Chapter 9 - Liam Gallagher’s Last Lie
Penny did not call Declan.
She called Eleanor.
“Come alone.”
Her mother arrived forty minutes later.
Penny placed the ledger page on the kitchen table.
Eleanor stopped.
“Where did you get that?”
“My chest.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Apparently not.”
Penny pointed at the circled name.
“Explain.”
Eleanor sat.
For the first time, Penny saw something other than grief in her mother.
Guilt.
“I worked with Arthur.”
“How long?”
“Years.”
Penny felt sick.
“You said you were hiding from him.”
“I was.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
Eleanor closed her eyes.
After Moira’s murder, Eleanor had made a deal.
She would help Arthur maintain the forged Gallagher trust.
In exchange, he would never search for Penny.
Margaret hated the arrangement but accepted it because it kept the child alive.
“So all those years,” Penny whispered, “you weren’t only hiding.”
“No.”
“You were helping him.”
“To protect you.”
“Everybody keeps saying that.”
Eleanor flinched.
Penny immediately regretted the cruelty but not the truth.
“You should have trusted me eventually.”
“I didn’t know how.”
“Neither did Margaret.”
Penny sat opposite her.
“Do you know what being protected like that feels like? It feels exactly like being abandoned.”
Eleanor cried silently.
Penny let her.
Then someone knocked.
Declan.
He entered, saw Eleanor, saw the ledger page, and understood.
His anger was immediate.
Penny stopped him.
“No more secrets solved with threats.”
Declan looked at her.
“She helped the man who murdered my mother.”
“Our mother.”
The correction stunned both of them.
Penny was still learning how to say it.
Declan sat.
Eleanor told him everything.
When she finished, he asked only one question.
“Did Moira know?”
“Yes.”
“Did she forgive you?”
“She made me promise to survive.”
Declan looked away.
That was enough.
Not forgiveness.
Not yet.
But enough.
The federal investigation exploded across Chicago.
Gallagher Logistics accounts were frozen.
Executives were questioned.
Patrick Gallagher was placed under guard.
Arthur Cole was charged in connection with Moira’s murder.
Vanessa survived surgery.
Penny became front-page news despite desperately wanting the opposite.
SECRET GALLAGHER HEIR EMERGES.
She hated every headline.
At work, employees who had ignored her for years suddenly knew her coffee order.
Penny stopped going.
Declan offered her a penthouse.
She refused.
Liam offered security.
She accepted that.
It was progress.
Three days later, Liam visited.
He looked exhausted.
“I owe you an apology.”
“Several.”
He smiled faintly.
“I knew you were Patrick’s daughter.”
Penny stared.
“When?”
“Three weeks ago.”
Her anger returned.
“You knew that too?”
“The background investigation found a sealed DNA record.”
“And you said nothing.”
“I was afraid.”
“Of me?”
“Of Declan.”
Penny frowned.
Liam sat.
“If you were legally recognized as Patrick’s daughter, you could challenge the trust. You could take a third of everything.”
“I don’t want it.”
“I know that now.”
“And before?”
“I thought you might.”
Penny understood.
“You thought the invisible assistant was secretly coming for your money.”
Liam looked ashamed.
“Yes.”
“That’s almost funny.”
“It gets worse.”
“Of course it does.”
Liam had transferred the first two million intentionally.
He wanted to see whether Penny would react.
She had not.
Then he moved more.
Still nothing.
His suspicion weakened.
But Arthur noticed the activity.
Liam’s test had exposed Penny.
“You endangered me because you didn’t trust me.”
“Yes.”
Penny stood.
“Get out.”
“Penny—”
“Get out.”
He obeyed.
At the door, Liam stopped.
“There’s one more thing.”
She almost laughed.
“What?”
“Patrick asked to see you.”
“No.”
“He says he remembers the night Moira died.”
Penny froze.
“He says Arthur wasn’t the only person there.”
An hour later, Penny and Declan entered Patrick’s room.
The old man looked at his three children.
Declan.
Liam.
Penny.
He began to cry.
“I destroyed all of you.”
Nobody contradicted him.
Patrick told them Moira had discovered Arthur’s theft.
Patrick intended to kill Arthur.
Moira begged him not to.
She wanted law, not revenge.
On the night she died, Patrick arrived minutes too late.
He saw Arthur leaving.
But another car was parked outside.
“Whose?” Declan asked.
Patrick whispered a name.
Penny stopped breathing.
May you like
It belonged to someone who had supposedly spent that night protecting baby Penny.
Margaret Higgins.
