"And I'd like your permission to marry her, sir."

Beckett howled with laughter. "Son, my Emma's a grown woman with a mind of her own, in case you haven't noticed. Now, I'm not saying I don't appreciate the old-fashioned courtesy, but it's her permission you need, not mine."

"Yes, sir."

"Congratulations," Beck said. His chin quivered. "Now let's go get our girls."

Thomas pressed the gas, thanked God it was past evening rush, and let the whole mess whirl around in his head. The fear he felt was desperate, potent. And he realized that he'd only felt fear like this one other time in his life, when he was just a kid. When his mother had left.

And it occurred to him that he'd spent the rest of his life making sure he never set himself up to be this afraid again, because obviously, this kind of fear was the flip side of love. When you loved people they became your whole life. And losing them became the worst fate imaginable.

He saw their faces-Emma and Leelee and a baby that was probably no bigger than a pea but was already real to him, real to his heart.

He refused to lose them.

He'd just found them.

Thomas swallowed hard. "Hang on, Pops," he said, putting the pedal to the metal.

Emma and Leelee were nicely trussed up again, this time sitting in the corner, back to back, wrists linked. There was no way she was going to get out this time, Leelee realized.

The two goons scared her more than Aaron did. They'd obviously done this sort of thing before, whereas Aaron was an amateur. She should be glad to see Aaron shaking and crying as he sat tied on the bed, but she couldn't be glad about anything.

She had a feeling she and Emma were really going to die.

"If you'd just let me follow through with the plan…" Aaron tried once more.

The ugly guy laughed again.

Man, he was ugly.

He had hair like Squiggy from Laverne amp; Shirley reruns. Leelee didn't think actual people wore their hair like that, but obviously she'd been traveling in the wrong circles. He was dressed in a mighty attractive yellow polyester golf shirt and a pair of those stretch pants men can order from the back pages of Parade magazine. He had more tattoos than the girls at the tractor pull, but fewer teeth. And he smelled bad.

His skinny friend was obviously the assistant manager of their criminal enterprise. He did whatever the ugly one told him to do, including tying her and Emma together a moment ago.

The last few minutes had been just full of surprises, and by this point, Leelee had put the whole twisted story together. Aaron had owed Scott Slick lots of money and Slick was tired of dealing with him, so he sold Aaron's debt to Goons Incorporated here for pennies on the dollar, and they'd started harassing Aaron to pay up. Aaron was royally pissed, and followed Slick home one night and tried to convince him to give him one more chance to pay his debt. Slick said no-can-do. They argued. Aaron snapped, he said, grabbed a kitchen blender, and whacked Slick in the head with it.

He swore he hadn't meant to kill him.

So there the three men were now, arguing about who they should kill and how they were going to get their hands on money.

Leelee swallowed hard. Obviously, if the goons killed Aaron they wouldn't be getting any more money from him, right? So the Ugly One must be considering Aaron's plan to kill them. That had to be why the three men were now staring at Emma and her like they were juicy T-bones laid out on ruffles of Bibb lettuce.

At least she hoped that money was the only reason they stared.

Leelee started to shake. She shoved down the fear and started talking.

"Hey, did you guys know that Scott Slick was actually an alias for a guy named Simon Slickowski, who lived in a trailer park in Smyma, Delaware, and was last year's World Canine Disco Dancing Champion?"

"What the fuck is that?" the Ugly One asked, frowning.

"Be quiet, Lee," Emma whispered through clenched teeth.

"It's where people wear funky costumes and dance around to disco music with their dogs-you know, Donna Summer, Rose Royce, Peaches and Herb."

"I've always loved Peaches and Herb," the assistant manager said, then began singing, "'We're bumping booties, havin' us a ball…'"

"This is messed up," the Ugly One said. "Everybody just shut up a minute while I think."

"And Slick has a bunch of money stashed up in Delaware," Leelee added. "We can take you to it."

The men began arguing again.

Emma twisted her fingers around to clutch at Leelee's hand.

"Lee! How in the world-? Were you listening in on a private conversation between Thomas and me? When?"

Leelee rolled her eyes. This was no time for another lecture from Emma. "I just overheard you one night."

Emma hissed and tightened her grip. "Well, just be quiet, would you?"

"I can't! I'm so scared!"

"It's going to be okay."

Leelee grunted. "How?"

"Thomas is coming for us," she whispered. "I can feel it."

Leelee rolled her eyes-their knight in shining Audi! God, how she wished it were true! Thomas was great, but he wasn't exactly a hero. She knew better than to believe in heroes.

"How much is up in Delaware?" the Ugly One asked.

"Over half a million," Leelee said.

"How in the hell did you know Slick anyway?"

Uh-oh. Maybe she should have kept her mouth shut.

"You're making all this up, aren't you, you little bitch?"

"No! I swear! It's true!"

The Ugly One took a step closer to them while looking over his shoulder at Aaron. "How much did you say the wife was worth, Kramer?"

"Quarter of a million." Aaron slumped further onto the bed.

"Okay. Everybody hold on a minute while I do the math."

Leelee couldn't help it. "Don't hurt yourself," she said.

Emma clamped down on her fingers.

The Ugly One bent down, touched Emma's hair, then Leelee's. He chuckled. "Whatever we do, I think we're going to keep the little one alive."

Emma whipped her head around and sank her teeth into the Ugly One's arm.

"Ow! Shit! Fuck! Hell!"

Things were really starting to disintegrate.

When they reached the scene, Thomas was told that sniper surveillance showed three men inside, one of them Aaron Kramer, and at least three weapons. The women were tied in the far southwest corner of the room, directly below the front window, Emma facing out. The hostage-takers seemed disorganized and the young girl had managed to keep them off balance by not shutting up.

"Thata girl, Lee," Beckett said.

The STATE team plan was simple: create a diversion and surprise them. Five men were poised at the motel room door, weapons at the ready. Two snipers were positioned in trees in the back. A remote-controlled explosive device-designed more for noise than destruction-was in place under the bathroom window.

Thomas and Regina were right behind the STATE team, tucked into Kevlar vests. The rest of Thomas's team waited in a staging area on the service road, along with five waiting ambulances and an assortment of state police and Prince George 's County Sheriff 's Department vehicles.

Thomas knew from experience that tactical maneuvers like these could be over in seconds-it was possible that within moments he'd have Emma in his arms. That is, if she'd come anywhere near him.

Snipers reported that Emma had just bitten one of the hostage-takers, and the instant of chaos that followed was all the STATE team needed.

As the hostage-taker dropped his weapon and ran screaming to the bathroom, a loud explosion rocked the room. STATE officers crashed in the door. Two officers immediately covered the women while the other three tackled and cuffed the hostage-takers. The takedown was over almost before it had begun.