Who Took Eden Mulligan?

by Sharon Dempsey

  Danny leaned back on the chair. ‘Maybe she thinks she did it, like you said. Or wanted to do it. She has to have played some part, even if she didn’t orchestrate it.’

  ‘Who was she working with, though?’

  ‘What about Dylan Wray, the one in intensive care? We could be looking at a murder-suicide pact that Iona was part of.’

  ‘It’s possible but not likely. Most murder-suicides involve family members. Any update from Dylan’s doctors?’

  Danny checked his phone in case there had been any recent texts he hadn’t heard pinging in. ‘Not since this morning. He lost a lot of blood and he’s still unconscious. Doctor said it was fifty-fifty as to whether or not he’d make it.’

  ‘Then I think it’s time we paid Iona a visit,’ Rose said.

  Within minutes, they were on their way to the Royal Victoria Hospital, located on the Falls Road. The visitors’ car park was full, so Danny reversed into a no parking section and slapped a card in the window saying the vehicle was on official police business. They were heading to ward 7C, where Iona Gardener was being treated for superficial knife wounds and shock.

  They were met at the entrance to the hospital by a huddle of smokers, all taking a quick drag before entering the building. The irony of smoking outside a hospital seemed to be lost on them.

  The maze of wards and side bays were easy to navigate, and they quickly found where they needed to be. Danny approached a nurse at a desk and asked where they could find Iona. She quickly scanned the computer and glanced up at them with a face that looked like it had seen too many night shifts. Her pallor was somewhere between yellow and grey and her hair was cut utilitarian style in a short, neat bob.

  ‘I’m not sure she is able to have visitors at the minute. You might need to come back tomorrow,’ she said, her voice carrying the lilt of a Derry accent. Rose did the needful with her medical ID and the nurse nodded and told them to go to the room at the bottom of the corridor. A police officer was standing at the door of the private room where Iona Gardener was being treated.

  ‘Maggie, holding the fort on your own?’ Danny asked in greeting.

  ‘Matt McCabe will be back in a minute. He’s just nipped to the loo.’

  ‘Has she said anything?’ Rose asked, nodding towards the door.

  ‘Not a word to us. Doctor’s in there with her now. The parents are here too, somewhere.’

  Rose knocked on the door and stuck her head into the room. ‘Excuse me, forensic psychologist Dr Rose Lainey and Detective Inspector Danny Stowe, here. We would like to have a word with the patient.’

  The doctor looked up from what she was doing. She adjusted her glasses and turned to the nurse, instructing her to return to do the stats on an hourly basis, before walking across the room and speaking to Rose and Danny in hushed tones. ‘Can we speak outside please?’

  They backed out of the room into the corridor.

  ‘Ms Gardener has minor injuries, some knife wounds and bruising – nothing life threatening – but as you can see, she isn’t really fit to speak to the police. I don’t think you’d get anything worthwhile out of her while she’s like this. Maybe if you come back tomorrow, we can reassess.’

  ‘Is the tox screen back yet? Any drugs or alcohol in her bloods?’ Rose asked.

  ‘All clean. We have her on pain medication now, and something to help relax her. She was very distressed when she came in. Here are her parents coming now. They were making calls.’ Rose looked behind and saw a dark-haired woman with a pinched-looking face walking beside a tall, grey-haired man. They both looked drained and shell-shocked, as if they couldn’t quite fathom what they were doing in a hospital when they should be at work or having lunch.

  ‘Mr and Mrs Gardener, this is Dr Lainey and I’m DI Stowe. Can we have a word?’ They looked into the room to check on their daughter, but she was still motionless.

  ‘Michael Gardener,’ the man said, before turning to the woman. ‘And Christine, my wife.’

  ‘Do you know what has happened yet? Who did this?’ Christine asked, her face stern and pale, devoid of make-up.

  ‘That’s what we are trying to decipher, Mrs Gardener,’ Danny said. ‘We understand that Iona walked into the police station at Dunlore and reported the incident. We currently have three bodies and another victim in intensive care. Iona told the officers at the station that she was the one responsible for what happened at the cottage.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous!’ Michael Gardener’s complexion flushed pink, his ears reddening in agitation. ‘My daughter has been badly injured, and God knows what she has witnessed or experienced, or can you not see that, Inspector?’

  ‘Mr Gardener, we have to speak to Iona to try and ascertain what happened. I’m sure you can appreciate that this is a very serious situation. Do you know if Iona has any enemies? Any reason to feel threatened?’

  The woman’s head whipped up. ‘No, of course not. She’s a happy, settled girl. Never given us a day of bother. She gets on with everyone.’

  ‘We have to ask. Let me introduce myself properly: I am Rose Lainey, a forensic psychologist working with the PSNI on this case. I’m here to help Iona as much as I’m here to help the police. We all want to get to the bottom of this and it is in Iona’s interests to cooperate with us,’ Rose offered.

  The father gave a terse shake of his head. ‘Christ, who could have done this?’

  ‘That’s what we are trying to find out, Mr Gardener, but we need Iona’s help to do that. Does Iona or either of you have any connection to Eden Mulligan?’

  He shook his head. ‘The woman who went missing years ago?’

  Rose nodded. Even after all these years, Eden Mulligan was still burnt into the public consciousness.

  ‘Why do you ask?’ Michael Gardener said.

  ‘We’re not at liberty to disclose that yet,’ Danny answered.

  He turned to the doctor. ‘We need to conduct a preliminary interview.’

  ‘Well, keep it short and if she gets too agitated, you’ll have to go,’ she said.

  Michael Gardener looked into the room, watching his daughter as she lay on the bed, and Rose could see the mother was about to cry. Her shoulders were hunched forward, and her head was buried into her chest, as if she wanted to curl up and hide away.

  ‘We have to go back in to our daughter. This is not the time or place for interviewing her. Anyone can see she has been traumatised,’ he said.

  Danny stepped forward, blocking the door as they attempted to move past. ‘I’m afraid that it won’t be possible for us to speak to her at a later time. We are dealing with a multiple murder inquiry and we don’t have the luxury of time to wait around. Miss Gardener may be able to help us.’

  ‘Has she spoken to you about what happened?’ Rose asked, her tone softer than Danny’s.

  Michael Gardener shook his head. ‘No, she hasn’t said a word.’

  ‘The best thing we can do for Iona is to clear up the notion that she is responsible. If she didn’t do it, we need to find who did. I’m sure you both want that too,’ Rose said.

  Michael Gardener looked to his wife and she nodded.

  ‘Trust us to do our jobs,’ Rose said.

  They looked at each other and Michael spoke. ‘Okay, but we stay with her. She’s been through a terrible ordeal.’

  When they entered the room, Iona was lying deathly still, with an IV hooked up to her hand. Her eyes, a clear blue, were opened, staring, but it was as though she was unaware that anyone was with her. Rose moved towards the bed. Iona’s left hand was bandaged, and they could see the crisscross of light scratches farther up her arm. She wore a regulation hospital gown of blue cotton and a white sheet was pulled over her, up to her chest.

  ‘Miss Gardener, we’re from the PSNI. We’re here to ask you about what happened,’ Danny said quietly.

  The girl turned her head as if to acknowledge them for the first time, but then closed her eyes as if to block them out.

  Rose took her chance. ‘Ion
a, I’m a psychologist. We’re here to find out what happened at the Dunlore cottage. I know you want to help us. We just need to ask a few questions. Is that okay?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Well, ten minutes. No more,’ the doctor said. ‘I’ll be back soon, Iona. If you need anything just push the buzzer.’ She placed the buzzer in Iona’s hand, the way you would with a child.

  Rose sat on the chair beside the bed and Danny stood close beside her. ‘Iona, can you tell us what you remember?’

  The icy blue eyes opened, but appeared glazed over as she said quietly, ‘They’re dead because of me.’

  Then, before any of them could respond, the girl was out of the bed and ripping out the IV needle stuck in her left hand. In one fluid movement she was at the window, pushing it with her hands, trying to open it, but it was on a safety latch, and only opened a few inches. Danny was there before Rose, grabbing the regulation hospital gown, trying to drag the girl back, before she could get the window open wider. The mother screamed, ‘Iona! Stop! What are you doing?’

  Rose hit an emergency button.

  ‘Iona, you’re going to hurt yourself!’ Danny shouted as he held on to her by her shoulders, the gown ripping away to expose pale skin. The father grabbed at her, holding her arm, trying to pull her back from the window. She seemed to have strength and force beyond her fragile physique.

  She didn’t listen to their pleas, nor appear to care about their concern, as she launched herself against the reinforced glass, smashing her head against it as if she wanted to knock her brains out.

  CHAPTER 10

  Back at the station, Danny watched as Rose opened a file to start making notes on Iona. They had little to go on, but he was certain that, given time, she would get beneath Iona’s skin. While the girl’s confession was infuriatingly intriguing, they had to adhere to protocol and they had to be cautious in how to proceed. They needed to establish her competency to be able to gain full access, or they risked a repeat performance of what had happened at the hospital. She had eventually been calmed by an injection of a sedative, but not before causing herself a minor head injury.

  ‘So, Iona’s in psychiatric evaluation after her meltdown, and we can’t get near her for questioning.’ Danny sighed as he mulled it all over. ‘Do you think the hospital incident could have been a convenient act to buy her more time?’

  ‘Nah. I don’t think anyone could put that on as a show. At least, it appeared real enough to me. She seemed terrified. Scared out of her wits enough to jump out of that window. Makes me think, what’s she frightened of?’ Rose said.

  ‘Or who? What went on in that house and what did she see?’

  ‘Yes, exactly – and why was she spared, if she isn’t the murderer?’

  Danny felt a surge of energy. He loved this initial stage of an investigation, when the details began to filter into focus. There was so much ground to cover – people to interview, evidence to examine – but at the beginning of every case was the endless stream of questions.

  Rose’s return was making Danny feel nostalgic. He found himself humming songs from years back – Nirvana, Radiohead and Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds – bands they had listened to in Liverpool. He’d find himself smiling at some daft memory and then check his phone to make sure he hadn’t missed her call. For the first time in months he wasn’t dwelling on Amy or the fucked-up Lennon case. He had tortured himself for weeks after he’d smashed that pimp’s head into that wall, thinking that maybe he was losing his control and ability to function. It was his job to catch the bad guys, make sure every scrap of paperwork was exactly as it should be to prevent barristers weaselling the scumbag’s way out of being banged up. His marriage troubles had affected his work. He couldn’t blame Amy for his reaction to finding that girl brutally murdered with the imprint of a DM boot smashed into her face, but he certainly hadn’t been his best self when it happened. Now, Rose and the Dunlore case were providing him with the perfect distraction.

  And she was as lovely as ever.

  Now that she was here, he couldn’t help reminiscing about the early days of their friendship. The first time he’d been invited into her bedroom, in her shared student house, he’d been struck by how tidy she was. The single bed was perfectly made up, the pillow plumped and the duvet pulled so tightly that he was afraid to sit on it and crease it. A row of novels sat on her bookshelf: Orwell, Graham Greene, Iris Murdoch. All worthy and so Rose. She had no posters or photographs to adorn the walls. No trinkets or reminders from home. Everything was monastically simple. His own room had a few posters and a Liverpool football programme displayed along with photographs of his mates back home. One of the photos had been taken on the last day of school, the friends’ arms around each other’s shoulders as the sun beat down on them. All smiling and thinking they were the dog’s bollocks.

  He’d noticed that whenever the subject of home came up Rose became spiky and irritable. Once, when he’d asked if she’d be getting the ferry home for Christmas, she nearly bit his head off. Eventually he learned not to ask and assumed money was part of the problem. She obviously didn’t come from a family with enough money to cover frequent trips back like he had. If she didn’t want to hark on about back home the way some people did, then that was okay with him. They both loved Liverpool and were making sure they got the most out of their university experience.

  There was an insecurity about her, a sense of uncertainty, as if she didn’t know her own worth. He saw it any time they were out with others. She became a spectator, sitting on the sidelines and letting the conversation brush over her, rarely offering an opinion or interjecting. Once, they were in the union bar and were discussing New Labour, a subject on which he knew Rose had plenty to say. He watched, amazed, as she let Gillian waffle on about why Tony Blair was a godsend to the party and how Gordon Brown wasn’t worthy of being party leader, never butting in to put her right. She seemed to doubt herself when in the company of the others, never shining the way she did when she was alone with him.

  The conference room was situated on the first floor, right beside the main open-plan office. The wall of windows provided a view of the car park, and though the bright blue of the sky made up for it, the heat of the sun beating in had cooked up a scent of old trainers with an undercurrent of fried food. Notice boards littered with the ghost pin holes of past investigations hung on the pale green wall at the back, while a wide projection screen dominated the wall to the front.

  The chairs and small desks were ordered into a lecture hall formation, making Danny feel like the teacher standing at the top of the class. He surveyed the room, and saw the usual faces looking back at him: Tania Lumen, Malachy Magee, Jack Fitzgerald, Jamie King, and a few others he didn’t know well. While every case was important, seeing the team assembled and waiting, he realised how make or break this case would be for him. The case that would either secure his future in the PSNI or prove everyone’s doubts to be right.

  He knew that word about the Lennon case had seeped through the office like damp through paper. Whether they agreed that the scumbag had deserved getting his head smashed in or not, none of them would condone it. The days of police brutality were behind them. They were a different kind of force and he’d risked all of their reputations by acting like a prize dick. The PSNI Discipline Branch had thrown the code book of ethics at him, and the board had threatened suspension, but he had managed to avoid the police ombudsman being brought in and McCausland had argued his case. The basement of doom and cold cases was the compromise.

  He knew he shouldn’t complain, but he felt he had served his time and now he was ready to set about proving his worth once again. A case this big and complex needed the best and those in the room, like him, were aware that they were lucky to have been selected. This case was going to get plenty of attention both from within the force and from the public. The media were already hounding them for quotes.

  He was pleased to see that the room was already set up with a map of Dunlore estate, a
floorplan of the cottage and photographs of each of the victims displayed on a board. The team sat expectantly, waiting for Danny to address them. He could feel tension in the air and knew it was either a reaction to the new live case or they were preparing to give him a hard time.

  He took a deep breath and began. ‘Right, you have all had the briefing notes earlier. We are dealing with a major investigation. Whatever you’re working on get it tied up or handed over to someone else. This case will demand your full attention.

  ‘As of yet, we do not know if the killer, or killers, planned and orchestrated this attack or if it was a crime of opportunity. In a planned attack, we expect to see a level of control, limiting the evidence left behind, and we can’t say yet if that was the case here. The scene is messy, with a lot of blood, but until forensics come back, we don’t know what else has been left behind by the killer or killers.

  ‘The cottage is out of the way but don’t let that prevent you from looking for witnesses. Someone may have seen something suspicious. We don’t know for sure if the killer entered the property after the victims, if he was already there, or was permitted entry by one of the group.’

  Danny was aware that he was stating more about what they didn’t know than what they did. Despite the carnage in the cottage they had little information to go on. He paused to make sure everyone was paying attention. He needed to have the team on side, to trust him as their case leader. He was sure talk around the station had been that he was losing his touch.

  ‘The offender’s actions after the event, in leaving the scene or perhaps in returning to their home, may lead to suspicion falling on them with others seeing out of character behaviour or blood-covered clothing. On the other hand, if the killing was planned or if the killer at least contemplated the use of violence by carrying a weapon, they may have come prepared to cover their tracks.’

  He paused and looked at the map.

  ‘This area surrounding the cottage has limited electronic data traces. Any potential CCTV and other types of digital imagery – such as electronic data relating to telephone calls or financial transactions – in the nearby areas must be traced. Mal, can I ask you to oversee this aspect of the inquiry?’