Chapter 1 - FIVE CHILDREN, FOUR CARS
At 11:43 on a Thursday night, six-year-old Mason Reed wrapped both arms around his little sister and refused to let a social worker put her into another car.
“I’ll be good,” he kept saying. “I promise I’ll be good.”
Daniel Carter stood barefoot on his front porch in Bellevue, Nebraska, trying to understand why five children were scattered across his driveway.
He had been expecting two.
Daniel was twenty-nine, single, and licensed as a respite foster parent. He worked remotely three days a week as a systems analyst for an Omaha hospital network and spent the other two at an office twenty minutes away.
He had never taken a long-term placement.
He definitely had never taken five children under seven.
But the county placement worker, Renee Collins, looked exhausted.
“The kinship placement failed tonight.”
“What happened?”
“Their grandmother said she could handle them.”
“And?”
“She can’t.”
Daniel looked at the children.
Mason, six.
Ellie, five.
Nora, four.
Caleb, two.
And one-year-old Sophie asleep against another worker’s shoulder.
Their mother had died six months earlier after years of instability. Their father had been out of their lives long enough that the court had already begun permanency proceedings.
Their maternal grandmother, Judith Reed, had promised to take them.
Tonight she had changed her mind.
Renee lowered her voice.
“We found homes. Just not one home.”
Daniel understood.
“How many?”
“Four.”
Mason heard anyway.
His head snapped up.
“No.”
Renee crouched.
“Mason—”
“No!”
He grabbed Ellie harder.
“You said Grandma’s.”
“I know.”
“She said we stay together.”
Daniel watched the boy’s face.
Not crying.
Not yet.
Calculating.
Trying to decide which adult needed convincing.
Daniel recognized that expression so quickly it almost made him step backward.
Renee stood.
“We need somewhere for Mason and Ellie tonight. The younger three can go directly to emergency placements.”
Mason stared at Daniel.
“Are they your kids?”
Daniel shook his head.
“No.”
“Do you have kids?”
“No.”
Mason glanced at the house.
“Then you have room.”
Renee closed her eyes briefly.
Daniel should have said no.
His license was not written for five children.
His house was not prepared.
He had one crib from respite care, not two.
He had food for one adult and whatever children occasionally stayed on weekends.
He had an important systems migration Monday.
His mother lived ninety minutes away.
His closest friend traveled for work.
There were a hundred reasonable reasons.
Then the worker holding Sophie stepped toward one of the cars.
Mason moved in front of her.
“You can’t.”
“Mason.”
“She cries if Ellie isn’t there.”
Ellie whispered, “I can make her bottle.”
Five years old.
Offering childcare credentials.
Daniel felt something old move inside his chest.
He looked at Renee.
“Can you request an emergency sibling exception for one night?”
Renee stared at him.
“You understand what you’re asking?”
“One night.”
Daniel knew before she answered that it would not be one night.
Mason knew too.
Twenty minutes later, all five children walked into Daniel’s house.
Mason entered last.
Before crossing the threshold, he looked back at the empty driveway.
“Are they coming tomorrow?”
“Who?”
“The cars.”
Daniel could have lied.
Instead he said, “I don’t know.”
Mason nodded once.
May you like
Then he whispered something Daniel almost missed.
“If they do, they should take me first.”
