He stood several feet away from the grave with his hands in his pockets, staring at the ground where they’d just lowered Sam. Everybody else had started walking back toward their cars, but he stayed there.
I watched him for a few seconds.
Something wasn’t adding up.
I just didn’t know what it was yet.
“Kaiden...” My aunt’s voice pulled my attention away from him.
“Yeah?”
“Come by the house when you leave here.”
“You need something?”
She shook her head, no. “I have some of Sam’s things. The hospital gave them to me, and there’s some stuff at the house too. I want you to look through it.”
“For what?”
“I don’t know.” She wiped beneath her eyes. “Anything. You said he wasn’t supposed to be at that hospital, right?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Then maybe there’s something in his things that’ll tell you why he was there.”
My eyes went back to Mace to see him finally walking toward us.
“Yeah,” I said, turning my attention back to my aunt. “I’ll come by.”
She nodded before reaching up and touching the side of my face.
“You be careful.”
“I’m always careful.”
“No, you’re not.” Even with swollen eyes and tears still drying on her face, she gave me the same look she’d been giving me since I was a kid. “You think because you’re grown and got money now, I don’t know you. I know exactly how you get when somebody messes with your family.”
I couldn’t even argue with her.
She knew me too well.
“I’m not gonna do anything stupid.”
“That’s what worries me. Your idea of stupid and mine ain’t never been the same. I want you to find out who killed my baby, but let the law handle them their way. Whatever information you get, you take it straight to the police.”
That almost made me laugh. She knew better than that.
“Go home, Auntie.”
“Don’t tell me what to do.”
“Sometimes I got to.”
She slapped my arm before pulling me into another hug. “I love you.”
“Love you too.”
I watched one of my cousins walk her toward the car before turning back toward Mace just as he stopped beside me.
