Margaret looked up over the top of her reading glasses. “Debra, sweetheart. They have absolutely nothing here. Not one single thread to pull on.”
I exhaled for what genuinely felt like the first time all morning.
“You’ve known something was wrong for a while, haven’t you,” Margaret said, setting the folder down gently. “You called me about the checking back in the spring. That’s five months, Deb.”
“I didn’t have proof of anything back in the spring,” I said. “Just a feeling I couldn’t put words to yet.”
“You could have called me sooner.”
“I know.”
She reached over and put her hand briefly over mine on the table, the same gesture she’d used on me at our mother’s funeral years earlier, brief and steady and entirely without drama. “I’m glad you called me now, at least.”
“Me too,” I said, and meant it more than I expected to.
