Chapter 8 - THE CLINIC AT THE END OF THE ROAD
The drive to Wisconsin took five hours beneath a sky the color of steel. Detective Ruiz sat in the front passenger seat of an unmarked vehicle. Evelyn rode behind her with Adrien, holding the old photograph of Lily so tightly its edges bent.
Dr. Voss had been located in a small town where he practiced under a different surname. When Ruiz questioned him, he admitted that Celeste's foundation had paid his clinic to care for a child listed as Ella Moore.
“She was never a patient in the usual sense,” Voss said in the recorded interview. “She was frightened. She wanted her sister. I was told her family had abandoned her.”
“Did you believe that?” Evelyn asked when Ruiz replayed the statement.
Voss lowered his eyes on the screen. “I chose to.”
Evelyn wanted to hate him. She did hate him. But anger could wait. Lily could not.
The clinic's records showed that Ella Moore had been transferred to a residential school after the fire. The transfer papers carried Celeste's signature and a second name: Margaret Vale, the school's director.
The school stood at the end of a snow-dusted road, surrounded by pine trees. It looked peaceful from the outside. Evelyn knew better than to trust appearances.
Ruiz and two local officers entered first. Adrien waited with Evelyn beside the car, respecting the detective's instructions even though every muscle in his body seemed to resist standing still.
Minutes passed. Then twenty. Then thirty.
Finally Ruiz returned, her expression unreadable.
“Lily was here,” she said. “But she isn't now.”
Evelyn felt the world tilt. “Where?”
“Director Vale says she ran away three weeks ago.”
“She's thirteen,” Evelyn whispered. “Where would she go?”
Ruiz held up a sketchbook found in Lily's room. Its pages were filled with drawings of trains, apartment buildings, and a woman with dark hair standing outside a restaurant.
Evelyn recognized herself.
On the final page Lily had written: EVELYN NEVER STOPPED LOOKING.
Evelyn pressed the sketchbook to her face and cried without trying to hide it. Adrien stayed beside her, saying nothing, offering only his coat when the wind turned bitter.
Inside the school, Margaret Vale insisted Lily had been well cared for. But the room had a locked window, the staff records were incomplete, and one young employee quietly told Ruiz that Lily had repeatedly asked to call the police.
“Did anyone let her?” Ruiz asked.
The employee shook her head.
Vale was detained for questioning. Investigators began searching the grounds and seizing records. A security camera showed Lily leaving through a laundry entrance with a backpack. She was alone. She walked toward the road with the determination of someone who had made a decision she could no longer postpone.
In the parking lot, Evelyn examined the sketchbook again. A folded page contained a hand-drawn map of Chicago and a red star over the Grand Aurelia.
“She was coming home,” Evelyn said.
Adrien nodded. “Then we go home too.”
Before they left, Ruiz received a message from Chicago. Someone had entered Evelyn's apartment overnight. Nothing valuable had been taken. The only missing object was a framed photograph of Lily.
On the kitchen wall, written in red marker, were four words:
SHE BELONGS TO US.
May you like
Adrien looked at Evelyn, waiting for her decision.
“I'm not hiding,” she said. “But this time we're going to be smarter than they are.”
