That wobble in her voice was getting wilder. I said, “They’ll be upset, yeah. And there’s a chance they might take that out on you for a bit, just at first. But even if they do, it’ll wear off. They’ll all know none of this is your fault, just like I do.”

“You don’t know for definite. They could hate me forever and ever. You can’t promise.”

Her eyes were white-ringed, hunted. I wished I had hit Shay a lot harder while I had the chance. “No,” I said. “I can’t.”

Holly slammed both feet into the back of the passenger seat. “I don’t want this! I want everyone to go away and leave me alone. I wish I never even saw that stupid note!”

Another slam that rocked the seat forward. She could have kicked my car to pieces for all I cared, if it made her feel any better, but she was going at it hard enough to hurt herself. I leaned around, fast, and got an arm between her feet and the seat back. She made a wild helpless noise and twisted furiously, trying to get a clear kick without hitting me, but I caught her ankles and held on. “I know, love. I know. I don’t want any of this either, but here it is. And I wish to God I could say that everything’ll be all right once you tell the truth, but I can’t. I can’t even promise that you’ll feel better; you might, but you could just as easily end up feeling even worse. All I can tell you is that you need to do it, either way. Some things in life aren’t optional.”

Holly had slumped back in her booster seat. She took a deep breath and tried to say something, but instead she clamped a hand over her mouth and started to cry.

I was about to get out and climb into the back to hug her tight. It hit me just in time: this wasn’t a little kid howling, waiting for Daddy to sweep her up in his arms and make everything all better. We had left that behind, somewhere in Faithful Place.

Instead I stretched out my hand and took Holly’s free one. She held on like she was falling. We sat there like that, with her leaning her head against the window and shaking all over with huge silent sobs, for a long time. Behind us I heard men’s voices swapping a few brusque comments, and then car doors slamming, and then Stephen driving away.

Neither of us was hungry. I made Holly eat anyway, some radioactive-looking cheese croissant thing that we picked up at a Centra on the way, more for my sake than for hers. Then I took her back to Olivia’s.

I parked in front of the house and turned around to look at Holly. She was sucking a strand of hair and gazing out the window with wide, still, dreamy eyes, like fatigue and overload had put her into a trance. Somewhere along the way she had fished Clara out of her bag.