My first act the next morning was to call Pasha. She sounded groggy as she answered, "Hello?"

        "I need you to go in today."

       She yawned. "It's Sunday."

       "I know. There's an emergency. I need you to fill in."

        "I hope everything's okay."

        I neither had the time nor the will to explain it to her. "It will be. Thank you."

        After swinging by her apartment to drop off the keys I headed to mom's house. I had to park on the street as she'd backed the SUV into the driveway. Up under the carport I could see that she'd applied patches of paint where the old was chipping.

        I continued to the porch and rang the doorbell. It took no time for her to answer as she was right there in the living room painting over the high ceiling with a long-handled roller.

        "Hey. It's actually looking pretty good." The paint on the walls was the same white color it always was except for being brighter and crisper. I didn't realize how much that helped until getting a look at it.

        "Don't I always tell you there's a reason to my madness? You can never see my vision until it's almost over."

        "So what's left?"

        She ran the roller through the paint tray sitting carefully on top of drop cloth. "Need to finish touching up with the painting. Then straighten up a little. That's all I'm doing for that heifer."

        I sat my purse on the coffee table. "When's she coming?"

        "Tomorrow after work."

        "Okay. Let me get a paint brush."

        "Alright, but just go over the places where it's chipped, scrapped, or cracked." She started spreading a coat over a wall that was neither chipped or cracked. "House doesn't need to look like we made repairs. It needs to look like we do this all the time."

        "You're the boss."

        I spent my morning painting over various imperfections with my mother to sounds of her favorite gospel station. I must admit, despite my skepticism a fresh coat of paint was going a long way to make the walls look better. And she'd done a bang-up job cleaning up too. It was still cluttered—typical when you had more stuff than house—but she'd managed to arrange the clutter so that the various piles of junk seemed to almost have a purpose. All surfaces had been decluttered and polished and both bathrooms were spotless.

        By ten AM we'd put the last of the trash out, swept and vacuumed the floors, and had the house looking good enough to host company. We stood in the kitchen basking in how shiny and new everything appeared.

        "Wow," I said. "What did you do to the cabinets?"

        "Baking soda and vinegar. Really polished the handles, don't you think?"

        "Yeah. Looks good."

        "Could you take a few things from your room when you leave?"

        Well, there's a phrase to make me raise an eyebrow. "Why can't it just stay? It's not hurting anything."

        "I just think it'll look better if you take your sewing machine."

        "...There's a bathroom sink in the middle of the floor."

        "I'll just tell her I'm installing it in my bathroom. It's part of home maintenance."

        "It's been sitting there for years."

        "She doesn't know that."

        "I guess."

        "You could take your old ball gown too."

        "What would I do with it?"

        "Wear it at your wedding."

        "I'm not getting married and if I was, I'd buy something newer."

        "Then donate it."

        We went back and forth like that for a bit longer before I realized I'd save a spike in blood pressure if I just did what she asked.

        "I hope it still works," I said of the sewing machine as I packed it into the trunk. "If not, it'll be a bitch to throw the goddamned thing away."

        "Evelyn Marie Harper."

        "Yeah, I know. I'll repent later."

        "That everything?"

        "Yeah."

        She came close and gave me a hug for the ages. "Alright. Drive safe."

        "I will."

        "Love you."

        "Love you more."

        She smiled. "Impossible."

        I'd gotten in the car and cranked the engine just in time for the call to come in. My heart gave a start when I saw Randy's number come across my screen. I'd been playing it cool in front of mom, but truthfully my nerves were a mess. I looked out the passenger window and waved at her where she stood, under the carport waiting on me to pull off.

        I managed to throw her a final smile, put the phone on speaker, and pull off all at the same time.

        "Ms. Harper?" Randy said.

        "Yes?"

        "I made the call."

        "How did it go?"

        "We're meeting at one."

        "Alright. Everyone needs to be there at twelve-thirty."

        "Okay." He sounded distracted. I didn't like that.

        "What's wrong? You aren't having second thoughts, are you?"

        "It's not that." The line went silent for a minute as he found the words. "While I was talking with Peter I figured out who's been helping him."

        "His mom?" Please say it's Karen.

        "I wish." He paused again. It took everything in me not to snap at him to spit it out already. "Back before rehab Peter used to run with this fella named Carl."

        "I think I remember someone mentioning that."

        "This guys bad news."

        "How so?"

        "Well, Peter at least tried to clean his life up, but Carl is scum. I'm talking multiple prison sentences, multiple assaults. And he deals. I hear about him from some of the other addicts sometimes."

        "Is this going to be a problem?"

        "That's the thing. I got the idea that Peter's bringing him for backup."

        Great. "Thanks for the heads up. We'll talk more about it when we get there."

        "Okay." He hung up and I was suddenly faced with a deep, ominous silence.

        I fucking hate uncontrolled variables.

        And I fucking hate drug dealers.

        Last time I had a run in with a drug dealer it ended in disaster. I still don't sleep through the night. What if he's violent? What if this escalates? What if it's like last time?

        What if? What if? What if?

        My mind was a carousel of worst-case scenario. It thought of every possible way this could go wrong. Every way one of the others could act, not act, or react. What if Rachel loses control and tries to do her own thing? What if Leonard chickens out and doesn't show? What if Randy says the wrong thing? What if I drop dead right here?

        Stop it! Nothing was ever solved by overthinking.

        I can't control everything, I can only control me. But sometimes it felt like even me was out of my own control. Like my life despite meticulous planning was nothing but a conduit of chaos. Like I might as well give in because nothing I do will ever work out.

        I don't remember if I always thought this way. I don't remember how I got here.

        After a while I got so sick of thinking I turned the radio up and put my brain on autopilot. There was no point to worrying myself to death. It probably wasn't going to be that bad—most things weren't. Still, it helped to be prepared for the worst.

        I'd assumed the neighborhood park Ken Bergman would take his foster sons to would be a bit more upscale but the first thing to catch my eye on Amory street was an abandoned apartment complex jutting into the sky like a four-story eyesore. The rest of the neighborhood wasn't far from being just as rundown, and none of it was helped by a perpetually cloudy sky that washed all colors gray and murky.

        Across from the park was an old diner where Leonard had said Ken used to take them for burgers and milkshakes. I pulled into a space out front and then got out just as he was strolling over.

        "Interesting neighborhood," I said when he reached me.

        "It used to be a bit better before the recession," Leonard shoved his hands in the pockets of his thin cotton jacket. "Ken used to say it was even better than that when he was growing up in that apartment over there."

        "Is everyone here?"

        He gave me a stiff nod. "Yep. Just waiting on you."

        We fell into a silence as I followed him inside the diner. The others were sitting in a booth that overlooked the street outside, and the park across from it. A waitress stood in front of the table with her pad in hand ready to jot down our order.

        "What'll it be?"

        "Coffee." I mumbled.

        The others followed suit.

        "So, this Carl guy," I said after the waitress dropped off our coffee. "Is he dangerous?"

        "He's not exactly a boy Scout," Randy said as he stirred enough sugar into his coffee to give me a residual toothache. "But I'm not sure how far he'd take it."

        "Okay." I took a great gulp of coffee to let the warmth pulse through me but instead it dropped into my empty stomach and left me feeling heavy instead of warm. "Randy you're going to be in the park of course, but one of you needs to be waiting in case he tries to bolt back to his pickup."

        "I'll do it," Rachel said. "I brought the spare key."

        "Perfect." She was conniving but I can't say it didn't come in handy. "We'll need someone to be waiting on the east side of the park in case he tries to go that way. That'll be Leonard."

        Leonard merely nodded and stared down into his coffee.

        "I'll be on the west side." I had started absently tapping my fingers against the table. I made myself stop. "We'll stay in contact with our phones. Rachel, you'll need to park your car about two blocks away."

        "Why?"

        "If he sees it or you he'll drive on by."

        I could see she was ready to argue from pure laziness, but she thought it over and nodded. "Okay."

        "What about Carl?"

        "If you see him, don't engage him. Bringing Peter home is our priority but none of us needs to get hurt for it."

        After leaving the waitress a nice tip and ordering a coffee to go, I sat in my car halfheartedly listening to the radio and scanning the streets for Peter's pickup.

        "Anybody got eyes on him?" I said into my phone.

        After a chorus of 'no's I relaxed back in my seat but kept my eyes roaming. I'd come prepared since my last run-in with Peter. Today I wore my cargo capri pants and some sneakers in case I needed to run. I'd thrown my purse in the trunk with the stuff I'd taken from mom's and put my I.D. and the knife, pepper spray, and taser in each of my pockets. By one o' six I was starting to get worried. That's when Peter's pickup turned onto Leggett.

        "I see him," I turned the radio off and leaned forward so I could see past the steering wheel. "He's driving up Leggett. Looks like he'll park in front of the check cashing place."

        "Should I go that way?" Rachel's voice was suddenly shaky.

        "Not yet. Wait for him to get in the park."

        Randy practically yelled, "I see him!"

        Leonard was the only one still calm. "Me too."

        "Everybody be cool. No one moves until he's in the park."

        We watched him pull his truck into a space in the small parking lot in front of Ace Cashing Place.

        Leonard was the first to break the silence. "There's someone else with him."

        Damn it. "Can any of you see who it is."

        "Yeah, it's Carl."

        Double damn it. "Is he getting out too?"

        "Yeah."

        "Okay. Plan's the same. When they get into the park, Rachel you get the truck. Randy, you hang up now."

        "Okay."

        I watched both men climb out of the pickup and slowly amble across the street. When I was ready, I turned off my car and started to open my door, "Okay, I'm getting out of the—" I blanked. My jaw slacked. I stared, not at the park, but back at the diner. "Um...everyone just do what I told you to do." I hung up and secured my phone into my pocket.

        I took a nice deep breath and shut the door. He was standing not even four yards away—big sunglasses in the middle of a cloudy day and a baseball cap pushed down low like I wouldn't recognize him. He was partially obscured by a skinny tree that grew from the dirt near the back parking lot, but I saw his ass. Does he think I'm stupid?

        He had his back to me, one hand in his coat pocket and the other gripped around his phone as he pressed it to his ear as if he was taking an urgent call. But nobody was on that phone.

        I should call that shit and watch him scramble but I don't have time. So, instead I jogged across the street and marched right up to his back. He was so into his charade I don't think he saw me until I was right up on him. He jumped a bit when turned and saw me right behind him.

        I crossed my arms and frowned. "Manny. Fucking. Juarez."