“You want to be. You’re not, and you know you’re not, but you want a world that simple, and you lash out at the people who remind you that it isn’t.”
Her hands are trembling. I watch her fingers tighten around the cup to try and stop it, and then she puts the cup down and hides her hands in her lap. “This sounds a lot like you breaking up with me.”
“It isn’t.”
“Really?”
“I should have stopped pretending a long time ago. But you have to understand this, Siobhan: I’m not doing it anymore. You need to decide if you can be in a relationship with someone with a painful personal history, someone who needs to be able to talk about difficulties or triumphs with a job you hate. If you can, or think you can, wonderful. I really hope you do, and that we can figure out how to make this work going forward. If you can’t, I can understand that, but that’s your choice to end it.”
“You’re putting that on me.”
“Yes.” I drain the last of my coffee and stuff the trash into the cup. “Will you let me tell you something else about the children?”
Her expression says, hell no, but after a moment, she nods.
“They were hurt by their parents, and when this woman took them from their homes, she brought them to my house and told them they’d be safe. I would keep them safe. And yes, it’s terrifying that she knows where I live and what I do, but she’s also trusting me to keep these children safe. The history I have with my job, the reputation I’ve made with it, means these children aren’t being left in the house with their dead parents. It’s a small mercy, but a mercy nonetheless. She isn’t hurting the kids, and she knows I won’t either.”
“I’m not sure I have anything to say to that,” she replies shakily.
“That’s okay. Just think on it while you’re making your decision.”
My phone buzzes with another text, this one from Detective Mignone. Wong took pictures of his stepdaughter. In the photos, she doesn’t seem to be aware of it. Social worker wants you there when they tell her.
It might be close to an hour before I can get there, I reply.
That’s fine. I’ll let her know.
“I have to head to Manassas,” I announce.
“You’re going home? The day just started.”
“My yesterday hasn’t ended yet, and I’m going to the hospital to talk to one of the kids. Do you want to walk back with me or do you need some time?”
She looks at me for a long minute, and her shoulders slump. “I’ll stay for a bit. I guess . . . I guess I’ll talk to you . . . when?”
“Whenever you decide. You’re at bat.”
“At bat?”
“With a brother like Eddison, is it really so shocking baseball has crept into my vocabulary?” I stand and toss my trash, including the crumbled mess of her cannoli when she nods. I’m not sure she ate any of it, honestly. “I won’t show up at your apartment or your desk, won’t send you anything, won’t text or call or email. I’m not going to pass notes like in grade school. This is up to you.”
I hesitate, then decide what the hell and lean down to kiss her. However pissed at me she is, our bodies know each other, and she leans into me, her hand curling around my elbow. She tastes like raspberry and white chocolate and peppermint from that silly drink. There’s a catcall from a passing driver, but I ignore that, focused on the feel of her lips on mine, the small sigh when my finger strokes along her jawline. This may be the last time we kiss, and it’s frightening to realize that I’ve given up any say in that decision. Frightening, but right. When I pull away, it isn’t far, our breaths mingling as my forehead rests against hers. “Te amo y te extra?o y espero que sea suficiente.”
Walking away feels like leaving a piece of me behind, but I don’t look back. I head into the store instead, ordering drinks for Eddison, Sterling, and Vic, and a second one for myself. When I start back to the office, cups carefully slotted into a carrier, Siobhan isn’t at the table anymore.
10
Sarah’s sheer fury at learning her stepfather had cameras hidden around her room takes up pretty much the rest of the day. She’s so angry and so hurt, but she also hasn’t told her sister what happened, so all that rage spirals inward until we take her outside and let her scream. Nancy, a social worker with over thirty years of experience, expertly intercepts the running security guards to let them know what’s going on, and I stay with the shrieking, sobbing preteen in the little garden space that’s probably seen a lot of such things. She calms slowly, more a symptom of exhaustion than any actual calm, I think, and asks if she can see the pictures.
“Do you think it will help you?” Nancy asks evenly.
“They’re pictures of me. How many other people are seeing them?”
“Detective Mignone found them when he was going through your stepfather’s closet, and he immediately put them into an envelope and sealed them,” I explain. “There will be one person who will have the job of cataloguing the pictures into evidence, along with a basic description of the contents, and then the new envelope will be sealed. Given that Mr. Wong is dead and cannot be brought up for trial, there’s no reason for the pictures to ever see the inside of a courtroom. There’s no reason for lawyers to request to review the evidence.”
“What if Samuel showed them to someone else? Like to his friends or something, or shared them online?”
“Detective Holmes is asking her department to let her partner with the FBI cybercrimes division,” I tell her. “We have people who specialize in tracking files and photos online. If he sent them to anyone using his computer, they’ll find out. The police will also be talking to his coworkers and friends.”
“So even if they didn’t get pictures, they’ll know there are pictures?”
“No. They won’t mention the pictures specifically unless they’re pretty sure they’ve got someone. They’ll be very careful, Sarah. No one wants to see you hurt more.”
“And if they do have pictures?”
“They’ll be arrested and tried for possession of child pornography. Sarah, you are twelve years old. No one, and I mean no one, wants those photos out for anyone to see.”
“But I have to know,” she whispers, dropping to the bench like a puppet with severed strings.
“I can understand that.” Nancy leans forward, not crowding Sarah but engaging a little more now that the yelling has stopped. “But they’re trying to protect you. Those photographs are evidence of a crime, Sarah, and they’re not simply going to give them to you, even if you are the one in them. They’re not going to give back child pornography. Do I believe seeing them could help you? Possibly. Do I believe seeing them could hurt you? Probably. Sarah . . .”
Sarah, scratching at her wrist where the plastic hospital band is scraping her skin, waits for her to finish the thought, which is a good sign, I think.
“What your stepfather did to you, what he took from you, was extreme. Do you really want to see how much else he took?”
“I don’t . . .” The girl blows out a frustrated breath. “I don’t like other people seeing a piece of me I don’t know. Samuel hurt me in private, but now these pieces of it are public.”
“They’re not public.”
“But other people are seeing them, other people know they exist and why and how, and I don’t get to see them.”