Page 19 of Everything She Feared

“From what we’re hearing,” the woman was telling the reporter, “a girl fell from a cliff and died...”

“Who fell?” Sara asked others nearby. “Does anyone know who fell?” Most shrugged. Sara said a bit louder, “Please, I need to know!”

The reporter, watching from the corner of her eye, stepped toward her, thrusting the microphone toward her face. The camera and light were now on Sara.

“Excuse me,” the reporter said. “Would you talk to us?”

Anger and fear rising in her throat, Sara shook her head and moved off, bumping and shouldering her way toward the police line and the deputies there.

“Can you please help me?” Sara said to a deputy with a clipboard. “I was told to come here to get my daughter.”

“Yes, ma’am. Her name?”

“Katie Harmon. Kaitlyn Jean Harmon, she’s nine, with the Sunny Days group.”

He focused on the name sheet, then said, “Your name, ma’am?”

“Sara Harmon. I’m her mother.”

“Could you show me some identification?”

Sara withdrew her driver’s license from her wallet. The deputy then flipped to a page and turned the clipboard and his pen to her.

“Sign here.” He tapped a spot.

After she signed, he stepped away, turning, reaching for his shoulder microphone and saying something into it. Then to Sara, “Please stand aside, ma’am. They’ll bring her out shortly.”

“Can you tell me what’s happened?”

“I’m not authorized, ma’am.”

Sara nearly choked on her words.

“My daughter’s in there! Tell me! Is she alright? Tell me!”

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but I don’t have any information. Please stand to one side.”

Stunned, Sara moved trance-like, watching other parents getting their kids. Some parents she knew, like Daria Ahmadi, who’d worked at the diner years ago.

Daria was helping her daughter, Leila, who was about eleven, pass under the tape.

“Daria.” Sara touched her arm. “What’s happened?”

“Oh, Sara. It’s awful, just awful. It’s going around that one of the children was killed.”

“Oh, my God, no! Who? Do you know who?”

“No, Mom,” Leila said through tears. “It was a supervisor.”

“A supervisor? Who?” Sara asked.

The deputy stepped closer, saying, “Ladies, I’m sorry, but you need to keep moving. Please.”

“We have to go, Sara,” Daria said.

Her mind racing, Sara stepped back, clasping her hands together, entwining her fingers and touching her knuckles to her lips as if in prayer. Then a man and woman wearing jackets withSHERIFFon the back arrived. They spoke quietly with the deputy at the tape, then followed his gaze to Sara before approaching her.

“Are you Sara Harmon, Katie Harmon’s mother?” the woman said.

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