Missing Mary (Suburban Noir Book 1) by Chance Madeleine

Author:Chance, Madeleine
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-10-19T00:00:00+00:00

Tuesday, May 30, 2023

The father

“Eleanor!” I snap at my mother-in-law as she heads down the hallway towards my wife’s room.

I just got home from my business trip a few minutes ago and found out that the maids had let themselves in, which is fine. But Eleanor followed them here and they let her in too, which is not fine.

My wife is at her yoga class, which means that Eleanor has free run to snoop all over the place. What the hell is she even looking for? Does she think we have Mary hidden in a closet somewhere?

“What’s wrong, Michael?” She turns to me with big, sad doe eyes.

I shake my head. “Save it for someone who doesn’t know you, Eleanor. You told me you needed to use the restroom. The guest bathroom is downstairs. So why are you trying to go into Portia’s room?”

Her wounded expression melts into a pout, and she holds up a little plastic bag. “I have a few lovely little outfits I bought for my grandson. I was just going to leave them in there. Can’t a grandmother even…” She’s using her cutesy innocent voice, but she trails off when she sees the look on my face.

“Downstairs,” I snap, and point.

Pouting, she obeys and follows me down to the living room.

Beatriz and Kristen are in the kitchen, cleaning, and I shoot an annoyed look in their direction. Fortunately, according to the security camera footage that I just checked on my phone, they’ve only been here about ten minutes, so hopefully Eleanor hasn’t been able to get into too much mischief. It’s not that we have anything to hide here, it’s more that I know Portia would be mad as hell to know her mother had free run to snoop through her things.

Eleanor is one of Clean Sweep’s biggest clients, so of course she used that to wheedle her way in here. Still, this is not acceptable, and I’ll have to talk to them about it.

My eyes fix on Eleanor. “I wonder if you actually have yourself fooled into thinking that you’re really here trying to mend fences, Eleanor. Because if you were trying to fix things, you wouldn’t want to make Portia feel violated and creeped out by sneaking into her room and leaving baby clothes behind as proof that you’d been in there.”

“My daughter has completely brainwashed you into looking for the worst possible motives for everything I do.” She sniffs.

I roll my eyes. “Sure. That’s what’s going on here.”

“So, where is my daughter exactly?” Eleanor pins her gaze on me.

I’m trying to keep my promise not to tell her anything to do with Portia. If I do, Eleanor will throw it in Portia’s face the first chance she gets. She thrives on undermining everything in Portia’s life, including her relationships.

“I would prefer that you discuss that with her.”

She arches one perfectly penciled brow. “Well, I would prefer to have a pharmaceutical sales rep who doesn’t scare off some of my major accounts, but here we are.

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