Don't Believe a Word by Patricia MacDonald Page B

try anything.’
    Eden hesitated. ‘So, you really just uprooted your lives for Jeremy’s sake.’
    Flynn shrugged as if it were of no importance.
    ‘After all that, it just seems unfathomable to me,’ said Eden, ‘that my mother would just give up on Jeremy. After all she’d been through.’
    ‘You can’t possibly know what she felt,’ he warned.
    ‘But surely she had some hope for him. Why would she just … throw it all away?’
    Flynn cleared his throat as the proprietor returned and placed their plates of food down in front of him. He poured a few inches of wine into their glasses. ‘
Saluti
,’ he said.
    Flynn lifted his glass. ‘
Saluti
.’
    Eden picked up her glass and sipped it. She was surprised to find that the wine was full-bodied and rather tasty. ‘Cheers,’ she said. The proprietor nodded, and shuffled away.
    Eden hesitated a minute, and then decided to be blunt. ‘Did you know that she was suicidal?’ she asked. ‘There’s no mention of that in your book. Did you realize that she was coming to the end of her rope? That she needed help?’
    Flynn twisted the stem of the wine glass in his large, rough fingers, and stared into the ruby liquid. ‘Let’s talk about something else,’ he said without meeting her gaze.
    ‘I realize it’s a difficult subject,’ said Eden. ‘But I can’t help but wonder if a good psychiatrist or psychologist might have helped,’ she persisted. ‘Maybe she just needed someone to talk to.’
    Flynn looked at her coolly. ‘She talked to me,’ he said.
    ‘Obviously that wasn’t enough,’ said Eden, avoiding his gaze.
    ‘You have no idea what you’re talking about,’ said Flynn bluntly, setting down his glass and picking up a fork.
    Eden thought about her mother’s phone call, on the night of Tara’s desperate act. ‘That’s why I’m asking you,’ she said. ‘Is there something I need to know—’
    ‘Nothing you need to know now,’ he said deliberately. ‘It’s all over now. And it has nothing to do with the book. The book is why you’re here.’
    Eden sat back and stared at him. ‘Why did you want me to be the editor on this book? You could have had a much more senior person at a bigger house.’
    Flynn’s eyes narrowed. ‘It’s what your mother would have wanted.’
    ‘That’s the only reason?’ she asked.
    Flynn shrugged. ‘DeLaurier’s a good house. I thought about it, and decided to mention our connection to Gideon Lendl.’
    Eden kept her face expressionless. ‘Perhaps you thought that my being involved might be a good talking point for interviews,’ she said.
    Flynn returned her gaze implacably. ‘I’m not really expecting a lot of publicity. It’s a first novel, after all.’
    ‘But everyone agrees that the murder/suicide of my mother and Jeremy will attract a great deal of interest,’ Eden countered. ‘It’s unusual. Unnatural … for a mother to … do that.’ She could hear it in her own voice – she was baiting him. It was unprofessional, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself.
    Flynn stared back at her. ‘If it does, it does. Would that upset you?’
    Eden had no intention of explaining her own feelings. But he was studying her as if he could see right through her. She tried to deflect his comment. ‘It just strikes me as … opportunistic.’
    She knew she had crossed the line from baiting him, to insulting him. She felt guilty, and satisfied, all at once.
    ‘And yet you signed on,’ he observed. ‘You agreed to do it.’
    Eden wanted to protest that she had no choice, but she knew that was not exactly true. She had agreed, in spite of her misgivings. He would see right through her protests.
    Flynn sipped his wine and studied her. Finally he shifted his weight in the chair. ‘Look, let’s call a truce,’ he said. ‘You and I have both suffered a great loss. Doing this book might be kind of a … healing thing for both of us.’
    ‘I don’t need any help healing,’ said Eden shortly.