Free A Family Kind of Gal by Lisa Jackson Page A

said as Charcoal mewed loudly at the back door.
    â€œYou want a bite?”
    â€œYou bet,” she lied, trying to push her worries about her son far to the back of her mind. She’d deal with Stephen when he arrived home. “A big bite.” She pushed open the screen door. Charcoal slunk into the kitchen.
    Christina, holding out her prize, started to run up the back steps.
    â€œWatch out!”
    Too late. With a shriek Christina stumbled over one of Stephen’s in-line skates and pitched headlong on to the porch. Tin pie plate, grass and clumps of mud flew into the air.
    Tiffany was through the door in a second, picking up her daughter just as Christina took in a huge breath and let out another wail guaranteed to wake the dead in the entire Rogue River Valley. Tears streamed and blood began to trickle from a raspberry-like scratch on Christina’s knee.
    â€œMom-meeee!” Christina sobbed as Tiffany held her.
    â€œShh, baby, you’ll be fine.” Tiffany hauled her daughter into the house to the small bathroom off the kitchen.
    â€œIt hurts!”
    â€œI know, I know, but Mommy will fix it.”
    In the medicine cabinet she found antiseptic and a clean washcloth. As Christina, seated on the edge of the counter, wriggled and sucked in her breath, Tiffany washed each scratch and cut on her knee and chin.
    The doorbell rang.
    Probably the officer with Stephen in tow. “I’ll be right there!” she called out over Christina’s whispers. Balancing her daughter, she reached into the medicine cabinet for a package of bandages.
    The bell chimed sharply again.
    â€œJust hold your horses,” Tiffany muttered, placing a bandage over the biggest area of Christina’s wounds. “Come on, sweetie, we’d better answer the door.” She tossed the washcloth into the sink, picked up her sniffling daughter and carried her to the front door. Expecting to have to apologize to a police officer and Stephen, she yanked on the knob and found herself face-to-face with J.D.
    â€œYou were going to get me a key,” he reminded her.
    â€œRight.” His key had been the last thing on her mind. He shot a look at Christina, and his brows drew into a single, condemning line. “I didn’t think about it. The back door was unlocked.” She shuffled her daughter from one hip to the other while Christina blinked back tears.
    â€œWhat happened here?” J.D. asked.
    â€œI falled down!” Christina said with more than a little pride. All of a sudden she was like a soldier home from battle, showing off her war wounds.
    â€œThat you did.” Tiffany pressed her lips to Christina’s curly crown. “Well, come on in—” She waved to the back of the house and then stopped short as she looked over his shoulder toward the street. “Oh, no.”
    J.D. turned in time to see a police cruiser easing up to the curb. His gut coiled, an automatic reaction from too many conflicts with the law when he was a kid. In the house, Tiffany paled, and J.D. realized that for a beautiful woman, she looked like hell. Her normally cool facade had slipped, her hair was falling out of a makeshift ponytail, and her clothes—faded jeans and a sleeveless blouse—wrinkled and smudged with dirt, were a far cry from her usually neat and tidy, no-nonsense appearance.
    â€œExcuse me.” Like a brush fire devouring dry grass, she was past him in an instant. Holding her daughter to her, she dashed down the two steps of the porch to the edge of the lawn, where shade trees lined the narrow street.
    J.D. followed, his eyes narrowing as the rear door of the police car opened and Stephen sheepishly crawled out. All of J.D.’s worst fears congealed right then and there, and he wondered if Tiffany was at the end of her rope as far as the kids were concerned.
    Christina was dirty and bleeding, like a refugee from a war zone. Stephen didn’t look much better. Most of his