I nodded and had to swallow hard and look away to keep from crying. Just the thought of a child tucking away her little trinkets because it wasn’t acceptable to others that she had them made me want to crawl in bed and sob. Instead, I said, “We have to figure out what happened to her, Santi.”
He pulled me to him. “We will, Pais. We will. I think this will help, as hard as it is.”
I stood up and wiped my eyes. “Do we need to put all these things back?” I gestured down toward my car.
“Nope, I’m coming to your house to go through them with you. Just let me take some photos of your car, and then wait for me before unloading, okay? I need to check in at the station, and I’ll be right over.”
“Okay,” I said as I climbed into the driver’s seat. “We’ll see you at the house in a little while.”
