In the days leading up to their departure, Beth’s complete attention to Nama showed Carmen she’d made the right choice. When she conveyed this feeling to Helen, the woman arranged for new identification documentation, set up a healthy, anonymous account for them to live off, and then tried to push it to the back of her mind and help her daughter deal with the tragedy.

Carmen took care of getting Beth and Nama off the island. It was a stressful situation, as at any moment they expected Beth to be arrested for kidnapping, but they looked the part of mother and daughter and made it through security without any trouble.

As Carmen talked, Quinn let her head lie back on the headrest, watching the road ahead of them. Maggie asked a few questions here and there, but Quinn was too drained. After the first few miles, she felt like she was outside of her body, listening to a horrifying story being unraveled but not really being there. For some reason, the thought came to her that it was no wonder Carmen hadn’t married or had children. She probably thought she didn’t deserve them after what she’d done.

According to Carmen, she was the only one to keep in touch with Beth, since Helen was too afraid to be connected to her. Helen had hoped that they could all move on and her deed would prove best for everyone.

But after only a year, Helen had second thoughts when her daughter Jules couldn’t overcome her grief. She talked to Carmen, who relayed to Beth that she should bring the girl back. They created a scenario in which Beth would leave Nama somewhere safe and then make the call for the family to find her. They gave Beth a month to come to terms with it and make the drop. She was promised that no one would ever know she had taken the girl and told there’d be another deposit of a substantial amount of money—a gesture of gratitude for keeping Nama safe.

“Beth told me she needed some time to think about it,” Carmen said. “But when it came down to the last days, I only got one more call from her. She’d completely panicked. You would’ve thought I was asking her to give up her own flesh-and-blood child. She said she didn’t want Helen’s money. She wanted to keep Nama.”

“How did she think she’d get away with it?” Quinn asked.

“She did get away with it,” Maggie answered.

Carmen nodded. “Yes, she did, didn’t she? At least until now. I assume she knew Helen wouldn’t involve the law. She packed you up and just dropped off the radar. Disconnected her phone number and moved to an unknown address. She also drained the bank account Helen had set up for Nama’s ongoing care, though she’d claimed not to want money.”