My husband laughed beside his mistress at my funeral, never knowing the woman he’d pushed off a cliff was still alive.

She asked me not to reply until her team had traced what they could. Waiting was difficult. Owen had gone back to the edge, and someone else had been close enough to see him. I wanted to know who.

Ada kept the phone as evidence and brought me a temporary one. Then she asked about Willow Bend.

My mother had bought the property before I was born. It was eighty acres of meadow, timber, and an old farmhouse along the valley road. She had taught me to ride a bicycle on its gravel drive and to tell which apples were ready by how easily they came off the branch.

After she died, Lily and I had spent weekends clearing out the house. Lily lived in Denver and wanted me to keep the land. She said I looked more like myself there than anywhere else.

Owen had different ideas.

His development company was building a mountain resort on the neighboring acreage. The route investors preferred for a new access road crossed Willow Bend. For two years, Owen had urged me to sell. He started by describing what we could do with the money. When that failed, he called the house a burden.

I told Ada about an argument the previous summer.

“Owen said the road would be built with or without me,” I said. “I thought he meant the company would find another route.”

“Did he ever ask you to sign anything?”

“He gave me papers after dinner in August. I said I wanted someone else to read them first. He was furious.”

The agreement in Ada’s folder was dated months later. It transferred Willow Bend to a company I had never heard of, one that appeared to have been created shortly before the signing.

I knew my signature. I knew how the letter H leaned when I wrote quickly. Whoever had copied it had been careful, but they had made it too smooth.

Ada photographed a page I signed in front of her for comparison.

“Are you going to arrest him?” I asked.

“We’re working with the prosecutor,” she said. “Your statement matters. So do the scene evidence, records, and the people who helped prepare this sale. I want the case to stand when he starts fighting it.”

“What if he hurts someone else while you work?”

“We’re taking that seriously.”

I could hear how hard she was trying to be honest with me. I appreciated it, even though honesty gave me nothing certain to hold.

That afternoon, Mara visited.

She came into my room carrying a paper bag and looking embarrassed by the attention she had received for finding me. Inside the bag were soft socks and a small sketchbook from the hospital gift shop.

“I asked the nurses,” she said. “They said you taught art.”

“Mostly children.”

“My son can make a horse out of six lines,” she said. “I’ve never understood how.”

For a while we talked about her son and the rescue team. Then I asked what she remembered from the lower trail.

“Someone was up on the road when I first got there,” she said. “I saw headlights through the trees.”

“Owen’s SUV?”

“I thought so. But another set came and went later.”

I looked up. “You told Ada?”

“First thing.”

Mara pulled her chair closer.

“Harper, I also heard a woman’s voice. I was farther down the trail and couldn’t make out the words. At the time, I thought it was one of our searchers. Ada checked the team roster. Nobody was assigned to that part of the road.”

“Maren.”

“I don’t know.”

I did.

Or I believed I did strongly enough that my hands began to shake.

After Mara left, I called the newborn unit. Wren had held steady all day. The nurse told me her breathing support had been adjusted and asked whether I wanted to come down.

I wheeled myself to her room.

Wren slept inside a clear bed, her chest rising in quick, small movements. I put my hand through the opening and touched the sole of her foot.

“I’m going to get us home,” I told her.

I hadn’t felt sure of it until I heard myself say it.

The next morning, Ada came with more news. The notary listed on the forged agreement was Elaine Mercer. Elaine had closed her office two days after the document was signed. Her house was empty, and her daughter said she had gone to stay with a friend but didn’t know where.

“She may be frightened,” Ada said.

“Or Owen paid her.”

“Either is possible.”

She showed me a photograph taken at my funeral. Owen and Maren stood outside the church beside a woman in a pale coat. Elaine. She had attended.

I studied the image. Elaine was looking over her shoulder toward the street. Maren’s hand rested on her arm.

“She doesn’t look like she wants to be there,” I said.

Ada put the photograph away. “We’re trying to find her.”

When she left, I opened the sketchbook Mara had brought. I drew Wren’s hand from memory. Every line came out unsteady.

My new phone rang before I finished.

Lily.

I let it ring once. Twice.

On the third ring, I answered.