“Why?”

“Because I needed it on a record.” Her hands were flat on the table. “I’d been talking to Detective Aubuchon for eleven days from a motel in New Hampshire.

And they had my statement, and they had Derek’s threats, and what they did not have was one single documented adult who could say where Ava was that whole time.

“If I’d walked in and said ‘my baby’s fine, she’s with a family friend,’ that’s hearsay. That’s a woman with a bruise on her face saying something. But if I point at you in front of two officers and they collect you and take a statement and it goes in the file with a time on it — then there’s a timeline.

Then Ava was somewhere. Then, if he ever comes at me for custody and says I abandoned her, there’s eleven days of a licensed foster parent and a CPS placement in a file with a case number on it.”

I sat with that.