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‘Because nice girls don’t take it up the ass.’
‘You’re not a nice girl. Not even a nice human, in fact. You haven’t once asked how your daughter is.’
My jaw aches from the tension in it as I pull open my jacket and lift out the bundle of notes I’d taken from the safe in my bedroom before leaving this morning.
‘There’s about twenty grand there,’ I growl, staring down at her shocked face. ‘Don’t even bother coming to look for me. We’ve moved, and the new house has security. You won’t even get past the gates before I call the police.’ I stalk to the edge of the room, then turn before I pull open the door. ‘Your dad said not to bother them, either. Not after last time. You’re on your fucking own.’
I’m not ashamed to say my whole body is shaking as I leave.
Chapter 26
KEIR
I text Flynn to tell him I won’t be coming into the office. I also suggest he go home, to which he replies that he’s coming over to the house as he witters something about me having a brain tumour. I decide, as he’s coming over, to ask him to pick up Sorcha. Which, in turn, allows me to pull out a bottle of Talisker I’ve been saving for a special occasion. This might not be a special occasion, per se, but it is monumental in a kind of fucked-up way. And six shots in, this is where Agnes finds me an hour later. I’m in the dining room. The whisky was here, so I haven’t moved much farther since pulling it from the drinks cabinet.
‘Whatever is the matter?’ she asks, placing her string shopping basket down on the dining table. She’s been using string bags since I was wee. I’ve no idea where she gets them from. They’re like something out of the annals of history.
‘Did you buy a job lot of these in the seventies?’ I ask, pulling out a packet of sausages and some milk and putting them on the oak table before wrapping my finger in the string.
‘What?’ Only, in her annoyance, her accent becomes a bit stronger, rendering the wordwhit?
‘These bags. Where do you get them?’
‘Out of a wee catalogue that comes out every year at Christmastide.’ She slaps my hand away before grabbing the bag, the sausages, and then milk, before bustling out of the dining room, returning almost immediately. ‘Why? Are you wanting a wee string baggy, too?’ she asks ridiculously.
I chuckle and take another slug of my drink. ‘No, hen. I was just reminiscing.’
‘Thinkin’ of the past is all well and good, but that’s not what’s bothering you,’ she asserts, swiping the whisky bottle from my reach.
‘Aye, you’re right. But I think I’ve fu—buggered everything up.’
‘Is this about the nice lassie you brought home the other day? The American one?’
‘Yes and no.’ I sigh protractedly.
‘I like her. And the bairn did, too. You can’t fool children into thinking you’re nice if you’re no’. Especially if they’re intuitive about such things, like Sorcha is.’
‘Better not introduce her to her mother then.’
‘What?’
‘I’m glad you liked Paisley. I’m sad because I liked her, too.’ Probably a bit too much.
‘Liking her made you sad? What’s with you today, and what’s with the mention of Jayne?’
‘She who shall not be named, mainly because she no longer goes by that name, is back in the country. And, sadly, I think Paisley and I have had our time in the sun.’
‘Has this got something to do with the stuff in the newspaper?’ she asks, pulling up a seat and sitting next to me.
‘You still like her after reading all that?’
Agnes harrumphs. ‘Anyone who believes what they read is a bampot—a daftie. Newspapers print a load of rubbish, and Paisley’s a nice lassie. Even if her parents must be a wee bit simple in the head,’ she says, touching her own head, ‘for naming such a bonny girl after a Scottish town.’
‘Paisley.’ I huff out a laugh.
‘Sure, there are nicer things to call your child, but it could’ve been worse, I suppose. They might’ve called her Auchtermuchty. Or Dull. I have a cousin who lives in Dull,’ she adds, ignoring my slightly shaking shoulders. ‘It’s no’ such a bad place, but it would make a stupid name.’
‘So,’ she then says, folding her arms under her cardigan-covered bosoms—bosoms, because women of Agnes’s ilk and measure have bosoms. Not breasts. If she had breasts, I wouldn’t be thinking about them, so it’s just as well she has this sort of battleship kind of shelf. Which is what I think bosoms are.
