Holly and Braden could argue until the sun came up in the west and the moon fell from the sky, but the look Holly got on her face when she saw her brother’s black eye proved that no one else had better get between them. Lily was sure glad that the school bus stopped at the junior high school before it picked up the high school kids. Holly had threatened to burst into the ISS room, take hold of those two bullies, and finish what Braden had started. If they thought for one minute that they could threaten her and Faith, she’d be glad to treat them to what a girl could do to them.

“And on Valentine’s Day at that,” she fussed. “Me and Braden were going to take selfies of us together this evening and print them for your present, Mama. We rescued a frame from the trash when we first moved in to put it in and everything.”

“I’ll take it, anyway.” Braden grinned and then winced. “It’ll be proof that I got in a fight and won.”

Mack arrived before Holly could say anything. He held three pretty boxes of chocolates, handed one to each of them, saving the biggest one for Lily. “Happy Valentine’s Day to all y’all.”

“For me?” Holly held the heart-shaped box to her chest. “That’s so sweet, Mack. Thank you.”

“I’m opening mine right now,” Braden said as he took off for the kitchen.

“Thank you. We didn’t get you anything at all,” Lily said.

“Yes, we did.” Holly brought a picture from her backpack. “We kinda rescued this frame, too, and we made a collage. Happy Valentine’s Day, Mack.”

Lily noticed that Mack had to swallow a couple of times as he looked at the pictures. “How’d you do this without a phone?”

“I’ve got a camera. It’s kind of old, but it’ll still take pictures, and then the librarian let me print them at school. Do you like it? There’s at least one of all of us in the frame, and one of War Lord and one of Star, and that right there is the mama cat and her kittens at Granny Hayes’s place.” Holly pointed at them as she talked. “That one is of you and Mama in the kitchen. I had to sneak around and take most of them so it would be a surprise. We wanted to take the one for Mama on this very day, but now Braden looks like he went up against a grizzly bear.”

“I’ll love it, anyway,” Lily declared.

“Holly, I’ll trade you my orange chocolate candy for a caramel,” Braden yelled from the kitchen.

“You got a deal.” She headed that way. “But first we got to do our selfie for Mama and then beg her to let us print it out on her printer.”