“See that corgi?” She pointed to a portrait. “That’s Jewel’s dog, Dulce. She died from cancer a year ago. That’s where the bracelet is.”

“Whoa, hold on,” he said, grabbing her by the elbow to stop her. “You wanna maybe explain how you know that?”

“Dulce!” she said as if that one word should have explained everything. When he didn’t catch on, she added, “Dulce means ‘sweet’ in English! Sweet! Like in the nonsensical recipe!”

“Still don’t get it.”

Luna tried not to let her frustration and impatience show. She took a breath, made eye contact, and spoke as slowly as she could manage, which wasn’t very. “Okay. The recipe says, ‘pour over sweet companion molds.’ It’s wordplay! You know how much Jewel loves wordplay. “Pour over sounds like pore, p-o-r-e, over. Pore over means to examine something in great detail, you know, like you’re searching for something.”

Alex sighed, staring at the ceiling for help. “Go ahead. Bring it home.”

“Dulce was literally Jewel’s sweet companion. Why else would it say ‘sweet secret’ in the envelope if Dulce wasn’t the correct fallen soul? The portrait is a mold of her image in the hall of the dead. ‘Fly with the bird’ means we have to go up. I don’t have wings, so I gotta make it work with my hands and feet.”

Alex thought quietly for a moment, then said, “We’re supposed to use C-P-R, but you’re using the recipe now.”

“So? Jewel never said we couldn’t, and Olive gave us a clue, remember? Everything is connected.”

“Yeah, but…” He paused. “Would anyone else have known that besides you?”

Luna hesitated. “Maybe?”

“That just seems like quite the reach. We haven’t gotten any other actual clues or information about Dulce. If you weren’t here and that was the answer, how would the rest of us have solved that?”

“You wouldn’t even be here without me,” she reminded him. “I know what I’m doing.”

“Wow. Really feeling that partner vibe you were talking about earlier. Thanks.”

“I’m just saying that you should trust me on this,” she said. “The whole point of Golden Rule was for Jewel to share her story with us and for us to share with her. I don’t think it’s too odd that a clue is a throwback. Kind of like it’s a reward for being faithful to her for so long? Or a test—something only someone like me, who’s used the app since the beginning and loves Jewel, would know.”

He didn’t look convinced at all.

“If I’m right, we’ll find our present. If I’m wrong, then I’ll just have sore arms tomorrow. No harm, no foul. I’ll come back down, and we’ll keep looking.”

“I don’t know. It just seems really off to me.”