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hours when I awoke to the sounds of her cries. She was sitting up in her crib, tears streaming down her face, and crying for her mama. Doing my best to console her, I picked her up and gently stroked her back, trying to explain who I was in a way she’d understand. Michael woke up and tried to help, but Lola had a death grip on me. I finally calmed her down enough to take her downstairs for something to eat.
    The next two days seemed like a blur. Michael was right about the storms; they skimmed us. Regardless, they were bad enough that the home visit and custody hearing had to be put off for one more day. Lola took to the girls and Sean immediately, and they to her. Michael even dove in, changing diapers and feeding her. I could tell she was definitely growing on him. My mother was in charge of interviewingpotential nannies. With the jobs that Michael and I held, child care for four children would be a nightmare. Day care wasn’t an option. I didn’t want Lola in a million different environments at once, and since Michael and I were in a comfortable financial situation, we could afford it.
    We had family visiting five times a day to meet Lola and by the time I went back to work almost a week later, my head was spinning.

Chapter Four
    I was walking into the police department when I happened upon two uniformed officers standing just outside the door. This was not unusual, of course, but the subject of their conversation caught my attention.
    They were rookies, and for the life of me I couldn’t remember their names, but one of them, a short, pudgy man with glasses, was laughing as he told his partner about his wife’s trip to the grocery store the night before.
    “…they said she didn’t need a man! Can you believe that shit? She called ’em Amish, but the way she described them they sounded like a bunch of fucking Hare Krishnas. Fucking kooks. Couldn’t have been Amish. I ain’t ever heard of them stinky-ass horse niggers promoting feminism before.”
    The other officer began laughing before they noticed I was standing there. The amusement on their faces turned to instant horror at my presence.
    “Oh! I’m sorry, Sergeant, I didn’t know you were—” Red-faced, Pudgy did his best to take back his cultural insensitivity.
    “Tell me again what you just said,” I interrupted.
    “It’s just a figure of speech, Sarge. I didn’t mean anything by it.” His face turned two shades paler at what he clearly thought was going to be an ass chewing from me.
    “I don’t care about that.” I waved my hand at him. “Though you might want to rethink using terms like ‘horse nigger.’ I want to know about the people your wife ran into last night.”
    “Huh?” Realizing he was off the hook, he exhaled the breath he had been holding.
    “The Hare Krishna people,” I said calmly, forcing him to refocus.
    “Oh, yeah, them.” He adjusted his glasses. “I was just telling Logan here that my wife was putting her groceries in the car last night when a group of Amish people came up to her and wanted her to go with them to their farm. Well, I don’t think they were Amish, but she said they were dressed funny and were holding baskets of roses.”
    “Why don’t you believe they were Amish?”
    “For one, they came in some loaded SUV and we know Amish don’t drive cars, let alone a fifty-thousand-dollar utility vehicle like that. Second, she said the women were doing the talking—unheard of for Amish women. She said they saw her wedding ring and asked her if she was truly happy, and if she wasn’t, she could go with them to see what ‘real happiness’ was or some horseshit like that. Sorry, there’s that horse word again.”
    “How many were there?” I asked, ignoring his last remark.
    “I think she said around eight or nine, mostly women. I told her it sounded like some freak cult to me and to stay the hell away from them.”
    I nodded. “Did they give her any names, anything like that?”
    He shook his head.