The Grace Girls

by Geraldine O'Neill

  She came back into the bedroom a short while later with the knickers and bra rubbed into dampness by a large bath towel, then she went over to the radiator and spread them out. She was just turning back the covers on her luxurious bed when a small knock came on the door.

  Kirsty’s hands flew to her throat. ‘Who is it?’ she called in a short sharp whisper – trying not to sound as startled and frightened as she felt.

  ‘It’s me,’ the unmistakable rich Dublin voice came from the corridor. ‘I could hear you going in and out and I just wanted a little word with you before you went to sleep.’

  She flew across the room to the door, her heart thudding. ‘Is there something wrong?’ she asked, opening the door to him.

  He stood there looking down at her, his face white and serious. He was also in his bare feet, his white shirt loose over his dark trousers with only a couple of the buttons done.

  ‘Yes,’ he said in a low whisper, ‘there is something very wrong . . .’

  And before Kirsty knew what had happened, Larry Delaney had swept her up in his arms and his warm mouth was crushing hers in exactly the same way it had happened in her dreams.

  When that first breathless kiss eventually came to an end, Larry tilted Kirsty’s chin up to look into her eyes, then he led her by the hand across the floor to the bed.

  Chapter 55

  Larry threw the covers back on the bed and then quickly and easily lifted Kirsty off her feet and laid her on it. He stretched a hand to switch off the bedside lamp, and then he lay down beside her and kissed her once again. A kiss that lasted a long, breathless time. A kiss that Kirsty had been waiting for for months.

  When the kissing finally stopped, she moved back on the pillow to look at him. Her heart was still racing and she had the funniest warm feeling down low in the pit of her stomach that made her want to reach out for him to kiss her again. To kiss her all over in places she’d never dreamed she’d want a man to kiss. Places she hardly knew about.

  But she didn’t reach out to him. She wasn’t ready to go beyond this stage yet. There were things she needed to know first.

  ‘What’s happened?’ she asked him. ‘What’s made you change your mind? That night in the Trocadero –’

  ‘You mean the night you frightened the life out of me?’

  ‘I don’t understand . . .’ she said, propping herself up on one elbow. ‘And I think I need to . . . to know where this is all leading.’

  Larry bent down now and lifted her free hand to his mouth and kissed her fingers one by one. ‘I thought it was going to be another terrible mistake,’ he told her, his voice weary. ‘I thought I might be heading down the same path I went down with David’s mother . . . but then I realised tonight when we were talking, that it was completely different. I suddenly realised that I was actually on the verge of making the biggest mistake of my life. A monumental mistake I might never be able to put right . . .’

  Kirsty waited, her breath coming in short bursts, terrified he might stop and not tell her all the things she so desperately wanted to hear. She closed her eyes, trying to still her rapid breathing, then she felt his warm breath on her face and then she felt his wonderfully soft lips kiss one of her eyelids and then the other.

  ‘Oh, Kirsty . . .’ he whispered, his voice ragged and heavy with feeling. ‘I love you with every single bone and breath in my body. And if it’s a huge, terrible mistake telling you this, then I’m afraid I’ve already gone and done it.’ He stopped. ‘That first night I saw you on the stage, something happened to me, and things have never been the same since. I know you’re younger than me, and that will probably cause us big problems, and I’m also very aware of all this trail of trouble behind me. But I really feel that I’m going to be in much, much bigger trouble if we don’t at least give it a chance.’

  Kirsty opened her eyes and looked up into his. ‘I don’t know what’s going to happen either,’ she said in a low, fearful voice, ‘and there’s a lot of things I’m frighteneD about. But I know one thing for sure – I love you too, Larry . . . I love you with all my heart. I think I’ve loved you since the second we met.’

  And then without the slightest warning, a huge sob suddenly rose up in Kirsty’s throat and salty tears started to spill down her face. She wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her damp mascara-streaked face in Larry’s perfectly white shirt and she cried and cried as she clung to him.

  Eventually, the crying quietened down and Kirsty came to rest her cheek against Larry’s slightly rough, stubbly unshaved cheek. Then they stayed like that in the dark silence of the hotel bedroom for what seemed like a long, long time.

  Larry kissed the side of her head. ‘I want to talk to you about something, Kirsty,’ he said, ‘if you’re up to it . . . if you’re awake enough to take it in.’ He tightened his arms around her. ‘I’d feel better about everything if I could explain this one last bit.’

  ‘I am wide awake,’ Kirsty said, cuddling into him. ‘Tell me . . .’ She wanted him to talk and talk for as long as he liked, just as long as they could stay wrapped around each other. It was the best feeling she had ever had in her life. None of the boyfriends she had danced with and even canoodled with over the years had prepared her for what it would feel like to lie in the arms of a real mature man. For all Kirsty Grace’s confidence and sharp tongue with males, she had very little physical knowledge of them, simply because the real attraction had never been there before.

  But now – with Larry Delaney – a whole new exciting world had suddenly spread itself out at her feet.

  ‘It’s all this business about David,’ he said, ‘why it made me wary of getting involved with another woman. That whole episode of my life was the one thing I’d been trying to avoid.’

  ‘Well, I can assure you I’d never do that!’ Kirsty cut in, her voice high and indignant. She struggled to sit up so she could look at him properly. ‘That’s one thing you’ll never need to worry about,’ she said earnestly. ‘I would never, ever get pregnant before I was married and ready to start a family. Even if I’d never met you, I would never want that to happen – I’m not like Liz Mullen. I want more out of life than to be running after a man. I have a career and I have ambitions . . . and I’ve more pride in myself than to let that happen to me.’

  Larry smiled down at her – the ‘trying hard not to let her see he was amused’ smile – then he kissed her again. ‘I know that about you already, Kirsty, and it’s one of the reasons I fell in love with you. I love the fact you have such pride in yourself and such high principles.’ He took a deep breath. ‘But there’s a few things I need to put you straight about – I’m a bit worried that you have the wrong impression of me. I’m not this middle-class, well-heeled businessman cum playboy that you seem to think I am.’

  Kirsty waited, intensely curious now.

  ‘I have worked very hard and I admit I’ve done well enough financially – beyond what I’d ever hoped or expected.’ He was struggling now. ‘But I got a very bad start in life. My mother wasn’t married and she left me in one of the children’s homes in Dublin . . . I was brought up early on with the nuns and then I was fostered out to various places.’ He shook his head. ‘I never knew what it was like to grow up in a real family until I was finally fostered at eleven years of age by a nice, decent family – the family whose name I took, and who now live in Man­chester.’

  ‘Oh, Larry . . .’ Kirsty said, her arms tightening around him. ‘That must have been terrible for you.’

  ‘It’s all I knew,’ he told her. ‘And you just get on with it. The nuns were nice enough, I didn’t have any major problems, and I was good at school – I learned easily, which helped.’

  ‘How did you come to be fostered by the family?’

  ‘It was an older couple who were too late to adopt a baby,’ he explained. ‘They were visiting the home and I was asked to show them around. They started visiting me and taking me for days out – that kind of thing . . . and gradually they asked
if I’d like to go and live with them.’

  ‘Was it OK?’ Kirsty asked curiously.

  Larry nodded. ‘They were great, they gave me a whole new start. If it wasn’t for Tommy and Nora Delaney I would not be in the position I’m in now. Tommy was a building engineer and Nora had been a teacher before she got married. Tommy used to take me fishing and golfing and he often took me out to work with him on the building sites when I was a teenager. I suppose that’s how I got interested in the property business myself.’ He sighed. ‘Tommy died about five years ago, and Nora moved over to Manchester to be beside her sister and her nieces. I still visit them all regularly and I always will – they were very good to me. They were the nearest I’ve ever had to a real family and I’m grateful to them.’

  ‘You would never believe that you had that kind of back­ground,’ Kirsty said. ‘You come across as a really confident person . . .’

  ‘I’ve always worked hard to be like that,’ he told her. ‘But I failed badly getting into that situation over David. It was the one thing I’d always vowed I’d never let happen – that I’d never be responsible for bringing a child into an unpredictable situation. I’d always hoped I’d be married and settled and give the kid everything I never had myself.’ His voice dropped. ‘I wish to God I’d never met Helen McCluskey . . . she was my biggest nightmare come true. I’d decided I’d never get tied down until I was totally secure in jobs and money, and that I’d be really picky and choosy about the woman I got serious about.’ He halted. ‘I don’t want to get embarrassingly personal here . . . but I was sure we’d been careful – that there was no way a child could have been conceived.’

  ‘Do you honestly think that David is your son?’

  Larry shrugged and gave a tired-sounding sigh. ‘I just don’t know . . . there’s every chance he’s the other fellow’s. And because of that, I think I’m going to have to give up and let him settle into the real family his mother wants now. I’ve got to give him the chance that I never had, to have a proper family life.’

  Kirsty had a sudden uncomfortable thought. ‘Did Helen McCluskey know all that about your background? Did you tell her all about it?’

  ‘No,’ Larry said, shaking his head. ‘Not at all. She thought Nora was my real mother, and anyway, she had no great interest in things like that. She was only interested in having nice clothes and a nice place to live.’ He squeezed her tightly. ‘You’re the only person I’ve ever told that to. In all the years since I left Ireland, I never trusted anyone enough to tell them the truth. I always felt it was a . . . I suppose a vulnerable part of me. A part that I didn’t want people have access to. I wanted them to just see the confident, capable Larry Delaney that you first met.’

  Kirsty’s heart soared. Larry Delaney loved her and trusted her enough to bare his soul to her in a way he had never done with one other person.

  At this very moment in time the whole world was suddenly perfect.

  Kirsty woke up in the silent white January morning, still wrapped in the warmth and security of Larry Delaney’s arms – exactly the same way she had fallen into a deep sleep around four o’clock. She looked at his peaceful sleeping face, trying to resist the urge to kiss his lovely full lips or to trace a finger over his eyes and mouth.

  Just looking at him now brought that strange new feeling back into her stomach, the feeling that made her want to get even closer to him. But Kirsty knew she wouldn’t. Not yet.

  They had a long way to go before anything more serious happened. They had months of kisses and cuddles and hand-holding to do before it reached the next stage. As she looked at the bright sunshine peeping around the wine and blue curtains, she thought how it had been the most unexpected and beautiful night. How they had come to be stranded in this hotel together, and how the snow had given them this wonderful opportunity to sort things out, to sort out the feelings they had both been hiding. She was still wearing Larry’s big soft shirt and he was still in his rumpled white shirt and suit trousers. Thank goodness he had plenty of other suits, she thought, because the ones he was wearing would have to go into the dry-cleaners to achieve the sharp pressed look that all his clothes had.

  Larry suddenly stirred, and after a while his eyes opened. He stared at her for a few moments and then he drew her close to him again and kissed her on the lips. ‘Thank God it wasn’t all a dream,’ he told her. Then he just held on to her tightly – breathing in her warm feminine smell and delighting in the feeling of her small neat body tucked closely into his.

  They both appeared in the dining-room at nine o’clock, dressed in casual jeans and jumpers. Neither had great appetites for the full Scottish breakfast that was put down in front of them, so they only picked at the sausages, bacon, black pudding and eggs on their plates. They took in very little of the hotel surroundings or the other guests. All that mattered was that they were together at this moment, and the plans they would have for the future.

  When they wandered out to the car park to check how bad the weather situation was, they were both amazed to see that the strong winter sunshine had already started a quick thaw, and the car looked as though it could be moving fairly soon.

  Chapter 56

  ‘Have ye heard?’ Mona came bustling in through the front door, hardly giving Fintan a chance to open it properly. Having been up and about for hours, the downstairs windows wide open for fresh air and to let the breakfast smells out, she was now ready to relax into a Saturday-morning chat with her neighbours and relatives. ‘Have ye all heard about the murders? It’s just been on the ten o’clock news again.’

  ‘No,’ Fintan said, following his brother’s wife down the hallway towards the kitchen, as if it was her house rather than his. ‘We haven’t heard anything this morning. You don’t mean the girl that was murdered in the golf course in East Kilbride?’

  ‘No, no,’ Mona said emphatically. ‘This is much closer to home – the family are from Uddingston. Seemingly they lived in a lovely bungalow as well.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Sophie asked, coming to meet them at the kitchen door, clutching the front of her dressing-gown. As always, she was conscious at being caught out in her nightwear by the gimlet-eyed Mona, who she knew would have done half a day’s work so far. ‘Is Lily all right? Have you any more news on her?’

  ‘Bright as a button last night,’ Mona said, ‘and hopefully due out next week.’

  ‘We were going to take a run in to visit her tonight, if there’s not too many others going.’

  Mona folded her arms high up on her chest, for once more interested in talking about another subject than her daughter. ‘I came around to see if any one of ye might know that family that was murdered in Uddingston.’

  ‘A family murdered?’ Sophie repeated, clasping at her throat. ‘Mother of God! It’s only a couple of days since they found that young girl’s body near Glasgow.’

  ‘Well, there’s more, and it might even be the same killer,’ Mona said dramatically. ‘This time he used a gun.’ She pointed to the middle of her forehead. ‘Shot all three of them stone dead through the head. They went by the name of Smart, according to the news – the man in the house was a Peter Smart.’ She shook her head in disbelief. ‘Did not one of youse hear it on the news? It was on at nine o’clock then again at ten.’

  Sophie’s hand flew to cover her mouth. ‘Oh, dear God . . . I never thought to listen to the news yet. I had a music programme on – it’s nice and relaxing in the morning.’

  Mona gave a sigh of exasperation. ‘You should keep yerself more up to date on things, Sophie,’ she chided. ‘There’s more important things going on in the world than music and books, you know. Especially when you think of young girls being murdered and raped and whole families bein’ shot dead only miles from us.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Sophie said, looking as contrite as an errant schoolgirl. ‘I must make myself listen to the news and read the papers more often.’

  Mona stared at her sister-in-law for a moment, always
amazed that Sophie could admit to her faults so easily – and yet do nothing most of the time to change them. Mona certainly wouldn’t feel so comfortable owning up to faults, but she supposed that in her own way, she tried hard not to have any.

  ‘I wonder how long that’ll last for!’ Fintan joked. ‘The only paper she likes is the Sunday Post because it has all the nice wee stories in it.’

  Mona threw a look of despair in Fintan’s direction, wondering how he put up with such a vague, disorganised wife. Pat Grace wouldn’t stand for it, that’s for sure. He was a man who appreciated the ship-shape way things were run, where meals were ready on the dot and things were cleared and washed up the minute they were finished.

  Mona glanced around the busy, cluttered kitchen now. ‘I suppose Kirsty’s gone off to work?’

  ‘Not this morning,’ Sophie said. ‘It’s her Saturday off . . . and anyway she stayed the night at the hotel she was singing in up in the Clyde Valley. Seemingly, they got a very bad fall of snow out there last night, and the roads weren’t safe to travel on.’

  ‘It’s amazing that the weather can be so bad only an hour away,’ Fintan said. ‘We only had a light fall of snow last night, and you’d hardly know it this morning. There’s only the odd wee bit at the side of the roads.’

  Mona looked from Sophie to Fintan, her mouth gaping open. ‘You say Kirsty stayed the night in a hotel?’ she repeated.

  Sophie nodded, suddenly beginning to feel uncomfortable. ‘Oul’ John the postman came to let us know just after nine o’clock. Kirsty phoned the post office to ask them to tell us she was safe. She didn’t want us finding her bed empty this morning,’ she explained. ‘But I probably wouldn’t have looked in anyway, because I always leave her and Heather sleeping in on a Saturday if they’re not working.’