‘Long time no see,’ he said. ‘What brings you here?’
‘Just popped in for a chat.’ She thought his eyes looked a lot darker than she remembered, with circles of blue-grey around them.
‘Well, it’s nice to see you,’ he said.
Lottie doubted the sincerity of his words. It was the way he looked at her when he said them. She glanced at Annabelle, frozen, cloth in hand, watching Cian watching her. Bizarre.
‘Don’t let me disturb your chinwag.’ He turned on his brown leather loafers and took himself out of the kitchen and back up the stairs, leaving the door wide open.
‘Don’t mind him.’ Annabelle rushed into motion, sweeping her hair on top of her head and wrapping it up tightly with a bobbin. ‘Work pressure.’
As her friend cleared away the mugs, Lottie said, ‘Is everything okay?’
‘Why wouldn’t it be?’ Annabelle dried her hands, checked a pot boiling on the stove then shepherded Lottie back to her boots at the front door.
‘Does Cian know about Tom?’
‘Shh!’ Annabelle put a finger to her lips, opened the door and shoved Lottie out on to the step. ‘Yes, he knows, but there’s no need to remind him. I’ll see you in town. Soon. For a coffee?’
‘Yeah, sure,’ Lottie said, standing in her saturated socks, boots in hand.
The door closed before she could ask the question she had come to ask.
* * *
‘What did she want?’
‘Cian, you know right well her name is Lottie.’
‘Always sounded like a dog’s name to me. Where’s dinner?’
‘Ready in ten.’
Annabelle backed up to the counter. She hated it when Cian was in this kind of humour, and it seemed to be happening more often. Since he’d discovered about her affair with the property developer Tom Rickard, he had made her life a living hell. It hadn’t even been her first affair – just the first he’d found out about. If it wasn’t for the twins, she’d have left long ago.
She turned her back to him and checked the saucepan, stirring the vegetables around and around and gazing vacantly at the swirling water. She knew that her indiscretion with Rickard had elevated Cian’s wrath to a new level, and for the sake of her sanity she had made a conscious decision to make her marriage work. But all her efforts seemed to be failing. Badly.
She put the lid back on the saucepan, turned down the heat. Behind her she could hear Cian clattering the sweeping brush around the kitchen floor. Before she knew what was happening, her legs were whacked from under her, and she was sprawled on the black and white tiles, her husband standing over her. She shielded her face as he rained blows down on her legs with the handle of the brush.
‘Stop, please stop!’ she pleaded.
‘You’re a slut,’ he snarled. ‘Spreading your legs for scum, and then you try to deny me in bed.’ He reached down and pulled her hair free of the topknot. Wrapping the long blonde strands around his fingers, he pulled her up to her feet. ‘And then you bring your detective friend around here, snooping. For what?’
‘You’re insane,’ she spat.
‘I’m perfectly sane. I just want what is mine. Mine!’
When he let go of her hair, she slumped against the cupboard, her legs like jelly. There was only so much a person could take. She would have to leave him.
‘Where’s your Lottie friend now? Woof, woof.’
‘Cian, we need to talk.’ She held up her hands, appealing to him. Annabelle had never begged for anything in her life. But maybe now she was begging for her life. She shrugged off the tremor scuttling up her spine. Ignored the pain in her legs. Her husband might be all macho with the handle of a sweeping brush in his hand, but when she slammed the divorce papers in front of him, then she’d see what he was really made of.
‘Talk? Now you want to talk?’ His laugh was stoked with derision. He grabbed her chin and held her throat. She felt his other hand pulling at the zipper on her jeans.
‘What the fuck? Get off me, Cian!’
‘Shut your mouth.’ With a kick, he spread her legs and thrust his body up against hers.
‘I hate you,’ she hissed. She struggled against him, but she was no match for him. Crushing her body against the granite, he pulled at her jeans. When he couldn’t get them down, he stood back and hit her in the stomach with the brush handle. Doubling over in pain, she felt the wood smash into her back. She bit her tongue, and blood seeped out of the side of her mouth. She wouldn’t cry. He could beat her and mock her, but by God, she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her cry.
The pot on the stove whistled. She twisted round on the floor to see Cian standing over her, the pot in his hand, steam rising in a cloud from the boiling water. Rolling her body into a ball, she held out her hands, pleading.
‘No! Cian… no!’
Eighteen
‘Something’s not right with the O’Sheas,’ Lottie said.
‘What makes you say that?’ Boyd drummed his fingers on the steering wheel.
‘Cian was acting a bit… off. He was always funny, but this was different.’
‘Funny ha ha?’
‘More like creepy. Are you going to start the car or start up a band?’
‘I’m thinking about it,’ Boyd said.
‘Why would he want the door left open?’
‘Who?’
‘Annabelle’s husband.’
‘What door?’
‘We were talking in the kitchen,’ Lottie explained. ‘Annabelle closed the door when I asked her about Tom Rickard. Then Cian comes charging down the stairs giving out about the door being shut.’
‘Maybe he likes listening to his wife chattering nonsense with her friends?’
‘Whatever it is, I think something isn’t right in that house.’
‘You’ve enough to be concerned about without getting involved in other people’s business.’
‘That’s not what I meant. Oh, you’re not even listening to me.’
‘Come on, Lottie. You and I both know Annabelle O’Shea. No one tells her what to do. Not even her husband. Drop it.’
But Lottie couldn’t get the look on Annabelle’s face out of her mind. ‘She was scared. Why did she blame me for closing the door? Outright lie. Why do that?’
‘Why didn’t you ask her?’
‘I didn’t get a chance. She rushed me out of that house like it was on fire.’
‘If it’s bothering you that much, ring her or call into her surgery.’
‘I think I will.’
She caught Boyd’s look – his eyes wide with warning.
‘On second thoughts,’ he said, ‘don’t get involved.’
‘I said I’ll think about it. Let’s go.’
‘Can we go get—’
‘Food? No. I have to get home.’
Before she could even put her seat belt on, he was out on the main road, whizzing back towards town.
* * *
The smell of burning toast hit her as she walked through her front door. At least the smoke alarm wasn’t blaring.
‘What’s going on in here?’ she asked, dropping her bag and unplugging the toaster. She flapped a tea towel around to clear the air. Maybe the alarm needed a new battery. She’d have to check that later.
The kitchen was full of bodies. Chloe was sitting at the table on her phone. Katie was rocking baby Louis in his Moses basket. He wasn’t crying, for a change. Lottie gave him a kiss and began clearing the mess of bread, knives, butter and bottles from the counter.
‘Katie, you have to clean up after you make the bottles. And who was this for?’ She held up the blackened piece of bread. No answer. The stench of dirty nappies rose from the bin. ‘I told you to use the bin outside for nappies.’ Still no answer.
The steriliser needed to be cleaned. The carton of baby formula was almost empty. ‘Did you go shopping?’
‘Mam! How could I? I’ve been busy with Louis all day. Please keep your voice down. I’ve only just got him to sleep.’
‘You could’ve put him in his buggy and walked to the shops.’
‘Did you see the rain?’
Stepping on a pile of swept-up dirt by the door to the utility room, Lottie went to get the brush and dustpan. The washing basket was overflowing with baby clothes and towels. She loaded the machine and switched it on.
‘Where’s Sean?’