I’m pretty sure Frank is using Helen as a human shield, and she’s too weak—or too exhausted by him—to do anything about it. “Katrina’s not a stranger,” I say. “She’s been with us since we brought Aubrey home from the hospital. You didn’t say anything about her being a stranger when Sophie was alive. Why now?”

I know the answer, but I’m glad I asked it anyway.

“Don’t talk to my wife like that!” Frank says, finally unleashing his inner prick.

“I’m sorry,” Helen says, her features melting. She’s embarrassed. A feeling she knows so well.

“You don’t need to be sorry,” Frank insists as Helen blinks hard. I expect she’s about to cry again. I wonder if her tears could fill a bathtub or maybe even a swimming pool. Next he faces me. “Look, Adam, we have never really gotten along.”

No shit, I think.

“And you know the reason for that, right?” he asks.

Except that he’s a prick, I honestly don’t. No man would be good enough for his only child.

He doesn’t wait for an answer, and I take a gulp of my drink. The ice in my glass crashes against my front teeth, and I wince a little.

“Frank, please,” Helen says in her more-than-ever mousey voice.

He flicks her away like lint. “Aubrey should be with an intact family,” he says. “She’s been through so much.”

I want to laugh. So I do.

“‘Intact family’? You’ve got to be kidding. Captive, yes. Sophie used to tell me that she thought her mom was a victim of Stockholm syndrome—that she had lost any sense of who she was because you dominated her like she was a science project.”

My eyes scrape over Helen. I feel somewhat sorry for her. At the same time, watching her wriggle under Frank’s thumb all these years has been revolting. Sophie wanted to liberate her mother. She loved her. Right now, I just want to jolt her like an online electroshock therapy kit.

“She called you,” I say, “‘my Stepford mom.’ Just so you know.”

Helen puts her fingers to her lips for a second, trembles a little, and then walks toward Aubrey’s room down the hallway, which gleams like polished brass with that goddamn over-finished oak flooring.

“You little piece of crap,” Frank says to me, keeping his voice low as if he wants to spare the others. “I won’t have you insult my wife.” His head is getting red. It’s a barometer of anger. “You didn’t need to say that. We’re all on edge. We’ve all been dealt the hardest blow we could have ever imagined. Helen’s teetering on the edge.”

From what I’ve seen, she’s lived her whole life that way.