“Nice,” I mutter, stuffing the bedding into a hamper in the corner. The early morning sunlight shining through the window catches a glint of gold. I glance down and see the tiny tip of something in a far corner. It’s actually lodged in the crack between the wall and the floor, and I would have missed it if the sun hadn’t wanted me to find it. I squat and coax it out with a fingernail until it’s fully revealed on the floor.

The star of David.

And at the center, an onyx stone.

My breath catches. I’ve seen this charm before. Ruth Stern wore it all the time when we were growing up.

I pick up the charm and run outside. Ezra’s stashing my overnight bag and slamming the trunk.

“Ez,” I say, my heart racing with the possible implications of what I’ve found. “You said you never came here before, right?”

“Right.” He leans against the car and studies me. “What’s up?”

I hold out my hand, palm up, with the Star of David charm, a little tarnished, but still gleaming. He stiffens and then lifts it from my hand.

“This looks like my mom’s, but I haven’t seen it in years. She lost it.” He looks from the charm back to my face, his expression reflecting the same speculations.

“If you never came with your family, then how would that be here?” I ask. “We just knocked out some walls when we added a laundry room. Maybe the charm got dislodged or shuffled around in the commotion. I found it in the laundry room. Your family never came here, so why would your mother’s charm be in this house?”

Everything I believed about my father goes out of focus, blurred through a sheen of tears. “Do you think… Ez, do you think they came here together? How would it be here unless she was?”

“I have no idea.” Ezra’s fist closes over the charm. “But I will find out. I promise you that.”

The silence between us on the ride back to the city throbs with our unspoken thoughts. My heart is too heavy for words. Disappointment in my father. Hurt on my mother’s behalf. I’m disillusioned that the man who guided me more than anyone else at one point may have lost his way. I know he was human. Despite what Mama thinks, I wasn’t deceived that Daddy was perfect, but this?

While Ezra drives, my phone starts ringing, wresting me from the chaos of my own thoughts and plunging me into chaos of another kind. One I know how to manage.

Work.