"Why does any of this matter? Do you think Rob Moore had something to do with Amy's using again?"

"I don't know," Ellen answered, feeling an odd momentum building within her. She wished she could tell Rose that she intended to find out, but she was too stricken to speak. Too many things weren't making sense, or maybe they were. She sensed it wasn't speculation. That Amy's death was connected to her visit to Cheryl. That she had set it all in motion. And that Rob Moore had everything to do with Amy's death.

"You there?"

"Sorry." Ellen fake-checked her watch, then rose. "Jeez, I'm late, I should probably get going, thanks so much."

"Now?" Rose blinked in confusion. "We're in the middle of a conversation."

"I know, but I have to go." Ellen grabbed her coat and purse from the seat. "I'll follow up and let you know if I learn anything new. Thanks again."

"You think we should call the police?"

"No," Ellen said, too quickly. "I'm sure it's speculation, but I'll give it some thought. Have to go now. Thanks again."

She turned and fled the restaurant.

Chapter Sixty-eight

Ellen hurried from the restaurant, her head swimming. She broke into a light jog, pulling her coat around her with a shaky hand. Her heels clacked along the frozen concrete, and she almost ran into two students who came suddenly out of a bookstore. She hurried ahead, ignoring their laughter. Her breath came in short, ragged bursts, fogging from her mouth. Her eyes stung, and she blinked the wetness away, telling herself it was the cold. She reached her car, fumbled for her keys, jumped in and turned on the engine, then lurched into the lane of traffic.

HONK! HONK! A van driver blared his horn, but Ellen didn't look back. It was late afternoon and a premature night was falling, frigid as black ice. Cars clogged the street in both directions, their headlights aglow. She drove on autopilot, through a world that had gone topsy-turvy around her.

She had thought that Will was hers and would be forever. She thought that he had a young mother somewhere and a wandering father. She thought that they were gone for good, a young couple who made a mistake. But it had been a fantasy, created by a writer's imagination. All of it was fiction. And now Ellen was deathly afraid of what was true.

Her hands gripped the wheel. Her heart thundered. She skidded to a stop at a traffic light, the burning red circle searing into her consciousness like a hot poker. She was too emotional to think straight. She didn't know where to go or what to do. She couldn't go to the police because she'd lose W. She had been going it alone for so long, she couldn't do it for another minute. She picked up her cell phone and pressed in a phone number.

"Please be there," Ellen was saying, when the call connected.

Chapter Sixty-nine

"Come in, what's the matter?" Marcelo swung open his front door, and Ellen hurried past the threshold, compelled by a force she didn't understand completely, whether pulled or pushed inside she didn't know. It had taken her an hour to get to his house in Queens Village, but the ride over hadn't calmed her down. It had been all she could do to hide her panic when she'd called Connie and asked her to stay late.

"There's a problem but' I don't know where to begin." Ellen raked a hand through her hair and found herself pacing back and forth in his neat living room, a blur of exposed-brick walls, glass tables, and black leather furniture. Marcelo closed the front door behind her, and she spun on her heels to face him. "I don't even know where to begin."

"It's all right," Marcelo said softly, his dark eyes steady. "Try the beginning."

"No, I' can't." Ellen didn't know why she'd come here. She wasn't sure it was the right thing. She knew only that she needed to talk to someone. "I think I'm in the middle of something ' I don't know what."

"Did you do something illegal?"

"Yes, and no." Ellen didn't know how to answer. She didn't know what to think. Her hands flew to her face, and she felt her fingerpads burrow into the flesh of her cheeks. "No, but' I think I stumbled onto something ' I wish I never started. It's the worst' the worst thing that could happen."

"What could be so bad?" Marcelo asked, disbelieving, stepping closer to her and taking her by the shoulders. "What is it?"

"It's too awful, it's just'" Ellen couldn't continue, afraid to give it voice, as if she'd fall into an abyss, a darkness that would follow as inexorably as nightfall. She felt something tear loose in her chest, as if her heart were actually ripped from its moorings, untethered from everything that held it in place, everything that kept her alive, and she heard herself erupt in a sob that came from deep within and burst free. The next thing she knew, she was crying and Marcelo had put his arms around her, wrapping her in a strong embrace, and she could feel herself sagging against his soft shirt, hiccuping in the civilized office smells clinging to him, the remnants of her life before.

Marcelo was saying, "Whatever it is, we can figure it out. Everything is going to be all right, you'll see." He held her tight, rocking her slightly, and she heard him saying again that everything was going to be all right, and she listened to his words as if she were a small child, permitting herself to be told a fairy tale.

"I made a ' a mistake, a terrible mistake." Ellen looked up at him through her tears and she could see in his expression that he had let his guard slip away, and all that was left was a naked pain that must have mirrored her own. He stroked her cheek gently, brushing away her tears, and Ellen felt his other arm behind her back and leaned against it fully, letting him support her. His eyes met hers, so full of feeling that she felt a kind of wonderment, and she couldn't remember anyone ever looking at her that way, and in the next instant he lowered his face and kissed her softly on the lips, once, and then again.

"Everything's going to be all right," he murmured. "You're here now, and we'll make it right."

"Really?" Ellen asked, still wondering, and when Marcelo leaned down to kiss her again, more deeply and with urgency, she had her answer. In that moment she gave herself over to him and her own emotions, kissing him back deeply, drawing from him comfort and strength, escaping into the delusion of his embrace, just for now, for the few moments before he learned the truth and understood that everything was most decidedly not going to be all right, but that all of her worst fears were about to happen and there was nothing and nobody who could stop them.

And in the next minute Ellen felt her own hands reaching up Marcelo's back, her fingers rough against the thin fabric of his shirt, pulling him as close as she possibly could, and he responded, holding her tighter, kissing her with more urgency, his breath quickening as they sank, fumbled, and stumbled together onto the couch.

Ellen felt him press her backwards against the leather, or maybe she pulled him up and onto her, almost embarrassingly eager to lose herself in him and forget about everything else. About Amy. About Carol. Even about W. For a moment she wasn't a mother anymore but simply a woman, and the heat of Marcelo's kiss and the weight of his body chased every thought from her head and obliterated every worry. In the soft light, she saw him smile with pleasure as he helped her wriggle out of her coat and they shoved it slip-sliding off the couch and onto the rug.

"Here, allow me," Marcelo whispered, and Ellen eased partway up and put her arms in the air, letting him pull her sweater over her head, and when her head popped out of the black neckline, she saw the softest expression cross his face, and he stopped for a second, halting the urgency of before, and his gaze traveled from her face, lingering at her neck and finally coming to rest on the black lace of her bra.