Page 61 of Letters From Victor

I nodded, though a knot formed in my stomach. “I know. It’s just…hard to wait. When all I want is to be with you, yet I have to keep pretending.”

He squeezed my hand. “Barbara, we’ll get through this. We just have to hold on a little longer. Stay with Frank for now and keep up appearances.” He kissed the back of my hand. “You’re an actress, right?”

I smiled at his recollection but quickly looked away, focusing on the delicate patterns of the curtains as they swayed in the breeze. “Victor…” I started. “Edith knows. She’s the only one I’ve confided in, but I trust her completely.”

His grip on my hand tightened, then relaxed. “Your sister… She’s always been supportive of you, hasn’t she?”

“Yes,” I said, turning back to him. “She understands what I’m going through. She’d never betray me.”

Victor sighed and ran a hand through his dark hair, mussing its usual razor-sharp lines. “All right. But no one else, Barbara. If this gets out…”

“I know,” I said quickly. “I know what’s at stake.” The knot in my stomach tightened. “But my mother suspects. If she stirs up trouble?—”

“She won’t,” he interrupted, though his voice lacked its usual certainty. “She’s not so foolish as to air dirty laundry in public.”

I pulled my hand away and crossed my arms, sinking back into the sofa. “You don’t know her like I do. She’ll do whatever it takes to protect the family. And in her mind, divorce is the devil, and a ‘well-brought-up girl’ should stick it out in a miserable, loveless marriage rather than try for happiness.” I shook myhead and let out a bitter laugh. “She’s still stuck in the last century.”

“Then all the more reason we give her nothing to go on, darling.”

I nodded, letting out a shaky breath.

Victor studied me in silence, his dark eyes probing. “Speaking of being stuck in the last century…I’ve been wondering about something.”

I uncrossed my arms and sat up straighter. “Oh?”

“The age difference between you and your siblings—it’s quite pronounced, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “I’m the baby of the family. There’s an eleven-year gap between me and my brother, Bill. He’s the next youngest. Why?”

Victor leaned back, his fingers idly drumming on his knee. “Your parents—they’re older than I expected. Older than my own, even. And I’ve got ten years on you, darling.”

“Yes, Mother was forty when she had me. Apparently, I was something of a surprise.” I studied him. “Where are you going with this?”

“If you were the surprise baby—the ‘change of life miracle,’ if you will—I’d expect your parents to dote on you more. Indulge you, even.”

A rueful smile dusted my lips. “My father does. When he’s around, that is. When I was a kid, he treated me like a princess. I remember once, between meetings with very important bigwigs during his time as city mayor, he made time to come to a tea party with my dolls. I couldn’t have been more than three.” I sighed, the memory warm but distant. “He’s always so sweet to me.”

“But not your mother?”

I let out a quiet, humorless laugh. “No. Mother is all rules, manners, and propriety. Very no-nonsense. She’d have made a great general.”

Victor chuckled, low and knowing. “I took orders from a few just like her during the war.”

I loved Victor’s face, the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he laughed. This was a pleasant moment of levity, and I hesitated to disrupt it with what I needed to say.

“Victor,” I began, my voice quieter. He turned his full attention to me. “I want Frankie to have every bit of love and attention I never got.”

He tilted his head, listening intently.

“It’s not just about me,” I continued. “Or about us. When I leave Frank, it means taking Frankie away from his father.”

Victor leaned back, one arm draped over the sofa’s worn top rail. “Barbara, you’re not taking him away forever. Fathers have rights. Or they should, anyway. Frank could still see him.”

“But would he?” I asked, my voice rising with the swell of emotion I’d been holding back. “Frank barely makes time for him now when we’re all under the same roof.”

“Are you saying Frank doesn’t love his son?”

“I’m saying that Frank loves theideaof having a son—the status symbol of having a boy with his name. But the reality of fatherhood is something else entirely. He never plays with him, never reads him a bedtime story, nothing. If Frank can’t be bothered when it’s easy, why would he make the effort once we’ve split?”

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