Twenty-three days. And on the morning of the twenty-fourth, when I pulled up the shades and saw hundreds of my favorite flowers swaying in the breeze, my heart flipped over in my chest. I didn’t tell him for another month, but I fell in love with Cam, right then and there.

“Babe. Don’t... Jesus, please don’t talk like that. Where are you? Are you okay? Are the kids?”

“You had me at tulips, Cam. I was a goner. I still am. I want you to know that what you and I have, it’s for real. The best thing I ever did was walk in your restaurant that day.” My face scrunches with tears, and a sharp and searing pain explodes in my cheek—a physical reminder of what’s coming after we wrap up this call. The man’s expression says it will be so much worse.

“Jade, I... I love you, too, but you’re scaring me. Tell me what’s happening there.”

I sniff, my gaze wandering to my daughter. A solemn-faced Beatrix, who’s trying her damnedest not to cry. “We’re in the playroom. Beatrix is duct-taped to the chair.”

“And Bax?”

“He’s with Tanya. She dropped by earlier and took him for pizza.” I think about telling him to call over there to check in, but I don’t. Every mention of Baxter is a reminder to the masked man that our son is safe across the street, and I’d rather keep his focus right here, in this room. Instead, I say, “Are you almost here?”

“I’m driving as fast as I can. Beatrix, baby, you there? I want to hear your voice, too.”

Beatrix heaves a petulant sigh. “I’m fine. He hurt Mommy, though.” She glares at the phone as she says it, and I know what she’s thinking. She’s pissed at being played like a puppet.

“What did he do to Mommy?”

“He hit her on the cheek.” Beatrix glares from her recliner at the masked man, who gives an enthusiastic thumbs-up. “It’s swollen and really, really purple.”

A long patch of motor and air. I picture Cam in his truck, white-knuckling the steering wheel, the three loud thumps that sound through the phone, Cam’s fist hitting something solid.

“Tell him I’m on my way. Say I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay? For sure by seven.”

Beatrix rolls her eyes. “You don’t have to tell him, because he’s sitting right here.”

“Sir, whoever you are, I want you to know that I meant what I said just now. I’m fighting traffic, but I’ll be there by seven. And I have the money.”

The man needles me with a finger to the shoulder, and I ask, “All of it?”

“Yes. All of it. I have $734,296 in a bag, headed your way.”