“I’ll be back, Shine,” he whispered, his thumb wiping away a tear.
Katie nodded, even though she couldn’t allow herself to believe a word he was saying. If she let herself, it’d hurt too much when he didn’t return.
Twenty-six
Rill didn’t exactly know how his mother would react when she saw him. He’d stopped trying to reach out to her twelve years ago. Fiona Pierce had never tried to contact him, not once since he’d moved stateside for university when he was nineteen years old.
Rill always had the idea growing up that his mother didn’t know what to do with him . . . didn’t know how to relate to a son. She knew precisely how to relate to men, and men seemed to know exactly how to relate to Fiona. Women tended to both despise and be enthralled by her. Fiona had that effect on people—like a queen who’d flipped off the world and become a whore because it made her laugh to consider the irony of the concept.
Fiona certainly knew how to treat her brothers—Ray and William—with a harsh tongue and a healthy dose of disdain.
Despite the fact that he’d long ago given up trying to have a relationship with his mom, he still felt a sense of sharp anticipation as he closed the kissing gate behind him and made his way across the broken stone of the sidewalk. A few chickens strutted up to him, obviously used to being fed by a human hand. He’d learned from the bartender—Mick—at the Regal Lion Pub in downtown Malacnoic that his mother’s latest place of residence had changed a few years back. Rill hadn’t been surprised. Fiona made a habit of changing residences at the same rate she changed lovers.
He knew her instantly when she opened the front door at his knock, although he could tell by her blank expression she didn’t recognize him. Her long, dark hair didn’t show a sign of gray, and Rill realized distantly she must color it. Maybe she had since he was a child. For all he knew, she’d been born a redhead.
Her hair may still look lustrous, but her face showed signs of wear and age. Wrinkles deepened around her eyes when she peered up at him.
He knew he resembled his mother. Almost every person in Malacnoic had said it at one time or another. Dark with blue eyes and a confidence people seemed to feel he had no right to, as a bastard child, even if they did admire that characteristic.
You’re the spitting image of your mam, aren’t you?
The townspeople had never said it joyfully, like they might other children—but rather sadly or suspiciously, like a person might say the devil’s spawn resembled its father.
Fiona gave a dry, crackling laugh when she recognized him. Apparently, his mom still hadn’t broken her pack-and-a-half-a-day habit. He could smell the scent of stale cigarette smoke coming off the too-tight cotton dress she wore.
“Lord, I thought you were the guy here to fix my oven for a few seconds. I was wondering when Fitzgerald got so tall. Come on in, then,” she told Rill briskly, waving him inside the house as though he were a neighbor she saw every day of her life. Rill followed her down a dark hallway that smelled strongly of cigarette smoke to a sunny kitchen. She sat down at the dented, pockmarked oak table and picked up a lit cigarette. Smoke wafted through the air as she waved at the ancient AGA oven.
“That’s the broken oven I was talking about, there. Been driving me mental, that thing. Patrick finally went and called Fitzgerald, the repairman, when he didn’t get his dinner on time for the fourth day in a row, lazy sod,” Fiona said fondly before she took a long draw on her cigarette. “What brings you here, then? I’d heard on the television you’d gone mad after that prissy wife of yours died.”
“Do I look mad?” Rill countered quietly.
Fiona shrugged. She studied him as she smoked, clearly undecided on her answer . . . or uncaring, most likely.
Rill inhaled slowly, resisted his typical inclination to say something foul to his mother and storm out of the house in a fury. On the flight across the Atlantic, he’d ritualistically prepared himself for her typical coldness. He’d come here with a purpose and he wasn’t going to stay here long.
He wasn’t a child anymore. He wasn’t a masochist, either.
He glanced around the stark, serviceable kitchen. “You live with a man named Patrick, then? This is his house?”
“That’s right.”
“You have everything you need?” Rill asked, already knowing what her answer would be. Hadn’t he offered to give her money over the years, given her the opportunity not to prostitute herself to these men? She’d just laughed at him with that deep, raspy voice he supposed some men found attractive.
You’re not going to take care of me, Rilly. Not a chance.
“Do I look like I need anything?” she asked him.
He glanced at her. Her figure was still full and voluptuous, but she was going to fat. Truth be told, she didn’t look well. There was a gray cast to her skin that alarmed him . . . hurt him to see, because he knew there was nothing he could do about it.
Nothing.
He steeled himself against the onrush of sympathy he felt for her. He knew what would happen if he expressed it, knew it deep inside his bones. She’d insult him if he communicated his concern, send him into
a fury so that he forgot for days, or months, or years why he’d ever felt an ounce of compassion for Fiona Pierce.
“I came here to ask you who my father was,” he stated starkly.
She paused in the action of inhaling her cigarette. Her sharp blue eyes flew to meet his gaze. She slowly pulled the cigarette away from her mouth.