Shiloh sighed. “And you didn’t have any more contact with her?”
Bayou shook his head. “She backed off. I haven’t seen or heard from her in about three and a half years.”
He stopped and waited for more information. I could tell he was curious as to why any of this was relevant, and I could clearly tell he was humoring us with what information he was giving.
There was likely more, but I was sure without more information he wasn’t going to give that out as willingly.
Shiloh blew out a breath.
“About a month ago, Ilsa got reported to CPS by her mother.” Shiloh glanced at Bayou, then down the table at the little girl that was now fitting the last piece of her puzzle into place. “CPS became involved, and nothing was found.”
We all waited, knowing there would be more to this story than met the eye.
“And…”
“And, it wasn’t until Ilsa’s youngest daughter, Isa, nearly died from a drug overdose that CPS could finally pin something on Ilsa.” Shiloh jerked her chin toward the little girl.
That was when I started to notice the bruising on the little girl. In places that IVs would go such as around the top of her foot, and in the little bend of her elbow.
She also looked quite pale and based on the man’s coloring that was two seats down from the little girl, that wasn’t her natural skin tone.
Her hair was also shaved in a spot right above her right ear, synonymous with a drain or shunt of some sort. Did she have brain swelling due to her drug overdose?
“And the little one beside you just spent a month in the hospital, fighting for her life,” Shiloh said softly.
Bayou looked over at the little girl and frowned.
He still didn’t see it.
But he would.
I swallowed hard, about to blurt out my observation, but someone—my father—kicked me under the table, causing me to narrow my eyes at him.
Then I kicked him back.
He winked, and I bared my teeth at him.
Puzzle pieces hit the table, and I looked over to see the little girl—Isa—scatter all the pieces she’d just painstakingly fitted into place all over the table in front of her, then reach for the first piece again.
I blinked as she started with a middle piece.
Jesus, the kid was smart.
I wasn’t sure how she knew that went there, but I was enraptured all the same.
“That’s awful,” Bayou finally said, turning away. “Did Ilsa finally get charged?”
“Yes and no,” Shiloh answered. “She claims that it was her boyfriend, who was watching her that night, that was responsible for the overdose. The ‘boyfriend’ under question, according to her mother, is actually just some man that randomly comes by the house for drugs, but for some reason, he’s covering for Ilsa. It’s a he said, she said kind of thing right now. With five kids in the middle.”
Bayou snorted. “I’ll never understand her capacity to get out of sticky situations. I’m not quite sure how she continues to do it, to be honest, but it gets really fuckin’ old.”
“I agree,” Shiloh said. “Apparently, one of my colleagues from the Brownsboro area, where this is all going down, said they’ve been trying to take her kids away for years, yet they just keep getting out of the situations. This time, it was suggested to us to possibly go a different route, and that was to find the fathers.”
“I tried that, too,” Bayou admitted. “I was able to find one, the eldest kid’s. He was just as much of a piece of shit as Ilsa.”
“Right,” she said. “The grandmother said as much. They all had atrocious fathers…except for that one.”
Bayou once again looked to the little girl and frowned.
“Yeah?”
“Yes,” Shiloh confirmed. “We convinced Ilsa that Isa would be better off with her father until we could get this all sorted out. Since she didn’t want to lose her other four children—for some reason she is acting like they’re chess pieces that she needs to hold onto to win—she agreed to tell us the father’s name in exchange for goodwill when it comes to the other four children. They will stay with her mother until this is over. Isa, on the other hand, will be staying with the father if he’s willing.”
Bayou turned away from the girl that nearly had the entire middle of the puzzle done, and then stared at Shiloh. “Okay…”
“Your daughter is a very intelligent little girl, and she’s extremely lucky to be alive,” Shiloh said softly, finally letting the cat out of the bag.
Bayou froze, closed his eyes, and inhaled deeply.
Blowing out the breath he’d just sucked into his lungs, he calmly stood up and walked from the room.
I didn’t get up until twenty minutes later when I was kind of unsure that he was even coming back.
Shiloh must’ve been, too, because she urged me on.