Julien frowned. Maybe she wanted to tell him about some drama at the retirement home?
“What’s that?” he asked.
“I heard what they did,” Nora said, her eyes shining. A bit louder, she said, “I heard they got rid of that awful man at city hall. That monster. You know the one.”
Julien’s ears rang with alarm. His instinct was to shush his mother, although he didn’t want to belittle a woman of her age. He glanced around at the other tables, praying that nobody had heard what she’d said.
“Well?” Nora raised her head higher. “Aren’t you going to say anything?”
Julien was struck dumb. He took a bite of ice cream and shrugged. He didn’t want to be caught saying anything out of turn. And he certainly didn’t want to celebrate the death of anyone—not even if the dead man in question was Thomas Bard.
15
Throughout the following day, Julien felt jittery, as though someone was following him, as though he were being watched. He reminded himself to stay focused, to keep his mind on the job. But he couldn’t help but glance behind his shoulders, to study the eyes of the men who worked for him and try to deduce what they were thinking.
When he got into his pickup at the end of the workday, he put his forehead on the steering wheel and tried to convince himself that he’d gotten away with it. So what if his mother had spoken loudly at the retirement facility? She’d spilled dirty secrets aloud in a place and at a time when she shouldn’t have. But Nora was a sick woman. She couldn’t be blamed for what she’d done. Even the Legacy Club had to understand that.
Then again, Julien knew that the blame could be moved from Nora to Julien, that people in the Legacy Club never forgot what you owed them, or how you’d betrayed them.
They kept perfect records.
Julien drove the rest of the way to his little house on the water, trying to focus on the things that mattered: what he was going to make for dinner and how many beers he had in thefridge. Just one? Or did he have another one, hiding somewhere in the back? Maybe tonight he could catch the back half of the basketball game. He told himself that he wouldn’t fall asleep in front of the television, not tonight. It was getting pathetic.
Julien entered the house through the side door, opened his fridge, pulled out a beer, and put a one-person lasagna into the microwave. The microwave began its familiar buzzing song. When he turned back around, he clicked on the light in the adjoining living room. Immediately, all the blood rushed out of his head. But he bit his tongue to keep from screaming.
A woman was sitting in his armchair, watching him.
Julien’s heart rate was impossibly high. But rather than show his fear, he raised his beer toward her, sipped it, and set it on the counter. He wanted to show her that these kinds of tactics didn’t work on him (although, of course, they did).
“Evening, Eleanor,” he said. “Would you like a beer?”
“No, thank you, Julien. I haven’t had a beer in fifty years.” Eleanor scoffed.
Eleanor remained seated, her hands folded primly over her thighs. Julien wondered how long she’d been there, sitting in the dark, waiting for him. She probably knew his schedule down to the minute, just as she knew everything.
Julien was prepared to stand up for his mother. He prepared to tell Eleanor that Nora was losing her memory more and more every day, that nothing Nora had said was a secret in that retirement place anyway, that Eleanor’s tricks and schemes were everybody on Nantucket’s business. But he decided to wait it out, to see what she had to say.
“Why don’t you sit down, Julien?” Eleanor gestured toward the sofa opposite the chair. “You’ve been on your feet all day.”
Julien wanted to roll his eyes at her so-called thoughtfulness. But he obeyed her anyway, sitting on the edge of the sofa and maintaining eye contact as best as he could.
The clock that hung on the wall ticked and ticked. Julien wanted to throw it in the ocean.
“Do you remember the last time we saw one another?” Eleanor asked.
“I suppose it was at the funeral,” Julien said, although that wasn’t true. He’d spotted Eleanor, Rosamund, and Clarice coming out of the Sutton Book Club a few nights ago. As far as he knew, Esme Sutton wasn’t involved in their secret society, but Eleanor had always loved to read, and she’d always found Esme Sutton to be “charming.”
Regardless, he’d given them a wide berth.
“Do you remember what we spoke about?” Eleanor asked. It felt like a quiz at elementary school, something meant to stump him.
“I suppose not,” Julien said. Sweat was slick at the back of his neck.
“I’ll enlighten you. We spoke about the newcomer, Hannah Moore,” Eleanor said. “I believe I asked you to keep tabs on her? To make sure she wasn’t getting too close?”
Julien’s ears rang. Was it possible that Eleanor had spotted Hannah and Julien on the boardwalk last night? Had she heard Hannah asking Julien about the Legacy Club?
“I haven’t really seen her,” Julien said. “We met by chance at the funeral, but we don’t know each other.”
