Trevor flinched, his gun hand wavering for a fraction of a second.

“Check it,” Trevor barked to the guard on his left.

The guard stepped toward the opening, his boots splashing in a puddle of half-frozen slush.

Nothing came out but an empty, automated metal cart, rolling slowly onto the concrete ramp.

The distraction was small, but it gave us a moment to breathe.

My father pressed his back against the brick wall, his fingers white around the carved wooden bird.

“Emily,” he whispered, his voice trembling like a dry leaf in the wind.

“It is cold. We have to go home.”

I reached back and took his shivering hand, squeezing it as hard as I could.

“We are going home soon, Dad,” I said, though my own voice shook.

I looked at Trevor, the man who had managed my shifts, who had docked my pay, who had watched me for years.

“You knew the whole time,” I said.

“You knew my father was alive in this place.”

Trevor smiled, a thin, ugly line on his pale face.

“Of course I knew, Emily,” he said.