Even his name was nearly impossible to nail down. Apparently, he had several alias names, which were accredited to his need to “retain a low profile” due to shady business dealings while at Lineage.

Essentially all that Michael really knew for sure was that his first name started with a J and that there were several variations of what name he actually went by; Jason, Jerry, Jack. One of the names was even a foreign name that I couldn’t pronounce. Michael’s father was as slippery and elusive as they come, and even after his death it felt like his identity was still being covered up.

Rob and Adam tried to help too. Rob had access to lots of old police records and confidential information about people that we couldn’t get at. Adam was just good at being cunning and thinking about ways to find information in places that the rest of us wouldn’t even think to look. I figured that we’d give it a day or two, see what we could come up with, and then drop the notion altogether if our efforts didn’t turn up anything of substance. Michael didn’t seem to need this as much anymore. He seemed to be able to come to terms with his own closure after giving it some rational thought and sleep.

I sat in his lap on the desk chair as we scrolled through things on the computer. There was a lot more information about my father on there than his, which was saying a lot in terms of how covert Michael’s dad must have been, because mine had done a pretty good job of hiding under the radar and pretending to be dead for years. I guess being “actually” dead makes it a bit easier to disappear from sight. It was a bit strange though, how no one seemed to ever talk about Michael’s dad and how no one seemed to really know him or anything about him. If Marta was still alive, she would be the only one that would be able to give any solid information on her husband.

Aside from her, it seemed like Michael’s dad was more like a ghost of a Lineage legend, than an actual person.

I swiveled around in his lap and distracted Michael from the computer, and he didn’t seem to mind at all. He reached around my waist and turned me into him until our open mouths met and the desire to do any further researching was replaced with the desire to make out in the chair.

“Get a room you two,” Adam said with a giant and exaggerated roll of his eyes.

“They have a room,” Rob teased. “But unfortunately, it’s our room too.”

Michael stood up from his seat and picked me up with him to carry me to the bedroom.

“Hang on there, lovers,” Rob said as he got up as well. Let me get my keys and jacket out of the room before I end up needing to come in there. I need to run out to the store and get some more cycle parts.”

Michael set me down on the ground while we waited for Rob to get his stuff, and then went to the kitchen to get some water.

“Find anything interesting?” I asked Adam as I leaned over his shoulder to look at the computer.

“Actually, yes. And I think you should take a look at it.”

I peered at what Adam was pointing to on the screen and tried to figure out what the significance of it was.

“What am I looking at exactly?” I asked him.

“When I couldn’t find much on Michael’s dad, I decided to do some backdoor searching and come at it from a different angle by looking up Michael instead, and hoping that it would lead me to his dad.”

“Wow, you’re really taking this seriously,” I teased. “I had no idea you would be so interested in Michael’s family history.”

“Oh, you know, anything I can do to stir up a little trouble between the two of you,” he said.

I wasn’t sure if that was a joke or not.

“This is Michael’s birth certificate,” he said. “Notice anything weird about it?”

I moved my face closer to the screen to read it.

“Aside from his dad’s name being the same as mine, not really. Please don’t tell me that you’re making something out of that coincidence. There are a million Jacks in the world, and besides, they both have different last names. We already knew that one of the names he went by was Jack. I don’t see how this is a big deal.”

“It’s not,” Adam said. “Until you look at the rest of the paperwork.”

He scrolled his finger down and pointed to the part that listed the address for Michael’s father, which was the address of my childhood home.

“What the hell?” I said under my breath.

“Yeah,” Adam said. “So now we have his father and your father both having the same name and the same address. See how it’s a big deal now?”

As weird as that was, there had to be some sort of explanation for it.

“Maybe it was a typo,” I said.

I knew that sounded absolutely absurd. How many typos were there on official birth records and what are the chances of my family’s address being the one used by mistake. There was just no way that was plausible.

“Come on, Lisette,” Adam said. “I love you and all, but don’t be stupid. There’s no way that was a typo.”

I shook my head. “Maybe there was some other reason. Michael said that my mom helped him when he was growing up; maybe there was a reason that they used my family’s address.”

“Okay, again I’ll say it; don’t be stupid. Michael was a newborn, and your families hated each other. There would have been no reason for them to use your address.”

“Okay then, Adam,” I said as I started to get pissed off at being called stupid. “What do you think the reason behind this, then? Please tell me all of your conspiracy theories.”

“I only have one,” he said as he turned around in his chair to face me. “And I honestly don’t think that it’s far-fetched enough to be a conspiracy theory.”

I waited for him to say it and hoped that he would just keep it inside his own head because I already knew what he was going to propose, and it was ludicrous and absolutely impossible.

“I think that Michael is your brother.”

“God damn it, Adam!” I screamed at him.

He was just doing this to create drama and drive a wedge in between us again. There was absolutely no way it could be true. There were way too many contradictory things that didn’t add up. Yes, it was all very strange, and the coincidences were unnerving, but that’s all that they were—strange and unnerving coincidences.

“What’s going on?” Michael said as he rushed out of the kitchen to see what I was yelling about.

“Nothing,” I said.

Adam quickly changed his computer screen to look like a blank internet search browser.

“I don’t think you’d be shouting at him if it was nothing,” Michael said as he looked suspiciously at us both.

He had a point.

Rob came out of his room when he heard the commotion as well.

“What did you do now?” he asked as he lightly smacked Adam on the back of the head.

It was more a gesture of brotherly and playful banter than it was ill will.

“Nothing,” Adam said. “Just trying to talk some sense into Lisette again.”

“About what?” Rob asked.

He was starting to look just about as suspicious as Michael was.

“Hey, I need to go to the store too,” I said to Rob quickly.