Vincent and I hopped in his car in the hopes of finding Nancy for ourselves. We were driving all over town, stopping at all of Nancy's favorite lunch spots and clothing stores. No one had seen her, including my aunt and uncle who said the last time they saw her was the night before. I tried to tell myself that it was me who the drug traffickers were after but Darren said that Nancy was being followed too. I knew there was a possibility that she was already captured or left somewhere beaten and bruised. I hated that possibility. 

Vincent said the police were starting to call local hospitals. 

 We drove out of the busiest part of town and onto the back roads just in case. I kept an eye out for Nancy's car while I chewed the tips of my fingernails.

From the driver's seat, Vincent gave me one of his sideways glances again. I couldn't take it anymore. 

"What is up with you?" I said, tearing my gaze from the window. He jumped back a little and his skin flushed red. 

"Nothing." 

I stared at him. He was back to focusing on the road, his expression overly solemn. It was the textbook reaction to someone yelling "Quick! Act natural!" 

"It's definitely something. You've been acting strange since we decided to try and get Darren to confess. It's like we're strangers again." 

A muscle in his neck spasmed. "We've been busy. That's all." 

With all the secret keeping in my family and relationships, I was fed up. I was going to get Vincent to tell me what was up even if I had to interrogate him like I watched Mac do. 

"It feels like you've been ignoring me or not telling me something." 

He bit his lip, his features pinched. "It's silly." 

"Your feelings aren't silly." 

He released a breath through his nostrils. His ears were turning red. "It's just . . . this will be over soon." 

"What will?" 

"This investigation. We won't be working together anymore." He glanced at me. "I won't see you anymore." 

I felt my own face start to redden. "So you stopped talking to me ahead of time?" 

"It makes it easier to say goodbye." 

I hadn't thought too much about what would happen after the case was solved. It was such a big obstacle that it was hard to focus us on anything else. Now that I was thinking about it, I couldn't imagine never seeing Vincent again. How was I supposed to go from texting him daily to deleting his number? Could I even see the Waffle House the same way after having lunch with him there so many times? Our relationship was much more than the case. It had outgrown it.

I frowned. "Why do we need to say goodbye?" 

His eyebrows twitched as if he was trying to work something out. Did he think I wouldn't want to see him after the case ended? 

"Oh!" he exclaimed. He pulled off to the side of the road and reached into the glove compartment in front of me. 

I had a hand on my chest, startled at his sudden outburst. "What? What is it?" 

"I almost forgot to tell you. This was recovered from your house as potential evidence but pictures were taken so I can give them to you." He pulled out a stack of opened envelopes tied together by thread. He placed them into my hands. "They're letters from your father." 

The paper felt like hot coals on my skin. Nancy told me that he wrote back to me only to be intercepted by our aunt and uncle. She said the letters had been destroyed. 

"Where were they found?" 

"In a box in the attic. It was under a video tape and some photo albums." 

I had been in the attic only weeks ago. I had sorted through the video tape and photo album. It was surreal to think I had been mere centimeters from making the discovery for myself. 

I thumbed through the collection. There had to be at least fifty of them. There were ones dating back to when I was a teenager and one as recent as two years ago. They all had the same postage stamp on the upper right hand corner: a ladybug. 

He remembered. 

"Have you read them?" I asked. 

"No. You don't have to read them if you don't want to. I just thought you should have the option." 

If I didn't read them, I would regret it. For years, all I wanted was to hear back from my father, to know him to some capacity. My wish was granted. I needed to know what had been hidden from me. I could handle it - if he was cruel and the letters were filled with curses or if he was so kind it was confusing. No matter what it was, I could handle the truth. 

With unsteady fingers, I undid the string and opened the first letter. 

Dear Mickey, 

my precious little girl, it's such a surprise to hear from you. It was the highlight of my entire life to receive your letter. Thank you. 

I know you hate me and your letter wasn't for me as much as it was for you but I want you to know that I love you, I love Nancy and I loved your mother. Some things are complicated and I have made peace with the possibility that I will always be the villain in your story. But if your letter to me was a chance, let me extend an olive branch to you. 

Write to me about school? I'd love to hear about what you are up to. 

Love, 

your dad. 

I shook my head, perplexed beyond all measure. Suddenly, it became a race to read all the other letters. I skimmed through them and was appalled at the tenderness in every one. 

He was asking me about school, my hobbies, Nancy and the family. He wanted me to send pictures of my graduation and prom. He wanted to know what career I wanted. He was responding to everything I wrote to him about, even going as far as giving me advice like asking my math teacher for extra credit when I mentioned failing an exam or not paying the mean guys at school any mind because they would peek at high school anyways. He was trying to be my father. 

In the last few letters, it seemed like my father had picked up on the fact that I wasn't receiving his replies. Instead of speaking to me in the letters, he spoke to whoever was holding onto them. 

I know you're keeping my letters from her. Please. She's my child. I want her to know that I care.  If you can let Nancy come and visit me, then Mickey can read a letter. She's an adult now. Let her decide if she wants to contact me. 

"Oh my gosh," I said, reading the last few lines over and over again. "He said Nancy went to visit him!" 

The date on the letter was from last year. Why would she visit him? She was such a hypocrite. She had given me such a hard time for simply writing to him, for only wondering about him, while she had gone to see him face to face. She probably had the same urge to get to know him as I did but shamed me for it all the same. 

Wait. 

It's been under my nose this whole time. 

In the many manuscripts I edited for work, when a character made a sudden, important realization it hit them with the power of a punch to the gut. A light turned on. There was imagery of a curtain being pulled back or puzzle pieces falling into place. 

In my experience, the realization was like descending down into a basement. I took a long staircase to get to it and though I was sprinting, I could feel the enormous quantity of steps I had to take to reach the bottom. It was dark, so dark I had to run my hands along the walls and I didn't see the countless cobwebs that tore on my clothing. It was a descent because what lay at the bottom made me feel buried six feet under. The truth was ugly and scarier than I could have imagined because it was a reality I did not anticipate. 

"We didn't interview all of my family," I said, my hands suspended in the air as I held the letters. "We missed one." 

Vincent scanned my expression. His chin dropped slightly and left his mouth agape. "Your father." 

The reason my father killed my mother had never made complete sense to me or to anybody. It wasn't really the court's job to determine his motive, not when it had been so clear what he had done. The weapon had been in his hand when the police arrived, I was a witness, he pleaded guilty. A domestic dispute was an easy answer given to add some sort of conclusion to it. It was a ribbon to tie around it and make it more neat. There was no proof that my father was a jealous or violent man. 

When I saw the tape of my dad walking me around the playground, he said he would have done anything for our family. My mother said she was suspicious about the people he hung out with. I remembered my childhood home. It was dingy and falling apart. We were poor. What if my dad had been trying to do something to provide for us? What if my mother's murder had hidden a deeper crime just as Adonis's death had? 

"We need to go see him." Even as I said it, I couldn't believe it. After nearly twenty years, I was going to willingly visit the monster under my bed. I had no idea if he would be as tender as he had been in the letters. Especially when I was going to try and get him to come clean about what really happened the day my mother died. 

"When do you want to go?" Vincent asked. 

I buckled my seatbelt and felt a heavy weight settle on my chest. 

"Now." 

Author's Note: Things are unraveling.  What do we think? Was it what you expected? Any theories?