“This will be way better.” Hope had disappeared to the grocery store on the corner and returned with a can of fancy Italian tuna fish, kewpie mayonnaise, extra-sharp cheddar cheese, celery, onion, and tarragon.

Lindsay rotated her laptop on the kitchen island. “The application’s all done. Are you absolutely sure?”

“Of course.”

“You could be Tara King again, you know. Or pick any name you want,” she quickly added. Carter Decker had explained to them how he discovered Hope’s true identity after connecting the necklace he found on Lopez’s boat to Richard Mullaney’s murder. When shown photographs of Hope and Alex, Melanie Locke did not recognize either of them. It was Sophie, now twenty-five years old and a vice president of marketing at LockeHome, who remembered her former babysitter.

Once Hope learned more about her background, she had wanted to know where her mother was. Decker informed her that Laura King had been released from prison three years after Hope left Wichita, but died of a drug overdose five years later. It was a lot of new information at once, and Hope seemed open to the suggestion of resuming therapy to help process it. Lindsay had offered to track down the police reports for the criminal case against Hope’s mother, but Hope said she wasn’t ready to learn the details of her childhood quite yet. It was no surprise that she didn’t want to revert to her given name.

“How about Beyoncé?” Lindsay suggested. “You’d never have problems making a dinner reservation again.”

“Sacrilege. There’s only one Queen B. Besides, I picked the name I wanted fifteen years ago. I’m Hope Miller, and I have no desire to be anyone else.”

On Lindsay’s screen was the electronic form to petition for a legal name change. Now that Hope had a birth certificate for Tara King, she was taking all the steps to establish a legal identity. Once the name change was complete, Hope Miller—no middle name—would get a driver’s license and insurance. Hope reached over and hit the enter key. “Done! And so are these,” she said, sliding their sandwiches onto two plates.

Lindsay took a bite and nodded. “Okay, that’s good.”

“See?” Hope was mid-bite when her cell phone rang on the kitchen counter. She answered on speaker. “You should be calling my lawyer, Detective Decker.”

She flashed a smile in Lindsay’s direction. God, she was beautiful.

“I just wanted to make sure you were by your phone,” Decker said. “I’m sending you something right now on email. I think it’s going to make you very happy.”

Attached to the message that landed in Hope’s inbox was a copy of a handwritten letter. Lindsay read over Hope’s shoulder.

PLEASE READ.

Dear Hope,