She poured theirs and then reached inside to get an icy glass for herself. They hardly looked at her, just stared vaguely into space, getting their breath.

"There you are. A few beers and a shower and you'll feel better."

Angel snorted, his black eyes snapping. He was a dark Indian looking Mexican-American boy, wiry and strong looking but with the concave chest of the perpetual sloucher… terribly handsome in spite of his attitude.

"It will take more than a few beers. That heat will kill a man," he said bitterly.

"Stop beefing," Eric advised, grinning. He had the quiet smiling blondness that indicated his Nordic ancestry. A giant of a boy at eighteen. He had fair almost white blonde hair and deep blue eyes that crinkled when he smiled. Already his fair skin had reddened and burned and was now turning to a deep tan. His shoulders were immense and his hands like two rather dirty hams.

He was going to be fine. The foreman had told her that Eric worked with a slow measured intensity and that he was strong as a bull. No, it was Angel that was going to be a problem. He'd complained from the moment she'd picked them up at the bus station. But then, heavens knows what he'd had to endure in the city. Living in a ghetto with too many brothers and sisters and only his foster mother to feed them with a too small welfare check. Kate felt a rush of pity for him. She must remember to tell Frank to go easy on him. And then she remembered. Cole would be home tomorrow and he wouldn't go easy on anyone when it came to working.

If only somehow she could make Cole see that the boys really could be a help to him for the summer. There was so much to do. Cole complained that the few hands that drifted through were really no help. Somehow she had to make it work… and if she did… maybe… just maybe she could get Cole to realize that a stranger in the house wasn't so terrible. A little stranger.