Page 143 of Hidden Daughters

‘Okay.’ Mooney capitulated, his shoulders drooping. ‘Where would you look?’

‘If Imelda said Assumpta Feeney is key to it all, that’s where I’d start. Where did she live?’

‘God, I hope I’m not making the second-biggest mistake of my career.’ He unlocked the car. ‘Hop in.’

‘And what was the first-biggest mistake?’

‘Meeting Lottie Parker.’

As they drove, Mooney took a call on his hands-free. He had earlier asked for a trace to be put on Ann Wilson’s phone, before he’d asked for the same thing on Lottie’s. Now they had a location for Ann’s phone.

‘It’s at Assumpta Feeney’s house,’ Mooney said. ‘I’ll ring it and see if she answers.’

Boyd put out a hand to stop him. ‘Wait. Think. If Imelda is involved in these murders and she still has the phone, you could be alerting her to the fact that we know where she is.’

‘How would she figure that out?’

‘Because she is most likely a techie nerd and will put two and two together.’

‘If she’s that techie, she would have dumped the phone or turned off its location.’

‘True,’ Boyd said. ‘Up to you.’

‘Fuck it, we’ll be there shortly, so I’ll ring.’ Mooney took his phone off the hands-free and handed it to Boyd. ‘I saved Ann’s number in the contacts. You call it.’

Boyd found the number, hesitated, then tapped the screen.

81

Bryan couldn’t take much more interruption in his life. He wanted to herd his sheep, feed them. Walk his dog. Hold Grace in his arms. Marry her. And for everyone else to leave them alone for the rest of their days.

Grace was in the living room, taking it upon herself to scrub it from top to bottom. He hadn’t the will to ask her not to do it. It was his space. He had to remember that it would soon be their space. The little boy, Sergio, had his head in his tablet and seemed to be no trouble to anyone. Bryan’s trouble was the memory of a life he’d spent trying to forget.

He needed to be outside. The walls were enclosing him and he felt claustrophobic.

He left the house and walked across his fields. The sound of the waves, usually a balm to his soul, now seemed to intrude on his thoughts. The smell of the seaweed rose from the rocky shore, and his sheep grazed on the hard, barren ground where little grew other than heather and gorse. Maybe he should buy a few goats.

At the wall that held the sheep back, he stood and leaned his arms on the stones. Memories came rushing back to him. His home. His poor mother, his sorry father. His brother andhis little sister. He rarely thought of her and suddenly he felt ashamed.

The girl had tried to be a mother when their mam died. He had been a teenager then, a boyo. Causing trouble. Ending up in Knockraw. Getting Mary Elizabeth pregnant. He had been so caught up in his own delinquent ways he forgot about the sister who had fed them and tended to the baby. The baby who had entered the world as their mother took her final breath. He had little memory of that child. What type of brother did that make him?

Big fat tears rolled down his cheeks. His sorrow arrived with full force, years late. He did not deserve to spend his life with someone as good and beautiful as Grace. He had abandoned his family. He had gone about his life doing whatever the hell he’d wanted, but his sister had done nothing wrong. She was a gem and he’d ignored her.

Feeling sorry for himself made him ashamed all over again. But crying wasn’t going to solve anything. It would not absolve him of his many sins. He needed to look forward. To Grace and the life they were about to make together. He had to man up and be truthful.

Bryan O’Shaughnessy had never been fully truthful in any part of his life.

He wasn’t sure he could be now.

82

Somewhere in Assumpta’s house a phone rang, and all three heads swung around.

Lottie took her chance and leaped from the chair, tackling Robert Hayes in an effort to dislodge the knife from his hand.

Imelda screamed.

Hayes refused to loosen his grip on the knife as Lottie struggled with him.

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