I let myself soak up the feel of the comfort, of not being alone, for a count of ten, and then I forced myself to straighten and pull out of Mason’s hold. “We should go eat. I don’t want Justin and Lyla to worry.”

Mason studied me, his gaze calling bullshit on my subject change. But again, he didn’t push. “Okay, let’s go eat.”

I wandered out of Mason’s massive walk-in closet, my gaze firmly focused on the paper I’d highlighted half to death. My and Lyla’s sleepover had been abandoned for me making sure that everything was ready for tomorrow. “Crap, we need a fire extinguisher. I can go to the hardware store tomorrow—”

“There’s one in the pantry, one in the garage, and one in the barbeque area off the patio.”

I looked up from Keisha’s list of things a social worker might inquire about. “There is?”

Mason set his book down as he reclined against the pillows on his massive bed. True to his promise, he’d already erected a pillow wall of sorts in the middle of it. “Yeah. And there are fire ladders for the windows in Justin’s and Lyla’s rooms.”

A burn lit in the back of my throat, spreading to behind my eyes. “Did you always have that?”

“No, but Keisha sent me the same list. I wanted to be prepared.”

He was more prepared than I’d been, and they were my niece and nephew. The burn only intensified, and I blinked in an attempt to clear it. Mason swung his legs over the side of the bed and strode towards me, moving in close but not touching me. Since I’d pulled away on the front porch, he’d been careful not to. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

I took in a shuddering breath. “I just—I feel like I’m failing already.”

“Bullshit.”

My eyes widened. I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard Mason curse. “Excuse me?”

“You have done everything imaginable to help those kids. But there’s been a lot to tackle in the past couple of weeks.”

He wasn’t wrong. There’d been meetings with Keisha, packing up the cottage, going through the storage unit. I’d been trying to pin down the detective in Vegas, but I felt like she was giving me the runaround. Oh, and I’d gotten married. I could feel a hysterical laugh bubbling up, but I tamped it down.

Mason reached out as if he were going to rest his hands on my shoulders and then stopped himself. Disappointment flickered, but I shoved that down, too. “We’re as prepared as we can be,” he assured. “What you need to do now is sleep. It’s after midnight.”