Page 62 of Road Trip
“‘To market, to market, to buy a fat pig,’” he chanted, his face breaking into a broad grin. “‘Home again, home again, jiggety-jig. To market, to market, to buy a fat hog. Home again, home again, jiggety-jog.’” He noted the surprised expression on her face. “I suppose it’s an old nursery rhyme,” he said. “My granddad used to sing it, after he’d taken us to the shops to buy sweets.”
She felt another unexpected pang of sadness. All those months of Mary Helen’s illness, she hadn’t realized the dementia had been slowly robbing her of her mother, bit by bit. Hearing that silly little verse reminded her again of her loss. Hers and Therese’s.
“I had fun tonight,” she said, turning to Liam.
He leaned across the steering wheel and held her face between both hands, his lips finding hers. The kiss was gentle at first, and when she responded, his embrace deepened. After a moment, he trailed a fingertip down her cheek. “Lovely,” he whispered, his lips close to her ear. He pulled her closer, kissed her again.
“Can I see you again?”
“I’d like that,” Maeve said, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks as she thought about what she’d really like—which was to have Liam walk her inside the inn, take her to a vacant room, and do all the wild, sinful things she’d been told her whole life not to do with a strange man.
“Better go now,” she said reluctantly. “Big day tomorrow.”
He got out of the Jeep, came around, and helped her out of the passenger seat, casually slinging an arm around her shoulder as he walked her to the inn’s front door, where he kissed her again. “Home again, home again,” he whispered.
CHAPTER 27
Therese hastily cleared the letters off her bed, stripped off her jeans, dropping them onto the floor, and climbed into bed, snapping off the lamp on the nightstand, turning with her back to the door, and pulling the covers over her head.
By the time she heard a key in the lock and heard the door creak open she was taking long, slow breaths, feigning sleep. Fuck Maeve. She’d never give her the satisfaction of letting her know she’d been worried.
Her sister tiptoed around the room, like a thief in the night. Therese wanted to laugh, because it reminded her of all the nights she’d been the one sneaking in through her bedroom window, praying Mary Helen wouldn’t catch her, with her panties in her purse, smelling of weed or booze or both.
How times had changed.
“I know you’re not asleep,” Maeve said.
“Am too.”
“Liar. I saw you spying on us out the window.”
Therese grinned into her pillow. “Slut.”
They were inthe rental car, on the way to Cobh, when Therese’s curiosity finally got the better of her.
“How was last night?” she said, trying to sound casual.
“Nice.” Maeve wanted to kick herself for not being more forthcoming with details of her date, but whatever she felt for Liam still felt too new, too fragile, to be examined in the light of day.
“Where’d you go?”
“A pub called the Three-Legged Goat. There was a group playing traditional Irish music—the Hooligans. They were really good, but Oh. My. God. Some of those songs were so sad. Heartbreaking. Liam’s friend Donal, from the distillery, was there. Talk about a wild and crazy guy. He sort of started a brawl, then got physically thrown out of the pub, just as we were leaving.”
“Kind of a late night for you,” Therese said. She silently congratulated herself on how chill she was being.
“I wasn’t aware I had a curfew,” Maeve retorted. “What did you do last night, before you started spying on me?”
Therese ignored the barbed comment. “I sorted through Kathleen’s letters and read a bunch of them, which was what I was doing when Scotty Childress called.”
“Uh-oh.”
“He’s been looking into Mom’s transactions at the bank. The records show she started doling out cash to the Reverend Brother Jerome about eighteen months ago.”
“Eighteen months ago,” Maeve repeated. “I knew she was starting to slip back then, but I thought it was little stuff, like letting the teakettle boil dry, or forgetting her doctor’s name or asking me the same question two or three times a day. Completely harmless. It never would have occurred to me she was that far gone.”
Therese lightly touched her sister’s sleeve. “Don’t beat yourself up about it. Nobody else noticed it either, not Bernie or Frannie or Uncle Keith. And apparently, nobody at the bank noticed either, even though all of a sudden after decades of penny-pinching and saving, Mary Helen Dunagin is coming in every Friday to withdraw a hundred, and then five hundred dollars a week in cash, until her life savings were gone.”
“Someone at that bank should have done something,” Maeve said, angry now. “They knew Mom. They know our whole family.Mary Helen Dunagin wasn’t just an account number on a deposit slip.”
