The Never List

let’s just get out of here. None of that matters now.”
    “Yes, it does,” I said quietly. “What if something she said to someone all those years ago could have prevented what happened to us? What if it revealed some criminal connection that Jack and Noah had fifteen years ago? Something that would have landed them in jail before Jack had had the chance to abduct us. Then what?”
    “Come on, Sarah, that’s not fair. It’s not fair to put the blame on her. Jack did those things to us. He’s responsible. He’s the culpable one. Not her.” Christine leaned back in the seat, staring up at the roof of the car, thinking. “I mean, you can trace that blame all the way back down the chain. What about Jack’s mother? Theone who adopted him? She probably had some indication that her son was a little off. He was probably one of those kids who set fire to small animals or something. But she isn’t responsible for this either.”
    “That’s different. And at the very least Helen Watson knew someone was suffering at Noah’s hands. Maybe she didn’t know about us, but she saw these girls riding through town all the time. She lived with it in front of her. And she was probably the only one who knew what was going on. The only other person besides the perpetrators and their clients. And she didn’t do anything. Just so she could keep her own dark secret.”
    Tracy started the car and pulled out of the lot. “Let’s go get some sleep. Then we’ll see about who owned that post office box.”

CHAPTER 32
    We spent the rest of the morning asleep in our new hotel rooms, missing the media frenzy over the Noah Philben story.
    I woke up later that afternoon feeling uneasy. I surveyed the room, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary—the hotel air conditioner hummed quietly, and my folded clothes lay on the dresser in neat, ordered piles.
    On my way into the bathroom, I saw an envelope slipped under my door. I assumed it was a note from the front desk, though I thought it strange that they didn’t use the creamy white stationery, stamped with the hotel’s logo, that was on my bedside table. I leaned down and picked it up, before I noticed the handwriting. At the sight of that familiar script, something inside me collapsed. I didn’t open it. I couldn’t bring myself to look at it alone, so I ran down the hall to Tracy’s room. It took several knocks to wake her up. Finally, she opened the door.
    “Did you get one too?”
    “What?” she said groggily.
    “A letter. From Jack. Here at the hotel.” My voice was breaking. I felt frantic now. The old panic was back, rising inside me. “He knows where we are. How can he know that? Noah Philben’s men must have followed us, and now they are acting as couriers for Jack.”
    I pointed at Tracy’s floor, just inside the doorway. There it was. Her letter. Tracy’s face seemed paler than ever as she stared at it, unmoving.
    “Let’s get out of here. Go get your bags. I’ll get Christine.”
    I ran back to my room and hastily threw my things into my suitcase. I told our security guard that we’d decided to go back to New York and were racing to catch a flight. He looked confused and made a phone call. Whoever was on the other line clearly needed him freed up for other duties, because we got the go-ahead.
    I met Tracy and Christine in the lobby. As shaken as we were, somehow we managed to check out and run to the car, Tracy slipping behind the wheel. The tires spun out beneath us as we pulled out of the parking lot.
    In the backseat, Christine was showing the first sign of nerves. “Do you think they’re still following us? Where do we go? Another hotel? Jesus, why did I get myself involved with this again?” She ran her hands along the inside of the car door. Even as we built up speed, I had a vision of her opening the door and jumping out to hail a cab back to Park Avenue.
    “Christine,” Tracy began in an even and controlled tone, “be quiet unless you have something productive to say. I can’t handle panic right now. Read the letters to me.” Tracy was thinking, and scared.
    I opened my letter first, holding it at the edges to avoid too muchcontact with it, and read, “‘The family has finally reunited. I’m so pleased. Come home, and you will find the answers.’”
    I threw the letter into the backseat and opened Christine’s.
    “‘Girls, let’s take a family photograph. A tableau vivant. I have so much more to show you.’”
    “Okay, next