My phone was against the wall, charging. “I got a message from my sister today,” I said, picking it up and scrolling through my email. When I found what I was looking for, I passed the phone to Reagan.

She stared at it for what felt like an hour. When she finally looked at me, she was frowning.

“It sounds like your sister,” she said. “But are you a hundred percent sure it’s real?”

I ticked the reasons off on my fingers. “She mentioned what our mom went through, and who else knows that? She called me Dodo, which was her nickname for me when I was a kid. I found out it’s true that her husband was married before. What part doesn’t ring true?”

“That first line—I keep thinking of Mom, and how you never believe you’re going to end up like one of your parents, until you do—I can literally hear Caroline’s voice in my head saying that,” Reagan said. “But the part where she says to bring her husband to justice? What does she expect you to do?”

I had been wondering about that myself. “Maybe she meant I should go to the police. Or maybe she wanted me to do to Theo what I did to my father.”

“Absolutely not.” Reagan’s voice was sharp. “Your sister cared about you. She wouldn’t ask you to do something that would land you in jail, Dee. Stop thinking like that.”

I sighed. She was right.

“Caro wrote it because she knew she was in danger,” I said. “She was expecting something awful to happen.”

“That makes sense,” Reagan said. “But here’s another thing that doesn’t sound like Caroline: she knew Theo killed his first wife, and she stayed with him? No. She wouldn’t do that.”

Reagan was right about that too. She was good with puzzles, and she was sliding bits of information into place, creating a picture I could barely grasp the edges of. Maybe I wasn’t ready to look at it.

“When I confronted Theo, he was shocked I knew about the first wife. Maybe Caro just found out about her? That could be what put her in danger.”

“Back up,” Reagan said. “What’s this about you confronting Theo?”

“I was in the car with him on the way to Green-Wood. I felt like . . . like it was now or never. I had to find out if what Caro wrote was true.”

“One day, you’ll pass the marshmallow test, Dee. But today is not that day. You just lost the element of surprise.”

“I don’t care.”

“Dee, if this guy killed his wife, what do you think he’ll do to you?”

“I don’t care,” I repeated.