A housekeeper had left a TV on downstairs in the breakfast room. Grace was asleep against my shoulder. I was halfway through a bowl of oatmeal when Wesley entered, took one look at the screen, and reached for the remote.
Too late.
There was Darlene.
Hair done. Makeup perfect. Standing outside our old house speaking to reporters with one hand pressed dramatically to her chest.
“I loved that child like my own,” she said. “She has always been troubled. I tried to help her. Then this man—this billionaire—sweeps in and suddenly I’m the villain?”
I went cold all over.
“She’s lying.”
“I know,” Wesley said.
On the screen Darlene continued, tears glittering at the corners of her eyes. “No one is asking what really happened. No one is asking about the kind of girl she was. I have been dealing with inappropriate behavior from her for over a year.”
My hand tightened so hard around Grace that she squirmed.
“No,” I whispered.
Wesley turned off the television.
“Look at me.”
I did.
“She is desperate,” he said. “Desperate people reach for poison because it is all they have left. But poison is not proof.”
“She’ll make people believe her.”
“Not the people who matter.”
I wanted to believe that.
Then he said, “The district attorney filed charges this morning.”
Leave a Comment