I stare across the counter at the man, and I want all of this to be over already. Did he see Beatrix dig the phone out of my purse? Did my body jerk when she slid it onto my lap? My nerves are so sizzled I can’t be certain. The only thing I know for sure is that he saw.

And it’s not like I have much of a choice here. With a shaking hand, I pass the man my phone.

Baxter is still squashed into my side, his face buried in my sweater and his body trying to wriggle closer, but there’s nowhere for him to go. Despite the armrests between us, he’s already more on my chair than his own, his bones pressing into my skin. I haul him onto my lap, and he crumples into my chest with a whimper. My other arm I wrap across Beatrix, a laughably ineffectual shield.

“You’re scaring the children.”

The man offers up a wry smile. “I should hope so. Because this should be a lesson to both of them, that trying to sneak something over on me is not wise. It will get you caught. Better yet, it will get you punished.”

He lets the last word linger while he stares at the back of Baxter’s head, then shifts his attention to Beatrix. The guilty one. Every muscle in my body hardens into concrete. My lungs swell with breath and hold there. If he goes for my family, if he so much as lifts a finger toward either of my children, I will take the blame. I will defend them or die trying. I am ready.

The man taps a rubber-tipped finger to my phone, waking the screen. “What’s the passcode for this thing? And before you ask, yes this is a test. I want to make sure what you told me about your security system is on the up-and-up.”

My back locks up, my mind racing with panicked thoughts. There are all sorts of apps on that phone, and it never occurred to me to disguise the ones I don’t want people to see. That’s what passwords and face recognition are for, to keep what’s on the phone private.

And I’m too damn organized. If I give him the passcode, all he would have to do is flip through the pages to find every app that services this house. The pool controls, outdoor and indoor lighting, Sonos, the thermostats.

The cameras I told him about.

The ones I didn’t.

He sighs and looks at me. “Jade. The password.”

I could lie, but what then? I don’t see any other option than to give it to him. “It’s 2-9-2-1-9-2.”

He ticks it in, and the lock screen dissolves.