She started sobbing. “Oh, no! Can I come there? I have to go somewhere! I have to do something!”

“Krissy,” she said, but the girl kept crying. “Krissy, you have to stop crying and listen to me. Can you do that?”

“Okay...okay...”

“All right, calm down. I can’t talk to you unless you can stay calm.”

“Please...please, I’m sorry for everything, but, please...”

“Krissy, be calm. Can you listen to me?”

“Okay,” she said tremulously.

“I’ll come to you. It’s going to take me a long time—I won’t be there before tomorrow. I can talk to you from the car, but it will be a long drive for me. And I’m going to have to tell your father that I’m coming.”

“Why do you have to?”

“Because I’m not your mother or even your stepmother. I’m nothing more than an ex-girlfriend involving myself in his family business.”

“But you took care of us for three years!”

Well, not quite that long, she thought. As for the caretaking, since she’d been totally unsuccessful, how would that give her any leverage in this situation? “He’s your father. I take it you’re at his house right now, not your mother’s?”

“I’m here. If you tell him, he might just make me go to that doctor right away.”

“Well, he can’t. If you think that’s about to happen, if you think you’re going to be forced to have a medical procedure against your will, you can call the police. I don’t know exactly what will happen, but you won’t have a procedure before I get there. But you have to stay calm, and you can’t lie to your father, do you understand?”

“But...”

“No, Krissy. If your father asks you, and I believe he will, you have to tell him the truth, that you called me and that I’m coming. Are we on the same page?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Ma’am? Well that was a switch. She must be truly desperate. “I’ll call you as I’m driving, just to check in with you.”

“Are you going to drive all night?” Krissy asked, her voice so small, so scared.

Adele wandered into the room, the baby snuggled against her shoulder. She frowned as she listened.

“Probably. I might have to stop somewhere for a little rest, but I’ll be there as soon as I can. Now, I’m going to call your father. I’m going to tell him I’m coming to see if I can help you. I don’t know how I’m going to help, but I will come. I’m sure you’ll hear from him.”

“He’s going to be so mad at me....”

“Well, that would be a first, now, wouldn’t it? Just stay calm and tell him you called me because you were scared, and I’m coming. Can you do that?”

“Yes. Yes, I’ll do that.”

“All right. I’m going to hang up so I can pack and make a couple of phone calls. Will you be all right now?”

“Yes. And...thank you, Peyton. I’m sorry, but thank you.”

“I want you to be calm because this is going to work out. I’m not sure how yet, but it will.”

“Okay,” she said.

Peyton disconnected and looked up at Adele, who was swaying in the bedroom doorway with the baby in her arms. “Did I hear what I think I heard?”

Peyton nodded. “Ted’s daughter. Begging me to come to Portland to help her because her parents are planning to force her to get an abortion.”

“And you’re going?”

“I’m going. She said a couple of things that could be melodrama or...or could be suicidal.”

“What can you do?”

“I have no idea. I think I can buy her twenty-four hours. Maybe forty-eight. Forcing a minor to have a surgical procedure is abuse. How the police handle that isn’t up to me. And her parents—Ted and Olivia—they’re pretty forceful people. But my biggest concern right now is that the girl definitely needs some kind of intervention before she does something crazy—like run away or kill herself or God knows....”

Peyton started putting her folded clothes into a suitcase.

“When are you going to be free of that loony bin?” Adele asked.

Peyton stopped what she was doing and went to Adele, taking the baby from her to hold her close for a moment, kissing that little head, inhaling the fresh powdery scent of her. Then she looked at her sister, her best friend. “It’s pretty sad that I’m the only one they have to reach out to, isn’t it? I mean, Ted’s a doctor and Olivia is a geologist with a post-graduate degree, they’re very successful, and apparently not a lick of sense between the two of them. And Krissy calls me? I swear, she hated me the whole time I was there. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t reach them. And yet when their parents should be getting them help, who do they call?” She shook her head sadly. “I could turn my back right now. No one would blame me. But I don’t think I could sleep at night if I didn’t at least try.”

“She’s fifteen, Peyton. Maybe it would be best if her parents won this struggle.”

“That’s just the point, Adele. There will be no winner.”

“But what’s your stake in it? Proving to Ted you’re right?”

“Ted?” she asked with a laugh. “Ted is so yesterday’s news! My stake in it might just be in my head. I was there for over two years, trying my damned hardest to make a difference in the lives of three spoiled rich kids who had no attention from their parents. They never once asked for my help. I prayed they’d ask me for help, for advice, for anything that would make it seem they wanted to be decent, civilized people, and it never happened. And I finally gave up. Now one of them asked me for help. I resent the hell out of it, to tell you the truth. But she’s fifteen, and I’m thirty-five. I can afford to give it a couple more days. It’ll help me sleep at night.”

Adele just smiled. “Oh, you are your father’s daughter.”

“How so?”

“Stubborn. Committed. Proud.”

“Foolish,” Peyton added, handing the baby back to Adele. “Papa has been foolish a time or two. But with grand flourish.”

“What do you want now?” Adele said, mimicking their father. “My pockets are empty! My wealth is under the dirt, my pears are hanging from the trees waiting to be picked before a freeze, my sheep are skinny, my chickens are too nervous to lay. You want something—you know where to find it!”

“Remember how we used to call him Paco Poor Mouth?” Peyton laughed. “He wouldn’t make it easy, would he?”

“But if anyone was really in trouble, he was there. You got nothing for wanting things easy, you got nothing for being lazy, but if the world turned on you and you had no one, just blink and Paco Lacoumette would bring an entire clan to your feet. Listen, Peyton, just remember one thing, okay?”

“What’s that, honey?”

“You’re only one person. And there’s only so much you can do.”

“Thank you, baby. I’ll remember. I’ll give it a shot. And then I’ll pass the baton and walk away. I promise.”

* * *

Peyton left right away. She spent the first hour of her drive thinking about what she was going to say to Ted, then once she was out of the Bay Area, she pulled off the road and called his cell. As she thought he might, he picked up right away. “Peyton,” he said. “I’m so glad to hear from you.”