There was solemnity on their faces and earnestness in the way the partners held one another. Intent on the steps, the rhythm, the pace, they moved to the music. Their expressions showed concentration rather than joy. No one smiled, nor was there eye contact between partners.

Nola tucked errant hair tresses under the baseball cap and took a deep breath. Along with the scent of the roses and car fumes, she detected a different sweet smell. Only after she glimpsed an old man behind a tree sucking on a pipe did she identify the scent as opium. The man cleared his throat, brought up phlegm, and spat.

She averted her eyes. “We’ll find a small hotel,” she told Lulu. “Okay?” With a start, she realized that she had neither money nor credit cards—not even a passport. Leslie or Wade had always been at her elbow with her documents and a wallet full of bills. But even if she had those, the moment she checked into a hotel, Chinese officials would descend upon her. She had escaped, all right, but she was like a driver who had set out on a moonless night. She knew her final destination, but could only see as far as the headlights.

How ironic. She owned a ranch in the Colorado mountains, a villa on her private Azure Island in the Caribbean, and a twenty-four-room Manhattan penthouse overlooking Central Park. Each was stuffed with furniture, draperies, rugs, planters, gilded mirrors and original art. She hated minimalism in interior design. No understatement for her. “Less is more,” the decorator had tried to convince her, but she had been raised in a home with too much “less,” and it had never become “more.”

She must switch gears. This path of thinking might only send her over the precipice of despair. Nola made her way to the back of the plaza and sat down on a stone bench beside a patch of roses. What next? She untied the sling, and for the first time since finding Lulu in the orphanage four hours earlier, the baby stirred.

Nola tickled her cheek. “Wake up, Dumpling. Time to eat. Your tummy must be starving.” She massaged the little body through the clothing. The round belly of two days earlier had flattened.

Lulu opened her eyes. Her gaze was unfocused, then her lids dropped again. A surge of protectiveness ballooned in Nola, a force so large that it could not be crammed into the simple word, “love.”

“Wake up!” she urged. “C'mon, you can do it. You’re a resilient girl. Open your eyes and look at the world. Mommy’s here, waiting for you.” She propped Lulu against her shoulder and tapped on her back. The small body moved, then the little head lifted and twisted around to look at her.

Nola felt her mouth crinkle with a cry of happiness. She planted kisses on Lulu's head. “I’m here, Dumpling. Yes, it’s me.”