“Well, wouldn’t she?”

He aimed a hard stare over his shoulder. “She doesn’t need your encouragement. And I’ll face what fathers across the land dread and fear: a shopping trip.”

“I could take her.”

He turned completely around. “What?”

“I’m also going to need new beach clothes. I’ll take her. Girl shopping, girl lunch, girl talk. We’ll have fun.”

“You have no idea what you’d be in for. I’m serious.”

She sipped her Coke. “Challenge accepted. We’ll talk about it over dinner, Mariah and I, and pick a day after school’s out.”

“I need you to swear something, right here and now.”

“For God’s sake, Raylan, I won’t let her run in traffic or play with matches.”

“Not that. I want your solemn oath that after this experience, you’ll still have sex with me. No matter what happens.”

She swiped her finger across her heart. “So sworn.”

“I’m going before you come to your senses. Then I’m locking you in because when she brings up shopping, and she will, I’m telling her you’re taking her.”

“Fine with me.” She rose, wrapped her arms around his waist. “Men. You’re such wussies about a little shopping.”

“Yes, and not ashamed of it. Don’t work too hard, okay?”

“Just hard enough.”

He kissed her, held on a minute. “We’ll see you tomorrow. Kiss your sweetheart goodbye, Jasper. We gotta go.”

When he got to his mother’s, he saw Nana Magic had his kids working on—peacefully—a jigsaw puzzle on the dining room table. And his mother stood on a stepladder cleaning the high shelves in her kitchen.

“Get down from there. What are you doing standing on a ladder?”

“Since I don’t have the ability to levitate, it helps me reach these shelves.”

“Get down,” he repeated. “I’ll do it. You can’t be standing on ladders.”

She peered down at him, Orange Glo in one hand, rag in the other. “Are you saying I’m an old lady?”

“No, I’m saying you’re my mom.”

“Good answer. I’m done anyway.”

As she came down—with him spotting her—he saw the various dust catchers she kept on the shelves. Cookbooks on the bottom, easy-to-reach one, he remembered.

“You just hold on,” he ordered. “I’ll put the stuff back—you can hand it to me. But hold on.”

Now she slapped her hands on her hips. “I have to wipe it all down or wash it anyway. And just when did you start thinking you’re the boss of me?”

“Since I saw you standing on a ladder. Just wait, and I’ll do it.” He walked into the dining room, put a hand on each kid’s head, studied the puzzle.

“Candy store, very cool. You’re almost done.”

“It’s raining, Daddy.” Mariah tried a big, colorful piece in nearly every available spot before she found its place. “Nana said she has another one we can take home to do if the rain, rain, won’t go away.”

“You can help with that one, but not this one.” Bradley, tongue caught in his teeth, found the center piece to a giant bag of M&M’s.

“Then I will merely observe.”

As he did, as they neared the finish, he saw Bradley slide two pieces under his hand while he reached for another.

When it came down to the last pieces, he started to give his son a poke, but his mother—in the kitchen, facing away—just turned her head.

Raylan hadn’t considered, ever, the eyes-in-the-back-of-the-head mythos. He’d dubbed it, long, long ago, the Mom Mind Meld.

And she sent Bradley The Look.

Bradley wilted under it, as all humans, mammals, fish or fowl, or otherworldly creatures would.

“No more pieces! Where are the pieces!”

As his sister hunted, even looked under the table, Bradley slid one piece over.

“Here they are. Last two. Like Nana said, okay?”

Flushed with excitement—and thankfully oblivious to the attempted coup—Mariah snagged her piece. “We count down! Three, two, one!”

And they set the last pieces in unison.

“Yay! Look, Daddy, we did it all by ourselves. Yum, yum, candy!”

“Nana said if we finished it without fighting, we could have a Hershey Bar.” Bradley looked up at Raylan. “Can we?”

“Nana rules. But go upstairs, get all your stuff together first. I’m going to help Nana finish this, then we’ve gotta go.”

They raced off with Jasper on their heels.

Raylan picked up a dishcloth to start drying.

“They brighten my world,” she said.

“You brighten theirs. I want to say, while the bright is out of earshot, I’ve concluded that, with your superpowers, you know Adrian and I are doing jigsaw puzzles together.”

She smiled, handed him the old Delft teapot that had been his grandmother’s. “I’ve also concluded doing jigsaw puzzles is making both of you happy.”

“It is. We are. You know the crap she’s dealing with.”

“Enough to worry me, yes. Maya told me she—or Lina—hired a detective.”

“And the detective’s making progress. But in the meantime, and in the spirit of giving her a break, of seeing what comes next, I got Spencer’s beach house for two weeks in July. I asked her to come with me and the kids.”

“Then it’s more than jigsaw puzzles for you. Up you go. Top shelf first. Don’t question your feelings,” she told him as she handed him the teapot. “Just feel them. You have a good, strong heart, and so much room in it.”

“I have to talk to the kids about it. They have to be okay with it.”

“Of course. You’re raising good, strong hearts with lots of room in them.” She handed him a Depression-glass biscuit jar. “Careful with that.” Then she put a hand on his leg. “I loved their mother like my own child. She brightened my life, too.”

“I know.”

“Love isn’t finite, Raylan. It always makes more room.”

He thought of that as he drove home with the kids bombarding him with what they’d done at Nana’s.

Built a fort out of bed linens, made s’mores, played the Game of Life and Yahtzee and Old Maid.

In the jigsaw mode, they wanted to start the new one as soon as they walked in the door. So he set them up, sat down to work it with them while the rain splattered and Jasper decided it was as good a time as any for a nap.

“How many more days until school’s over, Bradley?”

“Thirteen! Only thirteen more school days to freedom!”

“Right. I’ve been working on a list of summer chores.”

“Dad!” Bradley slumped, dramatically, in his chair while Mariah systematically looked for end pieces.

“Oh yeah, and the first one is to put up a basketball hoop. Been meaning to get to that. And there’s porch sweeping, plant watering, room cleaning. I’ve got a long list.”

“Summer’s for fun.”

“I’m working that in. Basketball hoop, the summer reading contest, bike riding, hanging out with pals, going to the park, a couple weeks at the beach, family cookouts—”