sixty-three

Danny entered his house through the back door with two pizzas in hand and much-needed kid time in mind. The investigations had reached the tedious stage of burrowing into obscure leads and wrangling paperwork. For Annie’s death, Sid Gibson still intrigued him, but nothing concrete had ascended out of the masses of information that DS Sheehy diligently parsed and delegated. Nathan as the common point between the two deaths had led nowhere. In four days, they’d lose Sheehy back to his district.

“Pizza!” Danny called.

“’Allo,” returned Marcus from the living room. A moment later the children hustled into the kitchen. Danny stooped to hug them hello, and gave their tabby kittens, Ashe and Fire, back scratches while he was at it.

“Can we eat in the living room?” Mandy said. “We’re playing Legos, and I need to keep an eye on things.”

From the living room, Danny caught murmuring voices. “Who’s with Grandpap?”

“That woman Mum doesn’t like.” Mandy climbed onto a kitchen chair and opened a pizza box. “Is she allowed in our house?”

Merrit, then. No surprise, since she and Marcus were friends, but he hoped visiting didn’t become a habit. “Merrit is Grandpap’s friend.”

“Why doesn’t Mum like her?”

Danny pulled down plates to give himself a second to think. “She annoys Mum, that’s all.”

“Does she annoy you, too?”

“At times. Doesn’t Petey annoy you sometimes?”

“Yes, but that’s different.”

“Annoyance is annoyance.” He tousled her hair. “What are you going to do?”

“Yeah,” Petey echoed, “what are you going to do?”

Mandy snorted and retraced her steps into the living room with Petey following on her heels. Tricky kid conversations often left Danny feeling fraudulent in the parenting department. He hadn’t realized that Mandy knew how Ellen felt about Merrit. The thought distressed him, though not on Merrit’s behalf. Kids should be sheltered from the shite that arrived with adult relationships. In this respect, he and Ellen had failed as parents. He couldn’t help but wonder what else they’d failed to shelter Mandy and Petey from. They’d certainly felt more loss than any children should at their ages.

He gathered up the pizzas, plates, and napkins, and entered the living room. Merrit relaxed with Marcus on the couch while the children sat on the ground playing with a Lego space station and a Lego house. Merrit aimed an apologetic grimace at Danny.

Ah, so she had more in mind than visiting with Marcus.

He greeted Merrit in a nonchalant way to prevent Mandy’s hackles from rising any further and set the pizzas on the coffee table. “There’s plenty for all of us.”

Danny wasn’t fooled by Mandy’s absorption in her Lego house. She’d aimed her ears at them like satellite dishes. With great dignity, she picked up the piece of pepperoni pizza farthest from where Merrit sat, slid it onto a plate, and returned to her spot in front of the blocks.

Marcus bit into a slice of sausage and mushroom. “Merrit was telling me the preparations for Liam’s festival have gotten out of hand.”

“Do you think people will come?” Merrit said.

Marcus guffawed. “Listen to her. She’s after wanting to be let off the hook.”

Merrit picked up a slice of pepperoni with a smile at Petey. Mandy scowled as she regarded Merrit from under her bangs.

Danny opened his mouth to admonish Mandy for her bad manners, but Marcus shook his head. “Mandy’s been working on her Lego house. It’s a mighty beauty, isn’t it?”

“It’s a hotel for the space station visitors,” Mandy said.

Danny lowered himself to the floor beside her. “Smart thinking.”

She leaned into him, showing him the tiny yellow chairs and tables while Marcus and Merrit continued their conversation. Danny half listened to them, half listened to his daughter. After a while, he gathered up her plate along with Marcus’s.

“Let me help you.” Merrit paused with an awkward glance around the room. Her eyes glowed green in the light from the closest lamp.

“Grab the pizza boxes, would you?” Danny said.

“Sorry about that,” Merrit said once they were alone. “I wasn’t sure what to say with the kids there.”

“Next time text me to let me know you need to talk with me.”

She was quick to demur. “I wanted to catch up with Marcus, too.”

Danny set about wrapping the leftover pizza slices in tinfoil. She rinsed a plate and set it in the dishwasher.

“It’s about Nathan,” she said. “The other day in the hospital, he expressed interest in Sid Gibson. He’d overheard your side of a phone conversation.”

“Bloody hell. He did a good impersonation of being asleep.”

“He’s convinced that Sid killed Annie.” She leaned against the counter with gaze aimed at a drawing of a purple Easter bunny that hung on the refrigerator. “He wanted to know what I knew about the man—what you might have told me.”

The doorbell rang, followed by a flurry of children’s footsteps. In the other room, Zoe laughed at something Petey said. “Hello,” she said, “I’m Zoe. Nice to meet you.”

Merrit groaned. “What’s she doing here?”

“Peddling her services?”

“Let’s hope not.” She popped a stray piece of pepperoni into her mouth. “I want to ask you a favor, but it can wait for now.”

“Dad!” Mandy yelled. “This lady brought cake. Can we have dessert?”

“Cake,” Merrit muttered. “It’ll be from scratch, you’ll see.”

Zoe as Pied Piper entered the kitchen with the children not far behind. She’d wrapped one of her blue scarves over her head like a 1950s Hollywood starlet. “Chocolate cake as a thank-you token for taking my dad to the hospital.” She placed the offering, with its swirls of decadent frosting, on the counter and turned her exuberant
smile toward Merrit. “What a nice surprise! I was just thinking about you and Liam. I can’t wait for the party this weekend.”

“Oh yes.” Merrit didn’t bother to disguise her ambivalence. “That looks delicious. I bet you made it yourself.”

“I don’t bake often,” Zoe said. “I’m more of a meal maker, but I decided to try my hand.”

Marcus took charge. “I’ll cut our slices and the kidlings can eat while I read them a story.”

“I want to stay here,” Petey said.

Mandy glared from Zoe to Merrit and back. “The adults probably need to talk.”

“Correct,” Danny said. “We know a man who is sick, and we’re trying to help him.”

“Bully for you.” She grabbed her slice of cake and marched out of the room ahead of Marcus and Petey.

“What a wee sprite,” Zoe said. “She’ll be a precocious one, you’ll see.”

“Like you were?” Merrit said.

“Oh no. I was a homebody as a teenager. I lived with my grandparents, you know. My mom’s parents. They didn’t live too far from us in Sussex. I was a good girl and kept my precocity to myself.”

Danny marveled at Zoe’s capacity for sidelining the world of hurt that lurked below the surface story. “You must have missed your dad.”

Zoe’s cheerful expression dimmed. “I did. I was disappointed. I’d thought we’d be grand, the two of us, after the grief over my mother’s death lessened. Silly. What did I know about big emotions?”

Danny sliced off a bite-sized piece of cake and chewed. Merrit did the same. Danny beckoned Zoe to partake also. She smiled her thanks and cut off a chunk for herself.

“What happened the day Nathan was committed?” he said.

“You don’t know?”

“It’s difficult to get psych records. We’re still waiting.”

“Ooh.” Zoe popped the piece of cake into her mouth. “All this time, I thought you knew.” She slipped out of her white coat and unwound the scarf from around her neck. She wore a jumper with a cowled neckline that she proceeded to grab from the bottom.

“Hold on there,” Danny said.

Zoe rolled her eyes. “You’re not going to see anything a bikini top wouldn’t reveal.”

In one fluid movement she pulled off the jumper. Her bra surprised Danny. A simple white garment without a speck of lace or frill, girlish in its simplicity. She pivoted so that her back faced them. Between her shoulder blades, two scars marred the smooth expanse of ivory skin. Unlike Nathan’s scar, they’d healed into shiny, pale lines.

“He went mental on me. Lost his marbles.” She pulled the jumper back on and turned around. She sliced another piece of cake as she spoke. “He’s not violent, you know. Not really. His attempt to kill me was pretty feeble.”

“You forgave him.”

She plopped the chunk into her mouth. “Of course. He’s my dad. I understand why he hid himself away from me in Ireland all these years. I wasn’t the perfect daughter. I was too insistent about myself, I think. The way I am, you know?” Her smile reappeared. “You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed that about me.”

“Enthusiastic,” Merrit said.

“That’s my word for it. Some would call me pushy.”

Some days Danny’s children pushed him to the bleeding edge, and some days he barely contained the urge to tear out his hair or slam his hand down on a tabletop. How pushy would a child need to be to tip a mentally unstable parent over the edge? Answer: not pushy at all. A child being a child could be more than enough.

“How old were you when Nathan first showed signs of instability?”

Zoe picked up the cake knife and set it aside again. “Mum and Dad loved each other. They had a wonderful relationship, the best, and they loved me. I don’t remember anything in particular until I hit adolescence, and then Dad distanced himself. I was rebellious in my small ways. What you’d expect, I guess. And I resented Mum’s rule more. I was such a pill sometimes!” She laughed, shaking her head. “The big change came around the time Mum died. I wish I could be more helpful.”

She wrapped her scarf around her shoulders again. The fringe caught on one of her butterfly earrings. She eased the earring free. “I never blamed my dad for attacking me. In a strange way, I considered it a sign that he cared.”

With that she swung her coat over her shoulders and said her goodbyes. After the front door shut behind her, Merrit’s comment pretty much said all that Danny was thinking.

“That’s one fecked-up relationship those two have.”

“Nice use of the word feck,” he said.