Page 3 of Chasing Trouble
“I think so too, angel,” Mac agreed, taking the little girl by the arm and gently extricating her from the young boy’s grasp.
‘Witty’tried to stop him, but the little angel with her big blue eyes wasn’t cooperating.Her smile was cherubic as she stared up at him.Clearly, she was enjoying the attention.She dodged the older boy’s hands when they tried to pull her back by the shoulders.
Mac held both of her hands firmly so the boy couldn’t take her without resorting to a tug of war with her little body.“Why do you suppose...Witty...is lying?”he asked, probing for information despite the boy's scowling face.
“Maybe she no like you,” the cherub responded with a child’s blunt honesty, but he caught the gender in the tot’s voice.
“You mean...he...maybe he doesn’t like me,” Mac corrected with a smile.
“Who?Luke?”She looked around at the other boy.
The little girl looked genuinely puzzled, and Mac frowned.“Who is Luke?”
When Amelia pointed to the other boy behind his poacher, he scowled deeper.
“That’s enough, Amelia,” the older boy warned, grabbing his little sister by the arm and pulling her away from Mac.“You keep quiet now, you hear?”He turned to Mac.“I don’t know who you are, but you are not welcome in this house,” he stated gruffly.Now go on and git.”He pointed towards the door.
Mac stood up and looked down at the scowling boy again.“I have no idea who you are, either, but you are the one in the wrong here.You’ve been stealing from me for months, and now I've finally tracked you here.And now that I am here, I’m not leaving until I have an explanation from whoever is responsible for you.”
“Our mother is dead and our father is gone,” Luke volunteered suddenly, stepping out from behind the poacher with the bird in his hands.“Can we keep this bird, mister?Please?I’m sorry Whitney took it from you, but we really want to have it for Thanksgiving tomorrow.Maybe I could do some chores or something for it?”His earnest brown eyes looked up at Mac from a thin, eager face.
Mac's eyes turned to slits as he began to study his poacher intently.“Whitney...that’s not a boy’s name.”
The poacher in question sent his younger sibling a quelling look, but it was too late.His quick mind had already worked it out.
“You’re a girl!”He grabbed the hat off her head, and her braid came tumbling over her shoulders as she backed away.Seeing the fierce, defiant face with curling tendrils of honey-colored hair falling down her temples made his stomach jump.
“You got a problem with that?”
The jut of her chin and the fake male growl were gone, and somehow it changed everything.“If your parents are gone, who is responsible for all of you?”he barked, a growing suspicion forming in his mind.
“I’m not a kid,” Whitney snapped, in a more feminine voice.“I’m plenty old enough to take care of us without anyone else sticking their nose in.”
“And just how old might that be?”he snapped, figuring her for about twelve to fourteen tops.
“That’s none of your business.”
“How long have you kids been up here on your own?”
“That’s none of your business either,” Whitney gritted between clenched teeth.“Now get out.”
She drew herself up to her full height, which had to be all of five feet and two inches, and pointed a trembling finger at the door behind him—no wonder she’d been able to crawl through briar thickets.
Mac folded his thickly muscled arms across his jacket and drawled, “Well, since nothing is my business, I guess I’ll just have to turn this over to the sheriff.After all, poaching another man’s property is against the law, you know.Seeing as how you are all grown up, though, you can handle it.”
He turned to go and was surprised to feel a tug at his arm.Looking down, he saw the pretty little girl pulling on his jacket sleeve.Something wrenched in his heart, and he kneeled to talk to her.“What is it, angel?”
“Don’t go,” she cried plaintively, “Witty not mean it.”She reached out and patted his cheek, the tears welling up in her eyes.
Mac was hooked—noway he could leave now.He picked up the little girl, barely feeling her slight weight, and turned to face the other two.
“I don’t know what’s going on here, but I want explanations, and I want them right now.”
He carried Amelia to what passed for a kitchen table and sat on one of the rickety chairs.It creaked when he sat down, and he hoped it would hold his weight.
“I’m not going anywhere until I get them,” he finished firmly, dangling Amelia on his knee as she cradled her small blonde head trustingly against his brown jacket.Her threadbare, pink-checked gingham dress fell over his thigh, and he frowned at the state of her clothing.
Whitney’s eyes held panic and fear as she gazed at him, and Mac was reminded of a deer just before it bolts from a hunter.There was nowhere to go, though, because he knew she wouldn’t leave her siblings behind.There was no denying her protective streak.This girl was doing her best to survive in the hills—but it wouldn’t be enough if they were up here alone.
