Frankie shrugs. “My bad. Anyway, when Li’l Whizz hit it big, Peaches got a percentage. Turned around and reinvested a lot of that in his neighborhood, made him a local hero.”

“What neighborhood?” I ask.

Frankie hesitates and glances at Caesar, then Ethan.

“What?” I say.

Frankie opens his mouth, hesitates. “The Bluff,” he finally says.

The words bring a stillness to the room. Caesar watches me. Frankie seems embarrassed. Ethan looks stricken. I say nothing. That simple phrase, the Bluff, is like a knife slicing through the meat of my heart. But I keep my face impassive.

“So he’s, what, a developer?” I ask, my voice steady.

Frankie shakes his head. “He’s a gangbanger. Real protective of his turf. Sureños 13 tried to move in. That’s a prison gang—”

“I know who the Sureños are,” I say. “This Peaches guy stood up to them?”

“Put down half a dozen of them this spring,” Frankie says.

This didn’t make sense. Uncle Gavin was a criminal, but he didn’t deal drugs or get involved in gang wars. “So what kind of business would Uncle Gavin have with this Peaches?” I ask.

Frankie shrugs again. “No clue.”

“Come on,” I say, my voice sharper than I want it to be. “You’re like his right-hand man. You don’t know anything?”

“I told you, I don’t know,” Frankie says, his voice rising to match mine. “You think if I did I wouldn’t tell you?”

Frankie and I are facing each other, anger and frustration radiating off both of us like heat off asphalt in August. I clench my fists. Frankie glares at me, his jaw set.

In a low voice, Caesar says, “Mister Lester doesn’t tell us everything, Suzie.”

I take a deep breath, trying to ignore the jackhammering of my heart, and unclench my fists. “Sorry, Frankie,” I say. “I know you’d tell me.”

Frankie sighs, and his eyes turn sad. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m sorry too. Your uncle’s lying here in the hospital—”

Ethan, who has been standing by our uncle’s bed this entire time, interrupts. “Okay,” he says like a coach about to tell his squabbling players to knock it off. “We need to let Uncle Gavin get some rest. Susannah, we’re gonna have to talk about this heart valve replacement, figure out the next step.”

“What’s to talk about?” I say. “He needs the surgery. The doc can tell us about the choices tomorrow, like he said. And we’ll see what Uncle Gavin wants.”

Ethan gets the same stubborn look he had when he was a teenager butting heads with Uncle Gavin. “I want to talk to Doctor Lewis some more. It’s not that simple.”

I fold my arms across my chest. “It’s exactly that simple.”