Page 84 of No One Can Know

“Wait, the group?” Gabriel asked, surprise in his voice. “They were all friends?”

“Back then, sure,” Lorelei said. “But then the other three left for college, and Kenneth didn’t have the grades for it. When they came home, he expected things to go back to the way they were, but the others had moved on. He’s always resented that. I think that’s why Randolph offered him the job in the first place. He felt bad for the way things had fallen apart. And that’s why it stung Kenneth so much. It wasn’t just that his boss fired him, it was that his friends turned on him. Randolph fired him. Rick wouldn’t listen to him. And, of course, Christopher caused all that trouble for him.”

Emma’s stomach twisted. “Chris?”

“Oh, he sent those letters, full of ‘desist’ this and ‘severe penalties’ that. Convinced Kenneth the best thing to do was to shut up and move on,” Lorelei said. “Then the things he said about Gabriel.”

“He was doing his job, Nana,” Gabriel told her, looking uncomfortable. To Emma he said, “He and my lawyer had some sit-downs. He never suggested I did anything, but he was pretty skeptical about our relationship.”

“He didn’t tell me about that,” Emma said, lacing her words with as much apology as she could muster.

“You say you’re wondering if what Kenneth found got your parents killed,” Lorelei said. She gave Emma a shrewd look. “But you know perfectly well I don’t know anything that could tell you about your father’s business. You want to know about Kenneth. Whether he might have done it.”

Emma swallowed. “You said he came back while you were in the hospital. That means he was in town right around then, right?”

“Kenneth had a temper on him. I’m not saying he wouldn’t havetried to hurt your father for what he did, but he wasn’t a killer. He’d have decked him, but he wouldn’t have shot him in the head. And he certainly wouldn’t have shot a woman,” Lorelei said. “I see why you’d wonder, but you’re wrong.”

“Then why was he in town? What did he say about it?” Gabriel asked.

“I don’t know. I never saw him,” Lorelei said.

Emma frowned. “Then how do you know he came back?”

“Because he left me money,” Lorelei said. “He always left me money in my emergency stash, because he knew I wouldn’t take it from him if he offered. When I got out of the hospital it was there, so I knew he must have come by. He was a good man. He was, Gabriel, even if his demons got the better of him more often than not.”

Emma felt dizzy. Kenneth Mahoney had never been home at all. She’d been the one who left that money, and Lorelei had imagined her son coming home all these years when he never had.

“Look, honey. This is my Kenneth.” Lorelei held out her phone, and Emma took it gingerly. She studied the photo Lorelei had pulled up: a man about her age, with Gabriel’s hooded eyes and wide mouth, his chin up, mugging for the camera. She took in his smile, his short curls, the denim jacket he wore. There was a port-wine stain splashed across his jaw.

He didn’t look violent or angry. He looked like his son. “I need to go,” Emma said.

“What exactly is all of this about, Emma?” Lorelei asked.

Emma reached for the words to answer, but they slipped through her fingers like sand. Kenneth Mahoney had never come home. Lorelei had held on to the idea that he had returned, that he had wanted to take care of her, but it had been Emma all along giving her that false hope.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have bothered you about any of this,” Emma said. She stood. As happened so often these days, she wobbled. Gabriel immediately rose and took hold of her hand, steadying her gently.

Lorelei made ahmsound, looking up at them with a discerning expression. “You both be careful, now,” she said.

“Nana,” Gabriel said, and nothing more. His hand touched the back of Emma’s arm, ushering her into the house, and the contact made little zips of sheer awareness travel across her skin. Inside the house his hand dropped but the sense of touch remained. “Sorry about that.”

“She didn’t say anything,” Emma said.

“She said plenty,” Gabriel replied.

“I left that money for Lorelei,” Emma said. She could feel the shift in the air when he worked out what that meant.

“I came to the conclusion a long time ago that he had to be dead,” Gabriel said. “Figured he’d done it to himself, one way or another.”

“I wanted it to be him,” Emma said. “It’s terrible, but I did.”

“It’s not terrible. If my father was responsible, your sisters weren’t.”

Her throat closed up. She turned away from him, stepping deeper into the house.

“Emma,” he said, and there were fourteen years of things left unsaid hidden in those two syllables.

All the lights were off inside, and here in the narrow hallway between the back door and the living room, it was dark, all the doors closed. One step in front of her, sunlight slit open the shadows, a hard line of light she didn’t cross.

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