level. "And she's not going to get any more money. She's not going to
win."
Slowly, mechanically, Seth shook his head back and forth. "You don't
know her."
"I know pieces of her. She's smart enough to know we're set on keeping
you with us. That we love you enough to pay." He saw the flash of
emotion in Seth's eyes before the boy lowered them. "And we would pay if
that would end it, if that would ease things. But it won't end or ease
it. It's like you said. She'd just come back."
"What are you going to do?"
"It's what we're going to do now. All of us," he said and waited for
Seth's gaze to settle on his face again. "We'll go on as we've been
going on, mostly. Phil will talk to the lawyer so we got that end
covered."
"You tell him I'm not going back with her," Seth said furiously,
shooting a desperate look at Phillip. "No matter what, I'm not going
back."
"I'll tell him."
"Anna's going to write her a letter," Ethan continued.
"What kind of letter?"
"A smart one," Ethan said with the hint of a smile. "With all those
fifty-dollar words and that official-sounding stuff. She'll be doing it
as your caseworker, to let Gloria know we've got the system and the law
behind us. It might give her pause to think."
"She hates social workers," Seth put in.
"Good." For the first time in more than an hour, Anna smiled and meant
it. "People who hate something are usually afraid of it, too."
"One thing that would help, Seth, if you can do it--"
He turned back to Ethan. "What do I have to do?"
"If you could talk to Anna, tell her how things were before--as close to
exact as you can manage."
"I don't want to talk about it. It's over. I'm not going back."
"I know." Gently, Ethan put his hands on Seth's trembling shoulders.
"And I know talking about it can be almost like being there again. It
took me a long time to be able to tell my mother--to tell Stella. To say
it all out loud, even though she already knew most of it. It started to
get better after that. And it helped her and Ray get the legal crap
handled."
Seth thought of High Noon, of heroes. Of Ethan. "It's the right thing to
do?"
"Yeah, it's the right thing."
"Will you come with me?"
"Sure." Ethan rose, held out a hand. "We'll go home and talk it
through."
Chapter Fourteen
"ready? mama? time to go?"
"Almost, Aubrey." Grace put the finishing touches on her potato salad,
sprinkling paprika on to give it zest and color.