“So what’s her conclusion?” he asked. “Is she willing to give her parents another chance?”
“I think so.” Lia made a face. “I wish I had a guarantee that they are willing to believe her.”
“You don’t have any doubt.”
“Do you?”
He shook his head.
“Her behavior is classic. Somebody molested her, no question.”
“It wasn’t only, er, touching, then.”
Her glance speared him. “Only?”
“You know what I meant.”
Lia let out a breath that had her shoulders sagging. “I’m sorry. And no, when her mother marched her to the doctor, it was clear she’d had nonconsensual sex. Her mother didn’t take it that way, though. She was positive her daughter had gotten in over her head with some boy, chickened out but didn’t want to take responsibility for her own behavior.”
“What a winner,” he muttered.
“The trouble was, Sorrel and she were already going at it, fang and nail. Puberty had struck. You know what thirteen-year-old girls are like.” Her gaze slid sidelong. “Well, maybe not.”
He grinned. “Got to say, I haven’t so much as carried on a conversation with a thirteen-year-old girl since I was that age.”
“If it’s any consolation, she threw herself at you because she trusts you.”
“I did get that.”
“Ditto the teacher. She’s really wary with men she doesn’t trust. Trouble is, well, the behavior is inappropriate no matter what. She seems to feel it’s all she has to offer. It isn’t only men, though. She’s conflicted with women, too. After her mother’s rejection, she doesn’t believe she has anything at all to offer a woman.”
“But she seems to trust you.”
“We’re getting there.” After a moment she sighed again, then smiled at him. “Thrills and chills, constant drama. And you thought you’d be bored here.”
“I’m bored as hell sitting up in that damn attic,” he admitted. He glanced over his shoulder to check on the boys even though he knew Lia was watching them, too. Brendan had dismounted and was trying to convince Pepito the pony to move without notable success. Pepito snatched a mouthful of grass even as Walker kicked his sides. Mouth curving, Conall said, “Do you keep your horses doped up?”
Lia chuckled. “I don’t have to. They’re infinitely patient, and completely uninterested in any speed above an amble.” She turned to look more directly at him. “So what’s your job like? Weeks of tedium interrupted by moments of terror?”
He laughed. “Something like that. Not terror, though. Most cops enjoy the rush of adrenaline, you know.”
“Do you?”
A year or two ago, he’d have told her he lived for it. Lately, he’d been trying to believe it was still true, that he simply needed assignments that offered more action, more risk. Appalled, he thought he’d been like a drug addict, hooked but finding the same quantity of his drug of choice no longer gave him the rush it once had. Solution: shoot up more.
“I…always have.” He knew she was scrutinizing him again, but he didn’t meet her eyes. God forbid she see the cascade of doubt that was making him sweat. Now, that was terror. Oh, hell, oh, hell, oh, hell. If I don’t have that, what’s left?
“I think there’s more to you than you believe,” Lia said softly, then pushed away from the fence. “You’ll keep an eye on the boys?”
“Yeah, sure,” he said automatically.
She nodded and left him.
His head was spinning. The snow globe had been given another bone-rattling shake.
* * *
AFTER DINNER, CONALL CALLED Duncan, who agreed to try to sell the local public utility administration on allowing the DEA to borrow a truck, uniform and equipment.
“They’ll have to show you how to read the meter,” he said. “Your targets will wonder if they don’t get a bill.”
“Appears the bills go to the home-owner, not the residents, so maybe not. But you’re right, we don’t want to wave a red flag.”
There was a pause. “You going to do it?” Duncan asked, sounding a little too casual.