“You look like the most beautiful princess in the world.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
I knelt, held her shoulders, and swallowed hard.
“I promise you, Mia. Everything is going to be okay.”
She wrapped her arms around my neck. Over her shoulder, through the window, I saw a black sedan across the street, the same one I had noticed near the café. My smile faltered. A man sat behind the wheel, face hidden by glare, as still as if he were waiting.
The auditorium smelled like crayons and floor wax. I sat in the third row, tugging at my only clean button-down, while parents in pressed slacks adjusted expensive cameras. Mia stood onstage in her homemade dress, the ribbon I had tied still perfect. She spotted me and waved with her arm.
“That’s my sister,” I whispered.
The woman beside me smiled politely, then returned to her phone. When the ceremony ended, Mia crashed into my legs.
“Did you see when I bowed?”
“I saw, princess. You were the best.”
“Can we get ice cream now?”
“Two scoops,” I said, laughing softly.
We started toward the gate. That was when I noticed another man, not the one from the sedan. He wore a charcoal suit and stood with hands folded, watching me the way someone watches a door he has been waiting at for hours. I slowed, and Mia tugged my hand.
“Noah?” the man asked.
“I handled papers for your parents.”
I stared at him.
“My parents never mentioned an attorney.”
“They were private about it. My office sent a notice a few weeks ago, requesting a meeting.”
The cream envelope on my counter. The one I had ignored again completely.
“That was you.”
“Yes. Your mother instructed me to mail first. If you did not answer before today, I was to come here myself.”
