Love and Shamrocks: Ballybeg, Book 5 (7 page)

Tammy recoiled, her expression morphing from upset to resentment. “If you cared about anyone but yourself, you’d never have brought me to this dump.” With a choked sob, the girl fled the kitchen. A few moments later, her bedroom door slammed.

Helen drew herself up to her full five-foot-six-inches, including heels. “The girl needs to respect her elders. You’re far too lenient with her.”

Clio jittered with the urge to smash every tissue-paper-wrapped piece of porcelain in the house. “While I’m grateful for the chance to start afresh in Ballybeg, I’m not prepared to let you bully me or Tammy.”

Helen blinked, her haughty expression crumbling. “I’m not bullying anyone. I just want things done correctly.” She paused, uncertainty marring the immobility of her usually frozen features, and then heaved a sigh. “Perhaps my reaction was a little hasty. It’s been a trying weekend. Everything that could go wrong did go wrong while filming the episode of my show. A veritable case of Murphy’s Law gone wild. And I was fond of that vase.”

“Tammy is sorry she broke it. She can pay for a replacement out of her pocket money.”

Her mother brushed invisible lint from her pencil skirt. “Don’t be silly. I don’t expect the child to give me her pocket money. It would take her years to pay back what the vase cost.”

“She can make a token contribution at the very least.” Clio placed her empty coffee cup in the dishwasher and fetched the brush and pan from underneath the sink. “I realize living together is difficult for all of us, but Tammy’s recovering from a traumatic experience. She needs support, not constant criticism.”

Helen’s mouth hardened into a thin line. “If you’d paid more attention to where she was going and who she was seeing, none of this would have happened.”

Clio’s breath caught on a retort so delicious she could taste it. Her nails dug into her palms. Only the reminder she was dependent on her mother’s goodwill stopped her from exploding. “Like you kept an eye on me?”

Her mother looked tired all of a sudden, her true age showing briefly beneath the careful mask of makeup. “That’s precisely what I mean. I don’t like to see you making the same mistakes with Tammy that I made with you.”

“There’s no comparison,” Clio snapped, her resolution to keep her cool evaporating. “I got pregnant when I was seventeen by a younger boy. Tammy was attacked by a thirty-year-old man.”

“He didn’t attack her.” Helen’s tone was clipped, impatient. “He seduced her. Tammy says she loves him.”

“I know what she says.” Her voice raised a notch, wobbly with emotion. “But she’s not yet fifteen. He’s an adult.” How obtuse could her mother be? How could she not see a major problem with a teacher persuading a minor schoolgirl to have sex?

“Be that as it may, your handling of the situation leaves much to be desired.”

Hysterical laughter gurgled in Clio’s throat. If only Helen knew just how much her handling of the situation left to be desired.

“I’m saying this because my reaction to your pregnancy drove you away.” Her mother’s tone was tired, resigned. “I don’t want to see you create a rift with Tammy that takes years to heal.”

“How can you compare our situation to my relationship with Tammy? I’m there for her. I’m being supportive. I haven’t rejected her for making a mistake.”

Helen raised an eyebrow. “Are you really there for her, though? You’re very quick to dismiss her emotions. Telling her she can’t possibly be in love with Trevor O’Leary isn’t respecting her feelings.”

“He abused her. What she thinks she feels isn’t real. It can’t be.”

“It is to her. In any case,” continued Helen with an imperious sniff, “the man is in a coma. I suppose one can consider his being mugged a sort of karmic justice.”

Karmic justice delivered at the hands of Ray Greer’s thugs. Clio shuddered. Violence was
not
what she’d had in mind when she’d asked Ray to scare O’Leary off. Why he’d taken it upon himself to beat the living daylights out of the man was a mystery.

The throb in Clio’s head turned into a drumroll. She kneeled on the floor and brushed up broken glass. A crazy impulse to tell her mother everything hovered on the tip of her tongue, but mutual trust was in short supply.
With good reason
, she thought, the image of the two thousand euros fresh in her mind. “I tried calling you yesterday,” she said carefully, “but I couldn’t get through.”

“Oh? Did you leave a message?” Helen scrutinized her phone’s display. “Or did you speak to my PA? Phoebe didn’t mention your call.”

“No message. It wasn’t something I wanted to discuss with your assistant.”

Helen lowered her gaze, and a hint of a frown line appeared on her forehead. “If this concerns Tammy’s issues, I contacted the psychologist I mentioned. She’ll be in touch next week.”

“Thank you, but that’s not what I wanted to—”

Helen’s mobile phone buzzed, instantly claiming her full attention. “It’s my producer. We’ll talk later. In the meantime, can you finish cleaning up this mess? And maybe start unpacking the living room?” She moved toward the door, phone to her ear, heels clicking across the hard stone floor.

“I…Yeah, sure.” Clio’s legs were as unsteady as a building during an earthquake.
Damn.

She leaned over and resumed clearing up the shards of glass. Why had she had an impulse to spill her guts to her mother? A few minutes of semicivil conversation couldn’t erase years of mistrust. Besides, she’d soon have the money back in the safe. And, however she managed it, she’d prevent Ray and his gang from ransacking the house.

A shard of glass pierced her finger, making her wince. Crimson blood beaded at the tip. Cursing, Clio sucked it furiously, catching another sight of herself in the mirror. She looked haggard, a pitiful rendition of the fresh-faced girl of yesteryear. The stress of the past few months was taking its toll.

Clio dumped the broken glass into a plastic bag and tossed it into the bin. She straightened her spine and flexed her shoulders. Next up were the living room boxes. Clio’s stomach did a flip, and her mind shifted into gear. The living room boxes were amongst the few Helen had deigned to unpack herself. Most of the valuable ornaments were in there, hence her reluctance to let Clio and Tammy near them.

Clio’s heartbeat accelerated into a sprint. If Ray’s coveted aquamanile was in Clonmore House, it would be in one of those boxes.

***

Seán popped a painkiller and downed it with an energy drink. After a night spent questioning taciturn relatives and sifting through the charred remains of the caravan, he was exhausted, headachy, and red-eyed, not to mention tormented by memories of a naked Orla. God, she was one sexy woman. He felt awful for running out on her. He didn’t usually do follow-up dates, but he owed her one. And it would be no hardship, frankly. She was sexy, funny, great in bed. Exactly what he needed to take his mind off the job.

He eyed the mountain of paperwork on his rickety desk, topped by a cheeky Hello Kitty Post-it note courtesy of Brian Glenn. Buckets had been strategically placed to catch the drips from Ballybeg Garda Station’s leaky roof.
Drip, drip, drip.

Seán shivered and buttoned his uniform coat closed. The building’s heating system had broken down yet again. In keeping with the general tone of his morning, he’d lost the coin toss with Brian to see who got the station’s lone portable heater. Screw the budget. He was buying another couple of heaters to tide them over until they escaped this cesspit.

In the spring, the staff of Ballybeg Garda Station was due to move into temporary digs while this building was bulldozed and another constructed in its place. The move couldn’t come soon enough for Seán.

He fingered his phone with frozen fingers. Maybe he’d send Orla a quick text message before he tackled the admin. Invite her to dinner. He typed fast and hit Send. Almost instantly, his phone pinged.
Message undeliverable
. His heart sank. He’d wondered when she’d given him the number if it was the real deal. Seán chewed the top of his pen. Perhaps he’d give her a quick call, just in case.

A tinny automated voice droned, “This number is not in service.” So she
had
given him a fake number. Seriously? Okay, he’d had to cut and run, but he’d had a great time up until that point. He’d thought she had too. Ah, well. It wasn’t as if he had time to spare on wining and dining a woman, however sexy she might be.

He massaged his temples and tried to focus on the mountain of paperwork on his rickety desk.
An Garda Síochána
was strapped for cash at the best of times, and at Ballybeg Garda Station, funds for office furniture were nonexistent.

At the knock on his office door, he looked up.

“Morning, Seán.” Superintendent O’Riordan stood in the doorway, dapper in his police uniform, his silver-gray hair neatly combed off his broad forehead. Although he must have barely met the height requirement that had still been in place when he joined the police force forty years ago, the super’s confident posture and straight back made him appear taller than he was in reality. He looked cheerful and rested. Unlike Seán,
he’d
had a full night’s sleep.

“Sir,” he grunted in greeting.

“That bad a night?” The super cocked a bushy gray eyebrow. “I come bearing coffee.” The older man placed a tall paper cup on the desk. The tantalizing aroma of freshly brewed coffee was sufficient to bring a smile to Seán’s face, however fleeting.

“Ah,” he said, “the coffee smells divine. Thank you.”

“I wouldn’t drink the swill in the machine out front if my life depended on it.” His boss gave an exaggerated shudder. “This is from the Cottage Café on Curzon Street.”

Seán knew the place. It was the newest café in Ballybeg, and served a decent espresso. He took a sip of the strong black brew and sighed in appreciation.

“No news on the fire?” the super asked, sitting on the edge of the desk.

“No news,” Seán said with a grimace, “and no one’s talking.”

“In that case, I need to borrow you for a couple of hours.”

He gestured toward the stack of papers. “Much as I’d love to escape this freezing office, can’t it wait, sir? I’m way behind on admin.”

The super’s smile widened to Cheshire cat proportions. “No, lad, it can’t wait. I have a job for you.”

Seán sighed and pushed his chair back from the desk. “Does this involve John-Joe Fitzgerald and an air rifle?”

The older man laughed. “No. It involves Helen Havelin and a stalker.”

“A stalker?” Seán frowned. “Who’d she piss off this time?”

It was the super’s turn to frown. “I don’t think Ms. Havelin is in the habit of pissing people off.”

Seán begged to differ but opted to keep his trap shut. This toeing-the-line business was a bitch. Facing Helen Havelin wasn’t on his bucket list, especially not with a pounding headache, but he had his Dublin transfer to consider. He toyed with his cup. “At least the coffee is portable.”

“Indeed it is.” The super grabbed Seán’s hat and scarf from the stand by the door and tossed them on the desk. “Come on, lad. Let’s go.”

CLIO FOUND THE AQUAMANILE in the last moving box.

She knelt on the plush carpet, staring at the copper piece in her hand. It was smaller than she’d expected and heavier than it appeared. The delicate face was exquisite, each detail lovingly carved. The copper was polished to a fine shine. The aquamanile was over eight hundred years old, yet the expression on the leopard’s face was so lifelike, it could have been made yesterday.

Clio placed it on the ground with trembling hands.
A quarter of a million euros.
That amount of money could buy a person freedom.

“Are you finished unpacking?” Helen appeared in the doorway, making Clio jump. She’d changed into a figure-hugging dress and strappy sandals. Her dark red hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and her makeup was flawless. She could pass for Clio’s sister. Helen claimed her youthful looks were thanks to good genes. Clio suspected they were thanks to good docs.

“Yeah, I’m finished.” Clio pushed herself to her feet and positioned the aquamanile on the mantelpiece. “This was the last box.”

Helen clucked her disapproval. “Not there, Cliona. Put it on the display table by the window.”

Walking toward the table was akin to wading through seawater. Clio’s limbs didn’t seem to work as they should, and her hands refused to stop trembling.

Her mother didn’t notice.

But when had Helen ever noticed when Clio was upset? She’d spent her childhood trying to connect with her mother, desperate for her attention and approval. It wasn’t until she fell pregnant with Tammy that the full force of her mother’s attention was turned on her—and that was with anything but approval.

Helen stood before the window, stroking the leopard aquamanile, a rare expression of contentment across her face. “A lovely piece,” she said. “As soon as I saw it, I had to own it.”

Clio tasted the bitter dregs of resentment. When had Helen last touched her in affection? Or Tammy? Never.

Guilt gnawed at her insides. Okay, her mother might be a pain at times, but she didn’t deserve to be robbed. Not of the two thousand euros Clio had taken from the safe, and certainly not of something this valuable. She’d phone Ray and tell him they were still waiting for the rest of Helen’s belongings to be delivered to Clonmore House. Anything to stall him and buy time for Emma to dig up info that Clio could use against him.

She bit back a scream of frustration. What demon had possessed her to take justice into her own hands? Why hadn’t she done what everyone else had advised, namely let it go? She caught sight of the photo of a two-year-old Tammy perched on the mantelpiece, all chubby cheeks and sweet-faced innocence.

Her heart swelled. She hadn’t let it go because she’d wanted to keep her daughter safe.

She took and deep a breath and forced her feet into motion. Time to contact the devil himself.

***

They took the super’s car, a sleek black BMW. With a cynical smile, Seán slid into the passenger side. Despite being strapped for cash, the Irish police force managed to find the money to supply its senior officers with cars befitting their rank. Seán should know. Up until last year’s debacle, he’d been among them.