She looked shaken.
“There were families Mobility Bridge wasn’t allowed to help under its donor restrictions,” she explained. “People outside the right county. People whose immigration paperwork was incomplete. Families whose needs didn’t fit grant categories.”
“So Lane secretly redirected money?”
“Maybe.”
“To help them?”
“Maybe.”
“Then why the fake invoices?”
“To conceal it.”
Julian had been listening from the doorway.
“So was he stealing or helping?”
Rebecca looked at him.
“We don’t know yet.”
Julian frowned.
“That seems important.”
“It is.”
“Can somebody do something good in a dishonest way?”
I thought about his guitar.
Caleb’s attempted repair.
Dr. Mercer’s silence.
Thomas’s secrecy.
Apparently the story had been asking us the same question from the beginning.
“Yes,” I said. “And sometimes the good part doesn’t erase the dishonest part.”
He considered that.
“Does the dishonest part erase the good?”
“No.”
“That sounds inconvenient.”
