A widowed businessman returns early to his quiet mansion, ready to confront the housekeeper, but what he sees changes everything

Sadie arrived at his other side. “Mine is the garden,” she said, pointing back at her easel. “Except I made the roses purple because I wanted to. Lila said that’s allowed.”

“It is absolutely allowed,” Owen said.

He heard himself say it — the words arriving from somewhere that was not the managed, careful part of himself that had been doing most of the continue reading …