“We don't know yet.”
His tone was steady.
That distinction mattered.
Emery looked between the adults.
“Is my dad bad?”
Boone crouched again.
“I've never met your dad. So I'm not going to tell you something I don't know.”
It was the first completely honest answer an adult had given Emery that night.
Twenty minutes later, red-and-blue lights appeared through the rain.
Two Mesa County sheriff's vehicles pulled onto the shoulder.
Deputy Carla Mendez stepped out first.
She was small, maybe five foot four, but she moved with the confidence of someone who had walked into enough disasters to know panic rarely helped.
Her partner, Deputy Rourke, spoke with Boone while Mendez approached Emery.
“Hi, Emery.”
Emery looked suspiciously at her uniform.
“Am I in trouble?”
Mendez stopped.
Something crossed her face.
“No.”
“Because Valerie said—”
“You are not in trouble.”
Mendez crouched.
“Not even a little bit.”
Emery's eyes filled.
“I got her book wet.”
Mendez looked at Charlotte's Web.
“We can deal with books.”
“It was my mom's.”
That changed her expression.
“Oh.”
Mendez sat down on an overturned equipment case beside her.
“Then we'll be careful with it.”
For the next fifteen minutes, Emery told her what happened.
The SUV.
The argument that wasn't really an argument.
The command.
The emergency blanket.
The disappearing taillights.
The counting.
Mendez wrote almost nothing while Emery spoke.
She simply listened.
When Emery finished, Boone showed her Valerie's message.
Mendez read it.
Her posture changed.
“Rourke.”
Her partner approached.
She showed him the screen.
He read the message and frowned.
“So now she's alleging the father is dangerous.”
“Apparently.”
“Where is he?”
“Can't reach him.”
Rourke walked back toward his cruiser and began making calls.
Within minutes, what had initially looked like a straightforward child abandonment case became something more complicated.
Child Protective Services was contacted.
A supervisor was notified.
Daniel Quinn's vehicle information was circulated.
Hospitals were checked.
His workplace was contacted.
Nobody knew where he was.
Then Rourke received something strange.
Daniel's emergency contact information led them to a voicemail account that had received a message earlier that evening from an unfamiliar number.
Rourke stood beneath the open hatch of the cruiser.
“Mendez.”
She joined him.
Boone remained several feet away with Emery, but when the deputy activated the speaker, everyone nearby heard the woman's voice.
It was breathless.
Terrified.
“Daniel, she knows.”
Static crackled.
“Valerie knows about the hospital records. She found the papers. If anything happens tonight, don't let her take Emery to your father's property.”
Emery stopped breathing.
The voice continued.
“She'll say she's protecting her, but that's not what this is. You have to tell Emery the truth about who she is before Valerie does.”
The message ended.
Rain hammered the cruiser.
Nobody moved.
Mendez looked at Rourke.
“Caller?”
He checked the information.
His face changed.
“Marisol Quinn.”
The hot chocolate slipped from Emery's fingers.
The cup landed on the pavement.
Boone turned.
“Emery?”
Her face had gone white.
“That's my mom.”
Deputy Mendez stared at her.
“What?”
“My mom's name is Marisol.”
A pause.
“She died.”
No one spoke.
Emery looked from one adult to another.
“My mom is dead.”
Rourke checked the timestamp again.
The voicemail had been recorded less than two hours earlier.
Boone felt something cold move through him that had nothing to do with the storm.
Mendez stood.
“Find Daniel Quinn. Now.”
The next forty-seven minutes changed Emery's life.
Daniel was located at a gas station fifteen miles east.
Alive.
Barely.
Security footage showed him entering the store unsteadily before collapsing beside a refrigerated drinks case. Paramedics initially suspected a medical emergency, but hospital staff later found signs consistent with a sedative in his system.
A witness remembered seeing him earlier with a woman matching Valerie's description.
He had not known Emery had been abandoned.
He had not even been conscious when it happened.
Then deputies found the envelope.
It had been folded inside Daniel's jacket.
On the front, written by hand:
FOR EMERY — WHEN SHE'S OLD ENOUGH TO KNOW.
Inside were hospital documents.
Guardianship records.
Photocopies of court filings.
An adoption petition.
And a birth certificate.
Deputy Mendez stared at the name.
Not Emery Quinn.
Emery Marisol Vega.
Daniel Quinn was listed nowhere as the biological father.