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laws. You can’t just take the boy to Canada and adopt him.”
    â€œI didn’t suggest adopting him. We spend our lives helping people.” She stood and paced his beige carpet. “We sew up their wounds and try to keep them from starving; it’s what we’ve given our lives to. So now we have a single boy who is desperate for help. How do we help him?”
    â€œWe help him by saving his life! We deliver him to the blessed United States of America in one piece. We give him the opportunity to live a life few can even dream about where he came from. What are you talking about? Don’t turn him into your little pet, Leiah. You may feel all messed up limping back home, but that doesn’t give you the right to use him as your sweet little bundle of validation.”
    â€œHow dare you say that!” She let the question ring through the room. “How dare you say that? You have no idea about me. You think that’s all he is to me? Some teddy bear to keep me from crying at night? Who could make a comment like that?”
    His ears were ringing and he suddenly felt hot. “Who? Someone who hasn’t consigned themselves to hiding from the world.”
    â€œAnd that would be me, right?” She spoke bitterly. “You see me as the poor burned nurse who has fled the world in shame? You, on the other hand, are the world’s savior, rushing about tending to the less fortunate. Is that it?”
    â€œI didn’t say that.”
    They sat quietly for a few moments. Jason shook his head, angry at their harsh words. She was a stubborn woman; that much had been obvious from the start. But in the three days he’d spent in Leiah’s company, he had seen beyond the shell she wore and he knew a good heart when he saw one. Hers was better than good. It was an odd chemistry between them that allowed them to squabble like this, as though they had known each other all their lives and held no compunction in dumping their thoughts on one another.
    â€œMaybe, just maybe the boy deserves better than either of us,” he said, and he knew it made no sense. “Either way, our hands are tied.”
    She didn’t respond, but neither did she break her glare.
    â€œLook, the kid’s going to the orphanage, and that’s it. I’m an agriculturalist, for heaven’s sake, not a nanny. I can’t believe we’re even having this conversation.”
    â€œExcuse me.”
    They both spun to the small voice at the same time. Caleb stood in the hall, staring at them with wide eyes. He was out of bed and he’d just spoken in English.
    â€œExcuse me. Could you not speak so loudly, please?” he said.
    With that the boy simply turned around, walked back down the hall, and disappeared into his room.
    Jason stared after Caleb, stunned by his use of such clear English. He’d understood everything, then. Not just here, but in the Jeep and on the plane.
    He turned to Leiah, who had fixed her jaw. She looked at him sternly, as if to say, You see? And you want to throw him to the wolves?
    â€œIt’s late; we’re both tired,” Jason said. “We should get some sleep.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry; I don’t know why I said those things. I had no right.”
    Her expression softened a little but not much. “Like you said, we’re both tired.” It was all she offered.
    Jason stood and retrieved a key from the wall. “I’ll show you to your room.”
    He led her out back to the detached garage he’d converted into a small guesthouse for his mother-in-law’s extended stay after Stephen’s birth. The main house was too small to share with in-laws for three months, he’d decided. That was before taking a pickax to the cement slab in the converted garage to make room for the bathroom’s plumbing. Suffice it to say that the project had sharpened his use of profanity. After Ailsa’s untimely departure