Had she hurt her husband? she faltered for a moment. She shouldn’t have hit him; there was never any excuse for that. She was as bad as her ex, resorting to physical violence to make her point. ‘Henry,’ she started, but then she saw Nessa take hold of her husband’s hand, interlacing her fingers through his, and Keelin wanted to hit her across the face. She never knew she could have such a fierce desire to inflict pain on another human being.
‘You should go,’ Henry said, dropping Nessa’s hand. ‘My wife and I have to—’
‘But, but, what about us?’ Nessa said. She tugged on the ends of his shirt, like Evie did when she was desperate for his attention. ‘What about . . .’ She broke off, glancing at Keelin. ‘What about what I just told you,’ she hissed. ‘About the . . . the baby.’
‘The baby?’ Keelin asked, looking between the two of them. ‘What baby?’
Nessa whimpered, looking to Henry for help but he refused to meet her eye. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t mean for you to find out like this. It wasn’t supposed to happen. I—’
Keelin put her hand up to stop the younger woman from talking and she started to laugh, growing more hysterical as she saw the bewildered expression on Nessa’s face. ‘Oh, sweetheart,’ she said. ‘You’re saying Henry got you pregnant? That’s not possible, I’m afraid. He got a vasectomy two years ago, didn’t you, “H”? Not that he consulted me about it – I’m just the stupid wife, amn’t I? He told me he had to go to the mainland for some “business”, arrived home a few days later with –’ Keelin made a snipping gesture with her fingers – ‘and acted like I should be grateful. Said he didn’t want to risk me getting depressed again, like after Evie was born. It was a good thing, he said, he did it for me. I didn’t know the real reason for my husband taking away my chance to have more children was because –’ Keelin was screaming now, spittle running from the corners of her mouth, but she didn’t care – ‘he wanted to fuck twenty-something-year-olds without using a fucking condom.’
Nessa’s face crumpled, her mouth quivering, and she ran past Keelin, throwing the door of the garage open. ‘Shit,’ Henry muttered as the wind tore in, whipping against the garden furniture and knocking the folded chairs to the ground with a bang. Without thinking, Keelin went to follow Nessa but she didn’t get very far, bumping into Alex by the back door, his mouth gaping open in shock. ‘What happened?’ he cried, looking in the direction the girl had disappeared in. ‘She was crying. What did you do to her, Mam? What’s wrong with you?’
‘I didn’t . . .’ she started to say, but her son wasn’t listening. He was running after Nessa, calling her name. ‘Alex, come back, it’s too dangerous in this weather.’ She tried to go after him but there was a hand around her waist, restraining her. ‘Get off me,’ she said through gritted teeth, elbowing Henry in the ribs, but he held her so tightly she couldn’t move. ‘Let go of me, you piece of shit.’
‘No,’ he said, spinning her around so she was facing him, clamping her arms to her sides. ‘You have to let me explain.’
‘Explain what? That you’ve been fucking one of the Crowley Girls? I don’t think that needs much explanation.’
‘That’s not fair,’ he said and she couldn’t be sure if he was crying or if it was just the rain running down his cheeks. ‘Things haven’t been the same between us since Evie was born, you have to admit that.’ She didn’t have to admit anything, for she had thought they were happy, thought their marriage was a good one. ‘And I was there for you during all that, wasn’t I?’ he said. ‘Throughout the depression and the—’
‘Are you actually using my post-natal depression against me?’ she snarled. ‘What is wrong with you?’
‘Darling,’ he said, leaning in to kiss her, but she turned her face away from him. ‘Keelin. Please. I love you.’
‘Oh, fuck you, talking about love while you shagged the both of us at the same time. What if you’ve picked up some sort of disease from her? You’d be happy giving that to me, would you?’
‘That’s not possible.’
‘And how, prey tell me, do you know that?’
‘Because she . . .’ The rest of his words were muffled.
‘She what?’
‘She was a virgin,’ he muttered.
‘Oh, Jesus Christ, what is wrong with you?’ she said, the bile rising in her throat at the very thought. ‘And what about Alex? How could you do this to him?’ She stopped. ‘Oh, shit,’ she said. ‘What if this baby is Alex’s? What are we going to do?’
He hesitated, and with a sudden heaviness in the pit of her stomach she knew the truth. ‘No,’ she said slowly. ‘Of course not. She was never with Alex. That was just an excuse, wasn’t it? You used my son as a way of deflecting attention away from the fact you’ve been cheating on me for months, didn’t you? Didn’t you?’
He didn’t say anything, his mouth set in a grim line. He looked more annoyed than remorseful, as if irritated he had to explain himself in this way. Keelin dropped her head; she couldn’t bear to look at him any more. How could she have been so stupid? Obviously that photo had been for Henry, not Alex. The excuse her husband had concocted was pathetic, it was such a blatant lie. And she had known it too, on some level, of course she had known, but she didn’t want to believe it. She hadn’t wanted to believe that Henry could do this to her. She had loved him, and trusted him when he said he would never hurt her. And with Nessa Crowley, of all people! Keelin had been blind, hadn’t seen the girl for what she was – a snake in the grass. A worm needling its way into the heart of their family.
She slumped, her body going slack, and she would have collapsed if it were not for Henry rushing to hold her upright. He rested his forehead against hers, breathing in when she breathed out, recycling air, until it felt like they were one, the way they had on their wedding day, when they promised they would belong to each other for the rest of their lives. They stood there for what felt like hours, Henry whispering, ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ into her ear, while she said nothing, shivering against him in her wet clothes. I loved you, she said silently, as her husband held her close. I loved you so much.
‘What the –’ he said, spinning around on his heel at the flaring of something sharp behind them. ‘What was that?’ he asked, but Keelin told him to be quiet, for that sound had been too familiar, echoing in her bones. She stood still, listening. And then it came again and there was no doubt in her mind this time.
‘Alex,’ she said, and fear snapped inside her, breaking her breath in two. She started to run without knowing where she was running to. She looked around her, rubbing the rain out of her eyes, but she couldn’t see him anywhere. Henry ran past her, disappearing into the darkness, and she tried to chase after him but she kept slipping, hissing through her teeth as she pushed herself up from the mud, her scraped knees stinging. ‘Alex,’ she shouted, the thunder drowning out her voice. ‘Alex!’
She almost wept when she saw him in a flash of lightning, standing in the rock garden, his hands loose by his sides. ‘Alex,’ she said, ‘what are you doing? What happened? I heard you scream.’ He was shaking, she realised, as if he was having a fit. ‘Calm down, sweetheart,’ she said, pushing his wet hair off his face. ‘Tell me what’s wrong.’ He pointed towards the garden, and he turned his head away from her, gagging as he fell to his knees. Keelin crouched beside him, rubbing his back while he vomited onto the grass. ‘You’re OK, pet,’ she said. ‘You’ve had too much to drink, that’s all. You’ll be fine tomorrow.’ The clouds shifted, breaking apart, and the moon became visible for the first time that night. Keelin blinked, her eyes readjusting in the dim light. It was only then that she saw her husband. Blood on his hands, standing over something – a collection of limbs, a scrap of black material – staring down at it with a blank expression on his face.
‘Henry,’ she said, fear unspooling in her stomach, loose and wet. It was a body, she realised. The body of a you
ng woman.
‘Henry, what have you done?’
Chapter Fifty-Four
Joseph O’Shaughnessy, retired detective sergeant
Joseph: With a case like this, the first thing you’d do is set up jobs in order to track the movements of the deceased in the hours before death. Who they were with and where, what time, et cetera. After that, we spread the net wider in the victim’s life, talking to their friends and family. You’re trying to forensically take their life apart, in a way, to see if anything, or anyone, flags as suspicious. When there’s so little DNA evidence, you’re depending on witness statements, but witnesses are subjective, like. Their memories can be frail, and their recollections can be coloured by an agenda – you’d want to be mindful of that. Some might believe they’re telling you the truth, but what they think they remember isn’t actually what they saw. But all the same, usually there’ll be a few witness statements that catch our attention. From there, you’ll compile a list of persons of interest.
Noah: Who were the persons of interest in the Misty Hill case?
Joseph: I can’t be naming any names now, but in a case similar to that one, there could be people who might point the finger at another party guest. A man who was a friend of the host’s and was flirting with the victim, ‘had his hands all over her’, one witness said. A man like that, he mightn’t be the sort to take rejection lightly.
Jake: Are you talking about Miles Darcy?
Joseph: Jesus, lad, I’m not talking about anyone in particular here now. I’m just talking in general, d’you get me? No one was charged for Nessa Crowley’s murder, were they?
Jake: OK. If this ‘friend’ was ruled out, where would you look next?
Joseph: Hypothetically now, the guards might decide that a young man who was friendly with the deceased could be an interesting prospect. A possible motive to be found there, if you were looking for one – if he was in love with the victim but found out the stepfather was sleeping with her, betraying the mother too. But you know, if there happened to be multiple witnesses who saw that young man unconscious in bed at the time of the murder, then the gardaí would have to look further afield, wouldn’t they? Hypothetically speaking, like.
Noah: That leaves Keelin and Henry. Was Keelin ever a proper suspect?
Joseph: Lookit, I wouldn’t be the one to confirm or deny that. That wouldn’t be in my gift at all. But I will say if I was investigating a case and it was similar to the one you’re mentioning, then I suppose the wife could be a suspect. As a guard, you’d be looking for a motive – her husband was having an affair, she was jealous, she wanted the young wan out of the way. That kind of thing. You’d have to be checking if she had a decent alibi.
Noah: Keelin didn’t – sorry. What happens if ‘the wife’ doesn’t have an alibi?
Joseph: I’d be looking at a few factors. Physical strength for one; was the wife capable of delivering a blow like that? And if she wasn’t, then who was? Was anyone behaving in an odd manner? Doing things like, I don’t know, lighting a bonfire in the middle of a storm. That might be seen as strange behaviour, couldn’t it? Deleting text messages and emails. Scratches and bruises, that kind of thing.
Noah: It’s all circumstantial evidence though. The DPP said it wasn’t enough to convict Henry Kinsella.
Joseph: You’re right, lad. So a guard would then be looking at motive and alibi. With many of these cases, the alibi given is the wife, and that doesn’t amount to much if she’s a suspect too.
Jake: And motive? Maria Crowley told us Nessa went to the party that night to tell Henry she was pregnant, but the autopsy didn’t find any signs of pregnancy, did it?
Joseph: No. And I can’t talk about the specifics of this particular case, obviously, but if I was a guessing man, I would say there are two reasons a young girl might tell her boyfriend she was pregnant when she was not: a) she was mistaken due to her, eh, monthlies being late, or b) she was trying to force someone’s hand. What do you think a man would do if he heard news like that? If he was desperate, like? But as you said, this is all conjecture! Henry Kinsella is an innocent man in the eyes of the law and that’s that.
Noah: What do you think, personally?
Joseph: It doesn’t matter what I think personally – that’s not what being a detective is about. It’s about the facts. I will say one thing to you now though . . . I was a guard for a long time and I’ve learned to trust my instincts. When we bring a person in for questioning, we watch them carefully. You might have one person who’s distraught. She can barely speak, she’s in such a state of shock. I’ve seen enough throughout the years to know when that’s genuine. But sometimes you’ll get someone and the way they react is . . . unusual, d’you get me? They seem to be almost enjoying the whole thing. Such a person might fit the profile – narcissistic, lacking in empathy, unnaturally calm. I retired only two years ago –
Noah: Congratulations.
Joseph: Thanks, lad. So, yeah, I’m retired, but there are some cases that never leave you, and Nessa Crowley’s murder is one of them. (coughs) It haunts me.
Noah: Not just you, Mr O’Shaughnessy. Everyone I’ve spoken to during my time in Ireland is obsessed by this case. They all want to know what happened to the Crowley Girl.
Joseph: It’s funny. Young women go missing in Ireland all the time. Some of them turn up dead, others are never found. You never know which cases are going to take a hold of the country’s imagination. Which girls will be the ones we decide we’re all going to care about, like.
Jake: I suppose it helps if they’re white, right?
Joseph: I don’t know about that, lad. But it definitely helps if they’re good looking.
Noah: Which Nessa Crowley was.
Joseph: Yes. Which Nessa Crowley was indeed.
Chapter Fifty-Five
The Crowley Girl
Keelin would replay this scene in her head thousands of times in the years to follow, and each time she would still remember the sensation of being stuck, her feet welded to the earth beneath her, leaving her unable to move. Henry, looking up from the body, and saying, ‘What?’ His face shocked. ‘I didn’t do this, Keelin.’ Blood roaring in her ears as she understood the implications of what her husband was saying, of who was responsible instead. ‘It must have been an accident,’ she said, her breath catching in her throat. ‘She’s fine. Isn’t she fine? We just need to get the nurse. This will be fine.’ Alex’s panicked breathing beside her, whimpering, ‘Mam. Mam, please do something.’ Henry crouching down beside the body again. ‘Nessa,’ he said. ‘Nessa, can you hear me?’ Shaking the girl’s shoulders, and feeling for a pulse on her wrist, and then sitting heavily on the ground, a whispered, ‘Fuck. Fuck.’
Keelin felt as if she was being dragged out of her body, her fingernails scraping her insides as she left her skeleton, floating into the sky and looking down on the scene below. She was observing this taking place before her and it was like a play unfolding: the boy having a panic attack, gasping for breath; the man with a hand over his mouth, to stop himself from screaming, it seemed. A young woman lying in the grass, oh so very still.
‘What happened?’ the man said, standing up again. ‘Tell me exactly what happened. Did she fall?’
‘I didn’t mean to. She wouldn’t stop laughing at me.’
‘Alex. Did you push Nessa?’
The boy was weeping openly now. ‘She was laughing at me and I . . . Is she going to be all right, Henry? Please, I—’
‘Shh,’ the man said. ‘We’ll take care of this.’ He looked at the woman standing there. ‘Darling,’ he said, and she looked around, wondering who he was talking to before she remembered that she was the woman, the ‘darling’ to whom he referred. This man was her husband and this boy was her son, and there was a dead body lying in her front garden.
‘Keelin,’ Henry said, taking her hands in his. She looked down, his flesh aga
inst hers, the pressure of his fingers too heavy for a dream. ‘I need you to take Alex upstairs.’ He fished a set of keys out of his pocket and handed them to her. ‘Go around the back and use the fire escape.’ That had been installed when a Hollywood actress insisted on staying in Hawthorn House while rehearsing for her West End debut, instead of the cottages; it was deemed necessary for insurance purposes. Henry had been furious, she remembered. Health and safety nonsense, he complained. It utterly ruins the facade. ‘No one will see you that way,’ he said now. ‘Alex, you need to get out of those clothes immediately. We’ll burn them in a bonfire.’
‘We can’t light a bonfire tonight – we’re in the middle of a storm,’ she said, and she felt furious with him for even suggesting it. ‘Do you have any ideas that aren’t completely ridiculous?’
‘Keelin,’ he snapped, ‘we’re going to have a bloody bonfire, all right? Just get Alex upstairs. I’ll deal with this.’ He grabbed the boy by the wrists and pulled him to standing. ‘Alex,’ he said, ‘you stay quiet, do you hear me? You don’t know anything. You drank too much beer and you passed out in your bedroom before the lights died. You don’t know anything about this, OK? When the police come, you say nothing. Do you understand me?’
‘Yes,’ Alex tried to say, but he collapsed, his knees buckling. Keelin ran to her son, wrapping her arm around his waist and telling him to lean his weight on her. ‘Come on, mo stoirín, you can do this,’ she said. ‘I’m here, I’m here now.’ Alex’s entire body was convulsing, and she had to limp with him as far as the fire escape, shouldering his weight. As she hauled him onto the first step of the metal structure, she turned to meet her husband’s gaze. He nodded at her and she nodded back. A decision made, in that moment, she would think later. One that could not be undone without ruining them all. Keelin had chosen her son, and Henry had chosen her.
‘Get up, a stór,’ she said, as Alex fell on the steps. ‘Come on,’ she urged him as they reached the top of the fire escape. She unlocked the large window, dragging him in with her, and locked it behind her. ‘Stay here,’ she told Alex, holding her hand out for his room key. She crept down the landing to his bedroom, using her phone as a torch. She gestured at her son to hurry after her, closing the door behind them. Alex collapsed onto the bed, trembling in his wet clothes. He rolled off the mattress and vomited beside the bed, spewing yellow bile onto the wooden floor. The bitter smell curled in her direction; she could taste it at the back of her throat.
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