“I took two years off, but yes, now I’m doing that again,” she said. “Why?”

“You’re just so, ah, fit.” She was fashion-model slender, her pants and top fitted to defined, shapely arms and a flat belly.

“For a while, I was just too thin. But I’m getting strong again. Slowly. You...you’re thinner, too, Thea. Not that you were ever at all overweight. The truth of it is, I just should eat more.” She paused and said, “I have trouble eating these days, for obvious reasons.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Because she can’t.”

“Can’t?”

“Because Belinda can’t eat. Beet salad or macaroni and cheese or bean enchiladas or twice-baked potatoes or rum raisin ice cream.”

I thought of Stefan eating rum raisin ice cream in that horrible hotel on that horrible winter day. “Oh, Jill, oh Jill, I’m so sorry.”

She said, “I know you are. That’s the real reason I wanted to see you. I want to ask a favor of you. I want you and Stefan to stop speaking about Belinda in public.”

Again, I was caught flat-footed.

“You got so much attention, and it puts Stefan in the position of being kind of, I don’t know, familiar, a decent guy who made a big mistake, like somebody anybody could understand. This whole thing is making Stefan and you look very sympathetic. It’s breaking my heart, Thea, it feels so unfair to the memory of my daughter. And the girls and women who work with SAY are outraged, Thea.”

“I saw that for myself. But the interruption of the evening, that really wasn’t fair, Jill.”

“I had nothing to do with that. It’s their right to peaceful protest, their right under the constitution.”

“But so was the talk.”

“You’re trying to make it like there are two sides to this, and there aren’t.”

“And Stefan said it was his intention to try to support SAY. He still wants to do that.”

“And I said that was impossible, Thea. Even you must see why.”

I finally told her that it was only one speech. I said, “I won’t accept any another invitation. I promise.”

“You should not, and maybe even for your own good. I read about what happened to Stefan’s car recently. Aren’t you worried that something worse could happen to him or to you?”

Is it her? I thought then. Is it Jill who’s behind all that cautioning from Esme? Jill got to her and converted her and now she’s using her as her mouthpiece to shut us up. Jill probably paid that guy in the hoodie to stalk us too. Maybe even set Stefan’s car on fire.