It was against this ugly and unforgivable backdrop that her mother’s note was interpreted. Chicken-scratch words on a page from the hotel notepad found in the room. Words Nic had read just once, though she could still close her eyes and see the shape of each letter.

My beloved family, I am so very sorry. I couldn’t make it home, and then I thought maybe you are better off without me. I pray you don’t look for me. I pray for your happiness.

She signed it with her full name. Molly Clarke. The police said she had probably done that to make sure it found its way back to them—so the hotel would know who’d left it.

But she’d paid for the room with her credit card. It was in her name. And the words, the phrases—they didn’t sound like her mother.

The note was sent to a handwriting expert. It matched the samples they’d provided. It matched the writing of Molly Clarke.

Still, she had fought against them. The local police. The state troopers. Even her father. They’d given her the statistics which supported the walk-away theory. Most adult women who disappear were trying to leave their lives behind. They came home when, if, they were ready.

What did she have to fight with? Remnants from the past, fragments of memories about a devoted mother who could never cause her children to suffer by leaving them? The truth was, Nic had no idea what was in her mother’s head, what was even in her heart, or what narrative had been taking shape inside her—that she was a burden to them and they would be better off without her.

Nic had said as much to her face the morning before she left them.

The belief in her mother’s betrayal had come as a shock, but then settled in quietly, burrowing into the hollow spaces alongside the grief and the guilt that Annie’s death had carved. They were amorphous, covering every inch of her, living in every cell. And they had an insatiable yearning to be filled. The men and the alcohol were barely touching them anymore.

Evan had fared better. There’d been tears, but then his quick return to school. Her father had done his duty by wearing a somber face and taking care of his wife’s elderly parents. They lived in a home and were already in the throes of dementia. Nic envied them. Now, nearly two weeks later, friends had stopped bringing casseroles. Everyone was returning to normal life because it was unbearable to remain in a state of grief and loss. Evan at school. Her father back to work and his after-work activities. And Nic, back to her nights.

Only they’d been getting worse.

Now the woman again. “The driver of that truck may know where she went.”

Yes, Nic thought. The driver might know why she left us.