“How did you find this out?” Susanna asked.

“I arrested a hooker one morning who offered to trade me a hot-off-the-streets news flash for letting her walk. The news was that Anthony Navarro was offering twenty-five thousand dollars to whoever brought him his daughter.” She turned to Robert. “I was home that afternoon and thinking, what would I do if someone came for my daughter? I was waiting to go pick her up at preschool and was watching your press conference. I went online and filled out the application. I heard car doors slam outside and when I looked out, there were two men staring at my house. I was pretty damned sure it wasn't a coincidence. So I grabbed what I could and went out the back door. I went to my friend, Steffie's, and stayed there for a few days while I got everything in order.”

“Would your friend Steffie happen to be Chief of Police Stephanie Jenkins?” Mallory asked.

Emme nodded.

“Please, please, don't do anything that would harm her. She agreed to go along with this for Chloe's sake. Over the past few years, we've both had to clean up some of the messes Navarro's men have left behind and we were terrified that he would find Chloe.” She turned to look Mallory in the eyes. “I know that you're not going to keep me on and I accept that. I understand why you don't want me here. I'm all right with it. I deserve whatever happens from here on in. But Steffie will lose her job, and she'll never be able to work in law enforcement again, and that's all she's ever known. Please don't ruin her life because of me. She was only trying to save my daughter.”

Her voice broke and she covered her face with her hands.

“It seems to me that that's all you were trying to do, too.” Trula rubbed her back gently.

“I don't understand why you didn't call the FBI.” Mallory sounded skeptical.

“The FBI has been trying to get their hands on Navarro for years, Mal.” Emme turned to her wearily. “I could not count on them finding him before he found Chloe.”

Robert cleared his throat and said, “I think we need some time to talk this over.”

“I understand.” Emme stood. “I just want you to know that I am sorry that I lied to you, that I disappointed you. But I'd do it again if I had to. There's no question in my mind that Anthony Navarro could have tracked me down if I used my real name. He isn't used to not getting what he wants. Right now, he wants Chloe.”

“You're exhausted.” Trula rose also. “You're going to get a few hours of sleep. There's a spare room right next to mine.”

“Trula, I couldn't sleep right now, not after all this,” Emme protested.

“Nonsense. Just a few hours of rest, then we'll see.” Trula took her by the arm and led her to the door, and then out into the hallway. Before she closed the door behind them, Emme heard her tell the others, “I'm coming back, and I'm going to have my say.”

It was ten minutes before Trula returned, but she had plenty on her mind when she got there.

“I'm going to throw in my two cents,” she told them as she sat back in the seat she'd earlier vacated.

“Please,” Robert told her. “The floor is yours.”

“I just want to say that if you fire that girl, I'm going to be one unhappy old woman.”

“Trula, we have every right to fire her. She falsified her credentials, she got her friend to lie for her and help her pull off this fraud-the chief of police who should know better, for God's sake!” Mallory said, pointing out the obvious. “We have good reasons to fire her.”

“And you have good reasons not to,” Trula countered. “She was trying to save her child.”

“You're just blind to what she did because of the way you feel about Chloe,” Mallory replied.

“You're damned right I am. I think what Emme-or Ann or whatever name she wants to be called by-what she did was very brave. Gutsy. She pulled up stakes and drove across the country to find a place where she could safely raise her little girl. She gave up everything to do that-her home, her job… She had no way of knowing if you'd hire her, Mallory. And maybe I should remind you why you did.”

“She submitted a résumé that belonged to someone else.”

“She had an excellent reference from her former chief.”

“Who was her best friend!” Mallory reminded Trula.

“But wasn't everything she told you about this woman true?”

“That's not the issue.”

“Then what is, Mal? You needed a great investigator and you got one,” Kevin said. “She solved this case in a matter of weeks and made us all look good.”

“She's a fraud, Kevin. She should have told us the truth; we'd have kept her secret.”

“And how should she have known that? Reading between the lines, who has she been able to trust in her life? Tossed away like trash after she was born, bounced around from foster family to foster family, then bounced out onto the street when she turned eighteen to make her way alone from there?” Trula felt her blood pressure take off but she couldn't help herself. “Does anyone here know what it's really like to have no one in their life they can depend on?”

The room fell silent, and Trula let them sit for a few minutes before turning to Mallory. “I know you had some rough times growing up, but you always knew you had a place to come back to at the end of the day-no one was going to toss you out. This woman didn't even have that small bit of comfort. The one thing she does have is her daughter, and she fought for her the only way she knew how. Just for the record, I'd have done the same thing, and I defy anyone at this table to tell me otherwise.”

“Trula-” Robert said, but she cut him off before he could say what was on his mind.

“Robert, in all the years we've known each other, I've never interfered in your business or in your personal life, but I'm asking you now to think really hard before you let her go.”

“Whether or not you've never interfered is open for debate,” he replied, “but we'll let that go for now. But just so you know, I'm leaning toward keeping her on.”

“Robert, if anyone finds out that she falsified her records, that we hired her even though we knew she was a fraud, we could lose our license and our reputation would most certainly be damaged,” Mallory told him.

“Let's think this through. First, how would anyone find out?” he asked.

Mal rolled her eyes. “Robert, that is the most naïve thing I've ever heard you say. All it takes is for someone to recognize her, and it could happen. Or someone who knew the real Emme Caldwell-”

“Whoa. There are lots of people who have the same name, right?” he said. “And who in California, besides her former police chief, even knows that she's here at the foundation? No one.”

“There is one person who knows,” Mallory told them. “I called the chief earlier in the week, but she was out. I left a message with the desk sergeant that I needed to speak with her about Emme Caldwell. He said he and Emme-I'm sure now he meant the real Emme-had been partners early on. If he was wondering why someone from the Mercy Street Foundation was asking about a dead cop…”

“It probably went right over his head,” Robert tried to assure her.

“I don't know that I'd want to bet on that,” Mallory replied. “Her name is right there on the website.”

Robert excused himself for a moment. “I will be right back. I want you to hold that thought.”

He was back in a minute, his laptop under his arm. He placed it on the table in front of him and opened it to their website. He typed for a moment or two, then smiled broadly.

“There. All fixed.” He turned the laptop around for them to see.

“What's all fixed?” Mallory frowned and craned her neck to look at the screen.

“Here. As far as the rest of the world is concerned, Emme Caldwell is now Elle Caldwell,” he told them.

“You're serious. You think that's all it's going to take if someone comes looking for her?” Mallory was starting to get angry.