Broken Silence: A tense psychological thriller

by Fran McDonnell

  “Apart from my husband you’re the only person I’ve told,” Sarah said.

  “Thank you for telling me and trusting me.”

  Sarah took a deep breath.

  “Talk to your husband about any new safety measures you want to take with the children, OK?”

  Sarah nodded.

  “May I ask a few questions, Sarah?”

  Sarah gave a slight nod.

  “Just answer the ones that you feel able to.”

  Sarah nodded again.

  “Where were you when this man grabbed you?”

  “I was walking on the path from the university into town along the river.”

  “When was this?”

  “In September last year.”

  “In the evening?”

  “No. It was about twelve o’clock, lunchtime.” She swallowed. “He grabbed me and dragged me into a field. Then he started to strangle me. I passed out and when I came round I was lying on some plastic thing. He was all in black with a mask.”

  Isobel bit her lip.

  “Then he raped me,” Sarah whispered. “He said if I told anyone the kids would get hurt. Then he strangled me again.” She shivered and wrapped her arms around her body. “When I woke up, I came home. I tried to act as if nothing had happened and get on with my life, but a few days later I just wasn’t coping and I slit my wrists. My husband was worried about me and had come home at lunchtime. He found me and called the ambulance and I blurted it out to him – but I made him promise he wouldn’t tell anyone or report it. I was in hospital for a few days but I never told them about what had happened. When I came home things were a bit better with Steve until that photograph came. I felt as if that man was watching me and that made me worse again. I don’t even know why I’m telling you now.”

  “Maybe because Yvonne encouraged you to.”

  “And maybe because I can’t manage alone much longer.” Sarah paused. “I feel so afraid, so alone, so stressed. If I don’t get help …” She glanced at Isobel.

  Isobel nodded. “But you have done something now. You’ve been very brave.”

  “You could just be a visitor, a friend. Even if he is watching he has no reason to think that I’m saying anything.”

  Isobel nodded. “And you and Steve can be more mindful with the children. And, Sarah, there is other help out there.”

  “I’m not going to rush things this time like I did before. It’s enough that I feel a bit better. I’m going to wait and see what’s the best thing to do, for me.”

  “That sounds like a sensible plan. Is there anything else you want to say or add?”

  “No. I think that’s enough for now. To be honest, I didn’t think I was going to tell you all of this.”

  Isobel smiled. “Me neither. Will I call Steve in?”

  Sarah nodded. “And Yvonne.”

  Isobel raised an eyebrow.

  Sarah nodded with determination. “Yes, I need to tell her too. Maybe she could keep an eye on my Tony at the team practice.”

  Isobel went out to get the others.

  Steve sat on the couch beside Sarah while Isobel and Yvonne sat on the armchairs facing them.

  Eyes averted, Sarah told them very briefly how she had been raped and strangled.

  Yvonne gasped. “Like Emer!” while Steve paled with shock.

  Sarah didn’t look at them.

  “Yes,” said Isobel, “and, as in the case of Emer, he made a threat against the children should she tell anyone about the attack.”

  “The children? Oh, no!” said Steve, horrified.

  “I’m afraid so,” said Isobel. “And Sarah thought, if you knew, Yvonne, then you could keep an eye on Tony at the team practice.”

  Yvonne looked at Isobel, her eyes wide with shock.

  Isobel prompted her. “I’m sure you’ll do that, Yvonne, to help Sarah.”

  “Yes. Yes, of course.”

  Sarah smiled at Yvonne. “Thank you. And thank you for suggesting that I talk to Isobel. I feel better, like Emer.”

  Yvonne opened her mouth to speak but Isobel grasped her arm. “We had better go.”

  Isobel collapsed into the passenger seat of Yvonne’s car. She was drained after the session.

  “Two women raped,” Yvonne said.

  Isobel, eyes closed, said, “Yes.”

  “Isobel …”

  Isobel opened her eyes. “Yes?”

  Yvonne tried to speak but no words came, merely strangled breaths.

  She started the car and drove back in silence.

  After she had parked at the hotel, she said, “Two women raped and the woman you found murdered and probably raped.”

  “Yes.”

  “What should we do? Who will be next? No woman is safe. Should we tell the gardaí?”

  Isobel rubbed her hands over her face. “Yvonne, it has taken everything for Emer and Sarah to speak about what has happened to them. Neither of them, at the moment, is likely to speak to the gardaí. They are too worried about their children.”

  “What can we do?”

  “We can support them, listen, be there for them as best we can. You have done a lot for both of these women. You’re a good sister and a good friend.”

  “And the gardaí?”

  “Maybe I can tell them that I know of some women who have been raped. I will have to think about what I can say.”

  Yvonne nodded. “You’re tired now.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll tell Mum that you will talk to her tomorrow.’

  “Thanks, Yvonne.”

  “Be careful driving home, won’t you?”

  “Yes, I’m going to take it slowly.”

  Yvonne reached out and hugged her. “You helped Sarah tonight. Maybe now she and Emer can start to get their lives back.”

  “I hope so.”

  As Isobel drove home, her mind circled … a plastic sheet, a black mask, strangling, threats to children. The modus operandi of the rapists sounded the same. And what about the woman yesterday, strangled and most likely raped? Was she another victim of the same man? Or was there another predator out there who was a murderer?

  Chapter 7

  The landline was ringing as Isobel came through her front door. She glanced at her watch: ten o’clock.

  “Hello, Isobel.”

  “Patricia.” Isobel could feel her heart lifting and her mood lightening.

  Isobel nursed the phone between her shoulder and chin as she walked through to the kitchen and put the kettle on.

  “What’s wrong with your mobile?” Patricia continued. “I’ve been trying to get you all evening.”

  “Oh, I had it on silent because I was talking to someone. I was going to ring you as soon as I had made a cup of tea. I have so much to tell you.”

  “Is everything alright? Are you feeling well?”

  Isobel felt her stomach flip and anxiety tighten her chest. She didn’t know if she was well but Patricia’s quick concern about her health highlighted for her the worry that all her friends and family lived with. Maybe with time and distance from treatment that hair-trigger anxiety would ease. After all, it was only three months since her last treatment. However, right now she wanted to talk to Patricia not about her health but about all that had been happening in the last two days.

  Isobel had met Patricia in May on the Banks case, but it felt like they had known each other much longer. As they searched to find the truth in that case, Isobel realised that she had found someone who shared her curiosity, who she liked to bounce ideas off and who helped her clarify her thinking. Isobel had heard a crime novelist say that the greatest strength of the Sherlock Homes stories is the friendship between Holmes and Watson. She wondered if Inspector Ryan and Sergeant Finnegan worked in that synergistic way. She suspected that they did.

  “Isobel?”

  “Sorry, Patricia. So much has happened. I found a body yesterday.”

  “What? Oh my God!”

  Isobel heard a muffled voice and Patricia responding
to it. “Is that Peter, Patricia?”

  “Yes, Peter is here with me – can I put you on speaker phone?”

  Isobel raised her eyebrows and smiled. Obviously things were good with Patricia and Peter. They had worked together for years and nothing had happened between them. However, over the investigation into the Banks divorce, Peter had discovered that there was more than work between him and his secretary and they had started a romantic relationship.

  “Yes, no problem.”

  “Tell us everything,” Patricia said.

  “Hang on a minute. I’m just making tea.”

  Isobel brought her tea through to her sitting room and sank with relief onto the sofa. Outside the patio doors the violas and pansies tumbled over the sides of the containers. The light was beginning to soften. The few clouds had hints of pink and Isobel guessed it was going to be a dramatic sunset.

  “Right – I’m settled now,” she said.

  “Hi, Isobel!”

  “Hi, Peter.”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve found another adventure!”

  “You won’t believe it.”

  “Enough suspense,” Patricia said. “Let’s hear what happened.”

  Isobel laughed. She could feel herself relaxing. This felt like the meetings they used to have in Peter’s flat when they were on the Banks case. The three had worked well together. Peter was more legally minded and cautious, but Isobel and Patricia had proved to be persistent and innovative investigators.

  Isobel described finding the woman’s body.

  Patricia said, “Wow! Here you are again, thrown into a case. Are you going to help the police again?”

  “Well, that Detective Inspector Eoin Ryan had very little time for me. He started asking how I knew she was dead and why I had been so careful at the crime scene. I think he suspected me of something.”

  Patricia burst out laughing.

  “It’s not funny. He was rude and aggressive.”

  Peter said, “No. He was doing his job. You know that frequently the person finding the body is involved in the crime.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Peter,” Patricia said.

  “He doesn’t know you, Isobel. Give him a chance.”

  “I probably need to go and see them again tomorrow.”

  “Is it a follow-up interview to see if you remember anything more?” Patricia asked.

  “No. I’ve found out what I think is more information.”

  “I knew it,” Peter said. “You’re as bad as this one here, looking for adventures and mysteries to solve. Patricia has started her private-investigator course and now she keeps telling me about all the crimes she thinks people around us could be committing.”

  “Stop it, Peter! Isobel has a real crime here. Isobel, tell us what else you’ve found out.”

  Isobel filled them in on the conversations she’d had with Emer and Sarah.

  “What do you think?” Patricia asked. “Do you think it was the same man, even though it was rape in two of the cases and rape and murder in the third?”

  “Possibly, as there was strangulation and rape involved in all three.”

  “Why did he kill the woman you found and not Emer and Sarah? Do you think that his behaviour is escalating?”

  “I don’t know, Patricia. I’m puzzled by the change in behaviour. The modus operandi of Emer’s case and that of Sarah’s is very similar – the strangling, the rape, then another strangling – the warning to keep silent or their families would be in danger. That surely is the same man.”

  “Yes,” said Patricia. “A serial rapist, not confined to one area, who rapes and strangles his victims, lets them live and terrifies them into silence.”

  “And in both cases he threatened children in the women’s lives which implies that he watched them and knew about their lives.”

  “Oh my God, that is creepy!”

  “And, judging by Sarah’s story, keeps an eye on them afterwards and makes sure that they don’t talk. I think he sent Sarah the photos of her kids because her suicide brought her to the attention of doctors – so, just in case she was tempted to talk about what happened to her, he sent her a little reminder to be silent.”

  “I see what you mean. He didn’t send Emer any pictures because she showed no signs of change or improvement.”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s a wonder that those women talked to you at all.”

  “I know. Partly, I think, it’s because I’m not there in any official capacity – I’m a family friend. Also the fact that I came to their houses. But it’s as if, after Emer and Sarah were raped, it was so bad, so painful that they just tried to survive, live, exist – and now the shock of this new woman dying has really shaken them up.”

  “It certainly has.”

  Isobel left a silence and then said, “I think I’m going to have to say something to the police about these cases. Not obviously the names but the details of what happened, where they were attacked, the way they were attacked … because …”

  “Because there are big gaps between the attacks and you suspect that there are more victims,” said Patricia.

  Isobel could feel a tension leaving her shoulders. So it wasn’t that she was jumping to conclusions – Patricia had the same concern. “Yes. That thought crossed my mind. I don’t want it to be true, but I am very afraid that it might be.”

  There was a silence as the weight of that reality settled heavily on them.

  “What if they press you for the women’s names?” Patricia asked.

  “I’m not telling them. Those two women are already terrified enough.”

  “Do you think the gardaí will give much weight to what you tell them?” Peter asked.

  “I don’t know.” Isobel lapsed into silence again.

  “What else is on your mind?” Patricia asked.

  “How did you guess?”

  “You’re doing that quiet, waiting thing you do and that usually means you have an idea that you think is a bit out there and are reluctant to say it.”

  “I don’t have a ‘quiet, waiting thing’.”

  “You do, Isobel. I can almost hear your mind grappling with some idea, or intuition or suspicion you have. Come on, you’re with friends, what is it?”

  Peter laughed. “Yeah, it can’t be any madder than some of the ideas you had with the Banks case.”

  “True, but those ideas, mad and all as they seemed to you, weren’t too far from the truth.”

  “Exactly. I’ve learnt not to discount your ideas.”

  “Unfortunately, you’re not here and neither is Detective Inspector Simon Jones, our friendly policeman from the Met, who knows me and is prepared to give me the benefit of the doubt.”

  “True,” said Patricia. “Stop stalling, Isobel – let’s hear this idea.”

  Isobel closed her eyes. “Well, I was just wondering … this man, he strangled Emer and Sarah twice until they passed out.”

  “God love them.”

  “I wonder if that’s what he intended with this new lady too.”

  “And he just went too far this time?” Peter said.

  “Yes.”

  “You mean he killed her by accident?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Go on.”

  “Everything that Emer and Sarah told me suggests that this man is a planner, very organised, very precise. He was able to cause unconsciousness twice with both women and his threats mean that what happened wasn’t reported. His follow-up threat to Sarah when she was admitted to hospital suggests to me that he plans to keep going for a long time.”

  “OK, that makes sense,” said Patricia.

  “And now this death means everyone knows, it’s all over the news, all over the city, the opposite of the ‘don’t tell or else threats’ he made. I wonder if he accidentally killed the woman. That he meant to render her unconscious, but not dead, and he made a mistake.”

  “What you’re saying makes sense – it’s quite possible,” said Peter. “What are you going
to do?”

  “I feel that I have to tell the police the two stories I’ve heard – no names though.”

  “Yes, I think you do,” Patricia said. “It’s a terrible thought that there is a man out there stalking and then raping women.”

  Isobel shivered. “It is.”

  “Is it Inspector Ryan you’ll contact?” Peter asked.

  “He is probably in charge of the case but, as you realise, I didn’t exactly get on well with him. I can only imagine what his reaction would be. I’ve decided I’d better talk to the other detective – Alanna Finnegan, the sergeant. She was far less antagonistic and maybe she will listen. Wish me luck.”

  “When?”

  “Tomorrow. I did call in today but she wasn’t there. I couldn’t wait as I had some other things to do. But tomorrow I’ll wait until she sees me.”

  “We’ll be thinking of you,” said Peter.

  “Ring me as soon as you’ve done it – I’m free all day,” said Patricia. “I’ll be anxious to hear how it went.”

  “Will do. So … here we are … back on a case.”

  “It’s not the same by phone,” Patricia said with a laugh.

  “No. I suppose not. Thanks for the chat though. It helped.”

  “Talk tomorrow.”

  “Night.”

  Isobel sipped the last of her tea and watched the blazing sunset. Tonight she hadn’t the energy to go out and take a photograph of it. With a weary sigh she got ready for bed.

  Isobel dreamt that she was in darkness.

  She sensed another presence, malevolent, threatening.

  She was afraid to move in case she revealed where she was, afraid to breathe, to make any sound at all. She felt paralysed.

  She listened for sounds. Was there someone there? Someone who threatened her? Or was she imagining it? Was the fear real or was it her imagination?

  Chapter 8

  Thursday 20th May

  It was ten o’clock when Isobel reached Limerick City. She had woken at eight with stiff and sore muscles, wondering if the malevolence in her dream related to the rapist or her fear of cancer or maybe both.