Another silence.
“Did you know?”
“No.”
“But you know something.”
“Laura, I don’t want to do this over the phone.”
“Then tell me who Lily was.”
“I don’t know. But there was someone Daniel knew when he was young.”
“Who?”
“A friend. Michael.”
The name stirred a faint memory.
Daniel had mentioned Michael only a few times, never fondly.
“He stole from Daniel.”
She went silent.
“Didn’t he?”
“I don’t know what happened between them.”
Whatever she knew, she had hidden it for a reason.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
“I’ve told you what I know.”
“No. Four years ago, you told me Lily was his cousin because you wanted me to stop asking questions.”
“I didn’t know what else to say.”
There it was.
An admission.
“Why?”
“I have to go.”
“Who was Michael?”
She hung up.
I stared at my phone.
Daniel’s mother and I had never been
