Chapter 37
The hearing was going the way Wes had warned him it might.
Dale’s attorney had gone first, laying out a version of events that was technically true and entirely poisoned. He spoke of a property under active county scrutiny. A construction site that had drawn complaints. A pattern—a regrettable, worrying pattern—of instability.
Then, in a measured and sorrowful voice, he listed all the reasons Grace wasn’t safe with the Kings. The shooting on Main Street this week. The fact that law enforcement had been summoned to Refuge Cove multiple times.
“It simply isn’t a safe environment for a child, Your Honor.” Dale’s attorney sat down, resting his case.
Every word he’d spoken was true. That was the worst part.
Dale had petitioned for custody of Grace as her uncle—Richard’s brother and her blood relative. On paper, a blood uncle outranked a household of people who weren’t related to her at all. The Kings had no claim of blood to Grace. They only had the six months they’d spent loving her.
In the courtroom, Micah sat behind Naomi, close enough to be support and far enough to be proper.
He’d come as the man dating her. But he’d also come as the sheriff, and he’d already told the court, in a short and careful statement, that the King family hadn’t caused a single disturbance.
They’d simply reported crimes committed against them.
When Kori called Luke to the stand, he took the oath and answered her questions about Refuge Cove—the permits pulled, the inspections passed, the fifteen years he’d spent building structures that didn’t fail the people inside them.
He kept his voice even as he talked about the foundation depth and the electrical sign-off and the county’s own approved plans. He said the truest things he knew.
Then Dale’s attorney rose to cross-examine, and Luke felt the trap before the man opened his mouth.
“Mr. King, is it true a firearm was discharged near members of your family this week?”
“Yes.” He held the man’s gaze and gave him nothing more.
The attorney turned from the judge back to Luke.
“Is it true that your wife is currently living at Refuge Cove and that she’s being sought by a criminal organization?
And that the incidents your family has reported—the shooting, the repeated law enforcement calls—are directly connected to her presence on that property? ”
The courtroom went quiet.
Luke looked at Kori. She gave him nothing. There was nothing to give.
He couldn’t say we’re being hunted. He couldn’t say the danger isn’t us—it’s aimed at us. He couldn’t explain any of it without blowing open everything Jenna had fought to keep sealed.
“Yes or no, Mr. King.”
Luke’s jaw flexed. “Yes.”
One word. It cost him everything.
He could only sit there and answer yes to questions designed to make his family look like a powder keg with a baby inside it.
When he stepped down, he didn’t look at Jenna. He couldn’t.
Through all of it, Dale sat in his pressed shirt with his hands folded, the picture of a grieving family’s last decent man. He didn’t fidget or glance back. Instead he had the stillness of a man who already knew the outcome of this hearing.
Then the judge asked about Sissy Sutton, Grace’s mother.
Sissy was in prison, and Sissy’s wishes carried weight no one else’s in this room did.
Luke had assumed—they’d all assumed—that she’d still wanted Grace left with the family who’d been raising her.
She’d insisted that Dale Harding and the rest of Richard’s family were not to be trusted.
That was what it had been when Naomi had seen her at the prison last time. The same as it had been all along.
Her attorney rose and read from a single sheet of paper. “My client wishes the court to know that Ms. Sutton is no longer opposed to her daughter being placed with the Harding family.”
Family.
The word landed wrong. Sissy knew what the Hardings were. She’d said so herself, to Naomi’s face, not two weeks ago.
The words hit Luke like cold water.
Naomi’s head turned. Caleb went rigid. The same question moved through all of them at once, unspoken and sickening.
Had the Hardings gotten to Sissy?
It would be easy for them. After all, Richard sat in the same prison system. The same reach that had pulled Jenna’s name out of a cell could lean on a frightened young mother just as easily.
Sissy had every reason to fear the Hardings and not one good way to fight them from the inside.
Luke didn’t know if Grace’s own mother was about to give her to the man hunting all of them.
And there was no way, in this room, to ask.
The judge listened to the rest with a neutrality that gave Luke nothing to hold onto. When she finally spoke, it was to order exactly what Dale’s side had been angling for. A home study, completed by the county over the next two weeks.
The timing couldn’t be worse.
However, at least Grace would remain with Naomi—for now.
It wasn’t a loss. Luke knew it wasn’t a loss. Not yet.
But Dale’s attorney had planted doubt in a judge’s mind, with two weeks to grow. Most likely, their home study would be written by people the Barones had already bought.
His family hadn’t come here to win today.
They’d come to be slowly, legally bled.
Dale found Luke and Jenna in the hallway after the hearing. Naomi and Caleb were talking to Kori.
When Luke saw him coming, every muscle in his back went tight.
Dale stopped a polite distance away, his hands in his pockets and a mild smile in place.
“Luke.” He nodded. “Sorry it’s got to be this way. Family’s family. I just want what’s best for my brother’s little girl.”
Then his gaze slid to Jenna, and his smile warmed. “Jenna! Good to see you again. How’s that tire holding up?”
Beside him, Jenna went still.
She’d mentioned in passing that Dale had helped her with her tire.
Luke had known from the moment he’d heard the story that Dale’s actions hadn’t been a kindness, and their encounter hadn’t been chance.
The whole thing had all been calculated to send a message.
“It’s holding fine.” Jenna’s voice came out level.
“Glad to hear it.” Dale’s eyes stayed on her, warm on the surface and flat beneath. “A single woman can’t be too careful. You never know who’s out there . . .”
Luke’s jaw locked so hard it ached.
Dale’s smile deepened by a fraction. He leaned in, just slightly, and dropped his voice so it carried no further than the three of them. “You take care of yourself . . . Ellie.”