He glanced over, and I could see his conflict written on his face. He wanted to reassure me, but he didn’t want to lie. “Yeah, I can find her. Gabrielle will be looking, too, online.” God, I loved his certainty. But then he added, “The trick is getting it done before tomorrow morning. And we’re assuming that Lexie Pine’s mother intends to keep her deal with you and show up at Funtime.”

“She will.” Now I was the one who sounded certain. The mother and I had connected; I’d felt truth in her proposal. She would trade Robert for Trey. I also believed she’d trade Robert for her own child, though Lexie was a middle-aged woman now, and an angry and damaged addict. She would trade because Lexie was still her baby. Any mother would.

“Okay, then. Good luck.” He meant with Trey.

“Good luck,” I echoed. Sweet God, this thread we were following to get to Robert felt as fine as gossamer. If any of us went wrong, in any tiny thing, for even a moment, it would break. We would lose. We’d lose my son. I couldn’t think like that, though. I had to keep pushing forward.

I unbuckled my seat belt, but I was still loath to leave him. Marshall loved the law, but he was in this with me, law be damned. I was swamped in gratefulness. On impulse I leaned across and grabbed him in an awkward, sideways hug. He stiffened, surprised, but then he hugged me back.

He felt as sure and solid as an edifice. I didn’t want to let go. But we had separate work to do now. I got out and hurried up the walk, inside. I didn’t want to watch him drive away.

Exactly seven more minutes passed. I watched them happen, one by one. The little winding clock hung by the mantel had never ticked so loud or so slowly, and then I heard the garage door rising. Trey was home.

I wasn’t sure what I would do when I saw him. I owed him a story. He owed me one, too, much older.

I was afraid of who he would find when he came through the door. Some version of Betsy, furious and bold enough to say so? A stranger, locked down and cold? But I heard his dear, familiar voice call out my name, and I remembered who I was. I remembered how well I knew him; I loved my husband. I was the outermost ring around our family bull’s-eye, and I would be gentle and only myself as he walked blindly in to find his son gone and the hardest conversation of our marriage locked and loaded, waiting for him. Even before my mind could make this feeling into words, I was up and running for the side door, and then I was in his arms. The smell of him was safety, it was comfort.