Isabelle’s POV
Ivan dropped me off at the orphanage just after ten. The morning air was warm already, thick with the kind of summer humidity that clung to your skin and turned even silence into something heavy.
“You want me to stick around?” he asked, half-turning in the driver’s seat.
I shook my head. “No. I’ll text you when I’m done.”
With a nod, he drove off, leaving me in the calm quiet of the front yard. I took the path around the side of the building, where the kids’ bedrooms faced the trees, and walked up to the one with the butterfly stickers on the window — Laura’s.
She’d complimented my boots the last time I came. Eyes wide, voice full of wonder, like they were glass slippers and I’d stepped out of a fairytale. I hadn’t forgotten that. So when I saw the same pair in her size
