Tina glanced toward the door. “Do you? Including teenage girls?”

“Come on, Tina. Nobody understands teenage girls.”

She smiled. “I do,” she said. “I raised three of them.” She cocked a thumb in the direction Carly had gone. “That child is lost and so hungry for a place to belong it makes me want to cry just looking at her.”

“Maybe she is,” Cord allowed. “And maybe she’s a first-class grifter.” Despite his increasing confidence that the girl was telling the truth, or at least a substantial part of it, he wasn’t entirely willing to let that remaining doubt go. He wasn’t sure why. Out of self-defense? Not wanting to risk being hoodwinked or taken advantage of? If he bought her story too readily and then found out he’d been had, he wouldn’t just feel like a fool, he’d be wounded, and deeply.

Tina rapped lightly on his chest with one fisted hand. “She’s no such thing, Cord Hollister. I have no idea why Carly’s here, but I can guarantee it isn’t part of some devious plan to fleece anybody.”

“If I were you, I’d reserve judgment on that score. She turned up out of nowhere, and she’s got one hell of a story, as little of it as she’s been willing to tell.”

“Well,” Tina said, on her way out, purse in hand, “you’re not me. And furthermore, you’re too suspicious for your own good. You automatically mistrust anybody you haven’t known your whole life.”

Cord could have argued that he trusted plenty of people—he dealt with strangers all the time in his line of work—but he didn’t have the energy. All he could muster was, “You, on the other hand, would trust the Devil himself if he played on your sympathies.”

Tina merely shook her head.

A moment later, she was out the door. Seconds after that, he heard her car start up.

Cord crossed to the sink and watched her headlights slice through the drizzle as she drove away.

He sighed.

Maybe Tina was right, and he was too suspicious. But he prided himself on a sense of reality and the smarts to see through scammers.

Still, he knew one thing about Carly—she had to be Reba’s daughter, with that hair and those eyes. But in spite of the likelihood that one of them was her dad, it was still possible that Reba had hooked up with someone else (or several someones) after she’d left town…

Better to keep his guard up until he knew what was what.

A simple DNA test would tell the tale. Provided the kid could be persuaded to take one.