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She frowned slightly.

“You know Giovanni just as well as I do.”

“I thought I did.”

That made her quiet. She had to have known the extent of what Ghost had done because she never even asked why I was looking for him. I sat back and looked around the apartment before bringing my eyes to her again.

“Everything I thought he’d do, he ain’t done. Everywhere I thought he’d go, he ain’t there. Everybody I thought he’d call ain’t heard from him.”

Her expression softened.

“So clearly, there’s shit I don’t know.”

I said with a sigh before leaning forward again.

“You’re his mama. You knew him before I did. Before we started running together, before the streets, before anybody was calling him Ghost. So, think about Giovanni. Think back to when he was little. If he thought he fucked up so bad that he couldn’t come home, who would he trust?”

Ms. Gia looked away from me. For the first time, she didn’t immediately say she didn’t know. I watched her face while she thought, and after a while, something changed in her expression.

“My sister.”

“Your sister?” I frowned.

She nodded slowly. I knew Ms. Gia had siblings, but they had been people who weren’t around enough for me to know much about them.

“You think he with his aunt?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

“But you think he could be.”

She sighed before sitting back against the couch.

“My sister and I haven’t spoken in years.”

“How many years?”

“Long enough.”

“What happened?”

She gave me a look that just screamed I needed to mind my damn business.

“That’s between me and my sister.”

“Aight.”

I wasn’t here to dig through her family business. She became quiet for a moment before continuing. I could see that expression soften a bit.

“When I got pregnant with Giovanni, my life changed very quickly. Your father moved me out of my mother’s house, away from my mother and my siblings. Things were different after that. I didn’t speak to my sister at all, and then when G was around five, she started coming around. I never rebuilt my relationship with her, but I allowed her to have a relationship with my son.”

I nodded because that part of the story wasn’t new to me. Finding out Pops had been living an entirely different life behind my mother’s back had already forced me to look at enough childhood memories differently. I didn’t need to reopen all of that today.

“My sister and I stayed in contact for Giovanni years after she came back around,” Ms. Gia continued. “But eventually we had a falling-out. One of those stupid family arguments that goes on so long you don’t even remember what the original argument was about anymore. Neither one of us was willing to apologize, so we simply stopped speaking.”

“So, Ghost don’t talk to her either?”

“No. Giovanni kept his relationship with her.”