To her surprise he seemed to approve of that. He kept encouraging her, crooning things like, “Yeah…that’s right…go ahead, get it all out, now,” which only made her madder. She’d been going it alone for more than twenty years, her entire adult life. As far as she was concerned, crying was weakness, to be avoided if at all possible, and if not, then to be indulged in, like other weaknesses, in limited amounts and in strictest privacy. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d cried in someone’s arms.

Oh, yes, she could. And it was that memory-of two frightened teenagers walking in the woods on a lovely November day while the leaves and their worlds fell down around them-that was finally her undoing. Once again, as on that cold November day, she felt as though her world were coming apart, turning upside down. No longer was she Charly the independent and strong-minded career woman, Ms. Phelps the cynical and disciplined attorney. Instead she was back in those Alabama woods again, and she was Charlene Elizabeth, sixteen and in trouble, sobbing out her fear and desperation in her best friend’s arms.

“I…left him,” she sobbed. “He was…so little. He was…my baby.”

“I know,” Troy crooned. “I know…shh…it’s all right.”

“They let me hold him…just for a minute. He had such tiny little fingers…oh, God, he was so beautiful. And then he-he started to fuss, so I gave him my finger to suck on. And I got this feeling…all through me…like shivers, only warmer. Sharp, like pain, only…it wasn’t. It was wonderful…the most wonderful thing in the world. And then they-they took him away. They took him right out of my arms. And it hurt so much…oh, God…”

“I know,” Troy whispered, “shh…I know.” His arms tightened even more securely around her, his hand cradled the back of her head and his cheek rested on its top as he bowed his body, making of it a sanctuary, just for her. And she burrowed into his encompassing warmth like a wounded animal into its den.

“It hurt so much…I didn’t know what to do. I just wanted to get away from there. I had to go. I had to. I didn’t know…oh, God-I didn’t know…”

“Shh, it’s okay. What didn’t you know?”

“He…the judge…my father. He took my baby home. I don’t know-I think maybe he adopted him-but…he was there all the time. He was right there, and I didn’t know. I thought…all this time I thought he was gone. I thought my baby was lost to me forever, and all the time he was here. And I didn’t know…I didn’t know…”

“Of course you didn’t know. How could you?”

“They thought…they thought I’d come back,” Charly whispered brokenly. “But I didn’t. I never came back. Oh, God…” The pain overwhelmed her. This was worse than anything she’d ever known before, worse than Colin’s death, worse even than having her baby taken from her. Because this was her own doing… her own fault. Her own failure. And it could never be undone. How could she ever live with this?

Troy was stroking her hair. His hands were warm and steady, but his voice sounded strange, as if he had a bad cold. “What do you mean, you never came back? You’re here now, aren’t you?”

She shook her head rapidly, brushing her face against his front. “It’s too late…too late. He hates me.”

“Ah, now, it’s never too late.”

“Yes, it is.” She sat up, pulling reluctantly against the gentle restraint of his arms. God, she felt awful. Her sinuses ached, her head felt like a balloon that had been blown up too tight and her nose was running a stream.

She was looking fruitlessly around her for something to stern the tide when Troy matter-of-factly reached into the console between them and pulled out a small, travel-sized box of tissues.

“There y’go,” he muttered as he passed her a good-sized wad.

She took them without a word, blew and reached for more. Troy plucked a bunch and handed them over. She mopped her eyes, pressed them to her nose and muttered, “Boy Scout,” glaring at him over the balled-up tissues.

Troy gave a chuckle that was partly a sigh and eased himself back in his own seat, moving as if his body hurt. “Naw,” he said gruffly, “I guess you’d have to blame that on ol’ Bubba. You travel around with a pup, you better have a load a’ clean-ups handy.” As if on cue, they both craned around to look at the dog, who was sitting erect in the middle of the seat, gazing at them in complete and utter perplexity. They both said, at exactly the same moment, “Hey, ol’ Bubba,” then looked at each other and laughed softly. Together. A gentle and comradely silence washed over them like a healing balm.

Troy cleared his throat. “About your son-it’s not too late.”

Charly blew her nose, then shook her head and said in a stuffy but firm voice, “Yeah, it is. He hates me. And I don’t blame him.”

“He doesn’t hate you. Hell, he’s just young, is all. This was bound to be a shock to him, too, you know-you showin’ up out of the blue. He’s probably as upset and confused as you are. You need to give him some time. He’s gonna come around.”

“Oh, God.” Charly suddenly groaned and leaned her head back against the seat, closing her eyes. Just for a moment. Then she opened them again and stared avidly at the ceiling, wishing she could find the answers she needed written up there. If she only looked hard enough… “I wish…I knew what to say to him,” she whispered. “How will I ever get through to him? I don’t…know how.”

“Hell,” said Troy roughly, “just talk to him. Look, I know it won’t be easy. It’s not somethin’ that comes naturally to you, talking about your feelings-”

“You’re damn right,” Charly cried, as she felt the pain well up in her all over again. “It hurts too damn much!”

“-but you gotta do it anyway. You need to tell him what you just told me, about what happened, how you felt. Give him some time to think about it, and he’s gonna come around. Believe me.”

She swiveled her head toward him, compelled by something in his voice, something she’d been too caught up in her own pain to notice until that moment. The cracking, breaking sounds of a strong man’s emotion. As she stared at him, at his recruiting-poster face, his beautiful, compassionate eyes, a new and formless panic began to creep over her, jangled and raw as she already was. Who in the world is this man? she wondered. How was it she was sitting here telling him things she’d told no one else in twenty years? How could she feel so safe with him, when he was everything she’d been running away from her entire adult life? What was happening to her?

And another, even more frightening thought-could it be, that this was what Mirabella had felt like, that long dark night with Jimmy Joe in his truck?

No! something in her protested desperately. No, no, no.

“How the hell do you know?” she demanded in self-defensive anger. “You don’t know anything about it!”

He scrubbed a hand across his face, making a faint scritching sound, then turned his head slowly toward her. And she noticed with another pang of panic, and an indefinable sorrow, that his normally clean-cut face was all shadows-shadows of whiskers on his cheeks and jaws, shadows of fatigue around his eyes. He’d had as little sleep as she had, she realized. And it wasn’t even his trouble.

The ever lurking tears welled up again in the back of her throat. To contain them, she drew a breath and held it the way a stubborn child does, containing at the same time a powerful urge to reach out and touch his face, to smooth away the shadows with her fingertips.

“Maybe I don’t,” he said softly. “But I do know this-I know what’s important. And I know how to fight And I know that if something’s important enough to you, you fight for it even if it hurts.”

She couldn’t answer him. He held her eyes for a long moment, then turned abruptly and reached for the ignition key, started up the Cherokee’s engine and threw it in reverse.

“Where are we going?” Charly demanded with a gasp, letting go of the breath she’d been holding. Her voice thickened with suppressed sobs. “Aren’t we going in?”

“Uh-uh,” Troy muttered as they bumped out onto the highway, “I’m gonna feed you first. And don’t tell me you’re not hungry, either,” he added as she was opening her mouth to do just that. “It’s been a long time since that b-u-r-g-e-r this afternoon. You’re gonna feel a whole lot better once you get somethin’ in your stomach.”

Somewhat to her surprise, the mention of hamburgers made the ache in her throat ease a little. Her mouth even started to water as she conceded grudgingly, “Well, okay, I guess we can go to the drive-through.”

“Uh-uh. No way. No drive-throughs. For a change you’re gonna eat some real food.”

“I’m not going in any place! Not looking like this!”

“Fine. You can wait in the car.”

She sulked in silence for a minute or two, then turned to glare at the implacable profile of the man who had somehow taken charge of her life. Why, she wondered, didn’t it anger her, worry her, frighten her more than it did?

And again the thought crept around the edges of her consciousness like an unwelcome pest-like a mouse in the kitchen: Mirabella, was it like this for you? Is this how it happens?

“What are you,” she said in a surly tone, “the food police? What do you care what I put in my stomach?”

He lifted one shoulder in an easygoing shrug that made her want to yell like a shrew and punch him. “Hey-you are what you eat. Hell, it’s no wonder you’re havin’ a hard time coping with everything. When was the last time you put a vegetable in your mouth?”

“This afternoon,” she said promptly.

He snorted. “French fries don’t count.”

“I was referring,” she replied in a haughty tone, “to the ketchup.”

There was soft laughter from him then, and a subtle easing, like the wafting of fresh breezes through the air between them. Charly felt her face muscles relaxing as she leaned back against the headrest, perhaps even wanting to smile. She felt battered, drained, exhausted, but-and when she tried to come up with a word for it, the best she could do was…safe. She thought it must be something like spending a long, terrifying night in a storm-tossed sea, all alone in a leaky rowboat, bailing like mad for her very life, and the Coast Guard had just shown up and hauled her on board. The storm might still be raging, but she knew she was safe now, and in good hands.