I hold up one finger. “Sorry. Did you just say your sister unexpectedly passed away?” As if heretofore unknown sisters could pass away in any other way but unexpectedly. I have a weird urge to laugh but manage to keep it in check.

Her shoulders fall slightly, so slightly that maybe I imagined it. “Yes. My twin passed away unexpectedly in February, but the estate wasn’t able to find me until now. I haven’t been in touch with her for a number of years.”

My twin?

Do I maybe not know an alternate meaning for the word “twin”? No, I obviously know what a twin is. I must have misheard, because if she had a twin sister, if I had an aunt, I’d know about that, wouldn’t I? This is obviously a joke. Except… does my mother joke?

No, she does not. In my words, she lacks the necessary humor bone.

Which means my mother has a twin. Or did have a twin. My heart is picking up speed again. And now I’m running my eyes over my steady mom, her perfect style, her carefully controlled expression, and a tiny door is swinging open, one marked Do You Actually Know This Person? I mean, I’ve always felt about a million miles away from her, but this is something entirely different. This is next level.

“What… I…?” I take a deep breath but only manage another “What?”

My shock gives her enough time to pull herself back together. She smooths her hair, then glides back in her chair. “The estate is right outside of Boston. In… Salem, Massachusetts.” And the firm way she says it, it’s almost like a dare.

“Salem?” A flood of images rushes my brain, most of which I’m sure came from movies. Puritans wearing black hats with buckles. Witches riding on broomsticks with black cats. Also, that movie with the three witches, one of whom rides a vacuum cleaner. Hocus Pocus? She can’t mean that Salem, can she?

I shake my head slightly. “Salem… like, where the witches were?”

She hesitates. “There were no actual witches during the Salem witch trials.”

Really? I raise my eyebrows at her, and she must realize how irrelevant that information is because she reddens slightly, then pushes back from her desk, rising to her feet. “I’m so sorry to involve you, but I don’t have a lot of options. The estate is… large. And I can’t ask any of my staff to help me settle it because my past is sort of, ah”—she glances at the closed door—“something I’d like to keep in the past. I know I can trust you to keep it all secret.”

Now I am genuinely dumbfounded.