I dropped off Boo and his litter and my bag and went to King’s.

May descended the minute I came through the door.

I took one look at her stormy face and asked, “What?”

“You still together with Crowe?”

What now?

“Why?” I asked.

“Tell me,” she snapped.

“Yes. Why?” I snapped back.

Her face melted and she was all smiles. “Just checkin’,” she said, storm cloud gone, all bouncy and happy. “You want a pudding cup?”

“May, it’s eight thirty in the morning.”

“There’s no time limit on pudding cups.”

Jeez.

She was grinning at me, pleased as punch that I was getting it regular.

I looked at her.

Home, the word came into my head in Auntie Reba’s voice and a warm shiver ran along my skin.

“Love you, May,” I said softly.

May blinked at me. “What’d you say, hon?”

I walked the step of distance between us, put my hands on either side of her neck, bent at the waist and laid my forehead against hers.

“Love you,” I whispered.

I watched close up as tears filled her eyes.

She tried to pull away. It wouldn’t be cool for the kids to see us like this but I didn’t care and I held on tight. Maybe they should see.

“I think Vance loves me,” I whispered as I lifted my forehead from hers but kept looking in her teary eyes. “He looked at me this morning in a way, May, you wouldn’t believe. And he told me he’d never let me go.”

May was still staring at me. She’d never heard me share information about myself freely, certainly not something important, without her having to drag it out of me.

I let her go but put an arm around her shoulders and walked her toward the office. The whole time my head was bent to hers and I told her about my morning.

“Praise be to Jesus!” she shouted right before we disappeared into the hall.

All the kids (luckily, there weren’t that many of them that early in the morning) stared.

* * * * *

The morning was its usual madness.

I called my doctor to make an appointment to discuss birth control because I was done with the condom business. There might be ways to make it fun but Vance and I were kind of active (okay, really active) and spontaneous and enough was enough.

My cell rang mid-morning. The display said “Crowe calling”.

I flipped it open. “Hey,” I said.

“Got time for lunch?”

I didn’t and that sucked. “Not really,” I told him.

“I’ll bring something to the Shelter.”

I smiled into the phone. “That’d work.”

“See you around noon.”

My pug gave me a sleepy, puppy cuddle.

“Okay,” I said.

I went in search of Martin and Curtis and hustled them into the yellow room. It was time to get to the bottom of why they’d run away so I could start fixing it but even though I knew I had their respect, they gave me nothing.

We walked out of the yellow room and one of the tutors, Stuart, was coming at me. The boys took off. Most of the kids avoided the tutors like the plague.

“Hey Stu,” I said.

“Got a problem,” he told me. “Roam and Sniff had an appointment with me yesterday and today, they missed them both.”

Hmm.

Not good.

Roam seemed all fired up to get an education so he could become a badass mother. Clearly he’d lost interest when he thought Vance was out of my life.

“I’ll take care of it,” I said to Stu and I went in search of the boys.

Not stupid, they knew I’d come after them and I caught them making their getaway. I cornered them outside in front of the building.

“You missed two tutor appointments,” I said to them.

“What of it?” Roam asked, all lip and attitude.

“You need to get caught up so we can enroll you in high school, get a foster home sorted, get your life sorted.”

“Life’s good,” Sniff put in, in an attempt to assure me they knew what they were doing.

My eyes sliced to him and the look in them made him clamp his mouth shut for once.

I looked back to Roam. “I thought you wanted to get your diploma.”

“Don’t matter now,” Roam said to me.

“I don’t think you understand, what happened with me and Crowe –” I started.

“I understand, Law, you know I f**kin’ do. Can’t trust no-fuckin’-body. You think they’re cool, got it goin’ on and you find out they’re just ass**les. Everyone’s a f**kin’ asshole.”

Hmm.

Really not good.

I got closer. “Roam –” I started again but to my shock (and it must be said, supreme annoyance), he put both hands to my shoulders and shoved me hard. I went back on a foot and then steadied.

“Fuck off, Law,” he clipped.

“Hang on a goddamned minute,” I snapped but I’d lost his attention. His already tense body froze and he was looking over my shoulder.

I looked too.

Vance was there not a foot behind me. How he’d materialized, I did not know. I hadn’t heard him or sensed him but I couldn’t worry about that at the moment. Vance’s face was hard and set, his eyes were scary and his mouth was tight. I’d never seen him look that angry, in fact the word angry didn’t begin to do it justice.

“What the f**k?” Vance’s eyes flashed on Roam.

“What are you doin’ here?” Sniff asked.

Vance didn’t take his gaze off Roam. “I said,” Vance went on, his deep voice quiet, pure silk but not in a good way, “what the f**k?”

Roam brought himself up to full height which was an inch taller than Crowe but he still looked like a boy. Crowe didn’t move from behind me and I could feel the white-hot vibes crackling between them.

Roam didn’t answer.

“Never,” Vance continued in his scary voice, “do you put your hands on a woman in anger.”

All of a sudden I was finding it difficult to breathe, realizing belatedly why Vance looked ready to commit murder. Roam swallowed, his eyes darted to me then went back to Vance but he kept his position, his guard up and his mouth shut.

“Okay boys –” I decided it was time to cut in.