Some color came back into her.

And then she asked me the question I’d been dreading.

“Did they find Mom?”

“Not yet, sweetheart,” I said.

“But everyone is looking.

A lot of people are looking.” She stared down at the blanket and said, in that same small flat voice, “Mom tried to help me.” And it undid something in me, because until that sentence a low ugly fear had been sitting in me that I hadn’t let myself name — the fear that Elena had let this happen, had stood by, had chosen the man over the child. Mom tried to help me. I put that carefully away to think about later, and I told Maya she could tell the whole story to a special person whose job was to listen, whenever she felt ready, and that she didn’t have to tell me first.