“We need to ask these children some questions.” One of the officers bent down to speak with Bella. “Does your mommy ever leave you home alone?”
Kiersten held her breath as Bella looked up at the officer and shook her head. “No. But sometimes she locks Travis in a cage. I don’t like it when she does that. Travis doesn’t like it either.”
He exchanged a glance with the other officer as bile coated Kiersten’s throat.
Piper took a step forward, “Officer, you don’t understand—”
“Ma’am. Another outburst and I’ll ask you to leave.”
“Where do you go to school?” the officer asked, turning back to Bella.
“The Beaverbrook Academy for Inquiring Minds.”
“Where’s that?” he asked.
“In Mrs. Cleaver’s dining room. It’s home school. But Mr. Reggie does PE. And Miss Valentina reads us stories. Mr. Miles helps us find fox poop. He’s fromEngland, and Mary Poppins is his cousin. We call that science.”
“What else does your mommy do?”
“One day we had worms in our house,” Bella said.
“We had cockroaches,” Johnny put in helpfully. “And we go to the cemetery sometimes and look for dead people.”
“Does your mommy ever drink?” the officer asked, turning back to Bella.
She nodded. “She drinksa lot...”
“I see.”
“She calls it her ‘cup of ambition.’”
“What does your mommy like to drink?”
“K-Cups mostly,” Bella said. “She drinksa lotof those.”
The officer lifted his eyebrows. “Your mother drinks a lot of ... coffee?”
She nodded. “She puts a whole scoop of sugar inside her coffee, but she won’t let me have a whole scoop of sugar on my strawberries. I don’t think that’s fair.”
“I see. Does she drink anything else?”
“Water. She says it’s important to stay hy-rated.”
“Does your mother ever forget about you when she’s doing other things?”
Johnny nodded. “My mom forgotted me at a truck stop once. The patrol people brought me home.”
“Tell me more about Travis,” the officer said. “How old is he?”
“He’s like ... just born,” Bella said. “He’s still a puppy.”
“Wait. Travis is adog?”
“’Course, silly,” she said with a little giggle. “You don’t lockpeoplein cages. And his real name is Travis Kelce Mondello. After Taylor’s fee-onshay.”
“Where’s your daddy?” the officer asked.
“We never know where Daddy is,” she said with a cheerful shrug. “He’s with Deborah. The secretary.”
