I nod. “There’s a chance Kelsey is already out. That’s what I’m hoping, I guess. Or if she isn’t, that Leo will get us to Kelsey’s sister and maybe she’ll have some better ideas about how to get everyone out.” And I do hope that—no matter how unlikely.

Jasper looks down like he’s considering. “Okay,” he says finally. Like he’s come to a conclusion. “If that’s how you feel, that’s good enough for me.” He motions to the computer. “Let’s go.”

But when I try to turn on the computer, nothing happens.

“Shit, the battery is dead,” I say. “There’s got to be a cord around here somewhere.”

I push off the stool and open a narrow drawer to my right. Nothing. The huge kitchen is filled with drawers and more drawers. But I need to find that cord even if it means I have to go through every inch of the house.

“I’ll help,” Jasper offers and the two of us start opening one mostly empty drawer after the next. “She barely has anything in here. How does she even live?”

I shrug. “Takeout.”

There are only two drawers left to look in on my side, one—thin and wide—probably holds silverware. And a smaller one that is our last reasonable shot. When I jerk it open a manila envelope slides hard forward and bumps against the front of the drawer. I freeze, staring down at it. At the words written on the front: David Rosenfeld, January 12. Unmistakably in my mother’s handwriting. Dated this year, too, right before she died. I blink once, then again. I even shake my head.

All I can think to do is close my eyes again. Hope that when I open them it will be gone. “Do you see that? In the drawer?” I manage finally.

“Um.” Jasper seems more confused than anything. “You mean this?”

When I look, he has the envelope in his hand like it is nothing. No. Big. Deal. And it wouldn’t be maybe if my mom and Rachel had been in touch anytime in the past five years.

“Will you check what’s in it?” I ask.

“Sure,” Jasper says, but more hesitantly now. He pulls something out of the envelope and squints down at it. “They’re photographs: a building, a few people. Do you want to see them?”

“Those are my mom’s,” I say, my voice trembling. “Rachel shouldn’t have them.”

Breathe, I tell myself as I stare down. But my lungs feel encased in cement. I grip the counter hard to steady myself.

“Is it possible your dad gave them to her?” Jasper offers.

“No,” I say.

Because I do not believe for one second that’s actually what happened. Finally, I get myself to take the envelope from Jasper, but still I do not look inside.