Page 49 of Hidden Daughters (Detective Lottie Parker #15)

CONNEMARA

After she’d pulled on her jeans, Lottie searched her suitcase for a clean top.

She hadn’t packed enough clothes for the week.

She’d ask Grace if she could do some laundry later.

She went to Boyd’s suitcase and found it empty.

Of course. She opened the old pine wardrobe.

His clothing was neatly hung. She selected a black M&S T-shirt and slipped it over her head.

It would do. Clean. Smelled good. Her trainers would be grand once she gave them a rub of a cloth. Feck it. She put them on and stood.

A sharp knock on the door.

‘Come in.’

Grace plunged into the room in that awkward way she had about her.

Hair at the nape of her neck neatly tied with a pink ribbon.

Black trousers with an ironed seam, and an immaculate white shirt that cast Lottie in the poor-relation category.

She wasn’t even related, but anyhow. She was in awe at how Grace seemed transformed in her natural environment.

So different from how she came across whenever she visited Boyd in Ragmullin. Which wasn’t often, she had to admit.

‘We need to talk.’ Grace’s face was severe today, lined, with downturned lips. Her eyes, though, were burning embers.

‘Sure.’ Lottie sat on the bed and tapped the spot beside her.

Grace wrinkled her nose, childlike.

‘Ugh. You and Mark slept in that bed. I’m not sitting there. I will stand, thank you very much.’

Now Lottie was sorry she’d sat down. Boyd’s sister towered over her like a doomsday shadow.

‘What can I do for you?’ Jesus, she sounded too officious. She had to rescue this. ‘Is there something wrong, Grace?’

‘You need to stop interfering in my life.’

‘I haven’t interfered in anything.’ Oh, shit.

‘You’re telling lies and it does not surprise me. Not one little bit.’

‘What do you mean?’ She had an urge to stand, but she sat on her hands – just in case.

‘You’re interfering in that murder business. And you’re trying to break up myself and Bryan.’

‘Gosh, no, Grace, I’m not trying to do anything of the sort.’

‘Sure you are. Making out like Bryan did something wrong. Spouting lies about him to that detective sergeant, the Mooney man. You have to stop. And stop it immediately.’

Now Lottie did stand. No way was she going to take this tirade sitting down. Grace might be Boyd’s sister, but Lottie had done nothing wrong, so why should she take the blame? And then she wondered, why was Grace blaming her?

‘Grace, you need to speak with Bryan.’

‘I have done. And I believe him.’

‘Believe what?’

‘That he asked you to check something out for him, and the next thing he knows is that detective had him in Galway Garda HQ making a statement and taking his fingerprints.’

‘I think there’s a few gaps in that story that Bryan needs to fill in for you.’

‘It’s not a story, it’s the truth, and I believe him, not you.’

‘Then you need to rethink what he told you.’

Grace raised an eyebrow. ‘Are you being smart with me?’

‘No, I’m being truthful.’ Lottie made to approach the other woman, but the fire in Grace’s eyes halted her. ‘Listen, Grace, I don’t want you making a huge mistake. This?—’

‘Don’t you dare treat me like a child.’ Grace stamped her foot, exactly like a child would do. ‘I am a grown woman and I can make my own choices. If they’re wrong, it’s my funeral.’

Lottie grimaced at her choice of words. ‘Okay. But I didn’t do anything to hinder your wedding. Bryan asked me to look into something from his past. That’s all I was doing.’

‘Look into what? He didn’t mention anything in particular.’

So what had he mentioned? Lottie wondered. ‘Talk to him again. He asked me to keep it private and I can’t break his confidence.’

Grace seemed to physically pull in her horns. Her head and shoulders drooped, as did her mouth, a slight quiver trembling her lips. Uncertain, maybe? Then she raised her head and took a step towards Lottie, regrouping, wagging her finger in the air.

‘I don’t need you snooping around behind my back, Lottie Parker. And you can forget about us helping you and your family with somewhere to live in Ragmullin with Mark. That deal is off the table.’

And then she was gone.

Lottie found Boyd drinking tea with Bryan and Grace in the kitchen. Awkward.

She poured a cup from the teapot. You could trot a mouse on it, she thought, then shivered at that image. She would have loved a cut of brown bread, but there didn’t seem to be any left. Her stomach rumbled and she placed a hand there to quell it.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

‘You should be,’ Grace snapped, indignation seeping out of her pores.

‘That’s enough.’ Bryan stood, mug in hand.

‘Sit down,’ Grace said, but he didn’t. She glared at Lottie. ‘You try to destroy everything that’s good in life, so you do.’

‘What do you mean?’ Lottie looked at her, bewildered.

‘You won’t destroy me and Bryan.’

‘I have no intention of doing any such thing.’

‘Enough,’ Bryan repeated hopelessly. He ran a hand through his greying mop of hair and held his empty mug hooked in one finger by his side. ‘I don’t want anyone falling out. I’ll talk to you later, mo ghrá .’

‘We talked last night,’ Grace replied frostily.

‘I know, but I need to tell you about something else.’

‘Tell me now.’ Her voice was laced with a touch of hysteria.

‘Later. I’ve sheep to see to.’ He put his mug in the sink, his shoulder brushing against Lottie as he passed.

She stared after him. Was that a signal for her to follow him outside? Did he want to talk to her? She felt Grace was angry enough at the moment without adding further fuel to that particular fire. Whatever Bryan wanted to say, it could wait.

She took a seat beside Boyd, raging that he hadn’t stood up for her, and spoke to his sister. ‘I’m sorry for any confusion I’ve caused. I had no intention of?—’

‘Whether you intended it or not,’ Grace interrupted, ‘I am properly confused.’

Boyd took his sister’s hand in his own. ‘Bryan asked Lottie to look into an event from his past, when he was a teenager. I don’t think it’s up to her to tell you about it. It’s up to him.’

She snapped her hand out of his. ‘Might have known you’d abandon your own sister in her hour of need.’

Lottie thought it was Bryan who had abandoned his sister, and his girlfriend, years ago, by not searching for them, but before she could retort, she caught Boyd’s eye. He was trying to defuse the situation and didn’t need her making it worse.

‘I love you, little sis,’ he said. ‘I will always look out for you, but this thing, whatever it is, is between you and Bryan.’

Folding her arms petulantly, Grace sniffed and said, ‘I’m calling off the wedding.’

Before she could utter another word, the door burst open and Bryan ducked into the kitchen. ‘Mooney is outside. Plus a squad car.’

‘Is it me he wants?’ Lottie asked, rising.

‘No, it’s me.’

Shit and fan came to mind as she followed him outside.