I was stupid to think I could remain so naïve about Martin’s comings and goings, and knowing so little about his job. I was stupid to think he grieved his wife when I never saw him shed a single tear over her, never saw him looking at Candace’s photograph in Kat’s room, never saw him staring off into the distance as if she might emerge from it. I have been stupid, duped by my own desire to have what I wanted. And now I am going to lose it all.

I let the tears fall then.

I don’t care about this house and my fine clothes and the little sapphire on my finger and my new last name. I don’t care that I’m not married to anyone, legally.

I’d give it all up to keep Kat. Yes, I’ve long wanted what my mother had, and what I had with her, back when she had it. I wanted a cozy, warm home. A gentle man to share my life with. Children to raise and love. When I helped Mam care for the wee ones whose mothers worked at the docks, I used to imagine the tots were mine. I loved pretending they were mine.

I know now Kat is what I had wanted most of all.

But Kat is not my child. She never was. She is Candace’s little girl.

Why in God’s name did Martin bring me out here? He didn’t need me. Why bring Kat to San Francisco in the first place when he could have just as easily left her on Candace’s father’s doorstep when her mother was whisked away to that Arizona sanatorium? Why complicate his appalling endeavors with the annoyance of caring for a child he does not love?

Why, why, why?

The water is cool when I finally pull myself out of it. I towel myself dry and put my nightgown back on. I head back to my bedroom, my head throbbing with unanswered questions. I crawl back into bed and beg for sleep to come. Many minutes later, it finally does.

I wake well before daybreak, and I know slumber will not return to me. My heart is aching as I dress in the dark. I know I am setting out to do a grand thing—reuniting a child with her mother is the grandest thing I could ever do—but my soul is still heavy. I am wondering as I work my buttons if perhaps Candace will let me stay and care for Kat while she convalesces. Surely children are not allowed to live at the sanatorium with their mothers. And yet I can easily see Candace’s father sending me away after I return Kat to Candace because he can pay a reputable nanny to watch over his daughter’s child. Why would he or Candace trust me to care for Kat? I’m a stranger to them. I am pondering these thoughts when I hear a noise downstairs, the sound of a key in a lock.