Braden made a production of tiptoeing to his room and crooking his index finger for his mother to come over there. He’d put up his Harry Potter posters since the last time she’d peeked into his room, and now it looked more like his old room in Austin. He patted the bed, and she sat down beside him.

“Holly was real scared, Mama, and I mean for real scared,” he whispered. “She was afraid that we wouldn’t be able to use the hotel phone to call you. It was so old and had a cord like the one in the kitchen. She read all the directions about how to make a call and punched the right button when they asked for permission to charge it to the room. I guess Daddy told those people to let us do that so we could call him.” Braden hesitated and went on. “I told her to call Daddy—that I’d go to the stupid old dinner with him and Victoria and to the Alamo. I didn’t want to, but I didn’t like seeing her that scared. It’s all right with me if you give her cell back to her before summer. I don’t care if you keep mine, but if we have to go with him again, she needs her phone.”

“You won’t ever be going with him again.” Lily gave him a hug. “Now go take your bath and read for a little while. If your light is still on when I go to bed, I’ll turn it out.”

“Thanks, Mama,” Braden said. “I ain’t never been so glad to see anyone as I was you and Mack.”

“I’ve never been so glad to find my two kids safe.” Lily kissed him on the forehead and left the room. If there was ever a night when she really needed a shot of whiskey, this was it. She tucked her phone into her pocket and headed toward the kitchen.

Mack was already there with a beer in one hand and a shot glass in the other. His broad shoulders and biceps stretched the fabric of a snowy-white T-shirt. Red-and-black flannel pajama pants hung low on his narrow hips, and he was barefoot. What Holly said about wishing he was her daddy came back to her mind. He’d make a wonderful father because he always put other folks before himself.

“You read my mind,” she said as she reached for the glass and Mack poured for her. “This has been a double-shot night.”

“Or a triple,” Mack suggested. “I got to admit, that terrified the hell out of me. I kept thinking what if someone kidnapped the kids? What if they weren’t there when we arrived? Did you call Wyatt?”