The McKenna Legacy Trilogy

by Patricia Rosemoor

  Lily stared up at her daughter through stricken, disbelieving eyes. Claudia had been jealous of Frank, had assumed he was responsible for the breakup of her parents' marriage, had refused to have him for a father. She had assured her child that none of this was true, that she still loved Noah but couldn't bear his possessiveness any longer, that Frank was no more than a good friend. But obviously...

  Lily's thoughts scattered when she realized that, while Claudia's sobs had stopped, she was standing stiff as a statue...eyes lifeless...nightgown torn.

  Her nightgown was torn! Around her were signs of a struggle.

  Panicked anew, she flew to her daughter, touched her cold face. “Baby, what..." Remembering the rumors she'd heard about those young girls who'd worked for Frank – rumors she'd disbelieved – she was horrified all over again. “Claudia, did Frank touch you? Did he try to make you do something you didn't want to do?"

  She gripped the girl's shoulders and gave them a shake. Her daughter stared at her as if hypnotized, through eyes devoid of any clarity. “Mama? What happened?" Haunted eyes that told her Claudia truly didn't remember anything. That she was in shock.

  Standing between her daughter and the dead man who'd molested her, Lily sheltered the girl from the sight as well as from the memory. She removed the gun from Claudia's hand and set it down, cupped her daughter's head against her breast and led her from the room.

  "It'll be all right, baby. You didn't do anything wrong. Whatever you think happened...it was a dream. All a bad dream."

  She led Claudia upstairs and removed her torn nightclothes, nearly gagging when she imagined what Frank might have done to the girl. She smothered a cry of despair. Dear God, her fault. All her fault. She'd convinced Claudia to trust Frank. Guilt eating at her, she steeled herself against the tears that threatened to cloud her thinking. She cleaned up her daughter, helped her into a fresh nightgown and settled her in bed.

  Then she sat with Claudia, stroking her daughter's brow and whispering, “It's good that you forget, baby. Forget everything that happened tonight. You went to bed early and had a bad dream is all. A bad dream..."

  You never have to tell anyone about it...

  You don't even have to think about it...

  Nothing but a bad dream...

  Over and over she whispered the bidding until her daughter's

  brow cleared, her eyes fluttered closed and her breathing deepened. Claudia finally fell asleep.

  Lily gathered the evidence and wadded it into a ball that she stuffed into a trash bag. Noting that she, too, was soiled by some of Frank's blood, she did the same with her owned ruined garments. Then she washed and dressed and applied her make-up as carefully as if she were appearing before the cameras...as if preparing to play the ultimate role.

  For that's exactly what she intended to do.

  "LUCKILY, NOAH SHOWED UP unexpectedly, even as I placed the call to the police."

  Rosalind sat passively, aware of every word her grandmother had uttered, wondering how she could be so devoid of emotion now that she knew the truth. Her mother's attitudes over the years suddenly made perfect sense. Claudia might not be able to remember what happened consciously, but subconsciously...No wonder she'd been so content with a bedroom separate from her husband, that she'd turned a blind eye to his mistresses. No wonder she'd had mixed feelings toward her own daughter...conceived in an act she must have despised.

  "I arrived too late to talk my darling Lily out of the scheme," her grandfather was saying, “but in enough time to get rid of the evidence."

  "A little detail that might have tripped me up."

  "Maybe you should have gotten rid of the gun while you were at it," Skelly said.

  "What would have been the point?"

  "It didn't belong to Frank."

  "It wasn't registered to Frank," Noah corrected. “Buying guns on the street isn't a new phenomena."

  "Especially if you live in a big city like Chicago."

  Not seeing there was a purpose to the debate, Rosalind interrupted. “No wonder you didn't move heaven and earth to prove Lily's innocence, Grandfather. The two of you conspired to hide the truth. To protect Mother."

  "But you did help Lily escape later, right Noah?" Skelly asked, ever the vigilant reporter.

  "She wouldn't hear of it, not at first."

  "I thought I could bear my sentence," Lily confirmed, “and hoped I would get off early for good behavior. That way, I could eventually be with the people I loved. I was wrong about the bearable part."

  Noah pulled up her hand and kissed it. “Thank God I had the money to smooth the way."

  "So you knew where Lily was all along?" Rosalind asked, not quite comfortable calling the near-stranger whom she resembled Grandmother.

  "Of course. I made all the arrangements. Moved her from place to place every six months or so."

  "Thank God you had the money." Skelly echoed her grandfather, an ironic twist to his words. “And that your company business trips were never questioned."

  "I would have gone crazy without Noah," Lily admitted. “Even changing disguises with every move, I couldn't chance on getting too close to anyone in case I was recognized. So Noah was all I had."

  "Ironic that Noah finally got what he wanted," Skelly mused.

  Making Rosalind uneasy. She could hear him say You, all to himself. Expecting Skelly to follow up with some similar remark, she was even more unsettled when he sank into a thoughtful silence.

  Trying to distract herself from drawing conclusions, she asked her grandmother, “When did you move here?"

  "After Noah had his heart attack." Lily fondly stroked his hand. “He couldn't travel to see me the way he used to, so I came to him."

  Though Rosalind had argued with her father that Skelly's broadcast would kill her grandfather, she'd known it hadn't been true. While any heart attack was serious, the doctor had assured them Noah's attack had been relatively mild, and that after a recuperation period, he could get back to business as usual. Only he hadn't. He'd retired and had moved to Galena instead.

  "So what will you do now that you know the truth?" her grandfather asked Skelly.

  "I haven't decided."

  Oddly removed, wanting to accept things as they'd been given to her, Rosalind stood. “We have to go now."

  "So soon?" Lily appeared rebuffed.

  "But I'll be back. I've always wanted to know you better, and now I'll have the chance."

  Lily flashed a look at Skelly, who was making for the door. She didn't say anything. Sensing her grandmother's uncertainty, Rosalind gave her a quick, awkward hug.

  "I will be back," she promised.

  But a pall of silence hung over the room as she left it. And when they drove off, Skelly seemed immersed in his own thoughts. She held her tongue until they were on the highway, through Dubuque, across the Mississippi and quickly eating miles toward Galena.

  "What now?" she asked quietly.

  "I need to think things through."

  What was there to think about?

  "Skelly, your job is done."

  "Is it? Everyone in the country still believes Lily is a murderess."

  "But she doesn't care."

  "But I thought you did. Wasn't that the point?"

  "For God's sake, Lily's protecting my mother!"

  "Who was a child when Sullivan died," he said reasonably. “If Claudia pulled the trigger, it was because she was protecting herself."

  If? Hadn't he been listening?” Playing devil's advocate has its place. This isn't it," Rosalind argued. ”Lily has taken the blame for thirty-three years.“

  "Don't you think that's long enough? Isn't it time the truth came out so your grandmother can live a normal life again?"

  "She is living a normal life!"

  "Hiding on some farm? Depending on Noah as a lifeline to the real world?"

  The thought bothered Rosalind, as well, but she rationalized that perhaps Lily liked what she had. “You're talking about pointing the
finger at my mother, the very person Lily gave up a normal life to protect."

  "Your mother won't be going to prison," he said tightly.

  "She might as well be. If the truth comes out, she'll be smeared in all the tabloids!"

  Sensing Skelly stiffen at the reference, Rosalind gripped the steering wheel so hard that her knuckles hurt. Only a few more miles, she told herself. She had to convince him. Though her remark had been insensitive, she rationalized that Skelly didn't have anything but a job at stake here. And while she'd always known her mother's moods were unpredictable, she now feared for her parent's mental health.

  "What if Mother can't handle the truth? What if it pushes her over the edge?" When Skelly didn't respond, Rosalind swallowed hard, and her chest tightened painfully. “You're going to do it, aren't you? You've already made up your mind."

  "My mind's not made up about anything yet," he assured her. “There are questions to consider."

  But she didn't believe him. “You won't be able to resist. Not with a promotion hanging in the balance."

  "How do you know about the promotion?"

  "It doesn't matter. I thought I mattered to you."

  "You do matter," he insisted, practically yelling, “I love you!"

  "Then tell me you'll forget about doing the story."

  "I can't."

  "If you really love me, you can and you will."

  "Don't go there, Roz."

  "Where?"

  "Don't try to control me. Trust me to do the right thing, instead."

  "How can I trust you when you didn't tell me why this story was so important to you?"

  "Because I'm telling you my priorities have changed."

  "In less than a week?"

  "How long does it take to fall in love, Roz? Maybe I should be asking how long it takes you to fall in love. You've never said how you feel about me."

  "Of course I love you!" Not exactly the way she'd meant to tell him.

  "No of course about it. How do I know you're not trying to manipulate me into dropping the story?"

  "That's the most insulting thing anyone's ever said to me!"

  "And your thinking I'm putting a promotion above you isn't? I've tried to tell you from the beginning that I have my own brand of integrity. That hasn't changed...although I admit I'm more willing to take responsibility than I used to be. Be proud of that, Roz, because it's your doing."

  Close to tears, she said, “Then I wish I could undo it."

  "You wanted the truth. You demanded I be ethical and find the truth and share it with the world. You forgot to tell me the 'only as long as whatever you say suits me' part. Remember my condition, that I wouldn't be censored. Now you're doing just that. You want me to suppress the truth...again, for you. Well, you can't have it both ways."

  Furious, she yelled, “The only thing you care about are ratings and some damn promotion!"

  "What about you, Roz? Do you care about how anyone else feels? What they want? Or is having control over every aspect of your life so damned important that you're willing to throw away the promise of a future together?"

  "I'm not the one throwing it away."

  An angry silence permeated the already close atmosphere in the car for the rest of the drive. Rosalind was relieved when they entered Galena. And calmer. Wanting to give Skelly another opportunity to be reasonable, she waited until after pulling into her parking space.

  Taking a deep breath, she said, “You've had time to think, Skelly, and I'm willing to give you another chance.“

  "Another chance at what?"

  "To prove that you love me. “Though she kept her voice even, desperation filled her. “Please, tell me you won't involve my family in another story that would hurt the very people I was trying to protect."

  "I love you more than life itself, Roz," Skelly said all too calmly. “I'm asking you to trust me to do what's right."

  "If you can't agree, then you might as well leave," she choked out. “Get your things and go. Take my car." She tossed him the keys and threw open her door. “I'll arrange to have it picked up from the studio later in the week."

  "Roz!"

  She was already out of the car and running up the walk. Running away from Skelly. From another relationship.

  No, that wasn't quite right, she assured herself. Even if he did love her, Skelly was pushing her away with both. He didn't love her enough.

  The family curse had struck again.

  BLIND FURY DROVE SKELLY through the dark along fog-laced curves and hills. At least there weren't many other vehicles. A few drivers heading west gave him wide berth and the car lights that had been behind him since leaving Galena stayed at a safe distance. All around, a growing quantity of eerie white stuff sucked the black out of the night. His high beams briefly illuminated a green sign announcing three miles to Woodbine. He remembered Roz saying she didn't like to drive this strip of road after dark because the fog scared her and there was plenty of it.

  He remembered everything Roz had said to him from the first moment he met her.

  Unbelievable!

  First, she'd looked down on him and what he did for a living because she'd assumed he had no ethics. Now, after admitting that she was wrong and that she respected him – she wanted him to throw away those same ethics that had seemed so important to her. Though he'd known she was controlling, he hadn't considered she'd ditch a once-in-a-lifetime love if she couldn't come out on top.

  If he was her once-in-a-lifetime, Skelly thought, doubt creeping over him.

  To be fair, more than Roz's own ego was involved here. One of the things that had attracted him was her sense of family loyalty. He couldn't fault her for that. And Lily had put them in quite a predicament with her confession.

  If Lily knew everything there was to know.

  If only Roz had given him time to sort things out. What they knew for certain. What they thought they knew. What they suspected. At least what he suspected. As far as he was concerned, there was more to the big picture.

  Like the brakes.

  And the bluff.

  And the identity of the person responsible for what could have passed for accidents if Roz had been killed.

  A cold lump settled in his stomach. Now that he was thinking clearly again, Skelly realized what he'd done. He'd gone and left Roz alone. Vulnerable. And damn it all...unsuspecting! Whomever had started the job was bound to try to finish it.

  Before he could find a pull-over where he could turn around and go back, his cell phone rang. He anticipated this would be Keelin, ready to chew his butt for not calling like he'd promised.

  "Hey, cous, you get to hang me by my toes."

  The answering Irish lilt was not the one he was expecting. “Ah, boyo, I've been doing some soul-searching."

  His father's voice came as a shock. “Dad, are you all right?"

  "Not after talkin' to your cousin. What a mess you've gotten yourself into. Keelin confided in me even if you wouldn't."

  "I tried to.“

  "We never did communicate well, did we, boyo? Not too late to be fixing that, though."

  "No," Skelly said, a lump in his throat. “It isn't."

  And listened in amazement to what his father had called to tell him.

  ROSALIND STOOD BEFORE the front parlor windows long after Skelly had driven beyond the range of the brass telescope. Her hopes that he would turn around and drive back to her dashed, she felt numb.

  And she realized that she'd done exactly the thing she'd feared most. She'd continued the pattern she'd begun with Tim. As she had with her college fiancé, she'd pushed too hard, had expected too much. She'd wanted tangible proof of Skelly's love. Something she could hold up and say, 'See, he really does love me.' She'd tried to force him to prove it in a way that was not worthy of either of them.

  And if he had gone along with her, how would she have felt about him then?

  He wouldn't be the man he was.

  A good man, deserving of her respect, and who, God help
her, could be trusted to do the right thing.

  If only she could tell him...

  "He's gone?" came a voice from the dark behind her.

  "Aunt Hilary, you startled me." The first floor had been empty when she and Skelly had entered a while ago, and Rosalind had assumed both her aunt and mother had retired. “Yes, Skelly's gone. I'm afraid I drove him off."

  And, as if she didn't have enough on her mind, she wondered when Grandfather would return. What he would say. How he would act. How she would act. Negative thoughts about her grandfather that Skelly had stirred with his questions kept surfacing.

  Hilary drew closer and slipped a comforting arm around her waist. “He wasn't worth it, then, if he could be scared off so easily."

  "Worth it?" Rosalind echoed.

  "We don't really choose who we love, do we? Fate does that for us. But I have no regrets."

  "You don't regret loving Frank Sullivan?" After what Lily had told her?

  "So you know." Appearing only slightly surprised, Hilary shook her head. “Maybe that makes me immoral...loving another woman's husband. But Diane shouldn't have turned him away from her bed. He didn't care that she couldn't give him a child. But she made him into a lonely man who needed a woman's arms around him. My arms."

  Wondering if her aunt was deluding herself, she asked, “Are you certain you were the only one?"

  "He never slept with Lily!" Hilary insisted, her tone strident. “He loved me...if not enough to destroy his career with a divorce."

  She was defending her lover rather than her sister-in-law, and Rosalind faced a fact that had been in front of her nose all along. “You disliked my grandmother, didn't you?"

  "Lily was so judgmental where I was concerned." Hilary let go of Rosalind and wandered from the windows. “For years, she interfered with my life. More than once, she convinced Frank to stop seeing me so he could try to reconcile with Diane. That's what they fought about the night he...died. First she came between Noah and me, then did the same with Frank."

  Uneasy at the implication of Hilary's possessiveness toward her own brother, Rosalind said, “But in the end, Frank wasn't worth it, Hilary. He did awful things." Remembering that her aunt had raised her mother after Lily's incarceration, she said, “Surely at some point you had to guess something was wrong." But if Hilary knew what had happened to Claudia, she wasn't admitting it, Rosalind noted, continuing to push. “At the very least, you must've heard about the teenage girls who quit working for him."