That distance told me more than any confession could have.

He hadn’t known.

Or at least, he hadn’t known the part that mattered.

I couldn’t decide whether that made him less guilty or simply more useful.

We stopped in the kitchen.

The small white paper bag from the gas station off I-70 was still in my coat pocket. I’d bought Claire cinnamon mints because she used to keep them in the glove compartment and complain when she ran out.

That felt almost absurd now.

I’d spent seven dollars trying to surprise a woman who had apparently spent years telling another man I was buried somewhere.

On the refrigerator, a magnet shaped like the state of Ohio held up a reminder about our neighborhood block party. Beside it was a photo of Claire and me at a charity dinner in Columbus, both of us smiling like people who still belonged to the same life.

Evan stared at that photo.

Then he whispered, “You’re Mason Reed.”

I looked at him.