Counterfeit Love

"Somehow, I doubt that," I told him, even though he couldn't have known exactly how long I had been thinking about this.

"The adoption process is insane."

"I'm aware of that."

Interviews and home studies and inspections and even physicals. It was overwhelming to think about, let alone go through.

But, in my humble opinion, it would all be worth it.

"I'm an ex-con, love," he reminded me. "Can't figure they would put us through all the other background shit without looking at my record."

I had considered that.

Of course, I had.

I had considered my own position too, mostly leading Hailstorm since Mom decided to semi-retire a few years back.

And, of course, no agency would give a child to someone who had been accused of harm to children, or to rapists, or to murderers.

But there was a gray area with some violent offenses.

"The general rule is that so long as it has been five years, they will consider you. I'm not saying they will approve us, but the conviction won't exclude us completely. It is a case-by-case thing."

And, I thought, on paper, Finch looked like a hell of a success story. Poor kid with a criminal dad who was constantly in and out for drug-related offenses, who got a rough start, fell in with the wrong people, and served his time. Then came out and made a huge fortune for himself, settled down, and started a family.

That money launderer he'd found had done a hell of a job. No one could trace the fake cash. And everything Finch--and therefore I--had to his name was legit, the product of a very good knack for the stock market.

Out of curiosity one day, I had made a pet project of trying to trace his money. I failed spectacularly.

And I think we both knew that if I couldn't find it, no one could.

Finch McAwley was a self-made millionaire.

He was, too.

But not in stocks.

"I'm not saying this is absolutely going to happen. I just want to think about it. We both know that adoption is something near and dear to my heart."

The more we talked about it, too, the more real it felt, the more possible.

Pretty soon, Finch was as excited as I was.

Which only made the fact that we failed our home study all the more devastating.

We'd both been crushed.

For weeks.

Months.

I was sure a small part of me would never recover from the loss.

But, eventually, life went on, we went on.Then, nearly six years to the day of getting turned down, on a frigid day a few days before Christmas, with freezing rain pelting down on the shipping container walls, I was called out to the front gates, was told we had a situation.

Not accustomed to anyone having the balls to create a "situation" at our gates, I rushed out, curious.

Only to find that the situation was a girl around fifteen years old with fire-engine-red hair, a smattering of freckles across her cheeks, and honey brown eyes.

Something in them was very familiar to me.

"Let her in," I demanded without even speaking to her, ushering her inside, getting her warm, giving her a change of clothes, some foodmalnourished body. "What's your name?" I asked, sitting across from her in the kitchen, both of us holding steaming mugs of tea.

"Alice."

"Alice. I'm Chris. I sort of... run things here."

"I know. That's why I came."

"What do you mean?"

To that, she turned, reaching into the bag she had stuck inside a black garbage bag to keep it safe and dry, pulling out an old laptop covered in sticker residue.

Curious, I watched as she opened it, clicked around for a moment or two, then turned the laptop toward me.

I was familiar with the dark web. Not as familiar as I had been when I was younger, when I'd had more of a hands-on approach to the research because I hadn't learned to delegate yet. But I knew enough. I knew common sites. I knew common forums.

This was one I was familiar with.

And the categories on top went from Help> to Advice> to Resources> to Runaway>

From there, she scrolled the page down ever so slightly to a post made ages and ages ago.

By an internet handle I recognized.

Jstorm.

My Aunt Janie.

Back, it seemed, to when she had been much younger, maybe even back to when she had been around this girl's age.

If you need somewhere safe, head to central Jersey. Find a place called Hailstorm. Ask for Lo. Tell her I sent you.

"And then this update a couple years ago," Alice said, scrolling the page way, way down, spanning years in the process before she came to another post by the notorious Jstorm.

Update: If you need somewhere safe to be, head to central Jersey. Find a place called Hailstorm. Ask for Chris. Tell her I sent you. And then tell her her aunt is really proud of her.

"Your aunt is really proud of you," Alice told me, a small smile tugging at her lips.