The Darkling Bride

by Laura Andersen

  “But it’s not, is it? It’s Daddy’s, and then it’s Aidan’s. I will never be any better than Aunt Nessa, allowed here on sufferance so long as I behave. I can’t wait until I’m eighteen and never have to come back here again!”

  Oh my girl, my girl, Lily mourned to herself as Kyla whirled and ran out in angry tears.

  Sometimes she hated being a mother.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  Carragh gladly escaped the outdoor scene, desperate to take a hot bath—a shower borrowed from Aidan’s former lover was not that relaxing—and put on the warmest jumper she owned. She should have known better than to expect peace at Deeprath.

  But nothing could have prepared her for the disaster that met her eyes when she opened the bedroom door.

  If the window and walls weren’t intact, she would have assumed the storm itself had blown through here. But this was fury of a different—human—kind. The books she’d brought with her now littered the room like drifts of paper ghosts, Evan Chase’s words flung far and wide. Her notebooks had suffered the same fate. Worst of all was her computer. The laptop looked as though someone had taken a hammer to it. Luckily for her, she saved everything she did to the cloud.

  Only one item belonging to Deeprath had been touched. Laid flat in the center of the bed was the Bride portrait. Someone had taken a knife to it—or the shears that had cut up the valuable borrowed clothing night before last?—slitting both Jenny Gallagher and the mirrored bride to shreds.

  Why?

  Carragh was still contemplating that question, horrified and sick, when someone spoke from the open doorway. “How long have you been sleeping with my husband?”

  She whirled to find Kyla, her elegant voice rough with anger. She did not even appear to notice the vandalism, so intently focused was she on Carragh.

  There was no point lying—the guilt must be written all over her face. “It was months ago. I’m so sorry. I had no idea he was married, I swear. And the minute I found out I walked away.”

  “Of course you walked away, clever, independent girl that you are. Much too smart to stay with a man who lies to you, not like his stupid wife—isn’t that what you tell yourself in your smug working-class way?”

  Oh dear. While she was still desperately seeking any other apology she could think of, Kyla continued to shoot questions at her. “How did it start? Did you do temp work for him? You’re registered with a temp agency.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Money buys you a lot of information. I knew he was sleeping with an Asian girl. I’ve got someone on staff at his flat who lets me know when he brings them home. Where was he bringing you from?”

  “Kyla—”

  “Where?” she shouted.

  “A club. I was drunk and very, very stupid. I swear there has been nothing between us for two months. And when I took this job, I had no idea he had any connection to the Gallaghers.”

  “You expect me to believe that?”

  “I came here for the library. That’s all.”

  “Is that what you told Aidan? My brother is remarkably naïve where a pretty face is concerned.”

  And right on cue, as though summoned by his sister’s rage, Aidan appeared. “What’s going on?”

  Carragh had thought she wanted to die when Philip showed up without warning at Deeprath. This was worse. Where were her helpful ghosts now? Couldn’t they drop a convenient painting on her head or set something on fire?

  To her enormous surprise, Kyla didn’t jump at the chance to reveal her sins. Instead, she waved at the disordered room and said, “Seems our vandal has struck again.”

  Aidan stepped past Carragh, assessing the damage. “Is this all yours?”

  “Yes.”

  “Including your laptop.”

  “Yes.”

  “So either someone doesn’t like you or someone doesn’t like what you’re—we’re—doing.”

  Aidan stared at the mess all around them, then at the Bride portrait in tatters on the bed, a sight that made him draw his breath in with a hiss. “That does not belong to you. So why was it destroyed?”

  Kyla seemed to see the damage for the first time. Studying the wrecked portrait, she shrugged. “Miss Ryan must have done it herself.”

  “When? You can see the bed is made up. That means Mrs. Bell was in here yesterday morning, after she and I left Deeprath. She surely would have brought it to someone’s attention if the room had been in this condition. And as Carragh and I have been within ten feet of each other ever since, she hasn’t had time.”

  “Really, Aidan, do you think I’m fooled by your show of logic? You don’t think Miss Ryan did it, because you’re hoping to get her into bed.”

  Aidan kept his temper, though his voice was distinctly frosty. “Whatever has upset you, Kyla, there’s no need to take it out on the innocent. If Philip is behaving badly, then send him away and be done with it.”

  Kyla gave a hysterical laugh. “That would be rich, and exactly what Philip wants. Send him away at the same time as his slut. Or didn’t you know your precious librarian was sleeping with my husband?”

  All the air in the room vanished, and Carragh thought she heard a soft sigh of sympathy in her ear. She instinctively closed her eyes, then forced herself to open them. Not surprisingly, Aidan was staring at her.

  He had gone dead white. But years of control came to his aid, though it took an almost visible effort. “Kyla, none of this is helpful. Please, come away. I can take you home, if you like. It was a mistake coming back to Deeprath. I knew it.”

  “It’s too late, Viscount. There will be no peace for any of us now until our dead are laid to rest.”

  She stalked away and, with only a slight hesitation, Aidan followed her. Carragh called after him, “I’m so sorry, Aidan. It was a mistake, before I came here, I didn’t know—”

  All he did was hold up his hand, but the tension in his body made his meaning clear. Not now.

  Maybe not ever.

  * * *

  —

  Aidan drove Kyla home to Kilkenny himself, once he and Bell had managed to clear the drive of fallen trees sufficiently to get the Land Rover out. He also told Bell to do his best to get Philip out of Deeprath and on a train that night. Kyla hadn’t even bothered to pack, bringing only her purse with her.

  Neither of them said anything until the outline of Strongbow’s castle came into sight on the horizon. Finally, Kyla spoke. “I suppose you think I’m the one who vandalized Miss Ryan’s room. I didn’t, for what it’s worth. If I went around wreaking vengeance on every woman Philip seduced, I’d never have time for anything else. Besides, it’s not his women I hate.”

  When he didn’t say anything, she asked, urgently, “You believe me, don’t you? That I didn’t do that to Carragh’s room, or the Bride portrait?”

  “I believe you.” Did he, though?

  “I’ve got nothing against her personally,” his sister said. “It’s just her bad fortune to be the straw that finally broke my back.”

  “Are you saying your marriage is over?” He asked it cautiously, afraid to frighten her off the subject.

  “My marriage was over years ago.”

  “Do you want me to call Winthrop?”

  “For a divorce? I’ll do it. I don’t need you doing all my dirty work for me.”

  He eyed her sideways. “You’re really going to file?”

  A wry smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. “Do you want to know a secret? I’ve had the papers drawn up for three years. Ever since the French girl that he slept with for a year. He even took her to Tahiti over Ellie’s birthday. Told me it was a work thing.”

  “Philip was never good enough for you, Kyla.”

  She shrugged listlessly. “What options did I have? At least Philip understood me, knew where I’d come from. Don’t tell me you haven’t done the same. The reason you’ve never found someone good enough for you, Aidan, is because you’ve never wanted to explain that your parents’ murders
destroyed your family beyond repair. Better to remain aloof, and pretend that you are not afraid.”

  He pulled to a stop before the carriage house and faced his sister. Her eyes were enormous in her face, and he realized suddenly that she had lost weight; her collarbones were jutting out.

  “What am I afraid of, Kyla?”

  “That I’m the one who killed them both. Do you think I can’t piece things together? I know murders like these are mostly domestic. I know I’m the most likely suspect, with or without Philip’s involvement. I don’t blame you for wondering.”

  “Kyla—”

  “Good luck with the bones.” Kyla left him, entering the house she had prudently bought in her own name.

  Before Aidan left his sister’s driveway, he pulled out his phone.

  Where are you, Pen?

  Walking around Glendalough. And remembering why I like indoor activities.

  Can I come see you?

  You just saw me.

  Alone. I need you to help me remember. Nothing will ever be right until I can remember.

  A long wait, then:

  Come to my room. We’ll see what we can do.

  No more fear. The truth had to be better than this endless twilight fog. Kyla was right—he had lived the last twenty years half afraid that she’d been involved in brutally ending their parents’ lives. Ironically, only just now when she’d dragged it into the open had he become certain that she was innocent. He didn’t know why, but he felt it must be connected to that nagging memory of Kyla on the day of the murders, the memory locked behind the defensive walls of his brain. Something, he could only hope, that would prove her innocence.

  Time to explode those walls and follow this to the end.

  * * *

  —

  By late afternoon Carragh had cleaned up the chaos in her room and gently placed the damaged Bride portrait prone on her desktop. She hoped it could be restored. Aidan would probably know someone…

  How he must hate her. She hated herself for the hurt she’d caused an innocent woman. She’d felt guilty before knowing it was Kyla—now the weight of it was crushing. No, she hadn’t known Philip was married. But she hadn’t even tried to find out. And if she had known? She might just have been angry and reckless enough at the time to have gone ahead and slept with him in spite of it all. What a coward that made her.

  If she’d had the Hong Kong letter with her, she would have opened it then and there as punishment for her cowardice. All she could do was vow that at the first opportune moment she would read it and face whatever it contained. She was not that frightened child anymore. And what had she to fear in not being wanted by people she’d never met? She had all the love and belonging and closeness anyone could ever want—even more. As she’d told Aidan last night, she was a Ryan.

  She’d have left Deeprath if she could, but Aidan had taken the Land Rover. Nessa was in seclusion in her rooms, and Philip had prudently disappeared. Finally, Carragh wandered outside to see what was happening by the tower.

  Inspector McKenna had managed to get a team out there—if one used that word in the loosest sense. In this case, it meant two garda from Dublin and a forensic archaeologist. Carragh was introduced to McKenna’s partner, Sergeant Cullen, who looked refreshingly open and good-natured after the cloistered atmosphere of Deeprath Castle. He narrated it all for her.

  “No spotlights—not likely to get any in here now, what with storm cleanup—so they want to work as quick as they can. Closest we can figure is someone hid those bones inside the tower wall all the way up there. Must have taken some work.” He eyed the tower speculatively, hands shoved into a city raincoat that looked at odds with the muddy surroundings.

  “Not as much work as you think,” Carragh told him. “Medieval castles might have walls fifteen feet thick, but most aren’t solid stone. The stones form the outer and inner side of the wall, with rubble filling the hollow space between. Find a weak spot to chisel out a stone, and a determined person wouldn’t have much trouble creating a hiding space.” She watched the garda, slipping in the overgrown, rainsoaked grass as they followed the directions of the forensic specialist. Then she looked back at the sergeant. “The question is why bother to hide a body like that at all?”

  Cullen had listened to her intently. “Maybe the document case will tell us why.”

  “What document case?”

  “Once we got everything photographed and could start carefully moving things, we found a leather case that came down with the stones. One of those old ones, that writers could roll up and buckle.”

  “What’s in it?”

  Cullen shrugged. “We’re waiting on the coroner for the bones, but the inspector has called the National Library just in case it’s something valuable. They can’t send someone until morning, so that’s me with a long night’s job ahead of keeping an eye on the site.”

  “It will be good for you.” Sibéal McKenna had come up behind them, her footsteps lost in the high grass. “Go help them secure things before it gets dark.”

  When Cullen had gone off, McKenna turned to Carragh with a casual air that spoke of deliberation. “What happened in the castle earlier?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “First you went off inside, followed by Kyla Gallagher, then her brother, while Philip Grant stood around out here looking like he’d cheerfully set the house on fire. Then Lord Gallagher comes outside again and sends Philip about his business—without raising his voice, more’s the pity for the eavesdropper—and proceeds to tear apart those downed trees like they have personally insulted him. Then he roars out of here with his sister in tow, leaving Philip looking as though he just lost a fortune. So tell me…what the hell happened?”

  Where to begin? Carragh didn’t feel the need to lie, but she was too emotionally battered to get into the many details of her sins. So she put it as baldly as she could, for what did she care what this police officer thought of her? At least she wasn’t a murderer.

  “Three months ago I had a brief affair with Philip. I didn’t know he was married, and I certainly didn’t know who he was. It was over weeks ago and I got the shock of my life when he turned up here as Kyla’s husband.”

  Sibéal nodded. “I know.”

  “Is there anything you don’t already know?”

  “The nature of my job, I’m afraid. You can’t tease out just the secrets you want—there’s always a tumbled skein of them pulling and twisting on one another. Mr. Grant was far too eager to point me in your direction, considering you could have no connection to the past crimes. I’d say you bruised his pride severely. Probably doesn’t happen that often.”

  “Good. He’s a pig.” But honesty compelled her to add, “Not that I’m winning any prizes for my conduct. I behaved very badly.”

  “So what exactly happened earlier?”

  “Kyla had found out. She yelled at me—no more than I deserved—and Aidan got caught up in it and everything was in such a mess in my room and the portrait slashed and Kyla accused me of doing it myself…”

  She was aware of how overwrought she sounded. Logically, she knew it was because she hadn’t slept properly in two days, save for a few brief, uncomfortable stretches in the cave last night. And Aidan had looked so grim when he’d walked away with Kyla. Should she make sure to be gone before he returned? Or would he want to see her again—to yell at, if nothing else?

  “What else did Kyla accuse you of doing?” The inspector had the skill needed to calm any situation and refocus on one point at a time.

  Carragh drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. It helped slow her mind down as well. “My room was vandalized. Nothing taken, just messed about. Destroyed books and notes and my laptop is in pieces.”

  “Show me.”

  “I’ve already cleaned it up.”

  “Show me anyway.”

  The light was going and the power was still out. Carragh lit an available lamp and, as requested, described as best she could where everything had
been. The position of things on the floor. Were the clothes beneath the book pages? What had been touched first? Meanwhile, McKenna, using a flashlight, moved methodically, viewing the room from different angles.

  She whistled at the damage done to the laptop, her fingers touching the indents made by whatever had been brought down on it. “Fury,” she said under her breath.

  Last of all was the painting. “This was the only thing not belonging to me that was damaged,” Carragh said.

  McKenna studied the tattered images. “A Gallagher, I presume?”

  “Jenny Gallagher. She died in 1882.”

  “Unnerving,” was the officer’s judgment. She looked at Carragh, the flashlight beam carving odd shadows on her face. “Is there anything else you’d like to tell me?”

  About what? About the fact that the damn painting had been haunting her since she arrived? About the sympathetic sighs she heard, and the laughter in the dark? About the trail of Lily Gallagher’s treasure hunt, her distinctive voice echoing from the grave to lead her son to…what?

  If she’d had anything concrete to offer, she would have spoken up. Or so she told herself. But she and Aidan had nothing more than cryptic clues in poetry and graveyards to go on, nothing to prove a connection to his parents’ murders except a feeling. Anyway, it was Aidan’s story to tell, if he chose, not hers.

  “There’s nothing else,” she replied.

  McKenna gave her the look of a mother who knows better but is holding her peace for strategic reasons. “I recommend that you sleep elsewhere in the castle tonight.”

  “Don’t you think I should leave altogether? Surely the Gallaghers will want me gone.”

  “Honestly? I think you’re a convenient lightning rod for the tension running through this family. That tells me you’re an important piece of this case now, and I like to keep an eye on all the pieces. Also, you were hired to do a job. Unless you’re keeping something from me, neither Aidan nor Nessa Gallagher has released you from that contract. And surely there is plenty more to do in that library.”