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

by Laura Elliot

  ‘I skimmed it. Talk about a blast from the past.’

  ‘It landed your father in hospital.’

  ‘His heart landed―’

  ‘You’re wrong. It was Adele Foyle’s blog. Why should that pathetic diary scare him so much?’

  ‘It didn’t. Stop being so melodramatic.’

  ‘Melodramatic? Keith, she claimed she was gang-raped.’

  ‘But we all know that isn’t true. You remember her reputation? Look at the comments on Facebook. They tell it as it was.’

  ‘You’ll always get that negativity, especially when it’s anonymous. But others believe her. Your name is mentioned―’

  ‘Because I was driving my car when she went past. Honestly, Davina, your suspicions—’

  ‘Stop lying to me.’ Her scream, loaded with years of suppression, was full-throated. ‘If something is wrong, we need to fix it. And to do that, I need the truth. Were you one of those boys in Loyvale Park that time she—’ Davina stopped, unable to comprehend what she might have to tidy up on her husband’s behalf. Marianne Mooney putting it about. Such stories. Davina had listened to them once, shared them, even instigated some of them.

  ‘Can you honestly believe I hung around with that little whore?’

  ‘Why not? Half the village did, if the stories are to be believed.’

  ‘They are to be believed. But I wasn’t part of her pathetic stable. How dare you even hint that I’d stoop so low?’

  ‘Then what did your father mean? What did he cover up on your behalf?’ Davina shuddered. ‘Can you swear to me you never had anything to do with her?’

  ‘I swear. She was a kid. I was hardly aware of her existence. If you remember rightly, I wasn’t exactly short of girlfriends in those days.’

  Or since… She almost screamed it aloud but that would give her suspicions some twisted form of validity. Suspicion was not proof. Without proof, there was no reason to confront any unpleasantness in her marriage. She had to believe her husband. Anything else was unthinkable.

  28 Rachel

  Voices were being raised at the front desk where Garda Roberts was on duty. Rachel could hear them from her office and the impatient rasp of the second voice was too familiar to be ignored for long. Jack Bale, it appeared, had not been afforded due recognition when he demanded to see Rachel without an appointment.

  Rachel defused the situation and escorted him into her office.

  ‘Fucking snowflakes, that’s what they’re training these days.’ His cheeks were puffed with anger, the smell of alcohol strong on his breath.

  Rachel made a conscious effort not to lean away from him. ‘Sit down, Jack, and tell me why you’re here,’ she said.

  ‘It’s obvious why I’m here,’ he snapped. ‘The voice from the grave, eh? Lies, all fucking lies. It has to be stopped.’

  ‘What on earth are you talking about?’

  ‘Defamation. Character assassination.’

  ‘Who’s being defamed?’

  ‘Are you telling me you haven’t seen Adele Foyle’s blog?’

  ‘Her blog? No, I haven’t seen it. I’ve other things on my mind than surfing the net. What’s the problem with it?’

  ‘The problem, as you call it, is a diary that Marianne Mooney filled with lies. Lies that undermine my reputation. I won’t allow it to continue. I want you to release the statement that little whore made in my presence. I want it posted online and sent to the media in a press release. And that includes the rag your husband owns.’

  His arrogance should not surprise her. She had seen flashes of it on other occasions. But his blatant disregard for her authority was new. That diary – she remembered the entries, the unfolding story of a young girl’s troubled pregnancy and the fantasy she created around it. A fantasy that Rachel had almost believed until she read Marianne’s statement, signed in the presence of Jack Bale and another guard, now deceased.

  ‘What gives you the idea that you can come in here and make such a request?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s not a request, Sergeant Darcy, it’s a demand.’

  ‘Is it, indeed?’ Had alcohol affected his judgement or did he really imagine he had the authority to speak to her like that? His breath wafted towards her. She walked to the window and opened it. The noise of traffic was loud but fresh air was needed to dispel the rank smell of alcohol.

  ‘Did you drive here?’ she asked when she returned to her desk.

  ‘Ah ha, nice one, Sergeant.’ He slapped his hands off his knees. ‘I walked. No need to bring out the breathalyser, so can we get back to the subject in hand?’

  ‘We certainly can,’ she snapped. ‘I’m amazed that a man with your experience of Garda protocol would make such a demand.’

  ‘It’s a demand that you would do well to heed.’ He relaxed back in the chair, legs splayed, his posture deliberately provocative. ‘Your husband has skin in the game, whether you realise it or not. Far be it from me to judge a man on his past but being a junkie affected his judgement when he was a lad, especially when it came to the company he kept.’

  Hot saliva filled her mouth. She resisted the urge to return to the window. ‘I’m going to politely ask you to leave my office, Jack. If you don’t do so, I’ll have you evicted. Please don’t force me to take that action.’

  He stood and bent over her desk. ‘I’m warning you, Sergeant. You need to heed my advice. Discuss the matter with your husband and see what he thinks about this blog the entire village is talking about.’

  Unable to remain in his company any longer and overcome by another wave of nausea, she muttered an excuse and hurried from her office to the bathroom. Garda Roberts was combing her hair before the mirror, a cascade of auburn curls that she normally tied in a formidable ponytail. She looked startled at being caught with her hands in her hair, or, perhaps, it was the sight of Rachel rushing past her into the nearest cubicle. Unable to control her heaving stomach, or the sounds she made as she vomited, Rachel leaned her head against her arms and tried to steady her breathing before she emerged. Garda Roberts was still in front of the mirror, her hair tidied, her hat sitting squarely on her head.

  ‘Are you okay, Sergeant?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s a tummy upset,’ Rachel explained. ‘It hit me during the night. One of those twenty-four-hour bugs. I’m over the worst of it now.’

  Garda Roberts seemed convinced. At twenty-three years of age, she must look upon the possibility of Rachel being pregnant with the same disbelief she would feel if her mother announced such news. Rachel returned to her office, relieved to see the former sergeant striding through the front office and down the steps of the station.

  Afraid of building up Bob’s hopes and then having to dash them, Rachel had waited until he left for work this morning before taking the pregnancy test. During their first year of marriage, they had hoped it would happen. Trends had changed. Motherhood in the late thirties and early forties, while not exactly the norm, was commonplace enough for Rachel to believe she could become pregnant. No reason why it wasn’t possible, the gynaecologist told them after the first year had passed. Keep trying. How enthusiastically they had followed his advice. When nothing happened they had accepted that it was not meant to be. No angst, no rancour, they had each other and that was all they needed to complete their circle. Busy… busy… and now, suddenly, drawn up short and counting backwards, she decided to check the possibility.

  Positive. Nothing faint about this pink line. Rachel had been filled with disbelief. While she was thinking about other things, nature was sending out signals she had ignored until now. At forty-three she was going to become a mother. Armed with this new awareness, she was unable to understand how she had missed the signs, the slight nausea she had experienced on a few occasions, the overwhelming tiredness that she had attributed to work, the swelling and tenderness of her breasts and, latterly, her impatience with Bob’s moroseness. He was bored writing about lightweight politics that never moved beyond road improvement announcements and broken pr
omises to dredge the Loy.

  Tonight, she had planned to cook a celebratory dinner. This longed-for news would lift his spirits, give him a new focus. Imagining his delight, Rachel splashed cold water over her face and rinsed out her mouth. She stared at her reflection. Where was the glow she had experienced earlier? The hormonal aura that reflected her happiness? Washed away by an undertow. The news she wanted to share with her husband must wait. It could not be contaminated by innuendo and the jarring suspicions Jack Bale had left in his wake.

  Such a summer. The grass in their garden had been charred to stubble and the sun, lingering long into the evenings, drew them out of doors to watch the twilight settle. Bob had barbecued steaks and opened wine. She drank water instead. He made no comment when she told him she needed a clear head for tomorrow, when she had to speak at a conference on road safety.

  ‘Jack Bale called to see me this afternoon,’ she said.

  ‘Checking on you again, I presume?’

  ‘Who knows what goes on in his mind? He sent you his regards.’

  ‘Ha.’ Bob arched his eyebrows, his one vanity, plucked regularly to prevent them forming a unibrow.

  ‘He claims the two of you go back a long way.’

  ‘We don’t go way back anywhere,’ he replied. ‘I detested him when I was a kid and I like him even less now, if it’s possible.’

  ‘Why is that?’

  He laughed, a short, mirthless guffaw. ‘He was a bully and a toad when he was a sergeant. In deep with the big boys. Now, he’s a closed trap. All that information inside his thick head and it’s impossible to prise it loose.’

  Poor Bob. Dragged back from what he called ‘serious journalism’ to revive the ailing family newspaper, stymied by the Reedstown old guard with their secrets, their winks and nods, their secret deals and untraceable brown envelopes.

  ‘Do you hate being back here?’ she asked.

  He smiled at her before replying. ‘I deal with it by being happy with you.’

  ‘Is that sustainable?’

  ‘As long as you love me, yes.’

  He never talked about his troubled youth, apart from one night on their honeymoon when his defences came down. They drank too much wine over their meal and, back in their bedroom, he admitted that he had been bullied in his teens. It destroyed his confidence but drugs restored it, or so he believed until his parents persuaded him to enter rehab. His decision to begin afresh in New York had been the making of him and he left Reedstown when he was nineteen without a backward glance.

  ‘Bale came to the station to complain about Adele Foyle’s blog. Have you seen it?’ she asked.

  ‘Who hasn’t?’ He held the wine bottle towards her, then, when she shook her head, topped up his own glass. ‘Adele Foyle certainly knows how to throw a grenade into a crowd. That diary has gone viral on social media.’

  The chatter of starlings in the bushes was a shrill scold. Rachel shivered and wrapped her pashmina over her shoulders.

  ‘Did you know Marianne?’ she asked.

  ‘I remember her.’

  ‘From what I’ve heard, she had a reputation of sorts.’

  ‘There were stories…’ His voice trailed away as he cut into his steak. She had hardly touched the food he had prepared for her but he did not appear to notice.

  ‘Stories?’ she prompted.

  ‘Just stories,’ he said. ‘I never saw any evidence to back them up.’

  ‘‘You think they were lies, deliberately planted?’

  ‘Who knows? If so, I wasn’t involved in spreading them. Not that I’m giving myself any kudos for doing the decent thing. Far from it. I was too stoned to know what was going on under my nose. Marianne Mooney wasn’t even in my range of vision.’

  He was lying to her. This was a judgement based on her years of experience in the force; yet, in the next breath, she rejected it. She could not allow herself to be caught in a web spun by Jack Bale. Skin in the game. Why should that phrase undermine her? We go back a long way, me and Bobby Molloy… Way, way back… Jack Bale smirking when he said it and she had been afraid to analyse the implied meaning in his words.

  She pressed her hand against her stomach. Was that how it began, this protective urge that she had never experienced until now?

  ‘Do you believe her claim? The three blind mice, that’s what she calls them. Or do you think Shane Reagan was responsible for her pregnancy?’

  She was watching his reaction, as she’d been trained to do in interrogations. Recognising her behaviour, she wanted to sink her face in her hands and cry. The silence stretched between them, taut as elastic, before it snapped. Even the starlings had stopped their chatter and appeared to be waiting, as she was, for his reply.

  ‘I knew Shane.’ He cleared his throat before he spoke. ‘I used to see them together. They were mad about each other but his mother left Reedstown in a hurry. She was originally from Australia, so she just headed back home.’

  ‘So, you’re convinced Shane was the father.’

  ‘To think otherwise is to give credibility to that diary. Marianne Mooney is dead. It’s highly unlikely that the truth will ever be known. Adele Foyle told me she’d been in contact with you. She didn’t realise we were married.’

  ‘She must have been surprised when you told her.’

  ‘What did she want?’

  ‘That’s confidential information, Bob.’

  ‘Come on, Rachel. This is off the record. I’m not going to splash it over the front page.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘Then tell me?’

  ‘She showed me the diary.’

  ‘You’ve read it?’

  ‘All of it. She reported that it had been stolen but she obviously found it again. It’s shocking and heartbreaking but I had to make a decision as to its validity. Jack Bale convinced me that such a crime never took place in Reedstown.’

  ‘Well, if anyone should know, it would be him.’ His hand was unsteady as he refilled his glass and the wine, slopping over the edge, ran red across the table.

  The fruity aroma wafted towards her. Her heightened awareness of smell was another indication that she was on the brink of something new and wonderful. She had to tell him soon. A week ago, she would have considered it an unthinkable act to keep such wonderful news from him. But not tonight when the atmosphere between them was strained… by what? A frisson she could feel but was unable to control or understand.

  Later, while he slept, she traced her fingers across the firm slopes of his chest and forced Jack Bale from her mind. Way, way back… A meaningless expression that could never be interpreted as a warning. Skin in the game, equally so. She was overreacting, her hormones running riot, her judgement impaired by her pregnancy. She grimaced, knowing she would vehemently reject this suggestion if it was applied to any other pregnant woman. Still sleepless in the small hours, she wondered why happiness, truly fulfilling happiness, had always evaded her until now. And why, when it was so firmly in her grasp, she could already feel it stealing away from her.

  29 Adele

  The incriminating evidence arrived in a parcel postmarked Colorado. It contained a photograph album, so many pages to turn but only two people were visible in each photograph. They had been taken in Arizona, where Daniel had been attending a conference at Greendene Petro’s headquarters. He had mentioned the weekend conference to Adele during a previous phone call and she had promptly forgotten about it. A bad mistake, she realised as she stared at the photographs of him and Madison Fox seated together in a vast conference hall, elbows resting side by side. They were laughing together at some activity on stage, their faces turned towards each other. In another photograph, they projected the corporate gloss of authority as they addressed the audience in a coordinated PowerPoint presentation. Adele had tried to remember the theme of the speech, as if it mattered when her thoughts were racing chaotically towards an inevitable conclusion. Something about fracking and how it could eventually cause earthquakes or have some other seis
mic impact on the environment. Well, they were right on that one, she thought grimly as she viewed the rest of the album. The bars and restaurants they visited, the nightclub where they ended up afterwards, their faces slashed with laser beams, arms akimbo. Madison’s flamboyant red hair was shorter than Adele remembered, its self-assured spikes a conduit to her crackling energy. Adele stared at her walking into a restaurant with Daniel. She was wearing pink, her dress short and figure-hugging, her heels as high as gravity permitted. She reminded Adele of a flamingo, leggy and vicious.

  Daniel had his excuses ready when he Skyped, his terse expression clearly visible when Adele displayed the photographs to him. She also held the accompanying letter up for his inspection.

  Madison Fox always gets when she wants. Be wary of her. This is just a small example of what is going on behind your back. Be warned.

  With kindest regards from

  A friend Who Cares.

  ‘Someone is bent on making mischief,’ he said. ‘Six of us went to Phoenix. We were part of a team and we spent all our time together. Those photographs were cropped, Photoshopped, whatever. Madison is a friend, nothing more, nothing less—’

  ‘That’s not what it looks like from my side of the screen.’

  ‘That’s because your vision is distorted.’

  ‘My vision is twenty-twenty. It’s obvious there’s something going on between you—’

  ‘And if there is, which there isn’t, who’d blame me?’ he snapped. ‘I’m amazed you have the time to feel jealous considering all you ever do is blog that diary and deal with all the crap it throws up. You make promises about joining me and break them without a second thought for my feelings. Your obsession with your mother is the most important thing in your life. I don’t even come a poor second any more.’

  She had never seen him lose his temper until now. She pulled back from the screen, aware that everything was changing between them. Obsession. The word was cruel yet justified, though Adele would have called it her passion. Maybe that was the problem. Passion was the prerogative of the living and she had transferred all that emotional energy on to a dead girl, leaving him clinging to empty promises of a reunion. Soon… soon… how long is a piece of string?