My husband woke me up in the middle of the night. “Get up. Into the yard. Now.” We hid in the bushes in our pajamas, and when I saw who was entering the house, my hands began to tremble.

We crouched among the prickly branches while the leaves scratched my arms and Harper buried her face against Colton’s chest to muffle another whimper, and from that angle we could see the entire back side of our house standing silent and unlit against the black sky.

Several long minutes passed before a pair of headlights swept slowly across the yard, their glow sliding over the grass and briefly illuminating the pale siding of our home.

A dark cargo van rolled into the driveway without its engine revving loudly, and two men stepped out with the quiet confidence of people who had done this kind of thing many times before.

One of them carried a metal crowbar that caught the light, while the other adjusted a pair of tight gloves and glanced toward the windows as if checking for movement inside.

My breath caught painfully in my throat as they moved straight toward the back door without hesitation, and Grayson pressed his face into my chest while I gently covered Harper’s mouth when she stirred.

The back door opened without a single strike of the crowbar, and the realization that it had not been forced made my knees begin to tremble uncontrollably.