In My Mother's Name: A totally addictive and emotional psychological thriller Read online

  ‘Don’t mess with me, Rachel.’ His fury hit her like a heat wave. ‘I’ve a low tolerance level and it doesn’t do to test it. That’s when I tend to ask questions and demand answers. Like why you never admitted you were the last person to see Christy Lewis on the night he died?’

  Before she could respond, he removed his phone from his pocket and swiped the screen.

  ‘Ah, there he is,’ he said. ‘My dear old friend rang to have a final chat with me.’

  Christy Lewis’s voice filled his kitchen. The politician’s breathless last act. He must have rung Jack shortly after she left The Lodge. After she had harassed him, he claimed. She had threatened him, refused to undertake her professional responsibilities and left him fighting to breathe. A full-blown panic attack and Jack had recorded every word. He must have a cesspit full of such recordings, she thought, kept there until the right occasion presented itself to him.

  By the time the recording came to an end, her teeth were clenched together, her jaw rigid.

  ‘Voices from the grave, eh?’ he said as he replaced the phone in his pocket. ‘They’re all around us. Out to bring us down, but only if we let them.’

  ‘Why didn’t you call an ambulance for him?’

  ‘No need. I talked him down as I always did when he was upset. Thoroughbreds, those politicians. Always needing reassuring that their past isn’t about to catch up with them. However, I miscalculated the impact you had had on him and, sadly, he was gone by the time his daughter-in-law discovered him.’

  She was relieved to be able to walk with a steady step to the front door. He made no effort to follow her. He would quash the rumours he had instigated about her husband and the media would fall away from a non-story about a drug deal that went wrong. But he had her cornered, as was his wont when he was challenged. She would continue dancing to his tune unless she found his weak point and drove the knife in deep.

  46 Davina

  Poor Rachel. Grief was a savage and it had ravaged her. Davina could have passed her on the street and not recognised her. Hard to imagine she had ever worn a uniform and walked with an authoritative step. She needed to be transferred from Reedstown. That was if she was ever allowed back into the force. The publicity had been appalling but the truth should out. Once an addict, always an addict, as Jack had pointed out the last time they met. The former sergeant had a treasure trove of information gathered over his years of service. He used his information selectively and only leaked it to an eager source within the media when the occasion demanded it. Now, for reasons best known to himself, he had closed down the flow of information and the media had moved on to other stories. No one seemed any closer to finding out what had happened to either of the dead men. Davina would never figure out all that went on in Jack’s devious head but she had learned enough to understand why Christy had always kept him close, as she and Keith must now do. But having him on her side did nothing to alleviate her panic.

  Like the morning she turned on the television and saw the grey walls of the prison where Grad Wheeler had ended his life. She had known him. Not very well, admittedly, but she had sought his advice when she was setting up her Reedstown Reminiscences page. He had repaired her laptop whenever it gave her trouble, but then she heard a rumour that BootUrBytes was a front for drugs. After that, she never went near the place again but her acquaintance with Grad, however slight, had given her an eerie feeling when she heard about his death. It seemed more personal, somehow.

  Christy used to preach about the dangers of guilt by association and the fact that she had had contact with Grad worried her. She had once seen him leaving Jack’s house, sauntering from it as if the two of them were the best of friends. Working for Christy had taught her to hold her nose when the occasion demanded and, more importantly, hold her tongue when necessary.

  She was finding this increasingly difficult to do. When she was canvassing door to door, she was constantly being asked whether she believed the Garda statement or The Marianne Diary? She had burned the diary, watched the pages brown to ash, yet the debate rumbled on between the two online communities: those who believed Marianne Mooney’s story was real and those who insisted it was a fake.

  Today, being Saturday, Main Street was busy with weekend shoppers and Davina was busily canvassing them when a woman asked if she would instigate an enquiry into the rape of Marianne Mooney should she be elected.

  ‘It’s never too late to right a wrong.’ Her voice was shrill and sanctimonious. ‘Justice for Marianne… justice for Marianne.’

  For a horrifying instant Davina thought others would take up the chant, but Keith moved into position, distracting the woman with his easy charm. He gave her a leaflet detailing the Women’s Unstoppable March Towards Gender Equality Conference and offered her free entry to hear Babs Shannon’s speech. As a distraction, it worked. Turned out she was a fan and had read all the author’s books.

  Babs Shannon’s decision to speak at the conference was still the major selling point. Her reputation overshadowed the other speakers and Davina’s team was doing an excellent job with publicity. Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and other social media sites were the perfect platform, Martina assured her. There would be no cock-ups like the unfortunate Reedstown Reminiscences page; yet still Davina was unable to control those sudden rushes of alarm.

  After they returned home from canvassing, Keith poured a large measure of whiskey. He was pale and tense, his anger barely under control. He had never outgrown his teenage tantrums, those sudden eruptions when he would pick on someone over what he perceived as an insult, however slight.

  ‘What are we going to do about Marianne Mooney?’ Davina asked when he had finished his drink and poured another.

  ‘What the hell kind of question is that—?’ he began.

  ‘The kind you need to address. I feel as if I’m making my way through a fog and will only be able to see the way forward when I know the truth.’

  ‘Oh, for Christ’s sake!’ His exasperation was a veneer that did little to ease her panic.

  ‘You can’t continue lying to me, Keith. Whether you like it or not, we’re in this together. Shane Reagan told me he came back to Reedstown to tell his side of the story. Would you be damaged if he had his day in court?’

  ‘I’ve no idea what you’re getting at—’

  ‘Please don’t insult my intelligence.’ The velocity of her scream startled them both. ‘Tell me what happened that night.’

  He steadied the glass before the whiskey spilled, and took another sip. ‘I’ve no intention of being implicated in some online fantasy that has been utterly rubbished,’ he said. ‘And you’d be wise to watch the company you keep. Shane Reagan is a—’

  ‘Don’t say it.’ In one swift movement, she smashed the glass to the ground. She had been waiting for this to happen, had known the stress she carried within herself must finally seek release. Her beautiful house had become a shrine to a long-dead slut. Even though bouquets were no longer being tossed at her doorstep in the same numbers, people still came to stand and stare.

  Shocked by her violence, he watched the whiskey seep into the magnificent Turkish rug that was such a focal point in their living room.

  ‘You’d be wise to remember that you were nominated to run for the Party on the strength of the Lewis name and my reputation,’ he said. ‘Sing from my hymn sheet if you want to win this election.’

  His mulish expression; she was familiar with it. Deny… deny… deny… His father was dead but the life lessons he had instilled in his son lived on. Davina must go to the only source she trusted.

  Jack Bale was waiting when she arrived at their usual meeting place. Little Loy was a tributary of the main river and the road running along its bank was no longer in use; a cul-de-sac, too overgrown and potholed for cars to venture very far. This was the safest place to meet a man who had made too many enemies over the course of his career.

  Davina talked to him about the snake in the grass. The one with the bite of a cobr
a but capable of lying still until the instant it struck. As always, Jack was deliberate and considered as he revealed to her the details of the ‘Mooney incident’. Davina welcomed the term. An ‘incident’ was controllable. Every day ‘incidents’ were reported on the daily news and there was always an infrastructure in place to deal with each one. Shane Reagan would never have his day in court, Jack assured her. Nor had Rachel Darcy the power to begin an investigation. She was like a bitch with a bone, intent on besmirching her dead husband’s reputation instead of protecting his memory, but he had her under control.

  He confirmed what Davina already believed. Keith was there with that slut in Blake’s Hollow – with the other two, all there at her behest – beguiling them, Jack was convinced, tempting them, opening herself to their advances. Davina would not think about it, not now or ever, yet it had been necessary to gain that information. Knowledge was, as Jack said, the pathway to power.

  Keith was still drinking when she returned to Hillcrest.

  ‘I’ve been with Jack,’ she said. ‘He told me the truth about the Mooney incident.’

  He dug his knuckles into his eyes, too ashamed to look at her. His handsome face was bloated, all bluster and prevarication gone. He begged her forgiveness. Asked her to understand the pressure of being under suspicion for something that happened so long ago he could barely remember it. He had wanted to leave the shack before things got out of control. He had begged the others to stop but he became caught up in the madness and now it could destroy them all… Davina pressed her hand to his mouth and silenced him. Knowing too much, she now realised, could be as dangerous as knowing too little.

  She helped him to his feet and guided him up the stairs to bed. She would protect her weak-willed, lily-livered husband for one reason only. She was on the verge of winning her first seat in Dáil Éireann and she would not allow his past to put her future in jeopardy. Something fundamental had shifted in their relationship. His father’s guiding hand had gone and he needed Davina’s steadying influence more than ever. But there was little pleasure in the knowledge, just the sharp sting of satisfaction.

  47 Julie

  Her phone was on silent but the persistent vibration against her hip caused Julie to ease it from her jacket pocket. Her client’s eyes were closed as he contemplated a new question that had arisen during his session. She sneaked a quick glance at the screen. Liam would never ring her during clinic hours. The fact that he was doing so now, alarmed her.

  Can’t take call now. Is all okay with Steph?

  She sent the text and waited anxiously for his response. She imagined her daughter in a car crash, attacked, kidnapped. So many terrifying possibilities… Liam, knowing her fears, simply texted back,

  She’s okay but you and I need to talk. Cancel your clinic and come home immediately.

  Despite the curtness of his reply, her panic eased. If Stephanie was in trouble, he would be distraught, not irritated by something Julie had done. What that could be was a mystery as they hardly saw each other these days. She had no intention of closing her clinic early but, as luck would have it, her last appointment cancelled and she arrived at Holywell an hour later. The fact that he had taken time off work puzzled her but the reason was clear as soon as she entered the living room and he turned his pale face towards her. The marble-topped table was strewn with letters, documents, certificates, photographs, and Julie’s fingerprints were all over them. Invisible prints – but he knew what she had done and there was going to be a reckoning. Why had she entered the attic? She must have known it was not a safe place to venture. Nothing about Gloria had been safe.

  He lifted one of the birth certificates and examined it. His manner was not threatening, yet his anger ran like a current through her. Fight or flight? It was always thus and Julie just wanted an end to it… somehow.

  ‘‘Glorious Survivors Together,’ he said. ‘You’ve been quite an active little busybody. It was bad enough that you dared to snoop into my mother’s private affairs. But to publish them online is unforgivable.’

  ‘I didn’t publish—’

  ‘Julie… Julie… don’t waste your time lying to me. There’s only one other person, apart from myself, with access to this information, and that’s you.’

  She nodded. No sense denying it. ‘Why would you want to keep those certificates hidden when there are women desperate for information that rightfully belongs to them?’ she asked.

  ‘Rightfully? Don’t make me laugh. My mother looked after them when their own families turned their backs on them. She found homes for their babies and they were grateful to her for the care—’

  ‘Liam, are you listening to yourself? You sound like a parody. Have you read the stories they’ve shared?’

  ‘You mean the manufactured whining? That blog is as fake as the one Adele Foyle ran and she’s the brains behind this new scam. You’ve no idea of the trouble you’ve caused by copying those certificates.’

  ‘Why should there be any trouble? Everyone is entitled to a birth certificate unless…’ She paused. She had opened a can of worms and, in doing so, she had exposed the real reason why he was so protective of his mother’s memory. The facts laid out there on the table.

  ‘Unless what?’ He challenged her to say it.

  ‘Unless those certificates were gained illegally so that those babies could be adopted abroad. In other words, trafficked.’

  ‘Are you daring to call my mother a trafficker?’

  She should stop now. Step back before it was too late. But the urge that drove people over the edge of a cliff, into waters that were too deep, pushed her onward.

  ‘She was your protector, Liam. Just as Christy Lewis and James Molloy protected their own sons when you all went to Blake’s Hollow that night. If a father was named on Adele’s birth certificate, who would he be?’

  The question was out there in all its ugliness and it was too late to claw it back. His smile when he struck her was mirthless and detached. She went down easily, her breath whistling.

  When he was finished, his anger as spent as a storm that had passed and left devastation in its wake, he stemmed the bleeding, iced her bruises. Her body was cold, chilled to the marrow, and it hurt her to breathe. Her lips bled each time she tried to speak and she was unable to silence him as he confessed to her, whispering his sins like a fevered child seeking forgiveness.

  The swelling and bruising would heal, as would her lips and her ribs. Nothing could heal her marriage. It was over. She had known the risk she was taking when she contacted Siobhan Miley. It seemed a small price to pay for the wrongs done by Gloria. She had weighed up the odds of being discovered and had no regrets that they had been stacked against her. Quits now, the two of them. She was no longer bound to Liam by guilt, and love, if it had ever existed in their marriage, had not served either of them well. The only two people he had ever loved was his mother, whose crazed delusions he had endured, and Stephanie, the child he believed he had fathered. Unlike the authentic birth certificates she had photographed, the one her daughter held told a lie. And that was how it would remain. A delusion she would never shatter.

  Keith Lewis’s blue eyes, deep enough to drown a body, as they once drowned Julie, no longer enthralled her. She had believed him to be her crucifixion, her addiction. Now, he was neither. She used to wonder if he had forgotten their short-lived affair or if, like herself, he had acquired the skills to carry the memory of it on his shoulders without stooping under its weight. Now, she no longer cared.

  48 Adele

  The rain began to fall soon after they left Dublin and had softened to a drizzle when they reached Mayo. How dull the landscape looked compared to her last visit, Adele thought, as she drove through the drenched countryside. The trees were losing their summer lustre but the heather still cast a purple bloom over the mountain slopes that framed Inisada. They reached the House of Atonement in the late afternoon. The sun emerged from watery clouds to shine briefly over the burned-our ruin and the magnificence o
f the rainbow that spanned the blackened walls did nothing to soften their starkness. Shane was visibly upset as he walked from the house to the container, where wires hung from electrical fittings and medals lay like specks of mica on the grimy floor.

  After they had seen all that needed seeing, they left the foreboding atmosphere behind and called on Lilian. Adele had been in touch to tell her to expect them and the tea was ready when they arrived. So, also, were the photographs that she had failed to find on Adele’s previous visit.

  Calm in the midst of mayhem, Lilian had been a good photographer. The people milling around the courtyard must have been unaware of her presence, if the images Adele examined were any indication. Nothing studied about those poses. Shock and terror reflected on the faces of the barefooted, pregnant young women. The Thorns, mostly women in their fifties and older; the men, also, equally traumatised by the blaze as it flung plumes of smoke skywards. Shane viewed each image Lilian laid out on the table with the experienced eye of a professional.

  It was easy to trace the progress of the fire. Lilian had taken the earlier photographs when it had been contained to one wing of the house. Those were the clearest images. The later photographs, taken after the fire crew arrived and ordered everyone away from the house, cast an orange glow against the sky and the people watching were mere silhouettes in the background of an inferno.

  Shane seemed riveted by an earlier photograph, which he carried to the window for a closer examination.

  ‘What is this?’ His shocked exclamation brought Adele to his side. ‘I know it can’t be her but she looks so like… she’s the image of Marianne.’ The name he whispered floated towards her and held her still for an instant before she gently corrected him.