The Lost Child (Detective Lottie Parker #3)(113)

‘So Alexis took the twins again?’

‘No. Apparently Alexis was heading to America to start up a business venture. She agreed to take one child. The other, Bernie, was incarcerated with Carrie in St Declan’s. I think initially she was put in while the family decided what to do about her. But they just left her there. With her mother.’ Rose sighed, long and deep. ‘I thought they’d both died in there. But I was wrong about that, wasn’t I?’

Lottie was speechless. She didn’t want to believe her mother, but then hadn’t most of it been in Moroney’s report anyway?

‘How could you do it? Agree to take me in? How could you live with Dad after what he did?’

‘It was hard. I did the right thing in the long run. Look how you turned out. Good upbringing wins out in the end.’

‘I can see that we are both victims in this pathetic play, and you know what? I pity you, Mother. Or whoever you are. I pity you for the choices you made.’ Lottie leaned against the bed, wishing she was strong enough to run out of the door, down the stairs and out to the street, where she could howl like a wild animal at the night sky. ‘Dad’s suicide… had you anything to do with it?’

‘How could you think that? I had nothing to do with it. Anyway, he was the one who had the affair, not me. He had to live with that sin. Remember, Lottie, no one knows what goes on behind closed doors. We all thought Annabelle had a perfect marriage, and see what her husband was doing to her.’

Annabelle, Lottie thought. She wondered how she was, now that Cian had been charged with double homicide. She’d have to make contact soon. Thinking of what her mother had just said, she’d always known Annabelle hadn’t had the perfect marriage but she’d thought Cian, for all his faults, had been a good husband. Dead wrong there, Parker, she told herself. Circumstances had changed Cian, released in him something evil. And circumstances had most surely turned Bernie into what she had become. But Rose was deflecting the conversation, in typical Rose fashion.

‘This isn’t about Annabelle or Cian or anyone else,’ Lottie said, drawing her back to the topic in hand. ‘This is about my dad.’

‘He was the one who fathered a child outside of his marriage, so don’t go blaming me.’

‘But things must have been strained at home. Jesus, you took in another woman’s daughter. Shit.’

‘She was an addict. She couldn’t care for you. There was no help for her back then, just the asylum.’

Lottie stared up at the ceiling. Blinded by tears. Frustration? Anger? Sorrow? She had no idea.

‘No wonder I’m so fucked up.’

‘I thought if I let you have your father’s things, it would be the end of it. Instead you started on your mad witch-hunt. All those poor innocent people. Killed because of your meddling.’

Lottie dragged herself upright again. ‘You’re wrong there. Marian Russell started it with her genealogy investigations.’

‘But don’t you see, your snooping got Cian O’Shea involved to spy on you, and on me. And whether you care to admit it or not, Lottie, that led directly to the murder of the Moroneys. So don’t play the angel here. Shoulder some of the blame.’

Bristling from the harsh words, Lottie decided that once she was well enough, she’d visit Cian O’Shea in prison to see if she could succeed where others had failed. She needed to know who had got him involved.

‘I’ve heard enough now, Mo… Rose. I think you need to leave.’

Rose pushed away from the wall. At the door, she turned. Lottie stared at the once sprightly woman she had called her mother. Now that woman looked half her size and broken.

‘I’m going,’ Rose said. ‘I just ask one thing. Leave it alone now. Don’t go looking for more answers. It’ll only cause people pain. People who have spent their lives running away from it. Remember, you have your own children and your grandson to think of. You don’t want to bring more heartache into their lives.’

Lottie got up, cringing with pain. She stood as erect as she could.

‘For your information, I’m not finished with this. I intend to find my last remaining half-sibling.’

Rose laughed drily. ‘Don’t forget, you have two.’

‘Two?’ Lottie felt confused. Then it struck her. ‘Bernie Kelly can rot in jail for the rest of her life. I’m talking about her twin. I will find where this Alexis is and—’

‘You won’t. You can never fight her. Your father couldn’t.’

‘What do you mean?’ How did Rose always get the last word?

‘Your father couldn’t stand up to her. He was a tired and broken man, the poor eejit. It was Tessa that made him do it, but I firmly believe that Alexis was behind her, pulling the strings. Didn’t you wonder why Tessa had the gun? The gun that killed your father?’

Yes, she did.

‘Alexis put it all in motion and Tessa wore your father down. Tried to convince him it would be wrong to speak the truth. He was a wreck by the time… by the time… I could never prove it, but I always thought someone tied him up, put the gun in his hand and forced him. Why else was there a rope on the floor by his feet? The rope was taken away, and after the inquest, the gun disappeared too. Tessa had it all these years.’ Sighing softly, Rose added, ‘In the end, I don’t know if he even wanted to pull the trigger or not. But he did it.’