Peter covered his eyes with one hand.
“Can I read the letters?”
“Walter brought them.”
“All of them?”
“Every one he could find.”
Peter took a long breath.
“Then I’d like to start with the first.”
They returned to the bench together.
Walter opened a small bag and placed a bundle of envelopes in Peter’s hands.
Nobody made a speech.
Nobody declared the years repaired.
The four of them sat while Peter read the first letter, stopping occasionally when the words became difficult to see.
Later he asked Emily whether she intended to continue the public investigation.
“Yes,” she said.
“But I won’t use your life as evidence without your permission.”
“I want them to explain the records.”
“So do I.”
“I also want my daughter to grow up knowing nobody gets to rewrite her name without her consent.”
Emily thought of Nora’s refusal form and the pencil mark across the guardian signature.
“That’s worth fighting for,” she said.
Peter smiled slightly.
“You always did talk like somebody’s mom.”
“I had a good teacher.”
They parted without promising to become instant friends.
Peter invited Walter to visit his family when they were ready.
Emily drove home with a sense of relief complicated by grief for the childhood they had lost.
She did not know whether that feeling would ever become simple.
She no longer believed it needed to.
Chapter Twenty: The Second Child
Anna Serrano’s story reached Emily through a letter delivered to the historical society.
The writer was a woman named Lucia Torres who worked at a legal aid clinic in New Mexico.
She had read the public summary of the Briar Hollow documents and recognized details from a client’s childhood records.
The client had authorized Lucia to ask whether the records contained a girl named Anna Serrano.
Emily forwarded the request to Tessa without sharing any private files.
The two attorneys compared the available information through protected channels.
Several dates and placements appeared to match.
A photograph in the original shelter album showed a girl with braided hair holding a yellow blanket.
Emily remembered her standing near Peter in the school gymnasium.
Lucia explained that the client, now known as Elena Torres, had spent years believing her parents voluntarily surrendered her during the disaster.
She had no reliable memory of the transfer and had never been given access to the original guardianship file.
The possibility that the account was wrong left her furious and frightened.
Emily asked whether Elena wanted a conversation.
Lucia said she wanted facts first.
