What the Lady Wants Read online

Harold came back from the pantry with a loaf of homemade bread on a breadboard and a huge knife. "Get away from that counter, you dumb dog."

  A bird chirped outside, and Bob swung his head around and smacked it sharply into the cabinet.

  "I told you to move," Mae said to him, but Bob just blinked at her.

  "He does this a lot?" Mitch asked.

  "Daily," Mae said. "He's male. Like you. He never learns."

  "Be nice, Mae," June said.

  "Food in the library in five minutes," Harold said. "Take Bob before he brains himself again."

  The library was like the rest of the house, full of dark paneling and heavy furniture upholstered in rich, dark colors, this time complemented by shelves of leather-bound books in dark brown, blood red and deep green, some protected by locking glass doors, all looking as if they'd never been read. Mitch had to fight the urge to shove the heavy velvet drapes back from the windows and let in a little light. "Nice place," he said to Mae as he sat at the massive table in the middle of the room. Bob collapsed next to him, laying his head across Mitch's shoe.

  Mae looked at him as if he were demented. "You think so? It makes me want to scream. I always want to open the drapes. Now, about the diary—''

  Mitch leaned back in his chair. "I like libraries. Mostly because I've dated a lot of librarians. Some of the best experiences in my life have been in libraries." He gazed around, noting for the first time that some of the brocade inserts in the paneling had dark squares where the fabric had faded around something that no longer hung there. He opened his mouth to ask Mae about it, but she interrupted him.

  "About the diary," she said pointedly.

  Mitch thought about insisting on following his own train of thought and then looked at the stubborn set of her mouth and gave up. "All right," he said. "Tell me about the diary."

  Mae walked over to one of the glass-fronted bookcases while Mitch watched her in appreciation. If he got nothing else out of this case, at least he got to watch Mae Belle Sullivan move. She turned the key to open the door, and pulled down the last leather-bound volume from several rows of identical volumes.

  "These are all Armand's diaries," she told him as she turned back to him. "There were fifty-eight of them, one for every year since he turned eighteen. He had these bound specially for him, and he kept them locked in this case. This is last year's diary." She handed it to him.

  The book was thick and heavy, about five by seven inches, bound in hand-tooled leather and stamped on the spine with "Lewis" and the date. Mitch flipped it open to the middle and began to read Armand's account of the evening at the opera followed by a night with Stormy. Three pages later, he looked up to see Harold delivering a tray loaded with thick sandwiches, tankards of milk, and chocolate-chip cookies the size of small Frisbees.

  Mae surveyed him across the table. "Found a good part, did you?"

  "I can't wait to meet Stormy." Mitch closed the book and dropped it on the table, startling Bob, who raised his head and smacked it on the underside of the tabletop. Mitch winced, and then turned his attention to the butler. "Harold, how long have you worked here?"

  Harold straightened. "Twenty-eight years. If you need anything else, ring." He nodded toward the small brass bell on the table, but his tone implied that Mitch could ring until the millennium and still not get service.

  When Harold was gone, Mitch picked up a sandwich and said to Mae, "He came when you did?"

  "Yes. Uncle Gio sent him. Now, about the diary..."

  Mitch listened to Mae with one ear as he bit into the sandwich. It was full of slabs of roast beef, tomato and cheese, and he felt even more kindly toward June than he had before. She was pretty, she was warm, and she could make sandwiches. Men had gotten married for less. Not him, of course, but some men. He chewed and swallowed, then broke into Mae's explanation of how Armand had written daily in his diaries to ask her, "Why did Uncle Gio send Harold?"

  "He didn't trust Uncle Armand." Mae peeled the bread off the top of a sandwich and picked up a piece of cheese. "Can we talk about the diary?"

  "Look, Mabel. You can argue with me and waste time, or you can answer my questions. Why didn't Gio trust Armand?"

  Mae put down her cheese, exasperated. "This is ridiculous. Uncle Gio did not kill Uncle Armand." "I didn't say he did. Why didn't he trust Armand?" Mae glared at him. "All right. Fine. This is just a guess, but I don't think Uncle Gio thought that Uncle Armand wanted me because he wanted a child of his own." "Why?"

  "Because he was never much interested in me once I got here. " Mae calmed down. "I think one reason he fought for me was because he liked taking me away from Uncle Claud and Uncle Gio." "And what else?" Mae shrugged. "Nothing else." "There's got to be something else. You said one reason. That implies another reason."

  "Well. I have a theory, but..." Mae picked up a slice of roast beef and began to nibble on it. "I read the diary from 1967 last night. That's the year I came. I was trying to figure out how I felt about him." She frowned at Mitch. "He wasn't an easy man to like, but I did live with him for twenty-eight years at his request. But he never liked me much." She looked more puzzled than hurt. "So I read the diary to see if my suspicions were right. And I think they were. I think it was because if I left, June would have left him."

  "That would upset me," Mitch said, thinking of the food. "Why didn't he just offer her more money?"

  "It wasn't the money. She was unhappy. Her son, Ronnie, had just died, and she was going to leave, and then Uncle Armand brought me home, and I think she knew I'd never get any love if she left, so she stayed." Mae picked up another slice of roast beef. "So he got to beat Uncle Claud and Uncle Gio and keep June. Putting up with me must have seemed minor in comparison."

  Mitch scowled at her. Armand Lewis must have been a world-class jerk. Just looking at Mae, Mitch could tell she'd been a great kid, and now twenty-eight years later, all she could say was, "He didn't like me much." Hell of a way to treat a kid. He felt himself growing angry, and put a lid on it. She was a grownup now and obviously capable of looking after herself, and he had a strict rule about getting emotionally involved with his clients. Of course, with his other clients, that hadn't been a problem. His other clients hadn't been Mae Belle Sullivan.

  Mitch jerked his mind away from the thought. "That doesn't explain why Harold came to stay."

  Mae peeled another layer off her sandwich. "Uncle Gio sent Harold because he knew Uncle Armand didn't like kids. And Uncle Gio loves kids. He was worried about me. He still worries about me. So he sent Harold."

  Good for Gio, Mitch thought and then stopped himself. He did not approve of Gio Donatello. Period. Back to Harold. "And Armand let Harold stay?"

  Mae nodded. "I think he liked having him here for free, since Gio was paying at first. And then Harold and June fell in love, which was great because I ended up with two parents just like normal kids. So he's still here. Could we talk about the diary now?"

  "That doesn't explain why Armand didn't want you to move out once you were grown," Mitch pointed out. "Maybe he really did care about you and just—" He stopped because Mae was shaking her head.

  "The minute I moved out, June and Harold would have been gone." She picked up another slice of cheese. "He just didn't want to lose good help. And I couldn't afford to support June and Harold. They would have had to find a place that needed both a butler and a cook and that would give them the freedom they're used to, and it wasn't going to happen. Even at Uncle Gio's, they would just have been part of the staff. They needed a home."

  "And you're responsible for giving them one?"

  "Of course." Mae blinked at him, surprise apparent on her face. "They raised me. They count on me. They need me. I owe them."

  "Oh." Mitch picked up his second sandwich. "This still doesn't make sense. Why couldn't they just stay and work for Armand?"

  "Because they both hated him." Mae narrowed her eyes at him. "Do not get distracted by that. They didn't hate him enough to kill him. If they'd wanted to kill h