Chapter 4
Evelyn denied touching the nursery.
Then I opened the storage room.
My mother’s photograph was there.
Elena’s framed wedding picture.
Hazel’s baby blanket.
A box of letters Elena wrote during pregnancy.
Even the small silver music box my mother played for Hazel before bed.
All packed.
Labeled.
ARCHIVE.
I stared at the word.
Evelyn stood behind me.
“Those things keep her stuck.”
“She is three.”
“She barely remembers them.”
“That is not your decision.”
Her jaw tightened.
“You keep a dead woman alive in every room.”
There.
Finally.
Elena.
I turned.
“She was my wife.”
“And I’m supposed to marry a man whose daughter still has her picture beside the bed?”
I almost laughed.
“Yes.”
Evelyn looked stunned.
“Yes, Evelyn.”
I stepped closer.
“You were supposed to marry a widower with a daughter. Not erase the widow until the daughter became convenient.”
Her face hardened.
“Haze—”
“Hazel.”
She stopped.
I had never noticed how often Evelyn shortened my daughter’s name when she was annoyed.
As if even the name took up too much room.
Then Miles appeared at the doorway.
“This is getting ridiculous.”
I looked at him.
“What part?”
“The boxes.”
He shrugged.
“Kids adapt.”
I stared.
“Interesting.”
“What?”
“You say that like you’ve been involved.”
His face changed.
Evelyn looked at him.
Too late.
I stepped toward the shelves.
“Which box did you pack?”
Silence.
Cora answered from behind me.
“The letters.”
Miles looked at her with hatred.
She did not move.
Good.
May you like
The siblings had not only been frightening Hazel.
They had been cleaning her past out of the house together.
