Holly fell back onto the sofa and glared at her mother. “You had no right to come in the bathroom and spy on me.”

“So this is my fault? Do you realize what would have happened if the police had come into the bathroom instead? You’d be in jail, not moving to Comfort.”

“Why do I get punished, too?” Her twelve-year-old son, Braden, pouted. “I wasn’t the one who got caught smokin’ pot in the public library.”

“No, you”—Holly did a head wiggle—“you and your little buddies have been sneaking out at night to smoke cigarettes and drink beer. I don’t see what the big difference is between smoking pot and cigarettes.” She turned back to her mother. “If I’d gotten caught with cigarettes, you would have taken my phone for a week. But your precious little angel of a son is doing that, and you didn’t even know it. I’m calling Daddy.”

Lily focused on Braden with his dark hair and big brown eyes that, at that very moment, were trying in vain to look innocent. Surely this was a nightmare. The walls seemed to be closing in on her, and she had to lean against the back of a recliner to keep from dropping. How did things get so out of control? She was a therapist, for heaven’s sake, and she didn’t even see the signs concerning her own children’s behavior. Talk about having her head stuck in the sand.

“Is that the truth?” she asked.

He shrugged. “I only smoked a few and drank two beers. I didn’t do nothing like she did.”

“Yeah, right,” Holly almost snorted. “You and your little friends think it’s sooo cool. You strut around with them like you’re too cool for the other kids.”

“Do not,” he protested.

“Sweet Jesus,” Lily muttered. “You just lost all your techie devices, also. Both of you will have to earn them back, and that won’t happen before summer.”

Holly ripped her phone from the hip pocket of her jeans in a dramatic gesture. “I refuse to live like a prisoner. I mean it! If you force me to give up my phone, I will go live with Daddy.”

“Tell him I want to live with him, too,” Braden said.

Lily folded her arms over her chest and waited. The children thought their world was tumbling down around the toes of their cute little boots—it was about to take another major nosedive when Holly called her father, Wyatt Anderson.

“You can use your phone for one more call, but you have to put it on speaker,” Lily said.

Holly rolled her eyes toward the ceiling, hit speed dial, and laid the phone on the coffee table. Her father, Wyatt, answered her call with, “Hello, princess, did you have a good Christmas?”