Yes, even McDonald’s, Wendy’s, and Burger King.

Bitty, not to be outdone, had taken his phone and created a rating system on the darn thing, the pair of them spending a good half hour with their blond and dark heads together, debating the relative merits of various criteria for some kind of point system.

It was going to be a Dickensian march through trans fat and huge portions.

The good news? Bitty did have to gain weight, and this was as good a redress for that as any.

“Here we go,” Rhage announced as if he’d found the cure for IBS. “See? Plenty of space.”

Okay, at least he had a point. As he hit the brakes, and let the headlights do the talking, the back stretch of asphalt was long and broad, and completely empty but for a couple of Dumpsters: All things considered, there was nothing behind the strip mall but scruffy grass and trees.

“Fine, but I’m getting out of the car.” Mary cracked her door. “I’ve been in two near-misses in the last how long? I’m not risking a third.”

As she held the seat up for Bitty, the girl looked grave. “I won’t hurt it. I promise.”

Mary put her hand on the girl’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “I don’t care about the car—”

“What!” Rhage yelped while he got out of his side. “How can you say that?”

Shooing him, she refocused on Bitty. “Just be careful. Go slowly. You’ll do great.”

Bitty gave her a quick hug—and what do you know, it was something that stopped Mary’s heart every time it happened. And then the girl and Rhage were by the driver’s seat, talking in that fast way they did, the rapid-fire chatter making Mary’s head spin.

Stepping out of the way, waaaaaaay out of the way, she ended up leaning back against the single-story, long-as-a-football-field building, right next to a sign that read, DELIVERIES ONLY. The night was unseasonably warm, so much so that she let her jacket fall open, and overhead, the sky was cloudy, as if God had pulled a woolen blanket over the Earth against the chill of late October.

“Here we go!” Rhage said as he hightailed it around to the passenger side. “Get ready!”

As he waved like he was on the deck of a cruise ship that was about to depart, she waved back and thought, Please, no Titanic here, people.

Fits, starts. Grinding gears. Hopping and skipping—and then Bitty got it. Somehow . . . the girl gathered the reins of that twelve-billion-horsepower whatever-engine under that hood, and she and Rhage were cruising by. At five miles an hour.

Mary found herself jumping up and down and clapping like the kid had graduated medical school with a cure for cancer. “You did it! Go, Bitty!”

God, it felt so good to cheer. To watch a mastery happen. To be a witness as the girl turned the powerful muscle car around at the far end and started back again, waving madly as she passed by once more, her face aglow with happiness as Rhage sat beside her clapping and whistling sure as if Bitty were running a touchdown at the Super Bowl, dunking the final basket at the NCAA championship, and crossing the Boston Marathon finish line all at the same time.

Here they came once more, gathering speed, until Bitty was shifting into third on the straightaway.

It was . . . magic.

It was . . . family.

It was . . . absolutely, positively everything that mattered and was important.

And then it all went into bad territory.

Bitty and Rhage had just made the turn again and were heading away for the long run to the very far end, when the sound of a bottle being thrown against the pavement brought Mary’s head up.

Four or five guys came around the corner—and stopped short like they were as surprised to find anyone back there as Mary was to have her white-picket-fence moment interrupted.

“What the fuck,” one of them muttered.

“Wassup, bitch.”

Mary crossed her arms over her chest and stared right at them, holding her ground without saying a word. They were your typical fifteen-, sixteen-year-old bunch of nitwits, trying to make like they were gangstas with their low-hanging pants and side-tilt baseball hats—when in reality they might as well have been on a mall crawl by Macy’s and the Sunglass Hut. The trouble, though? In a pack, they were like coyotes, dangerous even though they were scrawny.

“How you doin’?” a third drawled.

What, like you’re Tony Soprano, you little punk, she thought as they closed in on her. Except, when she saw that one of them had a knife down by his side, she stiffened.

What was worse? The boy who was armed was twitching like he was on something.

By this time, Rhage and Bitty had turned around and were making their way back down, and all Mary could think of was, Please just keep going. Get Bitty the hell out of here.

But, no. The GTO stopped a good twenty feet away, its headlights illuminating Mary and the pack of animals.

“Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh, shit, check that ride out,” one of the them said.

“I’m taking that whip home—”

The chorus of whistles and curses toned down as Rhage opened the passenger door and rose to his full height. “Mary. Come over here.”

Mary started to walk away, but she didn’t get far. Next thing she knew, the one with the knife had grabbed her and dragged her back against him, putting that blade to her throat.

“Whatchu gonna do?” the boy blustered. “Huh? Whatchu gonna do?”

Mary trembled, but not because she was worried about her own life. What the hell could they do to her? Instead, all she could think of was, No, no, not in front of Bitty—

“Keep going!” she called out to Rhage. “Just drive—”

“I’ll cut you,” came the voice in her ear.

“Fine, do what you want,” she muttered. “Not in front of them, though. Let them go and you can cut me up all you want.”

“What?” the kid sputtered.

“Get out of here, Rhage—”

Yeah, nope.

Not even by half.

All at once, the light shining in her eyes and all over them got brighter by a factor of a hundred and fifty thousand kilowatts. And Mary cursed.

Shit. She knew what that meant.

“It is not much farther.”

As Assail spoke, he eased off on the Range Rover’s accelerator and made the right-hand turn onto the lane that proceeded down to the peninsula on which he lived. Beside him, riding shotgun, as the humans called it, Markcus was rather quiet, his eyes glued to the windows both in front of him and next to him.

The young male was transfixed by the environs—and also seemingly confused.

“The bridge was different,” he said roughly. “The one we just went over. It’s different from when I . . .”

“Much has changed indeed, I imagine.”

“There are far more tall buildings downtown. More cars. More . . . everything.”

“Wait until you encounter the Internet, my friend. Then you shall see a truly dubious improvement.”

Soon enough, they came upon the house, and Markcus gasped. “It is so . . . beautiful.”

“There is a lot of glass. And much irony in that.”

Assail pulled up to the garage doors, triggering the proper one, and then he proceeded inside and under cover. When Markcus went to open his door, Assail stopped him with a hand to the forearm.

“Not until the panels are back down. Precautions must be observed.”

“My apologies.”

When they were shut in properly, they stepped out on their own sides, and Assail waited for the other male to come around. Markcus was moving slowly, and using the Range Rover for support, but he had made it amply clear that he would accept no help and would not be availing himself of any canes or walkers, either.

Assail stepped over to the house door and opened the reinforced-steel expanse. The scent that boiled out of the mudroom was heavenly, everything that was good about First Meal. Bacon and eggs, coffee, pancakes . . . no, scones?

Markcus faltered as he entered the house. “Oh . . . that is . . .”