“We’re not done,” the man snarled.

A scuffling sound. Then a thud and a grunt. Emily would have raced down the stairs except Lila caught her arm. Emily was glad to have her mother there, a sanity check.

“Take your hands off me,” Frank said, his voice cold and steady. “Believe me, you don’t want to play this game.” There was a long silence. Then Frank again. “Okay. You want to talk? In my office.”

The front door slammed and the banister that Emily hadn’t realized she was gripping vibrated. Then the sound of receding footsteps to the back of the house and Frank’s office. Emily breathed a sigh of relief and turned around. Lila was right behind her at the top of the stairs, biting her knuckle.

“Who is that man?” Lila said. “Is Frank okay alone in there with him? Shouldn’t we call the police?” It was just like her mother. Calm in a crisis, panicked in its aftermath.

“I have no idea who he is,” Emily said. And, knowing how much Frank distrusted the police, she wasn’t about to call them unless he’d specifically asked her to. She started down the stairs, pausing halfway to listen, with Lila right behind her. She could hear the rumble of voices from Frank’s office. It sounded as if they were arguing.

Emily tiptoed to the front door and peered out through its glass panel. The front yard was dark. The pickup truck was still parked out there. She stepped aside and let Lila look out.

“We could at least get his license plate,” Lila said.

“We?”

“Take a picture. Just in case he punches a hole in one of your walls or throws a chair at Frank.”

It wasn’t a bad idea. Emily ran upstairs for her phone. She came back down and slipped outside. Lila watched from behind the screen door.

Emily approached the truck. The pavement under her bare feet was warm. The truck was a fancy version of a classic Ford pickup with front and back seats in the cab. She risked using the flash and snapped a close-up of the plate on the back of the truck, then hurried up the front walk.

She was nearly to the screen door when she realized that Lila was no longer waiting there for her. Instead, Frank’s back filled the doorframe. The porch light came on. Before Emily could dart into the shadows, Frank moved aside, the door opened, and the visitor hurtled out.

He came to an abrupt halt within inches of running into her. Jeans. A black shirt stretched over a muscular gut. Dark, close-cropped hair. He glanced at her, surprised at first. You? he mouthed. Then he barked a laugh, exhaling beer breath, turned back, and gave Frank his middle finger. When he wheeled around to face her again, Emily looked down, avoiding eye contact, anxious to get back inside the house.