Aunt Mira opened the passenger door for me herself, which I felt embarrassed about, and made me get in before she walked around to the driver’s side.

The interior smelled like leather and her perfume, something soft and expensive. The seats hugged me like they’d been measured to my body. The dashboard had more screens than my apartment.

Why was I even comparing anything to my apartment?

Mira slid in beside me, started the engine and it didn’t roar like the usual ones, it hummed, a low confident sound, then pulled smoothly into the road.

"Buckle up, sweetheart. Tell me everything you’ve been eating in the last week. And I’ll know if you lie."

...

The restaurant was called Nera, on the forty-second floor of one of the towers downtown. Floor-to-ceiling glass with a perfect view of the river that made me forget for a second that I had a list of problems waiting for me.

The host took one look at Mira, straightened so fast he nearly cracked his spine, and walked us to a private table by the window without asking if we had a reservation.

Two staff members appeared, took her coat, pulled out her chair, and vanished. A bottle of sparkling water arrived without being ordered. Then a small plate of olives I hadn’t asked for.

"Aunt," I said, looking around, "this is a lot."

"Mm."

"Like, this is a lot."

"Eat your olives, sweetheart."

I ate my olives.

The menu didn’t have prices on it, which I knew was a thing rich people’s menus did but had never actually witnessed in person. I scanned the dishes and tried to find the cheapest-looking one, which was a coward move, and Mira watched me do it for about thirty seconds before reaching across the table and gently closing my menu.

"I’ll order. You’ll like everything."

She didn’t even open her own menu.

"Lamb chops, the way I like them. The mushroom risotto, extra parmesan. The seabass for me. The chocolate dome at the end, two of them. And bread, all the bread."

The waiter wrote nothing down. He just nodded and left.

I stared at her. "You remembered the lamb chops."

"Of course I remembered the lamb chops."

"I told you that once when I was like thirteen maybe."

She put her chin on her palm. "You told me when you were thirteen that lamb chops were the only food worth dying for. You then ate four of them and threw up in the car. I remember everything, Lukas. That’s my whole job."

"Your job is remembering people’s food orders? I don’t think you work here, Aunt."

She chuckled. "Among other things."

Something about the way she said it sat in the air for a second too long. I let it pass.

The food came in waves. It was, without exaggeration, the best meal I had eaten in three years. The lamb chops were perfect. The risotto was perfect. Mira watched me eat with the kind of quiet satisfaction that mothers and aunts did, refilling my water without being asked, pushing extra bread toward my plate when she thought I wasn’t looking.

She didn’t push me to talk about why I’d called, for which I was very grateful. She let me eat and made small conversation, asked about my writing, laughed at the things I said.

She told me a story about a colleague of hers who had recently had a "very dramatic divorce" and described it in a way that was clearly leaving out about ninety percent of the actual events.

By the time the chocolate domes arrived, I was full and warm and a little less terrified than I had been an hour ago.

She tapped her spoon against the side of her dome and looked at me over it.

"Alright, sweetheart. Now tell me about the thing."

I set down my spoon. "Yeah, about that."

"Take your time."

I took a breath. "I’ve found something by accident. A lot of something, actually. Gold, some silver, gemstones, jewellery and stuff."

She didn’t react, at least not visibly. She just folded her hands on the table and kept looking at me.

So I continued.

"I can’t tell you where it came from. I’m sorry. That part’s not because I don’t trust you. It’s because... it’s complicated, and it’s not just my secret to tell. Maybe one day. Not today."

She nodded slowly. "Alright."

"I didn’t steal it from a person. I want to say that first. I didn’t take anything that belonged to anyone who’s still alive to miss it. Nobody’s looking for it. Nobody’s hurt by it. I want you to believe that."

Her eyes searched mine, then her jaw tightened, just a flicker, and her voice dropped a touch.

"Lukas. Tell me you didn’t do something dangerous because you were running out of money."

"I didn’t."

"Honey, if you needed money—"

"Aunt, I didn’t. I swear on... on the lamb chops. I didn’t."

A small startled laugh escaped her. She covered her mouth with her hand, shook her head once, and let out a long breath.

"You swore on the lamb chops."

"It was the most sacred thing I could think of."

"...Alright. I trust you."

The words hit differently than I expected. Quiet and final. Like a door closing on a question she wasn’t going to ask again.

"I want to sell it," I continued. "But I’m not stupid. I know I can’t just walk into a dealer with kilo bars and walk out clean. The serial numbers, the reporting thresholds, the tiara, it’s all... it’s a mess. I’m a complete amateur. I’d be in handcuffs by the end of the week if I tried this myself."

"You would," she agreed evenly.

"I want to sell it slowly and quietly. The right way. And I don’t know anyone else who could help me with that. Just you."

She tilted her head slightly.

"Just me."

"Just you."

A long silence followed, then a slow, soft smile that was almost shy on her face, which was wild because I had never seen Aunt Mira look shy in my entire life.

"You’re trusting me with this."

"Yes."

"You, Lukas. You are trusting me."

"Yes, Aunt."

She closed her eyes for one second, and I saw her swallow. When she opened them again, the businesswoman was back, but warmer.

"Show me a piece. A small one. So I can see what we’re working with."

I had thought about this on the drive over. I couldn’t pull anything out of inventory in front of her, the system was the line I wasn’t willing to cross today, maybe ever.

So I had palmed one of the small bars before leaving the apartment, tucked into my inner jacket pocket. A real, concrete object she could see me retrieve.

I felt a small twinge of guilt as I made a show of reaching into my pocket.

Sorry, Aunt. Not yet.