Chapter 3
“I didn’t take it,” I said.
Daniel closed my bedroom door behind him. He looked tired enough to fall asleep standing up, but he held the key tightly.
“Bianca found it missing this afternoon.”
“Where did you get it?”
“On the hall table. She thought you put it there after dinner.”
Ella had been beside me when I told her to keep it hidden. She would not have left it in plain sight. Bianca must have seen it in her pocket, or found it while searching the children’s rooms.
“Oliver found it outside by the garage,” I said.
Daniel stared at me. “Why would my key be there?”
“That’s what I’d like to know.”
He sat in the chair by my window. For a moment he looked like the young man who had held Lily’s hand through her first difficult labor, terrified and utterly devoted to her.
Then he said, “Bianca thinks you’re having trouble remembering things.”
I felt my face grow hot.
“She pushed me into a pool. Now she wants you to doubt me.”
“You’ve been under strain.”
“The children have been under strain.”
He looked toward the door.
“She says you tell them the house belongs to them.”
“It does.”
“I know what the trust says.”
“Then why is she angry that Ella knows?”
Daniel said nothing.
I showed him the scrape on my arm and the bruise rising on my shoulder. He leaned forward, alarmed, but Bianca had already given him an explanation.
“You could have hit the edge when you fell,” he said.
“Yes. I did hit it when she pushed me.”
He stood.
“I’ll speak with her.”
“You’ve been speaking with her for three years. Tonight you need to speak with your children.”
He left without answering.
I sat on the bed until my breathing slowed. Then I heard footsteps on the back stairs.
Nora arrived twenty minutes later with her coat unbuttoned and rain in her hair. The clear sky had given way to a sudden storm. I let her in through the laundry room.
She saw my shoulder and stopped.
“We’re getting you examined.”
“The children are upstairs.”
“We’ll check on them first.”
Nora had known them since birth. Ella rushed into her arms when we reached the children’s room. Oliver stayed near his bed until Nora knelt and held out her hand.
“Is Grandma leaving?” he asked.
“No decision has been made,” Nora told him.
It was a careful answer. I loved her for it.
Ella glanced at the hall. “Bianca came in and looked through my drawers.”
“When?” Nora asked.
“After dinner. She wanted a key.”
“Did she find it?”
Ella nodded. “She made me give it to her.”
So that was how it reached Daniel.
Nora asked whether Bianca had said why she wanted it. Ella shook her head.
“I’m going to speak with your father,” Nora said. “Stay here with Grandma for a little while.”
We found Daniel and Bianca in the study. Bianca’s expression changed when she saw Nora.
“This is a family matter,” she said.
“It concerns the children’s trust,” Nora replied. “Lily named me as one of its attorneys. I’m here because Martha called me.”
Daniel stepped toward us.
“Is that necessary?”
“I saw Martha’s shoulder,” Nora said. “Have you?”
“I have.”
“Then I’d like to know whether you’ve asked the children what happened.”
Bianca folded her arms. “I won’t let a lawyer question them at bedtime.”
“You can ask them yourself,” I said to Daniel.
His eyes moved to me. I saw shame there, and hope flickered in my chest.
Then his phone rang.
He checked the name and frowned.
“It’s the estate office.”
Bianca crossed the room too quickly.
“Let it wait.”
Daniel answered.
I heard only his side of the conversation, but I watched his face change.
“No. I didn’t authorize a visit tomorrow.”
He listened.
“Who made the appointment?”
Bianca reached for his arm. He moved away.
When he ended the call, he looked at her.
“Why is a property surveyor coming here at eight in the morning?”
“I told you I wanted estimates for repairs.”
“They asked whether the west garden could be separated from the house.”
Nora’s head turned toward her.
The west garden held Lily’s greenhouse and the small orchard she had planted with Ella. Selling any part of it required approval from the trust’s independent trustee.
Bianca’s lips tightened.
“I asked a question. I didn’t sell anything.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Daniel asked.
“Because every time I try to improve this place, Martha treats me like a stranger.”
I expected him to comfort her. He looked down at his phone instead.
Nora asked Daniel to put the survey on hold until she could review the paperwork. He agreed. It was the first time all evening I had heard him say no to Bianca.
Then Oliver screamed.
We ran upstairs. He was sitting on the floor of Lily’s old room, clutching a framed photograph. The glass had cracked against the carpet.
Bianca went to him.
“I told you children not to go in here.”
Oliver scrambled backward.
“I was looking for her blue box,” he said.
Daniel stopped in the doorway. “What blue box?”
“Mommy’s,” Ella said from behind us. “Bianca moved it.”
I knew the box. Lily had kept letters and small keepsakes in it. For years it had sat in her writing desk.
Bianca said she had packed it away to protect the contents.
Nora looked at the key in Daniel’s hand.
“Open the desk,” she said.
Bianca blocked his path.
“The children have had enough for one night.”
Daniel waited. Bianca did not move.
May you like
For the first time, I saw him look at her as though he did not know what she might do next.
“Step aside,” he said.
