Page 51 of April Flowers

Maybe he was after the house? Perhaps he wanted to steal the house out from under her, flip it, and sell it to the uber wealthy at an insane price. That seemed likely for a man of his caliber. To him, Lillian was just another sick woman he could take advantage of.

But Margot had no plans to let him.

The television was still flickering. She got out and steeled herself against both her mother’s rage and Vic’s slippery behavior.

But what if her mother had forgotten about today’s incident? What if going forward, every single day with Lillian meant Lillian saying something cruel and promptly forgetting about it?

What if Vic wasn’t actually up to anything? What if he was just a kind man who wanted to help an older woman out?

Margot took three deep breaths and went inside, stomping her boots. “Hello?” But the television was too loud for her to be heard. She removed her boots and crept down the hall. Her mother was strewn across the sofa, fast asleep, as the same tiny blond woman from The Cooking Channel made a pie. Her mother was still wearing her makeup and fancier dress. Where was Vic Rondell?

The hair on the back of Margot’s neck stood on end. She and her sick mother were alone in a house with a strange man. What had she been thinking? She should have asked Noah to come back with her.

She’d gotten too comfortable. Was she about to pay the price?

Gently, Margot sat at the edge of the sofa and shook her mother awake. Lillian groaned and whispered, “Frank, I don’t want to go to bed yet.”

At the mention of her father’s name, Margot stiffened and pulled her hand back.

Her father had been dead for twenty years this April. Yet in her mother’s mind, Frank was often still alive and well. In her mother’s mind, Margot was often the reason her lover had died.

But what did Margot think? Not two hours ago, she’d outlined the story to Avery for the first time in years. A part of the story had triggered something in her. Was it a memory?

Her father had been talking to someone in the parking lot.

Her father had been distracted.

Who had he been talking to? What secrets did her father have? Did they matter?

Did Lillian know?

What had she written in her diary about that fateful day?

Margot felt as though she were in the midst of a harrowing nightmare. Slowly, she got to her feet and tiptoed to her father’s study. She’d forgotten Vic Rondell; she’d forgotten the siblings who never called; she’d even, momentarily, forgotten Avery and Noah.

But when she opened the study door, she found, to her tremendous surprise, Vic Rondell already seated at the desk. He’d removed his coat and his shoes, and he was humming to himself, fully immersed in her mother’s diaries.

The scene didn’t make sense at first. Why did he care about my mother’s diaries? What was he doing?

But it did clear one thing up. Vic Rondell had been the one using her father’s study lately, not her mother. But why?

Vic hadn’t heard her come in. Margot stood, swirling with anxiety in the doorway. She didn't want to frighten him because she knew that frightened people were the most dangerous of all. She did not know this man! But she couldn’t close the door again. He would hear.

For what felt like five minutes, she hovered there, watching as Vic flipped through the diaries. As he read, he made notes to himself in his own separate journal. Margot would have given anything to read what he was writing.

Was it possible that he was writing a book about her mother? Was he studying her?

Margot couldn’t take it anymore. She cleared her throat.

But Vic Rondell was a cool customer. As though he already knew she was there, he raised a finger and said, “One minute, please.” He then finished what he was writing and closed both his journal and her mother’s. Slowly, he turned the chair around and smiled at her. He echoed charm.

“What are you doing?” Margot demanded.

Vic folded his hands over his thighs. “It’s good that you made it back. I was worried about you.”

“Answer my question,” she stammered.

Vic got up and slipped his journal into the pocket of his suit jacket.

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