Everything in me went cold and still.

And before I could ask him what he could possibly mean, what trap, whose trap, he placed the smooth wooden box into my hands, and my fingers closed around it and began, without my permission, to tremble.

“Julian chose that hospice,” the man said quietly, “because you volunteered there.

He did not end up in your care by chance.

He searched for you for twenty years, and he made me promise, on everything I hold sacred, to reveal the truth to you only after his death.” He paused, and his voice gentled, just slightly.

“You’d better sit down, Evelyn.