Lethal (Lee Coburn)

He turned back to her. “It may be nothing.” For several seconds, he wrestled with the decision to air his concern, then asked a seemingly unrelated question. “Have you ever tucked Emily in for the night?”

“As recently as two weeks ago. Honor had me out for burgers on the grill. We put Emily down, then kicked back and killed a bottle of wine.”

By telling him that, she was hitting below the belt, because he considered her a bad influence on Honor.

From the moment they were introduced, he’d regarded her as a slut, unsuitable friend material for the daughter-in-law of Stanley Gillette. Which, from Tori’s standpoint, was just too effing bad. She and Honor’s friendship had been forged when they were girls, and it had endured despite the divergent paths their lives had taken.

She admired Honor’s way of life, but she didn’t envy it. Not for her was the home-and-hearth scene. Marrying your high school sweetheart wasn’t her idea of hot romance. Eddie had been an excellent husband and father, and she had liked him for loving Honor and making her happy. His death had been a tragedy.

But Stan kept him alive and present to the point where Honor felt guilty if she as much as contemplated dating. That had been one topic they’d discussed over that excellent bottle of Pinot Noir.

Not for the first time, Tori had urged Honor to start going out, to meet new people, specifically men. “Your period of grieving has been twice the accepted time. You need to kick up your heels, and I mean that in the most literal sense. What’s the holdup?”

“It would break Stan’s heart if I began dating,” Honor had replied wistfully.

Tori had argued that she wasn’t married to Stan, and who cared what he thought anyway.

Apparently Honor did. Because she was letting Stan prevent her from having a future. He was keeping her shackled to the past and to a husband who was dead and buried.

But that was an issue for another day. Today, they had to deal with one much more pressing. “What about tucking Emily in?” she asked.

“She always sleeps with two things.”

“Her bankie and Elmo.”

“They weren’t in her bed this morning.” While Tori processed that, he continued. “They weren’t in Honor’s bed either. I didn’t see them anywhere.”

“A kidnapper who let Em take her bedtime pals along? Hmm.” She thought back to Doral’s insinuation that the supposed kidnapping might not have been that at all. What was Honor into?

As though reading her mind, Stan said, “I believe in keeping confidences.”

She didn’t touch that.

“I know how close Honor is to you. I don’t understand the friendship. I don’t approve of it. But I respect it.”

“Okay.”

“But these are critical circumstances, Victoria.”

His use of her full name underscored how critical the circumstances were. As if she needed him to emp

hasize that to her.

“If Honor has confided to you—”

“That she’s involved with a man named Lee Coburn? Is that what you’re waltzing around? Save the dance steps, Stan. The answer is no. Honor doesn’t confide in me every thought and feeling she has, but I think I would know if she was seeing someone. Hell, I’d be celebrating it. But if she knew this man at all, I swear to you that I’m unaware of it.”

He received her answer with characteristic stoicism. He coughed behind his fist, indicating to her that there was more on his mind. “Crawford asked Doral a lot of questions about Eddie. Crawford seems to be working under the delusion that there’s a link to him in all this.”

“I guess that explains why Doral asked me about it.”

“What did Doral ask you?”

“If Honor had recently revealed a secret about Eddie.” She shrugged. “I accused him of being high.”

“Then there’s no such secret?”

She gaped at him for several seconds, then looked around her familiar living room, almost expecting to see writing on the walls that would explain to her why everyone seemed to have lost their minds. When she came back to him, she said, “Stan, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”