Ellis liked to imagine Mary Carol meeting Irene. The Bauhammers would probably judge a tennis instructor as they had Ellis: beneath their standards. Sparks certainly would fly when The Hammer met the steel-bodied tennis lady.
When Jonah heard Ellis planned to travel with a tent rather than rent or buy a home, he insisted she at least take the new SUV he’d traded for the van. He let Ellis take all the camping supplies. She’d bought most of them long before they married.
There was only one condition Jonah fought. He wanted contact with Ellis, and she wanted none. She had to cut off her life in New York like an umbilical cord. She’d either survive without Jonah, River, and Jasper, or she would not. In between was not possible.
Knowing Jonah would be tempted to find her, Ellis had to route her bank statements somewhere unknown to him. To someone she fully trusted.
Ellis stalled calling Dani to the last possible day. She’d last seen Danielle Yoon, her best friend from college, a week after Viola was abducted. Dani had found out about the abduction through mutual friends, and she’d immediately hopped on a plane to come help.
Dani was working with one of the most prestigious plant geneticists in the country, and Ellis knew she must have gone to extreme measures to leave behind her doctoral studies at the University of Florida. Ellis hated that her shameful mistake was making a mess of someone else’s life. And Dani’s hugs, tears, and repeated offers to assist with the boys had only made Ellis feel worse.
Dani was all those memories from before Jonah: botany labs and field trips, late-night dorm chats, study evenings, camping, cheap beer, and laughter—always laughter because Dani was one of the funniest people she knew. She didn’t belong in Ellis’s housewife life. She wasn’t supposed to be sitting in her big suburban house weeping for Viola. Having her there—bringing all those memories with her—only cleaved open Ellis’s pain. Ellis had found herself submerging her grief in stoicism to get her friend to leave. Dani stayed for two days, and after she left, Ellis retreated to her bed, wholly exhausted from pretending she had the strength to handle losing her daughter.
Calling Dani would be difficult. Ellis had stopped answering her texts long ago, and Dani surely had been hurt by that.
But the bank needed an address before she left town. She called next to the packed SUV.
Dani picked up on the second ring. “Ellis! How are you?”
“I’m okay. How are you?”
“I got so worried when you stopped answering my texts and calls. Have there been any new leads with finding Viola?”
“No,” Ellis said. “How’s your research going?”
“Really well.” After a pause, she said, “What’s going on? There’s something wrong. I can tell.”
“There is. I’m leaving Jonah . . . or I guess we’re leaving each other.”
“What? Divorce?”
“Yes.”
“Ellis, no! You guys are still grieving Viola. Have you tried counseling?”
Neither Jonah nor Ellis had taken their friends’ advice and seen a therapist. Ellis didn’t see the point when Jonah had been cheating on her long before the abduction. And Jonah apparently had no intention of giving up his lover. There was nothing left in their marriage to salvage.
But Dani knew nothing about Jonah’s affair, and Ellis wanted it to stay that way. She couldn’t bear more of Dani’s sympathy. It simply made the pain worse.
“Yes, we went to a therapist,” Ellis lied. “It didn’t work.”
“But this is a terrible time to make a decision like this. Just half a year after your baby was abducted—”
“I really can’t talk about this, Dani. I called because I have a huge favor to ask.”
“Sure, anything!”
“Can I have my mail sent to your address for a little while?”
“Why do you need to do that?”
“I’m going on a road trip. To clear my head.”
“Where? For how long?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re leaving the boys behind?”
“I have to. It’s a mess.”
“Did he get custody?”
“Yes.”
“Full custody?”
“Yes,” Ellis said. “I need to get on the road. Can I give your address to the bank?”
“Ell, you’re freaking me out. If you’re leaving your kids, something really bad happened. Does Jonah blame you for what happened? He better not, or I’ll—”
“No, it’s nothing like that.”
Another lie. Obviously Jonah—and everyone else—blamed her. She deserved the blame.
“Please just answer,” Ellis said. “All you have to do is throw my mail into a box. There won’t be much. Just a few bank statements.”
“Of course I’ll keep your mail. But when will you come get it?”
“I don’t know. Are you at the same address I sent the baby announcement to?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you. I have to go—”
“Wait!” Dani said. “Will I still be able to call you at this number?”
Tears streamed down Ellis’s cheeks. Getting rid of the phone would be cutting the last cord that connected her to Jonah and the boys. And Viola. “No, I won’t have a phone for a while.”
“Ellis, what’s going on? You need to have a phone. I have to know you’re okay!”
“I’ll let you know when I get a new number. Bye. I love you.”
Ellis ended the call.
Her phone service would turn off by the end of the week. Jonah had wanted her to keep it on, even said he would pay, but Ellis had to dump it along with everything else.
With shaky hands, she opened a new bottle of pills and popped one into her mouth. She’d found a doctor at a small clinic who’d given her prescriptions. To help with the stress of her divorce. And her baby’s abduction. If she had to spill the gory guts of her life to get the meds, she would.
She entered the bank to deliver her new address. A house in Gainesville, Florida, a town in a distant state she’d never visited.
By the time she left the bank, the pill had taken the edge off. But no amount of pills could prepare her for her last task.
She drove to the first real house she’d ever lived in. She wouldn’t miss it. It
