Keelan had put Saoirse to bed early, read her a story and then tidied the kitchen before Cillian arrived home. The row started over nothing.
‘You spend more time fussing over Saoirse than me.’ Cillian kicked off his shoes and put his feet up on the coffee table.
‘And you spend more time giving out about your brother than looking out for him.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Have you not noticed how down he is lately?’
‘Down? And how would you know that?’
‘I saw him wandering around town. He seems … depressed.’
‘Our sister vanished off the face of the earth and it tore our family apart.’ He dropped his feet from the table and leaned over with his hands dangling between his legs.
‘I know that. I’ve lived through it with you for the last five years.’ Every year it was the same. The week before and the week after the fourteenth of February. And she knew the roses he presented her with annually were really in memory of the sister he had lost.
‘Yeah, but you don’t know what it did to me, to my family, at the time.’
She placed Saoirse’s train book, which Cillian had bought her, back on the shelf and turned to him. ‘That’s because you won’t speak to me about it. You just bottle it all up. Then every so often the cork explodes from the bottle and I have to suffer your temper.’
‘I said I was sorry about the plates. Did you buy a new set?’
‘I’m not talking about the damn plates. I’m talking about you and me. The way you treat me. It’s not right, Cillian. I think you need help.’
He shot up from the chair and grabbed her by the arm. ‘Don’t you dare say that. First you say my brother is depressed, then you lay all the blame on me.’
‘You’re hurting me.’ She tried to wriggle out of his grasp. He tightened his grip, his fingers digging into her skin, right through to the bone of her arm.
‘Hurting? I can hurt you a lot more. Would you like that?’
‘Stop!’ She snapped his fingers away from her skin one by one. She knew it was anger that drove her strength. He stood looking at her slack-jawed.
She said, ‘I’ve lived with the ghost of your sister haunting me every day since I met you. I thought by now you would have exorcised her spirit. But it gets worse. Every fucking year it gets worse. I’ve just about had enough of it. Do you get me?’
And then the tears started. She didn’t want to cry. She knew it would incense him further. Clenching her fists to keep from lashing out at him, from tearing her nails into his pathetic face, she turned away. Took out the train book and began ripping out the pages, one by one. She had no idea why she was doing it, taking a rise out of him, when he could explode at any minute.
His phone rang, and when he hung up, he said, ‘I’m going out.’
She watched him pulling on his shoes. ‘Where?’ He didn’t answer. Helplessly she said, ‘Take your coat.’
At the door, he spun round. ‘You sound more like my mother every day,’ he snarled.
The slam of the door woke Saoirse, and as Keelan rushed to her daughter’s room, she wondered if she now possessed the strength to leave Cillian O’Donnell once and for all.
Sixty-One
The house was unnaturally quiet when Lottie arrived home. Then she remembered that Katie and little Louis were in New York. She pushed the buggy out of the way and wheeled it into the sitting room, glad Katie had the light stroller with her.
‘Sean?’ she called up the stairs. ‘Will you fold up this buggy, please? And where is Chloe?’
Without waiting for a reply, she went to the kitchen and began pulling things from the refrigerator to prepare dinner.
‘Can we get takeaway?’ Chloe said, walking in behind her.
‘I’ve to cook something for your granny, so I may as well cook for us all.’ Lottie turned to find Chloe lounging against the kitchen door, pulling at her sleeves.
‘What’s up?’
‘Nothing. We’re on mid-term next week, and with Katie and Louis away I was wondering maybe we could go somewhere for a few days.’
‘I’m in the middle of a murder investigation. I can’t just up and leave.’
‘It’s always about you, isn’t it?’
‘Sorry, Chloe, I didn’t mean—’
‘Forget it.’
‘I’m sorry.’ She was talking to fresh air.
Sean shouted from the sitting room, ‘I haven’t a clue how this thing folds up. I’ll just push it in behind the couch.’
Her phone rang. ‘Yes, Mother?’
‘I roasted a chicken for myself. There’s some left over if you want it.’
‘No, it’s fine. We’re getting a takeaway.’
She hung up before her mother could lecture her about the importance of healthy eating for the development of teenagers’ brains. At least Rose seemed to be on the mend.
Chloe appeared at the door. ‘Will I ring for food, then?’
‘Yeah, do.’
But Lottie didn’t feel like takeaway. She felt like going out. Somewhere she could get a drink without Chloe finding out.
She rang Boyd.
Sixty-Two
The three men were sitting in the kitchen. The doorbell pierced the silence. Donal got up to answer it.
Cillian eyed his brother across the table. Finn dropped his head and Cillian smiled. He always did have the upper hand where his brother was concerned. His father returned with a woman behind him. Cropped curly hair and black-rimmed spectacles. She was about forty years old. Not much to look at, he thought.
‘This is Cynthia Rhodes. She’s from the telly,’ Donal said.
‘Hi, I’m pleased to meet you all.’ She shook hands and sat down uninvited.
With the four of them seated around the table, Cillian said, ‘Are you going to tell us what this is about?’
‘I don’t like dredging up sad memories, but I want to do a feature for the news on the tenth anniversary of Lynn’s disappearance. It might rekindle an interest in her case.’
‘I’m not so sure,’ Donal said.
‘Do you mind if I record this.’ She placed her phone on the table, with its recording app open.
‘I do mind,’ Cillian said, folding his arms. She took a notebook out of her bag. ‘And you can put that away too.’
‘Okay.’ She put her bag on the floor. ‘I’ve seen the posters around town. I thought you would like some more publicity.’
Finn spoke up. ‘Depends on what you mean by publicity.’
Donal said, ‘We miss Lynn so much. And my wife Maura … she died …’
Cillian sighed. He hoped his old man wasn’t going to start blubbering. He’d seen enough tears to last him forever.
‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ Cynthia said. ‘Maybe something will turn up if I do a particularly good feature? Like Crimecall.’
Cillian grunted. ‘The authorities seem to think no body, no crime. But we’ve been without our sister for the last ten years, so in my mind that is a crime.’
‘I agree,’ Cynthia said.
‘Then why are you talking to us?’ Cillian said. ‘Talk to the guards. See what they can tell you.’
‘I tried, but they’re very tight-lipped about it. I thought with the murder of a young woman last seen on the train, they would see the similarity to Lynn’s disappearance.’
‘I heard that. Awful it was,’ Donal said.
‘So, can you tell me anything that might help jog someone’s memory?’
Donal stood up and busied himself folding the newspaper. ‘You know the facts. My daughter worked in the civil service in Dublin. Commuted every day. And on the fourteenth of February 2006, she got the train home as usual, only she never arrived. That morning was the last time any of us laid eyes on her.’
‘And you boys, when did you last see your sister?’
Cillian observed the reporter taking notes surreptitiously in the notebook on her knee. Does she think I can’t see her? ‘We all lived at home then. Lynn got up for the early train. There was only the one early train back then. Me and Finn, we saw her the night before, when we were going to bed. Isn’t that right?’
Finn grunted, head still bowed. Cillian kicked him under the table.
‘That’s right,’ he said.