Chapter 7
Mrs. Keller answered that question reluctantly.
“Natalie came back.”
Cassandro stared at her.
Vivienne stopped breathing.
“When?”
Mrs. Keller looked ashamed.
“Two months ago.”
Cassandro did not move.
Two months.
While he ate dinner across from Vivienne.
While Audrey slept upstairs.
While Natalie was somewhere close enough to return.
“You saw her?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Here.”
Cassandro looked toward the stone wall.
Mrs. Keller nodded.
“She used the old passage.”
Vivienne shouted:
“She’s lying.”
Mrs. Keller flinched.
That reaction told Cassandro more than the words.
Vivienne saw it and smiled.
“Look at her. She’s been lying to you for years. Now suddenly she remembers everything.”
Mrs. Keller’s eyes filled.
Vivienne continued.
“You know what happens to servants who decide family secrets belong to them.”
Cassandro stepped between them.
“There.”
Vivienne frowned.
“What?”
“That voice.”
His expression hardened.
“That is the voice Audrey knows.”
Vivienne said nothing.
Mrs. Keller wiped her eyes.
“Natalie came after midnight. She was thinner. Her hair was shorter. She asked only about Audrey.”
“Why didn’t you bring her to me?”
“She wouldn’t let me.”
Cassandro’s jaw tightened.
“Why?”
“Because she said three men in your inner circle were still compromised.”
Damian laughed.
“Convenient.”
Mrs. Keller ignored him.
“She believed if she walked into the house openly, Audrey would become leverage again.”
Cassandro looked down.
That logic hurt because he understood it.
“What did she want?”
“To see her daughter.”
“Did she?”
Mrs. Keller hesitated.
“Yes.”
Vivienne went pale.
Cassandro looked at Audrey through the glass doors.
Suddenly her words beside the pool made sense.
Mommy never left this house.
Not an old toddler memory.
Something newer.
Something Vivienne had been trying to force out of her.
“When?”
Cassandro asked.
“Two months ago.”
Mrs. Keller swallowed.
“Audrey woke while Natalie was behind the wall. She saw her.”
Cassandro’s hands tightened.
“Did they speak?”
“Yes.”
“What did Natalie tell her?”
Mrs. Keller looked at the faded bracelet around Audrey’s wrist.
“She told Audrey that when the two blue bracelets were together again, it meant Mommy had found a way home.”
Cassandro stared at the matching bracelet in his hand.
May you like
Natalie had returned for Audrey.
And Vivienne had spent the afternoon trying to find out what else mother and daughter shared.
