Chapter 14: Supervised

The deputy climbed out of his cruiser with his hand resting near his belt.

"Evening," he said. "We got a call about a pregnant woman trying to take a child from a cabin."

"Who called?" Ty said.

"The caller wouldn't give a name. Said the boy was in danger."

I looked at the trees behind the cruiser, and at the road where no other headlights were coming.

Pete leaned on his truck and said, "Funny. Nobody here knew the address but us."

The deputy knocked on the cabin door, and this time Shelby opened it with the chain off.

She held Eli against her hip, and he was rubbing his eyes.

"Ma'am, is this boy safe?"

"Yes."

"Does anyone here have a custody order?"

"No," Shelby said, and she stared straight at me. "Not yet."

"Then I can't take him from you and I can't let anyone else take him either. Take it to a judge Monday."

He tipped his hat to me and drove away.

Shelby shut the door again, and I heard her slide the second lock.

Ty stood on the porch and put the stegosaurus on the railing where a small hand could find it in the morning.

Then he walked back to the truck, and I followed him.

The hearing was nineteen days later, in a family courtroom on the fourth floor of the county building.

I was thirty-four weeks and I came in with my hand on the small of my back.

Bernadette was not there, which I understood to be on purpose.

Shelby sat at the far table in a white blouse with a man in a navy suit, the same man who had set down a briefcase in Bernadette's hall.

My lawyer, the one in the gray suit, got to his feet before the judge asked.

"Your Honor, before we start. Who is paying Ms. Roark's counsel?"

"Objection," said the man in navy. "Irrelevant."

"Ms. Roark waited tables part time and does hair. She gets no paycheck that covers this man's hourly rate. I'd like to know who does."

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