The Great Escape by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

coffeemaker, exactly the sort of thing a highly paid professional bodyguard who loved good coffee might own. It was what she discovered in the refrigerator, however, that convinced her she’d found the right place. On a nearly empty shelf, she spotted a jar of orange marmalade, exactly the same brand she’d seen Panda slather on her homemade bread.
    “Real men eat grape jelly,” she’d said when she’d seen him pick up an identical jar at the grocery near Caddo Lake. “I’m serious, Panda. If you buy orange marmalade, you have to turn in your man card.”
    “It’s what I like. Deal with it.”
    The refrigerator also held two six-packs of Coke. No beer. She’d spent countless highway miles thinking about that first morning when she’d awakened by the lake and seen the pile of empties from the six-pack Panda had bought the previous night. What kind of bodyguard drank when he was on duty? But try as she might, the only real drinking she’d witnessed involved his taking a few slugs before she’d gone into the trees and the sight of him draining the bottle when she came out. Then there was the six-pack he’d set on the dresser their first night in that motel. How much of it had she really seen him drink? Not more than a couple of sips. As for their time at Caddo Lake … He’d only drunk Coke.
    She glanced toward the stairs that led to the second floor but couldn’t work up any enthusiasm for investigating. It was fully dark now, and she still needed to find a place to stay. But she didn’t want to go anywhere. She wanted to sleep right here in this big spooky house with its memories of summers past.
    She returned to the main-floor bedroom. Ugly vertical blinds covered sliding doors that led to an open deck, and a sawed-off broomstick resting in the door track provided the only security. After more snooping, she found a stack of the same low-cut boxer briefs he’d bought during their shopping trip, along with a pair of black and white board shorts for swimming. She retrieved her things from the car, locked the bedroom’s outer door to keep the wild things away, and settled in.
    Unexplained creaks disturbed her sleep, and toward morning, a troubling dream had her running through a house with too many rooms but no way out. The dream awakened her.
    The room was cool, but her T-shirt stuck to her skin. Early morning light trickled through the vertical blinds. She stretched, then shot up in bed as she heard the click of a latch.
    A boy came through the door she’d locked before she’d fallen asleep. “Get out,” she gasped.
    He seemed as shocked to see her as she was to see him, but he recovered faster. His wide eyes narrowed into a belligerent glare, as if she were the interloper.
    She swallowed hard. Sat up. What if she was in the wrong house after all?
    He wore a baggy pair of none-too-clean gray athletic shorts, a bright yellow T-shirt printed with an electric guitar, and scuffed sneakers without socks. He was African-American, his skin a couple of shades lighter than her brother Andre’s. Small and scrawny—maybe ten or eleven—he had short, nappy hair, knobby knees, gangly arms, and a hostile expression designed to proclaim his toughness to the world. It might have worked if his antagonism hadn’t been sabotaged by an extraordinary set of thickly lashed, golden-brown eyes.
    “You’re not supposed to be here,” he said, thrusting out his chin.
    She thought fast. “Panda said I could stay.”
    “He didn’t say anything to Gram about it.”
    So this was the right house after all. Although her brain had recovered from the shock of his appearance, the rest of her hadn’t stopped shaking. “He didn’t mention you, either,” she said. “Who are you?”
    But even as she asked the question, she suspected she knew the answer. This was Panda’s kid. And Panda’s beautiful, pregnant, African-American wife was in the kitchen right now, getting the place opened up for the family’s annual summer