The parents who had a child late in life. Who were hopeless when it came to controlling a wild, unruly Lila. The parents who are now getting older and are the only close family she has.

“Lila is smart enough to know that she can’t protect her parents twenty-four hours a day. She’ll come around to our way of thinking.”

“And if she doesn’t?”

“Do I need to spell it out for you?” he asks.

No, I don’t want to hear it.

I’m starting to panic now. The situation is spiraling out of control and I don’t know how to rein it back in. I have to talk to Lila.

Just one more time.

That’s all I need.

“At least give me a head start,” I say. “Two hours is all I’m asking for. Give me one last chance to turn this around. What can it hurt at this point? You don’t understand what Lila and I have. It is fucking real. Just like you and Kendra. We ran out of time. And she got scared. That’s all.”

Flint starts to deny it, then stops when he sees how serious I am.

“Jesse would never agree to it,” he says. “The plan has already been made. It’s not my place to change it. Jesse has the last word as President. You should be talking to him, not me.”

“I’m asking you to do this brother to brother. For me. Please, just give me her address. You know as well as I do what Jesse is capable of.”

“The answer is still no,” he says in a firm voice.

Now I’m getting pissed at him. We’re wasting time arguing when I could be on my way to Atlanta. I know the info is on his phone. If I have to, I’ll take it from him by force. We’re about the same size, but I’m a hell of a lot stronger and more motivated.

Shit!

He knows exactly what I’m thinking. I see him grip his phone tighter in his pocket.

“Damn it, Flint! You fucking owe me. I’ve never brought this up before, but you know what I’m talking about. You owe me and now I’m calling in the chip.”

Flint’s face looks stunned.

My words were a below-the-belt hit. I would have never brought it up if I wasn’t so fucking desperate.

“I was just a kid and you ran off to chase your own dreams. You left me behind to deal with an alcoholic father who beat the shit out of me almost every single day. I didn’t have anywhere else to go, and it wasn’t like you didn’t know what was going on. You left and turned your back on all of us for years.”

He moves toward me. “Sam...” he starts to say.