The snow kept falling. The road behind her disappeared. And for once, Lena didn't look back.
“No, baby.” She reached back and squeezed his ankle. “Daddy got lost again.”
For the first time in six years, she wasn't searching for anything. She was just sitting in the quiet, her son breathing softly behind her, the snow erasing every road behind her. Searching for- Your Daddy Ditched Me Again in-
Eli stirred. “Daddy here?”
Lena turned off the phone.
Then she turned off the GPS.
Her phone buzzed. Not a call. A text.
She watched the three dots appear, then disappear. Appear. Disappear. He was typing, erasing, typing—trying to find the right string of words to keep her on the hook.
The snow thickened. The road narrowed. The GPS fell silent, the screen showing a blank gray void where the map should be. For a terrifying, liberating second, Lena was nowhere. No route. No destination. No man-shaped hole to drive around. The snow kept falling
She looked up. There was no diner, no motel, no truck stop. Just a wide pull-off overlooking a frozen river, the moonlight turning the snow into a field of diamonds. The road ended here.