Chapter 5
Margaret Keene was alive.
Barely ill enough to be admitted for exhaustion and pneumonia.
Nothing sinister.
Thank God.
I went to see her the next morning.
She cried when I entered.
“I’m sorry.”
Not enough.
Maybe still true.
I sat.
“Tell me everything.”
Margaret believed, at first, that I knew Lily was alive.
Camille told her the child needed privacy after a traumatic recovery.
That public confirmation would create danger.
Mafia families make lies believable because danger already exists.
Margaret accepted it.
For ten days.
Then Lily asked:
“Why doesn’t Daddy call?”
Margaret questioned Camille.
Camille changed the story.
I supposedly knew Lily was alive but believed distance was best until her memory stabilized.
Weeks passed.
Then months.
Margaret began doubting.
Why no doctor I chose?
Why no calls from me?
Why was Adrian paying cash for everything?
Why did Lily use another surname whenever staff visited?
“What name?”
Margaret looked ashamed.
“Lily Vale.”
Not Voss.
Not Hawthorne.
Neutral.
Erase both sides.
Then Margaret showed me a box.
Drawings.
Dozens.
Lily had drawn our house from memory.
My study.
Her bedroom.
Our dog from before he died.
Me.
Always me.
In early drawings, I stood beside her.
Later, farther away.
Then sometimes outside the page.
A child adapting to a lie.
My hands shook.
Margaret continued.
Six months ago she confronted Camille directly.
Threatened to call me.
Camille begged.
Cried.
Promised she would tell me after our engagement announcement.
She didn’t.
Then after the engagement, she changed again.
After the memorial concert.
Always another milestone.
Another delay.
Margaret became ill last week.
Realized she might be hospitalized.
Called Adrian.
Told him if Lily was not returned to me immediately, she would tell someone in my household.
Adrian came first.
Not to return Lily.
To move her.
Tonight.
During a concert honoring the child they were relocating.
That level of cruelty was almost artistic.
Then Margaret whispered:
“There’s more.”
Of course.
“What?”
“Camille wasn’t only afraid of losing you.”
May you like
I waited.
“She was afraid of losing what Lily’s death gave the Voss family.”
