Lauren sighed.
“Right.”
She resumed typing.
“Easy, then.”
—
Ethan and Mia reached his mother’s house just before sunrise.
He carried Mia from the rideshare because she had fallen asleep twenty minutes earlier.
His mother opened the door before he knocked.
Margaret Carter was sixty-seven and wore the same faded blue robe Ethan remembered from childhood.
She saw Mia first.
Then Ethan.
Then the exhaustion in her son’s face.
“What happened?”
“Long flight.”
“Ethan.”
“Mom.”
She knew.
Mothers often did.
He carried Mia upstairs and tucked her into the bed she always used when visiting.
Captain went beneath her chin.
Ethan stood there longer than necessary.
Mia stirred.
“Dad?”
“Go back to sleep.”
Her eyes opened slightly.
“You saved her?”
“Yes.”
“Is she
