Her Name Was Rose

by Claire Allan

  I just about made out that he was speaking to DS Bradley, announcing my arrival when he shuffled back, and told me to take a seat.

  I’d been in a police station before, of course. Being interviewed under caution. Being actually cautioned. Listening to the PSNI officers talk to me but not really hearing them speak. I was too zoned out. Too broken. Sitting there now, even though I was scared and even though I felt like the life I thought I’d have was being ripped away from me, it dawned on me that I didn’t feel broken by it. Battered, yes. Bruised. A little cracked around the edges – perhaps. But not broken.

  A door to the right of the reception desk opened and DS Bradley walked through – the same silent officer who was with him when he called to my flat was following him.

  ‘It’s nice to see you Emily,’ he said with a smile that seemed genuine, or at least genuine enough to make me feel safe and comfortable in what was an otherwise totally surreal situation. ‘Are you happy to go ahead?’

  I nodded. ‘Yes. I am.’

  ‘Great, Constable Wilson here will bring you through to the interview room. Get you a cup of tea or a coffee if you want? I’ll be with you shortly.’

  Constable Wilson smiled and said ‘Follow me’ and I did as I was told, following her through a maze of doors and narrow corridors until we arrived at a small rectangular room – one plastic chair in front of a table and two more behind it. There were no windows, but an air conditioning vent overhead whirred, spluttering a dusty scented coolness into the air.

  I asked for a glass of water, which she brought, and moments later we were joined by DS Bradley, who took the remaining seat and offered me another warm, reassuring smile. It struck me that in any other situation I might find him attractive and I almost laughed at the absurdity of that thought coming into my head at that precise time.

  He explained he was going to ask me all that I knew about Cian Grahame and in particular his whereabouts on certain key dates. I nodded that I understood and he told me that if I needed a break at any time, I was just to let him know. I told him I was sure I would be fine, but before we spoke, I needed some advice.

  ‘Cian came to see me last night,’ I told him. I watched as he and Constable Wilson exchanged a look. ‘He said he was worried because he hadn’t heard from me yesterday – and of course you wanted me not to tell him anything about any of this. I lied and told him I was at my parents. But …’ I felt my voice crack. ‘He became, well, not exactly violent but agitated.’

  ‘Did he hurt you, Emily?’ DS Bradley asked.

  I had a flashback to the sharp pull on my hair, how my head was forced backwards. How I was unable to move. How he hissed in my ear. How my head hurt last night, how my neck felt tender. How I had cried and he told me not to get upset.

  ‘He scared me,’ I mumbled. ‘And yes, he hurt me.’

  ‘We can take a statement, Emily. Have you any bruises? Did he leave a mark? We can have the police doctor look at you? We could make a case against him on this.’

  I thought of the bruise on my neck – was that assault or consensual sex? It was rougher than I would have liked – but I hadn’t fought him off. Hadn’t said no. I hadn’t fought him off last night either. I had even allowed him to kiss me – but that didn’t mean I consented to his behaviour. It meant I was trying to preserve myself.

  I lowered the collar on my uniform – showed the bruise while my face blazed with shame. Told them how he had pulled my hair the night before.

  ‘We’ll keep you safe, Emily. Please don’t worry,’ DS Bradley said, with a tone so reassuring that I believed that he would.

  They took my statement. Asked so many questions I felt myself get dizzy. They took a separate statement about the assault – assuring me it was assault. ‘If more women came forward, less men would get away with this kind of behaviour,’ Constable Wilson said. I wondered whether Rose ever thought of coming forward? Then again – she was under his charm, wasn’t she? He had done to her what Ben did to me – made her feel as if she brought his tempers and controlling behaviour on herself.

  I wondered about Ben. Was he with someone now? Had he changed? Was it really the case that I had just brought the worst out in him? Was there something in me that did that? Brought out the worst in people – drove them to the extremes of behaviour? Or had I just made it too easy for him, and for Cian too, to mould me and use me? I’d change now, I vowed. I’d go to counselling. I’d not let this break me.

  As long as Cian didn’t get to me first.

  When I was finished, it had already passed 11am – already passed the time I told Cian I would be at his house. ‘I’m not sure what to do,’ I confided in Constable Wilson.

  ‘I will get a car to take you where you want to go,’ she said, softly, reassuringly. ‘A couple of officers will be keeping Cian busy for a few hours, so try not to worry about that now. If you have somewhere else you could stay tonight, that might be an idea – just until things settle?’

  I tried not to think about how my options were severely limited – I just nodded. I would sort something out.

  ‘Are you going to arrest him?’ I asked.

  ‘We’re going to talk to him about what you’ve said. We also have enough from the journal to ask him more questions. We have to see how it goes from there.’ She handed me her card – told me to call her if I needed her or, in an emergency, to dial 999 and someone would be with me straight away. I tried not to feel sick at that thought.

  ‘Try not to let it worry you too much – with people like Cian, sometimes all it takes is someone to stand up to him to scare him off. He has a lot to lose, Emily. He’ll do his best not to risk that. Now let me walk you out.’ She led the way back through the maze of corridors and doors and out into the soulless waiting area again. ‘If you just wait there I’ll get you some leaflets for support services,’ she said. Just as she turned to leave me, the door opened again and DS Bradley peered out. ‘Constable Wilson, can you come with me please? We’ve just got the CCTV footage – you’ll want to see this, and perhaps, Emily – could you wait around a bit? We might need you to verify the identity of someone.’

  They disappeared, leaving me to sit on the red plastic chairs wondering what exactly they had found. What CCTV footage were they looking at? From the accident that wasn’t an accident? From the night Kevin McDaid died?

  I took my phone from my bag and felt my stomach constrict at the sight of a missed call from Cian at 11.05am. He was already looking for me. I had already broken his rules.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  They were gone about ten minutes before I heard the door open again and saw Detective Bradley approach me. ‘Emily, I wonder, could we ask you to look at some footage for us?’

  ‘Of course,’ I said, although I was trembling and the very last thing I wanted to do was to walk back through that door.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I’ll lead the way.’

  We went to a different room this time, one where a number of officers stood around a collection of screens. ‘Emily, we’ve been trying to find out who might have paid a considerable amount of money into Kevin McDaid’s bank account – but the bank they used records over their CCTV footage once a month and by the time we requested the film from the day in question it had already been overwritten. We had to turn to the City Centre Initiative, and their CCTV cameras, to see if we could capture someone entering the bank at the relevant time.’

  ‘We knew a female had paid the money in,’ Constable Wilson said, her face a little flushed. ‘If I’m honest, Emily, we thought it might have been you.’

  ‘I didn’t. I couldn’t have. I didn’t even know him. I didn’t know any of them – not before …’

  ‘We saw you at McDaid’s wake,’ Detective Bradley said. ‘And then when we saw you at Scott’s and again at the Grahame house …’

  I blanched. Realising just how incriminating my behaviour had been. Until now I thought it just painted me as a bit of a crazy – but to realise I had unwittingly been
putting myself in the frame for a murder investigation – it made me feel ill.

  ‘I had nothing to do with it. I swear,’ I said, panic rising again. I put my hand to the back of a chair to steady myself.

  ‘Emily, it’s okay. We have ruled you out of our investigation – but if you could help us with this …’

  A young officer with short, dark hair and thick-rimmed glasses hit a few buttons on a computer and a grainy black and white image came into view of The Diamond – one of the city’s landmarks. The video was taken looking directly across the old War Monument at the bank on the corner of The Diamond and Butcher Street – one of the city’s busiest thoroughfares – and there were lots of people walking along the pavement, parking outside the bank and crossing the road.

  ‘Can you zoom in?’ DS Bradley asked, and the young officer pulled the image in closer to the bank. Many of those walking had their hoods up or carried umbrellas against the rain, but occasionally I got a glimpse of a face, none of which I recognised. The young officer pulled in a little tighter.

  ‘Can you run it forward a bit, to 2.42pm?’ DS Bradley asked. ‘There, that’s it,’ he said. ‘Emily, can you look at this figure approaching the bank from Butcher Street? Is there anything familiar about the person you see? The image isn’t great, so really we’re just looking to see if you can confirm our suspicions?’

  I moved closer to the screen, squinted to focus. Saw a figure in a trench coat, a dark scarf wrapped around her neck, an umbrella obscuring a clear view of her face. But the familiar white trousers peeping out at the bottom of her coat made me uneasy. When she came to the door – lowered the umbrella to take it down before walking into the bank, she looked upwards at the sky and, even though the image was grainy, there was no mistaking who it was. My hand flew to my mouth and I looked at DS Bradley and Constable Wilson who were staring at me expectantly.

  ‘That’s Donna,’ I said.

  ‘That’s what we suspected,’ DS Bradley replied.

  *

  Donna. Sweet Donna. Put-upon Donna. None of it made sense. Why on earth would she have deposited money into Kevin McDaid’s bank account? Why would she be involved in any of this? She had sat with me last night – with Owen and me – showing us Rose’s diaries. Showing me proof that Cian was a bully and a control freak. Pointing the finger at him. Unless that was all part of the plan – point the finger at Cian, make the evidence stack up in his favour and away from her? But it would never have been pointed in her direction anyway. Who would ever have thought Donna – who had to run the gamut between work and parent/teacher meetings with her boys – could ever be tied up in something so sinister? Donna who would regale us with tales of how she spent the previous evening doing nothing more exciting than catching up on the soaps and occasionally looking at the latest loser uploads on online dating sites?

  Donna who had cried almost every day about Rose. Who said Rose was one of her best friends. I felt as if the carpet had been whipped out from under me again. If Donna was involved – did that mean Cian was innocent after all? Yes, he might be a horrible person but he wasn’t a murderer by proxy, was he? Did it mean that Owen could be involved after all? Those two had been thick as thieves these last few weeks – Donna always knocking on his office door or insisting she assist him in the surgery.

  Donna.

  The police officers talked around me – I barely took it in but I knew they were going to bring Donna in for questioning. A big part of me – and I don’t quite know why – wanted to lift my phone and call her and tell her to run. Warn her. Tell her to call a solicitor. I thought of how fragile she seemed lately and I worried this would break her. But was it all an act? Was everyone in this sad state of affairs acting? Were they all pretending to be someone they weren’t? Was it possible I was the most sane among them all?

  The buzzing of my phone jolted me into the here and now. I lifted it to see another missed call from Cian and a text from Owen saying he hoped I was okay and he hoped he would see me soon – but what was I to do? Go to work? Go to Cian’s? Go home? Run away to the States and Maud and hope she would give me a sofa to sleep on?

  My mind just kept drifting back to Donna. She would be so scared. I knew she would. I felt for her. None of this was right. No, I would go to work and at least, when the police arrived, I could offer her a slice of comfort maybe? Then again, maybe she didn’t deserve it. She had, or so it looked, been responsible for killing a woman, and risking the life of a baby in the process.

  I left the police station, turning down the offer of a lift, and walked back into the cold across the street to the walkway that ran the length of the old Quay. I walked to the water’s edge – stood there looking in. Thinking of Kevin McDaid and how he had met his end there. So many lives had been destroyed already and I wondered how many more would be before this was all over. I would say it was the wind that brought tears to my eyes but I think it was much more.

  *

  When the police arrived at Scott’s, they thankfully decided to keep their presence low key. DS Bradley nodded at me as he arrived and I told him I would bring him through to Owen’s office – and then bring Donna to him. There was no way to stop this being horrible for everyone – but they would at least try to be as sensitive as possible. None of this was going to look good for Scott’s anyway. The word would spread quickly.

  My hand was shaking hard as I knocked on the surgery door and pushed down the handle to see Donna and Owen huddled around the computer screen looking at dental X-rays for the next client. A perfectly normal day was about to take a horrible turn. They both looked at me as I walked in. Despite my best efforts, I wasn’t able to hide how I was feeling.

  ‘Emily, what’s wrong?’ Owen asked. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost. Is Cian here? Are you okay?’ He stood up to walk towards me, and his genuine concern made me want to weep and shield him from what was about to happen.

  ‘Donna,’ I said, keeping my voice as steady as I could. ‘There are some people here to see you.’

  She looked at me without blinking. She was like a rabbit caught in the headlights – unable to move. Stunned. Terrified.

  ‘People?’ Owen asked, looking from me to Donna and back again.

  ‘Police,’ I said, in little more than a whisper.

  There was a low moan, as Donna clutched her stomach and folded in on herself. I felt myself give in to tears.

  ‘What on earth would the police want to see you about, Donna?’ Owen asked, his face a picture of perfect confusion.

  ‘DS Bradley and his colleagues are waiting for you in Owen’s office,’ I said to Donna as she sucked in her breath and tried to stop keening.

  ‘Bradley? This isn’t about Rose?’ Owen asked. ‘Donna?’ His confusion was almost as hard to watch as Donna’s fear. It was clear nothing about this made sense to him.

  ‘They know?’ she asked me and in that moment I knew it was true. It might not have made any sense but it was true.

  I nodded.

  ‘They know what?’ Owen asked, his voice impatient now. ‘What on earth is going on?’

  Donna turned to him and took his hands in hers while he looked on completely bemused. Gulping back sobs, she spoke. ‘I’m so, so sorry, Owen. So sorry. He wasn’t meant to kill her. He was only meant to hurt her. To delay things – to stop you moving in together. To give her time to think. To give me time to think. If I’d known what would happen … if I’d known Jack would be there. It wasn’t meant to be like this. She wasn’t meant to die.’

  I watched as the severity of the situation registered on Owen’s face. He threw her hands from his as if they were on fire – and she jumped backwards as if it was she who had been burned.

  ‘She just had everything, Owen, and I had nothing,’ she said, pleading with him to understand. ‘I just wanted something for me for a change. A chance to let you get to know the real me – to realise we could have been happy. She had Cian and they had their problems but they could work through it. Why would you thro
w all that away?’ She was sobbing loudly now – attracting the attention from staff and clients alike. DS Bradley and Constable Wilson came out of the office and when she saw them she looked wide-eyed from them, to me, to Owen.

  ‘All I wanted was you to love me like I loved you. You know I love you, Owen. You know I’ve loved you for a long time. She was in the way – but he wasn’t meant to kill her. Just hurt her or scare her. Just hit the pause button. I thought I was being careful. If I had known what would happen, I never would have …’ As her voice trailed off, DS Bradley walked past me and started telling her, in his calm voice, that she was under arrest in connection with the murder of Rose Grahame. I saw the faces of our colleagues first register shock, then crumple with grief. As he read her rights, she continued to plead with Owen, who could do nothing but watch as this nightmare scene played out in front of us. ‘Why should she be the one to get everything? Why didn’t I deserve to be happy? I just wanted to be happy, Owen. I just wanted us to be happy. I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry. She wasn’t meant to die.’

  Although I am sure there was noise around us as she was lead out of the surgery and into the police car that was parked outside, I couldn’t hear it. I couldn’t hear anything except for her pleading and sobbing. It was only when the door was closed, and the car had pulled off that the noise of ringing phones and hushed whispers and the sobs of co-workers struggling to come to terms with what had happened crashed back in.

  I looked at Owen, who was standing with his back to me – his hands resting on the work surface in the surgery, his shoulders shaking, his knuckles white. I saw him bough and break and curl into himself. The sound of his wail echo around the room.

  Very gently I pulled the door closed and walked back into the main waiting area. ‘I’m very sorry,’ I announced to our waiting clients, ‘I’m sure you can understand why, but we will be closing now and we will reschedule your appointments for a suitable time. I’m very sorry for the inconvenience.’