Girl Targeted

by Val Collins

  ‘That’s a good idea, but I can’t tonight. I promised I’d help Ryan with his taxes.’ Jason looked at the clock. ‘I should have been there ten minutes ago.’ He headed for the door, calling, ‘Don’t wait up,’ as he rushed from the house.

  *

  Aoife woke next morning to the sound of the front door closing. She glanced at the clock on the nightstand. 5:45. Beside the clock was one hundred euros and a note from Jason saying he had to go into work early.

  FOURTEEN

  ‘Laura?’

  ‘I’m thinking.’

  Aoife had spent days worrying whether or not to tell Laura about the pills Delia had taken. Now she was convinced the murderer worked in DCA it seemed wrong to keep the information to herself. Lives could be in danger. She waited until the evening, when they were on the train, skipped over how she and Irene had made contact but admitted she was investigating Delia’s murder. Laura listened without interrupting, then leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes.

  They were almost in Naas when she sat up and turned to Aoife. ‘Right, this has to stay between us.’

  ‘Don’t people deserve to know they’re working with a murderer?’

  ‘Why? Can you imagine what the atmosphere would be like? Everyone watching everyone else, and what would it achieve? The murderer’s had five months to kill again and he hasn’t. There’s no reason to suppose he will.’

  ‘Can we take that risk? Delia might not be the only person he has a grudge against.’

  ‘We don’t have a choice. To be on the safe side, I’ll say everybody has to be out of the office by six p.m. I’ll make up some story about health and safety concerns. That way there’s no risk of anyone being alone with a murderer.’

  ‘I think people deserve to know there’s a murderer in the building.’

  ‘They also deserve to know someone is investigating them as possible murder suspects, but if they found out, they’d refuse to work with you. Not to mention that the murderer might not take it very well.’

  ‘Maybe you’re right.’

  ‘I am right. Give up the investigation, Aoife. You can’t be sure anyone would ever print your story, and is it worth risking your life for a few quid?’

  *

  ‘She’s right, Aoife. You’re a mother now. If there’s the slightest chance your life is in danger, you have to drop this investigation. Maybe you should ask the agency to find you another job.’

  ‘Why? This is Ireland, remember? How many serial killers have we ever produced? If the murderer was killing indiscriminately, would he have waited this long to kill again?’

  ‘He might.’

  ‘No, he had a specific grievance against Delia, and maybe several other people. But whatever he was angry about happened long before I joined. He couldn’t possibly have a grudge against me. Trust me to know what I’m doing. If I even suspect someone is trying to kill me, I’ll drop the investigation immediately.’

  ‘I don’t like it.’

  ‘I’ve thought a lot about this, Maura. I gave up on my career when my parents died. It just didn’t seem important at the time, and even later, all I thought about was the present. I can’t afford to do that any longer. Amy deserves so much more.’

  ‘What do you mean? Amy has everything she could possibly want.’

  ‘For the time being, but what happens when she gets older? I want to spend time with Amy, but I also want her to have every possible advantage in life. Don’t you see? Journalism is the perfect solution. I’ll be my own boss, I can work around Amy’s schedule and I can earn a good living.’

  ‘I’ve never heard of a starving accountant, Aoife. Jason’s always been brilliant with money and he can provide Amy with anything she needs. You should have an income of your own, but you don’t need to risk your life to get it. Jason and I will make sure Amy never goes without.’

  ‘I told you, there isn’t any risk. I know you’d help if you could but I’m Amy’s mother. It’s my responsibility to see she has the best possible start in life. I want to send her to a private school and there’s no way we can afford that on our current income.’

  ‘Isn’t that a bit extravagant? The local schools have a great reputation. Most of Evan’s class are expected to get into college.’

  ‘It’s not the education that makes the difference, it’s the contacts. Those people have such an advantage in life. How long do you think it would take me to break into journalism if I’d been to a private school? One phone call to a friend and I’d be introduced to the people who could make it happen. I want that for Amy.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘And I want to be a good role model. I don’t want Amy settling for a job that pays peanuts. Or for one where she doesn’t use all her talents. I want her to know she can be anything she wants to be. People said that to me when I was young, but I never believed it. How could I, when almost everyone I knew was struggling to make ends meet? It’s going to be different for Amy. Her world will be different. It will be so different, she’ll never even question that she can achieve anything she puts her mind to.’

  ‘That’s all very well, Aoife, but the most important thing is that she has a mother.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that, Maura. I will never allow anyone or anything to separate me from my child.’

  You can’t handle it on your own. Admit it. You need help.

  FIFTEEN

  Aoife finished updating Laura on the progress of the HR system. She was reaching for the handle when the office door was pushed open with such force she stumbled backwards. Dan stood in the doorway, face purple, looking like any moment he might start breathing fire. Laura’s face blanched. Dan stood aside, waiting for Aoife to leave, then banged the door behind her.

  ‘Watch the door,’ Rachel hissed at Aoife.

  ‘What?’

  But there was little need for eavesdropping. A few minutes of muttered conversation was followed by Dan bellowing, ‘You weren’t aware! It’s your job to know what’s going on. The whole bloody office is talking about it. How is any work going to get done around here? If you’re not capable of doing your job, tell me and I’ll find someone who’s able to do what they’re told.’

  For what was probably the first time in his life, Dan stormed out of the building without talking to anyone.

  ‘What was that about?’ Aoife asked, but Rachel was halfway out of the office and Joe had picked up the phone. He was hanging up when Rachel returned.

  ‘You heard?’

  Joe nodded.

  ‘What?’ Aoife asked.

  ‘Somebody put sleeping pills in Delia’s drink so it would be easier to murder her,’ Joe said.

  ‘Oh.’

  Rachel glared at her. ‘Joe?’

  Joe followed her into Laura’s office, closing the door carefully behind him. Aoife heard low muttering, then Rachel came out, took an envelope from her desk and handed it to Aoife.

  ‘This needs to go registered post today. Laura said to take it to the post office now and she’ll give you money from petty cash later.’

  Aoife looked at the envelope. ‘It’s an invoice.’

  ‘I know what it is. I put it in the envelope.’

  ‘Why are we sending invoices registered post?’

  ‘How would I know? Laura says it has to go right now. Are you refusing to take it?’

  ‘Why would I do that?’

  ‘Just go, all right?’ Rachel said, returning to the office.

  There was a long queue and it was forty minutes before Aoife returned to Dame Street. In the lobby she met Karen, one of the marketing managers.

  ‘I’m escaping, thank God. I don’t envy you going back there,’ Karen said. ‘The news about the pills has everyone in a state. I see Rachel has a face on her again.’

  ‘I don’t know why. What difference does it make to her? A drugged Delia might be easier to murder, but it would still take a lot of strength to hang her from the ceiling.’

  ‘True, but I’ll bet Rachel thought she was i
n the clear. She thought the police accepted we were all in the pub the night Delia was killed. Now she knows they’ll be looking into everyone’s movements very closely.’

  ‘Rachel was in the pub, wasn’t she?’

  ‘If she was there, she didn’t stay long.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Positive. I wanted to talk to Laura privately. I knew she couldn’t admit she was aware of the redundancies, but I thought, if I got her alone, she might tell me if Marketing would be affected. I arrived at the pub around five-fifteen and Laura was at the bar buying drinks. When I looked for her later, she was gone. I checked several times but she never returned. I thought she might be with Rachel, but there was no sign of her either.’

  *

  ‘If Rachel is lying about being in the pub, it still doesn’t make her a murderer.’

  Karen shrugged. ‘Maybe whatever she was doing was nearly as bad. Or what if she killed Delia but someone else hung her?’

  ‘Two people just happened to murder Delia on the exact same day?’

  ‘Stranger things have happened. If ever anyone had a queue of people lining up to murder them, it was Delia. If I’d had to put up with her every day, I might have joined it.’

  *

  Rachel and Joe were sitting at their desks. They were both subdued but trying to act normally. Laura stayed in her office all afternoon. At five p.m. she came out. ‘I’m going home. Aoife, are you coming?’

  She hurried down the stairs, Aoife trailing behind. When they were outside, Laura said, ‘Who else did you tell about the sleeping pills?’

  ‘Nobody.’

  ‘Where did the rumours start, then?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Laura raised her eyebrows.

  ‘I really don’t, Laura.’

  ‘Okay. Two of the Stephen’s Green staff get our train. I should have made sure they weren’t within earshot. It hardly matters now anyway. Dan is such a bastard. He was never this bad with Delia. Maybe I should have an affair with him too. At this stage I’m so desperate, I’d try anything.’

  ‘Delia had an affair with Dan?’

  ‘Maybe not an affair, but they were all over each other at the Christmas Do one year.’

  ‘When was that?’

  ‘The year before Ellen was born. I thought at one stage Dan might be the father, but the timing was wrong.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Delia went on maternity leave at the beginning of September and she couldn’t have been more than six months pregnant then.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘No, but just after Paddy’s Day, she stopped drinking coffee and around the same time all the paté disappeared from the fridge. She was always eating paté and crackers before then.’

  ‘Did she look very pregnant?’

  ‘She looked big-ish, but then she wore clothes that emphasised her bump. You can usually tell, though, and Delia didn’t carry herself like someone in her ninth month. She didn’t tell us when she gave birth. We didn’t even know she had a girl until she returned to work.’

  ‘Did you look at her maternity benefit form? That would have to include her due date.’

  ‘It’s not on file. Delia took a month’s parental leave the following year and there’s no paperwork on file for that either.’

  The train was full and they had to sit in different carriages, so Aoife never got to ask the one question she was desperate to have answered.

  *

  The following week, Aoife took the early train to Dublin and met up with Laura, and they took the Luas to Abbey Street. They were crossing the Ha’penny Bridge when Aoife said, ‘Rachel was in the pub the night Delia was murdered, wasn’t she?’

  Laura sighed. ‘Of course. Don’t start suspecting everyone, Aoife. I can’t take any more drama. Rachel, Joe and I were in the pub together all that night.’

  SIXTEEN

  Laura stopped off at the Spar to buy chocolate. Aoife hadn’t set a foot inside it since she’d accused the guy who worked there of following her. When she entered the HR office, she found Karen sitting at her desk.

  ‘Hi, Aoife, I’ll get out of your way. I was having a little chat with Rachel. It occurred to me this morning that she, Joe and Laura must be the main suspects. After all, they were closest to Delia. I’d better get back to work. Have a good day.’ She winked at Aoife as she passed her.

  ‘I can’t stand that cow,’ Rachel said. ‘How dare she suggest I might be a suspect. I wasn’t even in the office that afternoon. Delia sent me to Navan to deliver that stupid letter. I only dropped into the office for a minute to collect my bag.’

  ‘That makes you the last person to see her alive. You could have brought her a cup of coffee before you went home.’

  ‘Very funny, Joe. When did I ever voluntarily give Delia anything?’

  ‘You might make an exception if you were planning to kill her.’

  ‘Oh yeah? I’m not the one with murderers in my family.’

  Laura joined them in time to hear Joe ask, ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘You know very well what it means. Do you think nobody saw you at that funeral? There are no murderers or criminals in my family.’

  ‘Rachel!’ Laura shouted.

  ‘So yous all know?’ Joe said. ‘I thought people were looking at me funny.’

  ‘Rachel doesn’t think you’re a murderer. Do you, Rachel?’ Laura glared at her.

  ‘He’s more likely to be a murderer than me.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, just because his grandfather killed someone doesn’t mean he will. If your mother kills someone today, does that mean you’ll become a murderer too?’

  Rachel scowled but didn’t reply.

  ‘I’m not my grandfather, and he wasn’t the big criminal the papers made him out to be either. He was a small-time crook who did one big job and got a name for himself.’

  ‘Yeah. The job where he murdered the guard,’ Rachel yelled. Laura grabbed her arm and pulled her out of Joe’s reach, but Joe didn’t even glance at her.

  ‘He had a hard life, me granddad. The police caught him mitching when he was ten and he was sent to Artane. Yous all know what went on in that hellhole. Me grandad blamed the guards more than the church ’cos they sent him there. He was barely literate when he got out, and robbing was the only way he could support his family. He’d never fired a gun before he shot that guard, said he wasn’t even sure how the gun worked, but he never regretted it. To him all guards were the enemy.’

  ‘Were you close to him?’ Aoife asked.

  ‘Hardly ever saw him. He and another family started a turf war when I was five. Me da was the first one killed. Ma never forgave Grandad. She wouldn’t let him near our house. I never even spoke to him until I was sixteen. I felt sorry for him. He was as much of a victim as that guard.’

  ‘See? He doesn’t even think murder is wrong.’

  Laura frowned. ‘That’s not what he said, Rachel. Anyway, there’s no proof that the murderer works here. The pills might have nothing at all to do with Delia’s death. She might have taken them by mistake. Mixed them up with aspirin or something.’

  ‘Aspirin are twice the size of any sleeping pills I’ve ever seen, and she’d swallowed an entire month’s supply. How could that be an accident? And how likely is it that she’d have an accident with pills the same day someone decided to murder her?’

  ‘I don’t know, Aoife. What I do know is no work is getting done around here and I’m the one Dan will blame. Do me a favour. No mention of Delia for the rest of the day, okay?’

  *

  Aoife was in the canteen when Laura came in.

  ‘Lisa from Advance Recruitment phoned me. She said you never returned your time sheet last week.’

  Aoife phoned Lisa on her mobile and spent fifteen minutes sorting out the mix-up. When she returned to the office, Rachel was looking for her purse. ‘I need something sugary,’ she said. ‘Would you like anything, Aoife?’

  ‘No, tha
nks, I’m fine.’

  ‘Joe?’

  ‘I’m fine too, thanks.’

  ‘I’m buying you both something, so it might as well be something you like.’

  ‘Okay, make me fat, then,’ Joe grinned. ‘I’ll have an éclair.’

  ‘Me too, thanks,’ Aoife said.

  ‘Everything’s sorted between you two?’ Aoife asked when Rachel left.

  ‘Yeah, she didn’t mean any harm. We’re all too wound up about this whole Delia business.’

  ‘Do you think somebody in DCA wanted Delia dead?’

  ‘Most of us did. Doesn’t mean we were prepared to murder her.’

  SEVENTEEN

  ‘Let’s get back to the budget.’

  ‘This affects the budget, Aoife. We need to consider how much longer we’re going to have a second salary coming in.’

  ‘I think we should wait a while, Jason. We’ve lots of time to give Amy a brother or a sister. What’s the rush?’

  ‘My brother was a year younger than me. I want the same for Amy.’

  ‘You and Ryan hardly see each other and Maura said you fought like cats and dogs when you were kids.’

  ‘All kids fight, but we were really close. We don’t see as much of each other since I got married, but we still care about each other.’

  ‘I know, but Ryan and Evan get on well and they’re seven years apart.’

  ‘They barely saw each other growing up. When Ryan was fifteen, Evan was only eight. Don’t you want Amy to have someone to play with?’

  ‘Of course, but would it really be so bad if there were three or four years between them?’

  ‘Two would be better, and it might take a few years to get pregnant, so you can’t afford to waste time.’

  ‘I’m still young. I got pregnant with Amy almost immediately. I don’t think that will be a problem.’

  ‘You’re young now, but if you wait four years you’ll be twenty-seven when you have your second, thirty-one when you have your third and thirty-five when you have your fourth.’