Estelle doesn’t respond, but the look on her face is anything but surprise, and I immediately realize without a doubt that she knew how they were living. My stomach revolts with the idea that this woman allowed her own flesh and blood to live in the conditions that Kenzie has shared with me. I may not know everything, but I know enough that anyone who had seen where she lived should have stepped in and done something about it. Instead, she allowed her granddaughter to suffer at the hands of her drunk mother and the various men she allowed into her home.

“You knew, didn’t you?” I ask, Estelle immediately...