Spotlight: Mother May I by Harry Hunsicker
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She lost everything. Except the will to fight.
When former CIA operative Meg Dalton finds a shocking clue that suggests her long-missing daughter might still be alive, she's forced into a desperate, high-stakes search for the truth. Fifteen years after little Ivy vanished without a trace at a Texas fair, Meg has built a career as a covert "operator" a soldier-for-hire who takes on dangerous black ops missions for the government.
But during a botched assignment in Los Angeles, Meg encounters a woman wearing her daughter's distinctive butterfly necklace, and everything she believes unravels. As Meg defies her handlers and goes rogue to chase the lead, she's thrust into a deadly conspiracy linking global espionage, human trafficking, and her own past sins.
Hunted by both her employers and foreign agents, Meg must decide how far she's willing to go and what lines she'll cross to uncover the truth and reclaim her child. Mother May I is a gripping, emotionally charged thriller about loss, obsession, and the unbreakable bond between a mother and her daughter.
Excerpt
Fifteen Years Ago
You’d think a mother’s intuition would count for something—a hunch, if nothing else. A vague feeling that the events unfolding that day were amiss.
But no. There was none of that.
There was only a beautiful fall afternoon and the two of us together—my daughter, Ivy, and me. Happy in the moment.
Same as it ever was. Us against the world.
To say I loved her—to say only that—was a failure of words.
All the writers who ever lived couldn’t properly express how I felt about my child. Not the ones I studied in Mrs. Novotny’s AP English class, nor those I’d never even heard of.
Ivy clutched my hand. She had just turned three, and this was her first time at the fair.
”It’s so loud, Mommy.” She looked up at me and smiled, squeezing my fingers.
I grinned back at her, remembering my first time at the fair. I was about her age, walking beside my father. The Dashing lights, the noise, the smells—so much happening all at once.
I held tightly to her hand as we wove through the throngs of people. Fe passed the petting Roo, the ring toss, the shooting gallery—carnies calling out to us as we walked by their booths.
I was eighteen, and I’d been coming to this fair my whole life. It was the biggest thing to happen in our little town—an event that drew people from all over the county and beyond, even from as far as Austin and San Antonio.
The crowd thickened as we neared the tent where the polka band played. People jostled us, so I hoisted Ivy onto my hip.
She looped an arm around my neck. Her skin smelled like shampoo and fresh milk. The necklace she always wore—a tiny silver butterfly with ruby red eyes—glinted in the sun.
”Don’t let me go, Mommy.”
”I won’t, baby.” I kissed her forehead. ”You and me. Always-always.”
She pressed her face into my neck. ”Always-always, Mommy.”
The Ferris wheel loomed ahead, not far beyond the tent. That’s where we were headed—to meet Ivy’s father, Rusty.
He and I weren’t together. Or not together anymore, but it’s not like we were ever a real couple. Sometimes I wished we had been. Other times, not so much. Me and Ivy—we did pretty well on our own.
”Daddy’s by the rides,” I said. ”We’re almost there.”
I was a senior in high school. Rusty had just turned nineteen, graduated last May. He’d been first-string for the football team all four years—running back. There had been talk of college scholarships, but he’d hurt his knee senior year and started hanging out with his uncle, a pot dealer. Now, he worked at the feed store, wrangling sacks of deer corn and fertilizer bags.
”Can we go on the ferris wheel, Mommy?”
”We sure can,” I said. ”Just as soon as we find your dad.”
That is, if he brought money, I thought.
Ivy and I lived with my grandmother. Her Social Security had run out this month before I could pay the electric bill at the trailer, so cash was tight.
Two men drinking beer brushed past on their way to the tent, nearly bumping into us.
I hugged Ivy close. We should have come earlier. Too many drunks later in the day.
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About the Author
Harry Hunsicker is the best-selling author of ten crime thrillers and numerous short stories, including The Life and Death of Rose Doucette, shortlisted for a 2025 ITW Thriller Award, and Still River, his debut, which was nominated for a Shamus Award. Hunsicker splits his time between Dallas, Texas and Santa Fe, New Mexico.
