Chapter 29 #2
“Listen, I just wanted her to do what I told her. She was refusing to marry Rick, and I needed her to get on board with that plan. So, I went to Dr. Wallace, and he suggested these pills that would make her more obedient.”
“More obedient?” Harvey said. “Or completely mindless and suggestive? You drugged her so you could get her to do whatever you wanted! Do you realize how evil that is?”
“She wouldn’t do what I wanted,” her mother screeched. “It was her duty to make a good match! She was meant to fulfill my dream of being the First Lady.”
“Your dream, not hers,” Harvey said. “Lily would’ve hated that. She would’ve hated the spotlight. And what were you going to do, keep her drugged the entire time?”
“Of course not. Lily came to her senses. She was going to marry Rick. She wanted to marry Rick.”
Harvey took a step toward her. “She didn’t want to marry Rick. You just took away everything in her life so that she had nothing. What you didn’t realize is that she had me. I’m always going to be on Lily’s side. I’m always going to protect her.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter now, does it? It’s all ruined.
Rick’s family is broke. He’s never making it to the White House.
I have nothing. And Clem wouldn’t give me my own mother’s property.
James left me and is working somewhere else.
Selena fled and I don’t know where she went.
Now Lily is with you. And I was arrested.
The world is completely upside down. None of it makes any sense. None of it even matters.”
“It matters to me,” Harvey said. “And it matters to Lily. What else were you doing to her?”
Her mother glanced away, looking nervous. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I wanted her to do what she was told, and Dr. Wallace prescribed us those pills. End of story.”
“I don’t think it is the end of the story,” Ronan said.
“Because the doctor’s finances don’t add up, and neither do yours.
You lost all your money, and yet you were able to pay for your lifestyle.
The doctor must be running something else from that clinic, something secret.
I’m sure the real patients are just a front to keep it looking legitimate.
There’s a back door, isn’t there, Roberta? There’s something very dodgy going on.”
She glanced around as though searching for someone to rescue her. “I need to leave.” She stepped toward the door, but Paddy moved in front of it and shook his head.
“You’re not going anywhere until we get answers,” Ronan said. “Who killed the doctor?”
“I have no idea. Like I said, I’m sure he had enemies with what he was doing.”
“And what was he doing?” Harvey was running out of patience with this woman. “Tell us.”
“I don’t know.” She pulled at her hair, and this strange look came onto her face as she stared down at Dr. Wallace. “I don’t know what is going on anymore. And I don’t want to talk anymore. This all went wrong. Everything has gone so wrong. David promised me it would all work out, but it hasn’t.”
Harvey tried to stop her as she paced back and forth frantically. But she screeched and jumped away.
“Leave me alone. Leave me alone.”
Ronan shook his head at Harvey, then glanced over at Paddy. “Find his home computer system and hack into it. See if there’s any footage.”
Paddy nodded and walked off.
Lily’s mother started to sob, and when he glanced back at her, she was sitting on the floor with her back to the wall, staring at the doctor’s body. “It’s all gone wrong. Everyone left me. James. Selena. Lily. Clem had me arrested. It’s all gone, wrong, wrong, wrong.”
Ronan walked over to her and crouched down, reaching out a grasp hold of her chin, not letting her move away. “Where did you get the money from? How did you pay for the doctor, for the Devil’s Breath?”
“It was all free. All I had to do was let him have her once a fortnight for a night or two and I got my cut. I don’t know what he did to her. I had to make excuses to Rick that she was sick. Luckily, he never seemed to notice or care. He was too wrapped up in himself.”
“You didn’t know what he was doing to your own daughter?” She really was the evilest bitch he’d ever met. “And let me guess, you didn’t care as long as Lily did whatever you wanted.”
She stared right up into Harvey’s eyes. “Yes, that’s right.
I didn’t care. Lily and Clem have been a huge disappointment to me.
I did everything for them, and all they’ve done is create problems. This was one way for me to get something I wanted.
To get Lily to do what I wanted and marry Rick, and for me to have some money. It really was the best of both worlds.”
“Then why did you try to force Clem off her land and into selling?” Harvey asked. “If you already had enough money to live?”
She gave him a strange look. “Because it’s never enough, is it?
And because that wasn’t Clementine’s land, it should have been mine.
I could have sold it off and gone on a holiday.
I could have bought a new car. There are so many things I could have done with that money.
Plus, Rick was going to need money in order to get to the White House.
It should have been mine, never Clementine’s. ”
Selfish old bitch didn’t care about anyone but herself.
She started muttering to herself, and he realized that he wasn’t going to get anything else out of her, at least nothing that would make any sense.
“Sam, search through the rest of the house for any clues about what happened here,” Ronan ordered.
Sam nodded and disappeared.
Harvey looked over at his oldest brother. “What do you think the doctor did to her in that clinic?”
Ronan stared at him steadily. “I don’t know. But whatever it was, you’re going to help her through it once she does know.”
“Maybe she’d be better off not knowing,” he said.
Ronan shook his head. “I get the sentiment, but nothing good ever came from keeping shit from people, not stuff that they should know about themselves.”
Maybe he was right, but Harvey was going to have to make that decision.
Fuck. Being in charge of someone else was something that he craved, that he wanted, but it also came with a hell of a lot of responsibility.
Lily was worth it, though. She was worth everything in the world to him.