Page 120 of The Devil’s Lair

“Can I see?” Xan holds out his hand for the diary, and it’s shaking. That one sign almost breaks me. My brother doesn’t shake. He’s stoic, controlled, the one we all look to when we need leadership.

“She never left us,” Nicholas whispers. “Mum never left us.”

My throat is full of razorblades. “No.”

“This is… I don’t…” Saskia leaps to her feet, pacing the length of Dad’s living room, then pivoting. “Alice? The fuck?” She returns to her seat, her leg bouncing. “All this time.”

The sound of Xan snapping the diary shut brings our attention back to him. My brother doesn’t speak. His jaw is locked so tight that a muscle leaps beneath his skin, his expression carved into something unnervingly still. In his eyes, though, a storm brews, dark and furious, contained only by sheer force of will.

Each of us is silent while we wait, absorbing and processing the shock in our own way. Twenty minutes pass, and there’s no sign of Alice. Is this history repeating itself? When we found Mum’s diary, George got wind of what was inside and fled, taking his murderous wife with him. Does he know what Alice did? Has he been protecting her all this time? Were they in on it together?

It’s another five minutes before she appears, escorted by Alan. Alice scans the room, taking us all in, then looks behind her, where Alan has stationed himself by the only exit.

“Alan said you needed to see me, Charles.” There’s a slight waver to her voice. “Is everything all right?”

“Sit down, Alice,” Dad says, his voice wooden. He points at the seat I’m currently occupying.

I get up and move next to Xan, who is doing a damn fine job of being a statue, frozen in place, but I know my brother. One spark, and he’ll detonate.

Alice tucks her skirt beneath her legs and sits. She knows something’s up, but she’s playing her cards close to her chest, feigning surprise and curiosity at being summoned on a Sunday morning.

Dad glances at Xan, and a silent conversation passes between them. Xan drops the diary onto the table that separates Dad and Alice. It lands with a solid thud. For a few seconds, Alice appears genuinely confused, then the penny drops. It’s only a split second, but it’s enough to see fear in her eyes. Gathering her wits, she schools her expression and continues the charade.

“What’s that?”

“You tell us.” Xan’s voice is threaded with menace.

Alice lets out a tinkly laugh. “Well, Alexander, I don’t know. That’s why I asked.”

His hands fist. He won’t put up with this for much longer.

“Okay,” he says, picking the diary up again. “I’ll play your little game.” He flicks through the diary “Let’s see. Ah, here we are. ‘Everything’s gone wrong. It’s a disaster. He wasn’t supposed to escape. It would be him, wouldn’t it? Golden fucking boy. I hate that child, but there’s nothing I can do now. They’ll watch him like a hawk. She’s gone, though. That’s something, I guess.’”

His smile is thin, his eyes murderous as they land on Alice. “What do you say to golden boy now, Alice? I presume ‘she’ is referring to Annabel. My fucking sister.” His voice breaks, his pain as raw as if Annabel and Mum were only taken from us yesterday. “Or do you mean Mum?”

Her fingers toy with the pearls hanging around her neck. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“No? What about this then? ‘Poor, stupid Fiona. She trusted me enough to drink the tea, to let me run her a bath, to close her eyes while I watched her sink beneath the water.’”

“I never wrote that. It isn’t my handwriting.”

Wow. She really is planning to deny it until the bitter end.

“If that’s true,” Dad says, speaking for the first time since he told Alice to sit, “then it’s easily disproven.”

He gets to his feet and crosses to the other side of the room. Opening one of the sideboard drawers, he rifles through, returning with a Christmas card. I smile. Smart, my father.

“This was the Christmas card you gave me last year. I always keep my Christmas cards. Have done for years. I like looking back on them sometimes.” He opens the card and shows it to Xan, who scans it, looks at the diary, then nods.

“I could have a handwriting expert brought here if you’d rather.”

Alice’s pretense splinters. She crumbles before our eyes, quiet sobs hitching her chest. “I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t lose George. I couldn’t. You don’t understand.”

Xan moves. It’s abrupt enough that Alice flinches, her hands flying up to protect her face as though she expects him to strike her. He doesn’t. He wouldn’t. Protecting women is what we do, but when one of those women is the villain in our story… what then?

His fists are clenched so tightly, they’re porcelain white, and his breathing is harsh, uneven. He’s struggling to maintain control. We all are.

He moves behind her chair, gripping it as though he needs it to anchor him. Alice sits rooted to the spot like a cornered animal who’s trying to appear invisible to avoid catching the predator’s attention.