Chapter 14

“Uh…” Vivian wasn’t sure how to respond to the question, it coming out of left field. Brainwashed? About what? Why would she have been brainwashed?

Rolling her eyes, the woman pulled out the chair Gabriel had vacated some time ago, sitting herself down with great care taken to make sure the knee length skirt fell over her lap just so as she tucked her feet to the side, ankles crossed like a proper lady.

It was obvious her hair, a rich shade of mahogany, was dyed, but her blue eyes were all natural and stared at Vivian like daggers, cutting to her very soul.

“Well? Have you been?”

“I… don’t know what you’re talking about…” Vivian finally managed to mutter, averting her gaze to scan the crowd in hopes of seeing Gabriel or Samuel, to plead with her eyes for them to come save her from this woman.

Again the woman rolled her eyes. “It’s obvious Samuel Devreaux murdered his wife; I don’t know why everyone is putting up with this…” she waved a hand in the air as if searching for the right word, “farce.”

Vivian’s gaze shot back to the woman, eyes wide as she stared. What?

“I’m sorry… did you just say you think…”

“I don’t think,” she interjected, aggravation hot in her tone, “I know. Honestly. If people would just listen to me this whole thing would have been long over.”

A hundred different thoughts were going through Vivian’s mind, some finding the entire situation almost comical, but others were worried about why someone would think her father had kill her mother.

“No-one’s told me that before,” Vivian said, choosing each word carefully. “Could you explain it to me?”

There was no eye roll this time as the woman looked Vivian up and down before smiling sweetly. “Of course, my dear, I’d be happy to tell you all about it. I’m Patricia, by the way. Patricia Lamont.”

Vivian opened her mouth to give her own name but Patricia kept speaking, giving no pause for the exchange to take place.

“Well. Everyone knows Sammy does some questionable things on the side, so it’s only natural that once Annie stumbled on the truth he took her out. Simple as that!”

“Uh huh.” Well that answered absolutely none of the questions in Vivian’s head. “Questionable things?”

Patricia made another tutting noise. “Do you know nothing?”

“I’m not originally from here, and haven’t dealt with… with the Devreauxs until a few days ago.” Truth — it was all true. Misleading, but honest, which was how Vivian hid truths best. “I’m… a blank slate of information on them.”

“Jesus, child, seriously? Everyone knows about him since Annie lowered herself to marry the scum.”

Instead of commenting on what was said, Vivian stayed silent, waiting to hear more — the woman was keen to talk and didn’t need prompting.

“He won everyone over with his fake charm, blah, blah, blah,” she continued, using a hand to mimic a talking mouth. “But I knew from day one that he was bad news, not that anyone would listen to me. The bastard had everyone wrapped around his finger in no time cause he’s loaded.”

That made it sound like Vivian’s maternal side were more interested in money than their daughter, but there was something off about this woman.

“Annie never wanted brats, and yet he made her have three of them! Like, honestly. Everyone knew she was terrified of pregnancy because of her blood clotting disorder and her wonky uterus, so the fact he had her birth three kids is just abusive.”

It was difficult to keep the expression of mild curiosity on her face as Vivian listened to this woman lie out her ass. The blood clots were barely an issue when her mom had kept semi-active, wore compression clothes, and ate healthy.

As for the wonky uterus, it was a horrible way to explain PCOS. Together they would definitely make a pregnancy high risk, with a large helping of fertility issues, but it wasn’t impossible — Vivian was proof of that much. Not to mention the boys had been born via surrogates, so what was this woman going on about?

Patricia was basically telling the world she didn’t know the first thing about Annie, so why was she so adamant that the husband was the killer? Because of the long standing trope?

Ridiculous.

“Forcing someone to do that against their will would be abusive,” Vivian finally said as Patricia had stopped talking for long enough the silence was noticeable.

“Exactly! But nooo, no one listens to me.”

“Pardon me, but how are you related to … Annie?”

“I’m her baby sister,” Patricia scoffed, not liking the question. “Her favourite sister!”

“You’re her only sister, Auntie Pat.” A hand found its way to Vivian’s shoulder and gave it a small squeeze. “Glad to see you could make it.” Glancing back, she was relieved to see Sebastian.

Patricia huffed. “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree with you.” Getting to her feet, she gave Vivian a warm smile. “You be careful around them. A pretty, young thing like you needs to keep good people in her life.”

Sebastian and Vivian watched the woman walk away without saying anything until the crowd had swallowed her up.

“I see you’ve met Auntie Pat,” he sighed, taking the seat their aunt had just vacated. “Sorry about that.”

“She really doesn’t like any of you, does she…”

Shrugging his shoulders, Sebastian leaned back in the chair as he folded his arms over his chest. “She idolized Mom; when our parents got together, Auntie Pat’s jealousy made for some interesting moments, or so I’ve heard. In her world, Dad stole Mom from her, so he’s the reason she’s gone.”

“She did say he killed his wife because she found out about his questionable dealings.”

This caused her brother’s eyebrows to raise in surprise. “What do you think?”

“About him killing her, or the questionable dealings?”

Sebastian let out a chuckle. “Both, I guess.”

It took her a moment to decide on the answers to his questions. The first was obvious, but she wasn’t going to talk about it — as far as Vivian knew, no-one was aware that she’d been there for Annie’s death — and the second part, well, she knew nothing about that.

Would it bother her if Samuel did shady things on the side? Maybe. It would depend on what those things were. Drugs? People? Real Estate? Robberies? Politics? Hell, there were a couple things that came to mind she was surprised to find didn’t bother her while others were a hard no.

“I don’t know,” she finally replied with a shrug of her own.

“You’re saying you don’t have any opinion, or even a thought about either?”

“No,” she shook her head a little, looking down at the glass of water she’d been nursing for the better part of half an hour. “I just don’t know what I think.”