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  Mei-Li thought it was likely true that Kristin’s mother would be angry—she was always angry. But the fact was, it was better for the little girl to deal with her mother’s shouting than the kind of abuse her supposedly ex-boyfriend was bringing into the house.

  “Are you thirsty?” she asked, pushing her shake towards the girl. “This is chocolate.”

  “Thanks.” Kristin sniffled and took a sip of the melting shake. “Mmm, good.”

  “I know, chocolate is the best, isn’t it?” Mei-Li shared a conspiratorial grin with her. “It’s my favorite.”

  “Mine too.” Kristin grinned and took another sip.

  “So how long has Randy been coming around?” Mei-Li tried to keep her voice casual. There was a court order stating that the man couldn’t be near Kristin or her little sister. For the last couple of months it had seemed like her mother was complying with it. But now…

  “I don’t know.” Kristin shrugged. “A while?”

  Mei-Li sighed, reminding herself that a first grader wasn’t exactly the best judge of time.

  “You said he was there last night, though?”

  “Uh-huh. Him and Mama were fighting.”

  I just bet they were. That seemed to be the basic pattern in their relationship—they would scream and fight and then Kristin’s mom would deny Randy sex and then he would take his anger out on Kristin and her sister. It sounded to Mei-Li like the whole messy, abusive cycle was beginning all over again and the two little girls were going to be caught in the middle.

  But how long had it been going on? She made a mental note to talk to the girl’s teacher and see how long she’d been listless and quiet. Chances are the timing coincided with Randy’s reappearance in her life.

  “These are really yummy. Can I have some more?” Kristin looked at her hopefully.

  “Have all you want.” Mei-Li tried to smile. She watched the little girl reach for another French fry and saw the shiny circle of an old burn scar on the inside of Kristin’s thin forearm. Randy had done that with his cigarette because she and her little sister were being “too fucking loud” having a tea party while he was trying to watch the ball game in the next room. He had done some time for it but a technicality had gotten him out of jail early and now he was slinking around where he didn’t belong. Not that scum like him belonged anywhere but at the bottom of the ocean in Mei-Li’s opinion.

  Just the sight of the scar made her jaw clench. It wasn’t the only mark Kristin and her little sister had courtesy of Randy Dungston. There were other old scars and at one time sexual abuse had been suspected, though it had never been proven. Just the thought of him coming around Kristin and her sister again, making their lives hell, made Mei-Le so angry she couldn’t see straight.

  And she wasn’t just furious at Randy who was an abusive asshole—but also at Kristin’s mom. Mei-Li didn’t have kids of her own but she knew if she did she would love them with all her heart. It was a mother’s responsibility to protect her little ones from harm. How could any woman have a relationship with a man who could hurt her children? How could she turn a blind eye to the abuse and pain he inflicted on her girls? How could she pick him over her own daughters?

  Mei-Li didn’t have the answers for any of that but she did have an idea of what to do. The only problem was, it was going to require extra vigilance on her part and with her massive caseload, she was already stretched thin. Still, she would do whatever it took to make certain Kristin and her sister were safe from harm.

  A bell buzzed somewhere outside and Kristin swallowed her mouthful of fries and looked up.

  “Oh, lunch is over! Now we get to do PE.”

  “You like PE?” Mei-Li asked, smiling.

  “I love it!” A little of the old enthusiasm was shining in Kristin’s big eyes. “And today we get to play with the parachute! I love parachute day. Can I go back now?”

  “Sure. Are you finished?” Mei-Li nodded at the mostly empty carton of fries and the shake.

  “Uh-huh.” Kristin scooped the last two fries into her mouth and slurped up the rest of the chocolate milkshake. “Can I go?”

  “I’ll go with you.” Mei-Li stood and held out a hand. “Come on, I need to talk to your teacher.”

  Kristin’s eyes grew suddenly wide as she took the offered hand. “Are you gonna ask her about Randy? He never comes to school.”

  No, he wouldn’t dare. He just shows up slinking around the house at night and scaring two innocent little girls to death, the bastard!

  Somehow Mei-Li kept her smile in place. “I don’t want you to worry about that, Kristin. I’m going to take care of it.”

  “Okay.” But the little girl sounded doubtful.

  “Come on.” Mei-Li tugged gently on her hand. “Parachute day, remember?”

  “Oh, yeah!” Kristin’s smile reasserted itself and she tugged back, leading them to the door. “Hurry—I don’t want to lose my spot!”

  “Okay, we’ll hurry.” They rushed, giggling out of the office and through the hallways to Kristin’s classroom. But though she entered into the spirit of fun with the little girl, Mei-Li couldn’t help being worried. Was Randy Dungston having a relationship with Kristin’s mother again? She knew if she called and asked the woman would only deny it, and the call would just put her on her guard. No, the only way to be certain was to make an unannounced visit some evening and night visits were never fun. Still, it had to be done and she knew she could count on Claudia for backup. They could also call in a squad car if necessary—the police were there to help if need be.

  Mentally, Mei-Li changed her idea of getting home around eight, pushing it back a couple of hours to ten or later. If she was going to do a stake out of Angry Mom’s house, it was going to add some time to her work day.

  Well, maybe I’ll be out all night and I won’t get to bed at all, she told herself. At least that would keep me from going to sleep and dreaming…dreaming about him.

  Avoiding the frightening dream was the one bright spot in the whole awful situation. But Mei-Li knew she couldn’t keep this up forever—if she didn’t get a decent night’s sleep soon, she was going to drop.

  That’s a problem for another time, she told herself firmly. For now, I just have to keep going. Have to be in court in forty-five minutes. And after that, I have got to get to that paperwork…

  * * * * *

  Six frowned as he watched her exit the door of the low, sprawling building which seemed to have something to do with educating young. It was strange to see so many little ones running here and there. He only ever encountered youngsters of any species when he visited the medical barges. On Z4 all the organic inhabitants were grown to adulthood before they were released from their medically induced comas and extracted from the incubation tubes. Here on Earth, it appeared that they were made in a more…unrefined fashion and allowed to grow to adulthood with no chemical manipulation or enhancements at all.

  Almost as odd as the children was the proliferation of females. Because the females of Z4 had all died off soon after the Collective took over, he wasn’t used to seeing them. They seemed so different from males—shorter, more slender, more vulnerable.

  But none that he had seen was as tiny as Mei-Li. She could almost have been mistaken for a young one herself until you looked at her face and saw the wisdom and life experience in her big, dark eyes. Also, she was dressed as the other adult females were with a piece of cloth that wrapped around her waist and thighs and left her legs bare and strange, stilt-like shoes attached to her feet. Six wondered about those—were they just to make her taller? For a while he thought they might be some kind of enhancement but he didn’t see any electronic components so he decided they must just be strange footwear.

  Speaking of enhancements, that was another thing he found strange about this planet—seeing everyone, everywhere completely unenhanced. The inhabitants looked oddly bare to him. Not a single one of them had so much as a mechanical hand or an ocular scope. How did they manage without the added inp
ut such enhancements provided? Six didn’t know and he had no desire to find out. He didn’t really care about the other inhabitants of this world—all his attention was currently focused on Mei-Li whom he had been watching intently for hours.

  As odd as the Earthlings looked to him, he was well aware that he would look twice as odd to them. Luckily, he was hidden from sight by his shuttle’s light refracting tech. Like most Kindred shuttles, it transformed to a land vehicle when it needed to. Unlike the others, it had the ability to blend seamlessly into whatever environment it was in. By using a special metal polymer skin that refracted light, it became for all intents and purposes invisible. And Six was invisible too—as long as he stayed inside it.

  He watched as Mei-Li walked past him and got into her own small blue vehicle which was parked only two slots down from his. She looked right at him as she started her engine but her eyes slid past his camouflaged vehicle, no doubt perceiving the place it was parked as an empty spot.

  Six frowned. So far he had seen her go back and forth to various domiciles as well as the building for young ones and another building that seemed to be some kind of business complex. He had watched as she hauled bag after bag out of one house—bags of what? The question had intrigued him and he had employed his trans-scope to see into the house. He had seen Mei-Li picking things up off the ground of the domicile but he still couldn’t fathom what the things were or why she and the other Earth female were so busily engaged in the task.

  As she left the small, shabby domicile, Six had observed the other female throw her arms around Mei-Li’s neck. He had almost started from his vehicle—certain this was an attack! But then he saw the moisture in the Earth female’s eyes and saw the corners of Mei-Li’s soft, full lips turn up. For some reason one of them was upset while the other was…what…happy? Both emotions were foreign to him but it didn’t seem to make sense that they were happening at the same time. Then again, nothing about Feelers made sense, he reminded himself. They allowed their emotions to rule them and consequently they acted illogically.

  Six shook his head in confusion. Just now he had seen Mei-Li give her provisions to a young one when she was clearly hungry herself. Or at least, he assumed she was hungry. She hadn’t consumed anything since he had been observing her and it had been several hours. Now she was driving away again—should he follow her?

  He had to admit that as frail as she looked, she didn’t appear to be in any danger. In which case, he really had no reason to keep on tracking her since his stated purpose was to defend her and there didn’t appear to be anything to defend her against. He really ought to go now—ought to report to One the strange behavior of the Kindred High Chancellor and explain that he had decided not to claim Mei-Li on those grounds.

  And yet…he lingered. For some reason he didn’t like the idea of leaving without her. But if he wasn’t feeling protective, then what was the sensation that made him want to Claim her, though his gut told him he should not?

  Again, Six had no answer but though he knew it was illogical, he found himself unwilling to leave Mei-Li just yet. Perhaps I should keep observing her for a just a little longer, he told himself. After all, the inhabitants of this planet seem innocuous enough but who knows how they behave when their sun goes down?

  Yes, it would probably be prudent to watch just a little while longer—perhaps just a solar hour or two until it began to grow dark. Then, once he assured himself completely of her safety, he would leave and go back to Z4 where he belonged.

  Chapter Six

  Mei-Li was nearly dropping with exhaustion by the time she finished the last piece of paperwork and pushed back from her desk. The shelter hearing had run longer than she’d thought and had taken most of her afternoon, meaning she hadn’t gotten back to the DCF until late.

  In court, she’d had to defend her decision to remove a two year old from a home where the parents had gotten high on meth and allowed their child to get out of the house and run into a busy road. If not for the quick actions of a concerned neighbor, the little boy would likely have been killed. Mei-Li had been called and had made a quick decision to remove the child to a safer environment.

  She’d had to describe the state of the apartment, (it was a mess with drug paraphernalia everywhere) and the actions of the parents, (high out of their minds and completely unaware that their child had gotten into the road) to the judge and the members of the court. Unfortunately, the meth-head parents had somehow scratched up the money for a pretty good attorney and he had attacked Mei-Li in every way he could, trying to find some reason why she was at fault for taking the child.

  Defending herself and her decisions was a lengthy and exhausting process which left Mei-Li feeling drained and shaky. She could hold her own in court, even against the best attorney, but it always took a toll on her. In the end, the judge upheld the shelter and the parents were ordered to get drug counseling and treatment before they could get their child back. They glared daggers at Mei-Li as she left the courtroom, as though she was solely responsible for the loss of their child and their drug habit had nothing to do with it.

  For her part, Mei-Li refused to return their looks or acknowledge them at all. She didn’t like to take kids from families but in this case it was clearly in the child’s best interest. And at the end of the day, that was her main objective—to protect the children under her care. If that meant taking them away from a potentially harmful or deadly situation, she was fully prepared to do so, even if it earned her the enmity and undying hatred of the parents she took them from.

  When she had at last reached the office again, it was four forty-five and almost time to clock out—a thought that would have made her laugh if she’d had the energy left to do so. There was no leaving the office until she got through her neglected mound of paperwork and documented everything she had done today from her interaction with Drunk Mom and her kids, all the way up to her meeting with Kristin’s teacher.

  Kristin…

  With her paperwork finally done, Mei-Li looked at her watch and saw it was half past eight. A glance out the window showed it was full dark outside. Even in sunny Florida the sun had to set sometime. She was the only one left in the office.

  Mei-Li thought longingly of her bed back in her little bungalow in Seminole Heights. It had a memory foam mattress—a gift from her father—one of the few she had been willing to accept. If Senator Hastings had his way, she would have been living in a plush condo in Hyde Park instead of a tiny bungalow on the unfashionable end of Seminole Heights. Then again, if her adopted father had had his way, she also would have gone through law school and would be working on making partner at this point. But Mei-Li hadn’t wanted law school or med school either though her GPA and SAT scores could have put her on the path to either one. She’d wanted to make a difference in the lives of children.

  Part of her determination had to do with the way she’d been raised herself. Oh, she hadn’t been abused or neglected—not in the way some of her clients were, anyway. But her mother had been a high society butterfly who had adopted her because it was the fashionable thing to do—rescuing a disadvantaged baby was like having the latest Coach bag in some circles. Her father, though doting, was often distant and consumed with his work.

  Mei-Li had been raised by a series of nannies and private tutors and had been sent away to boarding school at the tender age of twelve. As a consequence, she felt keenly for the children she watched over. She saw the same pattern over and over—how desperately the children loved their parents and how little affection and care they were often shown in return. That was why when she sensed genuine love and concern in a family, she tried so hard to keep it together.

  And that was why, despite being dead on her feet, she was going to swing by Kristin’s house instead of heading straight home to bed.

  The lights were on in the small, rundown house in Tampa Heights when Mei-Li got there. There was a plaster angel with a chipped face in the weedy, overgrown front lawn. It looked eerie in the
glow of the orange sodium arc lights which dotted the shabby street. A dirty rattan couch sat on the sagging front porch and discarded toys were strewn on the steps leading up to it.

  Tampa Heights wasn’t far from Seminole Heights—her own area of town which was perfectly safe. But despite or maybe because of its proximity to a nicer neighborhood, TH was one of the worst areas of Tampa and Mei-Li was aware that it wasn’t the best place for her to be out on her own. She parked across the narrow street and gripped a small canister of pepper spray in one hand as she watched the shadows moving across the shaded front windows.

  She’d been thinking she would have to go knock on the front door and demand entry to see if Randy Dungston was there but when she pulled up, she saw that wouldn’t be necessary. There were two cars parked in the dirt driveway of the grungy little house. One was an old gray Chevy sedan that looked like it had seen better days. The other was a jacked up truck with huge tires and purple flames running across its sides. It was instantly recognizable and Mei-Li knew exactly who the owner was—Randy.

  Even if she hadn’t seen the truck—which he hadn’t even taken the trouble to try and hide—she would have known he was there. That was because the door to the little house was open, doubtless to let in the fresh air on a hot Florida night. However, it also let out the raised voices of two people involved in a screaming match.

  “You fucking bastard! Why are you lying to me? I know you were with her—I know you were! Janelle saw you—she told me.”

  Mei-Li sighed. That was the voice of Angry Mom—so named by herself and Claudia because the woman literally never stopped yelling. Mei-Li had never heard her speak in a normal tone of voice, not even to her children. She shouted and screamed at everyone and everything, her hatred welling up from an inexhaustible fountain of rage buried deep inside and spewing over everyone she met.

  “God damn it, woman! So what if I was with her? I wouldn’t have to be if you’d put out once in awhile! But no—you act like your legs are fucking glued shut! Why the hell shouldn’t I get some somewhere else if you’re not gonna give it to me?”