“No. I know exactly where they were. They’re not worth much, but they’re gone. And your watch is valuable. You had it looked at once when we needed to repair the roof. Back then, even with the scratched face, the pawnshop would’ve given you a few hundred bucks, but I wouldn’t let you part with it.”

“This is ridiculous,” I snapped, trying not to shout. “Lily wouldn’t—”

“With all due respect, how can you be sure?” Maya shot back, and I couldn’t come up with an answer fast enough. “If you didn’t misplace your watch and I didn’t lose my earrings, where are they? Where’s the money from the Cliff’s Head?”

“I don’t know.”

“Patrick said he’ll talk to her when she goes in for her next shift the day after tomorrow, but he wanted to give me the heads-up. She’s on her way home now. Before she gets here, do you think we should...” She grimaced and waved a hand. “No, we can’t.”

“Go through her stuff?” I said. Jesus, she was joking, right?

“No, I was going to say talk to her. But you’re right. Maybe we should take a peek.”

“Maya, we can’t.”

“Why not? It’s our house and she’ll never know. If we don’t find anything, there’s no harm done, but my ass is on the line if she took the money. I vouched for her. And if she has my jewelry and your watch...well, we have a whole other set of problems to deal with.”

Fuck. My mind took a few seconds to wrestle with the options, but Maya was right. If we asked Lily about taking our things, it would give her the opportunity to get rid of them. Worse, if she hadn’t taken them—and I didn’t for one second believe she had—she’d hate me for accusing her of being a thief. But if she didn’t know we’d looked, and it would shut Maya up...

“Let’s go,” I said.

Once we were in the spare room, Maya checked the closet. I searched through Lily’s clothes in the chest of drawers, feeling more and more like a traitor. I kept telling myself this was all a big misunderstanding, but, as I dug through her things, doubts crept in and I wondered how well I knew Lily after all. Yes, I could recall her favorite movie, that I’d given her a bracelet on Valentine’s Day and she loved blueberry pancakes, but did I know her?

“Found anything?” Maya said.

I shook my head. “I need to be sure.”