig, gauging their reactions. Craig nodded in understanding.

Kara spoke again. "Zach says you were the best nanny he had."

"I had fourteen!" Zach told Rita. "Thirteen after you!"

"Thirteen in three years?" she repeated, amazed. "Why so many?"

"I don't know," he responded. "They never stayed very long. And every time one of them left, we had to move to a new house."

Rita considered that statement. "Do you move after I leave?"

"Yeah, the very next day," he recalled. "I was really sad. I lived in that house all my life until we moved away."

Craig leaned forward in his chair. "Rita, do you remember where his house was? Can you take us there?"

"Oh, yes, I remember," she nodded. "You want to see?"

Kara nodded eagerly. "Yes, please!"

Rita glanced at her girls, who were still nibbling at the last few bites of their food. She spoke to them in a stern tone, in Spanish. They gulped down what remained, and Rita looked back at Kara and Craig. "I will take you there now."

*****

Rita, in the car ahead of the Flemings, led them to the Ballard neighborhood some twenty minutes from home, in north Seattle. Kara peeked over her shoulder at Zach sitting behind Craig, who drove. The boy was searching earnestly out the window for the home of his youth, or at least the neighborhood.

"We must be close," he said for the second time. "The houses look right. I think I remember them...maybe." He seemed as impatient to see his former home as she and Craig were.

Rita passed the local high school and led them a few blocks deeper into the neighborhood.

"That's it, Dad!" Zach exclaimed suddenly, pointing to a house ahead of them, on the corner. "That one! Stop here, Dad!"

Sure enough, Rita pulled up to the front of the house and parked at the curb. Craig settled Kara's car in behind Rita's.

Zach was out of the sedan in an instant. As Craig and Kara followed, he ran to the tall wooden fence that surrounded the property and peered between the slats.

"It's up for sale," Craig noted; a sign to that effect stood planted at the corner, in the grass between the sidewalk and the curb.

"Wow, Craig," Kara commented, stepping up to him, "if you wanted to hide a child in the middle of the city, this would be the place to do it. High fence, with lots of trees and shrubs around the edges." She peeked through the fence slats in imitation of Zach as Rita joined them. "How old do you think these bushes are—the ones along the fence?"

He stood on tiptoe to look over the top of the fence and scan the yard. "Maybe ten, fifteen years?"

"Mm-hmm," Kara nodded. She had guessed about the same. "Like maybe somebody planted them ten years ago to hide the house and the yard a little more."

Craig gave her a sidelong glance and studied the yard again, nodding. "Whoever brought Zach here knew it was illegal. They didn't want the neighbors to notice anything—especially that they had something to hide."

Kara stamped her foot on the sidewalk. "But if they were trying to hide him, Craig, why in the world did they send him to public school? Why drive him all the way to Briar Point, no less? Why not just homeschool him?"

Zach looked up at her with a concerned expression. Kara suddenly felt a pang of guilt for talking about him like this right in front of him. The poor child, he had never realized what a cloistered life he had been given until he had come to her and Craig.

"I wonder the same many times," Rita spoke up, joining them at the fence. "Why he can't go outside, not ever, he will get too sick, but he is okay to go to school? At school, he will play outside! So why not at home? At school, he will catch every germ! It seem crazy to me, but I don't ask too many questions." She gave a sly grin. "But sometimes I break the rules, huh, Zach?"

Zach nodded absently as he gazed at the house.

Kara turned away from the fence to face Rita. _"Did_ Zach get sick a lot? He told us he used to, when he was younger."

"He get sick less than my own children when they are his age," Rita said. "One time in two years I see him get sick, miss one day of school. He have a fever, he sleep on the couch, he get well. No problem. But he tell me the same, that when he is little, he get sick a lot." She laughed at the memory. "When he is only five, he is very small, and he say, 'I get sick a lot when I am little, but no more.' But look at him now—now he is ten, no more little. Big and strong now." She shook her head, smiling fondly at him.

Craig walked along the fence, examining the house itself from different angles. Reaching the corner, he strode down the other street to the end of the property and back. "I think the house is vacant," he told Kara. "There's no furniture inside, nothing outside, nothing in the back. Want to take a closer look?"

"Can we, Dad?" Zach asked, excitement in his voice.

"Come on," Craig told him.

A narrow driveway ran up next to the house and under a carport. A door led from the carport into the house, but it was locked. Two gates opened into the yard, one to the front and the other to the back. On this side of the property, too, the yard was completely fenced in. Rita walked behind Craig and Zach, her girls trailing them and looking rather bored—this place, after all, held no meaning for them. Zach, though, touched the door, touched each post of the carport, carefully took in this home that had been his a few years ago. Kara watched him.

"Over there, Zach," Rita told the boy, pointing toward the back of the carport. "That is where the neighbor dog come when you take out the garbage and you think I don't see you from the window."

He walked to the spot and stood in it, looking around, seeing memories. "Everything's smaller now," he observed. "It all shrunk."

Kara bit her lip. She ached to have been the woman who had stood in that window, watching him and letting him think he was being sneaky, playing with the dog. It was a hunger that she knew would never be satisfied. If it could not be her, Rita was a fine second choice; what an intelligent and gracious woman she seemed to be. But someone had cheated Kara out of ten years with her son. Someone who had hidden here, held him prisoner here, a pair of someones who were _not_ his grandfather and grandmother, whatever they had told him.

Craig opened the back gate and walked into the yard beyond it, working his way toward the back of the house. Zach and the girls went with him, but Rita stayed behind. As Kara had been watching Zach, she had been watching Kara.

"I leave my children in Mexico to come here for two years," she confided softly. "Maybe I do wrong, I don't know. God know. But he give me Zachy to help me. Zachy remind me of my son, two years older, seven when I come to Seattle. Everyday, he remind me." She stepped over to Kara and stood face to face with her. "At that time, I believe Zachy have no parents. I think if there is any way to take him back to Mexico with me, I will give him a better home. But there is no way. If I..." For the first time, her confident voice failed her. She took a moment to regain her composure. "If I know you are alive, I bring him to you that same day. I do not wait."

Kara closed her eyes and nodded.

Rita stepped beside her, took her arm in her hand, and led her slowly to the back of the house after the others. "You want to know Zachy when he is younger. So you ask me about him, and I tell you everything, okay?"

A sad, grateful smile escaped Kara's defenses before she could hide it. They stepped unhurriedly across the narrow back yard, Kara eyeing the house. She peeked into a window.

"Zachy's bedroom," Rita informed her. She joined Kara at the window. "His bed is over there, by the wall. Very small, not with—" She didn't know the word. She made a squishing gesture with her hands.

"A mattress?" Kara offered.

"Yes, not with a mattress. A bed that folds. Easy to move. Maybe for if they have to leave quickly, like when the grandfather send me away and they go to a new house."

"A cot, maybe," Kara guessed. Had her son slept on a cot all these years? No wonder he had enjoyed the guest bed so much.

"He has a few clothes in the closet, but not many," Rita continued, passing along her memories. "I buy more for the right size. He has a small chair. No toys. He make toys from house things—empty bottle, a box, stack of books, anything he find. The grandfather tell me to bring him books from the, er...the _library._ I go when Zachy is in school. I bring him books about everything. He like to read everything. I read to him Spanish, he read to me English when he learn. I teach him Spanish, he teach me English. We are a good team."

"He still loves to read," Kara told the other woman. "He reads books and plays with the dog. And Craig plays baseball with him."

As she listened to Kara, Rita's eyes brightened with what must have been hope for Zach, for...well, Craig would say for his finally having a chance to _live._

Kara spoke again. "I took him to the store. He had never been to a store before. He thought it was the most amazing place. He wanted us to buy squid." Rita didn't understand, so Kara picked up a stick and drew the outline of a squid in the flower bed.

_"Calamar!"_ she laughed. "Did you buy?"

"No!" Kara answered, feigning disgust. "And a couple of weeks ago, I took him to the library. He checked out fourteen books. He's already read them all. And we took him to Mount Rainier, and Portland, and to see the fireworks..." She didn't know whether to laugh at herself for rambling on like this to a near-stranger or to cry for both joy and sorrow at having a son now, ten years late.

Rita observed her with genuine sympathy—Rita, another woman who had been apart from her children, albeit knowingly and by her own choice, for a time. Did that make it better or worse? "You give him many good days," she said. "I try, but I have to be careful. We go to church on Christmas and Easter if the grandfather is not home. I take him to the park a few times for short play. When he is seven, we walk down the street and come back everyday. Not long, but he love outside more than books or tacos. One day somebody see me—maybe the grandfather, I don't know. I never see nobody watching. The company call that night, say I have to leave after I take Zach to school in the morning, say I break the rules and take him for a walk outside. I cry all night. In the morning, I give him my little radio for a present. He always like to listen to it before. I take him to school, I say goodbye. I come back here a few days later to look, but he is gone, no one live here anymore. I go to the school and watch, and a new nanny pick him up. I try to follow, but too much traffic. I have to give up. I go home to Mexico and think I will never see Zachy again...until today."

Kara watched the other woman turn back to the window, awash in memory. She had meant to give Rita a simple potted rose this morning. Now she felt that she owed her so much more.

"Rita," she asked, "did Zachy"—she had to laugh at herself, rolling her eyes—"did _Zach_ ever... Well, when you touched him, did he ever pull away? Like it bothered him?"

"Always!" Rita confirmed at once, eyebrows raised. "I learn to touch quick, then take away my hand. He like it and not like it, both. It is like a new language for him. And he never try to touch me. Always he is happy, but no hugs, no kisses. When he is seven, sometimes he shake hands. Today at the church I see him take your arm. That is good."

"That was the first time," Kara told her, "except for once when he was scared. He pets the dog, he wrestles with the dog..."

"Yes, with the neighbor dog here, too!" Rita exclaimed. "But with people, no."

"No, not with people. He's doing better with it, though. We try not to overwhelm him with too much all at once."

They resumed their slow walk around the house. "Do Zach hide under the bed?" Rita inquired.

"Yes, sometimes. Did he do that with you, too?"

She nodded. "When I am angry, when he is scared. One time he don't want to take a bath, so he hide the soap in the toilet. I find it and I want to laugh. But I have to teach him this is bad. So I say, 'Go to your room!' Then I go to talk to him, but he is not there. He is under _my_ bed—his bed is too small for hiding." She paused, her eyes focused on those years past. "When I first come, Zachy tell me his grandmother sometimes drink wine, get mad. He hide under the bed until she go to sleep."

Kara sighed. "Was she mean to him?"

They turned the corner at the end of the house opposite the driveway. Craig and the kids were not there, having already made their way around to the front. There was one window on this end of the house, and Kara peeked inside it as Rita spoke again.

"She is good to him, I think. I think she care about him. He is a good kid when I come; he say he miss his grandmother. He is happy very much, same as today. He talk good, he know numbers and ABCs—all English, no Spanish yet. He already start kindergarten, and he do okay. He tell me she is nice, only not when she drink wine."

"And his grandfather? Was he good to Zach, too?"

At this, Rita shook her head solemnly. "Not very good, I think. I think maybe he hurt Zachy sometimes, but Zachy won't talk about it. Grandfather make Zachy stay inside, no TV, no computer, no toys, no nothing. He make many rules that are no good for boys. He go on many trips, leave me with Zachy for weeks, maybe three or four months. He never call Zachy, he never send letters. When he is home, he stay for two or three weeks. Then he leave, I come back, and Zachy is sad for a few days. I ask Zachy why he is sad, but he don't know. I ask him, do he miss Grandfather, and he say no. I think Grandfather ignore him, and Zachy is lonely."

Kara leaned her head against the window and pounded lightly on the glass with her fist. "Why? Why would someone give birth to him and then give him to _these_ people?" The window gave her no answers. It showed her only a small, bare bathroom. She tried to envision Zach, younger, sneaking the soap into the toilet.

"Rita!" Zach's voice sounded as he ran to them from the front of the house. "Rita, look what I found!" He beckoned her to come, and she followed him into the front yard. Kara came along in time to see him guide Rita to a flower bed against the house. "See? I remember when we planted these!"

He had found his pansies. Rita, still in her Sunday dress, knelt there before them and lifted their blossoms tenderly with one finger each in turn. "Zach, you remember? You love these flowers! I think they will only last one year, but now they make seeds and stay _four_ years! You plant them all by yourself. Well, I help a little. You are so happy to get dirty that day."

Craig was waiting for them, playing with Rita's girls on the driveway when Rita and Kara emerged from the yard. "I wrote down the address," he told Kara as he dodged Sofia's hands grabbing at his. "I'll call the realtor tomorrow and see if I can find out who used to live here."

"Good idea," Kara nodded.

"Mom?" Zach asked, coming through the gate behind her. She turned and found him holding up a single pansy flower he had picked, maroon with a black center. He walked past Rita and handed it to her. "It will last a few days if you put it in a vase with water." He watched for her response.

She smelled the flower—its fragrance was familiar, the same as the pansies at Grover's...yet more potent somehow because her son had given it to her from the prized collection of his former life. In a small way, it was a piece of his younger self.

"It's beautiful, Zechariah," she told him. "It's the most beautiful flower I've ever seen."

*****

Craig disconnected a call and turned to Kara as he stepped from the garage into the kitchen. His jeans were caked with mud—not unusual on a rainy day like today. Rain or shine, he still had to work.

"Hey, good-looking," Kara greeted him, leaving her dinner preparations to offer him a quick kiss, careful to avoid contact with the soiled parts of him. "Who were you talking to?"

Craig set his boots on the garage floor just inside the door. "That was the realtor who's selling Zach's old house. He said it's been a rental for twenty-five years, owned by a company that rents houses all over Seattle. Apparently they don't give out information on previous tenants."

"Maybe if we explained what it's for..."

"I did, sort of—enough to let him know a child's welfare might be at stake. He said he'd make some calls and get back to me, and he called back just now. But no luck. He said the company won't give out that information, if they even still have it. I stopped by and met some of the neighbors today, too, but none of them knew the residents three years ago. They said the residents pretty much kept to themselves."

Kara rolled her eyes. "Why is it that every time we learn something about Zach, it leads to exactly nowhere?"

"Because someone's hiding," Craig replied. "Or was, anyway. His grandfather and grandmother, whoever they were, left very little trail when they died."

"But there's someone else, too, Craig," Kara pointed out. "From what Zach says, the grandmother never claimed to be his mother, to have carried him. Someone else must have given him birth. And someone sent him to us."

Craig worked the problem in his mind yet again, but with no more success than in previous attempts. Discovering Rita yesterday had refreshed their hope, but so much had been kept hidden even from her. "Any news on Grover?"

"He's improving. They sent him home to rest, so naturally he made his daughter bring him by the nursery."

"I can imagine. I hope she dragged him away before he wore himself out. Where's Zach?"

Kara waved one hand airily. "Oh, you know him. He's outside being a fish."

_Of course—it's raining,_ Craig thought with amusement. "Well, I'll clean up and then go say hi to him." He turned and walked toward the bedrooms.

"Dad!" the youngster's voice sounded suddenly from behind him. He looked back to see Zach stepping into the kitchen through the side door, grinning with excitement. "Dad, look who I found! Come and see!"

The youngster was cupping a mound of mud that dripped from his hands, and he himself was soaked through from the rain, mud smeared across his legs, shorts, and shirt. He had even gotten mud in his hair somehow. He stepped to the center of the kitchen.

"Zechariah Timothy!" his mother roared. "I said you could _dig_ in it, not _swim_ in it!"

"Look, Mom!" he answered happily, oblivious to her disapproval, showing her the mud. It continued to drip slowly onto the tiles of Kara's kitchen floor. She did not look pleased, but peered graciously into his hands, all the same.

"That looks like him to me," she said, "but your dad knew him better than I did. Quick, Craig, come and see him before your son gets mud on the rest of the floor."

Curious, Craig stepped back to the kitchen. "All right, Zach, what's with the mud?"

"Not the mud, Dad," he corrected, _"inside_ the mud!" He watched with anticipation as Craig investigated the mess. A single worm wiggled through it, half in and half out, striving futilely toward someplace where the soil was drier and less prone to swinging this way and that.

"The worm?" Craig asked, confused.

Zach grinned. "Don't you recognize him? I think he remembers you!"

"Remembers me?" He narrowed his eyes. What was the youngster up to? He glanced at Kara, who nodded toward the worm with eyebrows raised. Then, as Craig took in Zach's mud-covered body, not to mention his own, along with the worm, he caught on. "Oh!" he cried. "It can't be! Wait a second..." He stuck a finger into the mud and dug the worm out into the open. "What do you know? That little red circle by his head—I'd know that circle anywhere! That's our boy, all right. How are you, old pal? I haven't seen you in years!" He touched the worm lightly, causing it to curl up. "Derek will never believe this. How did you find him?"

"Mom saw him the other day," Zach told him. "She showed me where he lives in the garden. I just had to dig around until I found him." He watched the worm wiggle a bit, then looked up at Kara. "Can we keep him inside, Mom? Just for a few days?"

She was still eyeing with disapproval the mess Zach was making on the floor; another chunk of slimy mud slipped off of him and hit her tiles. "Okay, I'll get a box for him. You"—she poked one clean finger into the mud on Zach's shirt, jabbing him in the ribs—"take your friend outside and wait on the patio."

Zach obeyed, and Kara retrieved a small box from the garage. As she returned to the kitchen, she cast Craig a quick smile. "I think he actually believes it's the same worm."

"Maybe it is," Craig shrugged, returning her grin. "Who are we to say it's not?"

She cocked one eyebrow. "Good point."

With that, she stepped out the side door and spoke to Zach. "Okay, put him in here... There you go. I'll take the box. You go around the house to the laundry room, take your clothes off, and put them straight into the washing machine."

_"All_ of them?" Zach responded, incredulous.

"Yes, _everything_ —well, maybe not the underwear, if you can keep the mud off of it," she compromised. "And then go straight to the bathroom and shower yourself off. Don't touch anything but the doorknobs. And use soap!"

"But—"

"Don't worry, we won't look."

With that, she returned to the kitchen, carrying the worm in its box. "I told him he could _dig._ How did he get so filthy?" Craig opened his mouth to speak, but with a quick appraisal of his clothes, she cut him off. "No, I know—it's a boy thing. Like father, like son." She reached for a roll of paper towels and began cleaning up the mess where Zach had stood. "I've changed my mind," she declared. "I want a girl."

Craig grinned and made his way to the back bathroom, careful not to touch anything along the way.

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, fidgeted. Waiting was perhaps the hardest part of the gloved, hooded figure's line of work. He took a deep breath—they would be along soon enough.

He crouched nestled within a stand of trees overlooking an old warehouse. A narrow alley ran between the building below and the slope on which he squatted. As usual, that alley would be the meeting place. With dusk falling, he should be sufficiently well concealed in the brush here. He checked his watch—just a few more minutes. Both men were prompt, always. They would be here on time.

The figure cautiously permitted his mind to wander, keeping a careful lookout all the same. Those papers retrieved weeks ago from McWrait's secret convenience store vault had proved useful indeed—the names, of course, and he had already tracked down several of them. Most of them had proved to be of little interest, naturally, but two of those names had led to new acquisitions on his part—small hoards of cash, drug money. They had made nice donations.

He was not here for a hoard of cash tonight, though. Tonight he had come out of pure curiosity. His sixteen hours in Ditch's cellar had brought a new name to his attention, one Albert K. It was a name he had heard before, and he had spent the past few weeks researching it—watching, listening, snooping. Even Robin Hood must have done a little snooping now and then in preparation for his grander heists.

Whether a heist would result from this investigation was uncertain. Something was amiss. Albert K.'s exploits were...strangely placed. He seemed to be a buyer, but he moved around the metropolitan area a lot, from Issaquah to Seattle to Tacoma. Most buyers held to fewer sellers, usually only one or two they trusted. But this guy, he was too active—subtly, but still too active.

Another glance at his watch, and the figure fidgeted again. Still a couple more minutes to wait, unless they arrived early, which they never did. He had watched the two men separately enough times to know that.

His thoughts meandered again, this time to the Fleming home. All had gone well there thus far. The plan had worked, it seemed; admittedly, it had been a long shot. But so far, all was well. Indeed, the boy's situation had worked out better than the figure had anticipated. The boy believed he was home; the Flemings believed it, too. And as for the man who could thwart his plans, the figure was simply waiting for him to—

They approached. A polished, black SUV came first, pulling in from the north. The occupants, two men, remained inside the vehicle. Ninety seconds later, a gray sedan, dented and scarred, pulled in from the south and parked facing the SUV. Its lone occupant exited the vehicle, and the passenger inside the SUV—Ditch—followed suit. The SUV's driver remained inside; he would be Ditch's bodyguard. The black-gloved figure atop the slope lifted the camera in his hand and double-checked—yes, the flash was off. In the dusk, that detail was vital to his concealment.

"Albert!" Ditch greeted the other man as they met between the vehicles. Albert K. was darker-skinned—Hispanic, perhaps, with dark hair, a lean figure, and a solemn face. Ditch, fair-skinned and heavy by comparison, wore the same ball cap that he had been wearing when the figure was trapped in his cellar.

"Ditch, how are ya?" Albert greeted him cordially, though without smiling. Albert didn't look like the type who smiled often. By contrast, Ditch opened his arms in a wide embrace of Albert.

"Any news?" Ditch asked.

Albert held his hands open. "You're in the clear, big guy. I removed a couple of papers from Agent Nyler's files. He's off on another trail."

_Agent Nyler?_ The figure knew that name. FBI. He was the lead agent trying to track down McWrait's dealings, among other things.

"You're a life saver," Ditch thanked him. "It's nice to have a friend in the Bureau."

_Albert K. is FBI?_ The figure's pulse accelerated at the thought. He must be an undercover agent, but gone bad—a _double_ agent. On the slope, the figure lifted his camera and began snapping pictures of the two men together. That alone would not be enough to prove anything; an undercover agent was supposed to be seen with dealers. Still, the right photo might be helpful later.

The two men stood and chatted a while, lowering their voices so that the hooded figure could not make out their words. Was there no deal going down tonight? They must have met only to talk and plan together. Sure enough, they eventually parted ways, each turning back to his vehicle. The figure shut off his camera and shifted his weight. This evening had been less useful than he had hoped. _No, quite the contrary,_ he reminded himself—Albert K. was a double agent connected to McWrait's drug ring; this was a significant revelation, and one the figure might be able to make use of.

Neither man climbed into his vehicle. That was odd. In fact, after a moment, they returned to their meeting spot, each with something in hand. The figure powered the camera back on. They weren't done here yet. There was indeed a deal going down.

The sunlight was dimming, the sun having already dipped below the mountain peaks to the west, but the figure could see clearly enough to tell that Albert was displaying the contents of a package, and nothing you could buy at the grocery store, to be sure. But this was backward! Ditch was the dealer—it should have been _he_ who was selling, not Albert. Already, though, he was counting out cash to Albert, even as Albert talked him through the contents of the package.

The figure zoomed the camera in as far as it would go and snapped a picture. The flash went off. It immediately faded, but not before it caught the eyes of the two men below. Instantly, they swung around, peering up the slope toward him. He had failed to check the flash after switching the camera back on!

Ditch pulled a gun. His bodyguard leapt from the driver's seat of the SUV. The figure on the hill spun and ran, the camera still in his hand. He knew they would see the movement, but there was no avoiding being found now—they had seen the flash and would come hunting for him.

A shot rang out. He heard the bullet whiz past somewhere to his right. This was bad. He scrambled up the slope all the faster. Thankfully, the slope was steepest at the bottom, where he could hear the men yelling and scrambling up after him.

They fired a second shot that ricocheted off a tree on his left, blasting shards of bark from the trunk. He ducked—too late to make any difference, of course, but out of instinct—and kept running. He reached the road above, where his getaway car was parked. Out of their sight for a moment, he threw himself inside the vehicle and sped away. Only when he had driven ten minutes without any sign of them following did he begin to relax. That had been a close call. Much too close—and thoroughly exhilarating, he had to admit. The figure loved his work.

At a stoplight, he picked the camera up again and brought the last photo onto the screen. It showed Albert displaying the package and Ditch counting out cash. The picture was perfect. Not worth getting shot for, to be sure, but since he had not been hit... Yes, it would be useful indeed.
Chapter 12

Kara heard Zach's bedroom door open and checked her watch. She had never seen him sleep in so late before. Was this really the same boy who had awakened earlier than Craig those first two mornings with them? Even after the fireworks show, after staying up until midnight, he had gotten up earlier than this. Had that really been a whole month ago? It still baffled her, this sequence of events that, since May, had turned her and Craig's life together on its head—in a good way.

" 'Morning, sleepyhead," she greeted him as he shuffled into the kitchen. He grunted something unintelligible in return and, rubbing his eyes, took a seat on one of the stools at the stand-alone counter. "What would you like for lunch?"

"Lunch?" he asked dully.

Kara grinned. "Just teasing. It's not quite that late. Oatmeal, cereal, toast, scrambled eggs?"

"Where's Dad?" he inquired.

"He left for work over an hour ago. And he stayed late, too, hoping to see you before he took off."

"Oh."

Kara set both hands flat on the counter directly in front of Zach and bent across it to look him in the eye _. "For breakfast?"_

He turned away from her. "I'm not hungry."

"Yes, you are," she insisted. "You're a growing boy. You need to eat something."

He heaved a sigh. "Fine. Oatmeal. With raisins."

"That's my boy," Kara encouraged him. "Excellent choice." She pulled a bowl out for him and poured it full of oatmeal, sprinkling the raisins on top. "We should have just stuck with the oatmeal test. Could've skipped the DNA test, huh? It would've saved us a lot of money."

Zach didn't respond. He just sat on his stool and stared straight ahead.

"Why don't you go feed Paws while I'm warming this up? He's been waiting all morning to see you."

The boy slid off the stool and trudged to the side door and outside. _Not excited to see Paws?_ Kara thought, wrinkling her forehead. _He must still be half asleep._ He usually made a big deal of greeting Paws first thing in the morning.

She had his oatmeal warm and waiting for him alongside a glass of orange juice when he returned. He reclaimed his seat and began to eat, slowly lifting the spoon to his mouth. Kara, sitting across the counter from him, tried to scan the newspaper ads before her, but found herself looking up every few seconds to check on him. He kept eating, but silently; that was odd.

"When you're done," she broke the silence after a couple of minutes, "we need to run to the store and get you some new shoes. You've about outgrown those shoes you came here with, and school starts in three weeks."

"Do we have to?" he mumbled through another bite of oatmeal.

Kara cocked her head. _"Do we have to?_ What kind of question is that? You love going to the store."

"We go all the time now," he groaned.

Kara frowned at him. What was wrong with him this morning? "So, what—you suddenly don't like going to the store anymore?"

"I just don't want to."

Kara returned to searching through the ads. "Well, we've got to get you new shoes sometime, and today's the day."

He just glared into his bowl still half full of oatmeal.

"Zach, are you feeling okay?" she asked, concerned. "You're not acting like yourself."

He shrugged in reply.

She walked around the counter to him. "Hold still." She reached out a hand.

"What are you doing?" he protested, pulling back from her a little.

"I'm checking to see if you have a fever." She placed the hand flat across his forehead.

He jerked his arm up to push her hand away, knocking the oatmeal bowl askew. It clattered to the floor; warm mush flew in every direction.

"Zechariah!" she scolded, jumping back. Some of the oatmeal had splattered against her leg; it was a good thing she was wearing shorts.

He stared at her in shock—whether more for her tone or for his having spilled his oatmeal, she could not tell. Then he dropped his gaze to the mush on the floor. "I'll clean it up," he droned. He began to scoot off the stool.

"No, sir," she ordered, holding him in place, "you sit right there and keep still." This time she succeeded in checking his forehead. "Well, you don't feel hot. But," she continued, tilting his head back so she could see his face better, "you don't look right, either. Your eyes are all red. Did you sleep last night?"

"Yeah."

Kara could feel his tension beneath her touch as he worked not to pull away again. She withdrew her hand. "Okay, clean that up and give it to Paws. I'll warm up some more for you."

"I don't want any more," he groaned, sliding off the stool.

She stepped to the other counter to get the paper towels for him. "Are you sure you're not sick, Zach?"

He didn't answer.

Kara shook her head, handed him the paper towels, and let him be. She went to her own bathroom to wipe the oatmeal from her leg, then took her time putting her hair in a ponytail and gazing out the window. Zach needed a minute by himself. Clearly, if the boy wasn't ill, he had gotten up on the wrong side of the bed.

Kara wasn't sure she had given Zach enough alone time when they left the house, and his mood did not improve as they reached the store. He was only grudgingly cooperative in selecting his new shoes; most of his responses about their style and fit were little more than a grunt or a shrug. When he finally gave her a halfhearted, "Those might be okay," she figured he liked them as well as any and chose that pair for him. For the rest of their time at the store, Kara did her own shopping. Zach dragged his feet behind her.

"I'm hungry," he complained as she picked out some new gardening gloves.

"Hmm, why do you think that is?" she asked with mock-curiosity, throwing a sidelong glance his way. He shrugged. "Maybe because you only ate half of your breakfast?"

"I wasn't hungry then," he argued. "Can I buy a snack?"

Settling on the gloves she liked best, she turned and gave him a stern look. "No. You can wait until we get home. Then you can have lunch."

Zach slumped his shoulders. He followed her to the front of the store and sulked as she paid for their goods. On the way out to the car, he spoke again. "Can we go to the waterfront and ride the huge wheel-thing, Mom?"

"The Great Wheel? Today? No."

"Why not?"

"Because we're not going downtown," she answered. "We have things we need to do at home."

The boy let out an exasperated sigh. "We never get to do fun things anymore. We used to go places, but now all we do is stay home. It's boring."

"It's boring when you go over to Cayden's house, or when he comes over and plays soccer with you in the back yard? It's boring when we take Paws to the park? Is home really so dull now?"

"I'm just saying," he whined, "we used to do things that were really cool. Now it's just normal things all the time. Why can't we do special stuff anymore?"

Kara stopped abruptly in the middle of the parking lot and spun to confront the boy, her face growing hot. "Let me tell you why, Zechariah Fleming. We had the best time of our lives, your dad and I, taking you to the zoo and the Space Needle and Mount Rainier and all those other places, but now we owe the credit card company three thousand dollars, plus interest! Clothes, DNA tests, zoo admission, gas for the trips, nonrefundable cabin reservations, French fries—all of that costs money, young man! Oh, and I forgot about toys, soccer balls, _baseball glove..._ Now, if you've got three thousand dollars hidden in a bank account somewhere that you don't mind letting us know about so we can pay our bills, then sure, we can go ride the huge wheel-thing as soon as your chores are done! Any more questions?"

Zach's eyes widened as her finger added exasperated emphasis to each point. He dropped his head and walked on to the car. She stormed after him. He was in a mood today, and he was starting to put her in one, too.

After lunch, it was time to do those chores. "First, I want you to make your bed like I showed you yesterday," she instructed him as she cleared their lunch dishes from the table. "I want you to get in the habit of making it every morning."

"I never had to make my bed before I came here," he grumbled, an obstinate look on his face. She had never seen him wear that expression before, and it made her angry.

She dropped the dishes loudly into the sink and turned to face him with her fists on her hips. "That's because you've never had a real bed before, isn't it? Just a cot, right? Maybe you'd like to go back to having a cot?"

"No," he answered in a low tone, his chin on his own fists, his elbows propped up on the table.

"Then you'll make your bed. When that's done, vacuum your room and weed your row in the garden. It's getting out of hand again."

"I just weeded it last week," he mumbled.

She strode crossly to the table and stared him down.

"Okay, fine, I'll pull the weeds," he said with a petulant roll of his eyes.

Kara gave him a firm nod and turned back to the counter, violently wiping up some crumbs left scattered there. She allowed him several seconds, but when he didn't move from the table, she spun slowly to face him again. He looked idly up at her. _This child!_ Shutting her lips tightly lest she say something unfortunate, she raised her hands and signed to him instead. _"Go...make...bed!"_

She had taught him enough sign language in the past month that he understood. He sighed and stood up grudgingly. Kara looked away as if not paying attention, but listened to make sure he actually went to his room. When he slammed the bedroom door behind him, she placed her hands over her face and just shook her head. How did parents of three or four children deal with this sort of thing everyday, sometimes from all the kids at once? Of course, they got to start young with their children; she was working with a ten-year-old on only three months' experience.

She focused on her own tasks—a little cleaning, a load of laundry, and her own weeding, the latter of which she did without a word as Zach labored at the opposite end of the garden. He worked slowly but doggedly, with fewer distractions than usual and no breaks for conversation. Maybe there was one advantage to having him do chores while grumpy.

He completed his duties in less than an hour, and she did not object when he took his soccer ball into the back yard to kick it around. She finished her share of the weeding, washed her hands in water from the hose, and went inside to work at the computer. Ten minutes of peace flowed by, and then—

BAM!...BAM!...BAM! The noise of an impact every few seconds came from the side yard, wrecking her tranquility.

Kara marched to the dining room window, fuming. What was Zach doing now? As she looked through the glass, he picked up the soccer ball, tossed it a few feet in front of him, took a running start, and kicked it against the shed. BAM! It rebounded away, and he ran and kicked it again. BAM!

Kara caught herself clenching her fists and forced herself to release them and to breathe—once, twice, three times, the way she had seen Lia do on occasion. Zach was having a bad day; that didn't mean _she_ had to have a bad day, too. And another scolding wasn't going to change his attitude. He deserved one, but a new approach came to mind.

She went to her bedroom and fetched herself a cap and a pair of thick gloves, fluorescent green on the back and white on the front, from the closet. Then she returned to the kitchen and stepped out the side door. "Zechariah!" she commanded.

BAM! The ball rolled away as he looked up at her.

"Come here! Bring the ball."

He retrieved it and came inside, muttering to himself. She locked the side door and pushed him out the front, locking that one, too, behind them.

"What are you doing?" he asked her.

She turned to him with a glare that dared him to ask anymore questions and strode quickly across the lawn, and from there down the street. He hesitated. "Well, come on!" she told him, setting the cap on her head. He jogged to catch up with her.

They walked the two blocks to the school, and she took him across the yard to a soccer goal set up in one corner. "Give me the ball," she ordered. He handed it to her, and she set it down thirty feet in front of the goal. Then she pulled the gloves on over her hands—they felt good there, the old, familiar squish of the padding pleasant as she clapped them together. She lined herself up at the goal, faced the ball, spread her feet and hands, bent her knees, and flexed her fingers. "Okay, Fleming," she told Zach, "kick the ball."

"Mom, what are you doing?" he asked, genuinely curious. Good—for the moment, he had forgotten to be moody.

"Don't talk, Fleming! Just kick the ball!" He walked over to it and kicked it politely to her. She scooped it up and slammed it off the ground, catching it with both hands as it sprung back up at her. "That's embarrassing. Use your whole leg. Kick the ball!" She rolled it back to him.

This time he kicked it harder. She took a step to the side and caught it a foot off the ground. Secretly, she was glad to see that she still could. It had been a long time.

She bounced it back to him. "Not to me, Fleming! Kick it in the goal!"

Zach furrowed his brow at her, then launched a strong kick over the goalpost.

"Go get it!" she instructed him. "You miss the goal, you go get the ball. Run!"

The boy ran. He brought the ball back and kicked it again, and again, and again. She fielded each shot deftly and returned it off to his left or his right, making him run and kick from different angles.

And she yelled at him. "Harder, Fleming! Put some muscle into it! Not with your toes—kick with the top of your foot, this part, where the laces are! What did you kick it straight to me for? You're never going to score that way! Faster! Come on, Fleming! I'm getting old standing here!" She laughed at herself for that line—she was closer to forty than to eighteen, when she had been in her soccer prime.

At first he just stared at her when she yelled at him. Then he got sick of it—he got angry. He kicked the ball still harder; now he was kicking it with all his might—finally. He began to _try_ harder, too, sending the ball toward the corners of the goal, taking risks. After she had stopped perhaps twenty-five kicks and he had chased down a dozen misses, he got the idea to dribble the ball toward her and kick from closer range. She blocked his shot, but only barely, sending it rebounding off her right hand to the grass behind him.

He stopped in front of her and gaped, breathing hard. "How are you doing this, Mom?" he asked, eyes wide with astonishment. "How do you never miss?"

She grinned. "I was first-string goalkeeper on my high school team my senior year." She clapped him on the shoulder once, the way Craig sometimes did. "Let's go again, see if you can get one past me." She thought she might have spotted a combative grin slipping onto his face as he turned to retrieve the ball.

He came after her aggressively this time, dribbling the ball to within ten feet before launching a kick toward the opposite corner. His shot flew beyond the post, but Kara chuckled to herself. Her son had some raw soccer talent to match his baseball skills. Next summer, they would have to see if they could make time for both sports.

Next summer... _Will he still be with us next summer?_ But why shouldn't he?

He reset the ball and kicked again—over her head, and she didn't react quickly enough, but it rebounded off the goalpost and back to him. He kicked again, again, again...

She blocked a shot—an impressive shot for an inexperienced ten-year-old—with her body fully stretched out, her right hand fully extended. She tumbled to the ground as the ball ricocheted straight back to the boy. He looked at her, scrambling to her feet on the right side of the goal, and tapped the ball to her left before she could recover. It rolled well past her reach and into the net.

"I got one!" he yelled, jumping and thrusting his hands into the air.

Grateful—she was getting tired—Kara let herself fall back to the ground and sat there with her legs angled out before her. "It's about time," she panted.

He ran to get the ball, then brought it back to her. "I scored one on you, Mom!"

"Yeah," she said, regaining her breath, "you did. You win one-nothing."

He took a seat in front of her. "You're really good, Mom. Does Dad know you can do that?"

"Oh, yeah," she nodded. "We used to play this game sometimes, on this same goal."

She looked at her son—he was smiling for the first time today. It had taken an intense half an hour, but he had finally relaxed. "You feel better, kiddo?"

"Yeah," he replied. He was breathing hard and sweating from his exertion; they both were.

"Not too bored?"

"No," he admitted. "This was good."

She mussed his sweaty hair. "Okay." They rested on the grass a minute and then walked home together, chatting pleasantly on the way.

When Craig got home, Zach was outside with Paws, and Kara tried to explain how the boy had acted most of the day. But not having seen it, Craig could hardly relate. At dinner, though, he caught a glimpse. Zach had eaten nearly all of his food and began to stand to take his dishes to the sink.

"Eat your broccoli first," Kara instructed the boy.

"Do I have to?" he asked in an almost-whiny voice, half-standing.

"You know the rule," she admonished. "If you put it on your plate, you have to eat it."

He gave the broccoli a dirty look. "My nannies never made me eat stuff I didn't want," he informed her.

"Oh, yeah? Well, I am _not_ your nanny," she rebutted. "And you are not starting this grumbling again, Zechariah." She threw Craig a "That's what I was telling you about" look.

He took a deep breath and looked at Zach. "Sorry, pal. You have parents now, whether you like it or not. So you eat the broccoli."

Zach did not complain anymore the entire evening. Instead, he secluded himself in his room after dinner and remained there until Craig finally went to check on him at dusk. Craig returned a minute later, holding one of Zach's library books in his hand. "He was sound asleep on the floor." Craig tapped the book. "I pulled the covers back to put him in bed, and I found this under his pillow."

Kara took it and opened it. "Look at the bookmark, how far he's read—he just checked this out yesterday... Craig, he must have stayed up half the night reading it! No wonder he was grumpy."

"No more books in bed?" Craig asked with a grin.

"Nope," she agreed, shaking her head. One day like this was enough. In three months with him, it was their first bad day—that was pretty incredible, she had to admit. But one was enough, all the same.

*****

Zach, standing beside Dad's Mazda, groaned. "Really, Dad? Do we have to plant all of these?"

Dad hefted an entire tree—a young tree, granted, but still tall—out of the pickup bed and set it on the ground. There were nine more. "You got it, pal," he said. He lifted a second one out.

"But we spent the whole morning digging trees out from here! Now we're putting them back _in?_ And it's Saturday!"

"Yes, it is." He grabbed a third tree and set it beside the other two.

"Baseball fields don't _need_ trees, Dad."

Dad put his hands on his hips and faced Zach. "No, but the fans do. It's called _shade_. And having trees down the edges helps keep foul balls from hitting people's cars."

"Can't we do this tomorrow? I'm hungry. It's almost lunch time."

"Derek and Douglas have most of the holes dug already. We'll be done soon."

"But why do we have to plant—?"

"New ones? Because the old ones were dying. We've already discussed this."

"Couldn't we—" Zach began to protest, but it was no use. Dad, ignoring him, was already several steps down the first base side of the Little League field with a tree in each hand. He set them beside the holes Derek had dug in foul territory where the spectators sat. Derek sent Douglas to help Dad bring the rest of the trees.

Zach huffed, picked up his shovel, and walked out to take Douglas's place helping Derek dig holes. He didn't want to help Dad right now.

Derek thrust his shovel into the ground and broke up the dirt for the last hole. Then he pulled the nearest tree out of its pot while Zach scooped out the soil he had loosened. Dad and Douglas finished setting out the five trees for this side of the field and began to set out the five for the other side.

Once they had moved out of earshot, Derek glanced up at Zach. "A little tension in the Fleming household today?"

Zach scooped out more dirt. "I just don't understand why we have to do all this work on a Saturday."

"It's strictly an economic thing," Derek replied. "We fix up these ball fields for free, but to make our money we have to work all week. But I think there's a deeper problem here. _You"_ —he smiled broadly and slapped a huge hand on Zach's shoulder—"are being mistreated."

"Huh?"

Derek set the tree in the hole, and Zach held it straight as the big man shoveled dirt around its roots. "You and your parents used to always go out for a fun time, right? But now it's just work, work, work, even on Saturdays."

"It's not always work," Zach shrugged. "It's just not as much fun as it was. Now we mostly do normal stuff. It's okay, though. Mom said we don't have enough money to do special things all the time."

"I see." Derek beckoned Zach to the next hole. They set a young tree in it and began to fill it. Dad and Douglas were doing the same on the opposite side of the field. "Tell you what, young Zach," Derek grinned, "if you want more fun, I'll talk to your dad, make him a deal. Maybe he'll trade straight across, you for Douglas. If I'm lucky, maybe he'll take Shauna, too."

_"Trade_ us?" Zach said.

"Oh, yeah. You and me and Shanice, we'd have a wonderful time! We could go wherever you want—Canada, Alaska, maybe even Hawaii. And we could afford it, too, because of all the money we'd save, trading two kids for one!" Derek chuckled at the thought.

_He's joking,_ Zach thought, gawking at him. _He always jokes about stuff._

Derek's massive arms maneuvered a shovelful of brown soil atop this tree's roots. "Oh, yes. We would have great times together. Games every night, movies all the other nights, you could stay up late... You could have _two_ bedrooms of your own..."

Lines creased Zach's forehead as he tried to imagine life in the Hopper household. Could children be traded like professional baseball players? He had never known any friends who had traded families. One, though, had moved from living with one parent to living with the other. Was that the same kind of thing?

Derek shrugged. "Of course, you'd have to do double the chores to make up for Douglas and Shauna. And Shanice, she might expect you to go clothes shopping with her, go to tea parties—you know, mother-daughter things..."

Zach's eyes grew large. _"Tea parties?"_

"Oh, yeah. Don't worry—the ladies would love you."

"Please, no," Zach shook his head. Surely Derek was joking, but...well, he was getting really excited about this idea.

The man glanced up at him as he tamped down the dirt. "Just think about it—all the fun stuff would make up for the tea parties. Plus, your parents only have one dog. We have two dogs and a bird."

"A bird?"

"Uh-huh, Roger the parakeet. Yeah, I'll have to ask your dad if he's tired of you yet, see if he wants to trade."

"Tired of me?" Zach caught Derek grinning at him again. Did Derek really like this idea that much? Zach stared back at him, incredulous and increasingly uneasy. Derek seemed a little too happy and a little too serious. Zach bit his lip; he liked Derek, but he wanted to stay with Dad and Mom.

Derek finished that tree, and they stepped back from it. Noting Zach's look of concern, the big man smiled. "Hey, don't worry about Douglas and Shauna. They'll be fine. They'll enjoy the change of pace and getting to share a room and all that. Actually, Douglas will probably have to sleep on the couch. And Shanice, she'll be fine with it, I'm sure. We'll try it out for a month or two, see how it goes. I mean, what could go wrong?"

_What could go wrong?_ Zach repeated silently. _But what if it goes so well that Mom and Dad don't want me back?_ What if, after all these years of wondering if they were still alive, if he would ever meet them, they traded him away and didn't want him back? Hadn't Mom told Dad they needed to find another place for him, soon? That had been before the DNA test. Things were different now. Or were they?

Zach and Derek planted the rest of the trees on their side of the field, Derek continuing to laugh about this or that thing they might do together. Zach wished he would stop. Dad and Douglas finished their side a minute after Zach and Derek.

"Hey, Craig!" Derek hollered as Dad and Douglas walked back toward the pickup. "I had a great time with your son over here. You want to trade straight across? I'll throw Shauna in to make it even!"

"Sure, all right," Dad called back. "Kara would like having a daughter. And Douglas here is a lot of help."

Zach frowned. He could be a lot of help, too.

They put their tools away, and Zach sat down under a tree to rest. He leaned back against the trunk and closed his eyes, but snapped them open again when his ears caught Derek and Dad conversing in low tones. He couldn't make out what they were saying, but Dad kept glancing over at him. Derek kept shooting quick looks at Douglas, too, who was stretched out across the hood of his dad's truck. Their conversation lasted two or three minutes, and they clapped each other on the shoulder at the end.

Derek turned and yelled to Douglas that it was time to leave. Dad walked over to Zach's tree and offered a hand to help him to his feet. He led the way back to the pickup.

Trying to hide his concern, Zach risked a question. "What were you and Derek talking about, Dad?"

"Oh, just...you know, dad stuff. Making arrangements."

"About me?"

Dad gave him an odd look. "Never mind, Zach." There was a light in his eyes, though. Whatever they had talked about—and Zach had a pretty good idea what it was—Dad liked it.

*****

Ben's sermon the next day was on the biblical psalm that taught, "Be still and know that I am God," but Zach fidgeted so much that Kara couldn't concentrate on the lesson.

"Settle down, young man," she whispered for the third time, this time with exasperation.

But the boy couldn't seem to relax. He wiggled and writhed enough to irritate Craig, too; Craig put his arm around the boy and squeezed him close to quell the restlessness. Of course, being held just made Zach tense up, so when Craig released him a minute later, he fidgeted all the more.

The church service closed with a final "Amen," and Kara immediately turned to the boy. "What is with you today? You hardly said a word at breakfast, and now all through the service you couldn't hold still. That's not like you, kiddo. What's going on?"

Zach looked at her with innocent, but subdued, eyes. "Nothing, Mom."

She held his gaze.

"I'm not sick or anything," he sighed. "And yes, I went to sleep last night. I didn't stay up to read."

He had guessed her next question. "Well, okay," she said. "Why don't you go out and play with the other kids until we're ready to go home? Run off all of that wiggling."

He headed outside obediently, and Kara rubbed the back of her neck, watching him go. The boy was still beautiful like his dad. But he was still such a mystery, too. They knew so much about him now, yet still so little—like where he had come from. And what had made him so edgy all through church? Or was that just a normal part of being a ten-year-old boy? There was so much she didn't know—about his past, about how to raise a child, about what might make a boy too quiet over breakfast and too fidgety during church. Was that even something to be concerned about, or was she overreacting?

"Kara," Rita greeted her, breaking off her train of thought. The other woman approached with a warm smile. "I am just wondering, do you find anymore things about Zach?"

"No, nothing since you took us to the house," Kara replied.

Rita shook her head sadly. "Not me either. But the girls and I, we pray every night for God to help your family. I am so happy for him to have good parents."

"Thank you, Rita," Kara said. _"Dios le bandana."_ It was one of the few Spanish phrases she knew.

_"Bendiga,"_ Rita laughed. _"Dios le_ _bendiga_. God bless you, too. See you next _semana_...er, next _week._ I am still learning!" She walked away laughing.

Kara shook her head—Rita had a kind spirit. Not for the first time since learning of Rita's connection with Zach, Kara thought Zach must have turned out so well largely because of her.

Zach was apparently over the fidgeting by the time they headed home; instead of running with the other children, he was sitting quietly on the grass at the edge of the church's yard with his knees pulled up against his chest when Craig called him. He joined them without a word and remained just as silent all the way home.

He made pleasant conversation over lunch, though, until he elbowed his milk onto the floor. Then he apologized so many times that Craig had to make him stop and just clean up the spill. After lunch, he offered to assist Kara as she picked green beans in the garden; he was helpful, but he chattered to the point that Kara nearly sent him away. Her ears appreciated the break when Craig began repainting the shed and Zach asked to join him. It wasn't another minute before the boy had a streak of green paint in his hair.

"Good thing it's a bath night anyway," Kara told him when she saw it, "or you'd have to take an extra bath."

An hour before dinner, when the guys had washed and put away their brushes, Zach returned to Kara. She was rolling out a mound of biscuit dough. "What can I help with, Mom?"

Caught off guard, Kara glanced around her, thinking through her dinner preparations. "I'm in good shape here, kiddo, thanks. Why don't you go play with Paws?" She continued to flatten the dough before her on the counter.

"He's taking a nap. Could I make dinner for you tonight?" he offered.

"Do you see what I'm doing here?" she asked with a glance at him. "It's already half-finished."

"Oh." He looked around the room. "Could I clean the windows?"

Kara turned to face him directly. What was the child up to? No ten-year-old wanted _more_ chores. She narrowed her eyes. "You've already worked enough for a Sunday afternoon. No more chores today. Go read or play until dinner." Was she really telling her son not to do more chores? What kind of mother told her child _not_ to do chores?

Zach wandered off to his bedroom, but thirty seconds later was back at her side. "Mom, can I fold the laundry for you?"

"No, Zach, it's not dry yet. Go play."

He took two steps away and turned to her yet again. "Could I—"

Kara slapped both hands on her dough. "Zechariah Timothy, if you don't get out of my kitchen right this second, I'm going to roll _you_ with this rolling pin and put you in the oven! Now get out! Go play!" Raising the rolling pin in one hand, she chased him out the side door.

Craig was sorting through the mounds of yard equipment in the shed—finally—and with the door open in the warm weather, Kara overheard Zach asking him if he could help. With a hint of annoyance, Craig turned him down, and Zach finally gave up. He wandered off to sit in the middle of the yard where Paws, now awake, sat beside him to sympathize.

Dinner went well, though Craig and Kara grew weary of Zach's attempts to recall every adventure they had enjoyed as a family thus far. He ate a hearty meal, and when he was finished he cleared away all the dishes himself. He would have washed them, too, had Craig not sent him back outside.

Craig scratched his head and turned to Kara. "Do you know what's going on with him today?"

Kara sighed. "Not a clue. He must have asked me a dozen times if he could help with something. You know, most parents have to _tell_ their kids to do chores."

"So do we, most days," Craig pointed out. He helped her load the dishwasher and wipe down the counters, then left the room to stretch out on the couch with a novel.

Zach obediently played outside, entertaining Paws until the sun went down. When Kara finally called him in, he went directly to his bedroom, picked out some clean clothes from the closet, and made his way to the bathroom. Mildly stunned, Kara watched discreetly from the kitchen, wondering, concerned; never before had the boy taken a bath without having to be told.

When the muffled sound of running bath water emerged from the hall, Craig peeked around the corner of the den. "Did you remind him to take a bath?" he asked.

She shook her head.

"Me, neither," he told her. They shared a bewildered look—that look had become almost habitual since Zach had come to live with them—and Craig returned to his book.

Several minutes later, Kara heard the water draining from the tub. She gave the boy time to dry off and dress himself, then knocked on the bathroom door. "Zach?"

"You can come in," he answered. Entering, she found him sitting on the closed toilet, clean and dressed in his shorts, drying his hair with a beige towel; it might have been the very towel he had taken to dry himself that evening of his arrival, when he had somehow known— _guessed,_ he had said—where the bathroom was.

She stepped inside and spotted a wide puddle on the floor beside the tub. "Did you get out of the tub before you dried off again?"

Zach sacrificed his hair-drying to drop the towel onto the floor and mop up the pool. "I forgot. Sorry."

"Maybe someday you'll remember." Kara tousled his still-wet hair; it felt clean. It smelled clean, too. She raised her eyebrows in curious approval. "You washed your hair—with shampoo—without being reminded?"

Zach looked up at her and nodded, gauging her reaction.

"Hmm. Well, that's good." She considered him as he pulled his shirt on over his head. He really was a beautiful child, at least to her eyes.

"Why are you watching me, Mom?" Zach popped his head out through the shirt again, then pulled his arms through the sleeves and settled the shirt into place.

She narrowed her eyes. "Zechariah Fleming, at this moment you are—"

"—the most important person in the world to you, I know." He rolled his eyes.

"Mm-hmm," she affirmed. "And before you leave this bathroom, you will explain to me why you're acting so strangely today."

"I'm not acting strangely," he answered. "Just normal, helpful."

Kara sniffed. "Yeah, I don't buy that. You've been _too_ helpful, or would have been if we had let you. Ten-year-old boys are supposed to go outside and play, not ask if they can clean the windows. Try again."

He hesitated, picking up the towel and gripping it. Unconsciously, he squeezed it so hard that water dripped out of it and back onto the floor.

Kara reached out and snatched it from him. "Something's on your mind, Zechariah. Out with it."

"It's not strange to take a bath on a bath night. I had paint in my hair. So I—"

"Strike two," Kara interrupted him. "It's nice of you to take a bath without being told. You're welcome to do that anytime. But why today?" She could see him working the problem of what to say next. "Don't go to strike three with me, young man," she warned. "You want something. Tell me."

She gave him an overly serious look, and he withered in front of her, dropping his eyes to the towel that, she realized, _she_ was now squeezing so that it dripped onto the floor. She tossed it to the counter.

Several long seconds stretched between them before Zach spoke again. "Mom, why do you think my nannies all left so soon? Except Rita, I mean."

That was not the kind of response she had expected. She had figured he wanted to ask for something, something special, but was afraid to. "What do you mean?"

His eyes took on a new expression—searching, almost pleading. "They only stayed a few months at the most. One of them only stayed two weeks! Do you think they got tired of me?"

Kara's stern visage softened and she took a seat beside him on the rim of the bathtub, which, she realized too late, was wet. "Zach, why would you think that? Is that what's been bothering you? You think they got tired of you?"

The boy looked at everything in the room but her; yeah, she had found the problem.

"Look, kiddo, nannies come and go. They might get tired of the job just because, I don't know, they're weird or something. Maybe being a nanny wasn't their thing. Maybe someone offered them a better job. Who knows?"

"But _all_ of them?" he asked skeptically. "Only Rita stayed very long. The rest... Am I boring, Mom?"

Kara barely caught herself before she blurted out a laugh. _"Boring?_ No, you are definitely not boring."

"I get in trouble too much." He studied the remnant of the puddle on the floor.

"Sometimes, a little bit. But every kid does. Your grandmom told me that for a while, when your dad was about your age, he got in trouble everyday. It must be a boy thing, huh?"

His shoulders drooped sadly. What was going on inside this child?

"Hey, you can't take it personally. If the nannies left, I'm sure it had nothing to do with you."

"But Rita stayed."

"Yeah," Kara nodded, "because Rita is awesome."

"I think _you're_ awesome, Mom." It was a petition—Kara could see it in his eyes.

_What is my son asking for? What does he need?_ She would have hugged him if it would have comforted him rather than disturbed him.

As it was, she settled for tousling his hair again. "You too, Fish. And as long as you live in this house, until the day you leave, I'm going to keep doing... _this!"_ She messed up his damp hair with both hands, rubbing playfully.

"Argh! Stop!" Zach cried, pushing her hands away; but it seemed to Kara that he liked it in spite of himself. At least, she hoped he did.

*****

_Until the day you leave..._ Mom's words, spoken an hour ago, echoed in Zach's mind as he sat on his bed and pounded a baseball into his glove.

_Until the day you leave..._ What day would that be? How soon? And would it be forever, or just for a few days? Would Mom and Dad want to keep him longer than the nannies had? He could probably enjoy being with Derek and Shanice for a week or two, but then he would want to come back home. This was, without question, his home now. He wanted to stay.

A knock sounded at his bedroom door a second before it opened. Dad stepped in. Usually it was Mom who tucked him into bed, but not always.

"Hey pal, all set?" Dad asked.

"Yeah," Zach answered. He jumped off the bed and returned his ball and glove to their place on his desk. Then he noticed the dirty clothes he had left in a pile on the floor after his bath. He snatched those up and deposited them in his hamper in the closet. Maybe if he didn't get in trouble for anything more, they would change their minds and let him stay. He leapt back onto the bed, situated himself under the blankets, and looked up at Dad.

Dad picked up the glove, trying it on his hand—the wrong hand for him, his right hand. That was his throwing hand. He punched the pocket a couple of times with his fist, then tossed the ball into it, testing it. "It's getting looser," he noted with approval. "You've been working on it."

Dad kept the glove on his hand as he came to sit on the edge of the bed. He took a deep breath and looked at Zach. "I...need to give you some bad news," he said hesitantly.

Zach's breath caught. _Already? No! I tried really hard to be good today! I was helpful! I even took a bath without being told! Mom said she thought I was awesome!...But,_ came another voice in his mind, _she also said, "Until the day you leave."_ Dad and Derek had worked it out yesterday. Why shouldn't they be ready for it to happen tomorrow?

He sat up, propping himself against the headrest. _Bad news._ "Is it about me?" He hoped his trepidation didn't show as strongly as he felt it. Whatever happened, he would be brave.

"Well, yes," Dad replied. "Not just you, though."

_Douglas and Shauna, too,_ Zach realized. Yes, this would affect them just as much as him—though it might bother them less. Maybe they would be looking forward to a change. They had never lived without parents.

"It's about me, too," Dad continued.

_Yes, because you made that deal with Derek._ "I already know, Dad," Zach said, crestfallen. "Derek told me. And Mom too, sort of."

Dad suddenly looked hurt. "They did?"

"Yeah. I don't want to do it," Zach pleaded.

"You _don't?"_ Now Dad really looked sad. Why would parents like Dad and Derek enjoy something so much that their kids—well, Zach at least—didn't want to happen at all?

Zach blinked back a tear. "I just want to stay here, Dad."

Dad ran a hand through his hair. "You're joking, right? You'd rather stay here and miss out on another adventure? This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, pal. Very few people get a chance like this."

Zach banged a fist on the headrest. "I don't want that kind of adventure, Dad! I love you and Mom! I want—" He caught himself. He had never told anyone he loved them before, not even Rita. But it was true. "Dad, I really, really want to stay here with you and Mom." He sniffled. "Please don't make me leave."

"But you'll _be_ with us, Zach. The whole time. I'll be standing right there with you." Dad looked confused. And worried, like he might be terribly disappointed. Then he cocked his head, taking on a gentler expression. "Does it scare you, Zach? Is that why you don't want to do it?"

Zach nodded. "If I go, I might never get to come back."

Dad rubbed his whole face with one hand. "You'll only be out there for a minute, pal. It's not like they're putting you on the team or anything. It's just an honorary thing."

Zach stared at Dad, perplexed. "The team? What team?"

"The Mariners, Zach. What did you think I was talking about?"

After another moment's confusion, relief washed over Zach like a cold, hard rain, making him shiver once all over. "I thought...but—You and Derek said you were going to trade me for Douglas and Shauna, and I would have to go live with Derek! I thought maybe it's like kids going to live with their other parent or something, and..."

Dad goggled at him. "Derek said... Oh!" Dad exclaimed, breaking into a wide grin. "You thought—! You _did?_ Didn't you know he was joking? He jokes about everything!" Dad slapped Zach on the shoulder. "He was pulling your leg, pal!"

"But Mom, she said I'll have to leave here someday, and—"

"Well, you don't expect to live here until you're fifty, do you?" Dad laughed. His eyes studied Zach. "Is that why you've been trying to be so helpful today? And why you took a bath on your own? You thought we were going to send you to Derek's?"

"I thought..." He looked down at his hands, ashamed. "Yeah, I guess."

Dad smiled and shook his head. "We're not sending you anywhere, pal. You're staying right here."

"So...you're not tired of me?"

"Why would we be tired of you?"

"I don't know. The nannies, the ones after Rita, I think they got tired of me and—"

Dad interrupted him by handing him his glove and ball. "Hey, are you coming to this baseball game with us or not? Because if you really want to stay home by yourself..."

"A baseball game?" Zach was thoroughly befuddled. "The Mariners?"

Dad patted the glove as Zach held it in both hands. "Remember how I told you the Mariners invited me and Derek to throw out the first pitches at a game this summer?"

Zach nodded.

"That's this week."

Zach was still trying to figure out where he'd gone wrong. "But I saw you and Derek talking—"

"We were talking about the game," Dad explained.

"But you said you needed to tell me _bad_ news..."

"The bad news is that Derek and I aren't going to throw out the first pitches after all. There's been a last-minute change." Dad didn't seem very sad about his bad news.

"Why? Did they get somebody else instead?"

"Derek and I decided to ask someone else to do it." Now Dad had that look he got when he was holding back secret information. "Someone we think will do a better job."

"Who?" Zach asked.

"Our sons...if you want to."

Zach's eyes popped wide open. "You want _me_... Really, Dad? You came in here to ask me...? That's not _bad_ news! Me and Douglas, both?"

"If you want to," Dad repeated, grinning again. "But I could understand if you'd be too nervous, being in front of all those people, you know. I just thought—"

"Yes!" Zach said. "I want to, Dad! I do!" He would get to go to his first Mariners game _and_ throw out the first pitch? This was unbelievable!

Dad's eyes were bright. He was as happy about this as Zach was. That was strange, since it meant Dad wouldn't get to throw out the pitch himself. "It was Derek's idea, actually. We'll go out there with you, but you guys throw the pitches. We figured we fix those fields up for kids to play on, so kids should get to throw out the first pitches. Besides, you and Douglas will be celebrities. Derek and I aren't sure we can handle that kind of pressure."

Zach slipped his glove back on his hand, marveling at the thought of wearing it at Safeco Field as he threw a pitch across home plate. "Wow, Dad, this is awesome," he said. Then another thought struck him. "What about Mom and Shanice and Shauna?"

"They get to come, too. They gave us enough tickets for all of us, and great seats, too."

Zach held the ball in his hand, gripping it as if to throw a fastball, just like Dad had shown him a few weeks ago. "Can you help me practice my pitching, Dad?"

"You bet—tomorrow, as soon as I get home from work."

"Okay." Zach stretched out flat on his bed again.

Dad pulled the covers up to his neck. "Want me to put the glove away for you?" he asked.

Zach held it up over his face, considering. "No, I think I'll keep it here with me tonight."

"Sure, all right," Dad chuckled. "See you in the morning."

"Good night, Dad," Zach responded. His dad wasn't trading him at all. No, he wanted him to throw out the first pitch at the Mariners game! Who said being here wasn't as fun as it had been at first? It was different now, more...normal somehow. He knew what to expect everyday; there were fewer surprises, though he had certainly received one tonight. But it was still fun to be with Mom and Dad. More than fun, it was... _good._ It felt right.

"Hey, Dad?" Zach asked as Dad neared the door.

He turned and looked back.

"Thanks, Dad."

Dad gave him a little smile. "Just throw a strike, all right? Good night."

He shut off the light and slipped out the door, and Zach curled up with his glove and slipped off to sleep.
Chapter 13

It was August 12, and Hugh McWrait lounged in a seat two rows below his personal luxury suite at Safeco Field, watching the pregame festivities on the field below with minimal interest. His mind was on other things: business transactions, most of them legal; his intentions toward the woman sitting at his left, wearing a glittering diamond bracelet; and a mystery, a three-month-old problem he had been unable to solve.

"You want some nachos?" the woman asked, rising. "I'm starting to feel a little hungry."

"Sure, babe," McWrait answered. "Go easy on the jalapeños."

She smiled—she knew how he liked his nachos, and how much he liked _her._ She stepped past him and turned toward the suite, where friends and a few relatives enjoyed the well-supplied food and drink bar that came with the suite.

McWrait breathed deeply, quieting his thoughts. He came to watch the Mariners less to support his investment as a minority owner—his share of the team was quite small—and more to relax, socialize, and give himself time to think. Did he want to marry Sasha? She was gorgeous, and she came with money of her own, though nothing next to his... He enjoyed her personality, he delighted in the way she could love him without feeling the need to meddle in his darker financial affairs—a rare trait in a woman...

Should he marry her? She would want to have children with him. And he might enjoy having a child or two; he could hire staff to care for them so they wouldn't be too much of a burden.

He wasn't getting any younger. Maybe it was time to settle down at last...

The deep, smooth baritone of the stadium announcer interrupted his thoughts. _"Ladies and gentlemen, at this time we direct your attention to the field. As a part of our salute to supporters of Little League baseball during the month of August, the Mariners are proud to welcome special guests Derek Hopper and Craig Fleming, owners of D and C Landscaping. For the past seven years, Mr. Hopper and Mr. Fleming have generously donated their time, money, and expertise to improve Little League fields across the greater Seattle area."_

A couple of men strolled out to the pitcher's mound, accompanied by two boys. The announcer's voice continued. _"Mr. Hopper and Mr. Fleming, the Mariners and Little Leaguers from around the city thank you and your families for your contributions to the game of baseball and to the youth of Seattle."_

McWrait absently joined in the smattering of applause that arose from the crowd. The foursome reached the pitcher's mound, and the announcer continued once more. _"Throwing out this evening's opening pitches on behalf of their dads are Douglas Hopper and Zechariah Fleming. Good luck, guys."_

McWrait bolted suddenly to his feet. _That name..._ "Melinda!" he called. "Binoculars, if you please!"

A young woman, confident, capable, and remarkably attractive—almost as much so as Sasha; certainly the kind of attendant McWrait liked to employ in his personal service—approached him from behind and handed them to him. The foursome on the field appeared in huge scale on the vast video screen over center field, but McWrait focused the binoculars in on the youngest of them, a brown-haired boy about...yes, about ten years old.

The other boy set up on the pitcher's mound and threw a baseball into the glove of the Mariners' star pitcher, who acted as the catcher. The team mascot, the Moose, crouched behind in the umpire's position and thrust his furry right hand outward, declaring the pitch a strike, then congratulated the boy with two fists raised triumphantly above his antlers. A couple thousand fans in the stands clapped in support.

The second boy stepped up to make his throw. McWrait smiled. The boy was healthy and strong—and looked to be completely normal. An absolute success. Yet nothing had come of it, nothing to repay McWrait's investment in his existence. But now, serendipitously, the three-month-old mystery was solved. McWrait had found the child—and with his _father,_ no less! That was interesting. He wondered how that arrangement had come about.

Zechariah set his feet and looked in at the pitcher, who squatted again. He wound up and threw the ball. It sailed high and outside, but the pitcher stood and corralled it easily. The Moose jumped up and stretched out his right hand again, following it with a jab from his left to indicate a strikeout. The boy grinned. Yes, a perfectly normal-looking boy.

_"Nice pitches, Douglas and Zechariah,"_ the announcer's voice resonated from the stadium's speakers again as the foursome exited the infield. _"Thank you for being with us this evening. We hope you and your families enjoy the game."_

McWrait rubbed the stubble growing on his chin. _Zechariah Fleming, in the flesh._ He unzipped an inner pocket of his jacket and withdrew a small piece of paper with two words handwritten on it: "For Zechariah." The message was intended to insult him—and it had achieved its desired effect. But now he would answer it.

"Melinda," McWrait called, beckoning her back to him. "The young man who just threw that last pitch—his name is Zechariah Fleming. Find out his father's name. Follow him home. I want to know where he lives. Take Jeffrey. Tell him I want to know all about this child and his family. Don't be seen."

The woman nodded and left, waving for another man behind McWrait to join her. McWrait watched her go, then turned back to the game again. But he didn't see the game. He saw revenge—sweet, sweet revenge.

*****

Zach, Douglas, and their dads joined the ladies in the seventh row behind the Mariners dugout. Food—Mariners dogs, soft drinks, and the stadium specialty, garlic fries—awaited them.

"Great job out there, honey," Shanice welcomed Douglas as he slid into his seat beside her, Derek taking the seat on the far side of her in the middle of the row.

Craig sat on the aisle with Kara next to him, and Zach took the seat on the far side of her, between her and Douglas.

"How did we look?" Craig asked Kara.

"Well," she mused, "if I didn't know you personally, I might have mistaken you for one of those fine-looking athletes out on the field." She congratulated him with a quick kiss.

Zach showed his mom a ball signed by the Mariners' pitcher who had assisted them. "Look what he gave me! And the Moose called my pitch a strike, even though it was this far outside!" He stretched out his hands to illustrate.

Kara laughed and set a hand on his shoulder, just for a moment. Turning to Craig, she gave his arm a proud squeeze. He glanced over at Zach, his son, chatting with Douglas now, pointing in fascination at the sights around the stadium.

The game got off to a great start—the Mariners took a 4-0 lead in the bottom of the first inning. Midway through the second, Craig stretched and took another bite of garlic fries. "What do you think, Zach?" he asked the youngster. "Which are better, garlic fries or regular fries?"

"Regular are way better," Zach replied. "But these are good, too." He gulped down a couple more of his own garlic fries.

"Yep, he got your taste buds," Craig teased Kara. She preferred regular fries.

A voice came from Craig's right, at the aisle. "Excuse me—Mr. Fleming?"

Craig turned and found a copper-skinned man standing beside him, his thinning hair white and pulled back into a ponytail that hung to his shoulder blades. He wore a Mariners T-shirt, blue jeans, and a thin leather strap around his neck with a single, black feather dangling from it. "I'm sorry to bother you, but is this Zechariah Fleming?" the man asked, indicating Zach.

"Yes," Craig answered, curious.

The man nodded eagerly. "I heard his name on the loudspeakers and couldn't believe it. When I saw him on the video board, I recognized his face. I haven't seen him in years!" He peered past Kara at the youngster, who was still munching on garlic fries and laughing with Douglas. "He looks so healthy, so strong."

"Do you know Zach?" Kara asked, leaning around Craig with interest.

The man drew out a business card and handed it to her. "I used to be his doctor. John Blackfeather, pediatrician."

Craig examined the card with Kara, then looked back at Dr. Blackfeather in astonishment. "You were Zach's doctor? How long ago?"

"Almost from his birth. I'd say, what, about ten years ago?"

Craig met Kara's eyes with a jolt of excitement.

Kara turned to Zach, cutting in on his conversation with Douglas. "Zach," she said, taking his arm, "do you remember this man?"

Zach studied Dr. Blackfeather's face a moment. "I'm not sure..."

"I had darker hair back then," the man said with a grin, "but maybe you remember the aquarium in my office. Two rainbow trout, about this long." He held his index fingers a foot apart.

Zach wrinkled his forehead. "Were you my doctor?"

"Ha!" the doctor laughed. "He remembers! Kids usually remember the fish."

"So you," Craig stammered, "you knew Zach when he was a baby? Can we talk to you? We have...so many questions..."

"Well, not right here, I think," the doctor answered. "I'm in the way." He moved aside to let a woman pass him on her way down the steps. "Let's go up there." He pointed toward the main concourse above them.

"Yes," Kara agreed. "Come on, Zach."

Zach hesitated and looked longingly down at the field as the first Mariners batter of the inning stepped to the plate. But glancing up again at Dr. Blackfeather, he stood and came willingly enough.

They followed Dr. Blackfeather up to the concourse. There they found a place behind the last row of seats where they could see the game but also stand and talk without being in anyone's way.

Kara and Craig introduced themselves to Dr. Blackfeather, and he thought back. "I don't recall ever meeting the two of you. It was always his grandmother who brought him in for appointments."

Craig nodded. "We're still trying to figure all this out. Zach just came into our lives a few months ago. We didn't even know he existed."

"Didn't know?" Dr. Blackfeather repeated, cocking an eyebrow at Kara.

"We think he was adopted out as an embryo," Kara explained, "after an in vitro procedure."

"Fascinating," the doctor said. "Without your approval, I assume?"

"That's right," Craig said soberly.

The doctor rubbed his neck with one hand. "Would that explain the peculiarities?" he wondered aloud.

"What do you mean?" Kara asked.

Zach listened in, too, keeping one eye on the game below them.

"Well, what stands out most in my memory," the doctor said, "are a couple of times when Zach was ill and I wasn't certain he would pull through. The first time, I needed to put him in the hospital, but his grandmother refused. Only as an absolute last resort, she said. The family didn't believe in hospitals. I told her it was time for last resorts, but she still resisted. So I kept him with me at the clinic for two full days, when he was the sickest. I didn't dare leave him. I was an hour away from taking him to the hospital against their wishes when his fever broke."

Craig listened intently, the game forgotten. "How old was he?"

"Maybe one and a half. There was another time when he was two—not quite as severe, but bad enough."

Kara shared a glance with Zach. "What was wrong with him?" she asked. "He's told us he was sick a lot, but that's all we know."

The doctor looked at Zach for a long moment, thinking back and also studying the youngster as he stood before him. "My diagnosis was primary immunodeficiency—he was born with a low-functioning immune system. It happens a lot with premature infants. In his case, he caught about every bug he could catch, and it took his body longer than normal to fight them off. For two years he was in my office every other week with some illness. We got to know each other well for a while."

"How did he get past that?" Craig asked. "He's pretty healthy now."

"As I recall, he started showing signs of improvement around three and a half years, and by his fourth birthday he was doing much better. I only saw him every few months after that. I think I remember giving him his vaccinations for kindergarten... And that was the last time I saw him."

Kara nodded. "His grandmother died around that time, right after he started school."

Dr. Blackfeather pursed his lips thoughtfully, then took a step toward Zach and put both hands on his shoulders. Zach flinched.

"Hmm," the doctor muttered, "I had forgotten about that. You still don't like to be touched?"

Zach shook his head. "I'm getting used to it, though. Families touch a lot."

Dr. Blackfeather gave him a small smile. "That they do." He released Zach, but stayed where he was, looking into the youngster's eyes thoughtfully. "You look good, Zach. Are you getting a lot of exercise?"

"Yeah, I get to play outside all the time now. Grandmother didn't let me play outside much; just in the back yard sometimes. But now I can go out whenever I want."

"Dr. Blackfeather?" Kara had another question for him. "Why does he not like to be touched? Is there something wrong with him?"

"Every child needs regular physical contact," the doctor answered thoughtfully. "He's the only exception I've encountered in thirty years of practice. I can't tell you why he doesn't like it. It doesn't actually hurt him—that was the first thing I checked for—but it's been like that since he was born. It makes him uncomfortable."

Zach nodded his wholehearted agreement.

Dr. Blackfeather continued. "But I found nothing wrong with his skin or the nerves there. I thought it must be psychological. I advised his grandmother to hold him as much as she could when he was an infant, and to offer as much physical contact as he could handle, to get him accustomed to it. I thought that at some level he must still have a need for it."

Zach fidgeted a little; this line of conversation itself seemed uncomfortable for him. Kara pulled off his green and gray baseball cap playfully, mussed his hair, and put the cap back on him. He rolled his eyes at her, but limited his protest to that.

Dr. Blackfeather watched their interaction with interest. "I assume that his grandparents were not actually his grandparents at all?"

"No," Craig confirmed. "We still don't know who they were. We've been trying to track them down." A thought struck him—an obvious one, now that it came to him. "Would you happen to have their names in your files?" If Dr. Blackfeather had their names, that would be some solid information to work from at last.

"I should still have his records at my office," the doctor responded. "Listen, I ought to get back to my family and let you get back to the game, but my office opens at nine tomorrow. The address is on my card. Could you come by early, say around eight?"

Craig looked at Kara, and she nodded. She wouldn't need to be at work tomorrow until ten. "Absolutely," he told Dr. Blackfeather. "We'll be there. Thank you."

"Excellent," the doctor replied. "And if you don't mind me asking, does Zach currently have a doctor?"

"No," Kara admitted. "We hadn't gotten around to finding him one yet."

The doctor glanced at Zach again. "As healthy as he looks, I can see why. Bring him with you, then, and I'll give him an examination, if you like."

Zach, who was watching the ballgame again, turned back to Dr. Blackfeather apprehensively.

"Don't worry, Zach," the doctor assured him. "I won't do any more touching than I have to. Then again," he added with an instructive nod, "a little touching won't hurt you."

Zach sighed and looked toward the game again. Dr. Blackfeather bade them farewell and departed down the concourse.

"Craig," Kara whispered, taking his arm excitedly, "we're going to find out who had Zach! Finally, we're going to find out!" Zach seemed genuinely interested, too; at his mother's words, he even turned his back on the game for a moment.

As for Craig, after so many frustrations, he was reluctant to get his hopes up. But, he had to admit, this was a promising lead. He hugged Kara with one arm, and they stood together behind Zach, watching him watch the game again before they returned to share this news with Derek and Shanice.

*****

"And exhale slowly," Dr. Blackfeather instructed Zach the next morning, placing his cold stethoscope against Zach's back.

It made Zach itch with irritation all over. The doctor had touched his knees, elbows, chest, head, and back. He had stuck things in Zach's ears and mouth. He had pressed different places on his belly. None of it had hurt, exactly. It just felt...wrong, strange, annoying. It made Zach want to jump up from the examination table and run away. But he stayed...because he'd decided to...because Mom and Dad wanted him to. This was important to them.

"Good," the doctor said. He dropped his stethoscope's earpieces around his neck. "Well, Mr. Zach, you are one remarkable young man. Your health appears to be excellent. And five years ago, you would never have let me check so many parts of you without trying to squirm away. You've grown up a lot."

Mom smiled proudly at Zach. She had been watching him, knowing he was uncomfortable. "Does he need any vaccinations?" she asked Dr. Blackfeather. "We don't know if he's had any since the last time he saw you."

"I'll take a look," the doctor replied. He had been keeping notes about Zach on his computer, and now he scanned Zach's file there again. "No, it looks like he's up to date until next year."

Zach spoke. "Dad, what about that disease you told me about when I cut my fingers that first night?"

"Tetanus," Dad said. "Has he had his Tetanus shots?"

"He has," Dr. Blackfeather confirmed. "Everything we gave him for kindergarten covers him until next year. Except the flu vaccine, of course. That one you have to get every year."

"Is it a shot?" Zach asked with worry in his voice.

"It is," the doctor smiled sympathetically. "I'll go get that for him, if you like," he said to Mom and Dad. "And I'll get you a printout of his medical records."

Mom nodded. "Yes, please."

Dr. Blackfeather punched a few keys on the computer and turned to the door. "I'll be right back."

As he left the room, Dad hopped up onto the examination table beside Zach. "Way to be tough, pal," he said. "That didn't look like much fun for you."

Zach shrugged. "If I concentrate, I can make it be okay, almost. Do I really have to get a shot?"

"Yeah, you really do," Mom told him. "It could keep you from getting sick later."

"Don't worry," Dad encouraged him. "I've been getting shots for years, and I've only had one that hurt really bad."

Zach's eyes widened. "What happened?"

"It was always the nurses who gave the shots, but that one time my doctor did it himself. When he pushed the needle in—"

"Craig," Mom warned, "maybe another time, don't you think?"

But Zach urged him on. "What, Dad?"

Dad rubbed his shoulder, wincing at the memory. "I didn't scream, but I sure wanted to. I had a bruise on my shoulder for a week."

Zach winced, too, and rubbed his own shoulder.

"Nice job, Craig," Mom sighed. "That was reassuring."

Dr. Blackfeather returned, carrying a folder full of papers in one hand and a syringe in the other. He handed the papers to Dad, who reclaimed his seat beside Mom. They immediately began sifting through them.

At the counter along the wall behind Zach, the doctor fetched something Zach couldn't see. "Okay, let me have your shoulder..." He swabbed a spot on Zach's skin with whatever he had picked up—something cold, wet, and soft. It failed to distract Zach from the needle, which he eyed warily. "This will hurt just a little. A deep breath..."

Zach sucked in some air just in time, preparing himself for the worst. The needle stung, but the pain subsided instantly. A moment later, the doctor had fixed a circular bandage over the site of the injection. Zach ran a finger across the spot; it hardly hurt at all. Relieved, he released the breath he had been holding, grateful that he didn't have Dad's doctor.

"All done, Zach. Here you go," Dr. Blackfeather told him, tossing him his shirt. Zach pulled it on over his head.

Dad suddenly sat up straight, his eyes growing round. "Kara!" He held up a paper for Mom to see. _"Rhonda Lerwick,"_ Dad read. "And there's her signature."

"Yes," Dr. Blackfeather nodded, "Lerwick. That was her name."

"What do you remember about her?" Mom asked.

The doctor stroked his chin, one arm across his chest. "Mid to late forties. A little shorter than you, Mrs. Fleming. Dark blond hair down to her shoulders... Always seemed nervous. But Zach was comfortable around her."

"Do you remember her name, Zach?" Mom asked.

Zach shook his head. "I don't think so. But I remember she had blond hair. And some gray hair, too, when she moved away."

"Hmm..." Mom continued to peruse the papers before her.

"Can I go look at the fish?" Zach asked.

Dad looked up long enough to give him a nod.

The adults continued talking as Zach left the room and walked the length of the hall to the waiting room. Against one wall stood a large aquarium; two full-size trout swam from one end of it to the other, occasionally passing through a line of rising bubbles.

"Hi, guys," he greeted them. He hadn't had time to visit with them upon his arrival. "Remember me? I haven't seen you for a long time. You were my best friends when I was little. Well, not counting Grandmother." He watched them flick their tails and swim back and forth, opening and closing their mouths.

After a few minutes, Mom and Dad joined him, offered their goodbyes to Dr. Blackfeather, and led Zach outside to Mom's car.

"Where do we start, Craig?" Mom asked.

Dad was thinking hard—Zach could see it in his eyes. He was learning to tell what Dad and Mom were thinking just by looking at them. Maybe someday he could learn to read minds as well as Mom did.

"The Internet, I think," Dad told Mom. "We have a name now. We'll find her."

*****

Craig wanted to head straight home and start searching for information on Rhonda Lerwick, but Kara insisted that they first drop Zach off at Lia's and go to work like they were supposed to. Craig began to protest, but Kara cut him off. "The Internet will still be there when you get home, Craig. And Derek's counting on you to help him today."

Reluctantly, he admitted that she was right. He could be patient for a few hours.

Besides, he had a smartphone with him. He used it while waiting in line at the hardware store, searching online for a Rhonda Lerwick. The search results displayed something about a Lerwick, England; a Gary Lerwick who played music somewhere in New Orleans; a web page suggesting a theory on the etymology of Lerwick as a surname... But he found nothing pertaining to a Rhonda Lerwick. Later, at another opportune moment, he slipped the phone from his pocket and searched for a Rhonda Lerwick on every social media site he could think of, but to no avail. That made sense, when he thought about it—she had been dead five years.

Kara and Zach arrived home just before he did that afternoon. Kara began dinner preparations while Craig changed his clothes and washed up. He returned to the den and called Zach just before the youngster stepped out the side door. "Hey, pal, would you help me with this?"

"With what?" Zach asked.

Craig sat down at the computer and pulled up the web browser. "Searching for the woman who raised you," he said.

"Can we do it later, Dad?" Zach requested politely. "I want to go play with Paws first."

"No, come on. I want to get started right away," Craig returned. "We've been waiting three months. Let's find out where you came from."

Zach sighed, but gave in and pulled one of the dining chairs over beside Craig.

"Okay," Craig said, "I tried a few things already."

Kara shot him a suspicious glance from the kitchen.

"While I was in line at the store," he explained with a guilty smile.

Kara narrowed her eyes disapprovingly.

"Nothing came up, though. So let's try..." He pursed his lips, brainstorming options.

"Try the things where the newspaper says who died," Zach suggested. "Mom and I couldn't find her because we didn't know her name. But now we do."

"Right, the obituaries!" He tried searching for "Rhonda Lerwick" and "obituary" together. As when he had searched during work, a wide assortment of results appeared. This time, though—

"Hey, that one has potential," he commented, pointing to one item in the list of results. He clicked on it and a new page appeared—not an obituary, nor anything that looked very official, but it listed her name and gave a date: October 18, five years ago. And it named a city—Mount Vernon, Washington. "Good call, Zach," he congratulated the youngster. "Grab some paper and write that down."

Zach fetched paper and a pen as Craig perused the web page. "Where's Mount Vernon?" the youngster asked as he copied the information from the screen.

"About halfway between here and Canada," Craig answered. "Maybe that's where she moved to. Hmm... This page is just a record of a record. The real information is somewhere else. Let's go look..." He considered for a moment. "Let's look at the newspaper's obituaries." He logged into the Seattle Library's web site and located its newspaper archives. Would the _Seattle Times_ include obituaries from as far away as Mount Vernon?

Apparently it did not, except for particularly notable people. He did some more searching. Zach looked on with waning interest. The youngster kept peeking out the window at Paws, who eyed Zach impatiently.

Mount Vernon, Craig found, had its own newspaper. He pulled up its web page and clicked on the "Obituaries" link. When he typed in Rhonda Lerwick's name, a new screen with exactly one result appeared.

"Got it!" he cried.

Zach leaned forward, his interest renewed. Kara quickly left her cooking and joined them, wiping her hands as she looked over Craig's shoulder.

He had found an official death notice. He read it aloud:

Rhonda Emily (Verone) Lerwick, of Mount Vernon, died October 18 from injuries suffered in a single-car accident earlier that day. Ms. Lerwick, age fifty, had recently relocated to the community from Seattle to take a job with a local law firm. Authorities have been unable to locate Ms. Lerwick's family and request that anyone with information about their names and whereabouts please contact the Mount Vernon Police Department.

Craig checked the date preceding the death notice—it gave the correct year. Zach would have been five. She was from Seattle. This was the woman they were seeking. He turned excitedly to Kara. "We found her!"

"For what it's worth," she grimaced. "There's nothing here about her past, no names of relatives... This hardly gets us any closer to finding out where Zach came from." She shared a glance with the youngster.

Craig drummed his fingers on the desk. "She died in a car accident. But we already knew that... Maybe the paper reported the accident separately."

He searched the site for articles published October 19, the day after the accident. Sure enough, that day's articles included a short, promising news report, which Craig again read aloud:

DRIVER KILLED IN SINGLE-CAR CRASH

Mount Vernon police were called to the scene of a single-vehicle accident along State Route 20 east of Bradshaw Road late last evening. A lone driver traveling westbound lost control of her 2006 Chrysler Pacifica, veered off the roadway, and struck a tree. The driver, whose identity is being withheld until relatives are notified, was transported by ambulance to Skagit Valley Hospital with critical injuries. She was pronounced dead shortly before midnight.

Police report that skid marks left by the Pacifica's tires match what a witness described as erratic swerving and braking on the highway, followed by a sudden turn that resulted in the collision. Police suspect that alcohol may have been involved. An autopsy will be conducted.

Zach stared sadly at the words on the screen. Kara reached over to muss his hair. "Did you know how she died?"

The youngster blinked. "Not until Rita told us about the car crash. Do you think she was drinking wine?"

"Sounds like she was drinking something, kiddo," Kara answered gently. "It's too bad." She continued to monitor Zach's reaction. "Did you like her?" she asked him.

He blinked as he thought back. "I think so. I remember she drank too much wine sometimes, but she was nice to me all the other times. She taught me lots of things. She used to read books to me. Sometimes she played with me outside in the back yard, even though Grandfather didn't like it. And she told me about you and Dad. She always said I would get to go home to my parents someday. I guess she was right, huh?" He looked at Kara and Craig in turn, then shrugged. "I don't remember much else about her."

Craig scratched his nose with his thumb, thinking, then realized Zach was doing the same thing. _Funny,_ he thought, _the youngster looks and acts so much like me, but the way he deals with things is so much like Kara._ Or maybe that was like Craig, too, but Kara just knew how to respond to it, the way she knew how to respond to Craig. In any case, she had known to give Zach a moment to process what had happened to the woman he had long considered his grandmother.

Turning back to the computer screen, Craig ran a hand through his hair. He directed the browser back to Ms. Lerwick's death notice. "Too bad there isn't a picture here," he commented.

Kara, still standing behind him, patted his shoulder with one hand, then noticed Zach staring out the window at Paws. "You want to go play with him, kiddo?"

He looked up at her hopefully.

"Go ahead. We'll call you if we need you. Twenty minutes until dinner, okay?"

"Okay," he replied, darting away and out the side door before she could change her mind.

"I was hoping he would stay and help me," Craig told Kara. "I thought it might be good for him to feel involved."

Kara sighed. "It has to be hard for him, Craig, hearing how she died. She was the only mother he had before he came here. Rita was, too, I suppose, in a lot of ways. Thank God for her..."

She watched out the window as Zach rounded the house and chased with Paws. "He needs to go run a while. Besides, Craig," she said, turning back to him and kissing him once on the head, "this is _our_ search, not his. His search was coming to find us and then convincing us that he belonged here. He's happy. We're the ones who need...an explanation."

Craig leaned back in his chair, setting his head back to gaze up at Kara. "I have to know where he came from, Kara. Not the house—we know that. And not just this Rhonda Lerwick's name. I need to understand _why._ Why was he adopted out? Why did she tell him about us? Why did he come to us now and not before?"

"And for goodness' sake, how did he get that name?" Kara added, shaking her head.

"Right—that name." Craig drummed his fingers on the desk again. "And I have to know that nobody's out there looking to send the police to take him away from us. I _have_ to know that. I can't...go through that again."

Kara rubbed his head tenderly, just the way she had rubbed Zach's. "See what else you can find," she said. "I'll go finish dinner."

Craig watched her return to the kitchen, then turned his attention back to this mysterious Rhonda Lerwick. Was there any useful information here? A name, a date, a city... Over and over in his mind, he worked the problem.
Chapter 14

It was Labor Day, and the new school year was to begin tomorrow. To Kara, a whirlwind of activity over the three weeks since the Mariners game and the visit with Dr. Blackfeather had nearly consumed her. At first, she and Craig had taken every opportunity to sit down at the computer and scour the Internet for any morsel of information about Rhonda Lerwick. But the necessities of school preparation, not to mention life in general, had compelled Kara to shift away from the searching, leaving Craig to work at it alone.

She had spent one full day with Zach on the new adventure of getting ready for the school year, picking up supplies for him and a few more clothes for him to wear. He had grown a little, even since they had purchased those clothes for him early in the summer; thankfully, those still fit. They had also visited the school to meet Mr. Herd, who would be Zach's fifth-grade teacher. He was a surprisingly young man, in only his third year of teaching, and that had concerned Kara a bit until she noticed how quickly he established a rapport with Zach. If Mr. Herd was as good with the class as a whole as he was with Zach alone, Zach was going to have—in his own words, as he expressed it to Kara—an awesome school year.

On other days, she had taken Zach to the barber, to the dentist, and, at his request, on an outing with other kids from church to spend an afternoon playing with the kids at the children's home that Ben volunteered with. He had enjoyed that time so much that he asked to go again the next week, and Kara had agreed to let him on the condition that Ben be his chaperone this time so Kara could have a couple of precious hours to herself—the eye of the hurricane those three busy weeks.

That Labor Day afternoon, Kara pulled Craig away from the computer, where he was still sifting through obscure web sites for data on Rhonda Lerwick, and sent him out of the house, as they had planned. When he had driven away, Kara called Zach from his room and the puzzle that was taking shape on his desk.

"Do you have your shoes on?" she asked as he appeared in the hall. His feet were bare. "Go put them on, kiddo."

"Where are we going?" he inquired, returning to his room.

_"We_ are not going anywhere," she responded after him. _"You_ are."

He came back out a minute later with shoes on his feet and curiosity on his face.

"I'm giving you a test," Kara told him.

"What kind of test?" he asked suspiciously.

"A test to see if you're ready to walk to school and back by yourself."

Zach raised his eyebrows at her doubtfully. "Mom, a lot of kids younger than me walk to school by themselves."

"Then this should be easy for you," she returned. "So... First, do you have your house key?"

"My house key?"

"Yeah," Kara said, "in case you get home before we do. Your dad and I will try to make sure one of us gets home before school is out everyday, unless we tell you otherwise. But with Seattle traffic, you never know, right? So..." She pulled a shiny, new key on a green lanyard from her pocket and held it out to the boy.

His eyes nearly popped out of his head. "Really, Mom?" He lit up, receiving it as if it were a nugget of gold.

Kara held onto it for a moment before releasing it to him. "This key comes with some very important rules. Never give it to anyone, and always check to make sure you have it before you leave the house. And..."

"And what?"

"And that's all I can think of at the moment. But we'll have more later, I'm sure."

"You have a lot of rules, Mom," Zach remarked, "even more than Grandfather had."

Kara snorted. "That's because you get to do a lot more stuff here than you did with him. More opportunities, more rules."

Zach furrowed his brows at her as he considered that point. Then he grinned. "Yeah, I guess so."

"Okay then," Kara instructed him, "step outside..." She followed him out the door, locked it, and closed it behind them. "Now show me that you can unlock the door..." Had the boy ever unlocked a door with a key before? Yes—with the car, at least. Perhaps not a house door, though. Had they never thought to have him unlock the door? Funny, the things you assumed a person could do until you found out they had never tried.

Zach unlocked the door with ease.

"Good," Kara said, pulling the door shut again. "Now, off you go. Go all the way to the school and come back."

"By myself?"

"Mm-hmm, all alone. If you don't get lost, you can walk to school by yourself in the morning."

"Awesome!" he exclaimed. Without asking for directions, he darted away, running across the yard and slowing to a brisk stride as he reached the road.

Kara gave him a few seconds and then made her way to the road at a leisurely pace. How strange, that it was hard for her to keep her steps slow and even; she wanted to run and look, to make sure he knew where to go and that he was safe. But he was fine, of course. As she looked after him, he reached the corner and turned right. Good for him.

She stood there at the edge of the grass for a minute, then pulled out her phone and began to pace, waiting. It was three more minutes before it rang. "Did he get there?" she asked as soon as she had the phone to her ear.

"He went straight to it," Craig's voice informed her, "like he's been doing it his whole life."

She sighed with relief. Not that she had been worried—it was just something new, that was all. Like Zach said, a lot of younger kids walked to school by themselves. But he was not other kids. He was hers.

"Okay," she told Craig. "I guess you can come home, then. I'll wait out here until he gets back. If he knows the way there, he knows the way home."

"All right," Craig answered. A minute later he pulled his pickup into the garage and went inside, probably back to the computer. He had never been one to attach himself to electronics, but that had changed since they had discovered Rhonda Lerwick's name. Not that they had found anything new, but Craig was determined to keep trying.

Ten minutes after Craig came home, Kara still waited where the grass met the road, growing worried. The boy hadn't returned. Pulling herself away from her vantage point there, she hurried to the front door and thrust it open. "Craig!" she called.

"What is it?" his voice returned from the den. Sure enough, he was back at the computer.

"Craig, he's not back yet. I want you to go look for him."

Craig came around the corner and joined her at the door. "He's not back?" He got that calculating look for a moment. "How could he get lost? It's only two blocks. Where—"

His voice cut off as his eyes focused on something behind her in the yard. Kara turned to look. Zach stepped cheerfully through the grass, coming up to them. "I did it, Mom!"

Kara gaped at him. "You are ten minutes late! Where have you been? Did you get lost?"

"No," he said excitedly, "Eddie was cleaning stuff at the school, so I talked to him for a minute."

Kara sighed and shook her head.

Zach kept his eyes on her. "So, I can go to school by myself tomorrow, right?"

Kara chuckled. "Yeah, okay. You can walk by yourself."

"Even if it's raining?"

Kara glanced up at the sky. Clouds were moving in; it might rain indeed. Another gorgeous Seattle summer was coming to an end. Naturally, if there was rain, her son would want to be out in it. "Yes, even if it's raining."

*****

Craig prepared himself for the blast, and as expected, it came.

"You went _where?!"_ Kara was calmer than he had thought she might be, probably because Zach was in the room, doing his homework at the standalone counter; homework at Briar Point began the second week of school, apparently. The youngster looked up to see what the disturbance was about.

"Tumwater," he said, leaning casually—his ease was a façade—against the wall that divided the den from the hallway. "I went back to the office where we got Zach's birth certificate and picked up Rhonda Lerwick's death certificate."

"You picked up—Craig Herbert, don't you _ever_ drive that far without letting me know first!" She back-handed him in the belly perhaps a little harder than she should have and certainly more gently than she would say he deserved.

He grunted, but he had known the scolding would come, and the slap, too. He handed her the tall envelope in his hand. "Want to see it?"

She snatched it from him angrily, but he could see the curiosity in her eyes. "I guess it's better than skipping work to play golf, at least," she conceded grudgingly. "Was it worth it?"

"Derek and I didn't have anything more to do today, anyway. We finished early and didn't have time to start the next job."

"But was it worth it? Did you find out anything?" Opening the envelope, she slipped the paper out of its sheath and scanned it. Her eyes flicked back up to him. "We already knew all of this."

Craig coughed into his hand. "We didn't know her Social Security number."

"A lot of good that will do us," Kara snapped back.

"She was born in Florida..."

"Great. She might not have any family nearby, then." She rolled her eyes. "Or maybe they're spread all over Seattle, who knows? Maybe they moved here right after she was born."

She thrust one hand onto her hip, continuing to read the sheet. "Mm-hmm. So we have confirmation that she was single, which probably means she was divorced... It has her last address in Mount Vernon, but that's not going to help—if her family had lived there, the paper wouldn't have said the police couldn't locate them. It lists her parents as James and Elizabeth Verone. Can we track her down through them?"

"I checked that already," Craig told her. "In Seattle, anyway. They're unlisted, if they live around here, if they're even still alive. If they're somewhere else, maybe we could find them, but—"

"But they could be anywhere in the country. Or the world. Hmph. No names of children, if she had any... It doesn't list her ex-husband... You drove all the way down there and back, without telling me, for _this?"_ She shook the paper at him.

"Well, I thought it would have something helpful for sure. I didn't think—"

"Didn't think _I'd approve,_ I get it. Go get ready for dinner," Kara ordered. "And _you,"_ she declared, spinning to glare at Zach, who was still watching them, "finish your homework." He ducked back to his paper obediently.

After dinner, Craig returned to the computer and located a satellite photo of Rhonda Lerwick's last residence. It was nothing remarkable—just a small house near the edge of Mount Vernon. He considered it for a few minutes, then moved on to search for her parents.

"Hey, Dad," Zach said, interrupting his thoughts, "want to play catch?" He was tossing his baseball into his glove, which was now nicely broken in.

The boy's enthusiasm tugged at Craig, but he wanted to finish a little more searching first. "Uh, sure. Give me just a few more minutes, all right? I'm trying to narrow down whether any of these folks might have been Rhonda Lerwick's parents."

"Okay," he responded. "I'll be in the back." He walked through the kitchen and out the side door.

Craig followed another link, but it led to people by the wrong names. He was finding plenty of individuals named James Verone and Elizabeth Verone, but not the two together. Hopefully they were still alive and married and would appear as a couple in some record. He followed a few more links, but to no avail. Another search engine offered a few new possibilities, but none of them led to anything definite, either.

With a long exhale, he pushed his chair back from the computer and walked to his bedroom to fetch his glove. Still working the problem of how to track down the Verones, he wiggled his fingers into the glove and wandered back to the kitchen and outside. "Zach?" he called. But the boy wasn't in the yard.

And it was dark. How had dusk fallen so quickly? Of course—it was mid-September, and the days were growing shorter. The sun went down around 7:30 now. Had he really sat at the computer another whole hour?

Guilt aching in his belly, he came back inside and walked the length of the hall to Zach's room. The door was half open. Zach, stretched out on his bed to read, looked up when he knocked.

"Hey, pal," Craig said, stepping across the room. "I, er..." He opened his hands apologetically. "I meant to come out sooner. I guess I got caught up in what I was doing, and—"

"It's okay, Dad," Zach said dismissively. "I played soccer with Mom instead."

"You did?" Craig ran a hand through his hair. "Oh...all right. Next time then?"

"Okay, next time," Zach agreed, and immersed himself in his story again.

Craig nodded and stepped out of the room, feeling like he had been sent to the principal's office. But if Zach wasn't upset about it...

Kara had brought a bucket of green beans from the garden inside to clean and snap, and she sat in the den, watching TV as she worked on them. The show she was watching didn't interest Craig, so he sat down at the computer again and resumed his search.

*****

Zach threw the baseball high, straight up into one of the trees in the back yard. It ricocheted off one of the upper branches, and he had to react quickly and run several steps to his left to snatch it out of the air. It was good outfield practice.

Dad still wasn't home. He had promised. Zach kicked his foot crossly through a few red and yellow leaves. It was fall now, nearly the end of September, and the deciduous trees in the yard were beginning to shed their leaves into carpets beneath their outstretched limbs.

He gave the ball one last, little toss and returned to the house.

"Close the door behind you," Mom told him without looking up as he stepped into the kitchen. "It's getting cool out there." She was slicing potatoes at the standalone counter. A glass vase adorned the center of the counter, displaying a rose Zach had selected for her from the yard a couple of days before.

He shut the door and circled around Mom. "Paws found a black glove outside," he reported. "I tried to take it away, but he just wanted to play tug-of-war." He bounced the baseball off the floor and caught it with his bare hand.

"Don't bounce the ball inside, Zach," Mom ordered. "A baseball is not an inside toy."

He bounced it again. He didn't know why—he just did it, harder than before.

Mom spun at him. "Zechariah Timothy!"

Startled, he stabbed at the ball with his baseball glove, but misjudged it and knocked it onto the counter, where it caromed off a potato and into the vase, which fell to its side with a clang. Water spilled across the counter and onto the floor.

At Mom's instant, wrathful glare, Zach backed away, bumping into the dining table. Without looking away from him, Mom reached to the side and snatched the ball up from the counter. How did she grab it on the first try without even looking at it?

She came at him, the ball in one hand and the other hand stretched out before her, palm up. With a gulp, he handed her his baseball glove. "Go to your room!" she commanded. "And when I look in there, you had better not be under your bed!"

He didn't run to his room, but he wanted to. It took effort to only walk. And he didn't hide under the bed, though that was his inclination, whatever Mom had said. But he didn't dare disobey her again, not tonight. She was angry.

Shutting the door behind him, he sat down as near to under his bed as he could get without actually being under it. For several minutes he waited there, dreading Mom's coming to scold him.

She didn't come, though. Eventually, he looked around for something to do. He hadn't begun his homework yet, so he went to his desk and lifted his math textbook from his backpack. He set to work on the assignment Mr. Herd had given his "sheep"—Mr. Herd was pretty funny, calling the class his herd of sheep.

Mom opened his door and glanced in once as he worked. "Doing your homework," she observed. She was calm again, but not happy. "Good for you. Come and eat when you're done." She set his glove, the ball tucked into its pocket, on the desk and looked him in the eye. She was scary when she did that—not mean, just scary. "The vase didn't break, lucky for you. If it had, you might not be getting these back for a while. Next time, bounce the baseball _outside."_ She left his door open as she returned to the other end of the house.

He finished his homework a few minutes later and joined Mom at the dining table. She had eaten half of her dinner already. He dished out some potato soup and sat across from her. "When is Dad coming home?"

Mom was reading a gardening magazine and kept on reading as she answered. "Soon, if he knows what's good for him. He called a couple of hours ago and said he was driving up to Mount Vernon."

"Where Grandmother lived?"

"Mm-hmm. He wants to find the people she used to work for. An attorney's office—there are only a few there and he wanted to see if any of them remember her." She still did not look away from the magazine, but neither did her eyes follow the lines of words; they stared straight ahead as if through the pages, and they still weren't happy. She waved a hand in front of her. "He's off on another wild goose chase."

Zach plunged his spoon into his soup and took a bite. It was still warm. "Will he get home in time to play catch?"

Mom slapped her magazine onto the table and finally looked at him. "I don't know, Zach. I don't know." She stared out the window for a minute, then resumed eating and reading.

Zach said nothing more. He ate his food and took his dishes to the sink. Just as he dropped them in, he heard Dad's pickup arrive.

Seconds later, Dad stepped inside with exhilaration on his face. "Kara, Zach—look at this!" He held up a photograph, ignoring Mom's blank expression.

Zach stepped over to him and looked. "Dad, that's her! I remember!" The picture showed Grandmother standing with two men and two other women, all dressed very nicely as if they worked somewhere expensive. They were inside a room with wood paneling and a long, shiny, wooden table behind them. All of them were smiling, Grandmother too.

"That's really her, Zach?" Dad asked.

"Yeah, that's how she looked when she moved away."

Mom, in spite of herself, stepped over to them and looked at the photograph. "Which one is—Oh!" she gasped, her hands flying to her mouth. Her eyes went wider than Zach had ever seen them; her eyebrows stretched up so high they must have hurt.

She looked at Dad. "I _met_ her! I—I had forgotten..." Her eyes, still wide, flashed back to the photo.

_"What?"_ Dad asked, astounded. "You knew Rhonda Lerwick? How?"

"I didn't know her," Mom explained, all wrath drained from her face now. She was white with shock. "I only saw her one time. At the clinic—I was alone in the examination room, waiting for the doctor. You weren't with me. It was after the second procedure there. She came in to change out the magazines. She asked me if I wanted a boy or a girl. I said either one, I just wanted a child. She asked me if I'd picked out a name for a boy yet..." Mom's eyes glazed over for a moment. More slowly, she repeated, "She asked if I'd picked out a name _for a boy..._ I told her, 'Zechariah Timothy.' I didn't think anything of it... She said it was a good name..." She looked at Dad again, her eyes still big and round. "Craig, _she said it was a good name..._ She didn't ask if we had a name for a girl..."

She and Dad looked at each other for a long time. "So," Dad said finally, turning to Zach, "now we know how you got your name."

"She knew when she came into that room," Mom muttered under her breath. Zach could barely make out what she said. "She knew," Mom said more loudly, "and she didn't say a word. I told her I just wanted to have a child, and she didn't say a _word..."_ Mom looked angry again, but in a different, even scarier way.

The three of them studied the picture a little longer, until suddenly Dad said, "Oh, and there's something else. I found the law firm where she was working when she died. Two partners, they both remembered her. One of them still had this picture—he gave it to me. And he remembered her husband's name—Bert. Or maybe Bill—they weren't sure. Rhonda talked about him sometimes, but just stuff about their divorce, nothing helpful that they could remember."

"Bert Lerwick?" Mom repeated. "Or maybe Bill." She looked down at Zach.

He shrugged. He didn't remember either one.

Dad moved into the den, to the computer, of course. "I'm going to look him up. He died when, last spring? February or March, maybe? We're on to him, Kara—we're going to find him!"

Mom followed Dad into the den, and they began to search online. Zach hung back behind them. For a week, Dad had been promising to play catch with him, and everyday he had found some excuse to put him off, to search for something new on the computer.

"Dad?" Zach asked hesitantly.

Dad pulled up another web page. "Give me just a few minutes here, pal."

Mom drew out the phonebook and flipped pages until she found the one she wanted. She searched the page, her finger hurriedly tracing the lines of text. "Nothing in the phonebook," she said, closing it and looking over at Dad. "No Bert or Bill Lerwicks. Not many Lerwicks at all, actually. It must be an unusual name."

"Good," Dad replied. "That should make him easier to find. Let's start with Bert." He typed away on the keyboard and clicked on a link as Mom stepped back to his side.

Zach gave up and marched to his room, anger growing inside him with each step. He went in and slammed the door. _I waited for him all afternoon!_ Seeing his glove on the desk with the ball tucked inside the pocket, he grabbed them both, flung the door open, and hurled them together down the hall, slamming the door shut again behind him. It infuriated him that they didn't hit anything that would break or make a loud noise.

He fell on his bed and waited, but Mom and Dad didn't come to see what was wrong. They didn't even come to yell at him for slamming his door. He waited a long time, but they didn't come. As the sky began to darken outside, he stretched himself out on the bed and cried.

*****

"You sit _there,"_ Kara ordered the moment Zach stepped through the front door a few days later. She had been doing a lot of ordering lately, and she didn't like it. What was going on with this boy?

Slinging his backpack off his shoulder and dropping it beside the standalone counter, he took the stool she indicated. He had the audacity to look up at her with those all-too-innocent eyes he had inherited from his dad.

She left him sitting there for a minute, letting him stew with what she hoped was grim trepidation while she leaned against the counter beside the sink and finished her article in the latest _Northwest Gardener_. As she reached the end of it, some of the finer points of home composting now clearer in her mind, she set the magazine extra-gently on the counter. She did not look at the boy. Instead, she began a careful examination of the neatly-trimmed fingernails of her left hand.

"What time is it, Zechariah?" she asked very calmly. How convenient it was that she and Craig had given him a name that they usually shortened; she could say so much simply by speaking it full-length. _Someone_ else _gave him that name,_ she corrected herself angrily. She and Craig had chosen it, but this Rhonda Lerwick— _she_ had given it to him.

The boy fidgeted and glanced at the clock. "4:50," he answered.

"You _can_ read time. Good. When are you supposed to be home?" She still did not look at him.

"4:30."

"And how long does it take you to walk home from Cayden's house?"

"Mom, we were in the middle of—"

_"How—long?"_ She didn't raise her voice. The extra enunciation communicated her indignation.

He dropped his eyes. "Five minutes."

"So what time should you leave Cayden's house?"

He sighed dejectedly. "4:25."

Kara switched to examining the fingernails of her right hand, keeping her voice even. "Why, then, did it take you twenty-five minutes to get home? And why was this the third time in a week? You made it home by 4:30 every time you went to Cayden's for the first three weeks of school. I was impressed that you were so responsible. Why did that change?" At last she looked up at him.

He sat stiffly, the falsely-innocent look gone, replaced by a caught-and-guilty expression. "I don't know. I forgot what time it was. We were in the middle of a game."

Kara intensified her glare.

The boy fidgeted again. "I'm sorry, Mom."

"That's good to hear," she said, resuming her study of her fingernails. "Now, go to your room and do your homework. But feed Paws first—you forgot again this morning. He was disappointed."

The boy slid off his stool and went to the side door. "Mom," he asked, turning back to her, "can I go to Cayden's tomorrow so we can finish our game?"

"Absolutely not," she replied. "Maybe on Wednesday, but I will need some assurance that you'll be home on time."

His shoulders sagged, but he didn't argue. He went outside and refilled Paws' food bowl slowly, petting the dog for a moment. Kara was glad to see him take a little extra time, even if only to put his homework off a bit longer. He had not spent much time with Paws these past few days.

The boy's attitude had changed for the worse. He had been such a good child when he had first come to them. Everything, to him, had been an adventure, a joy. Now...

He came back inside and passed her en route to his bedroom. Kara shook her head as he walked by. What had happened to the sensitive, fun-loving boy who had sat on the front step with his bare feet soaking in the rain that first morning? He had grown so melancholy these past three weeks. Was it Mr. Herd, or something about fifth grade? No, all seemed to be going well at school. It was something here at home, and Kara had a pretty good idea what it was.

Craig arrived home from work just in time for dinner—tacos that Kara and Zach had made together, the boy assisting after his homework was done. Zach remained sullen, speaking only when spoken to, even through the meal. Craig didn't help matters much. He spent most of the meal calculating. He had Bert—or Bill—Lerwick on his mind again.

"I'm going to swing by two more houses tonight," he said as he swallowed the last of his third taco. "One's supposed to be a Jerry Lerwick, the other is named Pat. Hopefully one of them knew the Lerwick we're looking for."

"Why don't you stay home tonight, just call them?" Kara encouraged. "You've been gone almost every night since you went to Mount Vernon."

Craig considered, but shook his head. "Too many people screen their calls, but they'll answer the door. And we're so close, Kara. Someone in this city knows something about this Lerwick guy. If I can find that one person, we could discover everything we need to know about Zach."

"I don't know, Craig," Kara demurred. "I've been thinking—maybe it's time to go to the police."

Zach snapped his head up at her words, attentive and wary.

"We've had Zach for almost five months," she continued. "We have the DNA test results. We have the birth certificate, not that it's much help, since it's a fraud. Anyway, he _is_ our son, and we did _not_ give permission for him to be adopted out. And we have Rita—she can verify how he was raised."

"I'm not comfortable with that, Kara," Craig argued quietly. "What if they do take him away? Would that be better for him?"

Kara gave him a sympathetic sigh. "I know, Craig. I feel the same way. But they can find out so much more than we can. They have access to information that we—"

"Stop, Kara," Craig said. "Look at Zach. Do you really want to put him through that?"

Zach looked worried, glancing from her to Craig and back again. She leaned back in her chair and folded her arms. "Like he's not going through anything now?" she returned sharply. "You're gone almost every night! He needs a dad, Craig. Look, they can help us. We should have told them what was going on weeks ago."

She and Craig stared at each other for a long moment.

"Craig, you're searching for a miracle under every rock. It's not good for your family—not for Zach, not for me. We need you _here."_

Craig looked again at Zach. "Actually, we've found quite a few miracles already. All I need is one more." With that he stood and cleared his place at the table. "It'll only take a few more days...or maybe even just tonight." He set his dishes in the sink, then made his way down the hall and out of sight.

Kara and Zach finished their food, though it was clear that neither of them felt much like eating. She filled the dishwasher and set it running. The boy sat idly at the table, watching her. "Go get your jacket," she told him. "I'd like you to help me pick the vegetables before it gets dark."

"I don't want my jacket," he replied.

Why did he have to be obstinate, especially now? "It's wet and chilly out there, and I don't want you catching a cold." He still did not move, so she signed to him, _"Go...get...jacket."_

He trudged off to his room, looking sullen. Kara took her own jacket from the coat rack and pulled it on. Craig joined her there a moment later and grabbed his, as well. "Don't worry," he said, "we'll get to the bottom of this soon. And then we'll be able to keep Zach for sure and raise him the way he needs." Seeing the boy return from his room wearing his green and blue jacket, Craig asked, "Where are you guys going?"

"Just outside to pick some vegetables," Kara replied.

Zach tromped by them. "Vegetables are stupid," he muttered.

In a flash, Craig spun. He cornered Zach against the wall, blocking his progress with one hand, pointing a finger in the boy's face with the other. Stunned and suddenly breathless, the boy stared up at him in alarm.

Craig whispered at him furiously. "Tell me you did _not_ just call your mother stupid!"

Zach went rigid, too afraid to speak. He shook his head with only the slightest motion, but earnestly all the same.

Craig's face was inches from the boy's. "I hope not. If I _ever_ hear you insult your mother, I will ground you and put you to work for a month! You treat your mother with respect. _Always."_

Kara stepped to Craig's side and laid a calming hand on his shoulder. "He said _vegetables_ are stupid," she reported softly. "I heard him."

Craig held the boy's gaze a long moment. Finally, with a deep exhale, he stepped back. "That's better, but still rude," he said. "Go help your mother, and don't complain. I don't want to hear about anymore rude comments when I get back."

Kara thought the boy might run off to his room to hide—his eyes flickered in that direction one time—but he stayed as if still pinned to the wall.

Craig turned and kissed Kara on the forehead, then moved to the front door. "I'll be back in a little bit," he said, pulling it open.

"Please don't be too long," she pleaded as he stepped outside into a patch of evening light. The clouds that had spread a drizzly mist across the city all day had broken somewhat. Kara watched him go.

Closing the door, she turned back to find Zach still frozen in place, eyes wide, staring at her. Coming over to him, she placed her hands tenderly on his shoulders. "Hey, kiddo. Are you okay?"

He blinked at her and nodded hesitantly. He was shaking.

_Craig wasn't_ that _angry,_ she thought. _He never lost control. He didn't even touch him..._

"Look," she told the boy gently, "your dad, he—he did that because he loves me. He loves you the same way, Zach. He would never, ever hurt you. But he wanted you to know this is important."

She searched the boy's eyes; they were still scared, imploring her for some reassurance. _Why did that frighten him so much? He needs to have a healthy respect for Craig, but panic?_

"Your dad—he's a warrior if he thinks someone might hurt his family. It's one of the things I love about him. He always defends me. He would do the same thing for you. That's why he's working so hard to find out about Grandfather. It bothers him—he can't rest until he knows you're going to be safe here. Do you understand?"

Zach blinked at her again. At last, with a long breath, he relaxed.

She squeezed his slumped shoulders. "He won't be angry with you when he comes home. Not if your behavior is better."

Zach looked down at his hands meekly.

"Okay," Kara nodded. "Hey, you did the right thing, by the way, staying here and not running off to hide."

His eyes returned to hers in surprise.

"I saw you thinking about it. But you stayed. That was a good decision."

With a final squeeze, she dropped her hands and led him into the kitchen. "Now, stupid or not, the vegetables need to be picked." She collected four large bowls from the cupboard, handing two to him. "And we have more than we need, so I thought we might make a couple of vegetable baskets to give to families at church."

"Can we give one to Rita?" Zach asked tentatively.

Kara gave him a gentle smile; he needed some encouragement. "I hadn't thought about exactly who yet, but yeah, we could give one to Rita."

She took him outside to the garden. They picked beans, cucumbers, squash, and corn and pulled up carrots until darkness made it hard to see. Zach did not complain when she asked him to help her wash their harvest. Neither did he protest when she reminded him to take his bath—it was the first night in a week that getting him into the tub had not been a struggle. He spent the remainder of the evening alone in his room while she stayed in the den, paying bills and giving him some space. At nine o'clock, she tucked him in without much comment and wished him a good night.

Craig arrived home a few minutes later, frustrated. Neither family he had visited had admitted to knowing anything about a Bert or Bill Lerwick. He had actually stopped by two more Lerwick homes farther away—Kara gave him a hard, silent stare when he admitted it—but the residents had been gone, so he planned to try them again tomorrow.

"How was Zach after I left?" he asked an hour later, as Kara, preparing for bed, stepped out of their bathroom with her robe wrapped around her.

"Scared," she said, "but he behaved better."

He gave her a nervous look. "Was I too hard on him?"

She shook her head. "No, he earned it. But remember how they told us he didn't relate well to men when he first started school? I got the impression from Rita that this Mr. Lerwick wasn't very good with Zach. Maybe Zach understands how to relate to men at school now, like Eddie. But at home it's different."

"He's always been fine around me, ever since that first night," Craig replied.

"Yes, but when you correct him—well, he's never run to hide under the bed when _I've_ gotten after him. But he gets scared of you. It's not your fault. It's something from his past."

"His past." Craig shook his head in frustration. "That's why I have to find this Lerwick guy." With that, he stepped into their bathroom and closed the door.

Kara sat down on the bed next to her pillow and rested her face in her hands. Both of her boys were angry—one at Rhonda and Bert, or Bill, Lerwick; the other...at his father, who didn't see it. But now was not the time to mention it.

Shifting to arrange the bedspread, she noticed an envelope propped up against her pillow. "MOM" was penciled on the front in Zach's handwriting. Inside, he had placed a sheet of paper folded into a card. With colored pencils, he had drawn a picture of himself standing with her—she could tell by the long hair—the two of them smiling under an orange-leafed autumn tree, dark red flowers adorning the grass at their feet.

She opened the card. There were only three words inside:

I'm sorry.

Zechariah

Kara held the card in both hands. Were all boys so exasperating and so beautiful at the same time, or only hers? Glancing over the card again, she wasn't sure whether she wanted to smile or cry. In the end, she did a little of both.

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, knotted themselves into angry fists, but were helpless to intervene. Albert K. was making an arrest halfway across the factory parking lot, his badge in one hand and handcuffs in the other. He whirled his victim—Belinda, the young woman from Ditch's cellar—in a tight circle and shoved her face-first across the hood of her rickety sedan. She protested, but could offer no real resistance. Furious, the figure could only watch from his crouch behind a trash dumpster in the night's darkness. This wasn't right.

"I didn't do nothing!" she yelled in vain. "It was Ditch! He made me do it!" She yelped as Albert K. forced her arms behind her. "I was gonna turn him in. I have evidence! You gotta let me go!"

Her pleas rang futilely into the dark sky. The gloved figure cringed; her story was true. Ditch had betrayed her; her birthday had come and gone, and he had refused to release her from his cadre of delivery personnel as he had promised. The young woman, as _she_ had predicted, had made overtures to the FBI to help them collect evidence on Ditch. Unfortunately, the FBI had assigned the wrong agent to her case. Albert K., though in the employ of the Bureau, was no longer their man. As a favor to Ditch he had framed the poor woman and was now arresting her for what were in fact his own crimes.

The whole situation made the gloved figure want to vomit. For the past two months he had tracked Albert K., always at a respectful distance to avoid detection—and any more shooting. Yet over that time, even from a distance, he had gathered information on the double-agent, enough that soon, perhaps, he could slip some of it to the authorities and have justice executed on the duplicitous man. But how could he do so without involving himself? He had no desire to bring himself to the attention of the authorities; like Albert K., he had much to hide.

Albert K. cuffed Belinda's right wrist. She might deserve to be taken into custody, but not by this man, who had betrayed his oath to the Bureau and committed worse crimes than she. She, at least, had been trying to do the right thing and leave Ditch's employ. And she hadn't told Ditch about the man who was hiding in his cellar. The figure raged inside, but there was nothing he could do for her.

She, however, acted on her own behalf, rolling suddenly and slipping out of Albert K.'s grasp. She darted away, but he chased her down and threw her roughly to the pavement. As he reached down to restrain her again, she cried out and swung her right arm at him; the cuffs struck him across the face, and for a moment he fell behind her, stunned. He recovered and grabbed her before she could flee, pulling her to the ground face-down long enough to cuff her other wrist. Then he maneuvered her to her feet and forced her roughly to his unmarked car. He pressed her into the back seat and drove away.

The figure watched them go, then stepped out from the shadow of the dumpster and made his way to where she had struggled with Albert K. He groped about in his mind for a way to bring her assailant to justice, but what could he do? Belinda deserved better; she had been ready to turn Ditch in to the Bureau. She reminded the figure of another woman a few years ago who had sought justice, only to be rejected and ruined.

The unbidden thought of that other woman made the figure wince. Almost unconsciously, he reached into a pocket, drew out his wallet, and located an old photograph inside it. He held the photo up in the orange light of the parking lot lamps. The woman in the picture was unmistakably Rhonda Lerwick in her prime—no longer young, but mature and capable. Like Belinda, she had chosen to pursue justice, eventually, but had not achieved it. The memory of her failure roused old emotions inside the figure: anger, bitterness, and also, paradoxically, a certain pride.

But the past was done, and Rhonda was no more. The figure slipped the photograph back into his wallet and put it away. There was no point in dwelling on the past. He had tasks to accomplish in the present—the boy, and that task was still proceeding well; and now Albert K., a villain no true Robin Hood could abide. He would bring Albert K. to justice, if there was any way to do it...without being brought to justice himself.

A glint on the ground caught the figure's eye a few steps away. He moved to where he could discern its shape in the lamplight. It was Albert K.'s badge, knocked from his hand as he had struggled with the woman.

His gloved fingers picked up the badge. _A touch of justice,_ the figure thought as he inspected it. _He lost his badge._ How ironic that the figure—no entirely law-abiding citizen himself—would be troubled by the sins of an officer of the law. But to Robin Hood, justice meant something, and those who enforced the law were expected to abide by it themselves for the good of society. Albert K. did not live up to that expectation.

The figure considered retaining the badge; he might like to have it as a keepsake. But he didn't deserve a badge either, he reasoned, not even one tarnished by the sins of its owner. So he retraced his path back to the dumpster and threw it in, then turned his back on it and walked away.

*****

When she made her way sleepily out to the kitchen the next morning, Kara found Zach dressed for school and seated on a stool at the standalone counter, eating toast and oatmeal. As usual, Craig had a bowl ready for her, as well, and she popped it into the microwave. He sat opposite Zach, reading the newspaper, having already finished his breakfast.

"Hey, good looking," Craig greeted Kara, glancing up at her.

Acknowledging him with a smile, she began warming her oatmeal, then stepped over to him, placed her arms around his neck from behind, and kissed him on the cheek. "Good morning." She looked at Zach across the counter. "Did you sleep well, kiddo?"

He looked up at her, nodded solemnly, and returned his attention to his food.

_Hmm,_ she thought, _grumpy again?_ She kept an eye on the two boys as her oatmeal warmed. They were too quiet. Neither seemed interested in making conversation. She caught Craig peeking nervously over the newspaper at Zach, though. Zach, for his part, kept his eyes pointedly on his food, careful not to look at his dad.

Craig refolded the newspaper and walked out of sight down the hall. As he left the room, Zach sighed audibly and let his shoulders sag a little. Kara watched him with concern, then turned and followed Craig to their bedroom.

"You need to talk to him before you leave," she said quietly as Craig pulled a T-shirt on for work. He selected an old sweatshirt to go over the T-shirt—it was cool outside again today. Here at the end of September, fall was in full swing.

"I tried before you got up," he replied matter-of-factly. "He doesn't want to talk."

"He _does,"_ she returned. "But he's upset. He misses you, Craig... And he's scared of you from last night. He needs to know everything's okay. And you can't wait for him to talk to you first. You're the dad."

"All right," Craig said, surprising Kara. She had expected more resistance. "I'll talk with him for a minute before I go."

"Thank you." She hung back in the bedroom as he returned to the kitchen. A moment later she made her way to the front bathroom, where she fiddled in a cabinet to give the appearance of doing something more than eavesdropping.

She heard Craig speak hesitantly. "Hey, Zach... I wanted to tell you that your mom, she, er...she appreciated the card you left for her last night. That was thoughtful."

Kara listened for a response from Zach, but heard none.

After a moment, Craig continued. "So, um...there's a baseball game on tonight."

"There's a baseball game on every night," Zach replied flatly. Well, at least he was speaking.

"This one's the last game before the playoffs. Why don't we watch it after dinner? I know it's a school night, but maybe your mom and I could let you stay up if the game doesn't go too long."

"You won't even be home," Zach accused.

Kara groaned to herself. He could try harder to get along with his dad.

"Well, I do need to check on a couple of places tonight," Craig admitted, "but it shouldn't take long. I might be back by the start of the game. If I'm not, then when I get home you can fill me in on what I missed."

Kara heard Zach scoot his stool back and carry his dishes to the sink. A moment later, he shuffled past the bathroom to his room.

Kara met Craig at the coat rack, where he pulled his jacket on over his sweatshirt. "That didn't go well," he said irritably.

Kara stood there and looked at her husband, trying to come up with something to say. Before anything occurred to her, he leaned over to kiss her on the forehead. "I have to go. Derek's waiting for me." He left through the door to the garage.

When his pickup drove away thirty seconds later, Zach returned from his bedroom with his jacket on and his backpack strapped over it. He looked like he was in no mood to talk, but Kara blocked his path anyway. She straightened his jacket and tousled his hair. He didn't flinch—he really was growing accustomed to physical affection, at least from her.

"I did appreciate the card," she offered.

Zach frowned at her. "He only came back and talked to me because you told him to."

"He _wanted_ to talk with you, Zach. But he was afraid to. When you're angry like this, he's afraid of saying the wrong thing."

"Mom, I'm ten! Why should he be afraid of _me?"_ The boy shifted the straps of the backpack on his shoulders and stepped around her to the front door. "I have to leave or I'll be late," he said.

_Like father, like son,_ Kara thought, watching him escape out the front door. "Have a good day, kiddo!" she called behind him as he walked away from the house. _Naturally, he would inherit his dad's stubbornness._ That wasn't always a bad thing—she admired Craig's, and Zach's, tenacity. But this morning... She shook her head hopelessly, closed the door, and returned to the kitchen to reheat her oatmeal.

The day passed quickly, thanks to a busy afternoon at the nursery. Grover's health was holding, and he entertained Kara and the entire staff with gripes about having so many customers sifting through the fall sales, of which he had plenty. He was a shrewd businessman, Grover; he knew how to attract customers. He also took a few minutes to show her some new tips on preparing various berries and shrubs for the winter. Between his bouts of overacted grumpiness, Grover could supply a deep well of horticultural knowledge.

Kara left work almost half an hour late, the store was so busy, and arrived home a few minutes after Zach. This being the first time he had used his key to let himself into the house, she was pleased to find him safely inside, stretched out on his bed and reading a story Mr. Herd had assigned to the class.

"Hey, kiddo," she greeted him. "How was your day?"

He shrugged. "Okay, I guess." He set his book down for a moment. "I got to use my key." He was making conversation today; this was promising.

"Good for you. And I'm pleased to see you doing your homework. Is it interesting?"

Zach grimaced. "It's about girls. I'd rather be playing soccer."

"Would you play soccer with a girl?" she suggested, seizing the opportunity. He could do with a little aggressive play today, as glum as he had been lately.

Catching her meaning, he marked his page and jumped to his feet.

"Get your ball," Kara told him. "I'll meet you outside in a minute. Oh, and feed Paws on your way—you forgot again this morning."

He grumbled something indiscernible as he fetched the ball from his closet. Kara ignored it, stepped into her room, and chose a sweatshirt to wear outside. When she trotted through the laundry room and out the back door, Zach came around the other side of the house, dribbling the ball with his feet.

"All right, Fleming," she said, "let's see what you've got today." They had played enough times these past few weeks that they had finally tied a makeshift net between two trees at the far end of the yard. She took a position in front of it, daring Zach to score against her. He began with an intensity that Kara thought betrayed frustration just beneath his calm, if flat, demeanor. Yes, this was what he needed.

They played for most of an hour before she had to stop to prepare dinner. "Mom," Zach asked, walking back to the house with her, feet guiding the ball in front of him with small taps, "can I go to Cayden's house tomorrow? He still wants to finish our game. I promise I'll come home by 4:30."

"Maybe," she answered, "if you finish your homework _and_ clean your room tonight. It's messy again."

"Why do I always have to clean my room?" he whined.

She almost laughed. She had heard Jasmine say exactly the same thing to Lia a few years ago in exactly the same tone.

"Because it keeps getting messy," she told him, borrowing the response Lia had given her girls. "If you can figure out how that keeps happening and make it stop, then you won't have to clean it up as often." That last part she added herself.

He spent the next hour in his room while she cooked. Craig arrived home dirtier than usual and took extra time to clean himself up, then joined her and Zach at the dining table just as she served dinner—fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and coleslaw.

The food was good; the conversation, miserable. Kara urged Zach to tell them about his day at school, but he would answer her questions only with "Yeah," "No," "I don't know," or a disinterested shrug. Craig grew visibly frustrated with the boy's reticence, but said nothing.

"How was _your_ day?" Kara asked Craig.

"Good," he answered. "I did a lot of digging in the mud. It's still pretty wet from yesterday's rain." He took a drink of his milk. "You know, I think I can check on the next two Lerwick families and still make it home by the fourth inning of the game. What do you say we watch it together, Zach?"

"Not interested," he responded dully, without looking up.

Craig set his fork down a little too loudly. "How come you're so morose all the time now?" he challenged. "Vegetables are stupid, you won't talk at breakfast, and now you don't want to watch the Mariners? Why are you acting like this?"

"I just don't want to watch the baseball game with you," Zach replied, eyes on his plate.

"You don't want to watch the game, or you don't want to watch _with_ _me?"_

"Craig—" Kara cautioned, but he spoke over her.

"Kara, I don't like his attitude right now. I don't know what's going on, but it needs to change." He turned his eyes on Zach. "We are doing everything we can think of to give you a good home, and suddenly it's not good enough for you? You liked it well enough until school started! Maybe that's it. Is there something wrong at school? Because if that's what's going on, I'll take care of it. I'll go down there tomorrow—"

"Craig!" Kara broke in, raising her voice. Zach had slid slowly lower in his chair under his dad's assault. Craig turned to her with an angry look, but she held her ground. "Let's discuss this in the bedroom."

"No," he returned, "we can discuss it right here. Do _you_ know why he's acting like this? Something's going on, and I want to get to the bottom of it!"

Kara gave her husband a stern stare. Men could be so oblivious, particularly in the face of something so obvious. "You want to talk about it here, Craig, in front of Zach? Fine. He's angry! He's been angry for a month! Are you just now catching on?"

"Oh, he's angry?" Craig answered sarcastically. "There's more to it than that, Kara. I expected it to come, but not with such a bad attitude."

"Expected _what_ to come?"

"Don't you see it? He's regressing!" he said, as if that explained everything. When she gaped at him, he went on. "He's reverting back to the way he behaved before he came to us. He's staying inside more, keeping to himself, doesn't want to play outside—he's going back to the lifestyle he grew up with! This shouldn't surprise us. It's a big change, living with a family. Everything's new—he's having a hard time adjusting."

"Adjusting? _What?"_ She glanced at Zach. Before, he had simply been morose; now he was anxious. He had never seen them argue before, she realized—at least not so intensely.

Kara turned back to Craig. "He's not adjusting, and he's not regressing. He's trying to get your attention, you bozo!"

He had the audacity to give her a dumbfounded look. "My _attention?_ What are you talking about?"

Kara huffed. "I'm talking about how you've been gone every waking moment, out looking for Rhonda Lerwick, and now Bill, or Bert, or whatever his name is!" She was yelling, with Craig sitting just a few feet across the table from her and Zach right there watching, but she didn't care.

"Can I go to my room?" Zach asked quietly as she paused for breath.

"No!" Kara and Craig barked at him together.

"You stay right there, young man," Kara ordered.

She faced Craig again. "Four different times this month, you've told Zach you'd go out and play catch with him tomorrow, and every time he went outside with his glove and waited for you, only to have you come home too late or come home and completely ignore him!"

"I haven't ignored him!" Craig protested, standing up and beginning to pace. "We went out and played catch just—" He hesitated.

"Last Friday," Zach inserted.

"Right, Friday! We played catch on Friday!"

"For _five minutes,"_ the boy said, resentment clear in his voice.

Kara nodded and glared at Craig with one eyebrow raised. "That's the only time you two have played catch since he started back to school. A whole month, Craig—five minutes! And then off you went again, looking for someone who might possibly know 'Grandfather' and be able to tell you—"

"Hey!" Craig exploded. "Do you think I _like_ doing this, all this searching across the city?" He jabbed a finger toward Zach, who sank another inch lower into his seat. "He's the one I'm doing it for! If I didn't care about _him_ more than anything in the world except you, if I wasn't scared to death that somebody's going to come claiming he belongs to them—Remember Tiffy, Kara? Remember? _That's_ why I'm doing this!"

_"_ _I_ know that, Craig," Kara reasoned—still loudly, and getting to her feet to face him eye to eye—"but he's a boy! All he sees is his dad, the one he always dreamed of having, _leaving_ every night instead of spending time with him— _choosing_ not to spend time with him, one night after another! Is this the kind of father Rhonda Lerwick told him he would have someday? Why do you think he threw his ball and glove down the hall that night last week? Huh? Because he didn't mind that you were ignoring him again, breaking your promise again?"

Craig took a step backward, eyes wide and suddenly uncertain. He looked from Kara to Zach and back to Kara again. "No, I—We were looking for—I didn't—"

Kara cut him off. "Yes, it's going to be hard for him to adjust to living in a family sometimes, especially now that we're getting used to each other! Yes, he's going to have bad days—everybody does! But this is way beyond that, Craig! How many days since school started have I come home and played soccer with Zach because he needed attention and you hadn't been around to give him any?"

"Twelve," Zach said quietly.

Craig shot him a look of surprise and betrayal.

"And every night—nearly—you've left me here to deal with him by myself. So then he started taking it out on _me."_

Craig looked at Zach sharply this time, but Kara stepped around the table and jerked his attention back to her with a hand flat on his chest. He had such a strong chest—it infuriated her to catch herself thinking so in the heat of the argument.

"I can deal with him," she told Craig, less loudly. "What I _can't_ deal with is his father ignoring him, going out in search of his past and missing out on him in the present. _He's not Tiffy,_ Craig—he's Zach, and he's here, and he needs _you!"_

Craig met her eyes again, and all the anger that had filled them a moment ago suddenly melted away, replaced by denial that matured into sorrow as she watched. "I know he's not Tiffy... I...I didn't mean to not—I just—," he said weakly, and gave up. His shoulders slumped.

_Amazing,_ Kara thought, _how they even slump their shoulders alike._ She had seen a lot of that from Zach lately.

Craig turned to the boy. He spoke hesitantly. "Is that...what's been bothering you, Zach?"

Zach refused to look up at him. He folded his arms and said nothing.

"Hey, you haven't been behaving properly, either, Zechariah," Kara admonished him. "Your dad offered to spend some time with you tonight, and you turned him down. Don't be rude when he's trying to make amends."

She waited. Craig ran a hand through his hair.

Zach fidgeted in his chair. He didn't look up, but he did finally speak again, in a small, uneven voice. "I just wanted to play catch."

Craig's eyes took on his calculating look for a brief moment, as if he were working through one last problem. "All right," he said, "I'd like that, too. I can...go find these Lerwick people another day."

Zach looked cautiously up at Craig, eyes wary but also hopeful. Kara was glad to see the hope. There had not been much in those eyes for a while.

"Go get your glove and ball, Zach," she encouraged him.

He looked down at his plate, where half of his food lay uneaten. "What about dinner?"

"Finish it later. Go play catch." She raised her eyebrows at Craig.

He nodded his agreement. "I'll get my glove, too."

The boys took off down the hall, careful to give each other ample space, and Kara leaned back against the kitchen counter, catching her breath. Marissa was right—boys were exasperating!

She heard them exit through the laundry room and the back door a few seconds later. Quietly, she stepped out the side door and knelt on the patio. Paws trotted over to her and offered himself for petting. Kara obliged him as she listened to the boys; from where they had stationed themselves in the yard, the corner of the house blocked her view of them and theirs of her, so she could listen in on them unobserved.

The ball thumped into one of their gloves, then into the other's glove a few seconds later. Back and forth it went. They said not a word.

Kara rubbed Paws' head. "Ever thought about having kids, Paws?" she whispered. He looked up at her affectionately. "Let me tell you—they're complicated." He thumped his tail enthusiastically on the concrete. "Yeah, I know you like him. But all _you_ have to do is play with him. You don't have to raise him."

She listened as the two guys continued to toss the ball between them. After ten minutes, she gave up and returned to the dining room to finish her food. They still hadn't spoken to each other. _But they're boys,_ she told herself. _Maybe if they have a ball to throw, they don't need to talk._ Nevertheless, she worried about them.

When her food was gone, Kara cleared the table, except for Craig's and Zach's plates, which she left at their places. She washed the dishes, glancing inconspicuously out the window behind her. They were still playing catch as she finished, but now Craig was squatted down like a catcher and Zach was throwing from a windup, like a pitcher. She took that as a good sign.

It was getting dark outside, but they did not come in. Kara looked for something to occupy her mind while she waited. Nothing interested her at the moment. Finally she decided to sit down and watch the baseball game on TV. _What's gotten into me?_ she wondered. _I never watch baseball—not without Craig, at least._

For half an hour she watched. At last, when the cloudy sky was fully dark, Zach dragged himself in through the side door, arms draped across the top of his head, still wearing his glove on his right hand. He joined Kara in the den and collapsed beside her on the couch. "I'm exhausted!" he cried happily.

He was _happy?_ Kara hadn't seen him honestly happy in a week!

She tousled his hair. "You're all sweaty," she noted, wiping her hand off on his jeans. "You guys must have been playing hard out there."

"Dad said I might be a pitcher next year," he reported, fixing his eyes on the TV. "He said I've gotten stronger. I threw a lot of strikes, Mom!"

"Wow, good for you, kiddo." She looked up as Craig came into the room and took a seat on the other side of Zach.

"Is your arm sore, pal?" he asked.

"A little," Zach replied, rubbing his left shoulder.

"We probably threw too long for your age. If it feels tight tomorrow, we'll need to do some light tossing to loosen it up after school."

With a satisfied nod, Zach accepted the offer to play catch again tomorrow.

"Zach said he was pitching to you," Kara prompted.

Craig's eyes lit up. She hadn't seen him so excited in a while, either. "He was throwing hard because he was mad—but he was throwing accurately. It was impressive. So I squatted down and told him to hit the strike zone, and he nailed it almost every time. We might have ourselves a southpaw!" He patted Zach on the back, and Zach grinned.

Kara just shook her head. How did boys do this—going out unable to speak to each other and coming back best friends?

That night as Craig and Zach finished their dinner and watched the game, their home was peaceful again. Kara broke out some chocolate ice cream and shared it with them in her own private celebration.
Chapter 15

"Will you let me call the police? Craig?" Kara stood barefoot in the doorway between the kitchen and the garage the following morning, watching her husband throw a few tools into the cab of his pickup. His hesitation did not surprise her; he didn't want to involve the authorities. It seemed to her, though, the best way to proceed. Craig, even with her help, couldn't continue searching for connections to the Lerwicks forever.

He looked up at her, running a hand through his hair. How could a guy who did that so often still have so much hair? At last he shrugged reluctantly. "Maybe you're right. Can I have today to think about it?"

"Provided that you stay home tonight and don't go off looking for anymore Lerwicks," she answered, rather more bluntly than she had intended. "Ben and Lia and the girls are coming over for dinner."

"I remember," he assured her. "Besides, I really do need to have Zach throw me some soft tosses, loosen up that arm so he doesn't injure it. I pushed him too hard last night."

Kara, in her robe, stepped across the garage's cold concrete to kiss her husband. "He loved it. He was genuinely happy when he came in, all dripping with sweat."

"I was almost as sweaty as he was. He worked me pretty hard, too." Craig looked down at her sheepishly. "You were right last night. Thanks." He wrapped his arms around her.

"You're welcome, you bozo," she replied, enjoying his warmth. "Think about it, okay?—about calling the police tomorrow. They're not going to take him away, not once we show them everything we've learned about him."

"All right, I'll think on it. It _could_ save us a lot of time." He gave her a small smile as he climbed into the pickup. She watched him back it out into the street.

The two boys had gotten along with each other just fine this morning. One would never have known there had been any tension between them just last night. For the first time in a couple of weeks, Zach had been his usual, talkative self again, though with just a bit of an edge to his voice. He was tired; Craig had let him stay up to watch the end of the Mariners game.

Now it was nearly 8:30. Kara returned to the kitchen and heard Zach brushing his teeth in the bathroom. "Time to go, kiddo!" she called to him. She went to his room to fetch his backpack for him; the room was a minefield of books, toys, and laundry strewn across the floor. She tiptoed through it to reach the backpack, then back through it to the hall.

Zach drew his jacket from the coat rack as she approached. "Thanks," he said politely as he received the backpack from her. He pulled his ID tag out of its smallest pocket and draped the attached orange lanyard around his neck. This year's tag showed an older Zechariah Fleming than last year's and listed his teacher as "MR. HERD—FIFTH GRADE."

Kara opened the front door for him and followed him outside. "Do you have your key?"

He checked his pocket. "Yeah. Hey, Mom," he asked, stepping out into the grass before turning back to her, "can I go to Cayden's house after school? I won't stay there too long. We just need to finish our game."

Kara cocked one eyebrow at him. "Is your room clean?"

His face fell. "I didn't have a chance to clean it last night. I was playing catch with Dad. And before that, I was playing soccer with you."

"It would only have taken you five minutes. You could have done it this morning."

"If it will only take five minutes, can't I please clean it after I get home from Cayden's house?" Despite the "please," the boy's tone hinted at impertinence.

"No, Zechariah," Kara replied, growing impatient. "You have to clean it _before_ you go. And I want it clean before your cousins come over tonight."

"But Mom—"

She planted her fists on her hips and glared at the boy. "Zechariah, you come straight home from school, you understand me? Tell Cayden you can come over tomorrow _if_ your room is clean."

Zach stomped his foot on the grass—the impertinence was full-blown now. "You have more rules than Grandfather!" he yelled at her. He turned and stormed away across the grass.

That made her angry. "Yeah? Well, maybe you'd rather go back and live with him!"

He spun and sneered at her. "I can't, Mom. He's dead!"

"Oh, well, maybe we can find another place for you, then!" As soon as she spoke the words, she cringed, ashamed.

Zach, though, just spun back around and kept walking. In moments, he was down the street and out of sight.

Kara covered her face in her hands. Last night had turned out so wonderfully. Why did she have to ruin this morning, blurting out something so foolish? Not that the boy hadn't helped.

This great task of parenting—at the moment, she wasn't sure whether she liked it or not. She was furious with Zach, and he deserved it. At the same time, as she glanced back to where he had disappeared down the street, she missed the boy already, even if he was just on his way to school. She would try to do better when he came home. Hopefully he would, too.

*****

Kara's work at Grover's that day was six hours of hectic running, mostly in the rain. Jeff was sick, and that left them shorthanded for the second day of Grover's popular end-of-the-season sale. By the time she made it home at 3:45, she was worn out, cold, dirty, and ready for a warm, relaxing shower. Maybe she would take that shower, once she had dinner in the oven.

She parked at the edge of the driveway, leaving Craig plenty of room to pull the pickup into the garage when he arrived. Coming to the front door, she began to insert her key, but thought to check the knob first—it refused to budge. Good for Zach. Craig had told him to leave the door locked once he got inside.

She unlocked it and went in. It was quiet, just like yesterday when she had found the boy in his room, working on his homework. Maybe, if he had already cleaned his room and if he finished his homework soon, she could feel justified in allowing him to run over to Cayden's for an hour. Or then again, maybe she shouldn't, after his rudeness this morning. Or maybe she would just wait and see how his attitude was this afternoon.

She set her handbag on the dining table and went to check on him. His door was slightly ajar. "Hey, kiddo," she announced herself, pushing it open. The room was empty. "Zach?" she called, but he did not reply.

She walked to the den; maybe he had fallen asleep on the couch. As tired as he had been this morning, it wouldn't surprise her. But he was not there, either. "Zach?"

A thought occurred to her. "Oh, you had better not have, young man," she warned him under her breath. "If you went to Cayden's after I told you not to—"

She opened the side door and stepped onto the patio. Paws was there to greet her, wagging his tail happily. If Paws was waiting here beside the door, that meant Zach wasn't in the back yard. "Zechariah!" she called anyway, just to be sure. There was no response.

Back inside, and beginning to fume at his audacity, sneaking off to Cayden's when she had explicitly instructed him to come home, she checked each room. Maybe he was hiding from her, playing a joke—he was his granddad's grandson, after all. She didn't find him, though, not even when she peeked beneath his bed and then hers.

He wasn't home. She took back her pride in him for locking the door behind himself when he had arrived. At the kitchen counter, she dug around in a pile of notes. Finding the one with Cayden's number on it, she took a deep, calming breath, picked up her phone, and dialed.

When Cayden's mother answered on the other end, Kara said, "Mrs. Tyler, this is Kara Fleming, Zach's mom. Is Zach there at your house?"

"Hi, Kara. No, Cayden said Zach can't come over until he cleans his room," Mrs. Tyler replied.

"Hmm... Well, that's good," Kara said. "At least he didn't disobey me." Her belly began to churn, though, as she wondered where he might be. "Would Cayden happen to know if Zach might have gone to another friend's house after school?"

"I'll ask him," Mrs. Tyler said. Kara heard her call to Cayden in the background, and then her voice came back on the line a few seconds later. "The last time he saw Zach was in the hallway when school let out. He thought Zach was going to walk home."

"Hmm, okay," Kara said, thinking hard. Her pulse had picked up and she could feel herself beginning to sweat, though there was no need—not yet. "He must have had to stay after school. If he does come by, would you have him call me right away? He still needs to pick up his room. We're having company over tonight."

Kara called the school next, but there was no answer—only the school's voicemail. She glanced at the time—four o'clock on the dot. The office must have just closed. In that case, they would be sending Zach home about now. So she waited. It would only take him a few minutes to walk home from Briar Point.

She did not wait patiently, though. She paced the length of the hallway several times, then wandered out to the road to watch for him. _He should have come around the corner by now,_ she thought, checking her watch. She walked to the end of the street and looked toward the school, then in the opposite direction. There was no sign of him.

Kara jogged back to the house. _Where could he have gone?_

She started to pull out her phone, but caught herself. There was no need to bother Craig at work just yet. Zach probably was at the school. She locked the front door, hopped back in her sedan, and drove the two blocks to Briar Point.

Once inside, she caught voices coming from an open classroom a few doors down from the entrance. She hurried to that room, knocked, and stepped inside. Mr. Herd and a few other teachers were gathered around a table at the far side of the room. They looked up as she came in.

"Mrs. Fleming," Mr. Herd greeted her. He stood and came to join her outside the doorway.

"Sorry to bother you," she said nervously. "I'm looking for Zach. Is he still here?"

"As far as I know, he left right after school," Mr. Herd answered her in his deep, resonant voice, his black eyebrows furrowed. "Did he not go home?"

She shook her head. Might Craig have picked him up for some reason?—some secret surprise they hadn't told her about, and now they were caught in traffic somewhere?

Noticing that the teachers were all watching her with concern, she shrugged offhandedly. "I guess his dad must have picked him up. I'll just give him a call outside."

Mr. Herd nodded and followed her to the outer door. "Is everything all right, Mrs. Fleming?"

"Yes, I'm sure it's fine." _That's not entirely true,_ she admitted to herself. "I just need to give Craig a call. He and Zach, they like to pull pranks sometimes—Zach especially. They probably planned something to surprise me."

Mr. Herd opened the door for her, watching as she made her way to the car.

Once there, she did call Craig. His phone rang several times—an eternity, it seemed—before he answered. "Hey, good-looking," he greeted her.

"Craig," she said urgently, "is Zach with you?"

He hesitated for the briefest moment. "No, I'm still at work with Derek... Isn't he at home?"

"He didn't come home, Craig, and school let out over an hour ago. I called Cayden's mom—he's not at their house, either. I'm at Briar Point right now. Mr. Herd said he left right after school. Craig, where else could he be?"

Craig was silent. Kara could almost hear him calculating in his mind, thinking through the possibilities. "Do you think he ran away?" he asked.

"Oh, no," she groaned. That was an option she had not considered. It caught her off-guard. "I should've thought of that. We had an argument this morning. I was so stupid. The last thing I said to him was that we might find him a new home. Maybe he thought I was angry enough to actually send him away."

"Like he thought Derek and I were going to trade kids," Craig replied. "All right, why don't you go home in case he shows up and call whoever you think he might have gone to—Ben and Lia, Shanice..."

"Rita..."

"Right, Rita. Good thinking. If he knows how to find her, he might have gone to her. I'll tell Derek what's going on and come straight home. Give me thirty minutes. And then we'll figure out what to do next."

"Okay," Kara agreed. "If I find out anything, I'll call you."

She drove home and, after searching for the boy inside the house again and finding only his absence, she returned to the front porch to watch the street and make her calls. Rain that had subsided for a couple of hours resumed a light sprinkling. She hoped Zach wasn't out in it somewhere—though, she admitted, if he was, he was probably enjoying getting wet. The thought didn't quite make her smile; that churning in her gut had worsened.

Craig arrived home sooner than expected, his face taut with his own anxiety. "Any luck?" he asked as he hopped out of the pickup.

"Nothing," she responded. "I asked Ben to stay home in case Zach goes there, although I don't see why he would—he knows they were coming over tonight. But just in case..."

"If he panicked," Craig pointed out, placing a supportive hand on Kara's back, "there's no telling what he might be thinking."

"I called Shanice and Rita. Neither of them has heard from him, either. And I checked at Grover's. I tried to think of everyone he knows—adults, anyway. But what if he went to a friend's house to hide, somewhere other than Cayden's?"

"Then the parents will call," Craig assured her, "just like we would. That was the first thing we would have done when he showed up here, if we had known who to call."

Kara rubbed her forehead. It ached with worry and concentration.

"Let's go look for him," Craig proposed. "I don't like the thought of waiting here while he's wandering the streets out there somewhere."

"What if he comes home while we're gone?"

"I'll leave my phone and a note for him to call us," Craig answered.

"Okay." Kara was grateful that Craig felt the same way she did, not content to sit here and wait, hoping Zach came home on his own. She fetched her jacket from inside.

Craig stepped into the house just long enough to write a note and tape it to the front door. Then he joined Kara in her car and pulled into the street. "Where do you think he might have gone?"

"Not to the police," Kara replied. "He's scared they'll take him away somewhere. Maybe Rita's apartment, if he could make it. But she's four or five miles from here. Surely he's not trying—"

"I doubt it. That's a long walk." Craig sighed as he turned the corner at the end of their block. "Let's check the neighborhood first. Most likely, he's close by. He probably decided to come back home, but got lost."

Kara peered out the window. Despite the rain falling into the car, she kept it rolled down for a clearer view.

They patrolled the neighborhood for an hour, then checked back at home. Craig's note was still on the door and his phone inside on the counter, the house was still empty, and Paws was still eager for their attention.

"Craig, I don't like this at all," Kara told him, her voice quavering from nerves as they looked into his room; there was no indication that he had been there. "I was so mean. I wasn't thinking about what he might hear when I told him I would find him a new home. He must feel so betrayed!"

"Hey." Craig took her shoulders consolingly. "It's not your fault. He knew you expected him home after school. He just overreacted, that's all. Having parents is still new to him. We'll talk with him about it when we find him..." Craig looked around the messy room. "Did he take anything unusual with him this morning, things he wouldn't want to leave behind? Anything that might give us a clue where he went?"

Kara scanned the floor and peeked inside his closet. "His soccer ball is here. His baseball glove, his cap... Those are his favorite things. But we didn't argue until he was out the door on his way to school."

"He could have come back for them after school."

"And risked one of us being here? Maybe he decided it wasn't worth it."

Craig puffed out his cheeks and exhaled loudly, thinking. "He has his key, right? Maybe he plans to come back and get his things later, when we're gone. Or...maybe he's hiding like he used to do under his bed—waiting until he thinks you're calm and it's safe to come home."

Vexed, and drained by apprehension, Kara pounded her fist on the wall. From the corner of her eyes, she saw Craig watching her. "Go look again?" she asked.

He nodded. "I don't know what else to do. If we don't find him by dark..."

"Then we call the police," Kara finished.

Craig looked at her grimly. "We'll find him, Kara." His eyes did not seem as confident to Kara as his voice did; he was afraid, though he was trying to hide it. She appreciated the attempt.

*****

Standing beside Kara's car on the gravel shoulder of a road a few blocks from home, Craig checked the sky. Through the cloud cover and rain dusk was falling, and still they had found no trace of Zach. Craig wiped nervous sweat from his hands onto his grubby work jeans; he had not had an opportunity to change into clean ones.

Kara stood across the street, speaking with a couple who had been walking together in the rain, the hoods of their jackets pulled up against the weather. They shook their heads in response to her, and she hurried back to the car. Ben, Lia, Jasmine, and Marissa waited there with Craig; Derek and Douglas stood beside them. They had insisted on joining the search an hour ago.

"No luck," Kara reported. "They saw a boy come by here, but it wasn't Zach."

She was clearly anxious. Craig felt the same way himself, a stabbing wound of fear slowly piercing his gut.

"What now?" Derek asked.

Craig worked the problem. Zach had run away—it made sense. He had been angry, Kara had been angry, he had panicked... But where had he gone? Kara had called everyone again—Florence, who had said she would stay late at Grover's to keep watch there, and Rita; Shanice, Shauna, Brooke, and Jayda had remained at their respective homes to keep watch there. So far, Zach had not gone to any of them.

"Do you think he would go to the church?" Craig suggested.

Kara mulled it over. "Maybe to look for Ben. Or to hide. I don't know." She turned to Ben.

"We'll go take a look," he offered.

Craig nodded and worked the problem further. _Why did he run? He was afraid of being sent away. Why_ go _away to avoid being_ sent _away? Because he didn't know what else to do. So he will hide and then come home...if he can find his way. Should we still call the police? They might scare him even more. But they might find him, too._ And as the sky darkened over Seattle, that was becoming an urgent need.

"Craig," Kara said, "let's check the neighborhood around the school."

"Douglas and I will drive around south of here," Derek suggested, "see if we can spot him. If we don't see him, we'll meet up with you in an hour."

"All right," Craig agreed. "We'll call the police if we don't find him by then."

The three families parted ways, each driving off in a different direction. Craig and Kara turned into their neighborhood a minute later and approached Briar Point. There were a few lights on at the school, shining in the growing darkness.

"Look, that's Eddie's car," Kara said, pointing toward the parking lot. "Let's go talk to him. Maybe Zach told him something."

Craig steered the car into the lot, and they parked and made their way to the main entrance. It was locked, but the hall lights were on. Craig pounded on the glass door with a fist, and they waited. No one appeared inside, so he jogged around the edge of the school to a set of windows from which light filtered through drawn vertical blinds. Kara followed at a trot. Between the blinds, he could make out someone moving inside.

He knocked on a window. A silhouette looked up and came toward them, and two hands cautiously pulled the blinds apart. It was Eddie.

The young man's green eyes shot open. "Hi!" he yelled through the glass. "Hang on!" He hurried to open the nearest door, the back door to a classroom. "What are you guys doing here?" he asked, beckoning them inside. "Where's Zach?"

"We can't find him," Kara told Eddie. The young man's goateed face instantly took on a look of deep concern.

"He didn't come home after school," Craig explained. "Didn't go home with any friends we know of, didn't go to our relatives... We don't know where he is. We saw your car and wondered if maybe he had told you something, maybe about being upset, running away..."

"No," Eddie replied quickly, "I have the evening shift today. Everyone was gone by the time I got here."

Kara sighed and clapped her hands on top of her head. "Where are you hiding, Zechariah?" she groaned. "Just come home, kiddo. _Just come home."_

"He ran away?" Eddie asked.

"He and Kara had an argument this morning," Craig answered. "We think he might be hiding somewhere."

"Was he scared? He hides when he's scared." Eddie looked up at the wall, thinking.

Kara raised one eyebrow. "How do you know that?'

"Huh?" Eddie flinched, snapping out of his thoughts to meet her eyes again. "Oh—he used to hide from Mr. Lopez, the principal, if he thought he was in trouble. Not anymore, though. I found him hiding in the janitor's closet one time." He thought a little more. "Was he scared? When you argued with him?"

"I didn't think so at the time," Kara said. "Just stubborn. But now I don't know... Maybe." She stepped out into the hall and gazed down it. "Could he be hiding here somewhere, Eddie? Maybe he didn't come home because he never left the school."

Eddie loosed a set of keys from his belt. "We can find out," he said. Then he grinned at Kara. "Janitors get keys to every room...well, almost."

He took a few steps into the hall and unlocked the nearest classroom. Kara and Craig followed him inside it, and the three of them searched it together. Really, Craig noticed, Eddie did most of the searching himself. He was thorough and efficient. Kara and Craig did their part to check that classroom and the next, but Eddie was so quick that they weren't much help.

"He could search the school faster alone than you and I could together," Kara whispered to Craig as they watched Eddie unlock and rifle through the third classroom they came to.

"Well, he does work here," Craig pointed out. Being a custodian, it was only natural that the young man would know the building well, every closet and cupboard and hiding space.

The Flemings followed along as Eddie hunted through the restrooms, the janitor's closet, the kitchen, and every classroom along the way. He moved systematically from room to room. They found nothing, but Craig had a feeling... This had been a home away from home for Zach for five years. What better place to hide, if the youngster could do it when no one was looking?

The gym was easy to scan; it offered few places for a boy to conceal himself. The library was trickier, crowded as it was with tables and bookshelves. Kara and Craig helped with that room, but Zach was not there to be found. They searched every classroom, every nook and cranny, every storage room—any space large enough for a boy to squeeze into.

Last of all, they checked the front office. Eddie unlocked the door and led Craig inside, with Kara right behind them. They fanned out across the room. "Zach?" Kara called, peeking under a desk.

Ten seconds later, they met at the only room left in the building, Mr. Lopez's office, tucked away at the back of the larger office. Eddie tried the knob, but it was locked. "This is the one room I don't get a key for," he told them. "Mr. Lopez doesn't like me cleaning in there when he's not around."

"Zach couldn't have snuck in there anyway, right?" Craig asked. "Not with people working in the office after school."

Eddie shrugged. "He's clever, the little tyke." There was a small window in the door, and Eddie peered through it, then knocked. "Zach? Are you in there, kid?" He put his ear to the door, listening.

Hearing nothing, he reached into his pants pocket and drew out a pair of tiny tools. The first was a short, cylindrical strip of metal folded into the shape of an L. He inserted the longer end into the door's lock.

"Eddie, you don't need to break in," Kara said. "Like Craig was saying, Zach couldn't have—"

But Eddie, ignoring her, thrust the second tool into the lock, above the first. It was flat, with one edge ridged, like a miniature hacksaw. With one hand he held the first tool in place; with the other, he jiggled the second rapidly up and down. There was a click, and he turned the L-shaped tool ninety degrees. The knob turned with it, and the door popped open, swinging inward.

Eddie gave Kara a satisfied grin and stepped into Mr. Lopez's office. Craig followed him in. The young man checked under the desk, under the table against one wall, and inside the closet. Then he looked back at Craig and Kara.

"Not here," he said. There was urgency in his voice. He met Craig's eyes, then Kara's. "We should search the neighborhood."

"We already have," Craig told him. "We have people out there now. We checked with the neighbors. We called his friend Cayden's house. We searched every street within ten blocks—twenty."

Eddie gazed at him uneasily. "This is not good."

Kara took Craig's arm and drew him out of the principal's office, and Eddie shut the door behind them. "We need to call the police, Craig," she said in a low tone.

He hesitated, thinking. Calling the police did not necessarily mean telling them how recently Zach had come to them. Besides, Kara was ready to tell the police anyway. And so was Craig; he had made that decision during work this afternoon. Kara was right—let the police search for Zach's origins with the resources at their disposal. Craig himself needed to focus on caring for the youngster here and now...which, at this moment, meant calling the police.

He nodded soberly. "All right. Let's just make sure he hasn't gone back home first."

Eddie escorted them out of the office and through the main entrance, shutting off the lights behind him. Kara, sad and anxious, turned to him. "Eddie, thank you. I'm sorry we took up so much of your time."

He flushed a little at her praise. "I'll come with you."

Craig ran a hand through his hair. "We appreciate that, Eddie, but I don't know what you could do."

"I don't either," Eddie said, "but I'd like to help. He's a really special kid."

Craig and Kara looked at each other, Kara raising her eyebrows to let him know this was his call. "Well, I guess it couldn't hurt," he decided.

Eddie followed them in his car as they drove the two blocks home. Kara scanned the yards they passed, still hoping to spot Zach. "I like being a mom, Craig," she said suddenly. He glanced at her as they rounded the first corner. "Not this part, of course, but I want him to come home. I'd want him to be found if he was someone else's child, too, you know, but he's _ours_..." She gulped and continued searching through the window, peering into the pools of light provided by the street lamps.

They turned the second corner, Eddie rounding it after them. A vehicle was parked in front of their house.

"It's the police!" Kara exclaimed, her eyes widening. "Craig, they must have found him!"

He pulled into the driveway. Before he had stopped the car, Kara jumped out and raced to the police cruiser. Two shapes stepped out of it as she approached. Officer Garrenton, Craig saw as he hurried out of the car himself, climbed out of the driver's side. From the passenger side came a man, leaner and taller than Craig, mustached, dressed in a shirt and tie with a sport coat over them.

"Did you find him?" Kara called as she ran to them. She reached Officer Garrenton and the man at the edge of the grass.

"Find whom, Mrs. Fleming?" Officer Garrenton asked.

"Zach," she gasped, breathing hard. "Is he with you?"

Craig came up next to Kara and took her hand.

Officer Garrenton shared a dark look with the other man. He took a step toward them. "Clint Nyler, FBI," he said. He passed Kara a photograph, then flipped the switch on a small flashlight and shone it onto the picture. "Is this your son?"

Kara received it, and she and Craig examined it together. "Yes," they both said.

"But," Kara continued, "he's older now. This must have been taken a year or two ago. How did you get this? Do you know where he is?"

Eddie joined them and stood a little off to the side, listening from the shadows. Officer Garrenton spared him a brief glance before she responded to Kara. "We had expected him to be with _you."_

"He didn't come home from school," Kara explained. Her worried eyes jumped from Officer Garrenton to Agent Nyler and back again. "We've been looking for him all evening. We searched the neighborhood, the school... He ran away. We had an argument this morning, Zach and I. I didn't think he would panic like that. But he does sometimes—like the time he saw you and ran to hide under his bed."

Officer Garrenton nodded thoughtfully and glanced at the FBI agent.

Agent Nyler held Kara's gaze. "I hope you're right, Mrs. Fleming, that your son ran away. Unfortunately, we have reason to think he may be in greater danger than that."

Craig took the words like a blow just beneath his ribs, driving all the air from his lungs.

Kara's face, already strained, went taut. "What kind of danger?"

Agent Nyler pointed to the photograph. "This picture was sent to us yesterday by an undercover agent in Singapore. He's infiltrated a human trafficking ring based in southeastern Asia. He didn't know the boy's name, only that he lives in Seattle. We got lucky—we were looking for one face among millions, and Officer Garrenton just happened to know that face." He paused to draw in a deep breath. "Apparently someone has paid this group a lot of money to kidnap your son."

"What?" Craig blurted out. _"Zach?_ He's just a normal kid! Why him?"

"We were hoping you could help us figure that out," Agent Nyler replied evenly, watching them.

"He's hardly even been out of the city," Kara exclaimed, "let alone the country! Why would criminals in Asia want him?"

"It may be that someone in _this_ country targeted him," Agent Nyler answered, "and hired this group from overseas to do the job. They're good at what they do. If you can tell us why someone might want your son, that information might help us find him." He looked at Kara intently.

Kara, for her part, said nothing, but just stood there with her mouth open.

"With all due respect, Mrs. Fleming," Agent Nyler said, "there's something you're not telling us. We know he's not actually your son."

"What?" Kara blurted, recoiling. "Yes, he is! We have the papers to prove it!"

"The birth certificate is a fraud," Agent Nyler said in a carefully unemotional voice. "No woman named Della Appler has ever been licensed as a midwife in the state of Washington."

"And unless I'm quite mistaken," Officer Garrenton added in her motherly, no-nonsense tone, "you don't have any pictures of young Zach from before that night I brought him to your house. You really _hadn't_ ever seen him before, had you?"

Craig swallowed hard. Kara gripped his hand so tightly that she began to cut off his circulation. "We can still prove he's our son," she said quietly.

"We were going to call you anyway," Craig told Officer Garrenton.

She raised an eyebrow curiously. Kara turned to Craig with a look of surprise and gratitude.

He gave her hand a squeeze. "Kara's been asking me to for a while." He glanced up at the dark, cloudy sky. Cool rain continued to sprinkle their little group. "Can we explain inside?"

Agent Nyler received the picture back from Kara. "Quickly."

Craig and Kara led the two officers toward the house. Kara noticed Eddie hanging back and beckoned him to follow. "Don't stay out here in the rain, Eddie."

"I don't want to be in the way," he replied, ducking his head. "I'll just go look around the neighborhood for Zach."

"No," Craig admonished, "if Agent Nyler is right, we're not going to find Zach wandering the neighborhood." It was like another shot to the gut, saying that.

"Agent—Nyler?" Eddie spluttered, his jaw dropping.

The agent glanced back at Eddie.

Eddie gulped. "You, er—you're in the newspaper a lot. Solving crimes." He shut his mouth and dropped his eyes. "Sorry. Dumb thing to say." He seemed decidedly uneasy.

Craig felt uneasy himself, with his son missing and probably kidnapped, and with a pair of law enforcement officers here to question whether Zach was really his son at all, perhaps concerned that he and Kara themselves might have arranged Zach's disappearance. Fighting to keep his apprehension in check, he squeezed Kara's hand once more and escorted the group into the house.
Chapter 16

Pain throbbed through Zach's arms and legs. His back ached, too, from being bent double for so long. He had stopped sobbing a while ago, not because he was tough, but because he had simply run out of tears.

He was terrified. Faster than he could react, a man had jumped out of a passing SUV, grabbed him, and flung him, backpack and all, into the rear of the vehicle. A second man had sped them away while the first had tied him up, knotting his wrists and ankles together in front of him with a cord, forcing his arms between his knees. Even now, the cord was incredibly tight. The man hadn't been muscular like Derek, but he had been so strong anyway, like Dad.

The whole thing had happened so quickly, Zach had hardly had a chance to fight back. In the SUV, he had thrown himself this way and that, tugged against the cord, worked at the knot with his fingers—anything to free himself. But in the end, all he had been able to do was sob into the gag his kidnapper had bound across his mouth.

Through his nose Zach heaved a full breath, though his chest screamed at the effort. At last, he realized, he had stopped shaking. It wasn't that he was any less scared. He was just too exhausted from trying to escape and from crying.

The two men—Asian men, with eyes a little like Aunt Lia's narrow eyes—had said almost nothing to him, ignoring his pleas for release. They had simply left him on the floor of the SUV, where the back seat should have been. They had left him to scream and sob into the foul-tasting gag. It tasted like his socks when they had been in the laundry hamper for a week.

The men had driven for perhaps an hour, finally stopping in a place with lots of trees. Without undoing the cord, one of the men had lifted Zach out of the SUV, hauled him across a pad of smooth cement, and forced him into an empty metal shed a little wider than Dad's shed in the back yard. There they had latched the cord to a metal loop embedded in the wall and left him. He had pulled desperately against the loop and the latch, but neither had budged. He had kicked against the wall with even less result. A dull ache had gradually worked its way through his arms and legs as he sat with his hands and feet fastened awkwardly to the wall twelve inches above the floor.

They had left Zach all alone there. It had been pitch-black inside the windowless shed. He had heard sounds—the rain on the roof, of course, and the wind; a truck, perhaps; a plane; two people talking somewhere outside—but for the most part all was silent. He had been grateful to still have his jacket on; the air had grown chilly, but with the jacket he had stayed warm enough.

After nightfall, the two men had suddenly returned, undone the cord binding him, pulled off his backpack, removed the gag from his mouth, and let him collapse onto the floor of the shed. New pain had shot through his stiff muscles with the abrupt movement. They had dragged him outside to a tree, given him a minute there, and fed him an apple and a cup of water. He had spotted a massive house nearby—a mansion, surely—and tried to run for it, but they had caught him easily, dragged him back into the shed screaming, and bound and gagged him again.

He was all alone once more. What was the point of kidnapping someone and then just leaving them in a shed?

He had no way to tell the time. They had taken him when he was halfway home from school, before 3:30 that afternoon. It could be bedtime now, or maybe a little earlier. Bath time, at least. Was this a bath night? He wished he could have a bath, mostly to be anywhere but here. He would even use soap without being reminded.

His nose itched, but he couldn't quite bend himself down to where he could reach it with his thumb or even his shoulder. The itch was as agonizing as the fire burning in his back, his legs, and his arms.

_What are Mom and Dad doing right now?_ he wondered, trying to distract himself from the itching and aching. Would they be worried about him yet? Uncle Ben and Aunt Lia and his cousins had probably finished their dinner with Mom and Dad by now and returned home. Zach wondered if Marissa had missed him. She could be really annoying, but she was okay as a cousin anyway. He had been hoping to play soccer with Brooke again tonight.

For the first hour or two, Zach had wondered whether he was going to die. Gradually, though, as the initial shock of his kidnapping had faded, his thoughts had drifted toward home. His room—Mom had probably been furious when she saw that he still hadn't cleaned his room. He had been mad at her this morning for being so picky about it, but only at first. She had been right to stick with what she had told him, making him clean his room before going to Cayden's house. He had even told Cayden he needed to clean it, and that he might be able to come over tomorrow.

What if Mom had let him go to Cayden's house today? Then the two men wouldn't have been able to kidnap him, not if he had been walking with Cayden. He would be taking a bath at this moment, or sleeping safely in his huge, warm bed. _No,_ he thought, _they would have just taken some other kid, maybe one of my other friends. Or they would have come back for me another day._

He stretched his fingers and set them beneath his shoes, pointing his toes upward. With a little effort, he could support his feet with his hands, giving the muscles in his legs a break. After a minute, though, he had to trade the strain from his arms back to his legs. He alternated like this for a while, fidgeting frequently, trying to find a way to make this unnatural position comfortable. He found none.

Was Mom still mad? If he could escape and find his way home right now, what would she say _? "Zechariah Timothy, being kidnapped is no excuse. You are not allowed to get kidnapped until you've cleaned your room."_ Then she would rub his head and say, _"You've been out in the rain again, haven't you?"_ He hurt too much to grin at the thought.

Dad... Dad would say, _"Hey, pal, let's go out and play some catch in the street lights, loosen up that arm. You need to throw a little after being tied up all evening."_ But if he ever got away—if he _lived_ , Zach thought with a shudder—his arm would need days to recover, it hurt so much from being stretched out like this for so long.

How long would it be until Mom and Dad realized something was wrong and came looking for him? Could they be looking for him already? Had anyone seen his kidnappers grab him? Maybe someone had called the police. What did Dad tell Uncle Ben when he asked where Zach was? Would Marissa be happy he was gone?

_Why me?_ he wondered, but a noise outside interrupted his thoughts. He jerked his head up and listened. Someone was outside the shed, coming closer. The lock unlatched and the door swung outward, letting in a bright light that blinded him for a moment, until his eyes adjusted.

It was the two Asian men again, and one of them shone a flashlight in his face, making him squint away. A third man entered with them this time, a Caucasian who knelt in front of Zach and lifted his chin with a finger, examining him.

"Zechariah Fleming," the man said. "Yes, this is he. Well done."

Zach stared at him, eyes wide with fright. The man looked vaguely familiar.

He smiled. "Relax. I'm not going to hurt you. My name is Hugh. We've met before."

Zach remembered—Grandfather had introduced him to Hugh two or three years ago. The man had asked Zach a few questions, just like all the other adults Grandfather introduced him to did.

"And you, Zechariah," Hugh continued, "have grown. You have a strong throwing arm—and a lefty, no less." He patted Zach's left shoulder. "I saw you throw the first pitches at the Mariners game, you and your friend. Do you go to many games? I have season tickets."

Hugh made no move to release Zach. Zach tugged against his cord, his blue eyes darting between Hugh's brown ones.

"You're uncomfortable," Hugh observed. "I'm sorry about that. You will need to remain here just a little longer, I'm afraid. But one of my ships is scheduled to dock in Seattle tomorrow, and the moment it's unloaded these men will escort you there. Once you're on board, you can have more freedom. Do you like Thai food?"

Zach grunted and again pulled helplessly against the bonds around his wrists and ankles. He didn't know what Thai food was, and he didn't care.

"I hope you do. I have a winter house in Thailand; that's where you'll be staying. I'll join you there after Christmas. Maybe we'll play some baseball together, you and I. You'll like it there, once you get used to the heat."

He studied Zach's face for a moment. "I don't figure your parents told you, did they? That would have been the proper thing to do, though I can understand their reluctance. It seems they, er...didn't want you anymore. So I bought you from them."

Zach stared at him in defiant disbelief.

"It's true. Something about your grandfather being dead, and so they needed to _find another place for you."_

Zach's eyes went wide. _Mom's exact words!_ How could Hugh know, unless...

"I know it's rough for you right now, Zechariah. It was your dad's idea, apparently. You know how he's been gone every night? We've been negotiating, he and I. See, I'm embarrassingly rich, and he and your mom needed money, so we made a deal. They didn't figure you'd like it much, so I offered to have you picked up. I hope you understand."

Zach's throat tightened. He could hardly breathe. He refused to believe it. But Hugh knew what Mom had said, word for word. She must have told him this morning after Zach left for school.

"Hey, don't take it personally," Hugh consoled him, placing a fatherly hand on Zach's shoulder; Zach tensed at his touch. "I know it's a hard pill to swallow. But look—after a while, you'll get over it. You only knew them for, what, a few months? So no big loss, right? And me—I've known you your whole life. Not that we've spent much time together, but now we can remedy that. Tell you what—I'll see you after Christmas, and then I'll buy you something, okay? Whatever you like. Think on it—something expensive, something you've always wanted. Believe me, I can get it for you."

He stood, regarded Zach for a moment, and then left. The Asian men followed him out and shut the door behind him. "Leave him here for the night," Zach heard Hugh say, "and get him on the ship in the morning. I'll pay you the moment he's out of American waters."

Their footsteps faded away, abandoning Zach and his muffled cries to darkness again. Zach had thought his tears had all dried up earlier, but now they flowed freely again, and he sobbed. _They didn't!_ he screamed at Hugh in his thoughts. _Dad wanted to play catch again tonight! He said I might be a pitcher next year! Mom told me to come home tonight and clean my room!_

How, after everything they had done together, could Mom and Dad send him away? _They couldn't, they didn't!_ But Hugh had quoted Mom perfectly. Playing catch with Dad last night, staying up late to watch the Mariners—it had all been a ploy so he wouldn't guess what they were about to do... Still, if he could escape, maybe he could go back to Mom and Dad and convince them to let him come home again, to return all that money. He would tell them he was sorry, that he would be the best kid they could dream of having, and everything would be okay again...

He tugged at the cord with renewed vigor, but it didn't budge anymore than before. He twisted this way and that, but movement only increased his aching.

After a while, since trying to free himself was still pointless, his mind drifted again. He wished he had claws, sharp ones that could cut the cord. He remembered, from a wonderfully open place where nothing was tied up, the mountain goat, free to go wherever it pleased, to climb on rocks and snow, to descend into grassy meadows. No one had tied up the mountain goat.

But Zach—he hurt. He had been betrayed. He was scared. He was all alone.

He prayed. He had never actually prayed before, not by himself. At church, yes, and at meals with Mom and Dad, but not by himself. He didn't know what to pray, and he didn't even mean _to_ pray. He just did it. _Please help._ It was the simplest of prayers. _Please just help._

But as the minutes passed, no one came for him. It got colder inside the shed. His nose began to hurt from the cold, and he shivered. He shifted his position again, the little bit that he could. He dropped his chin and closed his eyes, trying to sleep. But just like his rescuers, sleep did not come.

*****

"Remarkable," Agent Nyler muttered, shaking his head. "Zach really is your son, but...adopted...as an embryo..."

"Without our permission," Kara emphasized again. She had made the same point already and didn't want him to miss it. She wanted to keep her son. She said another silent prayer for him, wherever he was.

"Right, without permission. And then he came and found you." Agent Nyler rubbed a finger across his mustache, mulling over the notes he had taken as Kara and Craig had spoken, telling the story of what they had discovered about Zach. "You should have told us about him sooner."

"You should have told me when I first brought him here," Officer Garrenton admonished from her seat beside Agent Nyler, across from Craig.

Kara grimaced. "I tried at first, but then... We thought he must be a relative. We thought he was Craig's cousin's son. And then when we found out he was ours, we were afraid to say anything. We didn't want to lose him." Craig looked abashed, but he had no more reason than she; until recently, she had agreed that they should keep Zach's mystery to themselves.

As the five adults had sat together around the dining table for the past thirty minutes, an extra chair brought in for Eddie, the most impressive bit of information Craig and Kara had offered had been the first—the DNA test results, hard evidence that Zach was their son. Those results had brought an exchange of serious and confused looks between Officer Garrenton and Agent Nyler.

As soon as he had seen those results and the picture of young Craig in the entryway, which was strong evidence in itself, Agent Nyler was convinced that Craig and Kara had had no part in Zach's disappearance—he had good instincts—and had notified his office at the FBI that Zach had likely been abducted. That sent agents, port authorities, and police officers into alert across the metropolitan area, watching for signs of Zach. No one would be able to leave the area by ship or plane with an undocumented child matching Zach's age and description, at least not openly. By car, though—that was another matter. No number of officers checking every car, even if that were feasible, could secure every road. And, of course, there were ample places to hide a young boy in Seattle itself.

So Zach could be a long way away by now, or well-hidden nearby, some five hours after school had let out. Kara had broken out into a cold sweat, realizing that.

The doorbell rang and Officer Garrenton rose to answer it. She invited a pair of FBI agents inside and led them to the den, where she and Agent Nyler huddled with them, quietly sharing the information they had gathered and passing around the photograph Kara had provided of Zach in his baseball uniform.

Kara looked at Craig. He so hated feeling helpless. But there was nothing for either of them to do that the police and the FBI weren't already doing. She took his hand and gave it a supportive squeeze. He offered an unconvincing smile and fidgeted a little. Zach fidgeted like that when he was nervous. How fascinating it had been to have Zach here in their home with Craig, to see the two of them, father and son, reflections of each other, so much the same and yet so distinct. Their time with Zach had so often been wonderful—but tonight that wonder had been twisted into a nightmare. Kara continued to sweat.

Eddie remained in his seat, keeping quiet. He had offered his share of information about Zach's history at the school with no unnecessary elaboration; he had a natural sense for what information was important and what was not. He had remained a bit sheepish, too, keeping his head down and, though he had been sitting right there with them the whole time, staying out of the way. Now he watched Kara and Craig, his eyes anxious just like theirs.

They waited. After a minute, Officer Garrenton rejoined them at the table and spoke in a subdued tone. "No departments report any sign of Zach so far."

Craig received the news with a miserable nod. "Is there anything we can do?"

She smiled sympathetically. "Wait and pray. That's about all, I'm afraid."

"I need to be doing something," Craig fretted.

"Mr. Fleming," Officer Garrenton admonished compassionately, "you _are_ doing something. You're here, and you're ready. We'll need you if the kidnappers call. Or if the FBI has a question." She sighed and reached across the table to place a hand on his. "And your son will need you to be there when we find him."

The two FBI agents talking with Agent Nyler departed a few minutes later. "We're checking recent passenger manifests for planes and ships that have come in from Asia," Agent Nyler reported, reclaiming a seat at the table. "In the morning, they'll be checking on anyone from Asia who stands out. I've sent agents to watch the airports and the docks. We'll also have agents at the clinic that performed your in vitro procedures first thing in the morning, Mrs. Fleming. They'll have a warrant to search the clinic's files and question the doctors the moment the employees begin to arrive."

"So," Craig grumbled, "you basically have no leads?"

"Not much," Agent Nyler admitted grimly. "But we have a clinic and a human trafficking ring, and we have an undercover agent in the latter. We've notified him to keep his ears open. And we have the names of the Lerwicks—we've got people working on tracking them down, too. The information you've collected, Mr. Fleming—it may save your son. I've solved cases with less to go on at the start."

Craig grimaced, but Kara nodded—weakly, to be sure, but it was all she could manage.

After a long silence, she offered to get drinks for them all. Craig gulped his down quickly and wandered back to the bedrooms, returning a minute later with his glove and Zach's baseball, pounding the ball into the glove as he paced the room.

An hour went by, then two, then three. It was getting very late. Derek and Ben stopped by the house again, but they could only sit and be supportive. They stayed a while, but as midnight approached Craig persuaded them to go home and rest.

Agent Nyler received an update by phone every half hour. Another pair of agents joined them at the house to process information with him. He seemed to be of high rank in the local Bureau; he directed the investigation and didn't appear to need to request a higher officer's permission for anything he needed.

Craig, still restless, went to the side door and invited Paws into the house. The dog immediately walked over to Kara, who approved his presence by rubbing his yellow head. Then Paws trotted down the hall to Zach's room, returning a moment later with his tail hanging behind him. He turned back to Craig and followed him across the room, lying down when Craig took a seat, placing his head on Craig's foot. The dog knew something was wrong, knew Zach wasn't here like he should be.

Seeing Kara sagging against the end of the wall dividing the hall from the den, Officer Garrenton rose from the armchair and stepped over to her. "Mrs. Fleming, why don't you and your husband try to get some sleep? If anything happens, I'll come get you right away. There's nothing you can do, leaning here against the wall."

Kara was tired, no question. But her son was out there somewhere, and she couldn't pray for him if she was asleep. Praying was the one thing she could do. "I don't think I'd be able to sleep," she told the officer. "I'll be okay."

Officer Garrenton studied her for a moment before taking a seat at the dining table.

Eddie came to stand next to Kara. "Do you mind if I lie down on the couch?" he asked softly. "I'd like to be here if you find out anything. But a little nap wouldn't hurt."

"Go ahead," Kara nodded. "Are you sure you don't want to go home?"

Eddie shook his head. "I want to help if I can."

She shrugged. "Make yourself at home. Get whatever you like from the fridge. I'll get you a blanket. And the bathroom—"

"There, on the left," Eddie said, pointing toward it.

Kara blinked at him—he was observant—then turned and walked midway down the hall. In the cabinet she found him a thick blanket. He received it from her and disappeared back around the wall into the den.

Craig's phone rang, and he jumped to answer it. It was Rita, still awake and worried, calling to get an update on the search for Zach. Craig had no news to offer her. Grover had called an hour earlier, and Craig's answer had been the same. Rita didn't stay on the line long; Agent Nyler had advised them to keep their phones free as much as possible, in case the presumed kidnappers called.

When he had hung up, Craig sat at the table and rested his chin in his hands. Kara turned to the coat rack and lifted her jacket off of it. Officer Garrenton saw her, jumped up from the table, and strode over to her. "Mrs. Fleming, we really need you to stay."

Kara sighed. "I just need some fresh air. I'll be right here, on the porch." The officer didn't object as Kara stepped out the door and shut it behind her. She felt the officer's eyes watching her through the entryway window, but it didn't matter; she had no intention of leaving. She sat down on the porch step and stretched her feet out into the steady rain.

"Where are you, Zechariah?" she whispered, gazing out into the darkness that hid most of the world from view. Raindrops streaked the thin beams shining from the tall lamp across the street. _God, hold him tonight, wherever he is!_ she prayed. She had often prayed for the boy, but not like tonight. She had never prayed for anything as hard as she had silently in her heart tonight.

A single tear slipped down her cheek. That tear opened the floodgates, and she wept for her son there on his step—the step where he had sat that first morning and splashed his bare feet in the rain. Almost unconsciously, Kara slipped off her shoes and socks and let her feet soak in the drops that fell from the sky.

*****

No one could sleep stretched out and doubled over like this. Zach was tired, but too sore to fall asleep...and too scared. Hours had passed, but Hugh and the two Asian men had not returned. Zach shivered. How much longer until the sun rose and warmed everything up again?

He thought he heard an owl hoot once somewhere outside the shed. What if he were somewhere in the mountains? What if a bear came by? Could a bear break into a shed?

Zach shuddered. This was bad, really bad. He wondered how long he would be left here, whether, after all those years of dreaming that he might meet his parents someday, he would ever see them again. He really liked Mom and Dad. He _loved_ them. They were awesome, even if they were frustrating sometimes. He frustrated them sometimes, too. If he could choose to see anyone right now, it would be them. Surely sending him away had been a mistake, some kind of misunderstanding. That must be it—a misunderstanding.

He had never imagined discomfort like this—the awful-tasting gag tight against his tongue, pulling his lips back at the edges; the cord slowly rubbing red lines into his wrists and ankles; the muscles in his arms and legs begging for merciful release from this position they had held for hours with only a single, brief break.

The loneliness was even worse than the discomfort. He was more alone than he had ever been in his life. Only once before had he been completely alone—during that first walk from school to his parents' home, when he had gotten lost. There had been people all around, but until he had encountered Officer Garrenton, he had been on his own, and in that sense alone.

Worse still was the fear, the growing awareness that Mom and Dad weren't coming for him. No one was coming to save him, and there was nothing he could do to help himself except run if he got the chance. But Hugh and the Asian men weren't likely to give him a chance.

The thought of running reminded him of Paws. He missed Paws. The dog had been such a good friend from their first night together. If Paws were here, maybe he could chew through the cord. Or if not, at least he would sit beside Zach and keep him company.

There was movement outside; Zach barely heard it, something close to the shed. He caught the sound again—footsteps falling on the cement, quietly and very near. If a bear smelled him, would it leave him alone or break in to attack him? A moment later, someone— _not a bear_ —tapped softly on the wall of the shed. Zach tried to scream for help, but the gag muffled his voice to almost nothing.

The person outside must have heard him, though, because a new scraping sound came quickly at the door, followed by a snap and a clatter as the bolt on the door fell to the ground. The door opened and a face appeared—a man's face. There was too little light to see it clearly, but Zach could tell it was not one of the Asian men. He could almost make out the man's features.

"Dad!" Zach tried to yell, but the gag muffled it into a grunt.

The face moved closer. "Zechariah!" The voice—it was familiar, but it wasn't Dad's. "Zechariah, are you all right?"

Zach froze. _Grandfather?_ _He's_ _alive?_

Never before had Zach been glad to see the man, but in his present state he was thrilled to see anyone. With hands sheathed in thin, black gloves, Grandfather angled a bolt cutter to slice through the cord. Zach toppled over onto his side. Grandfather loosed the gag, letting Zach pull it out of his mouth. He spat; the taste of it, though, lingered.

"Are you injured?" Grandfather inquired urgently.

"No," Zach coughed, sucking in his first full breath in hours. Fighting stiff limbs, he scrambled to his feet. A sharp, new pain pulsed through them, the sting of blood flowing back into tight muscles.

"Come quickly, Zechariah," Grandfather commanded. He was not nearly as old as Grover, but older than Mom and Dad, his hair and beard white, with wrinkles beginning to show on his face. He slipped back outside the shed. "We must leave before they return."

Thinking to scoop up his backpack, Zach hurried to follow. He was free! He stumbled noisily out of the shed and onto the cement, his legs faltering as the muscles seized up.

"Quietly, Zechariah!" Grandfather whispered. "Your abductors are very near." He pointed away from the shed. There was a cottage there, tiny compared to the vast mansion beyond it; the Asian men must have been inside the cottage.

With a hand gripping Zach's jacket, Grandfather pull him upright again and tugged him into a stand of trees. They wound through the trees to Grandfather's car beyond them, a silver, two-door sedan with a new-car smell to it that welcomed Zach as he climbed into the back. Grandfather always drove new cars. The man quickly shut the door and steered them away.

"Thank goodness I found you," Grandfather said as he drove. He took them away from the mansion and onto an empty two-lane highway. Zach soon spotted city lights up ahead; the Asian men must not have taken him far from Seattle, perhaps not far enough for there to be bears.

"How did you know where I was?" he asked. He almost expected Grandfather not to answer. Grandfather usually ignored his questions.

But the man responded immediately. "A hunch. I know the man who took you."

"Hugh?"

"Hugh McWrait, yes. That was his mansion back there. He's a bold fellow, as you have seen, but overconfident, and quite the novice at this sort of thing. Hiding you in the shed was too predictable. And leaving it unguarded was a rookie mistake. You would have been guarded more securely inside the mansion."

"Thank you for rescuing me," Zach panted. Why was he panting, now that they were safely away from the Asian men? But he was; he was shaking again and drawing in one deep, shuddering breath after another.

Another question lodged in his mind, and he cocked his head to the side. "Wait—how did you know they kidnapped me?"

"I've been keeping an eye on you since I returned from Japan," Grandfather explained as he drove. He wore the same kind of clothes he always wore—a turtleneck shirt, this one white, and a dark jacket, the fancy kind with buttons in the front. "I needed to make sure you were all right. And it's a good thing I did. I only wish I had been there to stop McWrait's men from abducting you."

Grandfather had been keeping an eye on him? He noticed Grandfather's gloved hands on the steering wheel. "It was _your_ glove that Paws found in the back yard!" Zach exclaimed.

"Ah," Grandfather replied. "I dropped it and your animal ran away with it in the dark."

Zach shook his head, wondering. "I thought you were dead!" he said. "The nanny told me—"

"Ah," Grandfather cut him off. Grandfather often cut him off. "The nanny was misinformed."

"It wasn't true?" Zach puzzled over how this could be.

Grandfather scoffed. "Well, look at me, boy! Do I look dead to you?"

"No," Zach acknowledged in a small voice. Grandfather had a way of making him feel small. If Grandfather wasn't dead... "Is Grandmother still alive, too?"

Grandfather's eyes flicked onto him briefly through the rearview mirror. "Alas, no. She has been gone for years. She did it to herself, the foolish woman. This time she could not blame me."

They drove on in silence for a while, entering the edges of the city. They passed an electronic board that showed the time—2:16, the middle of the night. Zach thought he should feel more sleepy, but though his thoughts were a muddled blur, his body was strangely full of energy.

Suddenly it struck him—he was free! Grandfather was taking him home! In just a little while he would be back with Mom and Dad again. Mom would hug him—he wouldn't pull away—and mess up his hair. Dad might even give him a hug, too. Paws would bark and lick his face. He was going home! It was like waking up from a horrible nightmare and realizing none of it had been real...except that his arms, legs, and mouth still ached, of course, and his lips were raw at the corners, and the taste of the gag remained, assuring him that it had been very real indeed... And except that Mom and Dad had made that deal with Hugh...

Hope and despair wrestled inside of Zach. "Grandfather," he asked, "did you tell my mom and dad? Do they know you found me? Grandfather?"

The man remained silent for several long seconds. His eyes flashed solemnly back at Zach again. "No, Zechariah. I have not told them."

At a stoplight, Grandfather turned and guided them onto a freeway. Zach caught sight of a sign informing him that they were nearing Seattle.

"Do you have a phone? Can you call them? We should call the police! How long until we get there? Are the—"

"Enough!" Grandfather roared from the front seat. "I am taking you to my apartment. You'll be safe there."

Zach frowned. "But I want to go _home!_ Why can't I just go home?"

He waited, but Grandfather didn't answer. The man ignored him. Mom and Dad never ignored Zach like that. They might say he was asking too many questions, they might tell him to go read a book, but they never ignored him.

"I want to go home," Zach repeated, trying not to sound rude—Grandfather had just rescued him, after all. "You always said Mom and Dad were dead, but they're still alive! They're great! You could meet them! They have a dog named Paws, and they took me to the zoo and Mount Rainier. They even took me to the beach, the big beach! And they—"

"Zechariah." Grandfather kept his eyes on the road, but his tone was stern. "We cannot tell them where you are. We do not know whom we can trust."

"You mean because they sold me? But I think that was a mista—"

_"Sold_ you?" Grandfather's reflection glanced at him with intense interest. "Is that what McWrait told you?"

"Yeah," Zach replied, "but they couldn't have. I don't believe him. Except that he said—"

"What did he say?"

Zach hesitated, but Grandfather's eyes in the mirror demanded an explanation. "He said the same thing Mom said this morning—that she would have to...find another place for me."

"Ah," Grandfather responded a moment later. "She must have told him. That is most unfortunate."

"But it's not true!"

Grandfather sighed. "Alas, Zechariah, I'm afraid it is." He drove on in silence for a few seconds. "When I sent you to your parents, they seemed decent people. But, alas, they are not. They have been—"

"Wait," Zach interrupted him, "you _couldn't_ have sent me to them. I found them by myself, in the phonebook."

Grandfather glared at Zach through the mirror. "Do not interrupt me, Zechariah. The nanny failed to give you their address as I had instructed her. It is fortunate that you were so resourceful, since I was away in Japan. Then, when I returned and saw that you had found them and it seemed they had accepted you, I did not worry much. But when I learned more about them—that was when I found out..."

"Found out what?"

Grandfather took a deep breath. "Your parents have been associating with criminals, Zechariah. Hugh McWrait is a criminal, a remarkable one in his own way. So you see—I rarely err, but I clearly erred in my judgment of your mother and father. They saw an opportunity for economic advancement and sold you to McWrait."

"No, they didn't!" Zach screamed before he could stop himself.

Grandfather tensed, and for a moment Zach thought the man might reach over the seat and strike him, but instead Grandfather merely let out a long breath. "I think they truly believed they loved you at first," he said. "But it is difficult to love someone for long when you did not invite them into your life. They were happy before you came to them, you see. They thought they would be happy to have you with them, and perhaps they were for a time. But eventually, the newness wore off. Did you ask irritating questions?" In the mirror, he watched Zach's mouth fall open. "Ah. Did you disobey?" Again he watched, nodding at Zach's silence. "I know you, Zechariah. You made it hard for them. You made the challenges of parenting impossible to manage. Now they had to do a thousand things they had never had to do before you appeared in their lives, and they grew weary of it—bedtimes, homework, clothes, toys, listening to you chatter... Did they never seem tired to you, Zechariah?"

Zach's eyes grew wide as he listened. It could not be; just last night—well, two nights ago, now that it was technically morning—he and Dad had played catch until they could hardly throw anymore. They were getting along again. Mom and Dad weren't tired of him; well, they had _said_ they weren't. But what if they just didn't want him to know?

"Yes." Grandfather watched him again through the mirror. "You saw it, didn't you? They were on the edge of a cliff, and then with one last shove, you pushed them over that edge. What did you do that angered them, Zechariah?"

"No," Zach stammered, "nothing, I didn't... I played catch with Dad. Mom was happy. We had ice cream. Everything was—" But those words that Hugh knew—like the burst of a bombshell, they struck home again—the last thing Mom had said to him. _"Maybe we can find another place for you,"_ Zach moaned.

"Speak up, Zechariah," Grandfather demanded irritably. Grandfather was often irritable.

Zach gulped. "I argued with Mom before school. I was mad. I was mean to her. That was when she said...they could find another place for me."

"Ah." Grandfather gave a knowing nod. "You see? They were not ready to be parents. They liked it better when it was just the two of them. You pushed them too far, Zechariah."

_NO!_ Zach screamed to himself. _No, they loved me! They took care of me! They—_ But all the good memories began to pale against the stark reality of Mom's final, angry words to him.

It made horrible sense. Being a family had gotten harder. Mom and Dad had been angrier with Zach and with each other. They loved each other, and Zach had invaded their lives without their permission. He was the stranger in their home. He had been rude to them one too many times, and now...

Now it was too late. All alone in the back seat, exhausted, Zach choked back a despairing sob. "No." He covered his face as tears began to flow again. "No!"

Through the mirror, Grandfather observed him with grimly satisfied eyes.
Chapter 17

"I ruined everything," Zach moaned as he lay stretched out on Grandfather's plush sofa, his face in the pillow. Grandfather had little furniture in his compact apartment; he probably didn't need much, being out of the country most of the time, especially since he also had a house he could live in when he was home. But what he had was very nice—the sofa, a well-polished desk and chair, a large TV mounted on the wall.

For the tenth time, Zach slammed a fist into the sofa's spongy cushions. _I finally found my parents, and they were great, and I ruined it!_ he berated himself. This last day had undoubtedly been the worst day of his life.

A small digital clock on the desk showed 6:35—he and Grandfather had arrived here four hours ago. Grandfather had warned Zach not to leave, not to go to his parents on his own, lest they turn him over to the kidnappers again and Grandfather be left with no way to rescue him. He had counseled Zach to sleep if he could; then they would get up early, take care of some business, and decide what to do about Zach.

Grandfather had gone to his bedroom to rest, leaving the sofa to Zach. Despite its luxurious feel, it had offered Zach no comfort. Through those four dark hours he had tossed and turned on it, alternating between weeping and silent, savage brawling in his head.

_You had parents, you had a family—and you wrecked it all!_ one voice screamed. _You just had to complain that the art museum was boring. Why couldn't you just be quiet, like Dad was? And why were you so mean to him when he was trying to find out where you came from?_ That voice had been the louder as he had wrestled with himself on the sofa these hours.

Another voice groaned in reply. _No! Things were okay! Mom loved me, Dad did too. They just...needed a break! A few weeks, a few months, and then we can be a family again. They'll want to see me sometimes. I can visit them. They'll see that I've changed, that I'm a better kid now. And then they'll want me back..._

Grandfather stirred in the bedroom. Zach rolled onto his stomach and wiped the tears from his eyes. He turned his head toward the back of the couch and controlled his breathing, pretending to sleep. He heard Grandfather make his way past him to the tiny kitchen and pour himself a cup of water. A moment later the man set the empty cup on the counter and returned to his room. Another minute passed, and Grandfather entered the bathroom and shut the door. Zach heard the shower begin to run.

He sat up and wiped his nose on his jacket sleeve; he hadn't taken the jacket off since being kidnapped yesterday. In the dim morning light, he looked around. The bathroom was tucked between the living room and the bedroom; the combination kitchen and laundry room was set adjacent to the living room. Zach's backpack lay against the wall beside the front door. No other accoutrements adorned the apartment; the walls were bare except for the TV.

Zach glanced toward the bedroom; Grandfather had left the door open. There was something small on the nightstand beside the bed—Grandfather's phone.

_I know how to use a phone now,_ Zach realized. _And I know my phone number!_

As soon as the thought occurred to him, he leapt up from the couch and tiptoed to the bedroom silently, stepping lightly so as not to vibrate the floor outside the bathroom. He grabbed up the phone and slipped back into the living room. From the kitchen, a sliding glass door led outside onto a concrete slab hanging three stories above the ground. Grandfather wouldn't hear him out there. If he hurried, he could make a call and return the phone before Grandfather finished his shower. Grandfather would never know.

Zach had to talk to Mom. Even if it was too late, even if she didn't love him anymore, he had to try. He stepped outside, slid the door shut behind him, and dialed home.

*****

Kara rubbed a hand across her weary eyes, willing them to stay open. She had gotten no sleep all night, nor had she tried. Neither had Craig. He sat restlessly in the armchair in the den, staring blankly at the wall, saying nothing. She stood before the picture window, gazing out into the back yard as the hidden sun nudged the black sky toward navy blue. She prayed simple, desperate pleas for her son, trying to remember the good times they had enjoyed out there in the yard. Paws was still inside, curled up despondently at Craig's feet.

Officer Garrenton peeked up at her from the couch, where she sat with her head leaned back. The officer had rested a little. Eddie, too, had slept a bit, and looked better for it. With a little encouragement from Kara, the young man had wandered into the kitchen to find food. Agent Nyler sat with two other agents at the dining table, drinking a bottle of orange juice he had brought and looking alert and focused. He had driven home to catch a few hours of sleep before returning just a few minutes ago.

They were all silent, waiting. In another hour a flurry of activity would begin—not here, but across the city and at the clinic, as FBI agents and police officers launched a citywide search for clues that might lead them to Zach. Grateful as she was for their efforts, Kara couldn't help thinking the situation seemed hopeless. They simply knew too little. Zach could be in Canada by now. If the kidnappers had a plane, he could be in Asia.

Her phone chimed. It was on the table. Kara, being closer than Craig, reached it first. She snatched it up and checked the incoming number. "It's blocked," she reported.

She waited for a signal from Agent Nyler. A wire wound from the phone to a recording device one agent had set up in case the kidnappers called. "Put it on speakerphone," he reminded Kara in a low voice; they had discussed what to do with anymore calls that came in, just in case.

He nodded that he was ready, and she activated the phone. "Hello?" Her voice seemed weak to her, trembling and exhausted.

"Mom?" Zach's young voice resonated across the room.

"Zach!" Kara cried, suddenly filled with energy.

In an instant, Craig was at her side and Officer Garrenton and all three FBI agents were on their feet. Eddie, at the standalone counter, looked up intently from the glass of water he was sipping.

"Mom, I'm so sorry, please, I'll be good, I'm so sorry!" the boy gushed, his voice quavering. "I didn't mean it, Mom! I'm sorry, I want to come back home, I don't want you to send me away, I want to stay with you and Dad and Paws, I'm so sorry..." He broke down into a sob that wrenched Kara's heart—he was alive, thank God, but he sounded so scared.

"Zach!" she exclaimed. "We were so worried! Are you hurt? Are you okay?"

His voice returned shakily. "I'm okay, Mom. I just—I'm so sorry, Mom. I want to come home." He was still crying; she could hear the strain in his voice. "Mom, please don't be mad at me. I'll do better, I promise. I'm sorry, Mom. I—"

"Zach, listen to me," Kara interrupted him. She struggled not to break down herself. He was panicking about being sent away. Maybe he had only run off after all. "We want you back home, kiddo. I'm sorry, too, Zach. I yelled at you without thinking. We've been up all night trying to find you, Zach. Your Dad, he's right here with me." She glanced to Craig.

He took the cue and stepped closer to the phone. "Zach," he spoke up, "we just want you back home, pal. We'll come and get you."

Zach's voice hesitated before replying. "But I was really mean. And I didn't clean my room..."

"I don't care about your room, Zach," Kara told him. "We care about _you,_ okay? Now, take a deep breath, kiddo. We need to know how to find you."

"Okay," he managed after a moment, and she heard him suck in a full, shuddering breath. She inhaled deeply herself.

Agent Nyler scribbled something on a sheet of paper and held it up for her to see. _Who took him?_ the paper asked.

"Okay, Zach," Kara instructed, "the first thing we need to know is who took you, kiddo. Or did you run away?"

He choked down a sob. "Mom, I didn't run away. I was halfway home, and they grabbed me and threw me into their car. They tied me up in the back and drove out of Seattle and left me in a shed for a long time."

He had been kidnapped. "Who, Zach? Who took you? What did they look like?"

"Two men, from another country—from Asia. They have an accent."

Agent Nyler nodded encouragement to Kara. This was helpful information. She needed to keep him talking.

"Okay, Zach. What kind of car did they drive? What color?" she asked.

"An SUV. I don't know what color. They left me in the shed all night, Mom. It hurt my arm, my throwing arm. I don't think I can play catch with Dad for a while."

Kara sniffled and grinned at the same time, meeting Craig's eyes. She bit her lip and wiped a sudden tear away with one hand. Her son had been kidnapped, and he was worried about whether he would be able to play catch with Craig!

Agent Nyler had written another note— _Where is he?_

"That's okay, kiddo," Kara assured Zach. "You're doing awesome, okay? You did the right thing, calling us. I'm really proud of you."

"I miss you, Mom," he moaned.

"We miss you, too, Zach. So does Paws. We need to know where to find you, okay? Where are you right now?"

"I don't know. Somewhere in Seattle. In an apartment."

Kara nodded to the phone, releasing a relieved sigh. Seattle. Still here in the city. "Good. That's helpful, Zach. Do you know the name of the apartments?"

"No."

"Can you look out a window?"

"Yes—no," he corrected, "not exactly. I'm outside, on a sort of porch, but up high."

"A balcony," Kara told him. "Can you see a sign with the name of the apartments on it? Or a street sign?"

"No," he replied. "Sorry, Mom. I'm trying."

At a loss for a moment, Kara looked to Craig and saw him calculating. Catching her eye, he received the phone from her and spoke into it. "Hey, pal. Remember when we were up in the Space Needle, looking at all the landmarks?"

"Yeah."

"All right, look around and tell me what landmarks you can see."

"Okay." Zach's voice was silent for a moment. "I can see the Space Needle, Dad! It's not very far away."

"Awesome, Zach," Craig encouraged him. "Which direction is it?"

"Um...south. I can see the downtown towers on the other side of it."

Agent Nyler gave a thumbs-up, urging Craig to continue. One of the other agents worked to access a map on his phone. Kara's heart raced. They were going to find their son!

"Great. What else, Zach?" Craig prompted. "What can you see closer? Is there anything unusual that might help us find you?"

"Um..." Kara imagined Zach scanning the area, searching for something distinctive to report. "I don't see anything unusual, Dad. Just houses and apartment buildings."

"Businesses? Stores? Freeway?"

"No."

"All right, that's helpful. That means you're in a residential area. What about water? Are you close to the Sound or one of the lakes?"

A pause. "I can't see them. Maybe the Sound. I'm not sure."

"That's okay, pal. It's still pretty dark out there. What else can you see?"

Zach sniffled and sucked in another deep breath. He was working to keep himself calm—good for him. "There's a place with a bunch of trees."

"Maybe a park... Which way from you, Zach?" Craig urged.

"Um, it's a little bit—oh, no..."

Kara's heart slammed against her ribs as new tension filled Zach's voice.

"What is it, Zach?" Craig asked. He was trying to stay calm, but his knuckles turned white as he gripped the phone.

"No, don't!" Zach yelled. There was the sound of a scuffle.

"Give it to me, Zechariah!" another voice, a man's voice, demanded—in clear American English.

The line went dead. Eddie's glass shattered on the floor; it had slipped from his fingers. His face went pale.

"Zach! Zach!" Craig and Kara yelled together, but it was no use. The call was lost.

Agent Nyler turned to the agent at his side. "Get the number the boy called from and have it traced!"

She nodded and pulled out her phone as she moved into the den.

"Jackie," Agent Nyler spoke to Officer Garrenton, "tell the station I need every officer they can spare to search Uptown and Queen Anne Hill, the whole hill. If they can't find him there, search Fremont, Lake Union, West Woodland—anywhere a kid north of the Space Needle and the towers could see them from a balcony. It would be facing east, west, or south. And he's in a residential area, might have been able to see a park with trees."

Officer Garrenton stepped to the hall to radio in to the police station. Agent Nyler joined his other agent at the table and with a finger on the agent's map indicated the area he wanted to have searched.

That left Kara and Craig standing helpless in the kitchen, gaping at each other and Eddie. They had been so close, or so it had felt, hearing Zach's voice.

"I broke your glass," Eddie gulped, looking stunned.

Kara shook herself out of her shock, set a consoling hand briefly on the young man's shoulder, and fetched a broom from the garage. Craig joined in, and the three of them set about to clean up the mess. At the moment, as the officers made their calls, it was what they could do.

*****

Grandfather seized Zach's jacket with a fist and pinned him roughly against the wall. He pried the phone from Zach's fingers and disconnected the call. Zach couldn't breathe, with Grandfather's fist pressed into his chest and collarbone. It hurt. Dad never did this. But Grandfather did; Zach remembered now, remembered Grandfather raging at times, shoving him to the floor or against the wall, standing over him, yelling angrily. There on the balcony, Grandfather held Zach against the building so hard that Zach could only gasp for air.

"Whom did you call?" Grandfather demanded. "Tell me!"

"Just my mom and dad," Zach answered in a small voice. He stared up at Grandfather with panicked eyes.

Grandfather pressed a few buttons on the phone and read the number on the screen. "What did you tell them?"

"I told them I was sorry."

Grandfather's eyes bore into his own. "Did you tell them where we are?"

"I don't _know_ where we are," Zach replied. That was true, so far as it went. Had he told Mom and Dad enough that they could find him?

Slowly, Grandfather relaxed his hand, releasing Zach, allowing him to draw breath again. "That was a dangerous thing you did, Zechariah. You do not know if you can trust them. What did they tell you?"

Zach dropped his gaze to the balcony floor. "They want me to come home."

"Ah. I thought they would say that. Do you know why?"

"Because they _do,"_ Zach replied, trying to convince himself. Mom had sounded like she meant it; so had Dad. He rubbed the sore spot Grandfather had left on his collarbone.

Grandfather barked a laugh. "No, Zechariah—because they don't get paid if you escape! But if you go back home to them, you see, they get a second chance to complete their deal with McWrait. Now we'll have to leave before they trace the call and give the location to your abductors." With a grunt, he turned and gazed out across the city. "Besides, they had to say they want you home because they don't know where you are; you could be with the police, for all they know. They couldn't very well tell the police they don't want you, could they?"

That made a strange sort of sense. But hearing their voices, he had been so sure they wanted him home with them. Mom had said she didn't care about his room, that they had been searching for him all night! If Grandfather hadn't interrupted them, they would have found out where Zach was, would have come to get him—but to take him home or to send him away again?

Grandfather was watching him. "Yes, you think on it, Zechariah. I have more to tell you, but not yet. We must leave." He shut his phone's power off and pressed Zach back into the apartment.

Inside, Grandfather wiped his whole phone with a cloth, smashed it under his shoe, and threw it into the trash. Then he picked up his briefcase, put on his nice jacket, and shoved Zach out the door. "I would advise against running away," he said. "You could outrun _me,_ but the men who abducted you are still out there somewhere, very likely searching for you. And there may be more than just the two of them. They could be anywhere, and they will have someone watching your home. It would be quite difficult for you to get there safely, I'm afraid." He paused. "And above all, do not go to the police. Hugh McWrait is so rich that he'll simply offer them so much money to give you back to him that they won't be able to refuse."

Zach took a deep breath; Mom was right, it helped to calm you down. When Mom told him things, they helped him. Why would she do that if she didn't...? "My parents _do_ love me!" he declared.

Grandfather sighed. "This is difficult for you, Zechariah. I understand that. So perhaps we can make an arrangement. Come with me for a few hours. I rescued you, so you know you can trust me. I have an appointment this morning. Do what I tell you, and after I meet my appointment, I will take you home. We will talk with your parents and discover their true motives. If they want you, I will leave you with them. If not, I will keep you with me and protect you. Agreed?"

Zach hesitated. He wanted to go home right now. But if Grandfather was right about Mom and Dad... He couldn't be... But if he was, he would be there to keep Zach from being kidnapped again. It seemed like the safest option. And it was true: he had rescued Zach. At last Zach nodded, and Grandfather led him down the stairs to the car.

*****

Craig knelt beside the standalone counter and helped Eddie pick up the last splinters of the broken glass. All four officers were on their phones, coordinating the search for Zach.

Kara, too, was on her phone. After sweeping most of the glass into a pile, she had thought to call Ben and tell him they had heard from Zach, that he was alive somewhere in Seattle. Ben would pass the word on to Derek and the others.

She put her phone away and rejoined them in the kitchen a moment later as Eddie emptied the dustpan full of glass into the waste basket near the side door. "Ben's sent out a message asking all the church members to pray for Zach," she told Craig, her voice tight with emotion. "He sent it half an hour ago. Twenty people had written back before I hung up."

"That's impressive, this early in the morning," Craig replied.

Officer Garrenton approached them. "Mr. and Mrs. Fleming?" She made eye contact with Kara and Craig in turn. "We're leaving to help with the search. Would you come with us? I think you'll want to be there when we find Zach."

"Yes," Craig nodded, grateful for her determined optimism. "I'll get our jackets." He slid past her on his way to the coat rack.

Moments later, he and Kara climbed into Officer Garrenton's patrol car. Kara gave Eddie a questioning look as he hung back. "Aren't you coming, Eddie?"

"Yeah, I just—I need to run home first," he told her. "I'll catch up with you in a few minutes. I'll find you."

He hurried away. Kara closed her door, and Officer Garrenton, with lights flashing and siren blaring, sped them off to Queen Anne Hill.

*****

In the back seat of Grandfather's car, Zach peered out the window, trying to see Puget Sound. Surrounded as they were by other vehicles, he caught only the briefest glimpse of the water. They were on the ferry. Now, of all times, he was getting to ride the ferry! But it was not the experience he had imagined. Instead of standing on one of the upper decks with all the walk-on passengers, the cool wind whipping at his face as they sped across the open water—that was how Dad had described it—he was stuck in the car, where he could barely see the water at all, let alone feel the wind.

Grandfather held a second phone, drawn from his jacket. He had called two people already and now dialed a third. "The primary location has been compromised," he spoke into the phone after a moment, repeating what he had said in the previous calls. "We will rendezvous at the secondary location." He ended the call and stared silently out the windshield.

"Grandfather," Zach complained, "a whole bunch of people got out of their cars and went up those stairs. Why can't I?"

Grandfather huffed. "That's twice you've asked me. Do not ask again. This is not a sightseeing trip. Your safety is more important than your entertainment, and you are safer in here."

Zach rolled his eyes.

"The trip is short," Grandfather rumbled. "Wait quietly."

The trip was _not_ short, at least not to Zach, as the ferry cruised across Puget Sound in the dullest possible manner. The waves being flat and the wind calm in spite of the rain, the boat barely even rocked. Zach frowned—he had hoped to find out if he got seasick.

After they had left the apartment, Grandfather had driven them through downtown to a line of cars near the water, and they had paid a fare and waited there until, as Zach had seen from a distance with Mom and Dad, they and all the cars around them had driven right up into the boat. That had been the end of the excitement, though. Now they were parked in what Zach guessed was the middle of the ferry's lower deck, doing nothing, surrounded by cars, trucks, and walls that all conspired to block his view.

"This is boring," Zach complained.

Grandfather remained motionless in the front seat. "Hush! You needn't jabber incessantly."

Zach closed his mouth and looked back out the window. But he didn't stay silent for long. "Why did you throw your other phone in the garbage?"

Grandfather glowered at Zach in the rearview mirror. "Did you talk this much at home? No wonder they sent you away." He turned his eyes back toward the water. "If you must know, the authorities can track the location of mobile phones, and I do not wish to be found by them today—not until I can discover your parents' true motives. It won't do for the police to arrest me and take you back to people who will simply hand you over to your abductors again. As for the phone itself, it was disposable. I keep this one for the most important calls." He tapped a finger idly on the second phone. "Now, Zechariah, about your inability to control your chatter—I had thought we might get breakfast when we arrive at Bainbridge, but I think instead we will wait until after my meeting. If you can control your tongue until then, I will get you something to eat."

Zach had forgotten how hungry he was. And thirsty, too. He'd had nothing to eat or drink since the little bit his kidnappers had given him last night. His mouth was dry and his stomach rumbled as if in reply to his thoughts. He sighed and stared out the window, silently rubbing his left arm, which was still sore.

Grandfather dialed a long number and returned the phone to his ear. Someone on the other end answered. _"Digame,"_ Grandfather said, speaking Spanish into the phone. Grandfather knew Spanish? Zach had never heard him speak it before—but then Grandfather and the nannies had never been around at the same time. Grandfather spoke Spanish well, it seemed; Zach could not keep up with his next few sentences except to make out a couple of words.

The man listened for a minute before he spoke again. _"Sî... Sólo dos meses más... Sî... Sî, tengo el niño. Vamos a Caracas."_

The conversation continued another minute. Zach didn't catch much more of what was said, but his thoughts locked onto the part he had understood: _Tengo el niño..._ _I have the child. We're going to Caracas..._ Did he mean he was taking Zach to Caracas, or was he referring to some other child? And where was Caracas? There were a lot of cities in Washington, even around Seattle, that Zach had never heard of. Wherever it was, Zach didn't want to go there. He wanted to go home...if Mom and Dad would take him.

Grandfather shut off his phone and replaced it in his pocket. He folded his arms and waited patiently, staring straight ahead again for several minutes. Zach fidgeted, craning his neck to see the water once more. He glimpsed land in the distance ahead of them—trees and houses overlooking the gray-blue of the Sound as it reflected the clouds above.

"I have more to tell you about your mother, Zechariah," Grandfather broke the silence. His voice was soft, though not tender—Grandfather was never tender. He reached across to the front passenger seat and opened his briefcase there. He lifted a small photo album out. "I know it is hard for you to believe what I have said about her, but what I tell you next will prove it to you. You deserve to know why your mother cannot truly love you."

Zach's throat tightened. _She_ does _love me,_ he argued back silently. He dared not say it aloud—he was hungry, and Grandfather would make good on his threat to starve Zach if he talked too much.

"You are aware, I suppose, that your mother did not give birth to you?" Grandfather asked.

Zach nodded. "She said another woman did."

"Ah. Your mother is wrong, Zechariah. You were never actually born."

"Ha!" Zach blurted out before he could stop himself.

He quickly cowered as Grandfather spun his head angrily, but the man merely slipped one of the album's photographs out of its pouch and handed it over the seat to him. "Look at this machine."

Zach took the photograph. It showed some kind of laboratory stocked with all sorts of scientific-looking devices—tubes, wires, video screens. In the center stood a table with a transparent box on top of it. The box was made of glass or some kind of clear plastic, its edges rounded, and most of the tubes in the picture led to it. It was filled with a clear liquid; a translucent sort of bag floated inside it. Something small and pale, a blob, floated within the bag, in the middle of the box. A tube the same pale color extended from the blob and joined another, clear tube that entered the box through its top.

_"This,"_ Grandfather said—"this is your mother, Zechariah. I created it, and I placed you inside it when you were nothing more than a little ball of cells. This is where you grew, in that sack within the tank. Do you see that scrawny thing floating there? That, Zechariah, is you."

Zach studied the picture with increasing awe—and repulsion. _That was me? I was grown in a_ tank _?_

"It is arguably the greatest invention ever, the world's first fully-functioning artificial human womb," Grandfather intoned affectionately. "A miserable thing compared to a human mother, to be sure—hard and indifferent. But it worked. It was a miracle. And there will be more miracles."

Zach touched the photograph, gingerly placing his finger on himself ten years ago—just a tiny, pale blob in a tank... No mother getting fat and feeling him wiggle and kick inside, no mom and dad waiting excitedly for the day when they would give birth to their new son.

"Why did you do this to me?" Zach breathed.

"Someone had to be the first," Grandfather replied matter-of-factly. "Consider yourself lucky. One day, Zechariah, your name and mine will be known by people around the world—Zechariah Fleming, the first child developed entirely within an artificial womb, and Dr. William Lerwick, the genius who made it possible. You and I inaugurated a grand, new era in human history, an unprecedented step in mankind's quest to conquer its own biological limitations. I have achieved the greatest medical feat known to humanity, and you, Zechariah, are my greatest accomplishment."

"I don't want to be an accomplishment," Zach muttered. "I just want to go home."

"Ah," Grandfather grimaced. "Hence our problem." He took the photograph back from Zach. "Zechariah, a fascinating thing happens when a woman carries a child in her womb and gives birth. I saw it with my own wife and son. A bonding takes place between the mother and child that they cannot share any other way. She feels the baby roll over within her, and she loves the creature because she and her child are one for a time. Its life is utterly intertwined with hers. When it is born, she holds it in her arms and thinks to herself, 'I brought this creature into the world; it is mine.'" Grandfather looked intently into Zach's eyes. "Kara Fleming never shared that bond with you, Zechariah. Your mother was a machine. Only by genetics is Kara Fleming your mother. For that reason, she can never truly love you, not like a real mother."

Zach stared in stunned disbelief as Grandfather held his eyes for seconds that felt like hours. How many times had Mom told Zach, "I never got pregnant, I never had a baby in my tummy"?

He slumped back against the seat, suddenly overwhelmed by the exhaustion of the past day, by hunger and thirst, by fear—not fear that the kidnappers would return, not anymore. Fear that Mom and Dad really, truly would not want him back, that they had said it on the phone but could never mean it. His life might have come from their cells, but he had been grown in a transparent box with tubes running into it. They could never completely accept him as their son.

Grandfather turned to stare out through the windshield again. "So you see, Zechariah—the only person in this world who can truly love you, your only _real_ parent, is me. I made you. And now," he smiled to himself, "I will keep you safe."

*****

"He found us." Craig touched Kara's arm and pointed down the street as Eddie strode briskly around the corner and up the sidewalk toward them. They were on the south face of Queen Anne Hill, overlooking downtown Seattle in the near distance. The Space Needle loomed before them a mere mile away, making it easy for Kara to imagine that Zach was, or had been, very near this place.

Officer Garrenton stood beside her patrol car across the street from them, speaking into her radio. A host of police officers and FBI agents had descended upon the hill, rushing through its neighborhoods and going door to door at qualifying apartment buildings in search of anyone who might have noticed Zach.

Kara greeted Eddie as he rejoined them. "You tracked us down."

Eddie looked almost as nervous as Kara felt. "It wasn't hard," he shrugged, motioning to a police cruiser that crept past them up the street. "Just follow the cops." He glanced toward Officer Garrenton, who approached them through the light rain. "Looks like they've found something."

Officer Garrenton's expression was focused, the warrior within her motherly demeanor asserting itself. "Someone made an anonymous 9-1-1 call," she reported as she reached them. "They claimed to have seen a boy matching Zach's description being taken into an apartment a few blocks from here. Agent Nyler is headed there now. He'd like you both to be there." She took a deep breath. "You need to prepare yourselves—we don't know what to expect. Just...keep praying."

Kara nodded, refusing to acknowledge the knot of dread in her belly. She and Craig moved to follow Officer Garrenton.

Eddie stepped politely away, but the officer shifted to face him. "You can come, too, young man."

"No, that's okay," he declined. He drew back from her so slightly that Kara only barely noticed. "I shouldn't even be here, really. Besides, I don't have any desire to ride in the back of a squad car."

"Ride in the front, then," she told him matter-of-factly, "but you've been saying you want to help, so you're coming."

Eddie swallowed hard, but noting the determination in her face, he came along without further protest, riding in the front. Officer Garrenton drove them six blocks east to a nondescript, three-story apartment complex on the south side of the hill, with balconies facing south and west.

An agent awaited them in the drizzle as they exited the vehicle. "Agent Nyler just sent word. Your boy's not up there."

Craig let out a disheartened sigh. Kara moaned. She put her hands over her face and rubbed her sore eyes.

"But he wants you to come up anyway. He found something that might belong to Zach."

"So he _was_ there?" Craig asked.

"Maybe. Come take a look."

They followed the agent into the building. Eddie hung behind for a moment, but Officer Garrenton poked a finger into his back. "You, too, Mr. Eddie," she ordered. "This is no time to be bashful."

He caught up with them as they reached a flight of stairs. The agent took them to the third floor and down a hall to an apartment the back of which faced south. There was a balcony there just beyond the kitchen. A dozen FBI agents, most of them in armored, olive green uniforms with helmets, some with high-powered rifles slung over their shoulders, scurried about the scantly furnished apartment. A few dusted for fingerprints; others took pictures or swept the place for other clues. _All of these people, even the rifles, all so we can find our son,_ Kara noted, grateful but overwhelmed. Maybe they did this sort of thing all the time, but to her it was surreal.

Agent Nyler was waiting for Craig and Kara. "Does this belong to Zach?" he asked as they entered. He held up a dark green backpack.

Kara recognized it and frowned, pursing her lips.

"Sure looks like his," Craig confirmed in a tight voice.

Agent Nyler unzipped it and lifted Zach's school ID tag from within it. He examined the tag, gave Craig and Kara a moment to register it, then handed it off to an agent who added it to a small collection of evidence on the kitchen counter. "I didn't want to open the backpack until you were here," he explained. "Nobody was home when we arrived, but obviously"—he waved a hand around at the barren décor—"the place isn't used much. Seemed like a strange spot to find a child's backpack." He took a deep breath. "Looks to me like this is where your son called from."

With a gesture, he led them out onto the balcony. The Space Needle did indeed look close from here, particularly from this height, on the third floor of a building halfway up the side of the hill. And there was a small, heavily-treed park just a block away to the southeast, partially obscured by other buildings.

"Oh, Zach," Kara groaned, taking in the view he had seen in the dim, pre-dawn light not two hours ago. Craig put an arm around her shoulders and gave them a small squeeze. She could feel his arm trembling, just as she was.

Agent Nyler clicked his tongue. "I'd guess we missed them by an hour at the most. There's still water on the walls of the shower and in a cup by the sink. They didn't eat breakfast, that I can see—not here, anyway. We found the phone Zach called from. Someone who didn't want it to be traced powered it off, destroyed it, and threw it in the trash."

The agent took a breath as he gazed out across the city. "We found hairs on one end of the sofa—brown, like in the picture you gave me. Zach may have spent the night lying there. They found gray hairs on the bed in the back room—an older person, I would assume a man, possibly one of the Asian fellows." As he said that, he eyed Eddie, who had stationed himself at the sliding glass door and returned his gaze nervously.

"Any clue where they've gone?" Craig inquired.

Agent Nyler frowned. "Not yet. An hour—they could be anywhere. But my guess is that they're still in the city. If they had intended to leave, they could have gone last night. I don't understand why they brought the boy here." He reached up to scratch behind his ear, cocking his head to the side. "It sure would be nice if we could get another tip from that anonymous caller."

Eddie inched toward the door, but found Officer Garrenton blocking his path.

"You can just stay right there," she advised him.

Agent Nyler nodded to Officer Garrenton. "Thanks for bringing him, Jackie. Nicely done." His tone hardened as his eyes landed on Eddie again. "I had the dispatcher play the anonymous call for me. Imagine my surprise. I wasn't entirely certain it was your voice, but that little attempt to leave just verified it for me. So, Eddie, why don't you begin with how you knew the boy was here, and then we'll get to why you didn't tell us straight out."

"No, thanks," Eddie declined, meeting Agent Nyler's eyes boldly now. He wasn't hiding sheepishly or trying to sneak away anymore. "I don't do self-incrimination."

"The Fifth Amendment doesn't protect you if you're withholding evidence about another person's crime," Agent Nyler pressed him. "Either you talk right now, or I take you in as a person of interest."

"You might get to ride in the back of my car after all," Officer Garrenton informed him with a dry smile.

Eddie defied Agent Nyler with a glare. "You have nothing on me. A similar voice. Anybody could have made that call."

Agent Nyler stepped nose-to-nose with Eddie; they were nearly the same height, eyes at the same level, confronting each other. "Son," he spoke in a hushed tone, "this boy you claim as your friend is out there somewhere. Now, I know you didn't have him when he called two hours ago, but somehow you knew he was here, in this apartment. Either you start explaining that to me, or you go to prison for withholding evidence and whatever else I can dig up on you. And I'm starting to get the feeling I won't have to dig very far."

Eddie merely continued to glare at him, hardly blinking. Kara had never imagined that Eddie could be so obstinate. He had always seemed so meek.

Agent Nyler waited several seconds before he finally broke eye contact with Eddie and looked over to Officer Garrenton. "Take him, Jackie."

She reached to her hip and pulled out a set of handcuffs.

Shocking herself, Kara darted between Eddie and Officer Garrenton. "Wait!" she entreated the officer. Turning to Eddie as Officer Garrenton paused, she met his green eyes. "Eddie," she pleaded, "think of Zach. If you know where he is, _please_ —Eddie, help us find him. I know you care about him. Tell us what you know...for Zach."

Eddie, so defiant a moment before, seemed suddenly shaken. His eyes darted around the balcony as if seeking an escape route no one else could see. "I'll—" He gulped. "They'll put me in prison until Zach is grown up," he whispered to her. "I can't—" His eyes flicked to Craig for a moment and back to Kara.

On impulse, trembling, she drew closer to him. "Is he in danger?" she asked in a low voice.

Eddie drew in a deep, shuddering breath. He lifted his eyes back to Agent Nyler, who waited, facing him with arms folded. "I knew your name last night because you once investigated my father."

Agent Nyler lifted one eyebrow. "Did I?"

Eddie shrugged. "He knew you never had enough evidence to prove anything. But you will this time. That gray hair you found—it's his."

_"Your father has Zach?"_ Kara blurted out.

Eddie nodded awkwardly.

Craig gaped, then frowned. "Eddie, how does your father even know who Zach _is?"_

"He raised Zach. Well, very loosely speaking."

"Eddie," Agent Nyler asked, "who is your father?"

Eddie hesitated just a moment before answering. "Dr. Bill Lerwick."
Chapter 18

_"Grandfather?"_ Kara exclaimed, astonished. "The man Zach called Grandfather is your _father?"_

"Dr. William Edward Lerwick, Senior. I'm Junior." Eddie watched for Nyler's reaction.

Agent Nyler unfolded his arms and nodded slowly, remembering. "Suspicious acquisitions of specialized medical equipment. How did he know I was investigating him?"

_"Bill_ Lerwick," Craig breathed, "not Bert."

"Grandfather—your father—took Zach?" Kara repeated, still trying to process the thought. "But he's dead!"

"That's what Zach thought, because that's what the nanny told him," Eddie explained, "because that's what I told the nanny—so that Zach would go to you."

"So that Zach...?" Craig's eyes shot fully open. _"You,_ Eddie? _You_ sent him to us?"

Eddie glanced toward Officer Garrenton, who still blocked his only escape route at the door. "I swear I didn't know my father had Zach," he defended himself, "not until I heard his voice on the phone."

"That voice was your father?" Kara demanded. "And you didn't tell us?"

"I thought he was still in Japan giving speeches! He's not supposed to be back for another month. I track his purchases, I know when he buys his plane tickets. He always reserves a rental car with the same company when he's about to come back—"

_"Why,_ Eddie?" Craig cut him off. "Why did your father kidnap our son?"

"I don't know. I can't believe he did it. Zach's been with you so long, I figured that when he returned, he would give up on Zach and let him go... I made arrangements, I was ready to stop him..."

Kara blinked. "Ten years, and you knew Zach was ours the whole time?"

Eddie leaned heavily against the solid balcony railing as if suddenly exhausted. "I've known what my father was doing to Zach all along, ever since I was a kid. I never told anyone before now. When I heard his voice, I couldn't say anything because—you know—the cops were there." He made a small wave with his hand. "I'm an accomplice to the crime, more or less."

Kara watched as Craig worked the problem in his mind. "Your father took Zach as an embryo?" he concluded.

Eddie nodded. "Your embryologist lied to you. There was an extra embryo. He sold it to my father."

Kara glared at Eddie as leaned there against the railing. "Tell us why," she demanded in a hushed voice. "Why did he take our son? I want to know why, and I want my son back."

Eddie rubbed his neck. "My father wants Zach because...he's one of a kind, the first... There's no one like him."

Craig ran a hand through his hair. "What do you mean? He's just a normal kid."

"That's the point." Eddie seemed to fight himself, glancing at Agent Nyler and Officer Garrenton, uncertain what to say. Finally, he spoke again, almost to himself. "My mother was a good woman. She always said Zach needed to be with his own family. She told him you were good people, that she'd met you, Kara, and you would be a wonderful mom for him someday. She used to argue with my father—she insisted that he give Zach to you. She said Zach had the right to have a real family. But my father wouldn't do it. He claimed he needed Zach for testing."

"Testing?" Craig inquired darkly. "He ran _tests_ on Zach?"

"I don't think he ever actually did. At least, Zach never mentioned any. But my father always said he had to keep him just in case tests were needed... He's a medical researcher, my father, the best in the world in human reproduction. And Zach is his greatest accomplishment."

"He took Zach as an embryo to run experiments on him?" Kara growled.

"Not to experiment on him. Zach _was_ the experiment. My father bought that embryo from your embryologist and tried to use it. He bought a few, actually. One survived. With him, the experiment worked. He was born almost normal, and he turned out healthier than anyone could have expected, despite being sick a lot those first few years."

"What did he do to Zach, Eddie?" Craig asked with some trepidation. "What was the experiment?"

The cool morning breeze gusted across the balcony for a moment. Eddie turned his face into it and let out a slow breath before meeting Craig's eyes. "My father is obsessed with making an artificial human womb. No one has ever created one that works. Years ago, a Japanese guy figured out how to keep a premature goat alive in a sort of artificial womb, but not from conception, and certainly not a human child. My father was furious. He always wants to be the first. But to make a human baby grow in an artificial environment from the beginning—it's enormously complicated, like trying to stack a card tower with your eyes closed. Hormones, temperature, how the mother's body triggers every step of the developmental process at just the right time—you have to mimic all these things perfectly, or the baby doesn't survive. It's risky. They just don't know enough about how all this works. It's essentially impossible... Or it was."

The young man shook his head slowly as he continued. "My father was twenty-five years ahead of his time, maybe fifty, maybe more. He came up with a new way to approach the whole process. Then he tested his approach using a new artificial womb. He kept it quiet, though, until he could try it out. Some investors he found financed it—rich types, some local, most of them foreign; he promised them a share of the profits when he perfected and sold his technique. My father hid his new system in a top secret section of his lab and didn't let anyone in except his senior research staff—the people he trusted to keep it quiet. He let me go in there and see it once—only once. I was fourteen. I didn't understand any of it. I still don't. But it all made sense to him. He's a genius, my father." Eddie paused, his eyes locking onto something in the past. "That was the first time I saw Zach—when he was born. It was strange. My father just said it was time and...lifted him out."

Kara stared at Eddie. "What did Zach do?" she asked in an oddly small voice.

Eddie raised his hands palms-up. "He breathed. Then he cried. My father was so excited, he almost cried, too. After that, it was my mother's responsibility to care for Zach—and secretly, because what my father had done was illegal. He wanted to avoid going to prison at all costs. He said you can't make great discoveries in prison. His research was his life. Not me, not my mother...not even Zach, really. The research, the experiments, the discoveries—they're everything to him."

Nyler crossed his arms again as he listened.

Craig cocked his head to the side and narrowed his eyes skeptically. "This is impossible, Eddie," he said flatly. "An _artificial womb?_ You haven't said one thing here that proves you're doing anything but making all this up."

Eddie shrugged. "Don't ask me to explain the medical part. I'm not a doctor. I was just a kid when he did it. I know he had other doctors working with him, but I don't know how they managed it."

"Where are those doctors now?" Nyler inquired.

"My father paid them off with the money from his investors. I think most of them moved out of the country and kept quiet. They know that if they say anything to anybody, and if my father goes to prison, he'll disclose their names to the FBI. It's a federal crime to grow an embryo artificially for more than fourteen days. So none of them wants to draw attention to themselves."

Craig shook his head doubtfully. "Where did he get all the equipment, all the...I don't know, the chemicals and stuff to do this?"

"Most of it was a normal part of his research, the studies everyone knew about. There were a few things he needed more of, or that he wouldn't usually need if he were only working with embryos. Those were the suspicious acquisitions of medical equipment. He bought them from companies that he knew wouldn't ask awkward questions. He might have stolen some of it or bribed some people, I don't know. He found ways to get what he wanted. He's quite the criminal mastermind, my father."

Agent Nyler spoke up. "It must have been right around that time that he sold his lab."

"Yes. He sold it after Zach was born and moved all his equipment to another country so he could focus on repeating the process there. It was too risky to continue that kind of research here. Once his investors saw how he had succeeded with Zach, they poured a lot of money into his work." Eddie rubbed his forehead with both hands.

"That's still not proof, Eddie," Craig stated flatly. "This is all just a story."

He looked to Kara. She gazed back, unfocused and open-mouthed. She wondered whether _she_ really believed all of this. It was so far-fetched.

"You know how Zach doesn't like to be touched?" Eddie offered. "My father thought that came from being born in an artificial womb. He didn't really know; it surprised him. He tried to simulate a real womb in some ways—he set up a recording of a mother's heartbeat and everything a baby would hear in the womb. He even made the womb so it would jostle sometimes, as if the mother were moving around. But the actual being inside the mother—he didn't have a way to replicate the _feel_ of it."

Kara considered Eddie a moment. "Why did Zach get sick so much?"

"A weak immune system. Newborns get a lot of their immunity from their mother. But Zach wasn't with his mother—you—so he obviously didn't get that. My father anticipated that illnesses would be a problem for him. He gave him every inoculation he dared once Zach was born, but he couldn't keep him from getting sick, the poor tyke. That first year, we didn't think he was going to make it. It seemed like my mother was taking him to the doctor every week."

Craig and Kara stared at one another, dumbfounded. Kara tried to absorb Eddie's unbelievable story—unbelievable except that Zach really was their son somehow... _Why would Eddie make up such a bizarre story if it weren't true?_

"Once Zach started kindergarten," Eddie resumed, "my mother demanded that my father take him back to you. He adjusted to school so well that she gave my father an ultimatum: if he didn't give you Zach, she would leave him. She said Zach didn't need him anymore. My father still wouldn't do it, though, and my mother was too terrified of going to prison herself to turn him in. So she divorced him and moved up to Mount Vernon. She had always drunk a little; after the divorce, she was so torn up about Zach that she drank more and more until—"

"The accident," Craig finished. Eddie raised his eyebrows, surprised. Craig gave him a wry smile. "We found the obituary."

"You always seemed to really care about Zach, Eddie," Kara said, "like your mother did."

Eddie dropped his gaze. "He's like a little brother to me. My father bribed somebody in the school district to get me my job at Briar Point when I was nineteen, the year Zach went to kindergarten. That way I could watch him there and take care of details like permission slips and phone numbers and such. It wouldn't do to have the school calling you about Zach. But my father wanted your names on all of his records so that if anything went wrong, he could dump Zach on you and disappear, and there would be no paper trail to him."

"Which explains why he never told Zach his name," Craig postulated, "and why Zach's birth certificate is a fraud."

Agent Nyler raised his eyebrows thoughtfully at that suggestion.

Eddie nodded. "My father paid a lot of money to have the birth certificate filed. And the nannies—he wanted nannies who were in the country illegally and only spoke Spanish. That way they were less likely to figure out something was wrong and report it to the authorities. He paid them well so they wouldn't cause any trouble."

"And you were the go-between," Kara guessed, "between them and your father. You were the nanny company."

Eddie's jaw dropped. "How do you know about the company?"

"We met Rita," Kara said.

_"Rita?_ She came back from Mexico?"

"A few months ago. She recognized Zach."

Eddie shook his head in amazement.

"So that's why you're an accomplice," Officer Garrenton spoke up, "because you helped your father keep Zach hidden."

Eddie nodded sadly. "When Zach was little, I helped my mom take care of him. But when he turned two, my father made me move out so Zach wouldn't remember me. He got me my own apartment, taught me some... _skills_ I would need to help him keep Zach secret. But I missed the little tyke—missed him a lot until I got that job at the school." Eddie hung his head again. "I always thought my mom was right." He looked up at Kara. "She gave him the name you chose."

"That was a cruel thing to do," Kara replied.

Eddied gave a helpless half-shrug. "She meant it as a gift. She wanted him to be yours."

Kara sniffled once and looked away from Eddie for a moment. "Why now, Eddie? Why did you send him back to us last spring?"

Eddie's face grew dark. "Because I promised my mother I would. I was with her when she died. I drove up to see her that day, saw the wreck where she had hit the tree, and rushed to the hospital."

Craig narrowed his brows. "But the newspaper said the police didn't know who her relatives were."

"Because I didn't stick around to tell them who I was," Eddie responded. "I stayed with her until she died, and then I left." He paced himself with a deep breath. "She was in shock, and she was drunk. She had been thinking about Zach again. She made me promise I would take Zach to you before he grew up."

"And you waited five more years!" Kara said.

"I had to find a way to do it without revealing myself and without my father being there to interfere. It was impossible. But then this year he planned to be gone for six months, doing his research and speaking at conferences—and I saw my chance. I slipped a little information to the nanny to convince her that my father had died and the money had run out, and at school I suggested to Zach that he look up your address..."

"In the phonebook," Craig recalled.

"And he did great, except for getting completely lost. I followed him the whole time, in the rain, until he found you," Eddie nodded to Officer Garrenton. "After that, I could only hope for the best. And, well"—he looked back to Craig and Kara—"you kept him. And you loved him. That was all I could have hoped for."

Kara looked down at her fingers, unconsciously intertwined. She looked up and saw Craig mulling over Eddie's story. She wasn't sure she believed it, the part about the artificial womb. It sounded too much like science fiction. But everything else made sense, making her doubts seem almost silly.

"Eddie," Kara asked softly, studying her hands again, "is Zach in danger with your father?"

"He won't hurt him," Eddie replied just as quietly. "He needs him healthy so he can show him off—that's how he gets his investors. He shows them Zach and explains where he came from. When they see that he's been successful before, they believe he can be successful again."

"Why would they invest in an artificial womb?" Kara wondered aloud. "Do they really think they're going to make money with it?"

"They'll perfect the system and then make a little money selling it to hospitals to save premature babies. And they'll make some on women who can't have children on their own. But for the real money—my father thinks there are thousands of wealthy women out there who would pay dearly to have a child without having to carry it and give birth themselves. Actresses, fashion models—women who want to have a child but keep their youthful figure, too."

"Eddie," Officer Garrenton asked with a glance at Kara, "will your father bring Zach back to his parents?"

Eddie locked eyes with her. "No. He will keep him hidden somewhere. Zach is too valuable for my father to risk losing him."

Kara looked intently at Eddie. His eyes betrayed no falsehood. Her breathing shallow, she stepped to the other end of the balcony to gaze out toward Puget Sound. "How do we find your father, Eddie?"

"I don't know," Eddie shook his head. "It won't be easy. He could go anywhere, and he won't leave many clues behind him."

"Help us, Eddie." She turned back to him and held his green eyes. "I know he's your father, but please—"

"I promised my mother," Eddie replied. "I'll try."

Eddie's assurance that Zach would be safe with Dr. Lerwick brought Kara no comfort. Perhaps the man would do Zach no physical harm, but if anything Eddie had told them here was true, the man had stolen away her son—and she wanted Zach back. More than she had ever wanted anything, she wanted him back.

*****

As Eddie wrapped up his tale, Craig eyed Agent Nyler, who rubbed his hands together in thought. "That's the strangest story I've heard in a long time," Nyler finally managed. He turned to look at Officer Garrenton.

"Beats me," she told him. "I never saw any of these folks before I picked up Zach that night."

"Almost at the Pacific Medical Center," Eddie put in.

Officer Garrenton nodded and shifted her eyes from him back to Agent Nyler. "He's right. That's where the boy found me."

"I don't believe his story either," Craig said to Agent Nyler. "An artificial womb, and nobody knew about it? You can't keep something like that secret."

Agent Nyler scratched behind his ear. "I didn't say I don't believe him," he replied. "Actually, it would explain the types of medical supplies Dr. Lerwick was gathering when I was investigating him. It all had to do with his field of expertise. Some of it fit what he was working on publicly at the time. The rest of it I couldn't figure out." He nodded solemnly to Eddie. "No, as strange as it sounds, I suspect young Mr. Lerwick here is telling us the truth."

Craig's stomach sank. The possibility that Eddie's story could be true struck another blow to him...but why? Zach wasn't any less human for being conceived in a test tube and born from a box or whatever the artificial womb had been. But there was something discomfiting about knowing his son had been the object of a grand and dangerous, not to mention illegal, experiment—without his parents' knowledge or permission.

"A question, though," Agent Nyler addressed Eddie. He laid one arm across his chest and rested the other elbow on it, placing a finger across his mustache. "Your father intended to keep Zach hidden. So why send him to school?"

Eddie smiled ironically. "It wasn't what my father wanted. His investors demanded it. For all the risk involved, they required that my father demonstrate Zach's ability to be socially and academically normal. They didn't feel that homeschooling would be sufficient confirmation of his capacity—too controlled. They nearly pulled their funding before my father gave in."

"But why _public_ school?" Nyler wondered. "Surely your father would have been more comfortable with a private school."

Eddie shook his head. "He considered it, but it was actually simpler to hide Zach's uniqueness in a larger school with a broader mix of children. Fewer awkward questions to answer that way. Besides, private schools expect more parental involvement. At public schools, you always have some parents who don't want to connect, or can't. Zach wouldn't seem as out of place there."

"And your role at the school was to manipulate information about Zach so no one would realize anything out of the ordinary was going on."

"Or at least anything illegal. Unordinary was unavoidable." Eddie met Agent Nyler's eyes again. "As for my role there—I'm pretty sure that information falls under the category of self-incrimination."

Agent Nyler grunted. "I'm guessing you could break into the computers by night and alter Zach's information as needed, pick up notes to be sent home, even forge his parents' signatures on forms."

"One might imagine so," Eddie answered with a smirk.

"Hmph." Agent Nyler switched the positions of his arms, placing his other index finger across his mustache. "So, where will your father be now?"

Eddie looked out beyond the balcony toward the downtown skyline, frowning. "Your guess is as good as mine. You could check his house, I suppose, but—"

"He has a house? Where?"

"Edmonds." From the pocket of his sweatshirt, Eddie pulled out a scrap of paper and handed it to Agent Nyler. "He keeps it and this apartment. And he moves around a lot—changes homes every year. It makes him harder to track if anyone catches on to what he's doing."

The agent scanned the address on the paper. "Jackie?" He handed the paper to her.

"I'll have the station contact Edmonds PD," Officer Garrenton responded. She stepped to the living room to radio the dispatcher.

"You're coming with me," Agent Nyler informed Eddie, who merely sighed in resignation. "Care to join us?" he asked Craig and Kara.

"Absolutely," Craig confirmed.

Agent Nyler stepped back inside the apartment. "Ernie!" he called. An agent stuck his head out from the bathroom. "Do what you can here. We have a house to check in Edmonds."

"You got it, boss," Ernie replied and ducked back into the bathroom.

"Agent Bentley?" Nyler yelled.

An agent who had been at Craig and Kara's home earlier cleared her throat from behind him.

Nyler turned and saw her. "I'd like your team to come with us."

She answered him with a quick nod.

"Let's go, then," Agent Nyler said to Craig, Kara, and Eddie.

Officer Garrenton passed the address along to Agent Bentley, then caught Kara's arm as she and Craig strode by her. "Hey," she whispered, "he'll be okay. Zach's an intelligent boy. He fooled me that first night. I raised two crafty sons, and he still fooled me. And he managed to call you this morning. He's going to make it through this."

Kara, who had been so strong through this whole ordeal, wiped away a sudden tear. She hesitated, then hugged Officer Garrenton unabashedly. Taken aback for a second, the officer returned the embrace, then sent Kara off with an encouraging pat on the back.

Craig followed his wife downstairs and out to Agent Nyler's car at the curb. Eddie was already in the front seat with him, waiting for them. As soon as they were inside, Nyler activated his siren and lights, and they sped away toward Interstate 5.

*****

The vehicles in the fast lane maneuvered out of the way to make room for Agent Nyler to speed by as Craig watched from the back seat, aching for his son—his completely unexpected son who looked like him, ate oatmeal with raisins, and was turning out to be just as complicated to raise as any other ten-year-old.

Lost in his thoughts, Craig snapped back to the present when Eddie, in the front, twisted backward to face him and Kara. "Hey, I'm...really sorry," he said hesitantly. "I should have sent Zach back to you years ago. I never meant for him to be in a mess like this."

Kara eyed him and bit her upper lip. "Just help us get him back, Eddie."

Eddie met Craig's eyes, imploring, but Craig didn't know what to say. Eddie had a point—he had made his mother's mistake, protecting himself at Zach's expense. Even when he had sent Zach to Craig and Kara, Eddie had put Zach at risk to keep himself hidden.

Perhaps sensing the tone of Craig's thoughts, Eddie dropped his gaze and turned back to stare at the road ahead.

"How many other...er, embryos has your father grown in his artificial womb?" Kara asked in a voice just loud enough to be heard over the road noise and the siren.

Eddie didn't look back at her. "He's tried several, I think. I don't know how long they lived. All I know is that Zach was the only one who made it all the way, or even close."

Craig felt his stomach twist at the thought of Dr. Lerwick growing human embryos—and losing them—for his research. He swallowed hard, trying to fend off the sudden sense of revulsion. Those embryos could have been children like Zach. "Does he not feel anything for them?" he voiced. "Are they nothing to him? Just experiments, research tools?"

"That's about it, yeah," Eddie responded bluntly, drawing Agent Nyler's eyes. "He figures they're worth it in exchange for the children who will be born later." Eddie shifted to look back at Craig again and frowned. "I've never helped him with that—never, I swear. All I've ever done is watch over Zach. For me, it was all about taking care of Zach."

"What if your mother had been wrong?" Kara asked, changing the subject. "What if Craig and I had been mean to Zach? You took a big risk, Eddie, sending him to us when you didn't even know us."

"Oh, I knew you," he returned. "I watched you for weeks before I sent him to you. I saw the nursery where you work. I found out about the baseball fields that Craig and his partner fix up for Little League games. I even sent an anonymous letter to the Mariners about them. One time I went to your church and found out the preacher is your brother. I wasn't going to send the kid to people who weren't _good_ people." He paused, considering. "And my mother was right. You're good parents. You should have had him from the beginning."

With that, they continued on in silence for several more minutes. Agent Nyler steered them off the freeway and west into Edmonds. A series of stoplights and turns brought them into a friendly-looking neighborhood where school zone signs warned motorists to slow down when children were present.

Nyler turned left into a long, narrow driveway that passed under several tall trees and dead-ended at a quintet of houses, two on either side and one where the pavement ran out. Police cars had already packed the little available space around one of the houses to the left, small and plain white with a tiny patch of yard and a high, wooden fence. A pair of cars—one unmarked, the other marked "FBI"—swung in behind Agent Nyler's vehicle.

As Nyler stepped out of the car, a compact police officer about Craig's age dressed in a shirt and tie hurried up to meet him. Eddie, Kara, and Craig stepped out with Nyler.

"I have six officers ready," the compact man reported. "This is your case—you make the call."

"Thanks, Mike," Agent Nyler nodded, puffing out his cheeks as he considered the house. "Anybody home?"

"Doesn't look like it, but we didn't take any chances. I have eyes all the way around."

"Good," Agent Nyler said. "We'll need to be careful. If anyone is inside, they may have the boy with them. Let's go in."

"Don't you need a search warrant?" Eddie advised.

"Not if we have reason to believe there could be an abducted child in there," Nyler answered. "You're my reason."

The FBI agents arrayed themselves among the Edmonds officers. Agent Nyler stepped up onto the front porch and tried the door. It was locked. "Kick it in," he ordered one particularly large agent.

"Woah!" Eddie blurted, stepping boldly between the large agent and the door. "There's no need to get violent." He drew a pair of thin gloves, clean and black, from the pocket of his sweatshirt and pulled them deftly onto his hands. He then brought out the tools he had used to pick the lock to Mr. Lopez's office last night. "May I?" he requested with a look at Agent Nyler.

"What's with the gloves?" Mike asked.

"Sweaty hands make for sloppy work," Eddie replied, "and leave fingerprints. Something my father taught me."

With a gesture toward the door, Nyler gave Eddie permission. "But then get out of the way quick," he warned.

Eddie inserted his tools. Five seconds later, the door popped open. He stepped back.

Agent Nyler bellowed, "FBI!" and the FBI agents and police officers rushed inside, weapons at the ready. Mike hung back, standing where—it seemed to Craig—he could step in front of Craig, Kara, and Eddie should they try to enter. He had taken responsibility for keeping them out of the way, and out of harm's way.

"Kitchen is clear!" came a call from inside. Similar calls sounded from each room of the small house. With the last one, Agent Nyler returned to the front and put away his firearm.

"Not here," he told Craig and Kara grimly. They accepted the news with weary nods. "But," the agent continued, "come see this."

They followed him into the house, through the living room, and down a short hall. He brought them into a bedroom, and Craig's breath caught at the sight.

"Oh!" Kara exclaimed. "Craig, that's his—No wonder he liked our guest bed so much." She stepped to the one piece of furniture in the room—a narrow, black cot set against the wall. With one hand, she pressed on it, pursing her lips disapprovingly. A pair of thick blankets lay jumbled at the head of the cot.

Eddie snorted. "My father never even got him a real bed."

Craig peeked into the closet. Clothes were stacked neatly on the floor—a couple of pairs of jeans, a T-shirt, underwear, and socks. Zach's old jacket lay askew beside them. Kara joined Craig there, and he put a hand on her back. "When he left his stuff behind, he wasn't leaving much."

"No." She turned back to the room. "Books." They were piled into four small towers in one corner. "There's his radio..." It was beside the books, with earbuds still plugged into it.

Several papers were taped to the wall. A few were pictures he had drawn, perhaps at school; one was a single-page story he had written about a school where the children never had to go inside. And one—

"Kara!" Craig motioned her over to him. "Look..."

Kara closed her mouth and swallowed as she examined it, a large heart in red crayon and filled on the inside with pink. Over the pink, in pencil, he had written, "Happy Valentine's Day to my mom Kara and my dad Craig. I wish I could meet you. I hope you like me." It was dated February 14 of this year.

Craig frowned and ran a hand through his hair. Then, without a word, he pulled the heart gently from the wall and handed it to Kara. Agent Nyler, watching, did nothing to stop them.

Craig waved a hand around the room. "Can we take these things home for Zach? Except the cot. I don't think he'll want that."

"We need to leave it here for now," Nyler answered. "Once we catch this guy, I'll see what we can do."

He turned to face Eddie. "You opened that door like a pro. I wonder if you can open something more complicated."

"Like what?" Eddie inquired cautiously.

Agent Nyler indicated the hall with his thumb. "There's a safe in the other bedroom. I'd be curious to see what's inside."

"Why don't you open it yourself?"

Nyler grunted. "I'm not sure we could do it without an expert here. Besides, we can enter and look for a missing boy, but the law doesn't permit us to search the house for whatever we can find."

"But you just asked me to—"

"No, I didn't."

Eddie barked a laugh. "You want me to break into it for you? Because you want to know what's inside or so you can arrest me?"

Nyler chuckled. "Tell you what. You help me find Zach alive and well, and I'll put in a nice word for you with the prosecutor's office. He happens to be an old college buddy of mine."

"Hmm," Eddie mused, rubbing his chin with a hand. "If the prosecutor's your friend, then I want complete immunity. And in exchange..." He leaned close to Agent Nyler and spoke in a low voice. "You remember that break-in at Hugh McWrait's store a few months ago? The one where nothing was taken?"

"Nothing McWrait would talk about, anyway—yeah. You know something about that?"

Eddie grinned openly. "Some papers were taken. There's a safe hidden behind a picture on the wall in the office. If you're looking for some dirt on McWrait..."

Nyler looked interested. "Where do you have these papers?"

"I didn't say I have _any_ papers," Eddie responded. "But maybe we can work something out. By the way, don't you have an undercover agent who goes by the street name of Albert K.?"

This question clearly caught Nyler by surprise. "I don't keep track of all of our undercover agents. Why?"

"I'll bet you don't," Eddie said wryly, still keeping his voice down. FBI agents and police officers stepped past the room every few seconds, searching for clues that might lead them to Zach. "He's a double-agent. Some photographs have been taken that you might find interesting."

"I don't suppose you'd have access to these photographs," Nyler suggested.

"I'm just saying they're out there. And the lady he brought in a couple of days ago—he framed her, just so you know. I'd love to see what you and I and your friend the prosecutor can work out." He stepped into the hallway. "In the meantime, I'll just go look around in the next room."

Agent Nyler watched him move into the other bedroom and reached a hand up to scratch behind his ear. "Bentley," he spoke quietly as the agent strode past the door, "get me Luke Terry on the phone as quickly as you can."

"The prosecutor?" she asked. "Why?"

"Our boy Eddie is more than he appears. I need to find out how much he knows."

Agent Bentley raised both eyebrows and activated her phone as she returned to the living room.

Nyler glanced toward Craig and Kara. "I hope the two of you didn't know anything about Eddie's...other line of work."

Craig quickly shook his head. "We only knew him from Zach's school—well, and he's helped out with my Little League team a few times. He's a good first base coach."

"I don't know if you should let him be around the kids anymore, Craig," Kara said, her voice troubled.

Craig puffed out his cheeks. Who exactly _was_ Eddie? "He brought Zach back to us," he reminded Kara. "He didn't have to."

In reply, Kara put a fist to her mouth and gazed around the room again—this room that had been Zach's before he came to the parents he had always hoped to meet someday.

Eddie returned a few moments later. "You don't know these were in the safe," he said to Agent Nyler with a wry smile, leafing through a small stack of papers in one black-gloved hand. "They're disappointing, actually. Just legal papers—the rental agreement on the house, another for the apartment, his car registration..."

Agent Nyler's head snapped up to look Eddie in the eye. "Car registration? I thought you said he always rents a car."

"Every time. He hates to pay for long-term parking, so he leaves his car here when he's away. But then he rents a car and drives around the house and the apartment to make sure no one's waiting for him when he comes home. I told you he's a genius. Paranoid, too—with good reason." Eddie was grinning. "Here," he said, handing Nyler a strip of paper marked with Eddie's own handwriting, "I copied the description and registration down for you. You got it from the Department of Licensing."

"Oh, yes, I'd forgotten," Agent Nyler said, narrowing his eyes at Eddie. "How did you get the safe open?"

Eddie shrugged. "Electronic code lock. I broke the code."

Nyler raised his eyebrows, impressed. "Mike!" He turned and hurried into the living room, where Craig heard him instructing the other agents and officers to notify local jurisdictions to watch for Dr. Lerwick's car, a silver, two-door Volkswagen GTI.

Craig leaned toward Eddie. "You _broke the code?"_

"On the fourth try," Eddie grinned wryly. "Zero-four-zero-three—Zach's birthday. Greatest day of my father's life, from his point of view."

"So obviously you're not just a night custodian at the school."

Eddie dropped the grin and shifted awkwardly. He glanced at Kara, who glared at him, then lowered his eyes to the floor. "My father trained me to be a thief, spy, forger—well, just the basics of forgery, mostly signatures and such. I'm kind of like Robin Hood—steal from the rich and give to the poor. I don't keep much of it for myself, actually. I live on what the school pays me, for the most part." He grinned again at that, but sobered when Craig's serious demeanor didn't budge. "Look, I only rob people who deserve it anyway," he justified himself.

Kara stepped up to him and stared at him with her head tipped to the side. "Did you forge our signatures on Zach's forms for school, Eddie?"

"Frequently," he returned. "Craig's is a little tough, but I'm really good at yours. I had to learn how to change the angle, since you're left-handed..."

He glanced around and spotted a sheet of paper serving as a bookmark in one of Zach's old books. He tugged it out and set it atop the book, then bent over it with a pen from his pocket. Concentrating, he wrote, then straightened and handed the paper to Kara.

Her mouth hung open as she examined the loopy writing. "Wow," she admired. She showed it to Craig. "That's...my signature, all right."

"You've signed a lot of Zach's forms without knowing it," Eddie chuckled. "Nothing bad, though—only normal stuff like permission slips and report cards."

"I never saw his report card until last June."

Eddie frowned again and shuffled his feet. "I know—sorry."

Kara gave him another stern look and stepped past him to the hall.

"The Valentine's heart that Zach made for you and Kara," Eddie told Craig softly after a moment's silence, "he showed it to me that day at school. That's when I knew I had to send him home. My father told him you were dead, but he never quite gave up hoping you were alive."

Craig met Eddie's eyes and drew in a deep breath. His throat tightened up, so he simply nodded his appreciation and left it at that.

Agent Nyler's voice resounded through the house. "We're done here. Let's go!"

Agents and officers streamed out to their vehicles and began to depart. "Mike," Agent Nyler called, grabbing the other man's attention, "have this house watched, would you? Lerwick doesn't know we've been here. He may return."

"You bet," Mike answered. "If he shows up, I'll bring him to meet you."

Agent Nyler followed Craig, Kara, and Eddie to his car. He stopped Eddie there with a hand and spoke softly. "I just spoke to my friend the prosecutor. He's willing to make a deal, depending on how well you cooperate and what information you have for us. But only if we get the boy back alive and well. You give me your information on McWrait, and if it's something we can act on, that will help your cause, too. McWrait's a big fish; we've been trying to hook him a long time."

"And Albert K.?" Eddie asked.

Agent Nyler glanced around to make sure no one but the four of them was within earshot. "That's between you and me for the moment. If you're right about him—well, let's just say that would strengthen our relationship a great deal."

Eddie raised one eyebrow. "Strengthen?"

_"If_ you're right. But it'll take a lot to convince me."

Eddie considered for a moment, then met Nyler's eyes again. "My car's parked on Queen Anne Hill. The pictures are hidden inside it."

Agent Nyler moved to get into the car. "Then let's go see them."

*****

Zach gazed out the window at the rain falling through the cedar trees that surrounded the cabin in which he waited. His stomach complained mightily. He felt weak, and his hands shook. Dull pain still pulsed down his left arm; all of his limbs ached from last night's imprisonment in the shed. He whirled his arms around like slow propellers the way Dad did when he was getting ready to play catch. It seemed to loosen his shoulder a bit and ease the aching for a moment.

From the ferry, Grandfather had driven them through a small town and then into wooded countryside. He had brought them here to this two-bedroom cabin secluded among the trees. Once inside, Grandfather had permitted him to drink all the water he wanted; after more than twelve hours without a drop, Zach had downed several cups. Nothing had ever tasted better to him. Studying himself in the bathroom mirror, he had been surprised by the redness in his eyes.

Then Grandfather had sent him into this bedroom to wait. His instructions had been succinct: stay here until I call for you. Zach had protested that he wanted to go home, but Grandfather had ignored him, warning him that when he came out of the bedroom, he was not to speak unless spoken to. A single violation and he would receive no food until dinner.

Zach had waited in this room ever since. The clock on the wall showed 10:28; he had spent most of two very dull hours watching the rain, sometimes praying that he could go home, sometimes wishing hungrily that he were in the kitchen with Mom making tacos for lunch. He eyed a gray squirrel as it darted down from a tree, hunted around for seeds on the ground, found something, and scaled a second tree with its find. _The squirrel is free,_ he thought, _just like the mountain goat, and they can get all the food they want. Why can't I? Because I was grown in a glass tank?_ Or maybe the tank was plastic. Somehow, plastic seemed worse.

_Mom never got to hold me when I was a baby._ The thought came unbidden, but it bit into him nonetheless. _She never felt me in her tummy. To her I'm just like any other person's kid..._

But what about Dad? Could a dad love his son as much if he hadn't been nearby for the birth? Was there a special bond for dads?

_Baseball,_ he thought, _that's our bond. And working in the dirt._ It was a silly thought; baseball and dirt were no match for having carried a baby in your tummy for nine months.

Headlights appeared through the rain; a car approached on the gravel road. The trees blocked most of his view, but he glimpsed it before it pulled around the cabin to park. Grandfather's voice greeted someone at the front door a few seconds later, just as another vehicle approached and stopped nearby. Zach heard Grandfather speaking with his first guest in the living room, but could not make out what they were saying. Grandfather was keeping his voice quiet, and the other person, a man, was following suit. Another voice—a woman's—soon joined them.

A third car shone its headlights through the trees and parked next to the cabin, and another man's voice added to the conversation in the living room. Zach stepped around the bed, the only furniture in the room, and lay down at the door with his ear pressed against the crack between it and the floor. He still had trouble making out their words, though, catching only enough to tell that Grandfather was doing most of the talking.

The conversation went on for nearly thirty minutes. After the first ten, Zach gave up on eavesdropping and stretched himself out on the bed. He closed his eyes, but sleep did not come. It should have—he felt exhausted. But it refused, probably because he was hoping Grandfather would wrap up his business with these other adults soon and finally let him have something to eat.

Grandfather did not end the conversation, but he did call for Zach, at last. Zach got up from the bed. His stomach rumbled as he pulled the door open and walked the short hallway to the living room.

Three strangers stood facing him as he entered; Grandfather watched from the side with his arms folded. The woman was Asian, though rather different from Aunt Lia—tall, with wide hips and short, black hair. An Hispanic man stood beside her, his hands in his pockets. He was dressed in a suit and tie and wore polished, black shoes. A third man, Caucasian and dressed in a shirt with three buttons and a high collar, leaned against the wall near the Hispanic man. The trio eyed Zach intently.

He looked at Grandfather, who smiled at him in a—well, _grandfatherly_ sort of way. It looked out of place on his face. "Zechariah," he intoned warmly, "these are friends of mine who would like to meet you."

So it was this again—meeting foreigners, Grandfather showing him off for them. Zach knew this routine. It would be easy enough. Hopefully they wouldn't ask too many questions and he could have lunch soon.

"This is your great accomplishment," the Hispanic man intoned. He sounded like Spanish was his first language.

"This is he," Grandfather confirmed. "How old are you, Zechariah?"

"Ten," Zach said clearly. He didn't feel like speaking up, but neither did he dare mumble—not if a meal was at stake.

The Caucasian man spoke. "What sorts of complications have you had with him?" His accent was strange—he wasn't from the United States. Perhaps Europe? The man looked at Zach the way Mom looked at meat at the grocery store—assessing it, gauging its quality.

"His immune system was the most daunting obstacle," Grandfather replied, "but as you can see, he has come through quite well. The first couple of years were a challenge. Basic medical attention, though, would provide our clients with a high rate of survival, to be sure."

"The survival rate must be perfect, not merely high," the Asian woman countered. "Especially at the beginning, or clients with the kind of means you're hoping to attract will refuse to take the risk." She, too, had a strong accent, but her words were clear and precise, and she was easy to understand.

"Quite true," Grandfather conceded. "Hence the need for continued funding and research."

"You have never duplicated this success?" the Caucasian man asked, waving at Zach.

"Not yet," Grandfather admitted. "But, as I explained, it is merely a matter of time. I have already shown you my most recent developments, and we have never been nearer to the ability to succeed consistently than we are today."

Zach had only a vague understanding of what Grandfather was referring to—something about growing more babies in those clear boxes—but the other three adults received his words thoughtfully. The Hispanic man stepped forward and circled Zach, studying him, placing hands on Zach's arms and feeling his muscles. Zach flinched at his touch. The Caucasian man, too, stepped toward him for a closer look.

"Talk with him, ask him questions," Grandfather encouraged them. "You'll find that his functioning is entirely normal. He is, in fact, average or better in all his classes, and he fits in well with his peers. No one in his school suspects anything unusual about his origin."

"Do you like school?" the Asian woman inquired of Zach. She remained standing in her place, observing him—not like the men, though. Her eyes examined him differently...like Nana Maggie's eyes, Zach realized, curious about him, but with a certain compassion that the men's eyes lacked.

"Yeah, I like it," Zach answered. "Especially P.E."

She smiled. "Yes, P.E. is good for boys. What games do you play?"

"Baseball is my favorite," Zach replied. "My dad is teaching me. And my mom is teaching me soccer."

The Asian woman furrowed her brows, giving him an odd look.

Grandfather saw it and chuckled. "I recently placed Zechariah with a couple to test how he would function in the environment of a home."

"No, you didn't!" Zach blurted out. "I went by myse—"

"Zechariah!" Grandfather interrupted him. "Remember what I said about speaking when you have not first been spoken to." He said it sternly but not angrily, like Mom and Dad when they corrected Zach. To Zach, it was clearly an act; Grandfather was trying to impress these people. Even so, Zach closed his mouth. He was hungry.

"And what was the result of the test?" the European man wanted to know.

Grandfather smiled. "He performed excellently. His behavior was the same as that of any normal boy his age. He struggles with obedience, as you've now seen"—Grandfather cast Zach an admonishing glance—"but he also learned a great deal from exposure to a new environment."

"Did the couple notice anything strange about him?" the European man asked again.

"Nothing," Grandfather said. "As far as they know, he is a perfectly normal boy from a troubled background, whom they took in as a foster child."

Zach clenched his jaw. Only the ache in his belly kept him from contradicting Grandfather; inside, he was seething. They were his parents, his _real_ parents.

"Do you have friends?" the Hispanic man asked Zach.

Zach restrained his anger and nodded. Grandfather motioned for him to do more than just nod. "I have lots of friends," he said wearily. "I have cousins, too, but only girls. I have one cousin who's a boy; he lives in Alaska. I haven't met him yet. And I—"

"Thank you, Zechariah, that is sufficient," Grandfather said. From a small table in the corner he took the photo album he had kept in his briefcase earlier and handed it to the Hispanic man. "I trust that you have already contacted the references I gave you concerning the validity of my claims and my research," he told the group, "but most of my investors appreciate the opportunity to see some record of Zechariah's development for themselves. These photographs illustrate the child's growth during his incubation and since his birth. I think you'll find, on the basis of Zechariah's health and progress, that my work is quite promising."

"Expensive, though," the European man pointed out. "Why so costly?"

"The returns will more than justify the expense," Grandfather assured him. "At the present time, though, the work I am engaged in is blatantly illegal in nearly every civilized nation. That, as I'm sure you understand, escalates the cost."

The European man smirked; apparently, he knew all about involvement in illegal endeavors. He looked over the shoulder of the Hispanic man, and the Asian woman joined them, studying the photos in Grandfather's book. All three pairs of eyes examined the first few pages with interest.

"When did you place him in the artificial womb?" the Asian woman asked Grandfather.

"He was a mere embryo, recently conceived in a laboratory. Only days old."

"Magnificent," the European muttered, shaking his head at the pictures he was seeing. "This remarkable machine—"

"Is now ten years out of date," Grandfather informed him, "succeeded now by a simpler and more efficient model built on the same principles, but with the most up-to-date technology. It is more versatile, more adaptable—in short, more certain to bring us success."

The three foreigners perused the photo album for another minute, making their way through it slowly, then returning to the pictures at the front for a second look. At last they set it down on the coffee table in the center of the room and returned their attention to Grandfather.

"We are on the verge of a grand accomplishment, my friends," he proclaimed. "The keystone of my research is at hand. Then, I am certain, we will perfect the process of growing infants in an artificial environment, and it will not be long before buyers line up to grow their own families at their convenience, without the inconveniences of pregnancy."

"Many women will prefer to bear their own children," the Asian woman challenged him.

Grandfather spread out his hands. "To be sure! But there will be others, particularly the wealthy, who are accustomed to a measure of freedom from life's discomforts—these will pay handsomely for the convenience of a pregnancy-free birth that bypasses the complications inherent in employing a surrogate mother."

"It is truly amazing," the Hispanic man declared. "I will give your proposal serious consideration."

"As will I," the European man agreed.

"I am most grateful," Grandfather said humbly. He looked to the Asian woman.

She hesitated. "I am not so certain. He appears to be flawed. His eyes are too red. He seems weak." She took one of his wrists, lifted it, and dropped it; Zach let it fall limply to his side. She shook her head.

"That is nothing more than weariness," Grandfather told her, the barest hint of irritation in his voice. "He had a busy day yesterday and needs rest."

The woman mused, examining Zach closely, face to face. "I would question him without you here to prompt him, if you would permit it," she said to Grandfather.

Grandfather hesitated just the barest moment, then threw his hands open. "By all means! Speak to him as long as you like. Come," Grandfather told the two men, "let us discuss the details outside before you depart." They followed Grandfather out the front door, leaving the Asian woman alone with Zach.

She knelt in front of him and looked up into his eyes. "I have a son, grown up now," she told him. "When I look at you, I know there is nothing wrong with you. You are a normal boy, just as Dr. Lerwick says. But I think you are very sad. Why?"

Zach held his tongue. Would Grandfather let him be open with this woman? But Grandfather was outside, where he would not hear. Could this be a trick?

The woman's eyes were probing, but gentle, and strong. "It is safe. I will not tell him what you say."

Zach stared at the floor. "I...miss my mom and dad," he told her in a soft voice.

"Your foster parents? You liked it better there?"

"They're not my foster parents!" Zach protested, still keeping his voice down. He didn't want Grandfather to hear him. "Grandfather lied! They're my _real_ mom and dad! Mom said they took cells from her and Dad and put them together, and they did a test on me _twice_ and found out I was really theirs!"

The woman leaned back from him and considered him with her head turned to the side and her eyes narrowed, gauging whether she believed him. "What is your mother's name?" she asked.

"Kara," Zach answered, "Kara Fleming."

"Do you know her phone number?"

Zach recited it for her, and the woman held his eyes, taking it in.

She repeated it once, then stood and took Zach's hand. "You are shaking," she noted. "Are you hungry?"

"Starving," he told her.

"When was the last time you ate?"

"Last night. But they didn't give me much."

"Who?"

"The men who kidnapped me."

The woman blinked slowly one time. "I see. Here," she said, drawing a granola bar from the pocket of her sport jacket. "Eat this quickly and give me the wrapper. Do not leave crumbs."

Without hesitation, he ripped the wrapper open and devoured the granola bar, careful, as she had warned, not to drop any crumbs that Grandfather might find. The snack was gone in seconds. He licked his lips clean. His stomach felt a little better, though it rumbled all the more for having received something solid. She took the wrapper back and stuffed it into her pocket.

She left the room, following the others out the door. "I am satisfied," she announced as she closed the door behind her. "He is fine."

They continued their conversation on the porch, out of the rain. Zach glanced discreetly through the window and thought briefly of trying to escape while Grandfather was distracted, but decided against it. He didn't know where he was—somewhere on Bainbridge Island, but he knew nothing of the place, and he had no idea where to go. Besides, Grandfather had rescued him last night and had promised that when his business here was finished, they would get some food. Then he would take Zach home to see if Mom and Dad genuinely wanted to keep him. In addition, of course—Zach shuddered as he thought of it—the kidnappers could still be out there somewhere, hunting for him.

Even as he decided not to try to escape, an idea came to him. He turned and opened the photo album. The pictures inside showed the artificial womb and himself inside it, first tiny, then gradually larger until he was a full-sized baby. After that, there were photos of him over the years—as a toddler, a four-year-old, a kindergartener, and on until just last spring.

Checking the window once more, Zach pulled out photographs, one here and one there. He took six of them and, closing the book, hid five in his jacket pocket. The sixth he carried quickly into the bedroom where he had waited. He placed it on the bed, on top of the pillow. Then he returned to the living room to wait for Grandfather on the couch.

Grandfather came inside a few minutes later, having bidden his guests farewell. "Get up," he commanded. "We're leaving." He scooped up the photo album without opening it and thrust it into his briefcase.

"Can we get some lunch now?" Zach asked in what he hoped was a polite voice.

"When we get back to Seattle," Grandfather answered.

"And then you'll take me home?"

"And then, Zechariah," Grandfather agreed with a sigh, "if you are truly certain your parents will want you back, I will take you home. And we will find out if they do."

Zach followed him out to the car, and they departed. A gray squirrel—perhaps the same one?—looked up from its scavenging among the trees to watch them go.

*****

The Asian woman boarded the ferry to Seattle by foot fifty minutes later and moments before it left the dock at Bainbridge Island. Dr. Lerwick's presentation had been as convincing as promised. The boy was a true miracle of modern technology and the man's own genius in reproductive science. None of that interested her beyond mere curiosity, of course; it had been the potential to make yet another fortune that had drawn her to the island today.

Stopping by the store on her way to the ferry, she had purchased one of those prepaid cell phones that so often came in handy. She drew it out and fingered it as she climbed the steps to one of the upper decks, feeling the boat plow steadily through the water. Exiting the shelter of the cabin, she braved the rain for the sake of privacy, walked to the rail of the deck, and stared out across Puget Sound, a lovely sight even in this dreary weather. She had always enjoyed visiting Seattle and its vicinity, especially when a favorable business deal was involved.

This visit, however, had turned up a surprise, and it was time for her to decide what to do about it. In truth, she had made her decision already, when she had bought the phone. She activated it and dialed the number the boy had given her. Though he bore very little resemblance to her own son, something in him had penetrated her well-warded conscience nonetheless: a yearning for home. Had she ever been permitted to return home herself, she might not have been so affected by it, but the shame her act of betrayal—for money, of course—had brought on her family prohibited any reconciliation. And so she yearned, forever ached.

For herself, she might be powerless to soothe the pain. But for this boy... She was not, after all, heartless.

She pressed "Call" and waited. The connection went through and the phone on the other end rang three times.

A woman's voice greeted her. "Hello?"

"Kara Fleming?" the Asian woman asked.

"Yes, this is Kara. Who am I speaking to?" The other woman's voice was tight, like someone very frightened but working to exhibit calm. In all likelihood, that meant the boy's story was true.

"Do you have a son by the name of Zechariah?"

There was the briefest hesitation. "Yes. Do you—Is he with you?" The other woman's voice was urgent now with hope.

"No, but I know where he was an hour ago," the Asian woman said as the ferry picked up speed, churning the water behind it. "I would like to give you the address, if it interests you."

"The address? Yes, yes, please! Um—" She heard this Kara Fleming moving quickly in the background. Her voice returned to the phone. "Please, go ahead."

The Asian woman gave the address along with a succinct description of the small cabin. "It is near Rolling Bay. The authorities will know how to find it, I'm sure." If she were to guess, the authorities were already standing with this Kara Fleming, beginning to radio the address even at this moment to the police on Bainbridge Island. That possibility had made it imperative that she board the ferry before calling. Ache for the boy she might, but she would not sacrifice herself.

"Thank you!" Kara exclaimed. "Please—is he okay?"

"He was weary and hungry when I saw him, but otherwise fine," the Asian woman assured her. "Zechariah tells me that he is truly your son, even if his birth was...unusual. If that is true, then you have a fine son, Mrs. Fleming, and brave. He wants to come home. I hope you are able to find him soon."

"You talked to him? Can you help us find him?"

"I'm afraid this is the best I can do."

"Who are you?"

The Asian woman considered for a moment. It was best to play it safe, she decided, in case they were already tracing the call. Mobile phones, for all their benefits, were easily located. "Let us say that I, too, am a mother—one who cannot approve of stealing such a lovely child from his home."

"Please, help us find him! We've been searching all night and all this morning—"

The Asian woman disconnected the call. Wincing at her own insensitivity, she examined the phone once more. The other woman's earnest voice hung pleading in her ears. She acknowledged an urge to call Kara Fleming again, to give comfort, perhaps even to help further. She knew enough about Dr. Lerwick that she could offer some assistance.

But finally, as so often in the past, she chose instead to protect herself, and dropped the phone over the side of the boat. With a tiny splash that registered no sound against the pulsing of the ferry's engines, it sank into the water and was gone.
Chapter 19

"Hello? Oh, please— _Hello?"_ It was no use; the call was lost. Kara spun to face Craig and Agent Nyler. "We have to get to Bainbridge Island!"

"Not yet," Agent Nyler shook his head.

_"What?_ No, he's _there,_ we have to—"

Kara was cut off by a hard, though not uncompassionate, look from Agent Nyler. "It could be a ruse. Your son may be there, or he may still be here in Seattle somewhere. Even so—Gail, have them get the helicopter ready, just in case. If they find the boy, we'll fly Mr. and Mrs. Fleming there right away."

Gail, Agent Nyler's near-retirement and entirely capable-looking administrative assistant, stepped away quickly to make the necessary arrangements.

They were in Agent Nyler's office on one of the upper floors of a building in downtown Seattle. It was tidy, despite spots of clutter—stacks of papers and files on tables along two walls, information Nyler had assembled on the cases he was investigating. Craig and Kara stood beside one wall while Eddie sat stiffly in a leather chair against another.

Agent Nyler returned to his desk and thumbed through copies of the photographs Eddie had given him. The originals had been sent with Agent Bentley. "Bainbridge Police are already en route. They'll be at the cabin before we could get airborne," he said with a glance up at Kara. "We'll know in ten minutes whether Zach is there. If he's not, then the call may have been an attempt to throw us off his trail."

"You don't have a trail," Eddie commented dryly.

"We have a house and an apartment, and also a car to look for," Nyler replied. "That's more than we had this morning." He gave Eddie a wry look. "And we have you."

Eddie turned away with a grimace.

Kara began to pace the length of the office. She was shaking. Craig caught her from behind as she neared him. He held her in front of him, his hands on her arms. He had strong hands. They helped to ease the shaking.

After a couple of long minutes, Eddie pointed to the pictures on the desk and broke the uneasy silence. "Are those good enough for you?"

"They're...enough to make me uncomfortable," Nyler admitted. "I—" He cut off as his phone beeped. He checked it, scanning an incoming text message. "Apparently, they _are_ good enough. The judge just gave Agent Bentley a search warrant. She's going to search Agent Jack—that is, Albert K.'s home."

"And the stuff on McWrait?"

"It's impressive. We'll get to it later. Right now, we have a boy to find. I've pulled a few agents to check out Albert K.; that's an urgent matter. But McWrait—he's not going anywhere. I want every possible agent working on finding Zach." He looked up at Kara again. She tried to offer him a grateful smile, but couldn't manage it. Her nerves were long since shot.

Agent Nyler left the room, leaving her alone with Craig and Eddie. Craig kissed the back of her head. "He's right," Craig told her quietly. "It makes more sense for us to stay here until—"

_"I know!"_ she barked at him. "I just want him to be there. I just want to know he's okay."

Craig rubbed her shoulders. His hands were steady, but when she looked back at him, his face was tight with concern. She put an arm around his waist and hugged him, and with a long exhale he returned the embrace. He needed her as much as she needed him right now. Eddie stood and gazed politely out the window.

Agent Nyler returned a minute later, carrying a handful of water bottles. He handed one each to Craig and Kara and tossed a third to Eddie. "You need to take care of yourselves," he said. "I want you ready if we have to move quickly."

Kara opened her bottle and took a few gulps. It helped. Being so worried about Zach, she hadn't realized how thirsty she had become.

The agent's cell phone rang. He glanced at the number and looked up at Craig and Kara. "Bainbridge Police," he informed them. Kara's pulse quickened as he connected the call. "This is Nyler." His eyes focused on the wall behind them for a moment, then snapped back to Craig and Kara. He shook his head sadly.

Kara sagged back against Craig. He ran a hand through his hair.

"No one there at all?" Agent Nyler asked the caller. Then his eyes locked onto Craig and Kara again, and he raised one finger—more information was coming to him. "What was it?... Yes, send it... I agree. Put a checkpoint at the bridge. And contact the State Patrol—have them watch the ferries. It's been an hour—they could have headed that way... Right. Let me know if you find anything more."

Nyler disconnected the call and stepped around his desk, tapping commands on his phone. "No one was at the cabin, but they found something interesting on one of the beds—a photograph... One of their officers snapped a picture of it and is sending it now."

His phone chirped again a few seconds later, and Agent Nyler pulled the photo up on the screen. He studied it briefly before handing the phone to Craig. "What do you think?"

Craig and Kara considered it together. "That's Zach," Craig said. "Maybe four years old?"

Kara nodded. "It looks just like him, only smaller." The picture, distorted slightly for being a photo of a photo, displayed a young boy with brown hair and those beautiful blue eyes Zach had somehow inherited from Craig, sitting at a table, a plate of macaroni and cheese in front of him. He was looking up at the camera calmly. Kara could only pray that he was calm now, and not too afraid.

"Eddie." She beckoned the young man to join them. "You knew him when he was little."

Eddie came and studied the photo. "That's him," he confirmed. "Cute little tyke."

"He was _there,_ Craig," Kara moaned. "The woman on the phone was right, but she called us too late. We almost found him."

Agent Nyler took the phone back and returned a call to the Bainbridge officer, verifying that this was the boy they were searching for, but six or so years ago. When he got off the phone again, he faced Eddie. "You know your father best, Eddie," he said. "Anticipate his next move. Where's he taking this boy? I want to beat him there."

Eddie sighed. "He'll get him out of the area eventually, once he's done with whatever business he has here."

"And take him where?"

"You keep asking me that. I don't know. He has a research lab somewhere."

"How will he go?" Agent Nyler questioned. "By plane? Boat?"

"Well, not by car, at least not his own car. Maybe a rental, under a false name. I can give you his aliases, the ones I know. Flying would be too risky—airport security would identify him right away. Maybe boat."

Nyler accepted this information with a nod. "I'll update authorities at the seaports. Might as well notify the airports, too, just to cover all our bases. But what if he does go by car, or by bus or train?"

Eddie shook his head. "I have no idea. He could take him anywhere."

Kara clenched her jaw. Having been within an hour of finding Zach—twice, now—this was not the news she had wanted to hear.

*****

Zach could see more of the water this time. They were on the ferry again, waiting in the car, heading for a town called Edmonds, north of Seattle. Grandfather had said they must go this way in case anyone had seen them on the first ferry, but Zach disapproved; it made the trip back to Seattle longer. Who could have known they were on the ferry to Bainbridge Island this morning?

He didn't dare question Grandfather about it, though, not now. They were on their way to get lunch at last, and then Grandfather would take him home. In the meantime, they waited as the ferry cruised smoothly atop the small waves.

Rain fell against the sides and windows of the boat. It was raining more steadily now. Even so, since Grandfather had been directed to park his car along the outer edge of the ferry, Zach had a clear view of Puget Sound. He could see land nearing ahead of them under the gray sky; they were close enough now for him to make out Edmonds, the colors and shapes of its buildings growing distinct as they approached. Being able to see out made remaining in the car more bearable than it had been that morning.

Observing him through the rearview mirror, Grandfather broke their silence. "You have behaved acceptably, Zechariah. As a reward, we will stop for food when we arrive in Edmonds. And then we will return to Seattle and visit with your parents—though I must impress upon you again that your desire for reconciliation with them is ill-founded."

Zach nodded without speaking. Grandfather could think what he wanted, but he was wrong, though something in Zach's gut warned him not to be optimistic. He had not grown inside Mom's tummy.

Stifling his doubts, he started to turn his eyes back to the water, but something moving in the side mirror caught his attention. Passengers who had brought their cars onboard and then had gone to sit on the upper decks were now returning to their vehicles. Zach twisted to watch them through the back window. Most found their cars quickly, but two of them walked between the cars toward Grandfather's. With a start, Zach recognized the pair—the Asian men!

"Grandfather!" Zach cried out. "Grandfather, lock the doors! It's them, the kidnappers!"

"What, Zechariah?" Grandfather spun to look, but it was too late. The two men were already at the car.

One of them jerked the driver's-side door open.

"No, you can't have him!" Grandfather exclaimed. He reached to pull the door shut, but the first Asian man was too quick. He slapped Grandfather's hand away, then punched him in the jaw.

"Move over!" he demanded.

Grandfather stared incredulously for a moment, a trickle of blood dripping from his lip. The first man grabbed him by the collar and bared his teeth; when Grandfather slid quickly into the passenger seat, he pulled the seat forward and settled himself into the back, beside Zach and behind the driver. The second man took the driver's place and closed the door. Both men drew guns from inside their jackets.

"Do not try to leave the car," the first Asian man warned Grandfather in his strong accent, "or we will kill you. No one needs to get hurt—except, oh, too late for that." He grinned at Grandfather's lip and kept his weapon ready in his hand. Zach cowered against the far wall of the vehicle.

"Do what they say, Zechariah," Grandfather told him in a low tone, wiping the blood from his lip. "I do not want you to be injured."

The man in the front pulled a length of cord from his pocket and swiftly bound Grandfather's hands. Zach's own hands began to shake uncontrollably. Grandfather wouldn't be able to rescue him this time, not tied up like that. Zach's heart raced. _Please, God, don't let them tie me up again!_ His stomach rumbled, but he hardly noticed it; hunger faded next to his fear of being bound and left alone again.

Grandfather did not test the cord around his wrists. "How did you find us?" he asked, staring blankly ahead through the windshield.

"Tracking device on your vehicle," the man beside Zach replied.

"Ah," Grandfather said simply. "McWrait's idea?"

The man beside Zach smiled openly. "He said very bad things about you when he saw the boy was gone. He does not like you. We searched the property, then came to find you. He will be happier now."

As the ferry approached the Edmonds dock, other drivers around them started up their vehicles. The Asian man in the front started up Grandfather's car, too.

"What will he do with us?" Grandfather asked. He seemed calmer than Zach felt, but he had a wary expression Zach had not seen on him before.

Neither of the men answered him.

"I know McWrait, and I know he doesn't pay a penny more than he has to. I dare say you men are worth more than whatever he offered you. If it interests you, I can match his offer, plus fifty percent. You seem like reasonable men..."

"Enough!" the Asian in the back yelled. "No more talking." He seemed to be the leader. He spoke to the driver in a strange, brisk language, and the driver answered him succinctly.

A minute later, Zach felt the ferry bump gently against the dock. When the cars ahead of them began to disembark, the Asian driver put Grandfather's car in gear and drove them off the ferry and onto land, guiding them straight ahead into the city.

They followed a busy road for several minutes. Suddenly the man in the back leaned forward and pointed past the driver. Zach saw it—a police cruiser parked at the side of the road directly ahead. The driver grunted. Without warning, the leader grabbed Zach's neck and forced him down onto the seat.

Zach yelped from the pain, but the Asian man pressed him down all the more. Zach felt the car shift lanes, then turn to the left.

"What are you doing?" Grandfather demanded. "Where are you taking us?"

"Downtown," the Asian in the back answered.

"You're not taking us back to McWrait?"

"Depends on the price you offer. For now, we go where we can talk."

He released Zach, who sat up, gaping at him with wide eyes, afraid even to move. The man was so strong, and he didn't care if he hurt Zach. In fact, judging by his sneer, he seemed to like it. Zach trembled.

*****

"Agent Nyler!" Gail raced into Nyler's office and handed him a sheet of paper, a printout bearing a full-page photograph. "This just came in from the State Patrol."

Agent Nyler took one glance at the picture and looked up meaningfully at Kara and Craig. They jumped to Nyler's side. It was a photo of a car leaving a ferry—a silver Volkswagen, two doors...and Zach was clearly in view in the back seat!

"That's him!" Craig declared with a surge of hope.

"He seems okay," Kara noted, relieved. "And look"—she pointed to Zach's side—"two Asian men, just like he said."

"And that must be your father," Craig said to Eddie, indicating the graying man in the passenger seat. It was his first look at the man Zach had known as Grandfather.

"Yeah, that's him," Eddie confirmed sadly. He had stepped behind Craig to view the picture with them.

"Where are they?" Nyler asked Gail, leaving the photograph in Kara's hands.

"They disembarked from the ferry in Edmonds twenty minutes ago," Gail informed him.

"Twenty minutes?" Craig moaned. "They could be to Everett by now."

Agent Nyler clicked his tongue, thinking. "Or Woodinville, or Seattle. The question is, are they heading north from Edmonds, maybe to the Canadian border, or somewhere else? Perhaps to Lerwick's house?" He turned to Eddie.

"His house is only ten minutes from the ferry," Eddie mused. "If he were going home, the officers watching his block would have called it in by now."

"Mmm," Nyler nodded. "So north, south, or east?" He clicked his tongue again and turned to Gail. "Put the offices in Everett and Bellingham on alert in case they go that way. Woodinville, too. Contact the Edmonds PD again and make sure they're watching. And inform the Seattle Police. They could still come back this way."

Eddie rubbed his red goatee. "You might want to contact the Coast Guard. My father's more likely to try to smuggle Zach out of the country by ship than to put him on a plane or train. And driving to Canada—it's just not his style. He won't risk having Zach out where people might notice him."

Nyler nodded. "Alert the Coast Guard," he said to Gail, keeping his eyes on Eddie.

"There's one other thing," Gail offered. "The officer who called in the report reviewed the ferry's onboard video and said the two Asian men forced their way into the vehicle."

"They kidnapped my father?" Eddie asked, incredulous.

"They were armed. They struck him in the face and tied his hands."

"What's going on here?" Nyler wondered. He looked at Eddie, who shook his head, bewildered.

Gail hurried out of the room. Craig turned to Agent Nyler. "What now? More waiting?" He met Nyler's eyes—they were sympathetic.

"We have hundreds of Seattle's finest out there searching for your son, and we're hot on their trail. We are going to find them. In the meantime, as for the four of us"—he looked at Craig, Kara, and Eddie in turn, and sighed—"yes, we wait." He stretched a hand to rub the back of his neck. "I hate waiting."

*****

They were in the city, almost beside Puget Sound; Zach could see the water from the car. The downtown skyscrapers loomed just ahead of them and to their left, over the tops of tall buildings that blocked most of Zach's view. He, Grandfather, and the two Asian men had driven south past the Space Needle and were now coming into the heart of Seattle.

This close to the waterfront, he glimpsed activity all around them—cars in every direction, people walking or riding their bikes in the rain. But no one looked up and saw Zach; no one could know that he had been rescued last night only to be kidnapped again today. No one noticed that he had no way to escape, that even Grandfather, who had rescued him, was trapped inside this car. They might as well have been a world away.

The Asian driver made a right turn and took them down a steep bit of hill, heading toward the water. With another right turn, he swung them onto a level street, then into a parking space at the foot of a tall brick building. He stepped out, circled the car, and opened Grandfather's door.

The Asian man in the back seat with Zach barked a command. "Out!" He showed them his teeth and waggled his gun.

"Zechariah," Grandfather urged from the front, "don't argue—just do whatever he says. Don't give these men any reason to harm you."

"Out!" the man in the back seat repeated. "Hands against your body," he instructed Grandfather, indicating the cord on Grandfather's wrists; Grandfather dutifully hid the cord against his waist. The Asian in the back seat exited on the driver's side while Grandfather climbed out on the passenger side. Quickly, inconspicuously, Zach, alone in the vehicle for the briefest moment, drew one of the photographs he had taken from Grandfather's photo album out of his pocket and dropped it to the floor. Then he stepped out after Grandfather and into the pounding rain.

The two Asian men hid their guns inside their jackets, but kept their hands ready. They nudged Grandfather toward the brick building.

"I hope you will consider my offer," Grandfather negotiated as he stepped across the sidewalk. "I am less wealthy than McWrait, but far more generous."

"Our vessel is not yet ready," the Asian man from the back seat replied idly. "We have time. Your proposal might amuse us."

"I can give you the money today, _in cash,"_ Grandfather offered.

The man who had been the driver grinned—he was missing a tooth, Zach saw—but the other considered Grandfather with mild interest. "Of course you can. But Mr. McWrait will not be happy if we break our deal with him." He was taller than the man with the missing tooth, and more threatening as he sneered at Zach.

He entered a code into a keypad at the corner of the building. It opened a gate that led into a small courtyard between the brick building and the structure beside it. The driver led them through the courtyard to a door. It was unlocked, and they followed him down the hall within to another door. This one opened to narrow stairs that descended into the basement. Machine noise rumbled up toward them.

Zach stepped reluctantly through the door and followed the driver down. At the bottom, a broader corridor met them. The driver stepped aside and the taller man, his gun back in his grasp, motioned for Zach to continue. Grandfather began to follow them, but the driver stopped Grandfather with a hand. "No," he said. "You go a different way."

"Please," Grandfather requested, keeping his voice low, "let me stay with the boy. You see how frightened he is. It won't take us long to work something out." He looked earnestly between Zach and the taller Asian.

The driver stepped between Grandfather and Zach. At the same moment, quicker than Zach could react, the taller Asian kicked Zach's feet out from under him and pinned him against the floor with a knee. All the air was forced from Zach's lungs; the man's knee pressed into his chest, so that he couldn't pull in enough air to yell.

"No!" Grandfather cried. "Zechariah! Please, we can work something out!"

The man brought out two rags from inside his jacket. One he wrapped over Zach's eyes, blindfolding him; the other he tied as a gag in Zach's mouth, just as before. Zach flailed, but it did him no good. The man was too heavy for him to budge.

The tall Asian lifted Zach from the ground and hauled him away, unfazed by Zach's aimless punches and Grandfather's protests. After a few steps, the noise of the nearby machinery grew suddenly louder; the Asian man had opened a door. The room rumbled from every side as he carried Zach through it.

Then the Asian stopped, set Zach roughly on his feet, and forced both of his hands straight out in front of him. He wrenched Zach's arms around a cold, metal pipe and bound his wrists together with a rope.

"No!" Zach screamed as he tugged against the rope, but the gag squelched his cry. He yelled for help, but it did no good; even had he been able to scream openly, the equipment in the room would have drowned out his voice.

The tall Asian finished tying Zach's wrists together and whispered into his ear. "Six hours—then our ship will be ready, and we will take you on a nice trip. You wait here until then." He patted Zach's shoulder. "You will like your new country."

With that, he strode away, his footsteps vanishing into the din. What little light Zach could make out went dark, and he heard the door shut behind the man. He strained against the rope again, but though he could slide it up and down the metal pipe as far as he could reach, he could not wiggle his hands free, and he could not pull the rope apart.

He was tied up again, here in the basement of some tall building, and no one knew where he was—no one except Grandfather, and _he_ was a captive, too. Furious, Zach kicked the pipe, but that only stung his big toe enough to make him cry.

It was hopeless. He would stand here helpless, hungry, and scared for the next six hours. Then they would take him away forever. The thought drained him of his strength. He wished Dad would come rushing through the door, rip the rope away with his strong hands, and take him home—but wishing didn't make it happen. All alone, Zach sobbed into his gag.

*****

Craig splashed cold water onto his face. He hadn't felt this fatigued in years, not since pulling his last back-to-back all-nighters in college. He gauged his appearance in the mirror: he looked even worse than he felt. His eyes were bloodshot, he needed a shave, and frankly, he needed a shower.

_Kara,_ Craig told his reflection. _I have to take care of her._ Zach might never be found. It would crush her. It would crush Craig, too—Tiffany all over again, Craig and Kara reliving that nightmare, only so much worse. Every synapse in his weary brain rejected the possibility, but he made himself think it anyway; he needed to be ready, for Kara.

_I'll take care of Kara,_ he persuaded himself. _Then..._

He didn't know. Life after Zach would never be the same. The thought left his gut hollow and his limbs trembling. Life _with_ Zach—well, the youngster, like Kara, brought a new kind of vitality to Craig, even when Zach's behavior was difficult, which, thankfully, it had not often been. He had a good heart, like his mom. He was unquestionably her son, and Craig loved that about him.

Life _without_ Zach—Craig, childless for so long that he had grown to accept and even prefer it, now found being childless again hard to imagine. He dreaded it.

_I'm getting despondent,_ he thought. _I need sleep._

He splashed more water on his face just as Eddie burst through the restroom door. "They found the car!" the young man exclaimed in a rush.

The words, penetrating after a moment, jolted Craig fully awake. Wiping the water from his face, he sped after Eddie back to Agent Nyler's office. "They found the car?"

"Just now," Nyler answered, wrapping a jacket marked "FBI" in bold, yellow letters across the back. "A few blocks from here, beside the waterfront on Alaskan Way. The driver and passengers were gone, but the engine's warm. Judging by the time, they must have come directly from the ferry. We're calling in every agent and police officer we can get to search the entire west side of downtown. If I had to guess, I'd say Zach is very close by."

"No one saw him?"

Agent Nyler shook his head.

"Are we going there?"

"We're going there." Pulling the jacket tight, Agent Nyler gave Craig a wry grin. "Something for us to do."

"It's about time."

Kara took Craig's arm as they left the office at a quick trot. "You okay?" she whispered. "Your eyes are all red."

"So are yours," he snapped in reply. She frowned at him. He exhaled, ashamed. "Sorry. I'll—I'll be all right the moment we find him."

"Yeah, me too," she agreed.

*****

Zach did not cry long—it took too much effort. He was tired and weak. His eyes dried quickly in spite of the tears that had dampened his blindfold earlier, as if every last drop of moisture had been squeezed from his eyelids. He moaned a while, but even that pitiful exertion required more energy than he could sustain.

The rag in his mouth had a repulsive, bitter taste, hardly better than the filthy thing the Asian men had gagged him with yesterday. Both legs shook at the knees as he shifted his weight between them, his hands roped together around the pipe. He could slide his hands up and down it, and that gave him more relief than he had had last night in the shed—but it was little enough relief, all the same.

He sagged against the pipe, despondent. Grandfather had warned him, and Grandfather had been right—the Asian men had found him again. And this time, they had taken Grandfather, too. No one else knew he was here; no one knew where to find him—not Mom or Dad, not Uncle Ben, not Derek...if they were even looking for him.

Grandfather had been right about the kidnappers; he must have been right about Mom and Dad, too. They really did want Zach gone. On the phone, Zach had believed they wanted him back, wanted him forever... But it must have been a trick. They were just hoping to catch him and send him far away—on the ship that would be ready in six hours—so he could never return.

Confused and exhausted, his breathing rough from despair, Zach knelt on the floor. He wished he could go home. He wished he had a phone right now so he could call Mom and Dad and make them tell him the truth. He would offer to stay away, to go with Grandfather, if that was what they wanted—they could have their peaceful lives without him, if only they would make the kidnappers leave him alone.

_Mom..._ His eyes were shut behind the blindfold, but he squeezed them tightly anyway, thinking of her. He could almost feel her messing up his hair the way she liked to do. He didn't dislike it anymore. It was...how had she explained it? It was a way she could say "I love you" without words.

_She_ does _love me,_ Zach tried to convince himself. _Her hands tell me all the time._ But doubts lingered... _"Maybe we can find another place for you, then!"_

If only he had a phone—well, and no gag to keep him from speaking to her. What would she say? Maybe she had changed her mind; maybe she _would_ want him to come home. She would say, _"Hey, kiddo, we're coming to find you. Remember what Uncle Ben said about searching for the lost sheep? You're the sheep, and we're searching. Paws misses you. You can play with him as soon as you get home. But then you'll need to take a bath and clean your room, okay? We're having tacos..."_

Was it a bath night? Zach couldn't remember. The last day had blurred into a fuzzy nightmare. When had he last eaten a meal? Yesterday, lunch at school, a full day ago. His stomach felt hollow, all shriveled up from emptiness.

Dad... Dad would say, _"Your Mom and I are worried about you, pal. We need to find a way to get you home, all right?... You're tied up and can't get loose, huh? All right, work the problem. See if there's anything you can do while we're looking for you..."_

Work the problem.

Zach sniffled and opened his eyes to the blackness behind the blindfold. _Dad would say to work the problem._

He took a deep, calming breath, then another, and listened. Machinery vibrated all around him, motors turning and humming. He could make out several distinct sounds, so he must be in a room with several pieces of equipment running at the same time.

_Work the problem._ He stomped a foot; the floor beneath him was hard, probably concrete. He twisted his hands upward to where he could just feel the pipe with his thumbs and fingertips. It was metal, about six inches wide, and it didn't budge when he pulled on it with all his weight; there would be no breaking it. He felt up as high as he could; it was perfectly smooth and stretched as high as he could reach. Working his hands back down it, he explored it in the other direction, to the floor. It was smooth here, too, and just before it reached the floor it joined another pipe that angled away from him.

He felt the angle where the pipes joined. "Ow!" he cried suddenly into his gag. Something had pricked the heel of his hand. He twisted his fingers inward to find what had pricked him—a flat piece of metal with a sharp edge. Sliding a quarter of the way around the pipe to feel it from another direction, he found that it stuck out the length of his thumb from the pipe. Something with grooves was attached to it—a bolt, perhaps, to hold the pipes together.

He tested it, pressing on the flat part—it held fast. New hope shot through Zach's body. He lowered himself to his knees and elbows and shifted so that the rope binding his wrists crossed the sharp metal point. He scraped the rope as hard as he could against that point. Nothing happened; the rope was thick. He repeated the motion. Still nothing. Again, again—he worked the problem, just like Dad would.

He counted a hundred scrapes of the rope against the metal, then checked his bonds. They were still tight, unyielding. Feeling them with his fingertips, though, he noticed something new—several threads stuck out where, before, the rope had been smooth. There was a sort of dent in the rope now. He was cutting through it!

He attacked the rope again, slicing and slicing it against the sharp piece of metal, working with renewed vigor. His stomach muscles screamed at him, hunched over for too long in this one position, but he ignored them. This was the only way he could reach that sharp point that could cut through the rope, that lone hope for escape. He gouged the rope again and again, minute after minute, praying that this would work—and quickly, before the Asian men returned to take him to Thailand.

At last he felt a silent snap and, with one last tug against the sharp metal, the rope fell away and his hands fell apart. He was free! Rolling onto his back, he relaxed his arms and those furious muscles in his stomach, but only for a few seconds. Then he sat up and felt for the knot behind his head that held the gag in place. It was tight, but at last he worked it loose enough to pull the gag from his mouth. He spat out the bitter taste and reached to undo the knot that held his blindfold.

Slipping the blindfold from his eyes, he blinked, tossed both rags to the floor, and stood to look around. A dim light emanated from panels on a couple of machines. At least six machines surrounded him, each adding to the clamor, and pipes extended between them and up through the ceiling to the ground floor. There was only one way out of the room, a door at the opposite end.

Zach hurried to the door and reached for the knob, then hesitated. What if the Asian men were standing guard outside? They would tie him up worse than before and he would never escape. He could hide behind the machinery instead and wait until they came, saw that he was gone, and left again— _but no,_ he decided, _they'll just search for me in here until they find me._

He would have to risk it. A trickle of light seeped through the crack beneath the door; he lay down on his stomach to peer into it. There were no feet on the other side of the door, though the Asian men could be standing off to the side and out of sight.

Zach climbed back to his feet and turned the doorknob as slowly and silently as he could, opening the door half an inch. No one was there. He opened it a little further, just far enough to peek around the doorframe. The entire corridor was empty.

Encouraged, he stepped into the corridor and closed the door silently behind him. He looked both ways. There were four more doors down here, but the only clear way out of the basement was the stairway down which the Asian men had brought him and Grandfather.

He stepped quickly down the hall toward those stairs, but a voice pulled him up short. It was Grandfather's voice, speaking to someone from the opposite end of the hall. The last door there was open part-way.

"It is a satisfactory arrangement," Grandfather was saying. Someone replied in a tone too low for Zach to make out the words.

_Grandfather rescued me,_ Zach thought. He hesitated a moment, then made his decision. Reversing direction, he tiptoed to the last door and peeked inside, careful not to let more than one eye show around the doorframe. Grandfather sat in a chair against the far wall, facing the door. The two Asian men were there, looking fearsome as they stood over Grandfather, their backs to Zach. Grandfather was still tied up.

"That information was most useful," Grandfather replied to one of the Asian men. "It's fortunate that you were watching at that moment, that you heard their argument—" Suddenly, Grandfather's eyes flicked to the door, and he saw Zach. "Zechariah!" he cried out in astonishment.

The two Asian men spun as one. Spotting Zach, they leapt toward the door. On instinct, Zach slammed the door shut and fled down the corridor.

"No, Zechariah!" he heard Grandfather cry out behind him. "They will kill you!"

But Zach was already at the stairs and sprinting up them. He bolted out the door at the top and onto the ground floor, where he sped down the hallway and crashed through a door at the far end just as the Asian men emerged through the stairway door behind him.

He found himself outside, in a brick-paved alley than stretched left and right. Rain pelted him. It felt wonderful, like freedom.

He ran to the left. The Asian men exploded out of the building a few seconds behind Zach, yelling when they saw him.

Zach raced up the alley as fast as he could go. He had thought he had been running his fastest when he had bunted that home run, but that was nothing compared to this. Desperate energy surged through his body. He rushed by a group of people who gaped at him. They were standing by a wall pasted with globs of... _chewing gum?_ The bizarre sight jogged a memory. _The Gum Wall_ —Mom and Dad had brought him here once. Before he could recall the occasion, one of the Asian men yelled again, and Zach darted ahead, uphill as the alley became a tunnel.

The tunnel curved to the right beneath a building for a few yards, then opened up into rain again. On his left, a stairway climbed up steeply from the alley, and without looking back he cut toward it and bounded up the stairs two at a time.

He reached the top just as the Asian men came into view in the alley below him. One of them saw him. Zach rushed ahead, jostling through a mass of people moving in every direction. Some were standing and watching something, and in a panic he forced his way between them only to find himself face-to-face with displays of fish and other seafood-on-ice that blocked his path. _The Gum Wall, the fish_ —he knew where he was! He was in Pike Place Market, at the store where the workers threw the salmon!

But he couldn't stand here. With a speedy glance he found a concrete stairway descending into the building below. There were more stores down there. He sprinted to those stairs and hurried down them. Had the Asian men seen him?

Not taking any chances, he turned at the bottom of the stairs and ran down a narrow hallway, found more stairs and took them, and reversed his direction again, anxious to lose the Asian men.

He neared an exit that opened to the rain outside. Just before the exit he spotted a green, unmarked door left part-way open. The room behind it was dark. He ducked into the room, pulled the door shut, and locked it. He listened, his ear pressed against the door—but there was no sound on the other side.

After a few seconds, his eyes adjusted to the near-darkness. As in the room where he had been tied up, a little light filtered through the crack beneath the door. It was just enough for him to make out an extra-large trash can with wheels on the bottom, stationed on one side of what turned out to be a janitor's closet about twice as big as Eddie's. He climbed into the can—it smelled horrid, but at least it was empty—and pulled the lid closed above him. He felt trapped again, but at least this time he had trapped himself.

Panting heavily, he waited. Several times he heard talking and movement in the corridor outside, and once he heard what he thought might have been large feet running past. But no one came in. After several minutes, his forehead sweaty and his back damp from exertion, Zach began to relax. He had lost them. He decided he would stay here and hide—hide until the Asian men had given up looking for him and gone away.

*****

Agent Nyler strode quickly to Dr. Lerwick's car parked in the now-pouring rain on the west side of Alaskan Way, right on the waterfront. He had just arrived with Kara, Craig, and Eddie, and immediately he ordered the vehicle searched inside and out. Within seconds, the search had turned up something.

"Craig." Kara nudged her husband.

"Hold on, Ben," Craig said into his phone as he turned and looked. Ben had called to check on the progress of the search. "The church is calling a prayer vigil," he informed Kara in a low voice. "Twenty-eight people came to the church to pray for Zach on their own, so they put out the word that the church is open for anyone who wants to join in."

Kara bit her upper lip. "Tell them to pray hard." Her son was nearby—she wanted to believe it. He had to be. They would find him.

"Mr. and Mrs. Fleming!" Agent Nyler called.

"They've found something, Ben," Craig told him as he and Kara hurried toward Dr. Lerwick's car. "I'll call you back." He disconnected the call.

As they reached Agent Nyler, the man held up a photograph in latex-gloved fingers, shielding it from the rain with his other hand. "Your son?" he asked Kara.

She examined it closely and frowned. "Maybe. It's hard to tell. We didn't know him when he was a baby."

Eddie came up behind her and looked at it. "That's my parents' house at the time," he told her. "The rug, the paneled wall... That's him all right."

Kara took another look. It _was_ Zach, maybe six months old, in diapers. Those were his blue eyes, that was his expression of wonder.

"It was on the floor of the back seat," Nyler said, "just like the photograph they found on Bainbridge. He was here."

Craig swallowed. "And he's leaving us a trail?"

"It would appear so." Nyler raised his eyebrows. "Clever." He turned back to the car, looking it over, immersed in thought. Two agents worked inside it, checking for fingerprints and searching under the seats and through the glove compartment.

Covering her mouth with the back of her hand, Kara stepped away to the railing that lined the sidewalk a few car lengths from Dr. Lerwick's vehicle. Beyond the railing, the ground dropped several feet and met Puget Sound, which sent small waves splashing against the rocks below her. She watched the rain pelt the water, forming a million circular ripples as far out as she could see. If Zach had been free at this moment, he would be playing in this rain, soaking it in, drenching his shirt, splashing through the puddles with Paws. She prayed that he was okay, wherever he was, and that he might at least get to see the rain.

"Agent Nyler!" a young agent called from behind Kara as he ran up to Nyler. "Pike Place Market, three minutes ago—a boy matching Zach's description, pursued by two men!"

"Asian men?" Nyler asked. He was already moving toward his car.

"Or Hispanic, depending on who you ask. At the Fish Market. The officer on the scene is getting mixed reports of where the boy went from there."

At a gesture from Nyler, Eddie, Kara, and Craig leapt back into his car. "I want all available personnel to sweep the market immediately!" Nyler ordered. "If he's in one of the buildings, clear it out!" He jumped into the driver's seat, turned on his siren, and glanced at Craig and Kara in the back seat as he pulled into the street. "We're going to find your son!"

*****

Zach sat in the garbage can a long time. He stretched his fingers. Though the can was wide enough that he could sit cross-legged at the bottom of it, his fingers were still the only body parts he could stretch fully. He had planned to stay in here until it was dark outside and he could sneak out of the market without the Asian men seeing him. But now he was having second thoughts. His muscles throbbed, sore from sitting in nearly the same position in the bottom of this can for...how long? Ten minutes? Thirty?

_I have to move,_ he thought, _find a better hiding place, one that doesn't hurt._ He reached to move the lid away and stand up.

Voices approached his closet. He hesitated. The doorknob jiggled; a key was being inserted into the lock. The door opened. Zach ducked back to the bottom of the can and froze.

"I told you, officer—there ain't gonna be no one in here," a woman's voice complained. "Didn't I say we keep these doors locked at all times?"

"My orders are to search every room on this floor, including the closets," a man's voice answered, with only a hint of exasperation. _"_ _Officer"_ —it was a police officer. Grandfather had warned him that police officers would take him back to Hugh. He held perfectly still inside the can, trying not to even breathe. If the police were helping the kidnappers search for him, he would have to be extra careful.

"Well, I don't know why you have to search the closets," the woman's voice grumbled. "Ain't nobody in there. They're long gone by now. And I'll tell you another thing—"

The door shut, and the two voices faded away down the corridor.

Zach sighed. He had only narrowly escaped detection. He decided he could stay cramped inside this garbage can a while longer.

*****

The first hour was hopeful as Kara watched the police and the FBI scour Pike Place Market with extraordinary energy—every shop, every closet, even the roofs. But they found nothing except a couple dozen witnesses who claimed to have seen Zach run past the Fish Market that afternoon; most of them described him accurately, but they couldn't agree on which way he had gone from there. The second hour was discouraging; hope of finding Zach here faded with each passing minute.

Her dwindling hope infuriated Kara as she stood across from the Fish Market with arms folded tightly, confronting Agent Nyler. "You're _giving up?"_ she scolded him as the bustle of agents around them thinned. _"Now?_ He was right here, in this spot!" How could they stop looking for Zach when he was so nearby? She knew she wasn't thinking clearly—how could she, not having slept a wink last night? Even so, continuing the search was obviously the right thing to do!

Agent Nyler rubbed his neck. His eyes were beginning to sag; he hadn't had much sleep himself. "We've searched every building in the entire market, Mrs. Fleming, every room." He was being far more patient with her than Kara could have been in his position. "Nine acres, multiple floors, for two hours, without a trace of him."

"You're doing the best you can—we understand that," Craig offered to Agent Nyler. He took Kara's hand.

She pulled it away from him irritably, then rolled her eyes at herself and took his arm. She wanted to be close to Craig. But she was angry—this made no sense! They had been so close to finding Zach! How could they lose him now?

"But we are absolutely _not_ giving up," Agent Nyler told her firmly, keeping his voice down because of all the shoppers bustling about them, keeping a respectful distance. "We just have to change our strategy. We don't know which way he went. If he went out through the west side of the market, he could have gone down to the waterfront. If he headed north... Well, what it comes down to—"

"He could be anywhere," Eddie concluded. "Or they may have caught him again." He stood off to the side a little, observing and thinking. He was good at watching things, Kara had noted; he caught every detail. Even Agent Nyler had begun to ask Eddie for his insights, for anything the FBI and the police might have missed.

"I suspect he's still downtown," Nyler mused, pivoting to consider the buildings that made up the market, "if they didn't catch up to him. And you're right, we can't assume they didn't. But if he's still free...I'd guess he's holed up somewhere close by."

Eddie nodded. "He's definitely a hider. He used to hide under the bed."

"He still does," Craig told them.

"I've seen him do it," a new voice spoke behind Kara. She turned to find Officer Garrenton stepping from the street to join them. The officer met Kara's eyes sympathetically. "I'm free for a little while," she said, "so I thought I'd come and help you folks a bit."

Agent Nyler resumed his musing. "Hopefully, he's hiding someplace small and dark, watching...and when he feels safe, he'll come out. The only problem is, where is he hiding?" He looked to Eddie, but Eddie could only shake his head. "In any case, Mrs. Fleming, we can't assume anything. And we can't keep all of our agents and the SPD searching here all night. We only have so many eyes; we need to spread them out."

"And if they caught him again?" Eddie asked.

"We're watching Dr. Lerwick's car. We have law enforcement looking for him across the city and checking the ferries and shipping docks. Zach's escaped once already. They won't be able to hide him forever."

Kara sighed. "Can we do something more than stand here?"

Officer Garrenton put a hand on her shoulder. "I was just thinking the same thing. Why don't we go look around? Police don't search the way moms and dads do. Maybe we can put your intuition to good use."

Agent Nyler nodded his approval. "Eddie and I will head back to my office and coordinate the search from there. We'll let you know if we hear anything." With that, he led Eddie to his car parked a short way down the street.

Kara glanced at Craig; he was watching her, letting her make the first move. She scanned the area. Rain still hammered the ground beyond the covered, open-air walkway in which they stood. "They said he came up the stairs from the alley?" she asked Craig.

"Everyone agreed on that."

She weighed her options, trying to imagine the scene from the vantage point of a frightened ten-year-old. Her eyes tracked his movements as she imagined them, from the stairs to the Fish Market to... "I think he saw those stairs over there and went down," she decided, motioning toward the stairway that led into the Down Under building. On that tenuous basis, Kara led Craig and Officer Garrenton downstairs, where they walked through every corridor and peeked into every shop before moving into the adjacent La Salle building.

*****

When he couldn't take sitting at the bottom of the garbage can any longer, Zach removed the lid and stood up. But he didn't leave the can or his closet. The Asian men might still be out there in the market somewhere, watching for him, and the mere thought turned his skin clammy. He wanted to stay here until dark, when it would be easier for him to move around outside and escape—but with neither clock nor window, how was he to know when it was dark?

For a long time he stood in the garbage can, afraid to leave it lest someone come to check inside the closet again. He didn't have to stay seated in it, though; standing there he could at least stretch and move a little.

His legs felt weak after sitting for so long. And he hadn't eaten a good meal in over a day; that, too, had to be part of why they shook beneath him. And sleep—he hadn't slept at all since waking up for school yesterday.

_Does getting kidnapped excuse my absence?_ he wondered at random. Surely Mom and Dad would explain the situation to Mr. Herd. _Was my class worried about me? I would have gotten to go to Cayden's house today if I had cleaned my room yesterday, if I hadn't gotten kidnapped..._

Did Mom know I was going to get kidnapped yesterday?

_No!_ he scolded himself. _Grandfather is wrong!_ But Grandfather had been right about everything, even about Zach making life hard for Mom and Dad recently.

How long had they planned it?

He remembered what Hugh had said. They had sold him to Hugh for a lot of money. At least he was wasn't sold cheap...

His mind wandered a long time, until suddenly the doorknob rattled again. In a flash, he ducked back into the garbage can and closed the lid over himself. The door opened and someone came inside. He heard the person moving supplies around.

The garbage can moved—tipped to the side a little, but was quickly dropped flat again. A man grunted. "Who left the can full?" he asked in an irritated voice.

The lid suddenly lifted. A man, the janitor, looked straight down at Zach and yelled, jumping backward. Zach jumped, too, and the garbage can fell over onto its side. He fumbled his way out and stood, cornered.

Short and mostly bald on top, and still yelling, the janitor snatched up a broom and brandished it bristles-first like a sword, staring wide-eyed at Zach.

Zach scurried with his back against the wall, edging his way around the man and his broom toward the door.

"Out!" the janitor demanded. "Get out of my trash can! Get out of my closet!"

He swung the straw end of the broom at Zach, slapping him on the backside as Zach bolted out the door and into the hallway. The man yelled once more as Zach ran away, up the nearest flight of stairs, down a corridor, and up a ramp to the main level of the market.

It wasn't dark outside yet, but it was still raining, and the rain gave everything a wet, gray sheen. Zach slowed his feet and, with his heart pounding madly, made his way as calmly as he could between two market stalls, one selling flowers and the other offering fresh Yakima apples that tempted his famished eyes. It wasn't safe here, but he didn't want to draw attention by running. He exited onto the busy street outside, where pedestrians thronged the road in spite of the rain and slowed the single lane of traffic to a trickle.

Zach walked with the people, attempting to blend in, breathing deeply. The rain helped to calm him. He kept his eyes alert, scanning all around. The last thing he wanted was for the Asian men to see him and sneak up on him before he could escape again.

He wandered around the market, moving through it without any real sense for where he was headed. Rounding a corner, Zach stopped short. He saw Mom!—or thought he had. His eyes had passed over a cluster of people moving past a building, and she had been there, and also a man who might have been Dad—but when his eyes darted back to find them, they were gone. He hurried that way, but it was no use; his mind must have been playing tricks on him. What would Mom and Dad be doing at Pike Place Market today? No one but the Asian men and Grandfather knew he was here.

He found himself back at the center of the market, across the street from the store where they threw the salmon. A police officer watched from half a block away on his side of the street, looking in the opposite direction. Zach edged backward, out of sight of the officer; he wanted nothing to do with the police. He didn't want to go back to Hugh.

Aromas wafted his way from a food stand somewhere nearby, reminding him again how hungry he was. He smelled French fries and swiveled to scan the building behind him. It seemed familiar—yes, Mom and Dad had taken him to a little restaurant inside it for lunch. He entered the building and quickly found the diner, set in a triangular room near the building's center.

Zach felt inside his pocket. His money was still there, the ten dollars Dad had given him at the store months ago—he still had that with him, waiting for just the right time to spend it. Now, for food, seemed as good a time as any.

He entered the diner. A woman dressed like a cook stood behind the counter and looked away from her cell phone just long enough to register that he was there. "What can I get for you?" she asked.

"Can I buy some French fries?" Zach inquired.

"Just fries? All by themselves?"

"Is that okay?" He wasn't sure; Mom and Dad had never let him have just fries before.

"Whatever you want, darling," she shrugged, and rang up his order. Zach handed her his ten-dollar bill and received his change. The woman headed back into the kitchen. "Sit wherever you like. I'll bring them out to you."

All the tables were empty; Zach was the only customer at the moment. Gazing warily through the diner's windows into the center of the building, where people passed by every few seconds, he chose the table where Mom and Dad had sat with him weeks ago. It happened to be situated where he could keep an eye out the windows for the two Asian men. If he spotted them, maybe he could duck down under the table before they saw him.

The cook returned after a minute, handed him a basket of fries, and disappeared again, eyes locked on her phone all the way. Zach thrust a fistful of the fries into his mouth—they were the big, thick kind, soft on the inside, incredibly delicious. He swallowed them as quickly as he could chew them, enjoying the sudden warmth in his belly and the satisfaction of having something solid there after so many hours of emptiness.

He had nearly consumed them all when one of the Asian men—the taller one—came walking down the corridor toward the diner! Zach gasped and ducked under the table, not daring to look out for a full minute, trembling. When he finally peeked out from beneath the table, the man was gone. He must not have seen Zach, but his presence meant they were still here, searching for him. He had begun to feel safe, like maybe they had given up and left, but they hadn't, and he wasn't. In spite of being drenched from walking in the rain, he began to sweat. He swallowed the last of his fries, set another of Grandfather's photographs on his chair, and crept cautiously to the door.

With a stealthy look down the open-ended corridor again, he saw that the Asian man had gone. But that didn't mean he wouldn't come back this way.

Zach had to get out of Pike Place Market, and quickly. A stairway ascended from the center of the corridor; Mom and Dad had taken him up those stairs to a street east of the market. Keeping his ears open for the voices of the Asian men, he climbed the stairs and took a short walkway that led to freedom outside.

People bustled everywhere and traffic clogged the street. Zach moved uncertainly down the block until he found a recess in the wall of a building; he ducked into it and felt safer, half-hidden from the pedestrians streaming by. The Asian men would have to walk directly in front of him to see him.

Chilly rain found him in the recess, soaking him as he huddled against the wall. It felt wonderful. It made him think of Mom and how she thought it so strange that he loved to go outside in the rain, but let him do it anyway. He wished he could go to her, but how could he when Grandfather had been right? Mom and Dad had sold him to Hugh. He didn't know what to do. One thing was certain, though: whatever happened, he would never, ever think it a small thing to get to eat French fries or walk in the rain.
Chapter 20

"We're looking for a needle in a haystack, and we don't even know if we've got the right haystack!"

Kara was irritable, and it was wearing on Craig, but he let her vent and replied only with a grunt as they walked. Her son had been lost for more than a full day now—how could she not be irritable? She was surely as miserable as he. He would not blame her if she suddenly broke down and screamed; a part of himself wanted to do exactly that.

Officer Garrenton offered Kara a sympathetic glance as they made their way through the rain and the people moving along Pike Place, the road that bisected much of the market from north to south, its southern end elbowing east into Pike Street just outside the Fish Market where they had begun their search an hour ago. They were approaching the Fish Market again, coming near enough to see a small crowd of people disperse as the workers closed up shop for the day. It was five o'clock, and most of the market's shops would be shutting their doors about now. Zach was not among the crowd.

Craig stifled a yawn. In spite of his best efforts to delay it, exhaustion was beginning to overtake him. He couldn't stay awake forever.

They had searched through Down Under, La Salle, the Main Arcade, and the North Arcade, the four main buildings on west side of Pike Place Market, without uncovering any hint that Zach had ever been there. They had asked some shopkeepers whether they had seen a boy like Zach wandering around, but none had noticed him. Most had told the police as much already.

As they arrived at the Fish Market, Officer Garrenton brought them to a halt. "Have you had anything to eat today?" she asked them both.

Craig suddenly realized how hungry he was. He had hardly even thought about food since Zach had turned up missing yesterday. "Not much," he admitted. "We've been...preoccupied."

"I don't want anything," Kara said darkly, "except to find Zach. Let's keep looking."

"Yes, but you need to keep your strength up," Officer Garrenton counseled. "It won't do any good if you collapse from hunger while—"

"Wait," Kara exclaimed, looking past the officer and into the Corner Market building. "Craig, we took him to that diner in there. Maybe he remembered and went _there_ to hide!"

She was grasping at straws, and this was the third establishment she had noted as a place Zach might have remembered, but Craig did not dare try to dissuade her. Besides, he had no better ideas himself about where to search for the youngster. "All right, let's take a look," he agreed, though with little hope.

They crossed the street, entered the building, and found the diner. The waitress, sweeping the floor, looked up as they entered. "We just closed," she informed them.

Officer Garrenton stepped to the center of the diner and displayed a picture of Zach, the picture Agent Nyler had distributed to the police and FBI. "We're looking for this boy. He's missing, last seen running through the Main Arcade. Has he come by here?"

The waitress shook her head. "Some officers came by a couple hours ago, asking the same thing. They still haven't found him?"

"Not yet," Officer Garrenton told her. "Thank you." She turned to leave, Craig following suit. Kara sighed and glanced around the room once before joining them.

She suddenly jerked back around, eyes locking onto a chair at the table where she and Craig had sat with Zach that day when they had brought him here. "Craig!" She strode briskly to the chair and picked up a photograph left on the seat. "Craig, he _was_ here! _He was—"_

Emotion choked off her voice. She handed the photograph to Craig. In the picture sat Zach, age eight or nine, on his cot inside Dr. Lerwick's house in Edmonds, staring blankly at the camera, a book in his hand. Craig got the clear impression that Zach was annoyed at having had his reading interrupted. The youngster had shown Craig that look a time or two.

"How did this get here?" Craig inquired.

"I don't know," the waitress responded, bewildered. "It wasn't there a few minutes ago." She spun to face the kitchen. "Becky? Do you know where this picture came from?"

Becky, the cook, appeared behind the counter. "A kid came in while you were taking the trash out. He must have left it."

The waitress glared at her. "That's the kid they're looking for! Why didn't you call the police?"

"I didn't know that was him! I barely even looked at him. I was...busy."

"He's still in the market!" Kara declared, spinning to look in every direction at once. "Craig, remember at Mount Rainier, how we talked about leaving a trail? He's doing it! He wants us to find him!"

"How long ago was he here?" Officer Garrenton probed.

The cook shrugged. "Maybe ten, fifteen minutes ago."

Craig's eyes shone with hope. "Agent Nyler was right—he was hiding out...at least until he got hungry." He tapped the empty fries basket left on the table. _Fries_ —Zach's favorite. "But where did he go now?"

"Why doesn't he just stop and ask somebody— _anybody_ —for help?" Kara wondered aloud. "Do you think he'll go home?"

"Sure, if he could find his way there," Craig replied. "He's not very good with directions." For a long second, he worked the problem. "Maybe he's still in this building. Let's split up and look, and meet back here."

Kara and Officer Garrenton sped away to check the downstairs shops. Craig took the stairs to the second level. There wasn't much up there; he scanned it quickly and then stepped outside to First Avenue, where he looked left and right, searching for Zach in the rush hour throng. The youngster was nowhere to be seen.

He returned to the diner, where Kara and Officer Garrenton stood waiting for him.

"What now?" Kara frowned.

"I'll radio Agent Nyler," Officer Garrenton offered, "and have him send as many people as he can manage. But," she added, "it will take a few minutes. He's got them spread all across downtown." She took a few steps out into an open space at the center of the building and called in her request.

"He's got to be here somewhere," Craig thought aloud. "The problem is, we can't search everywhere at once. We had dozens of officers searching earlier, and they never found him. We'd have to have at least a hundred people who could spread out across—"

A thought struck him. He worked the problem in his mind... _Ten minutes, dozens of extra eyes... Ben..._

"Craig?" Kara prompted him. "You're thinking something. What is it?"

Craig thrust his hand into his pocket and pulled out his phone. "I'm calling Ben. We _can_ get a hundred people here, Kara, or a lot, anyway! All the people at the prayer vigil—they're only a few minutes from here!"

Kara's eyes lit up. "They can search everywhere at once—people Zach recognizes, people he'll come to... Yes! I love you!" She kissed Craig swiftly on the cheek and drew out her own phone.

"Who are _you_ calling?" Craig inquired.

"Derek and Shanice," she returned, "and then Grover—anyone who can come and help!"

Energized with real hope for the first time all day, Craig dialed Ben's number.

*****

Ben disconnected the call and hurried back into the church's large multipurpose room. Today it was a prayer center. "Hey, everybody!" he cried out. He was usually careful not to interrupt prayer, but this was a distinctly _unusual_ situation.

Groups sat in clumps around the sanctuary, a buzz of whispers emanating from each. The buzz faded as faces turned toward Ben.

"Craig just called—they're pretty sure Zach's still on the run and that he's somewhere at Pike Place Market, but he's hiding away, scared. They can't find him, but a lady saw him less than half an hour ago. Craig wants as many people as possible to come down there and help search for him, especially people Zach knows. They need eyes—lots of them!"

Instantly, people around the room roused, standing and pulling their coats or sweatshirts on. "Listen!" Ben yelled over the rising commotion. "We'll meet by the Fish Market for instructions. Any questions?"

"I'll bring the bus around to the front!" one of the deacons called out, and the clusters of people coalesced into one large mass as they crowded toward the exits. Five minutes later, the bus was loaded and on its way into the center of downtown, a short drive even in rush hour traffic. Ben only hoped they would arrive soon enough to save his nephew.

*****

A bus—the church bus!—pulled up to the stoplight at First Avenue and Pike Street, well within Craig's line of sight as he stood with Kara and Officer Garrenton outside the Fish Market, just a step under its roof and out of the rain. The door opened and church members streamed out of it, the first of them jogging through the rain down the concrete sidewalk toward where Agent Nyler and Eddie stood ready to receive them. Those who knew Craig and Kara hugged them quickly and then stepped back to let others have a turn.

Nyler and Eddie had just arrived, and Nyler had been quick to point out the danger that a search like this posed for the church members: what if they found Zach with his kidnappers? A single wrong move and someone could get hurt, or worse. Even so, Nyler had not called off the effort. But he had insisted on coordinating it.

"This way!" he called. The bus passengers spotted the bright yellow "FBI" emblazoned across his jacket and assembled around him, pulling their hoods over their heads for shelter from the rain. They were still exiting the bus; it must have been packed full. Other church members appeared from other directions, hurrying through the Main Arcade behind Craig or jogging up Pike Place to meet the larger group. They must have come in their own cars. How many were there? Had so many been at the church, praying for Zach?

Ben, Lia, and Jasmine hopped off the bus and made eye contact with Craig and Kara. Jasmine gave them a somber wave. They must have kept the other girls at the church or at home with Jayda. Derek and Douglas appeared from another direction and joined the church group.

Even before the last riders stepped off the bus, Agent Nyler began instructing the group. "Stick together—teams of three or four! Nobody goes alone! The kidnappers may still be out there. If you encounter them, do _not_ engage them. Call 9-1-1 the moment you see Zach, even if he's alone." With a couple more admonitions, Nyler sent the search parties in various directions, and they hurried to their task.

"How many people are in your church?" he asked Craig with astonishment as he and Eddie rejoined them a few moments later.

"A few hundred," Craig answered. "I can't believe so many came."

Nyler shook his head. "This is risky. So I've stationed agents in every building for a quick response if someone—er, _when_ someone spots your son. And you"—he turned to Eddie—"keep your eyes out for your father. If you're as good as you say you are..."

"You saw what Agent Mitchell brought in," Eddie returned.

Officer Garrenton looked at Agent Nyler.

The man sighed. "Eddie here has been gathering evidence against a dirty agent," he explained, "enough to get a search warrant earlier today, and...well, Agent Mitchell and a dozen other agents just took him into custody."

"A _dozen?"_ Officer Garrenton repeated with astonishment.

"The guy is good with a gun. Mitchell didn't want to take any chances."

Officer Garrenton blinked a few times. "My, you've had a busy day," she remarked.

Nyler puffed his cheeks out. "How come I never get the easy cases?"

"He wouldn't like it if he did," she told Eddie.

Eddie flexed his fingers in front of him. "So does this mean—"

"Maybe," Nyler interrupted him. "Your chances are even better if you help us catch your father. We've been trying to get him for ten years. We bring him in, I tell the prosecutor how you helped—you may get off without a single charge. _If,_ you understand."

"Yeah, I get it." Eddie scanned the street as the rain poured down.

Kara pointed into that rain. "Craig, there's Grover!" Grover was making his way through the puddles with a cane, his daughter Florence by his side, stretching an umbrella over him.

A minute later he reached them, and he pointed his cane at Kara and Craig. "I may be slow, but I have good eyes," he declared, "so don't try to tell me I can't help you find your boy!"

"Not that it would do any good," Florence sighed.

"Thanks for coming, Grover," Craig said. "The church group just got started..." He passed Agent Nyler's instructions along to Grover, and the old man and his daughter disappeared into the Main Arcade to hunt for Zach.

*****

Zach, leaning against the recessed wall, shifted his weight. He was sorely tempted to return to the diner and buy more French fries—he had the money and the appetite. But he did not want the Asian men to see him. No fries were worth the risk of being taken by them again, no matter how hungry he was.

He pursed his lips. He couldn't stay here forever. He glanced at the towers above him. He didn't know where to go. He wished for a bed to hide under.

_No... Not a bed._ Mom and Dad had taught him that it was better to work on a solution to the problem than to hide. So he worked on a plan. He wanted to go home. He _would_ go home, if only Mom and Dad hadn't sent him away. _I didn't come out of her tummy._ _To her, I'm like any other kid..._

His thoughts were muddled. He needed sleep, but he was afraid to close his eyes.

_Mom and Dad—they didn't ask me to come to them..._ "Maybe we can find another place for you, then!" Mom had said. He had walked away, pretending her words had not stung, but they had. They had scared him, even if he hadn't believed she was serious at the time. Now, though...

Surely Mom and Dad had loved him for a while. It couldn't have been pretend. But now...how could they? He had been mean to Mom... He might have come from their cells, but he hadn't come from inside her... And if Mom couldn't really be a mother to him, how could Dad truly be his father?

_Where will I go?_ _Not home. To_ _Uncle Ben and Aunt Lia's house?_ _No. They would tell Mom and Dad._ _Derek and Shanice's house?_ _No, same problem. What about Grover?_ Zach managed a half-grin at the thought of asking Grover to be his dad. But no, that wouldn't work out, either. _The police?_ They would just take him to Hugh, or back to Mom and Dad, who would sell him again.

The children's home, the one where Ben and a few others from the church volunteered—maybe they would take Zach in. They found homes for kids without parents; well, that was Zach now. How did a person get to live there? Should he just walk in and say, "Hi, I'm an orphan, and I need a family"?

Zach considered. It would be a new life, though not the one he had hoped for. That life—he could never have it again. _But I can ask the people at the children's home,_ he reasoned. _If they try to take me back to Mom and Dad, I'll just run away. I'll find another place to go. Maybe I could live up in the mountains._ But he didn't know how to live on his own; finding someone to adopt him would be better.

_Adopt..._ His weary mind tried to link that word to something, someone. Why? _Adopted..._

_Cayden!_ The connection snapped into place. _Cayden is adopted! He and his mom don't look alike at all!_ Yet they were a family, Cayden and his mom and dad... He hadn't come from her tummy, but... _she's his mom anyway!_

Zach's heart began to pound and a murky haze lifted from his thoughts. _Mom—she didn't have to bond with me when I came from her tummy. It doesn't matter if I didn't! And Dad—he didn't have to be there when it happened. Grandfather is wrong!_

Images that made him happy and sad, warm and empty all at the same time flashed through his mind: Mom appearing in the doorway for the first time, the moment Dad had first walked into view, Zach gripping Mom's arm as they ascended to the saucer of the Space Needle...Mom red-faced in the underwear aisle at the store, Dad showing him how to break in his new baseball glove, Dad yelling, "No! No!" as Zach rounded third and raced for home... He heard Mom's voice on the phone this morning— _"We want you back home, kiddo... I don't care about your room, Zach. We care about_ you, _okay?"_

Zach worked the problem. If Grandfather could be wrong about Mom, couldn't he also be wrong about the Asian guys—about Mom and Dad giving Zach to them and Hugh? What if Hugh had lied? What was it Grandfather had said to the Asian men just before he had seen Zach peeking in on them? _"...very fortunate that you were watching at that moment, that you heard their argument..."_ What argument? Could they have been there on the street to hear Zach and Mom argue that morning? Then they had told Hugh...

"I'm not going to the children's home!" Zach exclaimed into the noise of the busy street. "I'm going to _my_ home!"

But how? He was downtown. He needed to go south, but where from there? The house was at 6050 Spindler Avenue, on a hill that overlooked Boeing Field. But there were a lot of streets on that hill. Could he find it without the Asian men finding him first?

A horn blared in the traffic. If only he had a car—and, of course, a driver's license. No—a bus! Anybody could ride the bus, if they paid the fare; Mom had said so. And he had more than enough money. He would get on a bus and ask the driver how to get home!

Sucking up his courage in one great breath, Zach risked a quick look around his recessed wall. A couple of people who walked by glanced at him and hurried on; no one else paid him any attention. This looked like as good a chance to get away as any.

He joined the throng of people moving down the sidewalk in the rain and scanned for a bus stop. Dad had explained that there were always busses downtown. He jogged to one end of the block, but saw no sign of a bus stop. Jogging back to the other end did no good, either—the busses apparently did not run on this street.

But somewhere near here, he was sure, there had to be a bus, any bus! Zach waited for a break in the traffic and jogged across the street, heading away from Pike Place Market and deeper into the center of downtown. He dodged around other pedestrians and came to the stoplight at the end of the next block, at the corner of Second Avenue and Pine Street.

There were busses! But which one? Several were lined up to his left, across Pine Street. Eager to get further away from Pike Place Market and the Asian men, he ran across Pine. His legs felt almost as rubbery as before he had eaten the French fries, like they might collapse if he had to run much farther.

He reached the nearest bus, pushed impolitely onto it ahead of another passenger, and paid his fare. "How do I get to the hill by Boeing Field?" he demanded.

"Step out of the way and let the riders behind you get on, you rude punk!" the driver barked. Startled by the man's abrupt tone, Zach stepped back obediently and took the closest seat, right behind the door. Four people boarded after him, and then the driver pulled out into the street.

*****

Rita stepped along Upper Post Alley past the Triangle Building near the center of Pike Place Market and gazed about in the rain. _Where would Zachy hide?_ she wondered in her native Spanish. This was a large place in the middle of a big city; he could be anywhere. No wonder they needed so many people to help with the search.

"Maybe we should look over there," Sofia, her younger daughter, offered in English, pointing at the buildings ahead of them and across the street. It was a random suggestion from a spontaneous, seven-year-old mind, but it reminded Rita that children don't always think with the logic of adults. Zach was still a child; he would go where his impulse drove him. It used to drive him under the bed. But today...

"First, we walk," Rita told Sofia, responding in English. She was trying to use English whenever possible, even with her girls, to help all three of them learn the language more quickly. It pleased her that her girls were mastering it with ease. "We stay out where Zachy can see us, okay? Maybe he see us and feel safe and come out."

She led Sofia and Isabella up the alley, moving north through the market and the rain. They had arrived on the church bus only a few minutes ago, and the FBI agent had sent her and her girls to search down Post Alley and back, which suited her well. Others from the prayer meeting— _vigil_ was the English word they had used—were searching the buildings, but knowing how much Zach liked to be outside, even in the rain, she thought he just might be hiding outdoors somewhere.

Isabella walked beside her silently. Being nine, she felt the weight of the situation more fully than Sofia did. She said nothing, but peered into shops and down the road ahead of them with serious, alert eyes.

The alley crossed Pine Street and continued beyond it, running north to where the market ended. Rita, however, turned right, thinking to walk up the hill to First Avenue and back down the other side of Pine before checking the rest of Post Alley. Even on a wet, dreary day like today, there were quite a few people milling about, moving past in every direction, especially now that rush hour was in full swing. Rain might slow down the tourists, but it didn't hamper true Seattle natives any.

At the stoplight, Rita waited impatiently for the crosswalk sign to permit them passage across Pine Street. Cars and trucks rolled by. Glancing back down the hill toward the alley, she noticed another team of searchers looking around for Zach, three church members who had happened to sit near her and her girls on the bus. They exited a building and stopped a passerby to ask if he might have seen Zach.

The crosswalk light changed from red to white, and she led her daughters across the road. In the middle of Pine Street, Isabella suddenly stopped and pointed to their right, behind them and further up Pine. "Mamá!" she cried. "There he is!"

As other pedestrians flowed around them, Rita's eyes jumped to the sidewalk Isabella indicated. There were several adults, but she didn't see—

He emerged from behind a knot of people moving toward Second Avenue. _"Zachy!"_ Rita screamed. With her hands, she herded her girls back to the corner where they had just been standing. Zach was rushing up Pine Street, moving quickly away from them through the downpour.

"Isabella, quickly," she ordered, switching unconsciously into Spanish and pointing down the street behind her, back toward the market, "those people from the church—see them? Run and tell them you saw Zach! Tell them to call the police, and tell the police where you saw him. Tell them he's running away. Sofia, go and help her. Hurry!"

The girls ran back the way they had come, and Rita launched herself in the other direction, rushing uphill after Zach. She reached the corner of Pine and Second and hunted urgently in every direction, but Zach was out of sight. Where could he have gone so quickly?

She scanned more carefully, looking for a boy running, but didn't see him anywhere. The stoplights changed, and Second Avenue traffic began to flow past her from left to right, largely blocking her view up Pine Street. She threw up her hands in frustration. Where had he gone?

A bus moved past, and suddenly she saw him—through a window, but it was clearly Zach on the bus, sitting just behind the door!

"Zachy!" she screamed, waving her hands, but the bus continued on down the street and Zach did not turn to see her. A desperate thought struck her, and she quickly noted the number on the bus's electronic display—592. He was riding the bus on Route 592.

*****

"Now, what did you want, kid?" the driver grumbled as he guided the bus down the street.

"I need to go to the big hill above Boeing Field," Zach repeated. "That's where I live."

"Beacon Hill? You're on the wrong bus. You should have boarded the bus to Othello Station."

"Yeah, Othello Station!" Mom, Dad, and Zach had caught the bus there to go to the art museum. It was only a few blocks from home. They had caught—"Bus thirty-six! How do I find bus thirty-six?"

The driver pulled up to the stoplight at Pike and Second. Zach glanced out the window behind him, checking to make sure the Asian men weren't there to see him riding the bus. They weren't, as far as he could tell through the rain.

"I'm not a map, kid," the driver snapped at him. "It's probably one of those busses that runs on Third Avenue."

"How do I get there?" Zach begged.

"That way." The driver pointed up the street to the left. "One of the busses up there's bound to go to Beacon Hill."

Zach stood, slipped another photograph from his pocket to deposit on the seat—carefully, not letting the driver see—and moved toward the door.

With a huff, the driver opened it. "Dumb kid! You didn't even ride two blocks! Next time, know where you're going before you pay the fare!" He shook his head in disbelief. "Shortest ride I've ever given."

Zach jumped from the bus to the sidewalk, back into the cool, pounding rain. The bus pulled ahead a moment later, and Zach waited for the traffic to clear, then ran across the street in the direction the driver had indicated. A block away, up the street, several busses stood in a line, unloading and loading passengers. None was bus thirty-six, but more busses were gathered another block to Zach's left. A small crowd of people loitered near them, watching further up the street, waiting for still other busses to come. Zach ran to join them, his eyes darting in every direction in case the Asian men were near.

Two busses, one behind the other, pulled up just as two others departed. He was about to step up and ask the driver of the first for help when he saw the display atop the second: "Beacon Hill," it read in electronic orange letters. It was bus thirty-six!

Zach raced to it and bounded aboard. "Are you going to Othello Station?" he begged of the driver as he pulled another bus fare from his pocket.

"Sure am," this driver replied. He watched as Zach grinned, deposited the fare, and walked up the aisle toward the middle of the bus.

There were a lot of people on the bus, but Zach found a pair of empty seats together halfway back, on the side behind the driver. He collapsed into the seat beside the window as the bus reentered traffic. _They didn't see me get on,_ he told himself. _They didn't get on after me._ As the bus moved to the next block, Zach began to feel safe for the first time since the Asian men had captured him and Grandfather on the ferry. _Grandfather_ —Zach hoped he was okay. Not that he wanted to see him again, but neither did he want Grandfather to get hurt for rescuing him last night. He still couldn't believe Grandfather was alive.

More people got on as the bus stopped every couple of blocks, and a few got off. But no one sat down beside Zach, and the Asian men did not get on. How could they? They were back at Pike Place Market, probably still searching for Zach there. They didn't know—they _couldn't_ know—that he had escaped. He would never see them again.

With that liberating thought, Zach let out a long breath and leaned the side of his head against the window. He was going home! He was going to find Mom and Dad...and Paws, too. He would give Paws a huge hug, and Paws would lick his face.

Feeling the bus bounce gently along the street, Zach closed his eyes, just for a moment. He was free.

*****

Police chatter reporting the progress of the search sounded through Officer Garrenton's radio amidst the noise of the driving rain. Kara leaned against a support post just beyond the Fish Market and stared impatiently into the street. She rubbed both hands over her eyes; after so many hours without sleep, they burned. Craig stood beside her, running his hands through his hair every minute or two. He was so tired—she could see it in his drawn face. How he was holding up under this duress she did not know. He was certainly keeping calm better than she was, keeping his mind clearer. He had always been like that—cool under pressure that she found overwhelming. It was one of many traits she appreciated about him.

He saw Kara watching him and took her hand. The simple gesture didn't ease her anxiety, but it was still a comfort.

The teams of church members and friends searching for Zach had been at work for only fifteen minutes, but already Kara was beginning to fret. She had hoped they would locate him right away; as the minutes stretched on, she grew more apprehensive, fearing that they had missed the boy yet again. "Come on, Zach," she whispered. "Just come out—look out here and see us." If he saw them, he would come to them, she was certain. He had not tried to run away yesterday, he had been kidnapped; he would want to come home. Recalling her last words to him yesterday, she hoped she wasn't trying too hard to convince herself that he would.

"Anybody found him yet?" Derek, with Douglas beside him, went hurrying past to check another building, slowing just long enough to get Craig's response.

"Nothing yet." Craig sounded worn. How much longer before he and she would have to give up and rest against their wishes? Sooner or later, everyone had to eat and sleep; Officer Garrenton had begun to say as much a few minutes ago.

Derek sped off into the Corner Market with Douglas at his heels. Several concerned citizens had stopped to inquire about the situation, and a couple of Seattle Police officers stood close by to field any information curious shoppers and tourists might provide. As yet, though, they had received no leads.

Kara didn't pray. No, that wasn't true—she had been praying all day and hadn't stopped. She just didn't pray with words anymore. Her heart cried out with a plea beyond the capacity of language. She wanted to take her son home. _Take_ our _son home,_ she corrected herself with another glance at Craig. He was as good a dad as she had ever imagined he would be, his distraction this past month notwithstanding. She wanted him to get to keep being a dad. He would make a wonderful granddad someday, gentle with the grandchildren, teaching them how to plant trees and play baseball, do all sorts of—

"Mr. and Mrs. Fleming!" Officer Garrenton's voice jarred Kara from her weary thoughts. "We've got to go!"

Adrenaline surged through Kara's body in an instant, making her tremble even as she jumped up and ran with Craig into the rain. They met Officer Garrenton at her patrol car.

Agent Nyler was there, too, with Eddie at his side. "Go, Jackie!" he yelled. "I'll send our teams to search that area!"

Officer Garrenton swung herself into the driver's seat, barely waiting for Craig and Kara to settle in behind her before she flipped on her lights and siren and sped the three of them away.

"They found him?" Craig asked, his voice filled with hope. Three more vehicles—police and FBI—followed behind them.

"One of the teams from the church reported seeing him down here near Pine and First," she responded. "They split up. Some went to get a phone, another tried to catch up with him."

"Catch up with him?" Kara repeated.

"He was running away."

In seconds they reached a small gathering of church members and befuddled onlookers. Craig and Kara leapt out of the car with Officer Garrenton and stepped onto the sidewalk.

"Who saw the boy?" Officer Garrenton asked the little crowd.

Two small hands went up in the front of the group. "Isabella!" Kara gasped. "Sofia!" She quickly knelt in front of them, taking their hands in hers. "Did you really see Zach?"

Both of them nodded.

"Where?"

"Up there," Isabella pointed up Pine Street with her other hand. "He was running to the corner. Our mom told us to come back and call the police."

"Are you sure it was Zach?"

"He was wearing his green and blue jacket," Isabella answered.

Kara squeezed their hands. "Oh, you did so good!"

"Mamá!" Sofia called out. She ran past Kara and Officer Garrenton and grabbed Rita's hand as the woman rushed up to the group.

"Did you find him?" Craig asked, his eyes imploring her to say she had. But she had returned alone.

"It is Zachy," she nodded, "but he get on a bus before I catch up. He does not see me, but I see the bus drive away and he is sitting in the front."

"Which bus?" Officer Garrenton prompted her.

She responded in Spanish and immediately shook her head, returning to English. "592, on Second Avenue, two or three minute ago! I chase, but I am too slow."

Officer Garrenton wasted no time in radioing her dispatcher. "Stop all busses on Route 592! The boy was seen on 592 near Pine and Second. Have someone tell me where that bus is!"

Kara lunged at Rita and embraced her tightly. _"Gracias,_ Rita!" Craig hugged the two girls. Then they slipped hastily back into the patrol car, and Officer Garrenton sped them away.

Four minutes later, with directions from the dispatcher, they had cut through the thick downtown traffic and located the bus, which had stopped at the curb. Officer Garrenton parked behind another patrol car, and they hurried out. An officer was just stepping off the bus behind the driver, a husky man with an overly-large mustache.

"Look, I'm on a schedule!" the driver bellowed. "And don't tell me I was speeding in all this traffic, either, because I'll contest that!"

"Hush!" Officer Garrenton snapped as she approached. She turned to the other officer. "He's not there?"

"No," he confirmed. "I checked the entire bus. But one of the passengers gave me this photograph. She said a boy matching his description left it on the seat."

He handed Officer Garrenton a photograph much like the others they had found. She eyed it quickly and passed it to Kara.

"Oh, Zach," Kara breathed. Age three or four, standing in the bathroom with no shirt on, trying to comb his own hair—that look of concentration was Zach's, all right. So were those blue eyes he had crafted from his dad's brown ones...

Officer Garrenton returned her gaze to the bus driver. "You had this boy on your bus, brown hair, blue eyes. He boarded on Second Avenue. Where is he now?"

"How should I know? He got right back off," the driver answered irritably.

Kara wanted to slap the man. What right did he have to be irritable?

He continued. "He was on the wrong bus. I told him to catch his bus on Third. He got off at Third and Pike—paid the full fare, went two blocks!"

"Where was he trying to go?" Craig asked.

"I don't know, someplace south of here—Beacon Hill," the driver managed.

Kara grabbed Craig's arm with both hands. "He's trying to get home!" Emotions warm and icy rushed through her whole body—warm hope because Zach was heading for home, freezing cold fear because he was still in danger. He would be in danger until she and Craig had him safely with them again. The contrasting emotions made her shiver—or maybe the shiver came from the cold rain. It hadn't let up for a couple of hours now.

Officer Garrenton was already on the radio, requesting the dispatcher to notify the Metro Bus system and have them check for Zach, especially on busses en route from downtown to Beacon Hill. Then she notified Agent Nyler to send his search teams to the block of Third Avenue between Pike and Pine Streets.

Craig started calculating. _What are the odds,_ Kara wondered, guessing his thoughts, _that our son who can get lost walking the neighborhood caught the right bus home? When we rode the bus with him before, was he paying attention?_

"Okay, let's get moving," Officer Garrenton told her and Craig. "I know the bus routes to Beacon Hill. We'll check those until we hear back from Metro." Before she returned to her car, though, she glared once more at the bus driver. "Can we ticket this guy for being a jerk?" she asked the other officer.

"I'm sure I can think of something," he answered with a grimace.

Officer Garrenton grunted. "Well, if not, you might keep an eye out for any lane violations later. Or failure to signal..."

The driver defied her with a scowl.

She beckoned Craig and Kara back to her vehicle. They took off right away and turned south. "Seven, fifty, sixty, thirty-six," she recited as she squeezed her car, siren blaring, through the crowded streets. "But which one? Fifty and sixty go across the west side, thirty-six down the middle, seven on the east..."

The radio crackled again, the dispatcher calling for Officer Garrenton. "Metro Transit reports a passenger matching the boy's description on route thirty-six," it said. "Bus is proceeding east on South Jackson Street. The driver indicates that the boy appears to be alone."

Craig glanced at Kara hopefully.

Officer Garrenton replied to the dispatcher. "Instruct the driver to take it slow, but not to stop until we arrive. We don't want to alert the kidnappers if they're on the bus. Or the boy, either—he may run if he thinks he's in danger."

She accelerated, taking them down the road much more quickly than Kara was comfortable with, but more slowly than she desired. A mere two minutes later—an eternity to Kara—they turned west onto South Jackson Street. "There it is!" Craig exclaimed, pointing to the bus a block ahead of them. It crept to a stop beside the curb as they approached.

Officer Garrenton turned off her siren, but kept her lights flashing as she brought her vehicle to a halt behind the bus. "Hold on!" she commanded, barely catching Kara and Craig before they leapt from the car. _"I_ go first...just in case."

Craig nodded, and they emerged from the car. He took Kara's hand, holding it against his chest as they followed Officer Garrenton and watched her step quickly to the bus's front door. "Whatever happens," he told Kara, eyes fixed on the bus, "I love you."

Kara blinked. _He's worried about_ me _?_ Well, she realized, she had worried about him a little today, too. She squeezed his hand in reply.

Officer Garrenton peeked into the bus as if expecting trouble, her right hand on the weapon at her hip. Kara prayed she wouldn't need it. Her prayer was answered; relaxing, the officer stepped onto the bus and, positioning herself beside the driver, looked around. Kara held her breath; she could feel her own tension reciprocated in Craig's hand.

After an endless moment, the officer turned back to them with a wide grin. She motioned them onto the bus. Kara, trembling, led the way, Craig right behind her. Officer Garrenton made room for them to enter the aisle.

Kara looked to the seats. The bus was nearly full. The passengers watched with a blend of curiosity and concern at the officer's entry—every passenger except one...

Kara's hands flew to cover her mouth. "Oh!" she breathed, lifting up a wordless, grateful prayer. There he was! He was mid-way to the back of the bus, on the driver's side, his disheveled head slumped against the window. He was sound asleep.

"Thank God!" Craig exclaimed as he spotted Zach.

Kara rushed up the aisle to the boy, but when she reached him, she slowed herself and settled gently into the seat beside him. "He must be exhausted," she whispered to Craig. "He never sleeps in the car."

She touched Zach's shoulder and shook him lightly. "Wake up, kiddo," she whispered to him. He did not respond; his breathing remained deep and steady. She ran a hand through his wet hair. "Zechariah." He didn't open his eyes, but he did shift to the side and snuggle against her. Kara glanced up at Craig in astonishment.

The boy was soaked—he had been out in that rain. Why did that please her? The water in his hair glistened just as it had the night when he had appeared on the doorstep. A police officer had been there then, too, at the door—the same officer as stood near the door of the bus tonight. As she had brought Zach to them that first night, she had now brought them to him. What a strange sort of birthing that had been, to see him standing there dripping that first time...

Placing an arm around his shoulders, Kara shook him more vigorously. "Hey, Fish," she spoke into his ear.

This time he roused and peeked up at her from beneath heavy eyelids. "Mom?" he managed, confused. She grinned down at him. He looked at her, sleepy and perplexed. Then, comprehension dawning with a gasp, he suddenly threw his arms around her and hugged her. Stunned, she hesitated a moment before embracing him in return. Her tears drained onto Zach's hair, mixing with the rain, and she made no attempt to stop them.

An instant later, though, Zach startled and pulled himself back abruptly, looking up at her in shock. He seemed so surprised at having hugged her that she couldn't help but laugh. He stared at her for a long moment, then noticed Craig standing above her. "Dad?" he mouthed, barely giving voice to the word.

"Hey, pal," Craig replied. "We've been looking everywhere for you."

In a flash, Zach stood and leaned across Kara to hug his dad. When he finally pulled away, he looked at them both with moist, puzzled eyes. "How did you find me?"

"You left us a good trail," Craig said. He pulled one of the photographs from the pocket of his jacket. "That was smart, pal."

"I just thought that if anybody was looking for me—"

"We've been looking since after school yesterday," Kara told him, wiping her eyes. She took his shoulders in her hands and looked him over. "Are you okay? Did they hurt you?" He looked all right from what she could see. But she wrinkled her nose. "Ugh, you smell!"

"I had to hide in a garbage can, Mom! And they tied me up in a shed!" His voice shook—he was exhausted, of course, and still very frightened. "And later they tied me up in a basement. But I got away—I figured out how, Dad!"

Craig bit his lip and nodded supportively.

"Grandfather helped me escape the first time," he continued in a rush. "He's alive, Mom! But I couldn't rescue him the second time. They were guarding him. They saw me and tried to catch me again. That's when I had to hide in the garbage can—"

"Shh," Kara interrupted him, placing a finger on his lips. Officer Garrenton was motioning to them. "We want to hear everything. But first, let's get you off this bus." She stood up. Craig led the way down the aisle to Officer Garrenton, Kara following with Zach safely between them.

In the aisle, he stopped and turned to her again. "Mom, I'm sorry," he said with genuine remorse in his eyes, not that falsely penitent look he had gotten from his dad. "I—"

"Zechariah," she cut him off, "it's okay. We both said foolish things yesterday. I didn't mean it, and I know you—"

"No, Mom," he protested. "Not that."

She tipped her head to the side, confused. "Then...what?"

He gulped. "Mom, I only bought French fries for my dinner. I know they're not healthy, but—"

"You're sorry," Kara interrupted him again, "because you bought _French fries?"_

He gazed up at her guiltily, as if expecting a reprimand.

She grabbed him and hugged him again. How could she do anything else? "Zechariah Timothy Fleming, tonight you can have all the French fries you want!" Releasing him, she prodded him down the aisle.

He craned his neck back to gape at her with a look of pure astonishment. "Really, Mom?"
Chapter 21

Zach slid into the back seat of Officer Garrenton's patrol car. He had ridden in it once before, on the night she had brought him home to meet his parents. Now Mom and Dad took seats on either side of him, squeezing him between them. Mom slung her arm around Zach and hugged him close again; Dad put a hand behind Zach's head and patted it affectionately. It felt weird, their hands on him—but good, too... _Safe_ —it felt safe. As Officer Garrenton sped them away, Zach pulled in deep, refreshing gulps of air.

"You were sound asleep on the bus," Mom said. "You must be so worn out."

He was. He sagged wearily against her. "Are we going home?"

"Soon, kiddo," Mom replied sympathetically. "They need us to go to the FBI office first so you can tell Agent Nyler what happened."

"Who's he?"

"He's been helping us find you. And he's trying to catch the kidnappers."

"It was two Asian men, Mom," Zach described. "One's taller than the other, and the shorter one is missing a tooth." Officer Garrenton glanced at Zach through the rearview mirror. He hesitated. "Mom?"

"Yeah, kiddo?"

"Did you and Dad—did you sell me?"

Mom shifted to face Zach. "Zechariah Fleming, at this moment you are the most—well, you know the rest of it, don't you? Why would you ever think we would want to sell you?"

He explained what Hugh had told him, and Mom exchanged a dark look with Dad, then looked back to Zach. "Is that what you meant on the phone this morning, Zach? You thought we sold you to them?"

Zach fidgeted under her gaze. "I don't—Mom, I—I'm trying to be a good kid, honest! But I was mean to you, and you didn't ask me to come find you. I did that on my own. And—" Zach looked at her and then at Dad. "Grandfather said it was true. That's what he told me when he rescued me."

"Oh, Zechariah," Mom answered, her face growing dark, "he told you a terrible lie! We would never, ever—"

"Wait a second," Officer Garrenton interrupted them from the front seat. "Did you say he _rescued_ you?"

"He found me in a shed in the middle of the night," Zach replied, "by a mansion where Hugh lives, the guy the kidnappers were working for."

"Are we looking for the wrong person?" Officer Garrenton mused.

Dad rubbed his chin in thought. "But Eddie said..." His voice trailed off.

"Then they found us again," Zach continued, "when we were on the—" He stopped and heaved a sigh. "Dad, he took me on the ferry."

Dad patted Zach's leg. "I know, pal. The police saw you on the security video."

"I didn't like it, Dad. He made me stay in the car the whole time. I hardly got to see anything...and it was all inside."

Mom spoke again. "The police found the picture you left on Bainbridge Island."

"I have another one, Mom!" Zach remembered suddenly. He brought it carefully out of his jacket pocket and held it where she and Dad could both see it.

Dad frowned as he studied it. "I didn't want to believe it," he said in a low tone. "It's so...completely bizarre..."

Mom saw the photo and bit her upper lip. Zach had intentionally saved this picture for last—the picture Grandfather had shown him of himself in the clear box when he was not yet ready to be born.

"Mom," Zach said softly, "I know I didn't come out of your tummy, but Cayden is adopted, and his mom and dad really love him—"

Mom cut him off with a look. "Zechariah," she said, her voice trembling a little, "I don't know what this Dr. Lerwick who calls himself your Grandfather told you, but you are mine, and your dad's, and nobody else's—nobody! He may have brought you into this world, but he had to steal you from us to do it. And I don't care if you came out of my tummy or not, young man. You were born to us the day you came into our house all wet and dripping on my floor." She gave him a stern look. It made warm goosebumps creep up his arm.

He found himself grinning. "That's what I thought. That's why I got on the bus to come home."

Mom nodded. There was a gleam in her tired eyes.

"Where did you look for me?" Zach asked.

"All over the neighborhood," Mom told him, "and then at the school, and then..."

"...and then the police and the FBI started looking, too," Dad finished.

"How many, Dad?" Zach inquired. "How many people were looking for me?"

"A lot, pal," Dad replied. "Most of police officers in Seattle, and pretty much everyone we know. It was Rita who saw you get on the first bus." Dad suddenly looked sad. "I bet it seemed lonely to you, though, huh? You were pretty much on your own until we found you."

Zach looked down at his hands in his lap. A lot of people had been looking for him the whole time—not just Mom and Dad, but Rita, the police, even the FBI...

He looked up at Dad. "It's safe now, right, Dad?"

"You're with us, now," he answered. "You're safe."

"Okay," Zach replied. He leaned over and put his head against Dad and closed his eyes. He might have slept just a little before they arrived at their destination.

*****

Even after spending most of the evening inside the FBI building, surely one of the most secure locations in Seattle, it was hard for Craig not to be overprotective of Zach as he walked the boy down the hall toward the exit beyond which Officer Garrenton's patrol car awaited them. Two hours of patient but focused questioning—not to mention a quick inspection by a doctor—had worn the youngster out, and Craig wanted nothing more than to get him home and in bed safe and sound. Thankfully, Agent Nyler had sent someone to get them dinner upon their arrival—tacos and French fries for Zach, sandwiches for Craig and Kara. All of them had been famished. Zach had glanced at Kara no less than four times as he had eaten his fries, just to make sure it was okay.

Now, Zach's story fully disclosed, discussed, and recorded in detail, and the adults' story outlined for the youngster as well, it was, as Officer Garrenton had exhorted Agent Nyler, time for Zach to get some rest. Craig yawned as they walked; he himself was ready to collapse into bed. He stretched, trying to stimulate his flagging muscles; somehow his body knew it was all right to relax now, and it was trying. He needed it to wait just a few more minutes, and then they would be home.

Kara stayed beside the youngster as they stepped outside. She, like Craig, seemed to be fighting the urge to hold onto him. Zach was still sensitive to touch, even if he had hugged both her and Craig—voluntarily—tonight. On the sidewalk, she and Craig waited for Officer Garrenton, who was conferring with Agent Nyler just inside, while Zach moved away into the rain to talk with Eddie.

"Did you really know me when I was little?" he inquired. Eddie had reluctantly revealed his connection with Grandfather—Dr. Lerwick—to Zach during their meeting in a conference room on one of the higher floors. Not much of what Craig and Kara had learned about Zach in the past day had surprised the boy, but Eddie's involvement had caught him off guard.

"Yeah," Eddie confirmed, "I've known you ever since you were born."

"I wasn't born," Zach returned dejectedly. "More like hatched."

Eddie shook his head. "No—hatched, you get yourself out. Born, someone else gets you out. You were born." He looked up into the rain that was falling steadily, if less forcefully than this afternoon. "I was there. I watched my father take you out of his artificial womb. I saw you take your first breath." He lifted his wallet out of his back pocket, opened it, and held it out for Zach to see. "That's me and you."

Craig caught a glimpse of the photograph—Eddie as a teenager smiling and holding an infant that could indeed have been Zach.

"I used to play with you," Eddie confided.

Zach raised his eyebrows. "You did?"

"Peek-a-boo was your favorite." Eddie demonstrated, hiding his eyes behind both hands and then revealing them suddenly. Zach—who, after all, had never been around babies—watched with his mouth open, uncertain how to respond. "Used to tickle your toes, too."

Zach wrinkled his nose. "Did I like it?"

"Not really. But we were trying to get you used to being touched. You'd cry the whole time. But with the dog..."

"We had a dog?"

"A little one. I used to put her in your crib, and she would lick your toes and curl up to sleep beside you. She didn't care if you cried. After a week or two you got used to it. You'd cry if anyone else touched you, but if the dog touched you, it was okay." Eddie smiled at the memory. "You were a cute little tyke back then. About the same as now, only you got bigger."

Zach rolled his eyes conspicuously.

"We were worried about you," Eddie told him more seriously.

Zach looked down at the sidewalk beneath his feet. "Why didn't you ever tell me?"

It was Eddie's turn to drop his eyes to the sidewalk. "I knew I'd be sent to jail if they found out. And kids, you know—they don't keep secrets very well."

"That's why you were so friendly at school—because you knew me."

"Hey," Eddie scoffed, "I'm friendly with all the kids! But yeah, you most of all. Guess I missed you. Hmph—dumb thing to say."

"Yeah," Zach returned with a small grin. "Are they going to put you in jail?"

Eddie paced a few steps away and turned back, rubbing a hand along the back of his neck. "Probably. Hopefully not for too long. Maybe they'll let me out before, you know, you graduate from high school or something."

"Do you have any sisters or brothers?"

"Only you."

At those two words, Zach's eyebrows jumped. His eyes darted left and right, as if searching for a way to process the thought. After a few moments, he glanced up at Eddie, then stepped out of the rain to his mom, who put an arm around his shoulders. He twitched at her touch, but didn't pull away.

Officer Garrenton rejoined them a few moments later. "He wants you inside," she informed Eddie.

"In prison, more likely," he returned.

"It's your father he wants in prison," she replied. "He's wanted your father a long time."

Zach spoke again. "Why do they want to catch Grandfather? He rescued me last night!"

"If you say so," Eddie replied, "but he's still a criminal." He stepped toward the door, giving Zach's head a gentle shove as he passed. "See you around, little tyke."

Officer Garrenton beckoned the Flemings to her car. "Let's get you all home. I don't know about you, but I'm bushed. And I haven't even begun the paperwork on today..." They buckled their seatbelts as she pulled the vehicle away from the curb.

*****

"We'll have an officer patrolling your neighborhood constantly until the kidnappers are caught," Officer Garrenton said at the doorstep of the Fleming home. He'll swing by and check the house every hour, just to make sure everything's all right. If you need anything, just call—he'll be here in an instant. And if you don't mind, I'll come back and check on Zach tomorrow, probably in the afternoon." She smiled. "I plan to sleep in late."

"You're more than welcome," Craig responded. "I can't tell you how much we appreciate all your help." He shook Officer Garrenton's hand. Kara hugged her in farewell.

As the officer returned to her cruiser, Craig fumbled in his pocket for his house keys. Zach reached into his pocket, too, but brought his hand back empty. "I lost my key," he groaned. He looked abashedly at Kara as if expecting a rebuke.

"It's okay, kiddo," she consoled him. "We can get you a new one."

"I don't want one anyway," he said resignedly. "I don't want to walk home by myself anymore."

"Well, not for a while, at least," Craig agreed as he opened the front door. "We'll work it out so you don't have to."

"Hey, go tell Paws you're okay," Kara encouraged the boy. "He was really worried about you this morning."

Entering the house ahead of his parents, Zach went straight to the side door, where Paws greeted him with a bark. Kara watched him for a moment, then followed Craig in the opposite direction to their room, where they both collapsed backward onto the bed and stared up at the ceiling.

"Did this day really happen?" Kara asked Craig. It felt like a nightmare from which she was finally waking.

Craig's hand found hers. "I say we get Zach in bed and then hit the sack ourselves."

"And take a shower—you're still dirty from work yesterday."

"I'll take it tomorrow. You know, I don't want to ever have reason to ride in a police car again."

"I've learned more about law enforcement today than from all the crime shows I've ever watched."

Craig grew silent for a moment. "Hey, why do you think those Asian guys kidnapped Zach? Do you think this Hugh guy knew about Dr. Lerwick's research?"

"Even if he did, what good would it do him to have Zach?"

"I don't know. We just assumed it was Dr. Lerwick who had kidnapped him, because of what Eddie told us. But Zach said it wasn't..."

"Tonight, I don't care," Kara remarked. "All I want to do tonight is go to—"

"MOM! DA—" Zach's scream from the kitchen was suddenly caught off.

Craig bolted up from the bed just ahead of Kara, and they raced the length of the hall. At the front door, they froze. A white-haired man stood in the kitchen, behind the stand-alone counter, his neatly-trimmed beard framing an oval face, one arm pulling a struggling Zach against himself, the other covering Zach's mouth. Thin, black gloves like Eddie's covered his hands.

He looked up as Craig and Kara appeared. "Ah, how awkward," he said as though he had accidentally barged in on the wrong meeting. "I assure you, I mean Zechariah no harm."

"Then let him go," Craig growled. He drew his phone from his pocket and began to dial 9-1-1.

"Kindly put that away," the man said evenly. He tightened his grip on Zach enough to make the boy wince. Craig froze. "There's no need for us to have a confrontation here," the man continued, "not with the child in the middle. In fact, perhaps you could both set your phones on the counter here in front of me, just to make it easier to resist temptation."

Craig hesitated, then took a cautious step forward, holding the phone out in front of himself like a weapon to be surrendered. "All right—look, just let him go, and you can get out of here before anyone finds out."

"And leave without that for which I came?" The man watched Craig set his phone on the counter and step back to Kara's side. With a look from Craig, Kara followed suit, placing her phone slowly next to his.

Noting her reluctance, the bearded man smiled. "Forgive me. I'm afraid I've made a bad first impression. You have a lovely home, by the way." He glanced around at the den, the dining room, and the kitchen. "Quaint, but cozy. I'm sure Zechariah enjoyed it here."

"We intend to keep him here," Kara stated flatly.

The man tipped his head to look at the boy—Zach's weary face was drained white, his eyes bulging, pleading to Craig and Kara. He had stopped struggling.

"I had hoped," the man continued, "to simply take Zechariah and go before you returned from the bedroom. But alas, I failed. It's unfortunate—it makes the situation so much more difficult for us all."

"How did you get in?" Kara demanded.

"Zechariah was kind enough to leave his key on my couch this morning," the man said. "Not that I needed it," he added as an afterthought. "Again, I hope you'll forgive my impoliteness. I am—"

"Bill Lerwick," Craig finished for him.

"Ah, my reputation precedes me. Yes, I am Dr. Lerwick." With his crisp, intellectual demeanor, the man could have been a college professor—or a mad scientist. "It is so good to finally meet you both, Mr. and Mrs. Fleming."

"Please let him go," Kara pleaded. She couldn't stand to see Zach caught like this, his blue eyes so huge, so afraid. "Please..."

To her surprise, Dr. Lerwick shrugged. "Certainly." He released Zach, and the boy ran to her. She gathered him in her arms and held him close, stepping subtly to the side and shifting him around behind her.

"I am not a monster," Dr. Lerwick continued. "However, in order not to put myself at a disadvantage..." From within his jacket he brought out a gun; Kara didn't know one gun from another, except that this was some sort of pistol, but it made no difference—it looked lethal enough. Her whole body tensed. "I've never actually used a firearm on another human being," he said, regarding the weapon thoughtfully. "But I am willing, you understand—if necessary." He met Craig's eyes, just to make sure Craig had gotten the point.

"Just leave," Craig told him bravely. "You can't do anything good here." Craig was shaking—Kara could see it—but he was standing strong, even so. She could see the warrior in him searching for a way to save them. He was a shrewd warrior, though; he wouldn't do anything foolish to put them in danger...unless, of course, he was too tired to think straight. She was certainly finding it difficult to think coherently herself.

"Why don't we visit in the den?" Dr. Lerwick invited. He waggled the gun toward the armchair there.

Craig moved first, after a moment, leading the way. He took the seat at the computer desk, keeping a wary eye on Dr. Lerwick. Kara took the armchair beside him, and Zach squeezed in next to her, snuggling close, trembling.

"He was hiding in here, Mom!" the boy whispered between rough, uneven breaths. "When I came back inside, he jumped out and grabbed me. I couldn't—"

"You make it sound like I'm a common burglar, Zechariah!" Dr. Lerwick chuckled, still at the standalone counter in the kitchen. "But my youthful days of petty robbery are far behind me. I'm simply here to reacquire that which is rightfully mine."

"You yelled in time for us to stop him," Kara praised Zach softly, giving his shoulder a squeeze.

"He's not yours, Dr. Lerwick, and you can't have him," Craig said defiantly, yet—because of the gun—almost respectfully.

"Ah," Dr. Lerwick nodded. "I was afraid we would disagree on that issue, you and I. What it comes down to, of course, is _intention_ —you did not intend to bring Zechariah into this world; indeed you _could_ not. But I could, and I did. I created him and I raised him. He ran away from me and came to you, but his rightful place is still with me."

Dr. Lerwick picked up Craig's phone and smashed it suddenly against the counter. Shattered bits of the screen and casing broke off and showered the floor. He scooped up Kara's phone and destroyed it in the same way.

Craig, unintimidated, spoke again. "He was _stolen_ from us. He is our son."

Zach watched his dad, eyes flicking from him to Dr. Lerwick and back to Craig.

"I could hardly have stolen from you what was never in your possession," Dr. Lerwick replied casually, moving into the den and settling himself across from them on the couch.

"We are his parents! He is genetically and legally ours!"

Dr. Lerwick barked a laugh. "An outdated paradigm for an era already fading away. Zechariah and I have ushered in a new age, when such simplistic definitions of parentage no longer apply. Now the question _will_ be one of intention. Who brings this child into the world? It is they who will be considered the parents, and biological heritage will matter little."

He turned from Craig to Kara. "Mrs. Fleming," he requested much too politely, "would you be so kind as to bring us drinks? For me, a nice, hot cocoa would be perfect. I took a slight chill out in that rain." Without setting down his gun, he opened his hands to Craig and Zach. "And whatever they would like, too, of course."

With a helpless glance at Craig, Kara stood stiffly. She glared at Dr. Lerwick, but willed her feet toward the kitchen. What kinds of poison did she have tucked away in her cupboards that she could slip into his cocoa? She immediately chided herself for the thought; she was not a killer. Besides, an extra-strong dose of sleeping pills would do the job sufficiently well until they could get the police here. But she had nothing of the sort in the house.

Behind her in the den, Zach spoke. "But you rescued me from the kidnappers. Why are you trying to kidnap me now?"

"Not at all, Zechariah," Dr. Lerwick replied from the other room as Kara retrieved a mug. She moved slowly, her mind desperately grasping for a way to use this change of location to her advantage. But Dr. Lerwick glanced at her in the picture window, using it as a mirror to keep an eye on her in the kitchen; the darkness outside created an excellent reflection inside. "Rather," he continued, "I merely need you to come with me for a while, to assist me in my research. I could hardly let spiteful Mr. McWrait and his hired men take you away from me, could I?"

"What are you going to do to him?" Craig demanded.

"What I have always done—observe his development." Kara saw the older man's reflection shift on the couch. "Zechariah has told you by now, of course, how I brought about his birth. I must watch him until adulthood to be certain that there are no unforeseen side-effects of his having been grown within an artificial womb."

"You could leave him here and do that."

Dr. Lerwick laughed. "Ah, but permitting him to live in the first place was a violation of law; everything since simply adds years to my prison sentence were I to be caught. I cannot take that risk." He shook his head. "No, I have prepared a place where Zechariah shall remain hidden with me while I continue my research."

"Our son is not a guinea pig to be experimented on!" Kara interjected from the kitchen. "You did enough of that with him before. Just leave him alone now. Let him grow up and have a normal life!"

Dr. Lerwick paused, considering, and looked toward Craig. "Why don't you and your wife come with me, Mr. Fleming?"

"Come with you?" Craig repeated warily.

"Certainly—keep the family together. I can provide for you. You will be my guests. Consider it an extended vacation." He said that last as though offering them a real treat. Kara could hardly imagine that time spent in this man's clutches would be anything like a vacation.

Craig sighed and stretched out his hands, palms up. "Dr. Lerwick, surely you don't need Zach anymore! He's a normal, healthy child. What more could you learn from him than you've already learned?"

Glancing at Dr. Lerwick's reflection as she placed his mug of water in the microwave and set it heating, Kara noticed that his attention had shifted to Craig exclusively for the moment. A thought struck her, and she waved a hand at waist-height to catch Zach's eye without Dr. Lerwick seeing. The boy saw her; fortunately, he had the good sense not to give any obvious reaction as he looked toward her.

_You—bathroom_ , Kara signed to the boy, hoping he remembered his sign language; they hadn't practiced much since the start of school. _Window—run!_

Zach watched her, but gave no indication that he understood. As Dr. Lerwick spoke again, Zach merely turned his attention back to the conversation going on in the den.

"You cannot possibly comprehend how much we might learn from Zechariah. He is truly the most amazing accomplishment of my distinguished career thus far."

"Why?" Craig asked. "He's a great kid, but what makes him so different from a billion other children in the world? Why must you obsess over this one?"

"Ah..." Kara saw Dr. Lerwick's face light up in the reflection as she lifted his mug out of the microwave. She mixed the cocoa into it and brought it to him, imagining spilling it, steaming hot, into his lap. But a man who would try to kidnap her son from their own house—with them present!—might also kill over a minor burn. So, sucking in a disciplining breath, she presented him with the mug and rejoined Zach in the armchair. With Dr. Lerwick's eyes on her, she had no opportunity to ask the boy whether he had understood her message. Instead, she wrapped a protective arm around his chest and pulled him against her.

Dr. Lerwick sipped the drink and smiled. "Excellent, Mrs. Fleming—Kara. Thank you." He turned back to Craig. "Why obsess over this one, indeed... I could ask you the same." He gazed into the mug. "To be frank—because he survived. When I saw the quality of the embryo I had purchased, I hardly thought it worth the effort. But somehow"—he nodded toward Zach—"it lived. Even then, though... How do I explain it in terms you can grasp?"

He took another sip of cocoa. "You recognize, of course, that the quality of the embryo and of its genetic code are separate issues; the embryo's health is not itself an indication of how intelligent or capable the creature represented within it could become, if the embryo survives. And you recognize that every person's genetic code is unique, with its own particular strengths and weaknesses. This person has athletic potential but a weak stomach, that one has a strong stomach but will never be an athlete. One person is naturally gifted in math, another in music, another in literature—and a few of us in all of the above. More to the point, one person has a stronger immune system, another gets sick all the time. Why? In some cases, simply because their DNA is different."

"So," Craig said, "Zach has a genetically bad immune system?"

"Quite the contrary!" Dr. Lerwick replied. He was in his element now, lecturing; unfortunately, his focus afforded Kara no opportunity to escape, to get Zach outside and away from this terrible man. He continued to look from Craig to her in turn. "I wondered, at first, if that might be the case, he was sick so often. But time and again, Zechariah surprised me—he lived! He always recovered—with some medical assistance, of course, and it could certainly have turned out otherwise. Yet he persisted, and I was persuaded that his illnesses were not due to a _genetically_ weak immune system, but were merely the result of not having had a mother's body from which to receive the usual immunities at the beginning. From the start, his immune system had to catch up. Eventually, his illnesses decreased to a normal level. He grew healthy and strong. I sent him to school, expecting that the illnesses children pass to one another would overwhelm him. But even there, his health endured. In fact, he thrived! So I was forced to reconsider what it was that had gone right in my experiments, why I had succeeded with Zechariah when with the others, under identical conditions, and even with higher quality embryos, I had failed."

"The others?" Kara asked with horror. "How many?"

"Then it came to me," Dr. Lerwick smiled, ignoring her, "and it was such a simple thing, so easy to overlook. I had been so proud of my discoveries, so certain that the things I had learned, the adjustments I had made to my first artificial womb, were what had given him life."

Craig shifted; he was growing impatient with Dr. Lerwick. "But..." he prompted.

"But it wasn't me—or, rather, my discoveries—that made it possible in Zechariah's case, not exactly. My artificial womb was already sufficient to the task, if only in a rudimentary way; it wasn't ready for every subject." He held up a finger. "The clinching factor, the one thing that brought Zechariah to life when others perished, turned out to be something entirely beyond my control. _His own DNA..._ It makes him unusually resilient."

"A _resilient_ immune system?" Craig puzzled, furrowing his brows.

"Like an inherent flexibility. You might say his body is more able than most to adjust and adapt under less than ideal circumstances." He sipped a little more of his cocoa. "It was so simple I had never considered it—disappointingly simple, to be blunt. But that's why he recovered so well from so many illnesses. Not that he _couldn't_ have died—simply that his odds of recovery were better than most." Dr. Lerwick looked at Zach. "Yes, you're quite the anomaly, Zechariah."

"I want to stay here," Zach said, "with my mom and dad." His voice shook, but Kara eyed him proudly all the same. He was taking his cues from Craig—defiant, yet controlled.

"My poor wife filled his head with false hopes," Dr. Lerwick sighed, "that, because of his singularity, can never be realized. He must be studied; what enabled him to survive the harsh environment of the artificial womb must be pinpointed if we are to find suitable candidates to perfect this technology and make it accessible to the world."

Kara gaped at Dr. Lerwick. He had a face somewhat like Eddie's, its proportions similar, though the fuller beard obscured the likeness. But he had none of Eddie's gentleness—only a feigned kindness, lacking substance.

"Why did you do it?" Zach asked. "Why did you make me alive?"

Kara flinched visibly; the boy's wording stabbed at her. This man _had_ made her son alive—shouldn't she be thankful? Yet she felt only bitterness toward him, especially at this moment, as he held his weapon, threatening her family. She hugged Zach more closely. _If only the boy had understood what I signed to him..._

Dr. Lerwick stood and walked to the large portrait of the Fleming clan—before the arrival of Zach—that hung over the fireplace at the far end of the den. "A fine-looking family," he remarked. "Your genetics"—he looked to Craig and then to Kara—"would naturally be of interest to me, as well. If you would consider joining me for but a short time—a few months might be sufficient—I suspect we could learn a great deal. In time, we might even be able to grow you a whole family..."

"You ignored my son's question," Craig retorted.

"It's okay, Dad," Zach spoke again. "He always ignores me."

"That's not acceptable here," Craig said to Dr. Lerwick. "Answer my son."

Dr. Lerwick fingered the gun in his hand, considering it for a moment, before he replied. "It pleases me to do so. I made you alive, Zechariah, because...I wanted to. I am like God to you. I chose to give you life. And that, you see, is why you belong to me."

Zach snorted. "You're a lousy god!"

Dr. Lerwick turned away from the portrait to face the boy. He smiled, mildly humored.

"You can't even walk on water!" Zach exclaimed. "Jesus walked on water. You had to take the ferry!"

A snort of laughter escaped through Kara's nose.

Dr. Lerwick extended one hand toward Zach. "If I can give a child life at will, who's to say I couldn't walk on water if I tried?"

Zach wasn't finished with his assault. "What if you had done something wrong? What if I had been born with three legs or something? Or _no_ legs?"

"It could have happened," Dr. Lerwick admitted.

Kara shuddered. She spoke softly, solemnly. "You didn't answer _my_ question, either. How many have you sacrificed for the sake of your...research?"

"They were but tools, my dear Kara, for the furthering of knowledge. Truth be told, few survived for long. I used no more than were necessary, and fewer than I could have justified."

"You _are_ a monster," Kara spat, regarding him with horror. What was this man not capable of doing to further his own interests?

"Perhaps, but history will count me a hero," he returned, "quite possibly even in my own lifetime. I will fulfill the hopes of barren women everywhere. Women like yourself will sing my praises."

Kara glared at the man as darkly as she could manage, but Zach began to squirm next to her, distracting her. She put a hand on him to quell his fidgeting. "Zach—"

"Mom," he whispered, though not low enough for secrecy, "I really, really have to go to the bathroom... _please?_ I haven't gone since we got to the big FBI building..."

Actually, he had gone just before they had left, perhaps half an hour ago. _Why—?_ The moment his earnest eyes met hers, she understood. _Oh, good boy!_ she praised him silently. She turned to Dr. Lerwick.

He opened his mouth in that same hollow smile. "By all means, do whatever you need to do, Zechariah. But hurry, please. While I am delighted to have met your parents at last, and as much as I am enjoying our visit, you and I really must be going. I daresay I've overstayed my welcome." Craig grunted at that sentiment.

Zach darted from the chair to the hall, disappearing into the bathroom. Kara heard the door shut behind him. _Run, Zach—hurry!_ she urged him in her mind.

It did not seem to dawn on Dr. Lerwick that Zach might try to escape. He rambled on almost congenially. "It was not until well beyond the fourteen-day threshold—when the development of an embryo for research becomes, sadly, unlawful in our land—that I noticed something different about Zechariah's development, that he was thriving. He was...active in the 'tank,' as we affectionately called it. On day forty, he waved his arms for the first time. In the twenty-ninth week, he blinked, right on schedule. It was...wonderful."

"You should have told us," Kara upbraided him. "We could have found a way—"

Dr. Lerwick cut her off with a wave. "The moment word of how the child had been born got out, I would have been arrested. I would have spent my best years in prison, my research dispersed to minds far inferior to my own, who would spend the next decade working to merely _comprehend_ that which I had already accomplished! No, telling you was impossible."

"Secretly, though!" she argued. "If you had offered us a child, surely we could have made some arrangement, some—"

"I think not," Dr. Lerwick replied abruptly. He gave a wry grin surprisingly similar to Eddie's. "Forgive me, but you and your husband hardly seem the law-breaking type."

"You would have been our hero!"

"No more than I am today. Oh, to have a child would have delighted you, I'm sure, but when you asked how I had acquired his embryo, what would you have had me say? That your embryologist was kind enough to sell it to me, and you should thank me?"

Kara had no answer. Her mind was fuzzy—how were she and Craig sitting here in the den, talking about such things with a man who threatened them with a gun and intended to kidnap their son? At least Zach would be free by now. The bathroom window opened easily enough. She didn't know what Dr. Lerwick would do when he realized he had lost Zach, but if she could keep him talking, it would give the boy more time to escape. That was all that mattered.

She swallowed; conversation with this man made her nauseous. "They said our embryos couldn't develop—"

"Terribly low quality embryos, yes. The embryo that became Zechariah was no better than the others. But unlike the natural womb, the tank allows even poorly-developed embryos to survive; attachment to the lining of the artificial womb is done manually, so that embryonic quality is nearly irrelevant. That's just one small part of the genius behind the miracle I have given you."

Kara swallowed again. "How—how did you make...the 'tank?'"

"Ah, that would be far beyond your understanding, my dear. Even the most basic terminology would baffle you."

"Just...a rough idea, then," she urged. Anything to keep him talking. Craig gave her a strange look. "I'm curious," she defended herself. He would understand later.

Dr. Lerwick drained the last of his cocoa. "Most experts assume that the hormones the mother's body releases, and the timing of them, are still an insurmountable complication. But I made a breakthrough in that regard shortly before I built my first 'tank.' Adjustments had to be made along the way, of course, but then I noticed that—What _are_ you looking at?"

Kara tensed. Her eyes had flicked unconsciously toward the entryway and the hall as she thought of Zach, wondering how far he had gone by now. Would it be far enough?

Following her eyes, Dr. Lerwick stepped around the corner into the entryway and to the bathroom door; Kara and Craig jumped up and followed, keeping a respectful distance from that pistol still in Dr. Lerwick's grasp. The man rapped on the door. "Zechariah?"

There was no response. Dr. Lerwick tried the doorknob, but it was locked.

_Way to go, Zach!_ Kara grinned, clenching a fist. He wasn't allowed to lock the door when he was in the bathroom, but apparently he had considered this situation an exception to that rule.

Dr. Lerwick knocked again. "Zechariah! Speak to me!" Hearing nothing, the man stepped back from the door, sized it up, and slammed into it with his shoulder. With a crack, it broke open and swung inward.

The window was open. Zach was gone. Kara laughed out loud. Craig shot her an astonished look. She grinned at him as Dr. Lerwick stepped back into the hall.

Seeing his expression, Kara frowned—the man was chuckling to himself. "Clever boy," he remarked, clapping his hands. "Right out the window. Ah, well..." Dr. Lerwick peeked cautiously out the glass in the entryway. He furrowed his brows, looking left and right across the front yard, toward the street.

A sudden chill ran down Kara's spine. The man was too comfortable. He ought to have threatened them furiously or raced out the door in search of Zach.

"Ah, there we are," Dr. Lerwick sighed, still watching through the window. He placed his hand on the front doorknob and waited. A few seconds later, just as Kara caught the sound of footsteps on the front porch, he pulled the door open. Zach tumbled inside as if thrown in, and two Asian men—one taller than the other—followed. They wore stern, dispassionate expressions.

"He tried to run," the taller one reported in a thick accent as Dr. Lerwick shut the door behind them.

"The officer patrolling the neighborhood—did he see you?"

"No," the shorter Asian man answered.

"They're helping you!" Zach exclaimed incredulously. His face, arms, and knees were smeared with mud.

"Everyone has their price," Dr. Lerwick responded offhandedly.

Zach lunged for the door. The shorter Asian man grabbed his arm and neck and held him easily in spite of Zach's twisting.

Dr. Lerwick's lips curled into an unfeeling smile. "If you cannot hold still, Zechariah, we will be forced to tie you up again. I know how uncomfortable that is for you."

Zach froze, terror darkening his blue eyes. Fury shone in his eyes, too. _"You're a liar!"_ he shrieked at Dr. Lerwick. "You said you were trying to help me! I told everybody you _rescued_ me!"

Dr. Lerwick cocked his head at the boy. "But I did rescue you, Zechariah," he explained as if stating the obvious. "It was McWrait who was behind your abduction. He thinks you belong to _him,_ you see, since he paid for the research that produced your birth. He was my first investor. But someone, it seems, robbed one of his stores and left a message in defense of your honor. _'For Zach,'_ I believe it said. He sent me a message informing me that he would get revenge, and then he hired these fine men to kidnap you. I really have no idea who launched this whole affair, but I'm delighted that it's all worked out for the best. These gentlemen—it seems he promised them significantly less than they deserved...just as he once did with me."

Zach stared defiantly at Dr. Lerwick. He trembled with rage and fear.

Kara couldn't bear to see her son like this. Instinctively, she moved to help him, to free him, but Craig caught her with his strong arms and held her back, though she flailed against him. Only when she noticed Dr. Lerwick's pistol leveled at her did she still herself, with a great force of will. There had to be some way to save Zach, if only she could see it...

Craig's eyes were calculating—and, like Zach's, furious. Kara had never seen such a forbidding look on her husband's face. She loved him for it, though it frightened her.

The shorter Asian man held Zach in place there in the entryway. Dr. Lerwick considered Craig and Kara. "Such a dilemma," he mused. "Killing the two of you would make the situation so messy. But since you refuse to come and join me in my research..." He tapped a finger against the barrel of the gun, thinking. "Here, give the boy to me," he instructed the taller Asian man. "Find something to bind the adults. There is no need for unnecessary deaths. I am not a murderer."

Murderer or not, he kept the gun leveled at Craig as the Asian men passed Zach to him and stepped toward Craig and Kara. They took hold of Craig first, but he resisted, pushing them away.

"Now, now, Mr. Fleming," Dr. Lerwick warned, his voice louder, more intense, "do remember how uncomfortable I am with the prospect of violence. Neither of us wants the situation to get out of hand." He pulled Zach against himself threateningly.

Craig slowly dropped his arms. Kara saw in his face what she felt inside—a seething, helpless rage. The shorter Asian man shoved Craig to the floor and planted a knee in his back. The taller man joined him, and together they dragged Craig into the den. Keeping a watchful eye on Kara, the taller man rummaged through the computer desk drawers and discovered the old roll of duct tape there. Despite its age, plenty of tape remained on the roll, and the taller man bound Craig's wrists with several layers, then repeated the procedure on his ankles. Craig strained against the bonds, but could not break them.

The shorter Asian man returned to the entryway and, taking Kara roughly by the arm, pulled her into the den and leveraged her to the floor beside Craig. He pinned her two wrists together in one large hand. The taller Asian was about to bind her with the duct tape when Dr. Lerwick moved suddenly away from the front door, pushing Zach ahead of him.

"Someone is coming," he said. He forced Zach into the den, where the wall dividing it from the hallway would block him from the sight of anyone at the door. "Bring Mr. Fleming over here. Kara—" He turned to her; why did he insist on insulting her by using her first name? "Answer the door and send them away. If they step one foot inside the house, I will kill your husband." He leveraged his gun at Craig's head just to reinforce the point.

For all his feigned politeness, Kara did not dare question whether he would do it. The Asian men dragged Craig fully out of sight and took places on either side of him. The doorbell rang just as they disappeared behind the wall. With a deep, stabilizing breath, Kara moved to the door.

It was Officer Garrenton there, with Agent Nyler. Both were armed, as usual, and Kara wanted more than anything to send them into the den to save her boys. But she could think of no way to do it without Dr. Lerwick first carrying out his threat against Craig.

"Sorry to bother you again, Mrs. Fleming," Officer Garrenton greeted her in a weary but gracious tone. "We forgot to give you Zach's backpack." She offered it to Kara, who accepted it from her without a word, simply nodding once. Officer Garrenton continued. "We would have brought it tomorrow, but Agent Nyler received some pictures from the undercover agent overseas who sent us Zach's photo yesterday."

Agent Nyler stepped up next to Officer Garrenton and showed her a handful of full-sized photographs. "I need to ask Zach if any of them are the Asian men who kidnapped him. Do you mind if we come in for just a minute?"

Kara wanted to scream that of course they could come in, that they needed no pictures to identify the two Asian men, that he could find them right behind her in the den. But with Craig's life in the balance, she could only bite her tongue and weep inside. "I...can't...let you come in right now," she choked. "Maybe you could come back later—tomorrow?"

Officer Garrenton looked at her with concern, much as she had looked at her that first night, right here at the front door, when Kara had claimed that she was not Zach's mother, that she had never seen him before. "Mrs. Fleming, is everything all right?"

Kara nodded a little too vigorously, hoping the officer would suspect a problem even as she prayed she wouldn't. Which option put her family in greater danger? "Y—yes," she stammered, "they're...resting right now, both of them. Really tired. Exhausted. They need to not be disturbed. If you could come back first thing in the morning..."

With a long look at Officer Garrenton, Agent Nyler cocked an eyebrow. "If we could bother Zach for just one minute, it would really help us to—"

"The morning would be...better." Kara's voice sounded strained to her. She yearned to say so much more.

Officer Garrenton's look of concern darkened almost imperceptibly. She turned suddenly to Agent Nyler. "Yes, this appears to be a bad time, Clint. We should have been more thoughtful. They've had a very long day."

"Jackie, I—" Agent Nyler began to protest, but with a hand on his arm, Officer Garrenton stopped him.

"We really should let them rest," she said, raising her eyebrows at him. "Sorry to bother you, Mrs. Fleming."

She steered Agent Nyler back down the walkway. Kara closed the door behind them, released a breath she hadn't realized she was holding, and sobbed into her hands. Strong arms heaved her roughly away from the door and deposited her onto the kitchen floor between the standalone counter and the dining table. Within seconds her wrists and ankles were bound together with duct tape.

"Watch them," Dr. Lerwick ordered, "make sure they leave."

The shorter Asian man hurried to the entryway to obey.

"You have saved your husband," Dr. Lerwick commended Kara. "Tomorrow, when I am gone and Zechariah with me, you can tell them everything that happened. And they can search, but they will not find us."

"I don't want to go!" Zach began to weep. "Please, Grandfather—let me stay with my mom and dad!"

Dr. Lerwick opened his mouth to reply, but the shorter Asian man stepped back into the den. "The police are gone," he reported.

"Good. One of you keep watch, and the other bring the car. It is time for us to take our leave."

They returned to the entryway, where the taller Asian stepped out the front door and closed it behind himself. The shorter man stood guard at the window.

Dr. Lerwick wrenched Zach's arms around and shoved him roughly into the entryway.

"Please, Grandfather, no!" Zach pleaded. Dr. Lerwick ignored him.

In the den, Craig strained at his bonds, but they held. Kara met his eyes. Like her own, they were very much afraid.

*****

Agent Nyler, at Officer Garrenton's urging, stepped away from the Flemings' house and back to the street, where her patrol car awaited them. He kept silent until they had climbed inside, and then he turned urgently to Officer Garrenton. "Jackie, there's something wrong back there. I don't know what it is—"

"Look straight ahead until we get out of sight," she told him. He did, and she pulled into the street.

When they had passed the next two houses, Nyler shifted to face her again. "What's going on? That is not the Kara Fleming we spent the whole last day with."

"Someone is in their house," Officer Garrenton replied. "I caught a reflection in the picture window, just for a moment." She made a right turn at the next street. "Two men, one taller than the other."

"The Asian men?" Agent Nyler asked with alarm. "Holding the family hostage?"

"I don't think you'll need those photographs."

"We've got to get back there."

"Agreed."

"But carefully. Pull around the block and park down the street from their house where they can't see you, but you can see anyone who comes and goes. Call for backup. I'll sneak back to the house and see what's going on. As soon as we have some personnel in place, we'll move in. But tell them to keep it quiet. And Jackie—don't let anyone surprise me from behind, okay?"

"I'll watch your back," Jackie grinned. "Partners again, eh? Just like the old days." She swung the patrol car to the end of the Flemings' block. The moment she had parked, Agent Nyler jumped out of the car and jogged back to the house.

*****

Kara, securely bound, watched helplessly from the kitchen as Dr. Lerwick stood wrestling Zach in the entryway. The man's back was to her for the moment as the boy tried to pull away from him, to no effect.

In the den, Craig, sitting up with his legs stretched out in front of him, tried again to snap the old duct tape on his wrists and ankles, but succeeded only in falling over onto his shoulder. He pulled himself upright and tried again. The tape held. Nearing panic, he rolled his eyes in vexation, but only for a moment—then his eyes narrowed and Kara saw him calculating, strategizing. He bent himself double and stretched his fingers to work at the tape around his ankles. He pulled it this way and that; it would not budge. He tried to tear it. Kara stifled a gasp—the brittle tape tore apart! His hands were still bound, though. Craig climbed to his knees and edged toward the dining room, gaining a view of the entryway but keeping himself out of Dr. Lerwick's sight.

Dr. Lerwick grappled with Zach in the hall, facing away. The shorter Asian man continued watching out the window. A car rumbled into the driveway outside. "We are going," Dr. Lerwick announced. "Come, Zechariah."

The shorter Asian man reached over to help Dr. Lerwick manage Zach, but the older man pushed his hand aside. "I can control the boy. Go make sure no one is watching."

The Asian slipped out the front door, leaving it open for Dr. Lerwick to follow. Dr. Lerwick dragged Zach into the entryway, where the boy continued to struggle.

"Desist, Zechariah," Dr. Lerwick said idly. "It is no use fighting me. You are not strong enough."

"I don't want to go!" he bellowed. "Leave me here! Leave me alone! Dad! _Dad!"_

Again, Craig tugged mightily against the bonds around his wrists, but they held.

Dr. Lerwick maneuvered Zach toward the door, clutching his pistol in one hand and attempting to cover Zach's mouth with the other.

Zach kicked out and caught the door with his foot, knocking it shut.

"Zechariah, must you make this difficult?" Dr. Lerwick forced a chuckle; he was in control, but increasingly impatient, too. Wrestling Zach to his side with one arm, he reached out for the doorknob with the other.

Zach regained his balance and stomped with all his might on Dr. Lerwick's toes. The older man cried out, and Zach broke free of his grip.

_"Dad!"_ Zach yelled again, and took a desperate step toward Craig.

But Dr. Lerwick, enraged, swung an open hand and caught Zach's ribs, slamming him into the small entryway table. Zach tumbled backward into the hall; the photographs on the table crashed to the floor. Kara saw, as if in slow motion, the photo of young Craig in his baseball uniform teeter on the edge of the table and then shatter on the tiles. Zach, bleeding, crawled into the bathroom and slammed the broken door shut with his foot. Dr. Lerwick stepped to pursue him.

Craig, his eyes suddenly wild, roared and strained with renewed rage against the tape binding his wrists. All at once the tape burst apart, and Craig launched himself across the entryway. With three quick strides he threw himself at Dr. Lerwick. The older man turned just in time to raise his pistol and bare his teeth.

Craig tackled him against the wall and they slid down it, wrestling each other to the floor. After a long moment's struggle, an ear-splitting boom tore through the house.

The struggle ended. Craig's body went limp on the floor, face-up and motionless. There was blood. Kara did not hear herself when she screamed.

*****

On the south side of the Flemings' house a gate led to the garden, which gave way in turn to grass surrounding the small patio. Placing a hand over his radio to mute the chatter—agents were calling in as they raced here; police officers were surely calling in as well, on another frequency—Agent Nyler passed through the gate and picked his way across the garden. There was no movement in the back yard except that Paws, lounging in front of the side door, peeked up at him curiously, then roused himself to greet him.

"Shh," Nyler instructed the dog as he passed. Paws sniffed him and kept quiet.

"I'm at the side of the house," Nyler whispered into his radio. "There's a window here, into the kitchen. I'm going to take a peek—"

A gunshot rang out. Mrs. Fleming screamed.

Every weary muscle in Nyler's body went fully taut and he instinctively threw himself flat against the wall, his back pressed against the paneling, his firearm suddenly drawn and ready. Adrenaline already coursing through his veins now surged violently.

"Shot fired in the house!" he whispered sharply into his radio. "I'm going in! Get me that backup!"

He leapt away from the wall, set himself, and kicked the side door in. "FBI!" he roared. "DROP YOUR WEAPON!" In a breath, he took in the scene—Mrs. Fleming, hands and feet bound, scrambling toward Mr. Fleming on the floor, bleeding on his right side, while a man with white hair and beard climbed to his feet and looked up in shock as Nyler stormed into the house. Nyler immediately recognized the face from earlier years—Bill Lerwick.

Dr. Lerwick held a Beretta .22 in both hands and fired it. Nyler ducked; the bullet exploded through the side door behind him.

He recovered just in time to see Dr. Lerwick flee down the hall. "FREEZE!" the agent thundered, both hands on his own weapon as he pursued. Into his radio he yelled, "Suspect is armed and inside the house! We have a man down!" There was no time to check on Mr. Fleming, not when Dr. Lerwick could return.

Agent Nyler ran the length of the hall, set his back against the wall, and risked a quick look around the corner. The hall was L-shaped, and that swift glance told him the shorter leg of the L was clear. There was another room ahead—a laundry room, it appeared. He performed the same quick look into that room, but it, too, was empty. The back door there had been thrown open.

He shouted into the radio again. "Suspect has fled into the back yard!" With another safety-peek around the doorframe, he stepped into the grass and peered through the darkness and rain. Motion to his right caught his eye and, spinning, he leveled his gun on another man emerging around the corner of the structure, weapon drawn, his dark blue jacket declaring "FBI" in bright yellow letters that stood out in the dim light from the den windows.

Lowering his weapon—thank goodness for those yellow letters—Nyler waved across the grass. "Search the yard! Caucasian man in his fifties, armed and dangerous! I've got an injured man inside!"

The other agent nodded and called out Nyler's instructions to two more agents who raced in behind him. The three canvassed the yard as Agent Nyler hurried back into the house. "We need medical personnel!" he told the radio. Someone responded that an ambulance was already on its way.

Mrs. Fleming had reached her husband and held his head propped in her lap when Agent Nyler returned to them. The dog stood beside them, sniffing around the blood that had spilled onto the floor.

"It's his arm," Mrs. Fleming breathed. She touched near the place.

Nyler braced himself and looked. Bullet wounds always made him sick. The impact had put a hole clean through the arm; from the bleeding it didn't look as though the artery had been struck. But there was too much blood on Mr. Fleming's side; the shot had sliced through the arm and impacted his chest—Nyler couldn't tell how deeply.

"Is it bad?" Mr. Fleming managed through deep gasps. He was struggling against the pain, his face drained white.

"I've seen worse," Agent Nyler answered honestly. "But you have a bullet in your chest somewhere. Try not to move." Nyler tore a strip of cloth from Mr. Fleming's sleeve and worked to hamper the flow of blood.

*****

Officer Garrenton left her patrol car parked at the end of the street, lights off, and kept to the shadows lining narrow Spindler Avenue, using the neighbors' old trees and tall shrubs as cover. She stayed where she could see the Flemings' front yard, just in case—which meant exposing herself to the rain, of course—and flexed her right hand, ready to draw her weapon the instant it became necessary. It likely would.

She contacted the SPD dispatcher to call for immediate backup, then switched her radio back to Agent Nyler's frequency. Officers on patrol nearby would arrive in moments; FBI agents would arrive soon, as well. Few were resting tonight; even after Zach's recovery, most continued to search for the kidnappers. She kept her radio volume low to avoid being heard.

A sedan, its headlights off, approached from the other direction. It pulled into the Flemings' driveway, and the driver stepped out to wait at the front of the vehicle. He was male, Asian. Either there were three Asians involved, or he had slipped out to bring the getaway car as soon as she and Agent Nyler had driven out of sight. Officer Garrenton considered arresting him on the spot, but the safety of the family was her first concern; she needed to keep watch until reinforcements arrived, lest her impatience alert the other bad guys inside.

She ducked behind a broad-leafed bush in the yard next to the Flemings' and kept an eye on the Asian man. A moment later, the Flemings' front door opened and light streamed out, rain streaking the brightness until it shut again. A second man—the other Asian—emerged and strode down the sidewalk to the driveway, where he spoke with the first Asian. The front door opened and shut once more, but no one else stepped outside.

A firearm discharged inside the house. Officer Garrenton reflexively drew her weapon and secured it in both hands.

She heard Agent Nyler's urgent voice over the radio. "Shot fired in the house! I'm going in! Get me that backup!"

The two Asian men ran toward the house. Sane folks would have fled from the sound of a gunshot in the city at night, but Officer Garrenton ran toward it, too. "POLICE!" she cried, racing at the two men. "Down on the ground! Now!"

Both men, one taller than the other, spun and stared at her in surprise for a full second. Then they bolted apart like magnets repelling each other. She couldn't chase both, so she reversed direction and ran after the closer, shorter man.

He was faster than she was, and outpaced her by a full front yard within seconds. But he was alone, and she suddenly was not. A police cruiser sped around the corner ahead of them, its siren silent but its lights flashing. The Asian man changed course, angling to Officer Garrenton's left and crossing the street. An officer leapt from the passenger side of the vehicle and joined the pursuit.

The Asian man ran as if toward one of the homes, then shifted direction again and sprinted across the yard, back in the direction of the Flemings' house. Officer Garrenton moved to intercept him at a hedge four feet high that divided that yard from the next, but the Asian man saw her and determined to hurdle it.

"FREEZE!" Officer Garrenton shouted, but the man leapt. His foot caught the top of the hedge, and he fell roughly to the ground. He struggled upright and took off again, but too late—she threw herself on top of him and knocked him face-down into the mud. He tried to turn over, but with her gun still in her hand and her weight pinning him down, she wrenched his right arm around his back and cuffed it, then forced his left arm back and cuffed it, too.

The other officer reached her, and she climbed back to her feet, sucking in great gasps of air. The second officer rolled the Asian man over onto his back; the man panted, his mouth hanging open.

"What do you know?" Officer Garrenton regarded him. "You're missing a tooth."

*****

Paramedics rushed into the house and took over the care of Mr. Fleming. Relieved of his medical duties, Agent Nyler drew out a knife and sliced Mrs. Fleming's bonds apart.

"Where's Zach?" he asked, eyes darting across the kitchen and dining room.

Mrs. Fleming, her face white, nodded behind Nyler. "Bathroom," she said weakly.

Agent Nyler went to the door—it was closed, but askew. Someone had forced it open; the frame was splintered apart near the knob. "Zach," he announced, "it's Agent Nyler. I'm coming in to check on you, son."

Nudging the door aside, he found the boy huddled against the back of the tub, gulping down air in quick swallows. He stared at Nyler with panicked eyes, like some injured animal. He _was_ injured—a streak of blood smeared the left side of his forehead and face.

Nyler stepped toward him, and the boy flinched. The agent hesitated, then moved back to the door. "Paws? Here, Paws!" he clapped.

At his name, Paws, resting his head on Mr. Fleming's legs, perked up and trotted over to Agent Nyler. "Good boy," Nyler praised him, leading him into the bathroom. The dog noticed Zach and climbed into the tub beside him to lick his face. The boy took Paws' head in both hands and hugged him close, breathing more deeply.

Nyler examined the boy's wound without touching him, then reached for a wash cloth and soaked it in cold water. "Here," he told Zach, placing the cloth in the boy's hand. He lifted the hand and pressed it and the cloth against the gash in the boy's forehead. "Hold that against the cut until the paramedics look at it." The boy didn't acknowledge him, but he kept the cloth against his head, so Nyler left him alone and returned to the entryway.

"Zach?" Mr. Fleming groaned as the paramedics tended to him.

"He's okay," Nyler reported. "Just needs a minute to collect himself." Mr. Fleming closed his eyes in reply.

With a nod to the paramedics, Nyler hurried out the front door and into the rain. Somewhere in the neighborhood, there was a fugitive he intended to apprehend.

*****

With Paws at his side, Zach peeked out the bathroom door, dreading what he would see. There was blood on the floor. Police officers and FBI agents were searching through the house for any clues Grandfather might have left. Another police officer stood at the open front door, watching the street, guarding. Zach had heard Grandfather's gun fire, had heard Mom scream. But Dad—he hadn't heard Dad.

Mom touched him gently on the back. "Go ahead, kiddo," she said softly. "It's okay now. They just left in the ambulance. We need to get you to the hospital, too." She had come into the bathroom to get Zach, had lifted him to his feet and just held him against her for a long time. Now she nudged him out the bathroom door.

"Me? Why?"

Mom squatted in front of Zach. "Because you're hurt, too, Zach. You got blood all over my bathroom. I like it better when you only drip water." She had already checked his head, but now she wiped blood delicately from the wound again. He didn't even think to shy away from her touch.

"I don't want Dad to die," Zach said simply, pleading. It sounded to him like the words came from someone else's mouth. "I've never had a dad before."

Mom wrapped him in her arms and pressed him close to her again. "He's going to be okay as long as they can get that bullet out without..." A drop of blood fell from his head onto her shirt, beside a stain from Dad's blood. "Well, you just wait—he'll be playing catch again before you know it, kiddo."

Mom took Zach's shoulders in her hands, which were shaking. She was trying to be brave for Zach, but she was really scared; he could see it in her eyes. He hugged her again and cried, shaking with her.

Officer Garrenton stepped through the door, and Mom slowly released Zach and wiped his tears with a finger. "Oh, you're all right!" the officer exclaimed as she spotted Zach. She embraced him unabashedly and checked him over. "I was so worried."

Mom turned to face Officer Garrenton with a venomous look. "Please tell me they caught him."

"They just arrested one of the Asian men on the next block," Officer Garrenton replied. "The other one I caught myself—tackled him and cuffed him. But as for Dr. Lerwick—they're still searching."

Mom grimaced.

Officer Garrenton placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "Let's get you two to the hospital." She walked with Mom and Zach to her cruiser awaiting them on the street.

*****

Dr. Bill Lerwick climbed another fence and jumped to the ground on the other side. _Not bad for a fifty-six year old man,_ he commended himself. _Not so spry as in former days, but sufficient for the task at hand._ That task was to elude the authorities until they spread out and he could make his way elsewhere.

_Where to go?_ He concealed himself within a tangle of low branches between two trees in a random back yard and listened to the sounds of law enforcement working through the neighborhood, trying in vain to find him. Edward had betrayed him, of course—that was the only way the boy could have come to live with his parents. And if Edward had betrayed him, he would have to rely on his secondary hideouts. There would be no more public presentations on the science of reproduction—any notoriety now would draw the attention of the authorities like a neon sign flashing his name and location.

But he no longer needed such spectacles in any case, not anymore. Just a few more weeks...

Retrieving the boy was no longer possible, not at the present time. That was a pity; he had been mere moments from escaping with the lad. McWrait's attempt at vengeance had produced such a serendipitous opportunity to regain possession of the child; McWrait had inadvertently done the hard work for him, arranging the abduction.

But that FBI agent—how had he known...? This would set his plans back a bit, but no matter. He could return for the boy later, when his work allowed and the authorities had let their guard down. It had been wise, his decision not to divulge all of his plans and arrangements to Edward. The young man was much like Dr. Lerwick himself, yet far too much like his mother to be relied upon. He was talented, to be sure, but like Rhonda, too prone to the weakness of compassion—a virtue, indubitably, but one that could all too easily ruin a more noble work like Dr. Lerwick's research.

_Information... Never give all your information to anyone. Information is power._ His parents had taught him that when he was growing up, when they had educated him in the arts of theft and deception so that he could provide them with an income to sustain their addictions. Information—its collection and its discovery—had done more than that for him: it had led to his new and growing control over the conception of human lives. Information—his having withheld it—would now keep him safe from his son and from the authorities.

The sounds of officers hunting for him in the dark continued to edge down the street away from him; a spotlight from a hovering helicopter followed them. Dr. Lerwick looked around carefully. There was a detached garage at the house next door, and all the lights in that house were off; with the police moving door-to-door in search of him, and with their having passed that house, the absence of lights indicated that the residents were not at home.

Dr. Lerwick snuck across the back yard—cautiously, lest eyes from inside this nearer house notice him through the darkness and rain. He reached the fence; it had a gate to the neighbors' yard. He stepped through it gratefully; at his age, he could not hop fences all night.

Coming to the garage, he drew a familiar pair of tools from a pouch in his inner jacket pocket—tools his junkie father had taught him to use those many years ago, tools he had passed along to his own son. He pulled his gloves snugly into place, then inserted the tools into the doorknob at the side of the garage, one atop the other, and jiggled the one on top. He felt the expected click in the knob, opened the door, and quickly shut himself inside. Dusty boxes and forgotten furniture cluttered the garage; no one had stepped inside this structure for months. Neither was there space to park a car here, so he need not be concerned if the residents suddenly returned home. He could hide here a while.

An hour, or perhaps two—that would be sufficient. He would need to move under cover of darkness sometime during the night, before dawn. A yawn threatened, but he stifled it; rest would have to wait. Safety first. He took out his phone—the one Zechariah had not used—and with a single call made arrangements for his transportation elsewhere.
Chapter 22

"Here, Zach, take this to Officer Castillo." Kara handed the boy a mug of hot tea. "Careful!"

She watched him carry the mug slowly, deliberately, from the kitchen to the front door, where Officer Castillo stood on the porch, watching the street, his body silhouetted against the bright, early afternoon sky. The recent rain had finally drifted eastward over the Cascade Mountains, leaving a glorious autumn day behind it.

She wandered into the entryway after Zach and pretended to arrange the photographs on the table there. The glass that covered the picture of young Craig in his baseball uniform had been replaced by Lia yesterday. By the time the Flemings had come home from the hospital the afternoon after Dr. Lerwick's attack, the police were done there and the dear woman, with her daughters' help, had reset the photos and cleaned up all the blood in the entryway and the bathroom. The photo had been returned to its proper position, just where it had stood the night when Zach had arrived. _Had come home,_ Kara admitted. What a strange realization, that he really had been coming home after all.

The officer received the mug from Zach with a grateful smile. _"Gracias, amigo,"_ he said.

_"De nada,"_ Zach replied smoothly.

The officer laughed, and they began to chat together in Spanish quite beyond what Kara could make sense of.

Exerting extra willpower, Kara pulled her eyes from the boy for the moment, returned to the kitchen, and scooped up the gardening book she had set aside on the counter. There was no need for her to stand there and watch him talk with Officer Castillo. With officers rotating every four hours around the clock, guarding the house until Dr. Lerwick was found, the boy was as safe on the porch as he could be anywhere. All the same, she found a place to sit where she could keep him in sight.

This boy... Even knowing he was safe, she felt an instinct to protect him. Already, after these few months, she loved watching him grow; it made her feel like at least she and Craig were doing something right, even if they didn't really know what they were doing. He knew more, could do so much more than when he had first come to them. He had proved as much this week—using the phone, riding the bus, leaving a trail. In small but noticeable ways, he had grown. Somehow, she and Craig were managing to help him to—as Craig liked to put it— _live._ What better could novice parents do?

Craig sat at as comfortable an angle as he could manage on the couch, reading his latest novel. His right arm, hanging tenderly in a sling, still hurt him significantly, and the bullet had broken two of his ribs on impact; medication was helping with the pain, a little. Fortunately, the bullet had cut a clean hole through the muscle of the arm, leaving the bone untouched, and had not quite penetrated the ribs; another centimeter, the surgeon had said, and his prognosis might not have been so good. He had been lucky.

That didn't keep him from making the most of his injuries, though. He sensed Kara's eyes on him and glanced up. "Hey beautiful," he teased, "could you get me some tea, too?"

"Get your own tea, bozo," she scoffed at him. His legs and other arm still worked just fine. "What am I, your waitress?" But he grinned at her display of feigned annoyance, and with an unconvincing roll of her eyes she went to get him some tea.

It had been a day and a half since Dr. Lerwick's appearance in their home. At the hospital, a rapid but delicate surgery had removed the bullet, and another had mended the torn muscles in Craig's arm. Zach, meanwhile, had received stitches to close up the gash in his head. Craig's doctor had insisted on keeping Craig under observation that night and the next morning, so the family had slept in his hospital room, Craig on his own bed and Kara on the couch, snuggled up with Zach in her arms; she had refused to let him go and, unusual for him, he had made no effort to seek release.

They had returned home the following afternoon to find Lia and the girls just leaving, then had swallowed a quick bite of food and slipped straight back to bed. Knowing one of Seattle's finest was posted outside had permitted them some respite. Zach, afraid to be left alone in his own room, had cuddled between them on their queen-sized bed, which had suited Craig and Kara just fine; they wanted him where they could reach him. Even when Kara had made him shower this morning, he had kept the bathroom door propped part-way open for their mutual reassurance. Granted, it didn't close properly anymore anyway since its encounter with Dr. Lerwick's shoulder.

For his part, Zach had slept most of that day and all last night, completely missing an impromptu press conference in the front yard—Ben's and Agent Nyler's solution to a deluge of interview requests that had flooded Craig and Kara as word of Zach's rescue got out. Craig and Kara had decided not to reveal the reason for his kidnapping—not yet—and the FBI, at Nyler's request, had kept it quiet, too. Someday, and probably soon, they would need to let the world know about Zach's origin, and there would be more press interviews, and visits by doctors and medical researchers. But not just yet—not until Dr. Lerwick was caught and Zach was ready, and Kara and Craig, as well.

Ben, speaking to the world on their behalf, had been wonderful, requesting privacy and prayers while also answering every question graciously. He had been so patient with the reporters. Craig and Kara had each spoken to the news cameras too, and Agent Nyler had given the official account of Zach's kidnapping and escape. But it had been Marissa, surprisingly, who had stolen the show, standing with her dad and giving voice to the family's relief at having Zach home safely. The minute Zach awakened the following morning and finally emerged from Craig and Kara's room, Marissa, having waited restlessly for him since breakfast, had nearly knocked him over in her elation.

Well-wishers had called and left messages, reporters had left requests for more interviews, and Craig had quickly silenced the new phone Derek had brought for them. A few more reporters came by the house hoping to see the family, but were turned away by the officer guarding the door—another good reason to have a cop stationed there day and night. Thankfully, most of yesterday's hubbub had subsided, and all was quiet at the moment.

Zach returned inside, leaving Officer Castillo alone on the front porch. Kara, handing Craig his tea, intercepted the boy on his way back to the den. "Hey kiddo, let me see those wrists." He held them out for her willingly; none of his obstinacy and irritability from the past several weeks remained in him now, at least for the moment. Kara enjoyed it while she could—the boy would reach adolescence in a couple of years, after all. Even so, he seemed more appreciative somehow, and in a deeper way than when he had first come to them. Perhaps this new spirit would last.

The rope burns that scarred his wrists had faded just a bit. Kara rubbed a finger across one. "Does that hurt?"

"Not as much as yesterday," Zach shrugged.

"Good. They look better."

"Did Dad really break that tape with his bare hands?"

Kara gave Zach a fond grin. "Yep, pulled it right apart. I saw him. How are the arms?"

Zach pinwheeled his right arm. "Better. This one still hurts sometimes." He shook the left one. "You want to see my stitches, too, don't you?" At her nod, he brushed his hair back and let her examine the place where his head had struck the entryway table. It, like the rope burns, was healing. All in all, the boy had come through his ordeal remarkably well physically, and—truth be told—emotionally, too. Nightmares that had troubled him the first night had been fewer the second night.

With an affectionate rub of his head, Kara released him to join his dad in the den. As the police had posted a guard over the house, Zach had taken to guarding Craig, jumping up to get what he needed, keeping Craig entertained. His attentiveness was good for both boys, repairing the strain they had felt between them over the past month.

Zach leaned against Craig on the couch and closed his eyes; despite the extra-long rest yesterday, he was still catching up. Craig pulled the boy against his left side and continued reading. Kara curled up in the armchair beside the computer desk with her gardening book and read peacefully for an hour, until a knock at the front door announced a visitor.

Officer Castillo permitted Eddie inside. Agent Nyler stepped into the entryway behind him, a manila envelope in his hand. "Hey, everybody," Eddie greeted them. Zach opened his eyes and sat up, blinking sleep away.

Craig marked his place in the book and set it aside. "Hi, Eddie," he replied. "Any luck?"

"Nothing," Agent Nyler shook his head. "No sign of him. All the kidnappers know—or will tell us—are that Hugh McWrait hired them to kidnap Zach and that Lerwick offered them twice as much to get him and Zach out of the country. We have agents watching his house, his apartment, and his cabin on Bainbridge Island, but he hasn't made an appearance."

"I told you he wouldn't go home," Eddie admonished. "Once his plan went bad—"

Nyler cut him off. "We still had to check."

"He'll hide out somewhere and come back for Zach when your guard is down. You can't post officers outside the door forever."

"So tell me where he is!" Nyler returned. "You know him better than anyone."

Eddie mumbled something under his breath.

Nyler ignored him and waved toward the side door, which, though closed, was clearly damaged; light shone through the doorframe where Nyler had kicked it in. "Sorry about the door," he said.

"It was unlocked, you know," Kara pointed out with a touch of good humor. "You could have just opened it."

Raising his eyebrows, Nyler looked guiltily back at it. His cell phone chimed. "The office," he shrugged to the Flemings. "Excuse me." He stepped away into the hall to answer.

"How're you feeling?" Eddie asked with a sheepish look at Craig. The young man felt some responsibility for the injuries, his father having been the one who had inflicted them.

Craig flexed the fingers of his right hand gingerly, refusing to wince. "A little better. Should be in good enough shape for baseball season when we get there. Lucky for me your father's a lousy shot."

"Aiming a gun is the one thing he could never do," Eddie replied dryly. "I was a better shot a week after he taught me than he ever was." He turned to Zach. "My mother—she used to tell you that your dad was a good man. Now you know for sure."

"Yeah," Zach answered simply, eyeing Craig's arm in the sling. He snuggled back against his dad again. Craig wrapped his good arm around the boy's chest.

"So," Kara spoke up, "what happens to you now, Eddie?"

The young man shifted his weight and gazed out the picture window. "I don't know. Prison, I'm sure...but Nyler hasn't arrested me just yet. He's been keeping me close, though. They actually set up a bed for me in the FBI building last night so they could have me around without taking me into custody. He wants me to help him track down my father."

"Are you okay with that?"

He hesitated. "I was only willing to help rescue Zach, until...well, this." He motioned toward Craig's arm. "But if he's willing to kill a person to take Zach, he...has to be stopped."

"Well," Kara said, "maybe once all this is over, they'll let you off easy."

Eddie shrugged. "If they don't, I can't really complain. As many places as I've broken into, I've earned some jail time."

Something about how his green eyes scanned the den and the kitchen as he said that gave Kara a funny feeling. "Eddie, have you ever...broken in _here?"_

His face, already framed by his strawberry-blond hair and goatee, blushed a full red.

"You _have,_ haven't you?" She gave him a stern look. Craig looked at him in astonishment, and Zach with fascination.

"Only once," he mumbled at last. "Usually, I just followed you to work—made sure you were good, honest people, you know. I couldn't let Zach go to you if you wouldn't be good to him."

Kara set her chin in her hand, her elbow propped on the armrest of her chair. "Hmm. Well, as long as you're coming clean, what did you take?"

"Nothing but information."

Kara narrowed her eyes at him. "What sort of information?"

"You know, making sure this would be a good place for Zach, getting the layout of the house and the property..."

_The layout? Why would he need—_ Her eyes locked onto Zach. "Zechariah Timothy!" she barked. His head, lolling against his dad's chest, snapped to attention. "You told me you _guessed_ where the bathroom was! And where the glasses were! And Paws—" Her eyes flashed at Eddie again. "You told him where to find Paws, didn't you? You set us up!"

"No, I—"

"He didn't, Mom!" Zach defended him. "All he told me was that if I needed a bathroom, a lot of houses have one in the hall by the front door, and that if I was thirsty, a lot of people put their glasses in the cabinet above the—" With sudden realization, his eyes flashed toward Eddie, too. "You _did_ tell me where to find all that stuff!"

"Well, not in so many words," Eddie muttered. "I just thought it might help you feel at home more quickly."

"He certainly did that!" Kara scolded them both. "Just walked right in here and helped himself to a towel and a glass of water, let the dog into the kitchen..."

Abruptly, she noticed Craig laughing at her. Her first reaction was to bark at him as well, but instead she began to laugh, too. With Zach sitting right there beside him watching her, absently scratching his nose with his thumb like Craig always did, she couldn't help herself. Eddie had risked everything to send Zach to them, had risked everything again to rescue him, and now...well, look what it had brought them. They had a son, and Zach had a home. Would all be idyllic as he grew up? Of course not—life was never like that. But life was _better_ now—better for the three of them than when they had been apart.

Agent Nyler strode purposefully back into the den. "We've got to go," he told Eddie.

"What happened?" Eddie asked.

"Two things. They just issued an arrest warrant for Hugh McWrait, based on the information you and the kidnappers gave us." He gave Eddie a meaningful look. "Have you been gathering this information... _freelance_...all this time?"

Eddie seemed confused. "I'm not working for anybody, if that's what you mean. I just thought he should pay for what he did to Zach. He funded my father's first artificial womb." Eddie was quiet for a moment, remembering. "What's the second thing?"

"Your father just bought a ticket out of Seatac Airport, to Toronto. The flight leaves in two hours. He's running to Canada."

Eddie frowned. "Why Canada?" He considered for a moment; Nyler watched and did not interrupt the young man's thoughts. "How did he buy the ticket?"

"Credit card. That's how we found out."

Eddie shook his head. "No. That's a rookie mistake. My father doesn't make rookie mistakes. It's a decoy. Have agents watch for him, but he won't be there. He's probably already left the country, and he's buying time so he can get to wherever he's going."

"And where's that?" Nyler pressed.

"No idea," Eddie admitted.

Nyler gave a deep sigh and rubbed his eyes.

Zach suddenly sat up straight. "Is there a place called Caracas?"

"Caracas?" Nyler responded. "The capital of Venezuela. Why?"

"Grandfather—I mean Eddie's dad—called someone while we were on the ferry. He said he was taking me to Caracas the next day. They were talking in Spanish."

"You speak Spanish?" Nyler raised his eyebrows.

Zach frowned. "Why does that surprise everybody?"

Agent Nyler turned to Eddie. "What do you think?"

Eddie stroked his goatee. "Could be. He has a lab hidden somewhere; it makes sense that wherever he wanted to keep Zach would be near it."

"Okay. They'll let us know if your father shows up at the airport. Let's go see what we can find out about Caracas." With a quick farewell, they turned to leave, but Nyler stopped suddenly and spun back to them. "I almost forgot the reason we came by..." He still held the manila envelope in his hand. He passed it to Craig, who opened it.

"The photos?" Craig asked, furrowing his brows. Kara hopped up and moved to the couch to see them as Craig drew them out. The picture on top was the last one Zach had given them—the one of him before he was born, growing inside Dr. Lerwick's artificial womb.

"We found them in the getaway car," Nyler explained. "We put the ones Zach took out back with the others to complete the set. We had to keep the originals as evidence, but there was nothing stopping us from duplicating them. Jackie and I thought you might like to have them."

Craig began to thumb through them one at a time. Kara and Zach looked in from either side, though of course Zach had seen them already. After the photo on top, the next picture showed Dr. Lerwick posing proudly beside the artificial womb; it was empty. In the one that followed, a small, pink spot that must have been Zach floated peacefully. The spot grew as Craig flipped slowly through the pictures, the fetus's umbilical cord clearly visible, attached to a transparent tube that curved out of the pictures.

Kara watched, entranced, barely acknowledging Agent Nyler and Eddie as they departed. When she saw the next photograph, her breath caught. Dr. Lerwick's hands—his body was not visible, but they must have been his—were lifting tiny Zach out of the womb; only Zach's head protruded from the clear solution in which he had grown. He was barely as long as the man's two hands together.

The picture wrenched her heart. It was a truly miraculous moment, and far more for her and Craig than for Dr. Lerwick—the birth of their son. _But that man is a monster!_ Kara fumed. _He risked Zach's life—and how many others? He should have let us be there...for Zach's sake, never mind our own!_

Her anger persisted but gradually gave way to wonder as Craig continued through the photos. Zach grew before her eyes—first an infant, then a toddler, then a handsome little boy dressed in a shirt that was too long and pants that were too short. No one else appeared in the pictures; the photographer had been careful not to include anyone but Zach.

Zach as a little boy had those Craig-eyes-but-blue that Kara knew so well, and that straight, brown hair that was a little darker and a fair bit thicker than Craig's, but otherwise just the same. In one photograph, he was smiling—that easy-going smile, full of joy and the wonder of life, that she had come to find so refreshing. In another, his face was dark, angry, his eyes red as if he had been crying.

The little boy became a schoolboy, and the schoolboy grew picture by picture into the Zechariah now watching his parents as much as he watched the photographs.

Setting the last photo at the back of the stack, Craig leaned against a cushion and sighed. "Wow... Do you remember when these were taken, Zach?"

"No," he replied. "Just the last couple, maybe."

Craig reached up and rubbed Kara's arm. "We should put these somewhere special," he suggested.

"In the family photo album," she nodded. "There are some empty pages yet. Zechariah needs to be in the family album." Squeezing Craig's hand and pausing to tousle Zach's hair, she walked with moist eyes to the hall cabinets to find that album.

*****

That afternoon, Eddie sat waiting in Agent Nyler's office—Eddie's home, these last two days—watching the endless traffic flow through the street several floors below. From his seat, he couldn't see Nyler's computer screen, and it had been for that reason that Nyler had asked him to take the place by the window. The agent was sorting through classified information from the Department of Homeland Security, searching for Eddie's father, hoping to locate him in a list of travelers to Caracas.

_Information..._ How you responded to a given situation depended largely on what information you possessed. Now they needed information on Eddie's father.

A part of Eddie yearned for the hunt—the delving for information, the discovery of what his target had been doing and why... He loved to hunt bad people, especially. He had always longed to be the one who set things right, who tracked down the bad guys and made them pay. His father, ironically, was the one who had taught him how to hide, how to hunt, how to gather the right information without being caught. Now he was hunting his father who, much more than Eddie himself, was an expert at elusion; finding him would be no easy task. And this hunt offered no excitement, but only grim sorrow.

Agent Nyler scribbled some notes on a sheet of paper. "Does your father go by any other aliases?" he asked without looking up at Eddie.

"I'm sure he does," the young man responded, "but those are the ones I know about."

Nyler punched a few more keys at the computer, then stood and gestured toward his chair. "Here, you take over."

"What?" Eddie asked, astonished, but he moved to Nyler's chair anyway.

"I'm hungry. You do the searching while I get us some lunch. These"—he pointed to a list of names he had scrawled on his paper, along with bits of demographic information beside each—"are the names of U.S. citizens who have traveled into Venezuela in the past seventy-two hours. Legally, that is."

"Wait a second," Eddie interrupted him, "you can't let me see this. This is classified. Why are you—"

"I'm not letting you see anything," Nyler cut him off in turn. "I'm giving you a list of names and asking you to look around on the Internet for relevant information about them while I go get us something to eat."

Eddie stared at Nyler, bemused. What was the man up to? Surely he was trying to set Eddie up somehow, but how? Did he think Eddie was still working with his father? Was that what this was about?

"You like Greek food?"

Eddie blinked at him. "Er, never had any."

"I'll get you some. There's a little Greek spot a couple blocks from here. I'll be back in twenty minutes. See what you can find." Nyler threw his jacket around his shoulders and strode out of the room.

Eddie stared after him. _He should have arrested me two days ago! Why this charade? He'd have more leverage on me if he took me into custody and then bargained for my help..._ Not that they hadn't already done some bargaining, at Eddie's father's house in Edmonds.

Apparently, Agent Nyler wasn't concerned about having him in custody just yet. Shaking his head, Eddie turned to the computer screen— _I'm sitting at an FBI computer!_ —opened the web browser, and began to search for the names Nyler had given him. Could Eddie get into trouble for using a government computer if an FBI agent had told him to? Was that Nyler's strategy here? Surely Nyler himself would be culpable if anyone found out he was letting Eddie use his terminal.

Most of the names Eddie checked turned up nothing of interest. But just before Nyler returned—

"Hey, I got something!" Eddie blurted out like a child catching his first fish as Agent Nyler stepped into the room, bringing two bags of food. He flushed red as Nyler calmly placed one of the bags on the desk for him and stepped around to see the screen. "This Dr. Wilson," Eddie said, clicking to enlarge a photograph he had found of a pale-skinned man in shoulder-length hair under a stocking cap, "I recognize him. He was one of the doctors who helped my father with Zach ten years ago."

"And he just happened to fly into Caracas last night?" Nyler mused, scanning the note he had jotted down about the man. "That's not going to be a coincidence, is it?"

"Zach's right," Eddie confirmed. "My father's in Caracas. And he's calling in an old friend to help him."

Opening his bag of food, Agent Nyler seated himself on the corner of his desk. "Tell me something, young man," he began, drawing out a sandwich wrapped in paper. "You had an FBI computer all to yourself for twenty minutes, all sorts of classified information at your fingertips. Why didn't you look at something more interesting than public web pages?"

Eddie's breath caught. He didn't understand where Nyler was going with this. "What do you mean?" he asked warily. "Who says I didn't?"

"I sent Gail to get the food," Nyler explained, "while I watched what you were doing from another terminal. You didn't even _try_ to look at anything classified. That's just as well—all the classified stuff is password protected. But I don't think you knew that. Yet you didn't even try."

Eddie was uncertain how to reply. "I—that wasn't what you told me to do! Besides, I found something without going into classified...databases or whatever. Isn't that what you wanted? Is this some kind of set-up?" He asked that last with more bite than he had intended; but having said it, he did not back down.

Nyler responded with a bite of his own—from his sandwich. Something in his eyes relaxed. He smiled as he chewed. "Yeah, it was a set-up," he replied. "I had to know if I could trust you."

Eddie blinked at him. "Trust me? You should be arresting me! What are you talking—"

Nyler chewed his food and gestured toward Eddie's bag. "Eat, son! We have a long trip ahead of us."

"Trip?"

"I'm taking you to Caracas with me, if I can get it cleared. I think I can." Nyler watched for Eddie's reaction.

Eddie gaped at him, at a momentary loss for words. "Caracas? I—I can't," he stammered. "I have a job. At least, I hope I do, after missing these last few days."

"I'll take care of it," Nyler answered.

"But I..." Eddie dropped his hands into his lap. Why did he feel like a fish being reeled in here?

"I'll need you. Maybe Venezuelan authorities can track your father down on their own, maybe not. He was slippery enough here in Seattle—he probably hides even more carefully there, where he's a foreigner. If they can't track him down, maybe you can. Besides," Nyler added, "you can give us a positive ID on him from a distance, in case he proves difficult to take in."

Eddie was still confused. "You could do this without me."

"I suppose," Nyler admitted, "but I'd rather do it with you. Think of it as penance for your crimes."

"Penance? So you're not going to arrest me?"

The agent smiled and shrugged. "Prosecutor Terry—my friend—is willing to wait until this case is wrapped up before he decides whether to press charges against you. I'd say he's rather pleased with your cooperation so far."

"Then I'm...free to go?" Eddie ventured.

"If you like," Nyler said, taking another bite of his sandwich.

Eddie stood up; Nyler's eyes followed Eddie, but the agent did not move from the corner of his desk. Eddie reached for the bag Nyler had given him—he might as well take his food—and walked to the door at a slow pace. He fully expected Nyler to order him back to a chair, but the agent chewed silently on another bite of his sandwich. Eddie stepped out the door and into the hall. He walked a few steps, but no sound came from Nyler's office.

He strode deliberately to the end of the hall, then stopped and leaned a shoulder against the wall. He was really, truly free to go? The thought confused him.

But it also brought clarity. If he was free, he could go home, he could go back to work, he could swing by the Flemings' place and help Craig fix those two broken doors...

Or... Something more important needed to be done. Zach was still in danger.

Eddie turned and strode back into Agent Nyler's office. The agent had not moved from the corner of his desk.

"I'll go," Eddie declared.

"I thought you would," Nyler responded with a hint of a grin. "Eat your food. It will take a few hours to make all the arrangements."

*****

Craig grew restless the Saturday after Zach's kidnapping—that was an awful way to mark a date, but at least the youngster seemed to be recovering from the ordeal. Zach was still afraid to be alone, even in the house, but less so than at first. Now he preferred to have the bathroom door shut when he was in there—at least as far as it would shut. He was also fine sitting alone in the den now, so long as Paws was with him. The dog had gotten to enjoy the great indoors a lot more than usual these past few days.

"Hey pal," Craig said, nudging Zach out of the book he was reading beside him on the couch, "want to play a little catch?"

Zach frowned at Craig's arm in the sling. "You can't throw, Dad."

"I'll play one-handed."

Zach raised an eyebrow doubtfully.

"The Angels used to have a one-handed pitcher," Craig informed him. Zach lifted both eyebrows, curious. "A lefty, years ago. I'll just play like him."

"But you're right-handed. Maybe we should do soccer."

"Nah, you can play soccer with your mom. I want to play baseball."

In spite of his initial concern, the youngster needed little convincing, and a minute later they stood in the grass behind the house, tossing the ball back and forth. It was awkward, throwing left-handed and cautiously, with broken ribs—much to Zach's delight.

"Fine," Craig remarked when Zach laughed at his technique, "you throw with your _right_ hand!" That evened things out, and the youngster chuckled at his own clumsiness as much as at Craig's.

Craig lobbed another ball to his son, wincing just a little at the pain that jabbed through his rib cage. He hoped Zach didn't notice; he didn't want to stop so soon. This wasn't any life-changing experience they were sharing, but there was something special about this moment all the same. Everything was all right between himself and Zach again. They were father and son once more. And he was grateful, truth be told, that they were both still alive.

_Father and son,_ Craig marveled. He reached cautiously for Zach's next right-handed throw and missed. Paws saved him the trouble of retrieving it. They played on for another twenty minutes until at last Craig—still only beginning to heal—had to return inside and rest.

The next day, the officer assigned to guard their house accompanied them to church and stood outside Zach's classroom during Sunday School, then posted himself at the back of the sanctuary during worship. Marissa stuck close to Zach all that morning, as if having an armed police escort nearby weren't enough to keep him safe. In fact, from the moment they stepped into the building to the moment they left for home, church members swarmed around Zach. Craig felt sympathy for the youngster, with so many people hugging him or shaking his hand. He and Kara ran interference for him when they could, but in spite of the bullet holes mending in Craig's arm and side, it was Zach everyone wanted to see—Zach back safe and sound.

On Monday morning, Ben came by to check on the family and found Derek inside repairing the two broken doorframes and replacing the doors. He offered to help, so he and Derek naturally spent the morning picking on Craig.

"Give us an extra hand here, would you?" Ben asked from the side door as Craig ventured into the kitchen. "Oh, wait—you only have one, don't you?"

"That was original," Craig returned with a halfhearted scowl.

Derek drove a nail into the strip of wood he was attaching to the doorframe. "Hey, quit ribbing the poor guy; those ribs are sore enough already. Besides, supervising is hard work! And he should know—he does it all the time."

Craig gave a mock sigh. "Did I ask you two to come over today?"

"Nope," Derek responded. "But with Kara at work and Zach at school"—the officer on duty this morning had accompanied the youngster there, his first day back to class—"I figured you might need someone around, in case you wanted a glass of water or something."

"Besides," Ben added, "somebody has to keep you out of trouble. We heard you've taken to hanging around with criminal types."

With another pair of nails, Derek finished replacing the wood that Nyler's kick had splintered apart. "Here, try the new door," he invited Craig.

"Don't strain the poor fellow," Ben said.

With a snort, Craig reached past him and drew the door shut. The latch fit perfectly. "Looks great. Thanks."

"Not a problem," Derek answered. "We'll fix the doors. You fix that body." With a broad smile, he slapped his big hand onto Craig's right shoulder. Craig grimaced a little more than the jolt of pain required, for Derek's enjoyment.

Craig followed them to the bathroom door and watched the two men work for a few more minutes. They detached the wood Dr. Lerwick had broken from that doorframe and removed the damaged door from its hinges. Derek carried the old door outside to deposit in the bed of his pickup.

Ben paused his work to look at Craig. "So, why'd you do it, Craig? Why did you rush Dr. Lerwick?"

Craig shook his head. He had asked himself the same question a hundred times since it had happened and still had no answer. "It happened so fast—and so slowly, too. I don't know how to explain it. I guess... He shoved Zach, Zach fell and hit his head... Dr. Lerwick looked away for a second, and..." His voice failed him.

Ben nodded and set a gentle hand on Craig's shoulder, the left shoulder. "You're a good man, Craig Fleming."

Craig ran his hand through his hair—it felt strange, doing that left-handed—and hung his head. "I don't know. There was an FBI agent right outside—"

"You didn't know that."

"Still, it wouldn't have done any good if I'd gotten killed, would it? I don't know what I was thinking. I shouldn't have done it."

"Is that how Zach feels about it?" Ben asked.

Craig released a deep breath. "He thinks I'm a hero. He thinks I saved him from being kidnapped again."

"Did you?"

"No! He yelled, _'Dad!'_ and I did a stupid father thing and rushed the guy who was hurting my son!"

For some reason, Ben's eyes lit up. "Yeah, you did." Craig grimaced at his brother-in-law. "Don't worry," Ben assured him, "I won't disillusion the boy."

Word from Mr. Herd that week was that Zach was a little distracted at school, but that some time spent with the school counselor seemed to be helping. At home, the youngster still stuck close to Craig, but not as close as at first. He reclined in the armchair or worked on his homework at the dining table while Craig rested on the couch. He helped his mom in the kitchen some and even took the garbage out—normally Craig's job—without being asked. And he kept the officers on guard duty entertained with reenactments of Craig mightily severing the tape binding his wrists. When Zach used the new tape from the kitchen to demonstrate, Craig didn't have the heart to tell the youngster about the old roll in the computer desk drawer.

The following Saturday, now more than a week after the encounter with Dr. Lerwick, Craig felt good enough for him and Kara to take Zach for a ride on the ferry. In line to buy their tickets, an Officer Carter escorting them for protection, Kara put a hand on Zach's shoulder; he didn't flinch, though Craig looked for it. The youngster was dealing better with being touched, especially by his parents.

"Let's take the Bremerton ferry," Kara recommended. "You've already been on the Bainbridge route."

"Mom, I want to take you the way I went before," Zach said.

Biting her lip, Kara squatted down in front of Zach. "Hey kiddo, you don't have to go on that ferry. That was really scary for you."

Zach's face tightened. He met Kara's eyes firmly. "I want to fix it, Mom."

"Fix it?"

"I want to do it the right way, without being scared. Just...don't leave me by myself."

Kara licked her lips and glanced up at Craig.

"All right, pal," he said after a moment. "That's a big step, but if you're ready for it..."

They bought four tickets for Bainbridge—the officer would be coming, too—and the boat launched away a few minutes later. Craig began to lead them to the upper decks, but Zach touched his arm. "Dad, can I show you where we were, down by the cars?"

"Sure, pal," he nodded, letting Zach step in front of him. They followed the youngster down the stairs to the auto deck, where dozens of cars were parked in rows spanning the length of the ferry. Zach led them toward the middle of the boat, between the cars. The officer followed, his watchful eye scanning in every direction.

"Over here somewhere," Zach told Kara. "That's where we parked. I could hardly see the water at all." The boat plowed across Puget Sound, rocking slightly. Craig sighed; what a terrible boat ride that must have been for Zach.

Kara squeezed Zach's shoulders in a side hug. He sagged against her. "He wouldn't let me leave the car, Mom. He said it wouldn't be safe. And," he continued, looking up at her, "this is where he told me how I was born. He said you couldn't really love me if I didn't come out of your tummy." The youngster looked back at the cars, seeing himself and Dr. Lerwick inside one of them together. "But he was lying."

"Yes, he was," Kara affirmed simply.

Zach looked around for another minute, remembering. Then he turned to Craig with an eager expression. "Can we go up to the top now?"

"Lead the way," Craig encouraged him.

Zach took them to the top passenger deck, to the rail that wrapped around the deck's outer edge. For a long time they watched the water roll by, letting the cold wind blow against their faces, gazing at the gray clouds that stretched north all the way to the horizon. Green land rose to the right and left of Puget Sound.

Craig cradled one arm in the sling and pointed out to the northwest with the other. "That's Bainbridge Island," he told Zach. He traced the eastern edge of the island with a finger. "You were in a cabin somewhere up the shore a few miles and inland a little bit."

Zach scanned the shore soberly. A light rain, not unpleasant despite the chilly air, began to fall. He lifted his eyes to the rain and smiled. "This ferry ride is way better," he said. "I bet Grandfather would be less grouchy if he came outside more. Woah!" he exclaimed suddenly, pointing to a gray form in the water a hundred feet from the boat. "Is that a seal?"

"A harbor seal, yeah," Kara informed him.

"And it's totally free?"

"Yep, wild and free."

Zach grinned, and from that moment on, he talked with her and Craig almost non-stop, noting landmarks in the distance, leading them in a circle around the deck, bringing Officer Carter into the conversation. Somehow he convinced Officer Carter to radio in to the Bainbridge Police Department and arrange to pick up the four of them and take them to Dr. Lerwick's cabin, and after visiting there they followed the path by which Dr. Lerwick had taken Zach from Bainbridge Island to the Edmonds ferry and then back to Seattle.

That evening, Kara snuggled into the armchair with Craig, careful not to bump his injured arm. "My ears hurt," she groaned. At a questioning look from him, she continued. "Zach started talking on the ferry to Bainbridge and never quit. I finally sent him out to play with Paws, just so I could get a break."

"He's going to be all right, isn't he?" It was more of a statement than a question.

"Yeah," she said quietly. "Pretty soon... We might, too. Can you believe we're parents?"

"No," he confessed. "Can't believe I got shot, either. That was brilliant, by the way, sending Zach out through the bathroom window."

Kara sighed. "I didn't know what else to do. I had to try something."

"Me, too," Craig nodded, rubbing his right arm. "Your idea was better."

Zach came back inside an hour later, having worn Paws out with frolicking in the back yard.

"It's bath night, Zach," Kara hinted.

He pulled a glass from the cabinet and filled it with water. _"Really,_ Mom? This was a perfect day until you said that." Teasing her with a mischievous grin, he tipped the glass to his lips with one hand and reached into the refrigerator with the other, drawing out a cube of cheese that he popped into his mouth.

"What are you doing, young man?" Kara challenged him.

"I'm hungry," he shrugged.

"You're _stalling._ Get in the tub!" She watched him sternly but fondly as he gave a resigned exhale, grinned again, and wandered down the hall to his room.

Craig shook his head. _Just a normal kid, born from a box or not._

Zach took his bath without further resistance and dressed himself for bed. After a little negotiation with Kara, he agreed to go back to sleeping in his own room again, so long as Paws was there with him; fear of being alone at night still lingered. Craig took Kara's compromise on Paws to mean that she was entirely ready to have Zach out of their bed after more than a week of nights spent crowded together.

Paws lay down happily at Zach's feet as the youngster snuggled under the covers. Kara tucked Zach in and sent the dog a look of mild disapproval, which Paws ignored.

Craig chuckled. "Don't get used to it, Paws. It's only for one night."

Kara spun to face Craig, blinking. "That's exactly what you told Zach," she said. Craig, confused, frowned at her, and she continued. "His first night on the bed—you told him it was only for that night." She turned to the dog. "Don't get any ideas, Paws. This is only until they catch Dr. Lerwick. Then you're back outside." The dog gazed back at her with eyes that suggested a suspicious measure of comprehension.

Kara tousled Zach's hair and, hesitating, rubbed Paws' head, too, on her way out of the room.

"Mom?" Zach called to her.

She stopped beside Craig at the door and turned back toward the youngster.

He propped himself up on his elbows. "Have you and Dad ever thought about adopting another kid? You know, so I could have a brother or sister?"

Kara gaped at him. Craig laughed before he could stop himself, but stifled his mirth as she turned a glare on him. "That's not funny, bozo," she chided him. "One child is more than enough trouble..." But there was something in her eyes that left Zach's question open.

Craig looked back at Zach. "We've been too busy getting used to having _you_ here to think about anything else, pal," he told him. "But"—he glanced hesitantly at Kara—"you never know, right? Stranger things have happened...recently."

Kara slapped Craig halfheartedly in the gut. "Go to sleep, Zach," she said as she left the room.

"You too, Paws," Craig added. He paused at the light switch; Zach was still watching him. "Something else on your mind, pal?"

"No," Zach shrugged. "I was just...glad you're my dad." He flopped onto his back and rolled to his side. "Good night."

"Good night, Zach." Craig turned out the light.

*****

Thin gloves, clean and black, did what they did best, picking a simple lock and breaking into a room. The room rocked so lightly from side to side that Eddie, his head shrouded in the usual black pullover hood, barely noticed; it was an equipment room down in the engineering deck of a massive cargo ship. No one else was in the room. Few were onboard at all, in fact. Since the ship had docked two days ago, all but three or four crew members had spent most of their time along the Venezuelan coast or in the capital city, Caracas, a few miles inland.

Eddie's father was on this ship...maybe. It had taken Eddie six weeks to track him down. Dr. Lerwick's sole mistake had been Dr. Effin Wilson, whom Eddie had recognized on Agent Nyler's computer back in Seattle. Except for the presence of Dr. Wilson, Eddie's father had remained perfectly hidden. Eddie hoped that one mistake would be enough.

Dr. Wilson, Nyler had found, had lived in Norway since assisting with Zach's birth, quietly continuing his own research into reproductive medicine. Other than a few short trips back to the States for speaking engagements, Dr. Wilson had remained in Europe all these years—until this visit to Venezuela.

For nearly a month, Eddie and Nyler, with the help of the Venezuelan authorities, had searched for both Dr. Wilson and Dr. Lerwick, but without result. They had traced a few leads, but even the most likely of those had petered out before long. As usual, Eddie's father had been thorough in setting up false trails.

But Dr. Wilson—he had erred. Two weeks ago, he had conducted a financial transaction that had alerted the FBI back home; the man's accounts in the U.S. were being monitored, of course. Nyler's Venezuelan counterpart, a man named Salazar, had tracked the transaction to a bank near the edge of Caracas. Wary of letting Dr. Lerwick discover that they were hunting for him, Nyler had persuaded Officer Salazar to let Eddie investigate alone, with free rein to go wherever he needed.

Eddie had not seen Nyler since that time. Nyler and Salazar had left information and money for him in designated locations now and then, but for the most part, they had stayed in touch by phone. As it turned out, keeping Nyler and the police with him out of sight had been a wise move; for the past week, someone had been trailing Eddie—a man around his own age, Venezuelan, keeping a low profile but appearing just often enough for Eddie to notice. The man had been good, but no expert; Eddie had been able to lose him easily enough when he had needed to move about unobserved.

At the bank, a fistful of Venezuelan _bolívares,_ the local currency, in the right hands had produced a bank official willing to provide an address and phone number for Dr. Wilson. The address had, of course, turned out to be fake. The phone number, however, had been genuine. It seemed that Dr. Wilson liked for the bank to contact him whenever his money came in. The national police had quickly traced the number and fed the location to Eddie, who then located Dr. Wilson in an apartment near La Guaira, a seaport a few miles from Caracas. He had not approached Dr. Wilson, but had patiently watched him from a distance, hoping the man would lead him to his father.

The man had led Eddie to this vessel, making three visits to it since its arrival. Eddie figured his father's secret research lab—he had to have one somewhere—must be on the ship. Very likely his father himself was here, too.

Nyler had arranged for Eddie to receive a tiny, two-way radio that he had tucked under the collar of his shirt before sneaking aboard in the evening's darkness to look around. The agent had insisted that Eddie do no more than verify that Dr. Lerwick was on the ship, then get off as quickly as possible. Two dozen Venezuelan national police officers crouched hidden in a stretch of jungle a few hundred feet away, on the hillside across the highway from the port, waiting for the word to storm the ship. They would have scoured the ship themselves, but Nyler was concerned that if Eddie's father was not on the ship at the moment, their descent upon the vessel might alert him and send him deeper into hiding. As it was, they would get to do the dirty work if Dr. Lerwick was discovered and once Eddie was out of the way. The plan suited Eddie perfectly.

He quickly searched the room. "Nothing in here," he reported. The wire hidden beneath his shirt carried his words to Nyler—hopefully. The tiny radio had a short in it; Nyler could hear him, but he could not hear Nyler, not consistently. If there was any trouble, Eddie just hoped they would receive his call for help and come running.

"I've checked this entire level," he whispered. "I'm going to walk through the crew quarters and check a few rooms. As far as I can tell, everyone who's not up on the bridge at the moment is either onshore or asleep in their bunks."

Leaving the equipment room, Eddie climbed the stairs to the main deck. He had to cut across it to reach the six-story tower that housed the crew and the galley. He crept through the shadows of the great shipping containers that had been loaded onboard by crane early that morning, careful to keep out of sight of the bridge.

The stairway brought him into a narrow corridor with six doors, three on either side. Unfortunately, it was well-lit with flickering fluorescent lights. _It's not like I was going to be able to hide in a corridor this short anyway,_ he admitted. Still, he moved with extra care as he scanned the nameplates posted beside each door—a lounge, a crewman's quarters, another crewman's quarters. He could have opened any of these doors even if they were locked, but he resisted the urge. The last thing he wanted to do was to walk in on a crewman trying to sleep, one who might sound the alarm. So he searched for signs of anything unusual. A nameplate reading "Secret Lab" would suffice.

Moving up to the next level, he located the galley and its adjoining dining room. Across the hall was a small recreation room set up for table tennis, the blue table arranged squarely in the middle. Eddie smirked, imagining sailors playing table tennis on the high seas.

The other four rooms on this level were clearly marked as crew quarters, so Eddie took the stairs to the third level, where more crew quarters took up the space. He ascended to the fourth level and scanned the nameplates there. The first four were still more crew quarters, but the fifth was unmarked—the only unmarked door he had found. Eddie put his ear to the door and listened, but heard nothing.

He whispered into the miniature microphone tucked below his collar. "Fourth floor up from the main deck, there's an unmarked room. I'm going to take a look." He heard only static in response—no reply, not that he had expected any.

His hands sweated inside his gloves, but they did not tremble as he picked the lock before him. In seconds the door swung gently, silently open.

"Good evening, Edward."

Eddie froze. His father sat inside the room, at a desk facing the wall to Eddie's right, working at a laptop computer. He did not look up.

"Come inside," Dr. Lerwick invited in a voice that sounded not surprised, but...disappointed. "These quarters are small, but they will suffice for our purposes this evening."

Eddie swallowed. "You knew I was coming."

"Naturally. Take off the hood." There was disappointment in his father's tone again. "You made several errors."

Eddie pulled his hood off with one hand. "The local guy who was following me—he works for you?"

"Of course. After all I taught you, I thought you would have been less conspicuous."

So the local guy was not as easily fooled as Eddie had thought.

His father turned away from the computer, swiveling on his chair to face Eddie. "Sit down. Please, I insist. We haven't seen each other in nearly a year, son." He gestured to a small couch against the wall to Eddie's left. With his other hand he drew a pistol from inside his jacket. He did not threaten Eddie with it, but he noticed Eddie's eyes fasten on it. "Don't be alarmed. It is merely a precaution in case anyone might have...followed you."

Eddie kept his face flat, emotionless. _Could he know about the national police waiting at the edge of the jungle? How long will it take them to get here?_ He probably needed to keep his father here only a minute or two; once they realized he was in danger, the police would come speedily. They ought to be able to hear every word being said.

Eddie moved inside and shut the door behind him.

"Lock the door, Edward," his father admonished. "You always did forget that little detail. Everything else I taught you, you could remember. But the doors..." He shook his head. "It's a rookie mistake, son. I expect better of you. At least you have not neglected the gloves."

With a deep frown at his thin, black gloves, Eddie locked the door and seated himself on the couch.

"Edward," his father said, stretching out his hands to Eddie, though one hand—black-gloved like its pair, matching Eddie's—still cradled the gun. "Son, you're a long way from home. Why have you come?" The man's tone was casual, but his eyes pierced through Eddie's own, and his fingers twitched on the pistol. That could not be a good sign. His father was nervous.

Eddie hesitated before answering. "I want you to leave Zach and his family alone."

"You came all this way to ask me not to take Zechariah back?" His father grunted. "I think not." He stood and stepped to the small window opposite the door and stared out through it. "It seems to me that you have come for one of two reasons. You have come to avenge the death of Zechariah's father, or you have led the authorities to me."

Eddie gulped. He knew.

"The latter option seems unlikely," his father continued. "Had you turned yourself in, you would have been arrested. That you would avoid at all costs."

Eddie stilled his expression, but writhed inside. _I'm not like you, Dad—not anymore._ No; for Zach's sake, he had had to reveal himself.

"Besides, had you been arrested, you might have cooperated with the police to help them find me, but they would not have set you free to search for me in Caracas and here aboard this vessel, as you have done. So," his father turned back to him, "you must have come to kill me in revenge. But you appear to be unarmed. Hence my confusion."

Eddie dropped his eyes to the floor to hide a moment's relief; his father did _not_ know about Nyler and the national police. _To avenge Zach's father?_ Eddie smirked. "Craig's alive, Dad. He's fine. You always were a terrible shot."

He peeked up at his father in time to see the man frown. "Not dead? Ah. How fortunate for him. It is of no significance. I will take the child when it suits me."

"And how long will you keep him, Dad?" Eddie challenged, his ire aroused by the thought of Zach kidnapped again someday. "A year? Ten? He's growing up! You won't be able to lock him away inside a house much longer. I'm not sure you could _now,_ now that he's been out—"

"Is this why you came, Edward?" his father cut him off icily. "To scold me?" He returned to his seat, but kept his cold eyes on Eddie. "How did you find me?"

"Zach," Eddie explained. "He said you were planning to take him to Caracas."

Dr. Lerwick furrowed his brows. "And how...? Ah—the phone call. All that time with nannies who spoke Spanish. I should have realized."

Eddie glanced furtively at the door; the police would be here any second. He needed to keep his father distracted, talking, lest the man hear them coming down the hall.

"Dad," he asked, "why did you do it? Why did you buy those embryos? Why risk your career to keep that one alive, that one that was Zach?"

His father gave him an odd look, his head cocked slightly to the right. "Is this the reason you traveled all this way? To ask me why? I thought you, of all people, understood!"

Eddie lifted both hands to rub the back of his neck, discreetly guiding his left thumb to feel the microphone wire beneath his collar. It was still there. If it was working, they should be here any moment...

"I thought so too, Dad, but it doesn't make sense anymore. You could have been the greatest in the world without keeping Zach hidden all those years. You could have—"

His father stopped him with a sharp laugh. "It was illegal, boy! Do you not perceive my dilemma? The embryo was healthy, thriving, but the legal limit arrived—a mere fourteen days! Far too few to accomplish anything of significance. Yet here at my fingertips was an opportunity to change the world! How could I have known he would survive full-term? But by the same token, how could I cut him short, when so much knowledge was to be gained every day that he lived? Every day that passed was itself a momentous advancement in medical science!"

Eddie shook his head. "But you gave up everything! Mom—you let her leave us! You didn't even cry when I told you she was dead!"

"Your mother was a coward, Edward," Eddie's father growled. "She did not deserve my tears. She was both too timid to share my vision and too weak to undo it. I gave her ample opportunity to turn me in, but she could not! No, she ruined herself; she deserves no pity."

"What about me?" Eddie questioned.

"You?" his father replied with eyebrows raised. "You I took under my wing. You I trained. To you I gave an adolescent's dream—your own home away from your parents. I found you a job, though with the skills I taught you, you did not need it."

"You got me a job so I could keep you safe!"

"Which favor I would have repaid richly when my research is complete—and that will not be long now. It is progressing well."

Eddie wasn't sure whether he was still talking to keep his father distracted or to spill out the bitter tensions he had stored up for years while watching Zach grow up all alone. Neither did he care which motive was at work.

He folded his arms across his chest. "I didn't want a job! I didn't want my own apartment! All I wanted was for you to come to my baseball games and cheer for _my_ sake, and not just for me to win so that you would look good!"

Eddie's father scoffed. "Games—how quaint. I taught you the things _of men_ —how to get your way in the world, how to rise above the limits of rules imposed by lesser minds! I taught you to excel beyond your peers, to thrive!"

"You taught me how to break the law and then hide!" Eddie retorted. "I didn't _thrive!_ You made me your slave. You taught me how to hide from the law. Well, I'm not your slave anymore!"

"No. You betrayed me." His father rose to his feet again and began to pace to and fro across the width of his little cabin. His fingers twitched on the gun again. "Why did you turn against me, Edward, after all that we had done for one another?"

"For one another?" Eddie laughed. "It was all for you! What say did I ever get? But I'll tell you why I sent Zach to his parents. I wanted him to have what I never got to have: a father, a family."

"Ah." Dr. Lerwick shook his head sadly. "You fool boy. You forgot our purpose. We were going to give children to families across the world, families that could not—"

"Your purpose, not mine!" Eddie yelled. He no longer cared if his father wielded a gun. "When I set Zach free, I did what you should have done long ago!"

His father gave him a scornful look. "Ever the good thief working to rescue the weak. After all these years, still the boyish aspiration to be the noble Robin Hood! You are so like your mother—all heart and no vision! What a shame."

Eddie's throat tightened to match his face. "She was tormented, living with you, hating how you hid Zach away! You killed her—you and your relentless quest to be the best in the world!"

His father's voice went cold. "I _am_ the best in the world! I am! No one can do what I have already done, and will do again." His eyes shone with a frigid light. "You fail to understand, Edward, what makes a life significant. Discovery, information—these are the things for which the masses praise you when you are gone. Newton, Einstein, Lerwick—it was to stand with men of such renown that I acquired the embryo that became Zechariah, and all the others. It was for the sake of the world that I kept him hidden."

"It was for your own ego."

Eddie blinked as his father smiled in a self-satisfied way. "Indeed. For my own ego. To accelerate my rise from a drug-infested home in the slums of Los Angeles to the pinnacle of scientific achievement. But it also," he gestured to the little room, "just happened to serve the good of humanity. I have accomplished what no one before me has ever accomplished and few have even dreamed of. I can initiate and sustain life apart from the mother! Do you understand what that means? I hold the power to give life where no one but God himself can give it! I have produced the greatest medical discovery of our time! Once it becomes known—"

"Once it's known," Eddie interrupted, "you'll live the rest of your life in prison! It's a fool's quest, Dad! You can never reap the benefits of your research! You've taken it too far! If you'd gone slower, obeyed the law, worked with other researchers—"

His father barked a laugh. "Foolish child! Do you, of all people, underestimate my preparations? Do you forget how meticulous I have been, spending years to ready myself for this day? By no means will I reveal myself, not at first! I will disseminate my findings through my investors. They will gain the income, fulfilling my obligations to them, but it is inevitable that in time, their 'discoveries' will be traced back to me! By then dozens, hundreds, _thousands_ of people will owe me the lives of their children, and as those children grow up their parents will sing my praises! The masses will plead with me, the giver of life, to come out of hiding and advance this new technology for the good of the entire human race!"

Eddie leaned back against the couch cushions, making no effort to hide his incredulity. "If it's all such a sure thing, Dad, why do you need Zach?"

"Ah," his father sighed with satisfaction. "He is my trophy, my showpiece, my first. A few more investors, and I will have all the funding I need to complete my current research and produce a reliable artificial womb that can be replicated around the globe."

"And then you'll leave the kid alone?"

His father smiled smugly. "On the contrary. At the proper time, I will reveal him to the world. He will always be useful to me—the symbol of my power, the evidence of my supreme accomplishment, my miracle..."

Voices called to one another from the ship's main deck below. Eddie's father strolled back to the window and peered out, unconcerned. Eddie began to sweat. _Those aren't the police._ If they hadn't come by now... _It must be the crew returning to the ship!_

The vessel pulsed suddenly and began to vibrate. A low hum joined the vibration.

"Why are they starting the engines?" Eddie asked, his voice tense.

"They are preparing to leave the port," his father responded calmly. "I arranged for them to depart immediately upon your arrival."

"But there's hardly anyone on the ship!"

"Those who are necessary have returned. They were merely awaiting my signal."

_His signal._ Eddie's eyes flashed to the computer. Just when he had thought he had outwitted his father, the man had set him up. Now he was caught here on a ship preparing to depart. He slid himself slowly to the edge of the couch.

"Just lean back, Edward," his father ordered, his voice pleasant but his hand wagging the pistol at Eddie.

"Are you going to shoot me, Dad?" Eddie asked bluntly.

"No." Eddie's father moved to the door and opened it. Two large men waiting in the hall stepped into the room; each of them held an automatic rifle in his thick hands.

Eddie looked from them to his father. "Too weak to do it yourself, huh?"

His father smiled. "Like you said, I have poor aim. Do not be dismayed; I have requested that they not kill you. They assure me that they know of a suitably unpopulated island along their route where your betrayal will no longer be a threat to me."

He turned nonchalantly and gathered his things—the computer, a few papers, the briefcase in which he deposited them. Facing Eddie again, he nodded once. "I fear I must leave you in the care of these men."

"You're leaving the ship? But your lab—"

"Was never on this ship, son. What a ridiculous thought, all that amniotic fluid sloshing around. Hmph. A pity that you did not permit me to hone your skills to perfection." He hesitated, regarding Eddie. "Betrayal—it's such a... _bitter_ thing..."

With that, he left the room, and the two large men lifted Eddie by the armpits and dragged him away.

*****

Agent Nyler shifted his weight anxiously. Why couldn't it have been a Venezuelan radio that shorted out? Why the FBI equipment, and at just the wrong moment?

"It is a long time," Officer Salazar, the head of the force assigned to assist Nyler, commented. His English was sufficient for easy communication.

Nyler nodded his agreement. "Too long. That wasn't Eddie's voice we heard just before the radio cut out. It was an older man."

"Señor Lerwick, you think?"

"Could have been." Minutes had passed, and the radio had picked up nothing more.

"Look," Salazar said, pointing across the highway from their hiding place in the trees near the La Guaira port. He was scanning the ship through a pair of binoculars.

He handed them to Nyler, who put them to his eyes. "They're boarding the ship _now?_ Why?" A handful of crewmen had suddenly returned to the ship and begun scurrying about the deck as if making preparations to depart.

"I think your Eddie, he is in trouble," Salazar told Nyler.

He waited for Nyler to make a decision, but Nyler hesitated. Heavy firearms aboard the ship would only put Eddie in greater danger—if he was still alive, of course. Without the radio, Nyler was flying through fog with little sense of direction.

A new, low sound rumbled out of the port—the ship's engines. Nyler met Salazar's eyes. The crewmen were preparing the vessel to depart. Agent Nyler quickly found his direction.

"Take the ship?"

Salazar grinned. "It will be easy. My men are good."

Nyler turned away to hide his grimace in the darkness. "Go quietly. If Dr. Lerwick knows you're coming, he may take Eddie hostage."

"He is already hostage on that ship, I think," Salazar pointed out.

_Yes,_ Nyler realized. _O_ _therwise he would have returned by now._ "Okay, do it."

The Venezuelan immediately spoke a command in Spanish to the men gathered around him. He singled out one officer and handed him the binoculars, and that man stayed behind as the rest of the team ventured out of the trees, Salazar leading the way, Nyler trailing him.

There was little traffic on the two-lane coastal highway at this hour. They waited for a single truck to lumber by, then jogged across the highway and onto the grounds of the port. A small service road wrapped around the U-shaped port, linking its docks. The officers crossed that road and, following Salazar's lead, knelt down behind an assortment of trucks and forklifts parked between the service road and the water.

Salazar, to Nyler's left, spoke into his radio, conversing with the officer he had left behind. His eyes widened and he turned to his men to whisper an abrupt command. They prepared their rifles. "One person coming off the boat," Salazar explained to Nyler in his Spanish accent. "He comes this way."

"Eddie?" Nyler drew his own gun even as he turned to peer hopefully through the windows of the truck behind which he and Salazar had hidden themselves. After a few moments, a figure stepped into view, walking away from the ship. It was a man, alone.

The man turned and angled toward them, passing behind a forklift. A pair of small cars were parked beside the forklifts, and the man rounded the nearest one, pulling keys from his pocket. For a moment he gazed toward the highway, and the port lights caught his face.

Nyler grabbed Salazar's arm. "That's him!"

"The doctor? _Muy bien."_ Salazar nodded to the officer beside him, who scrambled away, waving other officers to him.

Dr. Lerwick opened the driver's door of his car and set one foot inside the vehicle. Suddenly Salazar jumped out from behind the truck. "Stop there!" he cried, targeting Dr. Lerwick with his rifle. The doctor froze as half a dozen more national police officers leapt from their hiding places and surrounded his car, rifles trained on him. Others raced past him toward the ship.

"Do not move!" Salazar yelled at Dr. Lerwick. "Your gun—drop it!"

Dr. Lerwick held a pistol in his hand; slowly, he squatted and set it on the pavement.

"Your hands—on the car!" Salazar screamed as another officer approached just close enough to kick Dr. Lerwick's weapon away.

"Ah," Dr. Lerwick intoned as he turned to face the car. He set his left hand on the top of the vehicle, but with the other hand he reached into his jacket.

"Stop! Hand out!" Salazar yelled, tensing.

But Dr. Lerwick merely smiled. "Officer," he said pleasantly, "I would prefer not to be arrested this evening." He broke into fluent Spanish.

The other officers did not relax, but Salazar gave a small laugh and lowered his weapon. Responding in Spanish, he approached Dr. Lerwick with an empty hand outstretched.

Dr. Lerwick slowly, cautiously drew his hand out of his pocket, producing a thick bundle of cash. He glanced at Salazar, who nodded with a smile, and Dr. Lerwick began to count out the cash in dollars by the hundreds.

Salazar laughed again and shook his head. "No," he said, _"all_ of it."

Dr. Lerwick's eyes widened, and he swallowed once before handing the whole wad of bills to Salazar.

Salazar received the money and ran a thumb along the edge of it, satisfied. Then he stepped back and barked a command to his men. Two of them hurried to Dr. Lerwick and wrenched his arms behind his back to cuff him.

"Wait!" he protested. "I can get you more! I can give you more than you've ever dreamed of!" He continued to protest as the other officers gathered around his car, a pair of them opening the doors to search inside it.

Salazar chuckled. "Sorry, Señor Doctor. Bribing an officer is illegal in my country. And my friend, he gets tired of looking for you."

"Your friend?" Dr. Lerwick inquired darkly.

Nyler took that as his cue. He stepped around the truck to join Salazar. "Dr. Lerwick," he smiled, and it was entirely genuine; this was a pleasant moment. He looked the man over, this man who had eluded him for a decade, and with impressive skill. "Sir, my name is Clint Nyler, Federal Bureau of Investigation. I believe you know how long I have looked forward to making your acquaintance."

Dr. Lerwick's face turned red with fury. "Edward led you to me."

"You trained him well."

"He hid the boy for years!" Dr. Lerwick declared. "He broke into the school's computers! I can testify! It was he who arranged to keep the boy out of sight!"

"It was he who sent him home, Dr. Lerwick," Nyler countered calmly.

"He's on the ship! You have to arrest him!"

Nyler gave Dr. Lerwick a wry grin. "Not to worry, Doctor. Eddie will pay his debt to society."

With a nod from Salazar, the officers took Dr. Lerwick away. The man continued to cry out accusations against Eddie as they dragged him off toward the van they had parked on the back side of the port.

It appeared that the officers who had run toward the ship had taken control of it without incident. They escorted several crewmen down the ramp from the main deck to the dock in handcuffs, leading them away toward the van just as the hum of the ship's engines cut off.

Nyler clicked his tongue. How good it did feel to catch a crook after a long, tiresome search. Dr. Bill Lerwick, after all these years.

Now, what to do with Eddie...

*****

Eddie massaged his shoulder as a Venezuelan police officer escorted him down the ramp from the main deck of the ship to the port in the dim light. They followed the pavement alongside the water briefly before turning to pass by a group of forklifts. Nyler, as Eddie had expected, was waiting for him there.

"What took you so long?" Eddie asked. "They locked me up in the engine room." He tenderly probed a bruise beside his eye, his prize from a brief struggle with the guards.

"We got your father. Well done," Nyler congratulated him.

Eddie frowned. "I wouldn't have helped you if he hadn't shot Craig. Why couldn't I have had a normal dad—one who liked baseball and never thought to shoot people or strand them on deserted islands?"

Nyler lifted his eyebrows at that last image.

Eddie fidgeted, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "So you got him. What happens now?"

"Now," Nyler sighed, "we go home and do lots of paperwork on all this."

"Yeah, but what about me? You still going to let me go free?"

Nyler shrugged. "I suppose. Unless..."

"Unless you decide to arrest me?"

"Unless you'd enjoy catching a few more bad guys."

Eddie narrowed his eyes at Agent Nyler. "We caught my father. Who else—"

"Remember the agent you knew as Albert K.? I got word yesterday that he's pleading guilty to all charges. That leaves me with a problem." Nyler paused and looked out across the docks, making the most of the moment. "I need a new undercover agent."

Eddie's mind faltered, trying to make sense of Nyler's words. His knees almost gave way. _"Me?_ I can't—I mean, I have a record."

Nyler raised an eyebrow. "What record? I checked. You've never been charged with a single crime, never arrested. You've never had so much as a parking ticket."

"But I—" His voice abandoned him for a moment. An undercover FBI agent? Was that even possible, or was Nyler playing a cruel trick? Recovering, Eddie shook his head. "You have to go through a lot of training for that. And college. I've never—"

"Normally, yes," Nyler agreed. "But your case is unique. I've been making some calls. We can get you the education and training. In the meantime, you have some skills that could be useful to us."

Eddie just stared at Nyler for a long time. Then he laughed—more of a yell at first, but it grew into a full, long, loud laugh at what, except for Nyler standing here offering it, could only be a ludicrous dream, a fantasy. An FBI agent, Eddie Lerwick! And undercover, at that! Who would have imagined it? Robin Hood himself would have been jealous.

Nyler's eyes shone at Eddie's reaction. He nodded once. "Good. I'll make the arrangements once we get back home." He turned to walk away.

Eddie gaped after him. He still couldn't believe it. "Hey, one condition—I want a badge!"

"Fine," Nyler called over his shoulder, "you can have a badge!"
Epilogue

Two weeks after word came that Dr. Lerwick had been arrested, Kara put the finishing touches on a long, slender box covered in silver wrapping paper and snuck it out to the den. She glanced out the picture window to make sure Zach wasn't looking, then tucked the gift under the Christmas tree. It was the first gift there this year.

She admired the tree for a moment, then turned to tidy up the den. Craig's current novel she returned to the end table beside the couch; the book Zach was reading she set on top of Craig's. Both boys tended to leave their books on the couch—yet another trait they had in common.

A thick, black jacket rested in a heap on the armchair, and she scooped it up to deposit in Zach's room. It was Cayden's, and how the child could have forgotten his jacket as he walked home on a day as chilly as yesterday was beyond Kara's comprehension.

She folded the jacket neatly across Zach's desk, her eyes checking the status of his room. He had picked it up sufficiently well last night; only the clothes he had worn yesterday were out of place, strewn on the floor by the closet instead of tossed into the hamper like they should have been.

The strangeness of the past seven months struck Kara again, for the millionth time. This room had been their guestroom— _Craig's storage room, truth be told,_ she recalled with a touch of good humor. Now, it was arranged neatly; somehow she had managed to train Zach to make his bed every morning.

There were pictures on the wall. A couple of them were photographs, one a shot Officer Carter had taken of Craig, Kara, and Zach together on the ferry, another a photo of Craig and Kara that Zach himself had taken just last week. Others were Zach's sketches—a hand-drawn portrait of Paws, recognizable as a yellow dog; a colorful geometric design from art class; and two drawings he had kept from those that had been on his wall in Dr. Lerwick's house. The Valentine's Day heart, though, Kara had given a place of honor, framing it and hanging it on her bedroom wall.

The doorbell rang. Kara went to the entryway and opened the door. Officer Garrenton stood there in civilian clothes, flanked by Agent Nyler and Eddie, the three of them perched on the porch step, out of the rain. It still seemed strange, not having a police officer posted there to guard; the guards were, of course, no longer needed.

"Come in!" Kara said, stepping back to let them inside. "Not on duty this morning?" she asked Officer Garrenton as she closed the door behind the group.

"I have the weekend off," the officer replied, "but Clint said I needed to be here." She sent Agent Nyler a playful glare.

"For what?" Kara asked, looking up at Agent Nyler. At his side he held a slender, brown case by its handle.

"He won't say," Officer Garrenton replied mysteriously.

"He won't tell me, either," Eddie remarked.

Nyler pursed his lips. "I think the ambassador wants to tell you himself," he said to Kara.

"The _ambassador?"_ she inquired.

Agent Nyler glanced toward the den. "Are Craig and Zach here?"

"Yeah," Kara answered, "outside playing catch."

"In the rain?" Officer Garrenton asked disapprovingly. "It's nearly December!"

Kara shrugged. "It's a boy thing, apparently." She gestured to the dining table. "Make yourselves at home. I'll get them."

She went to the side door and stuck her head outside. "Craig! Zach! We have company!"

She ducked back inside to find Paws sniffing about the kitchen. "How did you get past me?" she asked him, but he ignored her and busied himself in a search for neglected crumbs. "Fine," she told him, "I guess if everyone else gets to come inside, you can, too—for a few minutes."

Agent Nyler drew a thin laptop computer from his case and set it up on the table as Craig and Zach made their way into the house. Both boys, noticing Kara eyeing them, dutifully wiped their shoes on the mat outside before entering.

"You got your sling off," Eddie observed, waving toward Craig's right arm.

Craig set his baseball glove on the table and rotated the arm to work out some stiffness. "I did," he replied. "The arm's not quite as good as new yet, but it's getting there. The ribs are better, too."

"Hi, Eddie!" Zach said, tossing his glove in the air and catching it again. As Craig exchanged greetings with Nyler and Officer Garrenton, Zach stepped over to Eddie and nudged him with his shoulder. "You're still not in jail?"

"Not yet," Eddie responded, raising his eyebrows at the physical contact. He shoved Zach away playfully, and Zach gave him a grin and shoved him in return before moving to take the last seat at the table. Eddie glanced up at Craig in surprise.

"He's been like that ever since we found him on the bus that night," Craig explained.

"I'm more okay with touching than I used to be," Zach said openly. "It still feels weird, though."

Officer Garrenton waved a hand toward the Christmas tree. "Decorating already?"

"Yeah, just started last night," Kara answered. "Craig and I always put the tree up the weekend after Thanksgiving." And it had been a good Thanksgiving, with much to be thankful for.

"Mom, there's a present!" Zach cried suddenly, jumping up to investigate it. Sensing the boy's excitement, Paws trotted to the tree after him and sniffed the gift. Zach slipped it out from under the tree and turned it over in his hands. "It's for me!" He grinned at Kara and shook it.

"What is it?" Officer Garrenton prompted him.

The boy weighed it and considered its length, longer than his arm. "I think it's a baseball bat," he decided.

_So much for the surprise,_ Kara groaned to herself. Oh, well—there would be other presents, though only a few more this year; she and Craig were still figuring out how to afford having a son around the house, one who already ate more than Kara did and would outgrow his shoes again in a few months.

"Here we go," Agent Nyler announced, stepping back from the computer screen. "Mr. and Mrs. Fleming—and Zach," he said, "come stand here so the ambassador can see you." He indicated one end of the table and positioned the laptop so they would be within the built-in camera's range of vision.

"The ambassador?" Craig repeated.

"The U.S. ambassador to Venezuela," Nyler specified. "He has something to show you."

Officer Garrenton and Eddie joined the Flemings at the end of the table, standing to either side of them just out of the camera's range. Nyler initiated a video connection on the computer and stepped to Craig's side.

The screen flickered and resolved on the face of an Hispanic man in a cream-colored dress shirt, standing in front of a concrete wall. "Your timing is perfect, Agent Nyler," the man said in native English. "She just woke up."

"Ambassador Raso," Nyler responded. "this is the Fleming family—Craig, Kara. And this, of course"—he put a hand on Zach's shoulder—"is Zechariah."

"Hello, Zach," Ambassador Raso said. "I'm Gilbert Raso, United States Ambassador to Venezuela. I've heard a lot about you recently. Mr. and Mrs. Fleming, it's a pleasure."

"Nice to meet you," Craig responded.

The ambassador continued. "I asked Agent Nyler to set up this connection for us. We're not quite ready to make an announcement to the press. The Venezuelan authorities here suggested that you be the first to know." He glanced to the side, then returned his gaze to the screen. "Local police tracked down Dr. Lerwick's research lab in a warehouse in Caracas three days ago. He refused to say where it was, but his assistant, Dr. Wilson, finally gave them the location. They found something...unexpected. There was an artificial womb—in use—and, er..."

Ambassador Raso motioned to someone out of sight, waving them over to him. A young couple came timidly into the picture, a Venezuelan couple in their early twenties. The woman held an infant in her arms, wrapped in blankets. The baby squirmed and protested softly.

"Oh my," Officer Garrenton said under her breath.

"He did it again," Eddie whispered wonderingly.

"Mr. and Mrs. Fleming," the ambassador said, "this is Mr. and Mrs. Abalos. They live here in Caracas. And this little one Señora Abalos is holding is their new daughter. They're naming her Genesis."

Kara stared in awe at the tiny child thousands of miles away. "She was...born the way Zach was?"

Ambassador Raso nodded. "She was on schedule to be born this week. The police found her just in time to contact her parents. Fortunately, Dr. Lerwick had kept detailed records on them. They met their daughter yesterday. Señor Abalos—he got to lift her out of the artificial womb himself." The ambassador smiled at the baby and then, with a small, awkward wave, excused himself from the picture.

Craig took Kara's hand, and they stared at the infant together.

Mr. Abalos cleared his throat nervously and began to speak to them in Spanish. Kara glanced down at Zach, who listened intently.

The boy looked up at her, dazed. "He says they found his daughter because of me. But I didn't do anything, Mom. I just—"

Mr. Abalos spoke again. Again, Zach listened and turned to Kara. "He wants to know if I'm normal, Mom, or if being born that way made me different." His eyes looked to her for guidance.

"Go ahead, Zach—tell him," Kara encouraged. "What's different about you?"

"I didn't used to like being touched," he thought aloud. "And I got sick a lot at first..."

Kara placed a supportive hand on Zach's back, and he replied to Mr. Abalos in Spanish. Both Venezuelan parents took his words in attentively, glancing between the boy and their daughter.

When he finished, Mrs. Abalos addressed him in a gentle voice. Zach translated for Craig and Kara. "She says the baby doesn't like being held. She's just like me!" He watched the squirming newborn, his eyes wide now, and bright.

Mrs. Abalos spoke again. "She said Genesis is like my sister!" Zach explained. He thought about that a moment with his mouth agape, then laughed. "Mom, I have a sister! Well, sort of."

He broke into Spanish again, and for the next minute chatted away with the couple in Venezuela, turning to Kara and Craig again only when the baby cried and distracted her parents. "They said I look really healthy, Dad," he told him with a grin. "I told them I eat lots of tacos and not just French fries."

_"Señor y señora?"_ Mr. Abalos asked, drawing their eyes back to the screen. _"Muchas gracias."_

"That means 'thank you very much,'" Zach explained.

"We know that one, pal," Craig smiled.

Mr. Abalos spoke further, in Spanish. "He says thank you for helping them find out about their daughter," Zach translated.

"You have a beautiful baby girl," Craig told them. Zach translated that, too, and the couple smiled back.

Mrs. Abalos spoke once more. "She says Genesis is a surprise from God," Zach told them.

"Just like you were for us," Kara whispered to the boy. _"Dios les bendiga,"_ she said to the couple in what she was sure was an awful accent. She took care to get the last word right.

They repeated the blessing back to her, and Craig gave Kara's hand a squeeze. She glanced up at him, then down at their son, wrapping her other arm around the boy's chest and drawing him against her. He didn't pull away, didn't even flinch.

Yes, they were blessed. Still a bit overwhelmed, perhaps—but very blessed.

###
Personal Note from the Author

Thanks for reading _The Boy Who Appeared from the Rain_. If you enjoyed this book, please leave me a review at your favorite retailer and connect with me at the links below. I'd love to hear from you!

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About the Author

Kevin David Jensen was born in 1973 in Longview, Washington, where he first encountered the wonders of books, baseball, rain, and the great outdoors. In his youth, he dreamed of playing Major League baseball, but when he found it impossible to hit a Little League curveball, he decided to instead pursue an education, and went on to earn Bachelor's degrees in English and Religious Education from Harding University. He completed a Master of Divinities at Harding School of Theology in 2001 and later moved to the Yakima, Washington area with his wife, Jenny. When he's not writing or playing baseball in the yard, Kevin enjoys hiking, gardening, cooking homemade pizza, and hanging out with Jenny and their three children.

