“What do you know about me?”
Her hands began to shake.
“I knew your father.”
My heart stopped.
I hadn’t heard anyone mention my father in eight months.
Not once.
He had been dead for eleven years.
At least, that was what I’d been told.
I looked at Evelyn.
“What was his name?”
She swallowed.
“Thomas.”
I stepped backward.
My father had always been Thomas Vale.
But hardly anyone knew his name.
Everyone who had known him was either gone or far away.
“How did you know him?”
Evelyn looked at the little metal box.
“He asked me to protect something.”
“What?”
She glanced toward Mack.
“Not here.”
Then she walked away.
I wanted to follow her.
But I couldn’t.
The guards were watching.
And Mack was watching too.
For the rest of the day, I couldn’t concentrate.
Who was Evelyn?
Why was she in prison?
How did she know my father?
And why had she looked at me as if she had been waiting for me?
That evening, when everyone returned to the cell block, I saw Evelyn sitting alone at the end of the corridor.
I approached her.
She looked up.
“You shouldn’t have helped me.”
“I know.”
