Annie frowned. "I like Bell."
"So do I."
Annie looked visibly relieved by that. Then, she asked the harder question. "Would you still be my mama?"
Lena crossed the room and sat down on the cushions beside her. She drew Annie close, wrapping one solid arm around her shoulders. "Listen to me carefully. No matter what any rich man says in a ballroom, I am your mother. That does not change because someone makes a promise in public."
Annie leaned into her chest. "Okay."
But Lena could feel the child's mind still working through the parameters. She got Annie changed, warmed a small pot of canned soup, and set crackers on a plate between them. Annie ate slowly, more tired than hungry, her face carrying that faraway look she got when her mind was trying to hold more than her age should require.
After dinner, while Lena washed the bowls in the sink, Annie sat at the kitchen table and drew circles on a scrap of paper with a blue crayon—round and round, over and over. Not flowers, not faces—just clean circles.
"What are those?" Lena asked, looking over her shoulder.
"Turns." Annie dried her hands and looked at the page.
"You remember them already?"
Annie nodded, her eyes fixed on the blue lines. "My feet do."
That should have been a sweet statement. Instead, it made Lena grip the dish towel significantly tighter.
Later, after Annie was fast asleep under the faded quilt in the bedroom alcove, Lena took Charles Whitmore's card out of her purse and laid it flat on the table. The heavy cream paper looked entirely foreign sitting among the overdue electric bill, a pharmacy receipt, and a school notice about winter supplies. She stared at his typed name for a long time. Then, she picked up the card, turned it over, and looked at the second number he had written by hand: *Judge Raymond Mercer.*
Lena did not call that night. She barely slept at all.