Prologue

      The bite mark was an angry red, only one shade darker than Teri Lynn’s face as she howled at the top of her lungs and clutched her injured arm. Breathless from streaking across the grassy playground to break up the fight, Liz Gentry knelt between the crying girl and her eight-year-old tormentor.

      “Kevin, what is the meaning of this?” Liz demanded as she wiped away Teri Lynn’s tears with a lace-edged, lavender-scented handkerchief.

      The towheaded boy she addressed stared sullenly at the ground, scuffing the toe of his sneaker back and forth in the dirt. She put a firm hand on his chin and forced him to meet her gaze. “Kevin?”

      She sighed as he remained obstinately silent.

      “He bit me, Mrs. Gentry. For no reason, he just bit me,” Teri Lynn said between sobs.

      “Did not,” Kevin muttered defiantly.

      “Did, too,” Teri Lynn insisted with a sniff as she inched closer to Liz’s side.

      “Kevin, if you didn’t do it, who did?” Liz asked impatiently, then sighed again.

      Of course, Kevin had done it. She’d seen him herself. One minute he and Teri Lynn had been tossing a ball back and forth on the playground. Seconds later he had flown at her in a rage. Half a dozen shocked classmates had stared on silently, while others, seemingly immune to Kevin’s displays of temper, continued with their noisy games.

      So much for her hopes for an uneventful recess, she thought as she comforted Teri Lynn. Thanks to Kevin, at the rate the school year was going, she would have had a quieter time of it in the Marines.

      As the bell rang ending recess, she surveyed the combatants. Both of them had cuts and scrapes, but that bite mark on Teri Lynn’s arm was the worst injury.

      “Okay, we won’t argue about it now. Teri Lynn, I’ll take you to the school nurse as soon as I get the rest of the class inside. Kevin, you and I will discuss this after school. In the meantime, you will go to the principal’s office and wait for me.”

      Her tone left no room for argument. Not that Kevin would have given her one. He simply nodded as he always did. Inside the building, as she watched, he walked down the deserted hall and turned into the office. She knew from experience she would find him there at the end of the school day, sitting on a bench, his expression stoic. Only the telltale traces of tears on his cheeks ever offered any indication that he’d found the recurring incidents of misbehavior or the punishment upsetting.

      The last hours of school dragged on interminably. She tried to listen as the students read their English assignments aloud, but she couldn’t get her mind off Kevin. Despite his troublesome behavior, something about the child’s lost, world-weary expression tugged at her heart. She cared about all of her students. She loved the challenge of making them respond, of making learning exciting for them. With Kevin the challenge had been doubled because her usual methods had failed so miserably. Whether it was her own ego or Kevin’s apparent need, he had gotten to her in a way that none of the other students had.

      But how on earth was she going to handle this ongoing behavior problem? No matter how compassionately she felt toward Kevin, his conduct had to be corrected. There was a fight or a temper tantrum, or a sulking retreat almost every day. The child clearly needed help, more help than she could possibly offer him in a room crowded with thirty-five energetic third-graders.

      It was only the first month of school and already she had repeatedly sent notes home to his father, who had sole custody for reasons not made clear in the file. No mention was made of the mother. In her first letter to Todd Lewis she had explained Kevin’s behavior problems in depth, detailing her suspicions about the cause and requesting a meeting to discuss solutions. The second note and the third had been a little more impatient, a little more concise. Admittedly, the last one had been barely polite.

      Todd Lewis had yet to call, much less appear, which told her quite a lot about the man’s indifference to his son’s wellbeing and left her thoroughly frustrated. Reaching him by phone had been no more successful. With an increasing sense of urgency, she had left at least half a dozen messages on his home answering machine in the last two days. If he had a business number, or cell phone number, she couldn’t find it. The emergency number in the file had turned out to belong to a neighbor, who looked out for Kevin after school. Liz had been unwilling to draw the woman into the midst of the problem. She had asked her only to relay a message asking Todd Lewis to call. The woman had agreed readily enough, but admitted she rarely saw him.

      Liz resolved to try just once more to arrange a meeting. If the man failed to show up yet again, she would have to resort