Lane jogged over. “Excuse me? Hello?”

She stopped. And then turned to face him.

“Mother?” he said with shock. “Mother, what are you doing out here?”

As he stopped before her, his heart rate regulated to something close to a normal rhythm, but he remained concerned. After all, didn’t people with dementia take to wandering? Was this the drugs or a worsening of her mental decline?

Or both?

“Oh, hello, Edward.” She smiled at him pleasantly. “It is such a lovely evening, isn’t it? I thought I should like to take the air.”

His mother’s accent was more House of Windsor than South of the Mason–Dixon, her consonants arched sure as a lifted brow, her haughty vowels drawn out with the expectation that what she had to say, and who she was, guaranteed people would wait for her to finish her sentences.

“Mother, I think we should go inside.”

Her eyes drifted around the flowers and the blooming trees, and in the shadows, her face was closer to what it had been when she had been young, its fine bones and perfectly balanced features the result of what in the old days people would have called “good breeding.”

“Mother?”

“No, I think we shall walk. Edward, darling, do give me your arm.”

Lane thought of his father’s visitation. She had mistaken him for his brother then, too.

He glanced back up to the house. Where was the nurse?

“Edward?”

“But of course, Mother dear.” He offered her the crook of his elbow. “We will make one pass, and then I am afraid I must insist we return inside.”

“That is very good of you. To worry over me.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too, Edward, darling.”

Together, they traversed the brick walkway, passing into the statuary portion of the garden. His mother paused at each stone figure, as if she was recalling old acquaintances of which she were fond, and then she stopped at the koi pond to regard the silver and orange and spotted fish. Overhead, the moon was coming and going under a sluggish cloud cover, the illumination that milky kind one found so often during the warm months.

“My husband is dead.”

Lane glanced at her. “Yes, Mother, he is.”

“He died recently.”

“Yes, he did.” Lane frowned. “Do you miss him?”

“No, I’m afraid I do not.”

There was a long period of silence. And then Lane just had to go there. “Mother, I need to know something.”

“What would that be, darling?”

“Your husband is dead. Is . . . my father dead?”

She went utterly still.

And then she pivoted toward Easterly and stared up at its majestic expanse, a strange light coming into her eyes.

“We do not speak of these things, Edward.”

“Is my father dead, Mother. Please tell me, I need to know for my own peace of mind.”

It took her the longest time to answer, and even then, her words were a mere whisper. “No, darling. Your father has not died.”

“Mother, I need to know who he is. Will you please tell me? With your husband dead, no one will get hurt.”

He fell silent to allow her the room to speak. And when she just looked at their home, he worried that her mind had gone on an idle from which it would not return.

“Mother? You can tell me.”

A ghost of a smile tinted her lips. “I was in love. When I was younger . . . I was in love with your father. I saw him quite often, although we were never introduced. There were proper expectations for me, and I was not going to go outside of them.”

Lane could only imagine how strict things had been back then. The manner in which debutantes and eligible young bachelors were required to meet and interact had been very prescribed, and if you made a misstep? Your reputation was ruined.

The fifties surviving into the eighties.

“I would watch him from afar, though. Oh, how I would watch him. I was quite shy, and again, one didn’t want to be troublesome to the family. But there was something about him. He was different. And he never, ever stepped out of bounds. In fact, I often wondered why he never noticed me.” There was a period of silence. “And then William came around. He was not exactly what one would expect my father to allow. But William could be so very charming, and he man aged to persuade Father that he was a fine businessman—and we needed one. After all, there was no succession for the company as I was an only child, and Father didn’t want the BBC to fall into the hands of the other side of the family after he was gone. So William came to work for Bradford Bourbon, and I was expected to marry him.”

The sadness in her voice was something he had never heard before, and indeed, did not associate with her. All his memories of his mother were of a beautiful, ornate bird, sparkling with gems in colorful gowns, drifting around Easterly, smiling and chirping. Always happy. Always serene.

He wondered exactly when she had started in with the self-medicating.

“My husband and I were engaged for six months. It took that long to have Dior hand-make my wedding gown—and also a parure of diamonds and pearls had been ordered from Van Cleef, and that, too, took time. There were photo shoots, as well, and planning the wedding. Mother did all of that for me. I was expected to turn up and be pleasant in the dress, and smile for the cameras. William ignored me for the most part, and that was just fine. He was . . . unsettling to me, and that initial instinct proved . . .”

Correct, Lane added grimly in his head.

“I can remember the night it finally happened. When I actually stood face-to-face with your father. I had to come forward to him and introduce myself. He was shocked, but I could tell that he had seen me all along, and he was far from indifferent to me. In spite of the upcoming marriage festivities, I continued to pursue him because I knew I was running out of time. Once I was married, William was never going to allow me out of his sight, and I would never get a chance to . . .”

“You fell pregnant,” Lane whispered.

“It was just something that happened.” She took a deep breath. “I do not regret it. And I do not regret you. The time that I had with your father was the happiest in my life, and it has sustained me through many a dark time.”

“William found out, didn’t he.”

“Yes, he did. I was already two months into it when we were married, and he was furious. He felt as though there had been a bait and switch, a virtuous wife promised and a whore delivered. He told me that frequently throughout the years. He never denied you, though, because he was worried that the subsequent children, which he insisted on having, would not be seen as his. We had sex four times. Once on our wedding night. And then for each of your siblings. I was, as they say, tragically fertile—but he also insisted that I track my cycle and not lie about it. He didn’t want to be with me any more than I wanted to be with him, but the succession of the company depended upon plenty of heirs and we delivered on that.”

“Did you continue to see my father?”

“I saw him, yes. But after the wedding, I no longer . . . saw him.”

“Did he know you were pregnant?”

“Yes. He understood the situation, however. He has always been most respectful. It is his way.”

“You still love him, don’t you.”

“I will always love him.” She looked over at him. “And you must know, my son, that you do not have to be with someone to love them. Love survives all things, time, marriages, deaths. It is more what makes us immortal than even the children we leave in our wake to our graves. It is the way God touches us, as our love for others is a reflection of His love for us. He grants us this reflection of His glory even though we are sinners, and so it is.”

“Where is my father now?”

“Right here.” She touched her sternum. “He is alive in my heart and will be forever.”

“Wait, I thought you said he hadn’t died?”

At that moment, someone came rushing out of the house. The nurse, all frantic. “Miss Bradford! Miss Bradford—”

Damn it, he needed more time. But as the woman in the white uniform rounded the corner and saw them, his mother’s expression became confounded, that precious window of lucidity starting to close.