Outside, faint and low, a motorcycle moved along Clearwater Road.
“Is that one of yours?”
“Yes.”
“Watching the house?”
“Watching the road.”
“Same thing.”
“Not exactly.”
He almost argued, then stopped.
“What do you want?” Raina asked.
“I want tomorrow to happen first.”
“All right.”
“I want to know what CPS says. I want to know if my mom is really going to try.”
“All right.”
“And after that I’ll tell you.”
Raina nodded.
She stood to leave.
At the doorway she stopped.
“Your father would not have sent you to people he did not trust completely.”
Eli looked at her.
“Whatever you are building out of what you learned today, keep that part in the foundation.”
Then she left.
Sandra Veetch arrived at eight-fifty-five the next morning.
She had worked child welfare cases for eleven years and carried the particular combination of compassion and caution that survived only in people who had remained good at difficult work without confusing optimism for evidence.
She wore a gray coat, carried a clipboard, and looked at the repaired porch boards before she crossed them.
Raina answered the door.
“Are you a family member?” Sandra asked.
“Family friend. Darla asked me to be present.”
Darla appeared from the kitchen.
“Yes,” she said. “I did.”
Sandra came inside.
The inspection was thorough without being theatrical. She checked running water, food, heat, sleeping arrangements, school materials, medication storage, the condition of the bathroom, and the safety of the porch. She asked about the stain on the hall ceiling. Raina answered that roof work had been scheduled. Darla corrected her.
“I scheduled it,” Darla said.
Raina looked at her.
Darla held up her phone.
“Monday morning. I called while you were outside.”
Sandra wrote something down.
For forty minutes, Sandra spoke with Darla alone at the kitchen table.
Eli sat in the living room with Raina, hearing only cadence through the wall.
Sandra’s voice was calm and sequential. Darla’s answers came slowly, with pauses, but they came.
“She’s doing well,” Raina whispered once.
Eli nodded.
At ten-forty-seven, Sandra came out.
“I’d like to speak with Eli privately.”
Raina stood without argument and went to the porch.
Sandra sat in the chair opposite him. She placed the clipboard to one side.
“How are you doing?”
“Fine.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
He looked at her.
“I asked how you’re doing.”
The silence after the question was deliberate. Sandra did not rush to fill it.
“I’m managing.”
“That’s a different answer.”
“Yes.”