Chapter 10 - The Night Penny Disappeared
Margaret had been at Moira’s house.
That did not mean she killed her.
Penny repeated that until the words lost meaning.
Patrick insisted Margaret’s car was there.
He also remembered seeing blood on Margaret’s sleeve.
Declan reopened everything.
Old police photographs.
Statements.
Timelines.
Penny barely slept.
Then Vanessa called from the hospital.
“Margaret didn’t kill Moira.”
Penny gripped the phone.
“How do you know?”
“My father kept trophies.”
Arthur had stored photographs from the night of the murder.
One showed Margaret kneeling beside Moira after the attack.
The blood came from trying to save her.
Another showed Margaret carrying something from the house.
A baby.
Penny.
“She was there to take you,” Vanessa said.
Penny sat down.
“Why?”
“Because Moira called her.”
Moira knew she was in danger.
She summoned Margaret to remove Penny before Arthur found her.
That night Margaret became Penny’s protector.
Not murderer.
Penny cried harder than she expected.
Even dead, Margaret was still being asked to prove she loved her.
That evening, Penny visited the cemetery.
Margaret’s grave was simple.
Penny sat beside it.
“You could’ve told me something, Grandma.”
Wind moved through the trees.
“You didn’t have to tell me everything.”
She touched the emerald ring.
“Just enough so I didn’t think I was nobody.”
A voice behind her said, “You were never nobody.”
Declan.
Penny wiped her eyes.
“You follow people quietly for a six-foot-four criminal.”
He sat beside her.
They remained there without speaking.
Then Declan said, “Moira would have liked you.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do.”
“How?”
“You tell me no.”
Penny laughed.
It surprised both of them.
Declan looked at Margaret’s grave.
“She saved my sister.”
The word landed gently.
Sister.
Penny had never had siblings.
Now she had two.
Complicated, damaged, occasionally terrifying ones.
But hers.
“I don’t know how to be a Gallagher,” she admitted.
“Good.”
She looked at him.
“We’re terrible at it.”
For the first time, Penny saw warmth beneath Declan’s reputation.
Not softness.
Something stronger.
Restraint.
He had inherited violence and spent his life trying to control it.
Penny had inherited fear and spent hers trying to disappear.
Perhaps both had confused survival with identity.
Declan’s phone rang.
His expression changed.
“What?”
He stood.
“When?”
Penny rose.
“What happened?”
Declan ended the call.
“Arthur escaped transport.”
Her blood went cold.
“How?”
“Inside help.”
They hurried toward the car.
Penny’s phone vibrated.
A message.
YOU SHOULD HAVE WAITED UNTIL THIRTY.
Margaret’s warning.
Penny looked toward the cemetery.
Something was wrong.
She ran back to the grave.
The soil near the headstone had been disturbed.
Freshly.
Declan saw it.
“Don’t touch anything.”
Police arrived.
The grave was opened under emergency authorization.
Penny stood beside Eleanor.
The coffin came up.
The lid was removed.
Inside was Margaret’s dress.
Her rosary.
Her shoes.
But there was no body.
Penny stared into the empty coffin.
Then her phone rang.
Unknown number.
She answered.
An elderly woman whispered, “Penny?”
Every hair on her arms rose.
May you like
She knew that voice.
“Grandma?”
