“Paul Schuster?” I know that name well. Paul was often at our house when I was growing up. I recall a pleasant man, the yin to Dad’s yang, or yang to Dad’s yin. Whichever, he was the more amenable of the two. There were several other lawyers on the letterhead, but Aldiss and Schuster were the name partners. Paul was married briefly, had no children, and was therefore often at our house for holidays. He made a mean apple pie—actually made it himself.

Lost in thought, Jack runs a finger back and forth on the stubble over his lip.

“Is he still around?” I ask.

He nods.

“I’ll call him.”

“Robbing Peter to pay Paul,” he says. “It has to mean something.”

“I don’t know if he’ll talk, client confidentiality and all, but it’s worth a try.” I pause, cautious. “What, exactly, do we want him to say?”

“Why my mother went missing. Whether she was upset enough to commit suicide. What your father meant by robbing Peter to pay Paul.” He is frowning, the grooves between his eyes pronounced.

“What,” I whisper.

His eyes meet mine, then dart away. “There’s an obvious meaning. If you take it literally.”

Yes. The question is whether he trusts me enough to risk airing it aloud.

“Between you and me?” I offer, because I am desperate for that trust.

When he finally speaks, his voice is raspy, as if a broken tone is less condemning than a full one. “What if my mother bolstered her business with money from the family estate that might have helped her brother? Wouldn’t that be robbing Peter to pay Paul?”

“There’s nothing illegal in it.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.” Tilting back in the chair, angled just a tad toward me, he pushes both hands through his hair, leaves them on the back of his head, and raises reluctant eyes. “If she committed suicide—” He stops and clears his throat. “If she deliberately jumped from that boat in the middle of a micro-burst, it would have been because she was in mental pain. People don’t do things like that unless they are. But she didn’t have a history of mental illness. She wasn’t in therapy. She wasn’t taking antidepressants. But if she did take money that could have saved her brother, she’d feel guilty. If her brother lost everything because he didn’t have that money, she’d be devastated. If her business failed in spite of what she took, she’d be destroyed.”

“That’s a lot of ifs,” I say, though what he outlines sounds frighteningly plausible. “But could she just take the money? Most estates spell out who gets what and how it has to be distributed. Can an executor just help himself?”

“No. A co-executor, likely Ron Doe, would have a say. In theory.”