Free The Stranger Next Door by Peg Kehret

tell from Blake’s expression that the question was important.
    “Your mother and I were hoping you wouldn’t ask that,” Blake said, “but since you have, you deserve an honest answer. The reason the drug smuggler called A-One Auto—the reason your mother was offered the chance to get ten thousand dollars per deal—is that the drug smuggler, the man she’s testifying against, is your father.”
    Rocky could not answer. He felt as if he were living a bad dream, hearing words that could not possibly have been spoken.
    “We think he called A-One Auto as a way to help you,” Blake said. “He never sent any support money because he didn’t want anyone, even you and your mother, to know where he was. If we had gone along with the scheme, we still wouldn’t have known his location. We believe he felt guilty about neglecting you, and he was trying to get some large sums of money to you through the shop. He knew that if your mother and I were involved in the illegal drug deals, his connection would be kept secret. He gambled that your mother would cooperate in order to make your future financially secure.”
    “That’s why she is the only witness who can convict him,” Mr. Franklin said. “She recognized his voice. She can swear that he made those phone calls.”
    “How did the police know where to find him?” Rocky asked. “Were the phone calls traced?”
    “The FBI has had him under surveillance for years,” Mr. Franklin said. “All we needed was proof that he’s sending drugs into this country.”
    His father. Rocky had wondered dozens of times what his father was like, but his mother had given only vague answers.
    “Is that why she divorced him?” Rocky asked.
    “She suspected he was connected with illegal activities, but she didn’t know what they were. She divorced him because he lied to her.”
    “Oh.”
    “I’m sorry she isn’t here to tell you this,” Blake said. “We probably should have told you from the start, but we worried how you would feel if you knew. Your mother has always wanted you to think that your father is a good person who loves you but doesn’t know how to show it.”
    “Instead, my father is an international drug dealer,” Rocky said.
    “In spite of what he did, I think he loves you,” Blake said. Then he added softly, “And so do I.”
    Rocky nodded. He didn’t remember his father at all. Blake was the one who had fixed broken toys and played catch and gone to conferences with Rocky’s teachers. Blake was the one who coached Little League and readbedtime stories and made him (at age five) take a piece of bubble gum back to the store when he had stuck it in his pocket without paying. Blake was his real father.
    Still, it hurt to know that the man who was his biological parent was a criminal. In the last couple of days, he had begun to feel that his life was returning to normal, and now this happened.
    All the anger and fear that he had felt the night when they first moved returned. He had done nothing wrong; why should he have to change his name and leave his friends and his dog? Why should he have to be afraid that someone, whose name he didn’t even know, was hunting for his family, wanting to kill them?
    “Doesn’t it seem odd,” Blake said, “that only five days after we move in, our house goes up in flames?”
    “It is very strange,” Mr. Franklin said, “especially on the eve of your wife’s testimony. The arson squad will look at the evidence carefully, and so will the FBI.”
    “What do we do now?” Blake asked. “We can’t live in motels forever, and we don’t want to leave this area unless we have to. Rocky just got started in school; it wouldn’t be fair to yank him out and start over again somewhere else.”
    “I don’t think this fire is related to your situation,” Mr. Franklin said, “so you can stay here for now. I’ll talk to Thurgood or Alicia Woolsey tomorrow. They have several unsold houses that are ready for occupancy; I’m