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have a baby so he’d died without knowing. She’d somehow allowed her daughter to get sick, hadn’t realized her illness was more than the usual childhood head cold so that infection and fever destroyed her kidney function. She had abandoned hope of obtaining a kidney for her through normal channels and opted for an underhanded alternative. And now she’d drugged and tied up the one man most likely to destroy her, and Lainey with her, if he found out just who Janna was and what she was doing.
    Regardless, Janna wasn’t sure there was anything she could have done differently. She’d followed her heart, always. She’d loved her daughter and cared for her the best she could. She’d tried so hard to make the right decisions, especially in the past few weeks. Clay showing up had been a shock, yet too perfect an opportunity to pass up; it was as if she had conjured him out of thin air, or else some higher power had delivered him to her. Not that she was particularly superstitious or religious, or even aware of feeling that way at the time. No, she’d simply moved as in a dream to keep Clay Benedict at the camp where he was needed.
    The idea of introducing her daughter to the Benedicts had been at the back of Janna’s mind when she’d first contacted Denise about staying at the camp. Second thoughts had hit her almost immediately. They were far too upstanding and law-abiding to risk bringing them into the present situation. What if they not only refused to help, but once they learned about Dr. Gower, moved to stop the surgery? What if they tried to take Lainey from her as Matt’s father had threatened the one time she’d spoken to him?
    The reason she’d decided to come in the end, was that Denise had said she could have the old place rent-free. Passing up the offer was not something Janna could afford. Her time at the camp would be limited after all, she’d thought; with any luck she would be gone without the Benedicts ever knowing she’d been near them.
    So much for that idea.
    What in the name of heaven was she going to do with Clay Benedict? Second thoughts about what she intended plagued her, but she was terrified of releasing him. Suppose Arty was right? If Benedict decided to make her pay for holding him, if he had her arrested for assault, what would become of Lainey? It was dangerous to keep the man but she couldn’t let him go.
    A quiet sound came from down the hall behind her. She stood listening. It was Lainey laughing. She mustbe awake from the afternoon nap she took every day, and either playing with the raccoon that Arty had brought her last week or had put one of her cartoon movies in her video player. Janna was turning her attention back to the window when she heard a chuckle in a husky and much too male baritone.
    She felt her heart jar in her chest. Whirling around, she ran from the kitchen. The door of the extra bedroom was closed. She shoved it open so hard that it banged against the wall, then plunged inside.
    Lainey sat on the bed beside Clay Benedict just as she had earlier, curled up within the circle of his bound arms while he propped his back against the headboard. She was smoothing with her small fingers at the red ridges that marked his arms where the restraint held them. As the pair looked up, her daughter’s expression was tinged with guilt, but that of the man who held her mirrored unadulterated mockery.
    “I thought I told you to stay out of here, young lady,” Janna said in grim reprimand.
    “He was lonesome, Mama. I asked him if he was and he said yes.”
    “That isn’t your problem. Come here at once.” Janna moved a cautious step nearer the bed.
    Her daughter frowned as she watched her. “It’s all right, you don’t have to grab me again. We’re only talking. I don’t see what’s wrong with talking.”
    She wouldn’t of course. Lainey had never met a stranger in her life. In spite of all Janna could do, she struck up conversations with people in the hallway of their