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There were too many unanswered questions, too many possibilities. A runaway? Victim of abuse? Was her family frantically searching for her this very minute?
But pressing her for information right now might make her flee back out into the night. “I’ll make us some cocoa, and then we’ll get you settled. Okay?”
Mandy pulled the blankets tighter around her shoulders and gave a weary nod.
In the kitchen, Jolie pulled a box of cocoa-mix packets and a bag of mini-marshmallows out of the cupboard, then filled a glass two-cup measure with water and put it in the microwave to heat.
The girl was pregnant and alone, Jolie mused as she prepared the cocoa and set it on a tray. Maybe Mandy was afraid to tell her family...or maybe they’d booted her out of the house.
When she returned to the great room, Jolie set the tray down on the coffee table that stood between the couch and fireplace. “Here you go, honey. A little cocoa will warm you up and help you relax.”
Mandy didn’t move. The blankets over her rose gently and fell with the deep respirations of sleep. Firelight flickered over her delicate features, accenting the dark circles under her eyes and the bruise—faded now to yellow—that Jolie had first seen at the clinic.
“What happened to you, Mandy?” Jolie whispered as she tucked the blankets snugly over the girl’s thin shoulders.
Her cell phone vibrated against Jolie’s hip. She moved to her bedroom and shut the door before answering the call.
“Jolie? Are you all right?” Rafe’s deep voice was laced with concern. “You didn’t leave much of a message.”
“I’ve got...a girl here. She appeared at my door at midnight. Apparently walked clear up to my cabin alone.”
Rafe gave a low whistle. “Is she okay?”
“She walked in the door, seems coherent. An old, good-size bruise on her face, wary of even giving me her last name. A runaway, maybe? Trouble at home? I don’t know...she seems awfully scared.” Jolie cleared her throat. “And she’s pregnant.”
“I’m already on my way. I’ll be there within fifteen minutes. Can you keep her from leaving?”
Jolie gave a quiet chuckle. “She’s not going anywhere fast—the poor thing looks exhausted. Right now she’s asleep on my couch.”
“I can take her to the sheriff’s office down in Big Timber.”
“No...please. I think she’s better off here, really. At least for tonight.”
“We’ll talk when I get there.”
His truck pulled up to a stop in front of the cabin twenty minutes later. Jolie met him at the door and ushered him in, a finger at her lips. “She’s still asleep.”
At six foot four, he towered over her and probably intimidated most suspects with just a level stare, but Thea’shusband also had an infinitely gentle side that showed in his eyes as he looked down at Mandy.
“I should have guessed,” he whispered. “This poor kid has had it rough.”
“You know her?”
“She’s Mandy Wheeler.”
Jolie looked blankly up at him.
Surprise flared in his eyes. “You don’t know?”
“She didn’t tell me anything, just begged for help and fell asleep on my couch.”
“I told Thea she should say something to you,” he muttered. He hitched a shoulder, cleared his throat, his gaze shifting to the leaping flames in the fireplace. “Mandy’s father is a drunk. She was taken into foster care at least twice before I came to town, and I heard that she and her mom packed up and fled to a relative’s house a few times. Not long ago, the mom left for good.”
“And left her with that man?” Memories of past abuse cases flashed through Jolie’s mind. “That’sterrible.”
In the past, Jolie had provided written statements and had testified in court, but all too often children ended up back in the same bad situation as before, where home was a dangerous place to be.
Their external wounds might heal, but emotional scars lasted forever.
