“I remember being sent to bed early. I remember yelling—my mom, my stepdad, and CarleeAnn, downstairs.” He looked away. “Weirdly, I . . . I think I remember CarleeAnn coming into my room later. It’s blurry. I was only seven then. But I’m pretty sure she kissed my forehead and then . . . well, she was gone the next morning.” He rubbed one palm over the back of his neck. “And, um, that was the last time I ever saw her.”

But why? If there was anything at all to Wilder’s theory, if CarleeAnn had somehow been in Diana’s car during the accident—or happened upon it or had even gone looking for it—and if she’d found Diana’s toddler still alive, why wouldn’t she have gone straight to Maggie? To her own parents? To the police, if nothing else.

Or if there was nothing to Wilder’s theory, if CarleeAnn had had a baby at eighteen or nineteen, why not take her home to her family? What had led her to Illinois?

Why never return to Muir Harbor?

Too many questions and they were decades old. What were the chances of answering any of them so many years later?

“Do you remember if your sister ever had a boyfriend?” Sydney asked. “Maybe someone named JP?”

Another shrug. Another shake of his head. “Sorry, no.”

“Did your parents ever say anything about her whereabouts? Talk to you about where she was? Why she didn’t come home?”

Creighton studied her again, perhaps looking for a hint of the older stepsister he remembered. “Not really. I heard Mom on the phone with her once—at least, I think it was her. Mom was crying. But mostly, they didn’t talk about her. And then Mom got sick and my stepdad had to quit his job so he could care for her. We moved to D.C. to be closer to her specialist.”

Had CarleeAnn ever even known that? Or had she been cut off completely?

Wilder laced his fingers on the table. “Creighton, were your parents the kind of people who . . . that is, if they’d found out their daughter had gotten pregnant out of wedlock, would that have been enough for them to become fully estranged from your sister?”

“I mean, I’d like to think not. No, we weren’t necessarily close-knit but it’s not like they were cruel. I should’ve asked more questions, I guess. But you know how it is when you’re a kid. You just kind of accept things. And then I was a teenager and all I cared about was baseball. Until Mom died and . . .” His palms drifted open. “I always knew I had a stepsister out there somewhere, but . . .”