Chapter 3 - Twenty Therapists and One Maid
Meline did not tell Adrian what Norah had said.
Not that night.
She returned to the estate at eight, changed into her uniform, completed two hours of cleaning, and walked toward the east wing shortly after midnight.
The broken doorway had already been repaired enough to close.
A guard stood outside.
Meline stopped.
“I’m supposed to go in.”
The guard looked doubtful.
Then Bennett appeared.
“She is expected.”
Expected.
That word felt strange.
Meline entered.
Adrian was sitting on the floor.
Not the chair.
Not the sofa.
The same place where he had collapsed the previous night.
“You could use furniture,” she said.
“I tried.”
“And?”
“I hated it.”
Meline sat at the piano.
“Comforting.”
Adrian looked at her.
“You talk more than most employees.”
“You’re paying me five thousand dollars.”
“So?”
“You’re getting the premium package.”
A small laugh escaped him.
The sound seemed to surprise both of them.
Meline opened the handwritten score.
Her mother’s handwriting.
Again she felt the strange pull between past and present.
Adrian closed his eyes.
“Tell me something first.”
“I thought I was being paid to play.”
“You are.”
“Then stop interviewing me.”
“How did Norah learn to compose?”
Meline hesitated.
“She studied at Northwestern. She wanted to write film scores. Then she met my father.”
“What happened?”
“They had me.”
“That ended her career?”
“She would have punched you for saying that.”
Adrian almost smiled.
“She taught. Composed privately. Raised me. She was happy.”
“Your father?”
“Died when I was sixteen.”
“I’m sorry.”
Meline looked at him.
The sincerity in his voice made it difficult to stay guarded.
“She never remarried.”
“And you followed her into music.”
“For a while.”
“Conservatory?”
Meline’s fingers froze above the keys.
“How do you know that?”
“I asked Bennett.”
“You promised not to investigate my personal life.”
“I promised not to ask you.”
“That is not remotely the same thing.”
“It is technically different.”
“You’re impossible.”
“So I’m told.”
Meline shook her head.
Then played.
The first notes quieted the room.
Adrian’s expression changed within minutes.
He did not fall asleep immediately.
Instead his breathing slowed.
His shoulders dropped.
Meline played the first section twice.
Then the second.
The piece moved from tenderness to tension and back again.
Norah had written it like a conversation between two people who loved each other but did not know how to say the right words.
Near the final page, Adrian spoke.
“Elena used to play that part.”
Meline kept playing.
“She wasn’t very good.”
“Don’t insult dead pianists.”
“She would agree.”
His voice had become softer.
“She played too fast when nervous.”
Meline smiled faintly.
“My mother hated that.”
“She made Elena practice with a metronome.”
“That sounds like Mama.”
Adrian opened his eyes.
“She liked your mother.”
“Apparently.”
“She trusted her.”
Meline remembered Norah saying Victor.
She nearly missed a note.
Adrian noticed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You changed tempo.”
“Occupational hazard.”
“Meline.”
She stopped.
The silence felt larger than the music had.
“I visited my mother.”
Adrian sat straighter.
“I didn’t ask you to.”
“She remembered Elena.”
His face changed.
“What did she say?”
“Her name.”
“Anything else?”
Meline looked down at the score.
“Victor.”
Adrian became completely still.
“Victor?”
“You know someone named Victor.”
It wasn’t a question.
“Victor Hale.”
“Who is he?”
“My operations director.”
Meline stared.
“Your employee?”
“My oldest friend.”
“How old?”
“We met when we were thirteen.”
“And my mother knows him?”
“I don’t know.”
Adrian stood.
The calm created by the music disappeared instantly.
“Exactly what did Norah say?”
“She said his name.”
“Nothing else?”
“She said he knows the song isn’t finished.”
Adrian looked toward the score.
Meline watched him process the words.
“What does that mean?” she asked.
“I don’t know.”
“You’re lying.”
His eyes snapped toward her.
“What makes you think—”
“Because your face changed.”
Adrian crossed the room.
For one second Meline understood why employees feared him.
There was enormous intensity in him.
Control.
Threat.
Something sharpened by years of surviving dangerous people.
Then he stopped several feet from her.
“Victor was with me the night Elena died.”
Meline’s pulse quickened.
“What happened?”
Adrian looked toward the windows.
“An ambush.”
Meline said nothing.
“We were leaving a charity event downtown. Elena wanted to go home early because Eli had a fever.”
“Eli?”
“My son.”
Meline blinked.
“You have a son?”
“Most people employed here know.”
“I clean bathrooms at night. Nobody gives me a family directory.”
Adrian almost smiled.
Then the expression vanished.
“Eli was six.”
“Was he with you?”
“No. He was here.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened.
“Our car was hit at an intersection. Two vehicles boxed us in. Gunfire.”
Meline felt cold.
“Elena?”
“She died before the ambulance arrived.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I remember holding her.”
His voice began to change.
“I remember blood on her dress. I remember her trying to tell me something.”
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
His breathing shortened.
Meline immediately turned back to the piano.
She played.
Adrian closed his eyes.
His fists slowly relaxed.
Minutes passed.
Then he continued.
“Victor was in the second car.”
“Was he hurt?”
“No.”
“Did that seem strange?”
Adrian opened his eyes.
“Until thirty seconds ago, no.”
Meline stopped playing.
“Adrian—”
“He changed the route that night.”
Every hair on her arms rose.
“Why?”
“He said there was construction.”
“And was there?”
“I never checked.”
“Because your wife had just died.”
Adrian looked away.
“Yes.”
Meline understood.
Trauma had frozen that night in his mind.
He had spent three years surviving memories, not investigating them.
Perhaps others had investigated.
Perhaps Victor had been among them.
Adrian walked to the doorway.
“Bennett.”
The butler appeared immediately.
“Yes, sir?”
“Where is Victor?”
“At the Michigan property until Thursday.”
“Who sent him there?”
“You did.”
Adrian’s expression remained unreadable.
“When?”
“Yesterday morning.”
Adrian looked at Meline.
Before she could speak, another voice came from the hallway.
A child’s voice.
“Dad?”
Meline turned.
A boy stood beside Bennett.
Maybe nine.
Brown hair.
White pajamas.
He looked too thin.
Too serious.
Adrian’s entire posture changed.
“Eli. Why are you awake?”
The boy stared at the piano.
“I heard Mom’s song.”
Adrian froze.
Meline did too.
Eli entered slowly.
His eyes moved to the handwritten pages.
Then to Meline.
“You know it?”
“My mother wrote it.”
The boy came closer.
“Mrs. Rhodes?”
Meline’s heart skipped.
“You remember her?”
Eli nodded.
“She used to bring lemon cookies.”
Meline nearly laughed.
Norah still made lemon cookies whenever Riverbend allowed her into the activity kitchen.
Eli touched the edge of the piano.
“Dad doesn’t let anyone play anymore.”
“I noticed.”
Eli looked at Adrian.
“Can she stay?”
Adrian did not answer immediately.
Then:
“For seven nights.”
The boy frowned.
“That’s stupid.”
Meline covered a smile.
Adrian gave his son a warning look.
Eli ignored it.
“Mom said music doesn’t work if you’re counting when it ends.”
The words struck Adrian hard.
Meline saw it.
Eli climbed onto the bench beside her.
“Can you teach me?”
“You play?”
“I used to.”
“Why did you stop?”
Eli looked at his father.
“Because Dad stopped listening.”
Adrian looked devastated.
For several seconds nobody spoke.
Then Meline moved slightly.
“Show me what you remember.”
Eli placed his hands on the keys.
He played four notes.
Wrong rhythm.
Wrong fingering.
But the melody was recognizable.
Adrian gripped the back of a chair.
Meline quietly corrected Eli’s hand.
“Again.”
The boy played.
This time correctly.
Adrian turned his face away.
Meline saw tears in his eyes before he did.
And suddenly she understood.
The song had not returned to the Vance house for Adrian alone.
It had returned for a child who had lost his mother and a father at the same time.
When the lesson ended, Eli hugged Meline before leaving.
She stood frozen.
Adrian watched.
“He hasn’t hugged a stranger since Elena died.”
“I’m excellent company.”
“So I’m beginning to notice.”
Meline packed the score.
Adrian stopped her.
“Leave it.”
“It belongs to my mother.”
“It was found in my wife’s room.”
They stared at one another.
Finally Meline released the pages.
“Tomorrow,” Adrian said, “I want to visit Norah.”
“No.”
“Meline.”
“No.”
“Then you ask her.”
“What?”
“Ask why Victor knows about the song.”
Meline considered him.
“I’ll ask.”
Adrian nodded.
She walked toward the door.
Behind her, he said:
“And ask her where the ending is.”
Meline stopped.
“How do you know there is one?”
“Elena told me.”
Meline slowly turned.
Adrian’s face had gone pale.
“Three days before she died, she told me Norah had finally written the last page.”
Meline looked at the unfinished score.
“But it isn’t here.”
“No.”
“Then where is it?”
Adrian stared at the piano.
May you like
“That,” he said, “is what someone has spent three years making sure I never discover.”
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