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  “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 him, they’d have done it years ago.” She drank a slug of milk and licked her milk mustache off, distracting Mitch from his questions. She reached for a cookie. “Now, about the diary—”

  “You can’t have a cookie until you’ve finished your sandwich, Mabel.” Mitch moved the cookie plate out of her reach.

  “I can have anything I want.” Mae pulled the plate back toward her, but Mitch held on, and she yanked on it, knocking the rest of her sandwich onto the floor where Bob swallowed it whole and then choked for thirty seconds. Mae patted the dog on the back until he stopped hacking, and he collapsed in gratitude at her feet.

  Mitch shook his head in contempt. “Is he okay?”

  “Yes.” Mae smiled affectionately at the dog. “He’s dumb, but he’s okay.” She turned back to Mitch. “Go ahead, inhale your next sandwich. I can do the Heimlich.”

  Mitch picked up his sandwich. “So why do you want the diary?”

  “Because whoever has the diary killed my Uncle Armand,” Mae said piously as she reached for a cookie. “I think justice should be served.”

  “Because you loved him so much.”

  “Actually, I didn’t even like him much, but that’s beside the point. The point is—”

  “That you want the diary. I know, I know.” Mitch put the rest of his sandwich back on his plate. “The memorial service is the day after tomorrow?”

  Mae nodded as she chewed her cookie.

  “And Gio and Carlo and Claud will be there.”

  Mae nodded again.

  “Who else? Stormy?”

  Mae nodded and swallowed the last of her cookie. “And also most of the business community, like Dalton Briggs. He’s been hanging around a lot lately, and he was engaged in some sort of business deal with Uncle Armand. And I suppose some of Uncle Armand’s ex-girlfriends might…oh, God.” She froze with her hand over the cookie plate. “Barbara.”

  “Barbara?”

  “Barbara Ross. She’s been dating Uncle Armand. Very high-society stuff.” Mae looked ill. “She’s going to meet Stormy. Oh, poor Stormy, first Armand dies and now this. This is going to be awful. I’m going to have to think of something.”

  Mitch frowned at her distress and then at himself for caring. He pointed at the most recent journal. “It says here that Armand set Stormy up in a town house.”

  “He kept a place a few miles from here. She used to live there, but I’m pretty sure she moved out.”

  “Do you have a key?”

  “To the town house?” Mae nodded. “Harold has one. He went over and brought a box of Uncle Armand’s personal stuff home. The rest of his clothes are in boxes for Goodwill. They’re still there, so we still have the key.”

  “Okay. I’ll pick you up at nine tomorrow morning. I want to see the place. I also want to look around this house and talk to Barbara Ross and Stormy, but I want to see the town house first.”

  Mae looked exasperated. “The diary’s not there. Harold looked.”

  “Forget the diary for a minute. There are other things of interest in that apartment.” Mitch stood up. “In the meantime, can I take a couple of the old diaries with me?”

  Mae scowled up at him. “But what I want is—”

  “I know. The one that’s missing,” Mitch finished. “Let me do this my way.”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  “No.”

  Mitch went to the bookshelves, and Mae rang the bell. Harold appeared.

  “What?” he said. “The game’s on. I’m missing it.”

  “Wrap up the rest of this stuff for Mr. Peatwick, please.” Mae waved her hand at the food on the tray. “He has a lot of heavy reading to do tonight, and he’ll need food.”

  Mitch turned back from the bookcase with three volumes in his hands. “You’re a good woman, Mabel. Spoiled rotten, but basically good.”

  Harold snorted and stalked out with the tray, closely followed by Bob, and Mae rose to look at the diaries he’d taken.

  “Okay, 1967 I get. That’s the year I came. Why 1977 and 1978?”

  “I want to know what Armand did that made Gio so mad he never talked to him again.” Mitch picked up the 1993 volume from the table and added it to the stack in his arms. “I may be back for more.”

  “Why?” Mae didn’t even bother to hide her annoyance. “That’s all in the past. I want—”

  Mitch put his free hand over her mouth and was momentarily distracted by the softness of her lips against his palm. He was getting distracted a lot today. Must be age. “Look, you want to find your uncle’s killer. And the only way to do that is to find out what made your uncle killable. You do want to find his killer, right?”

  Mae’s eyes met his, huge and wary, and she nodded as he took his hand away. “Right.”

  You’re lying to me again, Mabel, Mitch thought, but all he said was, “Well, then, that’s what we’ll do. As soon as I’ve read these diaries, we’ll go find who killed him.”

  Three

  When Mitch was gone with the diaries and the food, Mae leaned back in her chair and considered her situation. Mitch was definitely going to annoy everybody in Riverbend; he’d probably been doing it for years. If she could just keep him focused on the diaries, he could easily drive whoever had the missing volume to give it up and probably to take to drink, too. And keeping him focused might be easier now that he actually had some of the diaries in his hands….

  That made her think about his hands. Of all the times for her hormones to kick in, this was the worst, but there it was. Ever since she’d met him, she’d had that bubbly feeling under her skin that she hadn’t felt for a good long time. It was a nice feeling to have, but not in conjunction with Mitchell Peatwick. He was arrogant and stubborn and his face looked like a catcher’s mitt with a jaw. And she absolutely was not going to get herself mixed up with a man who didn’t listen to her; she had enough men not listening to her in her life already.

  Once again in control of the situation, Mae wandered back to the kitchen and sat down to pry the heels she’d borrowed from June off her feet.

  “Thank you,” she said, handing them back. “They were agony.”

  “Poor baby.” June put the shoes on the counter. “Do you want a basin of Epsom salts?”

  “No.” Mae rubbed one of her reddened feet. “I want the money so we can move to a better place than this mausoleum and live like normal human beings and you won’t ever have to worry about the future again. This is driving me crazy.”

  “I cleaned Armand’s room today,” June said. “The painting of that nude woman is gone.”

  Mae stopped rubbing. “The Lempicka? How long has it been gone?”

  “I don’t know.” June sank into the chair at the end of the table. “I think it was there last Wednesday when I did the room, but I’m not sure. I hate that damn room.”

  “I know. Don’t worry about it. Pretty soon