Irish Secrets

by Paula Martin

  Should he continue to Roscommon? Tom could be anywhere by this time. A quick search on his phone showed there were six taxi firms in the town but, of course, it was unlikely the handover would take place outside any of them. The rendezvous was probably a back street somewhere.

  Although there seemed little point in carrying on, he continued into the town, and drove around until he located four of the taxi offices. The other two were private houses, so presumably the owners worked from home.

  After about forty-five minutes driving around the town, he gave up. There was no sign of Tom's car, and no way of finding out where he was. He banged a frustrated fist on his steering wheel, and returned to the N63 for the long drive back to Clifden.

  * * * * *

  "Full Irish, is it?" Maggie Tyson, the head cook, asked when Kara went into the staff dining room for breakfast the following morning.

  The smell of bacon and sausages threatened to turn her stomach, and she shook her head. "No, I'll just have toast, thanks, Maggie. Is there any news about Jenna?"

  "Nothing yet," Maria said. "I called Charley last night after you went to bed, and she said she'd contact Guy. We're leaving it to her, because the last thing he needs is us all trying to call him."

  "And I heard from Conor," Liz added. "He rang about eleven thirty last night to say he'd been released without charge."

  "That's good news." Kara sat down at the long table and reached for the jug of coffee. "I think I'll need about three gallons of this."

  "Hangover?" Liz asked sympathetically. "Can't say I blame you after last night's shock."

  "I didn't have anything more to drink. Perhaps it might have been better if I had, because I hardly slept at all. Everything kept going around in my mind, and the more I thought about it, the angrier I became."

  "I'm assuming you mean angry with Ryan, and I know I said I'd go ballistic, too, but I suppose he couldn't tell you his real job."

  Kara poured coffee into her mug, and took a long gulp. "Not to begin with, no, but something else occurred to me, probably about three o'clock this morning. He was working undercover as a taxi driver when I first met him."

  Liz frowned. "So? That's how we all met him, although I can't remember when he started picking us up."

  "March or April, I think," Maria said. "When did you start dating him, Kara?"

  "Mid-May, after I met him in Galway, and he drove me back here." Her voice hardened. "So did he already know, or at least suspect, the cottage was being used to store stolen goods? And is that the reason he offered to help me search for my—" She stopped, remembering she hadn't told anyone here except Guy about her search for her mother's birth. "For my Irish ancestors," she went on quickly. "Pretending to be helpful so he could pump me for information? About the cottage and Conor and—" She broke off, blinking back scalding tears of hurt and humiliation like the ones she'd shed in the early hours of the morning. "Anyway, it doesn't matter. I'll probably never see him again. What time are we going to Ballindoon today?"

  Liz glanced at her watch. "In about thirty minutes. Are you sure you want to do the workshops at the Community Centre there?"

  "Sure. It'll be a relief to think about something else."

  She slid off her chair, and went up to her room, trying to drag her mind into a different channel, away from all her conflicting thoughts. Her anger still dominated, but it was accompanied by an ache of desolation as other memories forced their way in despite her efforts to push them away. Ryan's smile, the way his blue eyes crinkled with laughter or softened with tenderness, his firm hand gripping hers, his arm around her when they sat in the pub, and… No, the last thing she wanted to remember was their bed in Dublin, or the two exhilarating nights they'd spent there.

  Picking up the folder with her notes for the drama sessions with the eight and nine year olds, she went down to the hall, where the rest of the group were assembled.

  Charley had arrived and was giving them an update.

  "Guy called me at seven-thirty. Jenna's in labour and the baby is being monitored, and they're both doing well. It seems they're not too worried about him coming early. Most babies born at thirty-seven weeks are fine, but they may have to put him on a ventilator, depending on whether his lungs have developed fully."

  "Fingers crossed for them both." Liz said. "Okay, who's going in whose car? Kara, you come with Richard and me, and Maria and Karl can go with Charley." She opened the front door, and glanced back. "Uh-oh, not your favourite person, Kara."

  Kara peered over her shoulder and tensed at the sight of Ryan getting out of his car. "Oh, no. Why on earth is he here again?"

  Charley stepped forward as Ryan approached. "Good morning, Detective O'Neill. How may we help you?"

  At least he had the grace to look discomfited at Charley's pleasant greeting, and Kara held her breath.

  "I've been instructed to pursue a line of inquiry about some diamond earrings Mrs. Sinclair was wearing on Saturday evening."

  Eyes wide, Kara pushed past both Charley and Liz. "How dare you?" she seethed. "How dare you come here asking about something you wouldn't even have seen if you hadn't wormed your way into my life?"

  "Kara, he's only doing his—" Liz's hand grasped her arm, but she shook it off.

  "I showed him some photos of Jenna on Saturday night, and now he has the nerve to start suspecting her earrings were stolen."

  "I'm sorry," Ryan said, "but we have to follow up all potential leads."

  She glared at him. "And do you have a search warrant?"

  "I can obtain one, but I'm hoping it won't be necessary."

  Charley stepped forward. "I'm sure we'd all like this – um, this misunderstanding to be cleared up quickly, so there's no need for a search warrant. If you come with me to the office, I'll do my best to help. Liz, you go on ahead, and tell Mrs. Maguire we'll be there as soon as we can."

  Kara stared after them as Ryan followed Charley into the house. When he paused in the doorway and glanced back, she made a deliberate point of turning away and heading for Liz's car.

  * * * * *

  "You can't blame her," Charley said. "She feels hurt and betrayed."

  Ryan nodded. The short encounter told him all he needed to know about Kara's feelings. If he'd hoped her anger would have abated by this morning, he was wrong. He doubted she would ever forgive him.

  Pushing the bleak thought to the back of his mind, he followed Charley into a room off the corridor.

  "This is Guy's office," she said. "If you'd like to wait here, I'll go and see if I can find Jenna's earrings."

  When she'd gone, he scrolled his phone until he found the photo of Caitlyn Connolly's jewellery, and enlarged the picture of the earrings. He couldn't afford to make any error with this, but his feelings were mixed. If Jenna's earrings proved to be the same, at least he would feel vindicated in his suspicions about Mist Na Mara being somehow linked to the stolen goods. At the same time, he desperately wanted to believe Guy Sinclair wasn't involved.

  He looked around as Charley came back into the office and handed him a velvet box. "Easy to find. They were still on Jenna's dressing table."

  The words Hanley of Galway were embossed in gold leaf on the lid. At least that should be simple to check. Hanley's was a reputable jewellery business which would never deal in stolen property. Assuming, of course, this was the original box. As he opened it, a phone rang.

  "Mine," Charley said as she pulled her phone from her jacket pocket and glanced at the screen. "I need to answer this. It's Guy."

  He nodded, and while she spoke on her phone, he studied the earrings, and compared them with his photo. His heart sank a little at the similarity to the stolen earrings, but his attention was diverted by Charley's shriek of delight.

  "Oh, that's fantastic news, Guy! I'm so relieved, and so happy for you both."

  She asked a few more questions and he didn't need to be a genius to realise Jenna's baby had been born.

  She put her hand over the mouthpiece. "The baby arri
ved about half an hour ago. It's a boy, but they knew that, and mum and baby are doing well."

  Relief washed through him. Kara had been right. He couldn't have forgiven himself if his actions the previous night had resulted in any major problem for Jenna or her baby.

  "May I have a quick word with Guy?"

  She nodded and spoke into her phone again. "Guy, Ryan's here and wants to speak to you…Yes, will do… Give Jenna my love."

  She handed the phone to him.

  "First of all, congratulations," he said. "From what I heard Charley saying, everything has gone well?"

  "It has, and I can't thank you enough for allowing me to come here to be with Jenna. Do you know what's happened to Conor?"

  "Released without charge last night."

  "That's good. So you know neither of us has any idea about the stolen goods you mentioned?"

  Ryan hesitated. "I'm hoping we can eliminate you both from our inquiries, but I do need to ask you one question. Do you have a receipt for the earrings your wife was wearing on Saturday evening? The diamond and ruby ones."

  There was a moment's silence, and he held his breath.

  "Jenna's earrings? I bought them at Hanley's in Galway about a month ago. They were a birthday present."

  "And you have a receipt?"

  "Yes, of course. Tell Charley to find a brown manila folder marked Personal in the top drawer of my desk. I'm sure that's where I put it."

  "Thanks, Guy. I won't keep you any longer. You need to be with your wife and son now."

  He handed the phone back to Charley, who spoke to Guy for another couple of minutes. He obviously told her where to look, because as soon as she ended the call, she crossed to the desk and opened the top drawer. She flipped through a folder and pulled out a sheet of paper.

  "I think this is what you need."

  He studied the receipt and nodded. "Any chance of a copy of this?"

  "Yes, of course."

  She switched on the photocopier and handed the print-out to him a few seconds later.

  "Thanks, and as far as Guy's concerned, this is the end of the investigation."

  "Thank God for that." Charley hesitated for a moment. "And you and Kara?"

  He managed a weak smile. "I don't think there is any 'me and Kara' now. She'll never forgive me for deceiving her."

  "You may be right," she said, as they left the office and headed to the front door. "I'm not sure I could forgive you either, in her place. You'll have to do something pretty amazing to earn her trust and respect again."

  Her words rang in Ryan's ears as he drove back to Clifden, but a blanket of dejection settled over him. Kara's anger and contempt were only too obvious. He'd blown it, just as he'd blown the whole of this investigation.

  When he entered the Garda station, the desk officer gave him a sympathetic grin. "The Chief's not happy."

  "Why? What's happened now?"

  "Best let her update you. She's in the Super's office. First door on your right."

  After taking a deep breath, he knocked on the door and went in.

  "Well, you've really screwed this one up, Ryan," Enya said.

  As if he didn't already know. He sat down and handed the invoice copy to her. "Jenna Sinclair's earrings were bought from Hanley's in Galway at the end of June. I called them on my way back here, and they checked their records and confirmed the purchase, which was five days before the burglary at Waterside Hall."

  "So Guy Sinclair's clean, and Conor McBride's story checks out."

  "What about Patrick Walsh?"

  "Sergeant Byrne went to Waterside this morning, and the head gardener confirmed that Mr. Walsh took plants from their nurseries to Roscommon most Monday mornings. We double-checked this with the garden centre. However, when the sergeant went to the taxi office to question the owner, it was closed."

  "Closed?"

  "Are you ready for this? Tom Wild has done a bunk. Scarpered, disappeared. One of the drivers, Ben Murray, said Wild sent all the night shift drivers home at ten o'clock last night and told them he was closing down. Between then and when the day receptionist arrived at six this morning, the office was stripped clean."

  Ryan's heart started to beat faster. "Stripped? How?"

  "Phone ripped out, radio and computer removed, everything gone except the desk, a couple of chairs, and a map of Ireland on the wall."

  He nodded slowly. "I should have guessed."

  "Why?"

  "Because I followed Tom Wild to Roscommon last night."

  Briefly, he told Enya about his futile cross-country chase as well as the reasons he'd started to suspect Tom.

  "But you lost him."

  He grimaced. "Believe me, no one is more frustrated than I am about that, but I wasn't psychic enough to know I needed to fill up ready for a hundred and fifty kilometre drive in the middle of the night."

  "Any ideas about why Wild decided to shut up shop last night?"

  "News travels fast around a small town like Clifden. One of the drivers might have seen two police cars with their flashing lights heading down the road to Mist Na Mara, so Wild may have panicked. My guess, however, for what it's worth, is that he intended to close down anyway, because he couldn't use the cottage any longer, especially now the renovation is almost finished."

  Enya nodded slowly. "You could be right but, without hard evidence of any stolen goods in the cottage, or of who removed that big haul sometime on Sunday, there's not a damn thing we can do. Tom Wild has now become the chief suspect, but he isn't on our database, so that's probably not his real name."

  "What about Mick Leary? My gut feeling still tells me he's involved somehow."

  "The Belfast police checked and confirmed he was on the seven-thirty sailing out of Belfast to Stranraer on Sunday morning, so obviously he couldn't move anything out of the cottage."

  "Whereas Tom Wild was in this area and could have done it." He heaved a sigh. "What now?"

  Enya shrugged. "I'll put out a description of Wild and his car number, but I don't hold out much hope of finding him. All we can do now is wait for them to set up another route from somewhere in Connemara to—" She held up her hands. "Who knows? We're back to square one."

  "And I assume I'm off the case now."

  "I can't send you to any other taxi firm, can I?"

  "That's true. I suppose it's useless to say I'm sorry, but I am. I really thought we could nail this one down."

  "So did I, but we'll keep watching Mick Leary, because I agree with you that he could hold the key to all this. Meantime, you need to return to Dublin and see what assignment the BCI will entrust to you now."

  * * * * *

  Later that afternoon, Ryan loaded his car with two bags of clothes, another bag with his bed linen and towels, and his laptop and printer. He took a box of food down to Billy in the hardware shop on the ground floor.

  "Use what you want from this," he said, "or throw it away. And here's an extra month's rent in lieu of notice."

  Billy's eyes widened as he took the brown envelope. "You leaving, Ryan?"

  "Aye, Tom Wild's taxi business closed this morning. Oh, and I've left the telly up there. It was only a cheap one, so your next tenant can use it."

  "Well, thanks for that, but I'm sorry to see you go. You've been a good tenant, not like the last one. Had to chuck him out when all the neighbours complained about him playing his drums till two o'clock every morning an'—"

  Ryan had heard all this before, and nodded. "Make sure your next tenant doesn't play the trumpet, Billy. Anyhow, I'll be away now."

  He sat in his car for a few minutes, wondering whether to call Kara, but instinct told him she'd still be far too angry to want to talk to him. Maybe he should wait a few days, and then try.

  Avoiding the centre of the town, he set off on the N59 through Connemara.

  "Slán agat, Clifden," he muttered.

  He didn't know when he would be back in the town, or if he'd ever see Kara again.

  Charley's words came b
ack to him: You'll have to do something pretty amazing to earn her trust and respect again, but he had no idea what he could do.

  Chapter 24

  "Have you heard anything from Ryan?" Guy asked, as he drove Kara through Connemara to catch the nine-fifteen bus from Galway to Dublin.

  She stiffened and shook her head. "No, and I don't expect to."

  Two weeks had passed since she discovered Ryan's deception. Two long weeks of continuing her normal life at Mist Na Mara, while, deep inside, she alternated between anger and self-reproach. So many conflicting thoughts conducted a running battle in her mind. Sometimes her fists clenched and all her nerves tightened as she relived the shock when she first realised he'd lied to her. Other times, she berated herself for being so naïve and trusting, instead of asking him more about himself and forcing him to tell the truth.

  Guy glanced at her. "Kara, I know you're hurt because he didn't confide in you, but he was working undercover."

  "Believe me, I've thought about everything over and over again. Maybe I should have guessed, because he never told me much about his life, but there were times when I'm sure he nearly slipped up."