Kimberly smiled sweetly. "As they say, you can't choose your family."

"To hell with Tristan Shandling," Rainie said seriously. "Keep talking, girl, and I will kill you myself."

"Come on, Rainie. This is exciting news. Your mother is gone. You don't have any aunts, uncles, brothers, or sisters. But think about it. You might have a dad! A real, live, anxious-to-meet-you dad!"

"There's no proof he's my father," Rainie snapped. "So he slept with my mother thirty-two years ago. Who didn't?"

"But you'll take the blood test, right?"

"I don't know."

"Rainie…"

"I don't know!" Rainie threw her hands in the air. "You want to know the truth? I don't like it. I just plain don't like it."

"Because he's a convict."

"Of course he's a convict. My mother didn't hang out with aspiring astrophysicists. Hell, I'm not surprised my potential sire was in jail. I'm just shocked he was ever paroled."

Kimberly frowned. "So… it's the money you don't like? Becoming an heiress to ten million dollars? You're right, that's tough."

"Kimberly, think about it for a moment. What do all children who don't have parents do? They dream about their missing parents, right? They make up exotic stories. 'My mommy and daddy are secretly eastern European royalty, forced into hiding to flee the communists. When it's safe, they'll come back for me.' Or, 'my father was a Nobel prize-winning scientist, killed by evil government agents who wanted to halt his impending discovery of world peace.' Kids create fables, caricatures of real life. No one's absent father is ever a thug, or drunken white trash who simply didn't want to own up to his responsibility. He's always handsome, dashing, and frankly, rich."

It took Kimberly a moment, then she got it. "You think this is all fake. It's too good to be true."

Rainie finally grew still. She looked at Kimberly and demanded bluntly, "What does Tristan Shandling do? He identifies who the victim wants more than anything in the world. And then he becomes that person. I've been without a family for fifteen years, Kimberly. As you said, no aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters. There's a loneliness in that I don't think other people can understand." "Rainie, you don't know that it's a ruse." "Think about the timing."

"Just because you don't like coincidences, doesn't mean they don't happen."

"And just because it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, doesn't mean it isn't Tristan Shandling in disguise." Rainie plopped down on the sofa, then hit a cushion. Hard.

"You're scared," Kimberly said softly. "Don't psychoanalyze me." "I'm not trying to. It's just… You're scared." "I was so sure he'd go with law enforcement," Rainie murmured. "Or maybe a fellow PI. Even knowing how he works, I didn't see this coming. God, he's good. I'm sitting here now, and half of me is warning, Don't fall for it, you're too smart for this. And the other half of me… Christ, the other half of me is already picking out Father's Day cards."

Kimberly took a seat next to her on the sofa. Her long blond hair was pulled back from her face in a rubber band. She'd slept through the long plane ride and she looked better than she had in days. Rested. More composed. It was interesting to Rainie that as their situation grew more dire, Kimberly seemed to actually grow stronger. Young, but rising up to the challenge. Inexperienced, but definitely determined.

"Let's think about this," Kimberly said. "What's the next step?"

"Blood testing. Mitz gave me the name of a lab. They'll take a blood sample from me and ostensibly test for a DNA match with Ronald Dawson's."

"That sounds reasonable."

Rainie smiled grimly. "Do you know how long it takes for DNA testing? We're talking at least four weeks, or more probably, a few months. If this is all a scam, it will be over long before then."

"We can do some checking first," Kimberly countered firmly. "You said that Dawson 's father sold a farm in Beaverton. Real estate transactions are public records. We can also search for the arrest record of Ronald Dawson."

"One step ahead of you. Luke already pulled Dawson 's rap sheet. That checks out. Now he's working on the real estate records."

"Well, there you go!" Kimberly clapped her hands. She seemed genuinely excited. Rainie shook her head. She wished she could share the girl's enthusiasm. There was a numbness inside her, though. A sense of dread she couldn't shake. Or maybe it was simply the stunning realization that she was more vulnerable than she'd ever realized. And even as she told herself she knew better, there was something new and soft growing in her belly. Not numbness. Hope.

Thirty-two years old. The last fifteen years with no plans for Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter. Always working the holiday shifts because what else was she going to do? Always watching other people go home to their families at the end of the day, moaning about their in-laws, bellyaching about the demands of another family gathering, joking about the bad presents on Father's Day. Sometimes the whole concept of a family seemed like an exclusive club to her. Other people were members. She was the perennial outsider, the guest who got the pity invite, but never really belonged at the table.

She wished Quincy was awake. She wished… She would like to talk to him right now. Maybe, she'd even like to lean her head against his shoulder and have him tell her it was going to be okay. You have to have faith, he'd told her. She wished it were really that simple.

"Eight months ago," Rainie told Kimberly softly, "a man started calling around Bakersville, trying to find my mother. Luke told me about it a few months later, but never gave me the man's name as it didn't seem important. The man was Ronald Dawson. Luke still had the name listed in his notes. A few weeks after Ronnie's first call, the assistant district attorney dropped the criminal charges against me. At the time, I thought Quincy had intervened. In fact, I was really angry with him for it. But I called the ADA after meeting Mitz this afternoon. Quincy never talked to him. The district attorney himself was the one who asked for the charges to be dropped. He's about to run for office again. And according to the ADA, his campaign recently received a healthy donation from a local citizen – otherwise known as Ronald Dawson."

"Well there you go, Rainie. The timing isn't coincidental at all. Ronald Dawson started looking for you nearly a year ago, and you have proof."

"Tristan Shandling's been active for at least twenty months. He could still be part of this."

"But he was focused on Mandy then, and after that, my mother. He can't be on both sides of the country at once."

"Sure you can. The magic of the telephone, Internet, cable. Plus, it's just an eight-hour plane ride. You can visit the West Coast for a day. It's not fun, but it's feasible."

"There are cheaper and simpler ways of targeting you than paying off a DA," Kimberly countered, "not to mention meddling in a criminal case."

"I don't think cheap or simple are particular concerns of Mr. Shandling right now. He's on the warpath. So what if he runs up the ol' Visa?"

Kimberly frowned. "Do you, or don't you, want this man to be your father?"

"I don't know. I just… I don't know."

Kimberly was silent for a moment. Then she said, "Rainie, I never realized you were so pessimistic."

"Oh God, we have to get you back to college."

"It's true! You may be on the verge of something wonderful, but you'd rather steel yourself for the downside than inspire yourself with the good. Oh…" Kimberly blinked. "You and my father, I get it."

"Oh, no. Don't you go there right now. I really don't need this right now."

She might as well have not spoken. "I was so sure my father was the holdout in your relationship," Kimberly declared. "I mean, given his distant relationship with his father, his reserve with his own children, his fears of intimacy with my mother. But this time around, it's not Dad, is it? It's you. You're the one who doesn't trust the relationship."