Anne's fingers tightened ever so slightly on the steering wheel. Her eyes stayed on the road, but Lukas could see the brief flicker of hesitation in her jaw.
"Sorry," she said softly, "could you repeat that? I didn't quite hear you."
Lukas nodded, though something in her tone already told him she had heard him perfectly the first time.
"I asked… what exactly has my dad told you about my birth mother?"
This time, Anne didn't respond immediately.
The road hummed beneath them, the sky grey and calm, but inside the car the silence grew sharper, almost brittle. Lukas shifted in his seat, wondering if he had asked something he shouldn't have.
Maybe this was a sensitive topic.
Maybe it had caused arguments between her and his father.
Maybe he had just poked at something painful without realizing.
He cleared his throat.
"You don't have to answer if you don't want to," he said gently. "I didn't mean to make things awkward."
