Dean looked like he’d seen a ghost.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“What would it have changed?”
“I deserved to know, Dean.”
He looked down.
“I’ve spent six years thinking if I’d been on that boat, maybe there would’ve been another adult,” he admitted. “Maybe I could’ve done something.”
“And you decided I couldn’t handle that?” I shot back.
“I deserved to know, Dean.”
“I thought you had enough, Andrea.”
I looked him straight in the eye.
“You didn’t get to decide what I could carry.”
He flinched.
Then I told him about the extra flotation vest.
Dean looked up.
“He bought that for me?”
“Apparently.”
His face crumpled.
“I never even used it.”
“You didn’t get to decide what I could carry.”
That became our next question.
If Dean never boarded the boat, where had the extra vest gone?
***
A retired search coordinator helped us review the old recovery inventory.
