“So now that girl is involved in your mother’s secrets too?”
Finnian did not answer immediately.
Isabel stood in the office doorway wearing the cream coat she had planned to take to dinner.
Her gaze moved from the security logs to the handwritten note in Finnian’s hand.
She had not asked what the note said.
She had not asked whether Helena was safe.
She had looked at the paper with recognition.
Finnian placed the note on his desk.
“What secrets?” he asked.
Isabel gave a small, impatient laugh.
“You know how your mother is.
She turns every uncomfortable moment into a crisis, and now the housekeeper has made herself indispensable.”
“Elodie’s name is on nineteen overnight security entries.”
“That proves my point.”
“It proves she was here.”
“She was not hired to be here at night.”
Finnian studied her face.
“Neither were you.”
The remark landed harder than he intended.
Isabel’s mouth tightened.
“I have tried to support you through this,” she said.
“But your mother’s illness has consumed this house.
Every dinner, every trip, every conversation becomes about medication, appointments, or whether Helena feels lonely.”
Finnian looked again at the note.
Nobody was here last night when I couldn’t breathe.
He pressed the intercom and asked Mrs.
Lawson to bring every denied reimbursement request and all overnight staffing records.
Isabel stepped farther into the room.
“You are overreacting because you feel guilty.”
“Do I have a reason to?”
“You work.
You provide for her.
That is more than most sons could do.”
It was almost exactly what Finnian had told himself for eight months.
Until he saw his mother gripping Elodie’s wrist as the final strands of her hair fell into a white towel.
Mrs.
Lawson arrived with two binders against her chest.
She stopped when she saw Isabel.
Finnian pointed to the chair opposite his desk.
“Sit down.”
Mrs.
Lawson obeyed.
He opened the first binder.
The pages contained expense forms for tea, skin cream, flowers, novels, mint tablets, and the humidifier.
Each request listed Elodie Rivers as the purchaser.
Across the top of every page was the same decision: reimbursement denied.
“Why?” Finnian asked.
Mrs.
Lawson adjusted her glasses.
“Those items were not medically necessary.”
“The humidifier was requested after my mother struggled to breathe.”
“It was not ordered by her physician.”
“Who decided that a twenty-seven-year-old housekeeper should pay for it?”
Mrs.
Lawson did not answer.
Finnian turned several pages.
