The Secrets She Kept by Brenda Novak Page A

Mom. I’ve never seen a woman attract so much attention—except maybe Marilyn Monroe.”
    That the starlet had also died naked with an empty bottle of pills nearby made the comparison a bit chilling. Was that where their mother’s killer had gotten the idea? “So why wasn’t he willing to leave his wife for her?”
    “Maybe he loves his wife. Or he wasn’t willing to break up his family. Chief Underwood mentioned two sons and a youngish daughter.”
    “His wife has to be easier to live with than Mom would’ve been.”
    “He wouldn’t have realized that yet. No one can resist Mom when she’s pouring on the charm.”
    “Still, I can’t buy that she’d ever take her own life.”
    “Even after what we just heard?”
    “Did it change your mind?” he asked.
    She looked dejected as she stared at the wet, shiny pavement ahead of them. “Honestly?”
    “Of course.”
    “No,” she said.
    “There you go.”
    He’d finally shifted and pulled away from the curb when he saw a woman carrying a fluffy Chow Chow—a dog too big for that sort of thing—down the sidewalk ahead of them. “That’s Nancy, isn’t it? And her dog, Simba?”
    Maisey took so long to answer he thought she was going to ignore the question.
    “Isn’t it?” he prompted, throwing her a sharp glance.
    She squinted through the windshield as if she wasn’t quite sure. “Maybe,” she said.
    He knew it was Nancy. He’d recognize her anywhere.
    Pulling alongside her, he lowered the passenger window. “Hey, climb in,” he called out. “We’ll give you a ride.”
    She started at the sound of his voice. She’d obviously been so intent on not dropping her heavy bundle that she hadn’t been paying attention to what was going on around her. She was probably also a little surprised to see him. The only interaction they’d had in the five years he’d been gone was a handful of calls, all instigated by him and all of which she’d ignored, and the car he’d tried to give her a few years ago, which she’d forced the driver to return.
    “That’s okay,” she said. “It’s not much farther.”
    If she was still in the same house, and he guessed she was, she lived just down the street in a small cottage she’d inherited from her late aunt. She was right—it wasn’t far. But she was already struggling to hang on to her dog. “Simba’s got to be getting heavy,” he said. “And he doesn’t look comfortable. Let us give you a ride,” he said again.
    “We’re wet,” she responded.
    “Avis will clean the car when I return it,” he told her.
    “Come on!” Maisey chimed in and, rather than say no to both of them, Nancy slowed to a stop.

7
    NANCY COULDN’T BELIEVE IT. Maisey had stopped by just this morning to warn her that she might run into Keith and here he was—at the worst possible moment. Her hair was plastered to her head. She wasn’t wearing any makeup. She had on a jogging outfit that probably showed every extra pound. And she was breathing heavily from exertion.
    She told herself not to even think like that. She didn’t care if he admired her. She’d been crazy to believe he could ever give her what she needed. Maybe she wasn’t a svelte 120 pounds, like his mother, but she was done hanging on to his every word and feeling grateful for any scrap of attention. She was done starving herself in order to be something she wasn’t. She’d find the right companion eventually—or she’d continue to build a fulfilling life alone.
    “What happened?” Maisey asked as Nancy situated her dog beside her. “Why were you carrying Simba?”
    She held Simba back so he couldn’t stick his muzzle between the front seats. “He stepped on a piece of glass while we were on our walk, so I took him to the vet.” And here she’d thought she’d been fortunate that the incident had occurred only two doors down from the animal clinic. If she’d taken him home and looked after him herself, she wouldn’t have been on the side of the road