“Crystal.”

It took Larry ten minutes to fill her in. He sighed when he was finished, wondering what, if anything, this strange-looking young woman could contribute.

“Cady Jordan was a year ahead of me in school. I remember her. She was kind of shy but not shy, if you know what I mean. She had spirit. I was tall for my age, gangly, a real female nerd. She said she liked my red hair. I loved her pigtail. She was a nice kid. I remember the accident because I cried. I even wanted to go to see her, but my mother said she was too sick. That accident sure didn’t bother the others, though. Those four were always together. I wanted to belong, but I wasn’t allowed out of the backyard. Then after the accident, they didn’t see each other. Pete always ate by himself. Andy was with a boy named Carl, and Amy kind of flitted from girl to girl. I tried to be friends with her once, but she chased me away. Does any of that help?”

“Did you know Cady’s parents?”

“No. I just know what I heard my parents say. They talked about it a lot at suppertime. Every day there was something in the paper. They left Cady here and went to wherever they were going. My mother said that was a sin. You know, to leave a sick child behind. That’s why I wanted to go to see her.

“You’re right, Larry. You start at the beginning. The parents are the beginning. What are we going to do if they don’t want to talk to us?”

“I don’t know. But you need to be quiet now so I can think. There’s something buzzing around in my head, something I missed along the way. I have to put it all together and make the pieces fit.”

Cady stepped into the shower feeling woozy from the lack of sleep and all the alcohol she’d consumed during the long night. She now knew the contents of her own personal scrapbook by heart. She’d always been good at categorizing and collating things, shifting things from one place to another until it screamed satisfaction. The articles hadn’t done that. She knew there were things that had never been printed. There were too many gaps, too many unanswered questions in the printed articles, the most important being, why hadn’t her parents stayed around long enough to demand a thorough investigation? They should have defended her as vigorously as the Kings had accused her.

Steaming water sluiced over her tired body, taking away some of the tenseness between her shoulders. If she didn’t relax and unwind, she was going to get one of her hateful, pounding headaches.

She poured fragrant shampoo into the palm of her hand. It smelled like a warm ocean breeze and coconut. She lathered up, her thoughts going in all directions. Did her parents love her? She was thirty years old, and she still didn’t know the answer to that question. They’d provided for her. She’d always had plenty to eat and a roof over her head. She’d had clean, decent clothes. Necessities. But where was the love? The only person who had ever hugged or cuddled her was Lola.