Even Sandy wasn’t that crazy, but he still hadn’t been able to pry the baby’s real name out of Lucy.

The howls subsided. Maybe the baby was going to sleep. He glanced over toward the couch, where she was strapped in her car seat, but she looked wide awake and grumpy. All wet blue eyes and cherub’s mouth. The world’s crankiest angel.

“We’re hungry.”

“I thought you said you were feeling sick.”

The howls started again, louder than before. Why hadn’t he brought somebody along to take care of these little monsters? Some kindhearted, stone-deaf old lady.

“I feel sick when I get hungry. And Butt needs to eat.”

“Feed her. We brought bags of baby food and formula with us, so don’t try to tell me there isn’t anything for her to eat.”

“If I feed her while Mabel’s moving, she’ll hurl.”

“I don’t want to hear another word about anybody hurling! Feed the damn kid!”

She glared at him, then flounced out of her seat and made her way to the sacks of baby food and diapers.

He drove for another fifteen miles in blessed silence before he heard it. First a baby’s cough, then a gag, then a small eruption.

“I told you so.”

Nealy backed out of the driveway from her first garage sale and pulled onto the highway. A huge green ceramic frog perched on the seat next to her. The lady who’d sold it to her for ten dollars said it was a garden ornament her mother-in-law had made in a craft class.

It was supremely ugly, with an iridescent green glaze, protruding eyes that were slightly crossed, and dull brown spots the size of silver dollars across its back. For nearly three years, Nealy had lived in a national shrine decorated with the very best American antiques. Maybe that was why she’d known instantly that she had to have it.

Even after she’d made her purchase and tucked the heavy frog under her arm, she’d stood talking to the garage sale lady. And she hadn’t needed a gray old lady’s wig or elastic stockings to do it. Her wonderful new disguise was working.

Nealy spotted a sign ahead for a truck stop. There’d be hamburgers and french fries, thick chocolate shakes and slabs of pie. Bliss!

The smell of diesel fuel and fried food hit Mat as he stepped out of Mabel into the truck stop parking lot. He also caught a whiff of manure from a nearby field, but it beat the smell of baby puke.

A blue Chevy Corsica with a woman driving whipped into the parking place next to him. Lucky lady. Alone in her car with nothing but her own thoughts to keep her company.