I retch into the grass.

They killed Grover.

And it’s my fault.

I never warned him how dangerous they were. How deadly. I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. I use the car door to pull myself to my feet. I need to see him one last time, to beg forgiveness even if he can’t hear me. I step forward.

The sheet moves, and the man coughs.

“Grover!” I scream, running toward him. The ambulance driver tries to block me, but I’m a wild creature. I growl and push through. Grover’s wrist is warm where I clutch it. “What happened?”

The ambulance driver speaks, not unkindly. “He was attacked, ma’am. A burglar, they think. We have to get him to the hospital.”

“Gave ’em more than they bargained for,” Grover says, his voice weak. “I think they heard I got my hands on this.” There is trembling under the sheet, but he doesn’t appear to have the strength to move his arm.

I reach under and come out with an envelope, bent into an impossible shape.

Grover’s gurney is guided into the back of the vehicle.

“Is he going to be okay?”

They don’t answer.

“Is he going to be okay?” I scream. They close the rear door, leap into the front seat, and slam their doors before driving away, their lights flashing. A police officer steps out of Grover’s house, his face questioning. I stumble into my own car and start it up, clutching the envelope the whole time. I don’t know who’s watching here. I drive downtown and park the car beneath a streetlight.

I open the crumpled envelope with shaking hands.

I discover Paulie Aandeg’s birth certificate inside.

Grover’s favor had come through. It had nearly cost him his life.

It may yet.

My eyes glide over the words without understanding. I reread them, disbelieving, and flip to the image clipped to the back of the birth certificate. A picture of Virginia Aandeg. My lungs shrink as my body goes leaden. I suddenly realize what about Stanley in that 1944 photo looked familiar.

Dear God save me.

It finally all makes sense.

PART III

CHAPTER 56

I fumble for the key in the ignition, my fingers numb. I’m positive I’ve forgotten how to drive, but within moments I find myself in front of the Saint Cloud Police Department. I leave the car running as I bolt in. I realize from a great distance that I’m hysterical. That I’m screaming and yelling. That I am saying that my life is in danger. Swearing that I have proof of things. I’m waving the birth certificate and photo in one hand and the empty camera in the other.

I am led to a room and seated across from two men out of uniform.

They hand me water.

I tell them everything.

Everything.

They keep exchanging incredulous glances. Against all odds, I see they believe me. Finally. Finally someone trusts my story.

When I’m finished, the dark-haired of the two detectives reaches for the phone. He turns to his blond partner. They nod at each other, and then the dark-haired man turns to me.

“We’ll handle this. You rest. Let us do our job.”

I nod. My blood feels sluggish. I am so tired. But finally, I’m not the only one who knows about Lilydale. I’m led to a room with a couch. I lie down. The detective pulls a scratchy blanket over me.

Somebody else is in charge now.

Somebody else will take care of everything.

I wake to a commotion outside. It takes me a moment to remember where I am. The smell of stale coffee. The industrial furniture. I’m inside the Saint Cloud police station. They have Paulie’s birth certificate. Irrefutable evidence. I run my hands through my short hair and stand.

This is the story that will make my career.

I grimace at the thought. It’s a dying gasp from the old version of me, the girl who believed in ambition and love and happy endings. Still, Grover and Angel deserve their stories to be told.

I reach for the doorknob. The people in charge may want me to stay around for questions, but I’m hopeful I can simply check in at a nearby hotel and get to work writing this up. It’s no longer about the byline. It’s about the truth.

The doorknob turns under my hand. I jerk back.

Amory Bauer strolls in, as big as a mountain, pistol straining at his side. He’s pleased, as glossy as a snake who’s swallowed the whole rabbit.

I choke on my own tongue.

His smile is vicious.

“She’s awake!” he calls over his shoulder.

He steps aside so Ronald and Deck can stride in. Deck appears as shamefaced as a child and still groggy. Son of a bitch. I lunge at him and start pummeling him with my fists. Amory pins my arms at my side with no effort at all.

“Better take it easy. You won’t like it any other way,” he says.

He pushes me out the door, marching me past the two plainclothes officers. They won’t meet my eyes. “See you at the next meeting,” Amory says.

He doesn’t speak again until we are in the car, him behind the wheel and Ronald and Deck on each side of me in the back. Amory adjusts the rearview mirror, our eyes meeting in the glass.

“I can’t believe Grover tracked down your birth certificate. I was sure we’d destroyed all your papers, Paulie.”

CHAPTER 57

I remember little of the drive back to Lilydale. When we reach town, we drive straight to Dr. Krause. They’ve woken him up, and he looks disheveled and annoyed. Oddly, I don’t think he’s in on any of this. I think he’s just a plain old-fashioned sexist. He tells them I’m to be under constant supervision, not alone until the baby is born. Krause administers another injection. It must be stronger than the one he gave me after Kennedy was shot, because I remember nothing after the needle pierces my flesh.

I wake up in the lemon-colored room. I stand, teetering, and stumble to the window. It’s open a few inches. I can look across the way and see the bedroom I’ve shared with Deck for over two months, the flowered wallpaper splattering the walls like blood.

A roar deafens me, the sound of my reality splitting.

My childhood memories are coming back, coursing like boiling water over my brain.

They took me to this room, only for a night, before they moved me to the basement. I was wearing a sailor suit.

The jolt is so strong that for a second, I feel as though I’m standing next to my own body. Bile races toward my mouth. I hold it down, just. I see Slow Henry standing below, on the driveway. He meows up at me. I can’t get to him. My tears start pouring out.

Ronald’s voice comes from the doorway. “Can you believe Paulie Anna was your real name? I wouldn’t have let Stanley and Dorothy keep it, even if we didn’t need to hide your identity. It was too on the nose. You’ve always been such a goody-goody girl, at least until recently. So placid, when you were young. So docile.”

I don’t turn immediately. I can see his reflection in the glass. The birth certificate that Grover finally tracked down had been clear. Paulie Anna Aandeg had been a girl.

She was me.

Virginia Aandeg was my mother, though I knew her as Frances Harken. The man I’d been told was my father must have given my mom the new surname and me the birth certificate with a new name and birth date to hide us from these monsters. I shudder at what it must have cost her.