I pull it out of my sock and stare at it, wondering what would have happened if the Magpie Man’s plan had worked and they’d found it when I was dead.

Would they have realized, or would they have thrown it away without a second look?

It doesn’t matter now, but it’s nice to think I might have got one over the Magpie Man from beyond the grave.

Lorraine doesn’t answer when I call the number on her card, so I leave a message, telling her I have one last piece of evidence for her to collect.

Nan comes over that night and holds me tight, and it’s not until I try to end the hug that I realize she’s crying. For ten years, she kept us together, and now, finally, she can break down.

“Thank you,” she whispers. “She would have been so proud of you.”

This time, I know this isn’t Nan’s way of saying she’s proud of me. I know it’s true.

I don’t say anything back. I hold her extra tight and wait for her to let go.

Later that night, the three of us sit in the living room, mostly silent, mostly happy.

I would be lying if I said catching him made everything all right. In a strange, cruel way, I feel sadder when I think of Mom. The terrible certainty of never seeing her again is more powerful than the satisfaction of getting justice. But now we can grieve.

And I am happy too. I’m happy that he will never kill again, that Lorna Banks’s baby boy will grow up knowing her murderer rotted in jail.

I’m happy that somehow this ridiculous idea of mine actually worked.

The biggest moment of the show happened when no one was watching. But that’s life, I guess. Most of our defining moments take place when no one’s paying attention.

I didn’t know I was having my last conversation with Mom when she kissed me goodbye the day she was murdered.

She didn’t know those photographs would rob her of a happy ending.

Dad didn’t know he would lose his soul mate on a random Friday.

And Elliot Farrell didn’t know he would be caught because of a secret second phone and an emergency ring I never thought I would use.

Chapter 141

“I always knew he was an asshole,” Bernie said. “But I didn’t know he was a monster.”

It took a while before she would talk to me, and when she finally did, I didn’t ask why.

Maybe she was embarrassed, maybe she hated me a little bit, maybe she couldn’t look me in the eye once she knew what her stepdad really was, or maybe she needed some time to repair her own broken family.