and Mike had saved her from being raised by a godless degenerate?
Lily, Ben, and Mimi crossed the hot asphalt of the hospital parking lot. “Well, I guess that’s that,” Ben said.
“That’s all you can say?” Lily yelled, not caring who heard her. Her eyes flooded with tears as she strapped Mimi into her car seat. “You drag me to this fucking hellhole because you have a surefire plan for me to keep my daughter, and when it falls through, all you can say is, ‘That’s that?”
“I know...I’m sorry. I really did think it would work.” Ben started the car. “I was thinking...you and Mimi could always leave the country. I could have you back to Atlanta and on the first flight to wherever you want to go on Friday afternoon.”
Lily didn’t bother to wipe the tears that were rolling down her cheeks. “I never quite pictured myself as a fugitive from justice. Of course, it’s not justice that I’d be running from.”
She tried to picture herself raising Mimi in some unspecified foreign country. Before her move to Versailles, she had never lived anywhere but Atlanta. “Where would we go?”
“Amsterdam’s a great city. Nearly everyone there speaks English.”
“God, five months ago, I was thinking my life was getting too routine and that maybe I should sign up for a yoga class or something. Now I’m getting ready to hop the next plane to Amsterdam.
There’s something to be said for being in a rut.”
Jack had taken the afternoon off so she could spend it with Lily and Mimi. Now Mimi was wallowing around in the front yard with Lily the piglet and a couple of ill-bred hound pups while Lily the piglet’s namesake and Jack sat on the porch. “Ben told me he’d help get Mimi and me out of the country, if that’s what I want.” Lily’s voice sounded as cold and dead as she felt.
“Is that what you want?” Jack sat on the porch swing next to Lily, her arm around her shoulders.
“No, not really. Fleeing the country doesn’t appeal to me, but ...” Lily watched Mimi giggling beneath a pile of pigs and pups. “God, just look at her, Jack. I can’t let those people raise her.”
“You know,” Jack said, stroking Lily’s hair, “Daddy left me some money when he died ... not a whole lot, but it’d be enough for you to live on awhile till you get your bearings ... wherever it is you end up.”
“I can’t take your money.”
“Sure you can. If my money can help you, take all you want. Money’s never meant much to me anyhow.”
Lily was overwhelmed by Jack’s kindness. “You’ve already helped me. You’ve helped me keep a modicum of sanity in an insane situation. I don’t think I would’ve stayed here if I hadn’t met you.”
Jack watched Mimi play in the yard for a minute, then turned to Lily. “I’ll sure miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too.” Lily burrowed her face in the collar of Jack’s hay-smelling coveralls and let Jack hold her while she cried.
The test results would be revealed in court on Monday morning, and so the days before passed like the last days of a death-row inmate’s life—miserable, nerve-wracking, and yet over
