Page 315 of Safe With You

His mouth curved.

“Learning.”

He took the toothpaste from me and pointed down the hall.

“Bathroom.”

“I knew that.”

“Sure.”

I left him in the kitchen and carried it down the hall.

I’d been here enough now that I didn’t have to ask which door to open.

That thought stayed with me as I headed back toward the living room.

Mila was sitting on the floor at the coffee table, already testing every color in the pack.

“You missed one.”

She looked up. “What?”

I pointed toward the silver pen near her elbow.

“Oh.”

She grabbed it.

I smiled and turned.

That was when the photograph caught my attention.

I’d seen pictures of Elena before. Ellis had never hidden her.

But this one made me stop.

It sat on the shelf beside a framed picture of Mila. Elena was outside, laughing at something beyond the camera, her head tilted back slightly.

The picture didn’t look posed.

It looked caught.

There was something familiar about that.

The light.

The angle.

The way whoever took it waited until she stopped paying attention to the camera.

“Daddy took that.”

I glanced toward Mila.

She was still coloring.

“That one?”