Page 8 of State of the Union (First Family 3)

“I’ve got them if you guys want to take a break,” Eli said.

“Are you sure?” Nick asked.

“Yep. You must be exhausted after all the festivities.”

“I wouldn’t mind a break,” Nick said, giving Sam the side-eye at the unexpected opportunity for some alone time.

“Me, too,” Sam said.

“We’re going to hit the pool after this,” Scotty said. “We’ll catch up to you in a bit.”

“Sounds good,” Sam said, taking Nick by the hand to make their escape before one of the Littles could object.

“Did that just happen?” Nick asked as they headed downstairs.

“Don’t say a word that might jinx it. And isn’t it nice to have an older kid around to keep an eye on the younger ones? Our family planning was spot-on.”

Nick laughed at that.

Nothing about their family had been planned, but it had worked out beautifully.

They’d no sooner closed the door to their suite when Sam’s cell phone rang. “It’s Jeannie. I have to take it.”

“Make it snappy, and that’s an order from the president.”

Sam smiled at him as she took the call from her detective. “Merry Christmas.”

“Same to you. Hope you guys had a great day.”

“We did. How about you?”

“Lots of fun with the family. They’re all jealous that we got to do Christmas Eve at the White House. What a great time. Thank you again for having us.”

“It was fun. Thanks for coming.”

“I wanted to let you know I’m going to Richmond tomorrow to do some more digging into the Carisma Deasly case. As I mentioned last night, I met with a former boyfriend of Daniella Brown’s, and he believes she had something to do with Carisma’s disappearance. He said she was obsessed with that kid, and he used that word—obsessed. He said she lives in Richmond now and told me where to find her.”

Sam sat on the bed. “What’s your plan?”

“I haven’t got one yet. I’ll play it by ear and see what happens.”

“Is Matt going with you?”

“He is.”

“What did you tell him?”

“That we’re tying up a loose end from the Tappen case,” Jeannie said.

“I’m still worried about this blowing up in our faces after we were told to stand down on this investigation.” Carisma’s disappearance was one of many still-open cases overseen years earlier by now-disgraced Lieutenant Leonard Stahl, who’d recently been convicted of attempting to murder Sam—twice.

“I understand the situation, and I promise to clear anything with you before it happens.”

“If you think you’ve found Daniella, we’ll call in Jesse Best and the U.S. Marshals. We can’t be the heroes in this one.”

“I hear you. I’ll let you know if we need the marshals.”

“Sounds good.”

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