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Shell-B:

How do I figure this out?

Me:

I would guess you could take a DNA test, and I could steal some of Black’s DNA, and then we could compare notes.

Shell-B:

Are you two dating?

Were we?

I felt like we were.

Going with my gut, I answered.

Me:

Yes.

Shell-B:

At first I didn’t want to believe you. But with that drawing looking exactly like me—I went ahead and dyed my hair natural and dissolved my lip filler, so I could really get a good comparison. I asked my mom about my dad, and she got this look in her eyes. She pretty much brushed it off, said my dad was a dead beat like she always did. But she was too cagey about it. And now I don’t feel like I can trust her.

She couldn’t.

Me:

What’s your mother’s name?

I’d asked once before and she’d hedged.

But if we could get some details into a comparison…

We spent the next fifteen minutes confirming our fears—hopes?

Her mother’s name was Marcia. Her father’s name was unknown. She had the same birthday as Black’s Shelby. She named off grandparents, but Black and I hadn’t gotten to that point in our relationship that we’d talked about his family. She shared everything with me that she could think of.

I did the same for her.

And in the end, we decided that the next crucial step was a DNA test.

Which was why I’d bagged up the coffee cup he’d used that morning and sent it in to a DNA testing center in Texas, where Shelby was located and could go get tested in person.

I’d no sooner finished talking with Shelby than Opie called me back.

I’d gotten zero work done all morning. Not that I was complaining.

“Okay,” she said. “I’ll do it. But they have to promise to keep the boys away from my house. I don’t want them within a mile of it.”

I smiled. “Okay, Opie. Whatever you need.”

Twenty-Five

That light at the end of the tunnel? Huge fire.

—Black’s secret thoughts