Free Sea of Suspicion by Toni Anderson Page B

set of keys. “How did these get here?”
    “Oh I do stuff like that all the time,” Susie reassured the older woman. “Last weekend I left a book in the refrigerator and didn’t find it until I went hunting for a snack.”
    Emily eyed her steadily with one eyebrow raised. “I’m sure you are just saying that to make me feel better, but I do find old age and battiness rather liberating.” She smiled and spread cookies on a plate. With a nod, she indicated for Susie to take one. “I hope Lily is working hard for you.”
    “She’s a good student.” Susie bit into a cookie, the taste of home-baking melting on her tongue and reminding her of her grandmother’s kitchen, where she’d spent some of the best days of her life.
    “I wish she’d give up that job in that awful pub.” Emily shook her head, fragile silver hair falling from where she’d pinned it to the top of her head. “She didn’t get home till 2 a.m. last night.”
    Susie wiped crumbs from her lips. “It’s good she tries to help out financially.”
    Emily shot her a sly look. “I bet you never worked to get through college.”
    “My mother forbade me.” A trace of bitterness leaked out and Susie pressed her lips together. If her mother ran for president she needed to learn to guard even the tiniest of secrets.
    “Mothers like to protect their babies.” Emily twisted her wedding band then looked away. “If we can.”
    Emily’s grief was palpable and tore at Susie’s heart. At least her own child was alive and well.
    “Would you like to see a photograph of Christina?” Emily’s skin looked ashen, but her eyes were sharp, cataloguing Susie’s reaction to what Susie suspected was a rare honor. Did she want to see a picture of the woman Nick Archer had loved and lost?
    Heck no.
    “Of course.” Susie nodded and smiled, trapped by someone else’s motherly love.
    Emily stood, polyester swishing, slippers padding across worn linoleum, and went through the door into the back of the house. Susie didn’t know if she was supposed to follow or wait in the kitchen. She stood uncertainly, blew out one cheek into a ball.
    “Through here,” Emily coaxed in a soft voice.
    Hesitant, Susie walked through a homey living room with overstuffed couches, a battalion of knickknacks and a fat black cat asleep on a chair. She followed the light of an open doorway distorted by the old woman’s shadow.
    “Lily’s asleep.” Emily pointed to another door and placed her fingers to her lips, waving Susie into a small pink-walled bedroom with a twin bed pushed against the wall. Emily closed the door behind Susie, which spooked her for no reason at all.
    The walls were covered in framed photographs. Baby portraits, school shots, university graduation with Christina in a cap and gown. Every dimension of development catalogued and captured in a parental shrine.
    Snow White was the first thing that crossed Susie’s mind. The girl looked like some Hollywood version of Snow White. Midnight hair, blue eyes, ruby lips. Nothing like Lily. Except who knew what Lily looked like under all that paint?
    “They were very much in love.” Emily pointed to a picture of Christina and Nick on their wedding day.
    Susie avoided looking at it and instead picked up a framed photo off the dresser. “Christina was a diver?”
    Emily’s hands twitched nervously. There was a group of people in the shot, Nick looking impossibly young and lanky, his arm draped possessively across Christina’s shoulder. They looked tired but satisfied, the way it felt after the perfect dive.
    Hot panic shot along Susie’s nerves, and beads of sweat popped out along her brow.
    Dela rocketing to the surface. Susie racing after her. The sound of her own breath booming in her ears as she inflated Dela’s lungs with her own.
    Susie swayed slightly, blindsided by the rush of emotion cruising her veins.
    “All marine biologists are divers, aren’t they?” Emily was oblivious to Susie’s reaction. Instead