“And what if they do?”

“Pray they don’t,” was all he replied.

CHAPTER TEN

“Did you see anything?” Charles asked as we exited the jeep.

Karina came to my side smiling and opened the door for me.

“Yeah, boot prints,” Dingane explained.

Karina’s smile fell but quickly picked back up.

“We’ll have to set watch times then,” Charles said, walking off with Dingane toward his house.

Karina slid her arm through mine.

“Kate and the others will be watching the children at dinner tonight. I thought we’d do something special for your arrival. I’ve made dinner for you myself.”

“Thank you, Karina,” I said, but kept an eye on Charles and Dingane talking animatedly on the front porch. “I look forward to it.”

Karina brought me up her little porch and the men stopped talking. The tension was palpable but Karina forced me through it and we entered the door.

Karina’s little house was beyond charming. It was fairly bare, but the few things she did have, you could tell, meant a lot to her. Lots of old quilts, an entire living room set that looked like it came out of the fifties but was in good shape, well maintained. She had at least a million pictures of beautiful, smiling faces. I studied them one by one.

“Who is this?” I asked her when I came upon one of a small boy with Charles and Karina who looked to be in their twenties. I was right, of course, she was unbelievably gorgeous.

“Oh, that’s Isaac. He was our first boy here.” She started laughing and shook her head. “He was so mischievous and we had absolutely no idea what we were doing.” She picked the frame up and studied it. “He’s like a son to me.”

“Where is he now?” I asked quietly.

“America. We helped him, or rather Harrison helped him, get there. He educated himself and now he sends us a monthly stipend that helps feeds the children here.”

“Oh my God,” I whispered more to myself than to Karina.

“He is a very good boy. Married now, though I’ve never met his wife. They have a little girl themselves. It’s all very lovely.”

“It sounds it,” I told her honestly. I thought on something. “Does Pembrook often help you get children over there?”

“I cannot count the number of times Harrison has either helped adopt them out or helped them emigrate.”

I wondered why Pembrook had never talked about that before. I wondered if he thought me too selfish to bring the subject up at all. That thought sent me down a shame spiral I needed to sit from so I plopped myself on one of Karina’s chairs.

Charles and Karina’s house was essentially one giant room. The living area was at the door. The little dining area and kitchen were at the back and shared a space with the living. The only rooms I could see not part of the main room were the bedroom and bathroom and I assumed those were off to the side through the only doors I could recognize besides the front door. All in all, the entire house looked to be a thousand square feet, about the size of my parent’s pantry back home and yet they were the most happy people I’d ever had the pleasure of meeting.

I watched Karina, Charles and Dingane spill into the tiny dining area set next to the miniscule kitchen, smelled the wonderful aroma of whatever garlic-infused dish Karina was cooking and pondered over their simple yet incredibly complicated lives. One thing I could say for certain was they were infinitely more content than I’d ever felt my entire life.

Dingane, laughing boisterously, broke me from my revelry.

“Come join us, Sophie,” Karina said, patting the chair beside her and opposite Dingane.

I hoisted myself up and stumbled to the chair feeling the day’s work in my back and legs. I smiled at them as I sat.

“We were laughing at a very old story,” Charles offered to bring me into the conversation.

“Yes, old but very sweet,” Karina chimed in.

“It’s the story of how they met,” Dingane said, surprising me. My head whipped his direction and I watched his eyes light up as he looked on the two of them.

“What is it?” I asked.

Charles smiled at his wife. “Karina was desperately in love with me...”

“A lie!” Karina exclaimed, giggling like a schoolgirl. “You always make me out to be this silly creature and I wasn’t.” She turned my direction and sobered. “Charles exaggerates. I was not in love with him. In fact, it was quite the opposite.”

“I admit it without hesitation. I was most decidedly in love with Karina Smith from the second I laid eyes on her,” Charles added.

“Smith?” Dingane asked. “Was that your maiden name, Karina?”

“Yes, and I was a grade lower than Charles. He and I met at a church function for teens and he politely introduced himself. I had no idea he attended school with me, I just figured he was a local boy, but when he informed me we had chemistry together I was wracking my brain trying to remember him. I told him finally, ‘You’re not in my chemistry class.’ To which he replied dryly, ‘I beg to differ.’”

So Charles was witty.

“I pretended to be offended,” she continued, “but secretly was dying to swoon on the inside. Every day he would meet me at the front doors of school, but I would diligently ignore him, even going so far as to take alternate routes, but he always found me.”

“I was relentless,” Charles added.

“Apparently,” I teased.

Karina sighed. “I may have been attracted to Charles, but there was nothing I could do about it. I wasn’t allowed to date. My father would have killed me, but Charles was so dogged in his insistence that one day I agreed to meet him at a nearby ice cream shop. I had planned to tell him that he was very kind, that I found him to be a sweet boy, but I could not date so he might as well fixate his obsession on another.”

“To which he refused and probably pursued you with even more fervor,” I stated.

“Of course.”

“And you eventually gave in.”

“Naturally. Look at him. Who could refuse?” she asked, smoothing Charles’ cheek over with her thumb.

I watched Dingane smile at the older couple and wondered about his own parents. Mine would never be as sweet or as loving as Charles and Karina and I decided right then and there that I would be gobbling them up as long as I had the opportunity. I would learn from them. I would study them. I would endeavor to be like them.

Dinner tasted amazing and I hadn’t realized just how hungry I’d been. I ate more than my fair share and then immediately felt guilty thinking about Mandisa. The conversation was lively between myself, Charles and Karina or between Dingane, Charles and Karina but the conversation between Dingane and myself was practically nonexistent. A “pass the blank” here or a “hand me that” there.

Karina cleared the plates and a hormonal rage built in my stomach as I watched Dingane fold his napkin on the table over and over and over, creasing each fold tightly with nimble fingers. I wanted to rip it out of his hands, clear the table and attack him with my mouth. How can someone bug the shit out of you so much yet simultaneously cause you to want to know them intimately with your tongue? He was driving me crazy.

We all said our goodbyes on the porch and Karina kissed my cheek after I thanked her for dinner.

As soon as my head hit my pillow, I dreamt of Dingane’s ridiculous hands.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

I woke to someone shaking me.

“Get up,” I heard someone whisper. “Get up,” they said, shaking me more harshly.

I whimpered as I turned around. “Dingane?” I asked, sitting up and smoothing the hair from my face.

“I need your help.”

“What?”

“I’ll explain in the truck. We don’t have time. Get dressed and meet me outside.”

“What time is it?” I asked, throwing back my net.

“Just past midnight.”

And with that, he left me to myself, my creaky door swinging shut behind him.

I stood and immediately began brushing my teeth while I dressed, spit, rinsed and tied my hair in a ponytail. It was the fastest I’d ever gotten ready, not a stitch of makeup or even a brush through my tangled locks.

I rushed through my door, tucking my shirt into my belted jeans. I reached Charles, Karina and Dingane and bent to tie my boots.

“She can’t,” Karina said, wringing her hands.

“She’ll be okay,” Charles said, soothing his wife. “We’ll need you here to prepare.”

“What’s going on?” I demanded, standing up.

“There’s been an attack on a village two and a half hours from here and there are children who need rescuing still. We’re afraid the LRA will come back for them,” Dingane said.

“Then we go to them,” I said without thinking, surprising myself.

“I cannot send you out to that, Sophie,” Karina added quickly.

“She needs to stay here, Sophie,” Charles explained. “To prepare a small medical ward. We’ve heard it’s many more children than we’re handled to equip on a moment’s whim. She’s the only other one of us trained medically beside myself, but we need at least four in the truck and one of those should be trained. Kate and Ruth are needed here and Mercy cannot be fetched for some time. I’m asking for your help. Can you handle it?” he asked me.

“I can,” I said without hesitation.

“It’s settled then,” Dingane said after examining me for a moment and headed toward the truck after picking up a large container setting at his feet.

Charles rushed off to fetch something and Karina stuck to my side, taking my hands in hers. “The men will not prepare you for this, Sophie, so I feel I must. What you’re about to encounter will revolt you. I’m not exaggerating. I want you to steel yourself. Put all emotion toward the back of your mind. Get in there, get them out and come back in one piece. I’m relying on you.”

“Of course,” I told her, swallowing the knot that had formed so rigidly in my throat.

Karina ran toward the schoolhouse, shouting at everyone who had begun to run around in preparation to receive the children I would be helping bring back. I ran to the truck and Dingane had opened my door for me, allowing me to slide in without a moment to lose. Charles and Solomon jumped in the back, armed to the nines and I almost burst out sobbing. Fear, real fear crept through my body at an alarming rate.

Dingane’s engine rumbled into the otherwise quiet night. and I jumped inside my skin, burying my hands in my lap.

“What’s happened?” I asked as we tumbled through the large gates. I turned around and saw them close behind me.

“They were attacked in the night, unprepared.”

“How many survivors?”

“We’re not really sure. We’ve been told only to hurry and that there may be more than nearby aid may be able to handle.”

I swallowed audibly, turning toward Dingane. His eyes met mine briefly and they were alive, full of anxiety and fear. “I will never be able to forget what I am about to see, am I?”