Free Closer Home by Kerry Anne King

Captain of the football team. He was smoking-hot and he drove this GTO that could peel rubber in third gear. All the girls drooled over him.”
    She looks at the picture again, and then at me. She deflates a little. “You don’t think much of him.”
    That is putting it mildly. Back then, I was blinded by his good looks and popularity, but unless he’s done a full about-face, he is definitely not father material.
    “People change,” I say, as much to myself as to her. “He could have legitimately found Jesus and have a calling. But I can’t imagine he’s going to be ecstatic to have an illegitimate daughter come crashing into his world.”
    Her eyes light up and she grins. “I know, right? Like a bomb in the middle of his pretentious, hypocritical life.”
    “You don’t know that he’s a hypocrite. Like I said, people change.”
    “He looks like a hypocrite.”
    She has a point. Kelvin looks more like a seedy used-car salesman than a man of God.
    “He lives in Portland. How are you going to get there?”
    “There are these flying things called planes.”
    Only a teenager can produce this level of sarcasm. I take a breath and keep my voice level. “Where do you plan on staying? How are you going to afford all this?”
    She shrugs. “I have money.”
    “So, what’s the plan? You’re just going to talk to him? A meet-the-candidate sort of thing?”
    “No, I want to actually know. I can get a paternity testing kit at Walmart.”
    “Oh, come on. Walmart offers pretty near everything, I know, but—”
    She clicks a bookmark on the laptop and brings up a product description screen.
Identi-Match. Paternity DNA testing from the comfort of your home. 100 percent reliable.
     
    “You’ve been a busy girl.” Apparently, all it takes is a DNA swab and the United States Postal Service to determine the father of your baby. I read through the fine print, partly because I can’t believe it’s that easy. Partly just to buy time.
    “It won’t stand up in court.”
    “I’m not doing this so I can get child support.”
    “Suppose you tell me why you are doing it, then. Really. Because if you’re searching for another parent to love and look out for you, you’re probably better off hanging out with me.”
    Her lips thin into a hard line, and she slams the laptop closed. “You’re not a parent. You’re barely even an aunt.”
    Touché. Whoever her father is, I didn’t do any better than he did. I locked Callie out of my world, and shut Ariel out right along with her.
    “Just forget it,” she says. “Forget I said anything, okay? It’s not like I need your help.” Tears underlie the words, even though her eyes are dry.
    God, I suck at this. But I’m not running away again, not letting her shove me out the door. I inherited the same stubborn gene as Callie has apparently passed on to her daughter.
    “I don’t want to forget it. But you need to think this through. What do you think is going to happen when you show up—at a preacher’s house, no less—and announce that maybe he’s your father? He’s not likely to welcome you with open arms.”
    “I don’t care. It’s not like I want to live with him or anything. I just want to know if it’s him. Okay?”
    It’s not that I have any empathy for Kelvin. He deserves to have his world torn apart. In fact, if that’s what Ariel’s little visit is going to do, then I’d love to be a part of it. I try to summon up the strength to do what I’m sure is the right thing. I’m the responsible one. It’s my job to stop her.
    Studying her profile as she adds a T-shirt to her suitcase, the idea of managing her strikes me as ludicrous. I’d have to lock her in a room. Probably with handcuffs on. That face is not built for acquiescence. I catch myself trying to puzzle out the ancestry of her bone structure, the jaw that would be square in a man but is rounded just enough to be feminine, the sculpted planes of her cheekbones and forehead. She didn’t get