Chloe frowned, holding the dripping paper.

“What do you mean, Mom? You saved us.”

“No,” Mother cried, shaking her head violently. “We weren’t even in the county.”

She gripped the edge of a plastic lounge chair, her knuckles turning white.

“We had left you girls alone,” Mother said. “You were only six years old.”

I watched my mother break.

The stone patio felt very cold beneath my bare feet.

“We went to the country club dinner,” Mother said, her voice cracking. “Your father said it was just for two hours. He said you both would sleep.”

She looked at the officer, her eyes wide with old, buried terror.

“When we drove back, the cabin was already fully engulfed,” she said.

“Why did you lie?” Chloe asked, her voice barely a whisper.

“Because of the police,” Mother sobbed. “They were going to arrest us. Child neglect. Abandonment.”

She looked at Father, who had turned his back to us, staring at the high wooden fence.

“Your father’s firm was about to go public,” Mother said. “The arrest would have ruined everything. We would have lost you both anyway if social services took you.”