‘Absolutely. How do you do it?’ Andie said, scooting further away from her boyfriend and closer to me. He gave an audible sigh, picking up his beer off the table and leaning back, but he didn’t look bothered. I’d overheard a conversation between Travis and Andie one night where Andie had informed him that sometimes putting me before him was part of the package deal of dating her. I had felt bad at first, like I was intruding too much, but he had been kind about it and told Andie that she was worth it and it wasn’t a big deal since he liked me anyway. The way he’d handled it in stride had gained him a lot of points in my book. I tried to be conscious of not putting myself between them, but in times like this, I was grateful he was letting me have Andie’s full attention.

‘I just need to download my raw DNA profile from 23andMe and then upload that to GEDMatch’s website.’

‘Seems easy enough,’ Andie said, walking through the process with me. ‘Trav, you’re a genius,’ she said with a big smile, gripping her fingers into his short beard as she kissed him. Used to their PDA, I ignored them and clicked ‘yes’ to approve the use of my data, as it said this was the only way I could get match results.

‘Oh, look. This is interesting,’ I said, pointing to the next option, which I could tick to allow law enforcement to access my results.

Andie squinted at the screen. ‘Didn’t your dad say your bio-mom was in jail?’

‘Yeah, that’s the only thing my parents knew about her. She was young and went to jail in New York, they think on drug charges.’

‘Maybe you should opt in?’ Travis said, running a hand through his brown wavy hair. ‘Can’t hurt, right? I’m not sure how it works but if your mom has a record, maybe connecting with the police is another way to find stuff out about her.’

I considered what he was saying. ‘I don’t think anything bad could come of it, do you?’ I looked to Andie for reassurance.

‘Do it. You’ve been a relentlessly law-abiding citizen your whole damn life. I don’t think you have anything to worry about. It’s not like they’re going to find your blood at a crime scene or something and nail you with a murder.’

‘Yeah, you’re probably right,’ I laughed. I was always a little paranoid about living my life to the letter of the law, no matter how many times Andie tried to lure me into questionable adventures. It was impossible for them to link me to any type of crime. ‘Okay, why not?’ I clicked the box to opt in.