I tore free and yanked the back door open.
“Mammaaa!” she kept crying.
Over and over.
“Mamma. Mamma.”
Her cheeks were streaked with tears. Her little fists were clenched tight.
She was reaching forward.
Toward the front seat.
Toward a mother who wasn’t answering.
“Mamma up,” she whimpered.
I unbuckled her with shaking hands and pulled her into my chest.
Charlotte twisted, trying to look past me.
“Mamma.”
“I know,” I choked.“I know.”
Butshedidn’t know.
She didn’t understand why Mommy wasn’t turning around.
Why Mommy wasn’t saying her name.
Why Mommy wasn’t waking up.
She kept pointing.
Kept crying.
“Mammaaa.”
And I had to carry her away while she reached back for someone who wasn’t coming with us.
Someone she would never even remember.
25
NORA
“She didn’t die on impact,”Theo said quietly. “But I got there too late.” His jaw flexed. “I was always going to get there too late.”
My heart twisted.
I’d always known the outline of the accident. That Alisha had swerved to miss a deer. That the car had wrapped around a tree.
But I hadn’t known he’dheardit happen.
That he’d been on the line, listening.
Helpless as his wife died.