Chapter 11 - THE HOUSE WASN’T SAFE
The police moved us before midnight.
Lily thought we were going on a trip.
I packed her rabbit, her favorite pajamas, and the cup she liked for water.
Then I stood in her doorway staring at the bed I had promised was safe.
Owen touched my shoulder.
“Daniel.”
I picked up the overnight bag.
We stayed at his house behind a gate that actually worked.
Rosa came with us.
An officer checked the doors.
Another walked the yard.
Lily watched from the couch.
“Did I make the bad thing happen?”
I sat beside her.
“No.”
“Because I took the phone?”
“No, baby.”
She pulled at a loose thread on her rabbit.
“If I put it back, can everybody stop being mad?”
I had prepared myself for questions about police.
I wasn’t ready for that.
I gathered her into my lap.
“You found something a grown-up was hiding. The grown-ups made the bad choices. Every one of them.”
She leaned against me.
“Even you?”
The question landed exactly where it should.
“Yes,” I said.
Owen looked away.
“I believed someone before I listened carefully enough to you.”
Lily thought about that.
Then she whispered, “I tried to tell you about the school.”
I closed my eyes.
Three weeks earlier.
In the car.
She had asked whether snow stayed all year in Vermont.
Victoria said they had been watching a movie.
I accepted the answer because it was convenient.
“I remember,” I said.
“I don’t want to sleep at a school.”
“You won’t.”
After she fell asleep, I went into Owen’s kitchen and bent over the sink.
He stood beside me.
Neither of us said anything for a long time.
At dawn, Ruiz called.
Victoria had failed to appear for a scheduled meeting with her attorney.
Her apartment was empty.
So was Mason’s.
Then Owen’s security monitor chimed.
A delivery van sat outside the gate.
The driver held a box of flowers.
Tucked beneath the ribbon was a card.
For Lily.
From Mommy.
Owen reached for the gate control.
May you like
I caught his hand.
“Don’t open it.”
