“Um, hang on, honey.” Ronnie looked around. The shop was empty save for Esme and a worker at the counter Ronnie had never seen before. “Where’s Auntie Vanessa?” she asked. Esme just blinked big cow eyes back. She turned to the woman at the counter. “Excuse me? Which way to the bathroom?”

The counter woman scowled with exasperation. “We don’t have one for customers. Sorry.”

“Oh.” Ronnie checked behind the counter, even stood on tiptoes to see into a back room. “Where’s the person this little girl came in with?”

“My rate’s twenty bucks an hour, you know. She said you’d pay.”

She held out her hand, expectant. Ronnie frowned, but when she fished in her wallet and handed the woman a twenty, the woman seemed satisfied. “What did . . . ?” Ronnie asked, then stopped. She looked out the window. Out on the street, there was no sign of Vanessa’s car. She looked back at Esme, too afraid to ask what had happened.

She sank into the booth, shaken and buzzed. The suitcase they’d packed for Esme that morning was sitting against the window, though when she opened it up to check the contents, all the clothes were rumpled. They looked hurriedly stuffed in, not carefully folded, as they’d been when Ronnie packed. She bent down to sniff the clothes; they smelled sour, the way Vanessa did. Esme’s bathing suit smelled like chlorine. There were a few drawings crumpled up—bright suns, houses, smiling stick figures. And then she saw a folded note, her own name scrawled across the front.

She pulled it out. “What’s this?”

Esme glanced at it and shrugged quizzically. “We made cards. I made one for you!”

As the little girl reached for her bag to find the drawing, Ronnie opened the paper. Vanessa had written what she had to say lengthwise across the page in small, cramped letters.

I can’t. You win.

Ronnie’s eyes bulged. To her surprise, the sudden image she had of Vanessa driving home alone—feeling sad? bereft? unequipped?—made her heart crack. Who knew what Vanessa’s breaking point was, but she’d paid so much money and put forth so much effort, all for nothing.

But then came the elation. She pressed the note to her chest and felt another sob rise up, this one pure joy.

Another piece of paper had been tucked inside the message; it had fluttered to Ronnie’s lap when she’d opened it. She picked it up and unfolded this one, too. At first, she didn’t understand Vanessa’s message. The words swam before her eyes.

You killed him, years ago. But don’t worry. Nobody knows except me.