For a moment Dan didn’t understand. The words didn’t make any sense. Then they slowly came into focus.

Lucy. Abigail. Valdez.

Abby Valdez.

“It’s a common-enough last name,” Dan said at last, stammering a little. “Right?” He looked up into Abby’s wide eyes. “Right?”

She shook her head, pressing her lips tightly together. “That’s my aunt. Aunt Lucy. I was named after her.”

“Come on, Abby,” Jordan said. “That’s not your aunt, that’s just not possible.”

Dan sat back, silent, waiting for a reasonable explanation. If one existed.

“I’m afraid it is possible.” A gust of wind hit the windows, rattling the glass. The rain slapped down on the glass like a shower of pebbles. Abby looked out the window and then back again. She was clearly trying to keep from crying. “My grandparents were really strict on my pops when he was growing up. His sister Lucy never got along with them, from the time she was a little girl. She never listened, she’d talk back, scream, break things, stuff like that. One day there was a huge fight. My pops doesn’t know what it was about, he was only five, but he remembers that Lucy ran out the door and slammed it behind her. That night, he woke up from a nightmare and Lucy wasn’t in her bed. Seven years old, and she was gone. Just . . . gone. My grandparents acted like everything was normal, and when my pops would ask, they’d get really angry and tell him he wasn’t allowed to say her name any more.”

Dan was at a loss. The story lined up, but what were the odds? “Maybe it’s just a coincidence, the name,” he said, not really believing that himself. He just wanted so badly for it to be true.

“A coincidence is you and me both picking pie for dessert,” Jordan said. He gestured to the patient card with his cup. “What Abby is suggesting is flat-out strange.”

“What, you don’t believe me?” Abby said. Her voice sounded like she was kidding at first, waiting for Jordan to contradict her. But he didn’t. “That’s it, isn’t it? You don’t believe me.”

“Can you really blame me? I mean, what are the chances you just randomly wind up here for the summer, at the place where your aunt used to be a mental patient?” Jordan sat back, arms crossed. “I think there’s something you’re not telling us. Or you’re just not telling us the truth.”

Dan could see Abby’s shoulders beginning to shake as she tried and failed to control her breathing. It was too late to intervene, and he couldn’t think of a damn thing to contribute anyway. Jordan had a point about how impossible the coincidence was, but Abby wasn’t the sort to mess with them for kicks. Or was she? a little voice whispered in his mind. How well did he really know her, after all? Her mood in the last twenty-four hours had certainly been unpredictable. He stopped himself. She wouldn’t make a joke out of something like this. She just wouldn’t.

“Fine,” Abby finally said, composing herself. “I wasn’t going to say anything, but I guess we’re a little past this now.”

Dan shared a nervous glance with Jordan.

Abby picked up her spoon and dragged it softly across her bowl as she began to speak. “When I was little, I used to go through my mom’s clothes looking for hats and skirts and scarves and stuff to play dress up. She and my pops shared dressers, and one time I found this . . . this box.” She inhaled deeply, then pressed on. “I didn’t know what it was, but when I opened it and saw a bunch of papers, I—I started reading them. They were all letters. From my grandpapa. He was already dead by then, and my pops never talked about him, except to say what a mean man he’d been. . . . But these letters . . . Grandpapa just kept apologizing. He kept saying he was sorry for sending his little Lucy away. Away to that place.”

“And let me guess, that place was Brookline,” Jordan said coldly. He obviously still wasn’t convinced.

“It had to be,” Abby replied quickly. “There was stuff about how she was dangerous, and how he had sent her away for her own good. And there was more. . . . Grandpapa kept talking about ‘making a trip to New Hampshire.’ He never mentioned Brookline by name, but . . .”

“But I can see how you would put two and two together,” Dan finished, trying to show at least a little support.

She nodded. “It all adds up. I mean, listen, I didn’t think it was possible, either. Part of me always assumed I was imagining it, or had completely read them wrong. After that first time, my pops found out I’d read the letters and moved them all. But I never forgot. And when I got the letter about this program, well, I thought the fact that it was in New Hampshire was a sign.”

“A sign of how ridiculous this story is,” Jordan protested, sinking down lower in his seat. “I mean what, you just thought you’d come work on your art skills and find your long-lost aunt at the same time? Kill two birds with one stone?”

Abby looked horrified.

“Jordan . . .” Dan warned.

But Jordan barreled right on ahead, gesturing first to Dan and then to Abby. “Let me guess, you guys made this up together, thought you’d have a harmless laugh at my expense. Well, ha ha. Very funny. It’s not working, okay? I am not that gullible.”

“Jordan, why would I make something like this up? It’s too sick. . . .”

Jordan shrugged. “Who knows? Attention? Fun? Take your pick.”

“God, you’re such an asshole sometimes!” She clenched her jaw and looked at Jordan as if she had never really seen him before.

“Let’s all calm down and just think for a minute,” Dan said, hating to see the anger between them. “First of all, Jordan, I have to ask—do you really think I wrote this note to myself? For attention?”

Jordan sighed. “I don’t know anymore, man. You. Abby. I don’t know what’s going on. I feel like you’re trying to make me look stupid. Like the two of you are ganging up on me.”

“Okay, and Abby, do you think there’s any chance this could be a different Lucy Valdez?” he asked.

“No,” she replied firmly. “I know it’s her, and I bet there’s more evidence somewhere in the old wing about what they did to her.”

Jordan snorted.

Suddenly Abby slammed her fist down on the table. Both boys jumped in their seats. Dan’s plate rattled, his hill of macaroni crumbling.

“What would it take for you to trust me?”

Jordan didn’t say anything.

“I trust you,” Dan said in a placating murmur.

“Uh-huh, Peeta Mellark over here believes you. In other news, rain is wet,” Jordan said. “Color me sur-freaking-prised.” Taking his coffee and pie, he left without another word. The rain and the sounds of the dining hall rose up to fill the silence left by Jordan’s angry departure.

“Are you all right?” Dan asked.

“Would you be?”

“No. No, I guess not.”

“Then there’s your answer.” She took a spoonful of her minestrone. “Ugh. It’s cold.”

Dan scrambled for something helpful to say. All he could think about was how, if Abby could keep such a big secret so well, there might be any number of things she still hadn’t shared. Not that he was any better. “You know what? About Jordan? I think he’s still upset about the date thing. He’s probably worrying that we can’t be a duo and a trio at the same time, you know?”

“Hm? What? A duo?” Abby frowned, staring off into the middle distance. “Oh, right. Yeah, maybe. Maybe that’s it.”

Dan didn’t want to take her response as personally as he did, given the fight she’d just had with Jordan, but she’d really turned cold there at the mention of the word date. Everything seemed to be slipping out of control. His new best friends were quickly withdrawing—from him and from each other. He had to find answers and hold the group together, or they’d be total strangers again. Then the hydra really would be dead.

“Don’t worry, we’ll figure this whole thing out,” he said.

“I know I will,” Abby said coolly. “I’m going back into that office. One way or another.”