He takes off his headphones.

“What do you think Anderson is talking about? What secret?”

Across the room, Lawrence is studying his phone, but I can tell he’s frozen in place, awaiting the answer.

“No idea. Could be anything.” Billy puts his headphones back on and stares at his phone. “Weed, probably.” He shrugs.

“I’m not worried about Anderson,” Lawrence says. “But we should get ahead of this. Where’s Peter?” He looks around for DeFiore, who’s out in the hall, shouting into his phone.

“I bet it’s weed,” Nate says, shifting his eyes toward Billy.

Nate knows about Marcus, I think. Though the thought has occurred to me before, countless times, at the moment it seems absolutely true.

“Who gives a shit,” we hear DeFiore say. “Fuck that guy. Tell him I said no way.”

As Lawrence gets up, Eleanor grabs his arm. “Let it go. Let’s just have a quiet lunch.”

“I don’t want to have a quiet lunch, Eleanor. I want to talk to Peter.”

She won’t release his arm, which surprises me. Why isn’t she up on her feet, berating DeFiore for letting this happen? Clearly, I’ve been out of the loop for too long.

Lawrence shakes her off. At the door, he motions to DeFiore. “We have questions.”

Standing up, Nate surveys the food. “There’s one turkey sandwich,” he tells Billy. “It’s yours.” Nate positions the sandwich, fruit, and pretzels on a plate with care, as if Billy has broken both arms and can’t feed himself. He spreads yellow mustard, not the spicy brown kind, on both sides of the bread. He opens the pretzels and shakes them out onto the plate. He sops up the juice from the fruit then sets the plate on the table, unfolds a napkin and fills a cup with Diet Coke. “Here you go, buddy.” He squeezes Billy’s shoulder. “You should eat.”

Billy nods. “Thank you.”

“I don’t like Anderson,” I announce, needing to speak. If I don’t, I’ll explode. “He’s a pompous jerk.”

My brothers exchange glances that say I am beyond stupid. “Well, okay, Cassie.” Nate sneers. “Thanks for the legal insight.”

DeFiore steps into the room. “Try not to worry about what you heard today. They’re going to say terrible things about Billy and about all of you. But our case is airtight.”

Since when? This morning, he was pushing us to quit. But now that the trial is underway, maybe there’s no room for doubt. DeFiore seems unfazed by Anderson’s statement, and I realize that having seen the discovery, he knew it was coming. This means all of them—Lawrence, Eleanor, Billy, and Nate—have already discussed it. The only one who doesn’t know is me.

“We’re going to be fine,” he adds.

This doesn’t pacify Nate. “Anderson lied. Is he allowed to do that?”