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“How?”

Remy set aside his empty mug. “Don’t get me wrong. She could be arrogant, no doubt about that. You can’t be that pretty and rich and spoiled and not be full of yourself. But she wasn’t stuffy and she was never mean-spirited.” He smiled at some memory. “And she never treated people like they were beneath her, including me. She used to bring me lemonade on hot days and insist I take a break. She even gave me a box of my favorite pralines every Christmas. She knew how much I loved them, but I hated to spend the money for the treats.”

Warmth spread through Livia at his words. As she’d told Adrian, it was so hard to think of her mother without her memory being tainted by the mystery and agony of her death. She needed to know more about the woman who had created her.

“You liked her?”

“I did. Everyone did,” Remy said. “She had a way about her that put you at ease. As if you’d been friends for a long time.” He paused, pursing his lips. “I don’t think the old man liked that.”

“Why not?”

“He was old-school. There were people his sort talked to and those who were beneath his notice.”

“Like the hired staff?”

“Exactly.”

Livia had no trouble imagining her grandfather’s snobbish disapproval. The question was how far her mother might have gone to aggravate her overbearing father.

“Do you remember the chauffeur?” she asked, still bothered by Helene’s vague reference to her mother’s ghost searching for the mysterious Manny. Was her aunt unstable? Absolutely. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t fully aware of the family secrets. And her grandfather would certainly have disapproved of her mother being friendly with a good-looking member of his staff. “I think his name was Manny something or other.”

“I remember a driver. What was his name?” Remy struggled to dredge through his memories. “Baxter. Yeah, that was it. Charles Baxter,” he finally said. “He worked for your family for at least fifty years before he retired.”

“But no Manny?”

Remy started to shake his head only to hesitate. “You know, now that I think about it, there was a young guy there for a couple years. It was after Charles retired. Can’t remember his name. I’m not sure I ever talked to him. Kept to himself in his apartment over the garage most of the time.”

“Do you know if he was friendly with my mom?” Livia asked. “Maybe friendlier than he should be?”

“Nope.” Remy firmly shook his head. “Never heard anything like that. Why do you ask?”

Livia waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. “I was curious, that’s all. I wondered why he seemed to have disappeared so quickly. I thought maybe he was caught being too familiar with my mom and had been run off.”

“I doubt that.” Remy snorted at the mere thought. “If your mom was dating the hired help she wouldn’t have bothered to keep it a secret. Just the opposite. I think she would have flaunted it just to piss off the old man.”

That was exactly what she’d been thinking, Livia reluctantly conceded. “It’s curious he vanished without a trace.”

“I don’t know that he vanished,” Remy protested. “Your grandfather wasn’t an easy man to work for and Charles had been with him for years. I’m not sure anyone could replace him. And after your mother died, Henri didn’t really need a driver. He rarely left the house.”

Livia swallowed a sigh. Manny felt like a dead end. Literally. Time to move on.

“Yeah, being Henri Benoit’s granddaughter was challenging enough,” she agreed. “I can’t imagine working for him.”

“He was tough, but he was never stingy.” Remy, surprisingly, was defending his one-time employer. “Especially when it came to the Willows. Not like …” He coughed, realizing he’d been about to insult one of her relatives.

“Uncle Adrian?”

“I’ll just say that he’d not famous for his generosity around this neighborhood,” he hedged.

“You’re not telling me anything I haven’t heard before,” she assured her companion. “I’m not involved in the family business, thank God, but I suspect it’s gone downhill since my grandfather’s death.”

“I don’t know anything about the business either, but the Willows isn’t like it used to be, that’s for sure.” Remy rose to his feet, crossing to the stove to refill his mug. He waved the coffeepot in her direction, but Livia hastily shook her head. Remy returned to his seat, sipping his hot coffee as he reminisced about the good old days. “Once their parties weren’t a bunch of locals and a few gossip rags. They hosted the governor and senators and a few big wigs from Hollywood who did some filming in the area. And the entertainment came out of New Orleans. Jazz players and singers from the nightclub would perform in the back garden. I could sit on my porch and listen to them.”

“I’m sure Delilah would be thrilled to have those sorts of parties, but I doubt they could afford it now.”

“True,” Remy agreed. “It’s not just the cost of food and stuff. You need a full staff. Back then they had a housekeeper and cook and a couple of maids, plus they always hired me to set up the stage and chairs in the gardens and Charles to act as the valet. Everything was first class.”

Livia felt a pang of regret. She didn’t have any memories of those days. The Willows had always seemed like a mausoleum to her, not a place where people were eager to gather. But she’d heard enough stories to know that there’d been a time when Louisiana’s social elite had flocked to this tiny corner of the bayous. It was a shame that she’d never been able to see the house before the ghosts had shrouded it in darkness.