and then waxed until it shone. Similarly, the floor and all the fixtures gleamed and not a single cobweb lingered in the corners of the windows. If this was Callie’s doing, it was impressive, though she needed to increase her understanding of boundaries.
“Um, are you going to tell her?” Callie asked.
“I should,” Kate said.
“Mom.” Aaron’s voice rose in protest. He hated it when people got in trouble, probably because that’s where he found himself so often.
Unjustly fired only a week ago, Kate was quick to sympathize. “I won’t,” she reassured her, “but I’d like an explanation.”
The girl sipped her water. “I, um, I’ve been staying in the houses I cleaned, the ones that are empty,” she confessed. “I never bothered anybody and I always cleaned up after myself, a hundred percent. I didn’t know you’d be coming today, I swear. I had you down for tomorrow.”
“We decided to come up early.” Kate studied the girl’s troubled eyes, the pinched and worried forehead. “Where’s your family, Callie?”
“I don’t have a family,” she said flatly.
“That needs a little more explanation.”
“My mom’s away and I’ve never known my dad.” She shook back her hair, acting as though it didn’t matter to her.
“So are you homeless?” Aaron asked.
Callie plucked a cherry and ate it. “I’m supposed to be in a foster home, but I had to leave the last one. I couldn’t stay there.”
“Why not?” Aaron asked.
Callie’s eyes, as gray and turbulent as the lake during storm season, expressed a truth Kate knew she would not utter in front of Aaron.
“I didn’t really get along with the family,” the girl said.
“You can stay with us,” Aaron said.
Kate nearly choked on a cherry.
Fortunately, Callie anticipated her reaction. “I wouldn’t do that to you and your mom, kid,” she said, pushing back from the table. “Totally time to clip. I’ll go up and get my stuff and then I’ll be out of your hair.” She headed for the stairs.
As Kate watched her go, something about Callie touched a chord in her. The girl moved awkwardly within an oversize gray sweat suit, and she kept her head partially ducked as though anticipating a blow. Yet despite the ugly sweats and dirty bare feet, there was a touch of teenage vanity. Her fingernails and toenails were painted a beautiful shade of pink.
Aaron eyed Kate reproachfully.
“Don’t even say it,” Kate warned, getting up. “I’ll go talk to her.”
“I knew it,” he said, shooting out of his seat and punching the air.
“You can go play with Bandit while I sort this out.”
In the big bedroom, Callie had opened the drapes to let in a flood of afternoon sunlight. A large backpack was propped by the door, and Callie was busy putting the sheets on the bed.
“I used my sleeping bag, honest,” she said. “I didn’t use your linens.” She tucked the fitted sheet around one corner of the mattress.
Kate tucked the opposite corner. “I’m not worried about the linens,” she said. “I’m worried about you. How old are you, Callie?”
“I’ll be, um, eighteen in July,” she said, her gaze shifting nervously. “That’ll be good because I’ll be a legal adult and I can do whatever I want.”
Kate wondered what she wanted but decided to start with a different set of questions. Callie didn’t look as though she was nearly eighteen. There was a subtle softness and roundness in her face and a haunted, lost look in her eyes that made her seem younger. “Talk to me, Callie,” she said. “I’m not going to turn you over to the authorities. Where are you from?”
Callie opened the top sheet with a snap. The motion stirred a golden flurry of dust motes as though the house was waking up. The air was filled with the sunny smell of clean laundry.
“California,” she said.
“That narrows it down,” Kate commented. “Do you mind telling me why you were in foster care?”
“Because my mother belonged to this creepy commune,” she said, giving up the information without resistance. “It was near Big Sur, and it was supposed to be this incredible self-sufficient utopia.” Callie must have noticed Kate’s surprised glance. “They homeschooled us, and some of us actually got a decent education. Brother Timothy—he was the founder—has a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Berkeley.” She opened the cedar chest at the end of the bed. “Is this quilt okay?”
Kate nodded and helped unfold the quilt, a sturdy, colorful family heirloom stitched by one of the Livingston women a couple of generations back.
“So, this Brother Timothy?” she prompted, sensing Callie’s dislike.
“He’s not anybody’s brother and I’m sure by now Berkeley’s ashamed to claim him. He’s doing time for child molestation.”
Kate’s skin crawled. “Are you one of his victims?” she asked.
Callie worked with brisk agitation, creating perfect hospital corners. “When I was a kid, I had fun living there. We ran around and swam in the ocean and actually had a couple of good teachers. But once we hit puberty, pow. We didn’t get to be kids anymore. Brother Timothy called us—the younger girls—his angels.”
Kate abandoned making the bed. She sat on the side of the bed and motioned for Callie to do the same. “Didn’t your mother …” She hesitated, knowing she ought to choose her words carefully. “Do you think the adults in the commune were aware of this?”
Callie snorted and nodded her head. “None of the mothers lifted a finger to stop him. They were all, like, under his spell or something. He convinced them that we were their gifts to him. Even if a girl got hysterical and fought back, the mothers made her go to Brother Timothy. They did everything they were told, like they were Stepford hippies, you know?”
“That’s a nightmare,” Kate said. “You’re telling me.”
Kate noticed that Callie hadn’t answered her question about whether or not she was one of Brother Timothy’s victims. “So is this commune … still around?”
“Nope. This girl named Gemma O’Donnell, like, three years ago, she saved us all.” Callie studied the floor. “Gemma kept trying to tell someone what was going on, and every once in a while, somebody from social services or the school district would come up and take a look around but they never found anything. To an outsider, it looked like utopia—vegetable gardens, a flower farm, our own milk cows, everybody reading William Carlos Williams. Nobody listened to Gemma until she finally found a way to make them listen.” Callie paused, took a gulp of air. “She went to the Big Sur Family Services Agency and threatened to kill herself if they didn’t believe her.” Callie’s voice lowered to a shaky whisper. “She was pregnant by Brother Timothy. They took him away, and I never saw Gemma again. I don’t know what ever happened to her or the baby.”
Kate put her hand on the girl’s shoulder. The girl flinched and Kate removed it. “I’m sorry. I hope things got better for you after that.”
“They did for some of us,” she said. “For me, for a while. But in the last home I was placed in, well, that was bad so I had to leave.”
“Callie, where’s your mother?”
Callie dropped her gaze. She picked at her nails. “I haven’t seen her in over a year.”
“Do you think she might be worried about you?”
“She should have worried about