Close My Eyes (41 page)

I reach down and touch his arm, which is flung out across the bed. The night light casts enough light for me to see that the duvet contains a picture of some cartoon character. I have no idea
who. For some reason, this reminder of how far outside Ed’s life I am hurts more than anything.

Ed’s skin is soft. I lift his arm – a dead weight. He’s deeply asleep. I shake him gently, but he doesn’t wake. There’s a crash downstairs – the sound of a
chair tipping over. I start. Did Lorcan do that? Is Kelly trying to get away?

Or could Art have come back? I check the time. He promised he’d wait twenty minutes for me at the pub and it’s only been fifteen so far, so surely he’s still there.

Ed sleeps on. I try to haul him up, but he stays asleep. He’s heavy. I’m not sure I’ll be able to manage him all the way down the stairs on my own. I shake his arm again. No
response. There’s another sound from downstairs – this time a door slamming.

I lay Ed back on the bed. I need to find Lorcan. He can help me carry Ed. I race out of the room and towards the stairs. Everything’s silent on the ground floor.

Reassuring myself as best as I can that there’s no one else in the house, I creep along the hallway towards the place I last saw Lorcan. He was heading for the door at the back of the
hallway. He and Kelly must be through here.

I push the door carefully open. A pear-wood table sits in the middle of a large kitchen, which, like the rest of the house, is all very minimalist and uncluttered, with lots of shiny chrome and
an eau-de-nil splash back. A chair lies on its side. Apart from that, the room looks undisturbed. There are two doors, one at either end of the room. The door at the far end is wide open. Cold air
blasts through it. I feel the chill against my face and hands. I’m guessing it leads to the garage we saw outside. Is that where Lorcan has taken Kelly?

I want to call out, but I’m scared to in case anyone else is here. I tiptoe across the kitchen, towards the open door. I have a sudden flashback to the lock-up and the way I walked through
its darkness to the open wasteland on the other side . . . to Bernard’s body.

I can hear nothing except the sound of my own heart beating. A bead of sweat trickles down the back of my neck as I reach the open door. The garage beyond is in darkness. I can just make out a
line of shelves and a cardboard box of wine bottles. I reach for a light switch, but it’s not where I expect it to be. I step into the garage, letting my eyes adjust to the gloom.

Across the room, past a shelf lined with tools, a figure is slumped in a chair. It’s Lorcan. For a second I can’t take it in. He appears to be bound with a rope; there’s a gag
around his mouth. As I stare at him, he looks up. His face is bruised – two red marks on his chin and his cheek – and there’s a trickle of dried blood from a cut on his lip. His
eyes, however, blaze with fury. He starts shouting as soon as he sees me, but the yells are muffled.

I freeze. The tall, broad man who mugged me is here too. He’s standing behind Lorcan. I notice him as he steps forward and places a restraining hand on Lorcan’s shoulder. He’s
wearing a dark overcoat with a hood pulled low over his face. He looks up at me too and I see him properly for the first time: flat, Slavic cheeks and closely cropped hair. He really is huge. Broad
as well as tall. He holds up a gun. I stare at the metal barrel. Is he going to shoot me? The thought filters through my head with absolute clarity.

‘Who are you?’ I say.

The giant waves the gun, beckoning me towards him. ‘Over here,’ he grunts.

I don’t have a choice. Shivering with cold and fear, I walk over. Lorcan stamps his feet as I draw near. He’s making muffled shouts from behind the gag, but I can’t tell what
he’s trying to say.

‘Give me your phone.’ The giant’s voice is a low, threatening growl. I don’t want to hand over my only contact with the outside world but, again, I don’t have a
choice. Eyes fixed on the gun, I pass him my mobile. He removes the sim card and pockets it separately from the phone, then he pushes past me. He walks over to the door and disappears into the
kitchen. I stare after him. He’s leaving us alone? I look around, remembering Kelly. There’s no sign of her.

‘Hnn?’ Lorcan’s voice is still muffled, but I think he’s saying my name. It sounds like a warning.

I rush behind him, my fingers feeling for the knot that ties him to the chair. Lorcan glances from me to the far corner of the garage. Again, he seems to be signalling a warning but I
can’t see anything in the darkness. ‘Come
on
.’ My hands fumble as I fail to unpick the knot.

The light tap of a footstep makes me look up. The sound came from the darkness opposite. I peer into the shadows. A figure is standing beside the garage doors. All I can see are her smart, cream
kitten heels.

‘Who’s there?’ My voice falters.

And then she takes another step out of the shadows.

Morgan.

My mouth falls open as she emerges into the pool of light cast from the kitchen. A slow smile creeps over my sister-in-law’s face. She’s elegantly dressed, as always, in a long cream
coat that fits her perfectly and a cap made of soft, pale blue leather. Waves of hair from a blonde wig peek out from underneath the cap. As soon as I see her I realize that everything about this
house is her – sharply modern, oozing with understated design, and ultimately rather sterile.

‘You always were too stupid for Art,’ she says.

I stare at her pinched face and hard, dark eyes. And in that moment it hits me.

‘
You?
’ I say, my brain struggling to accept what must be the truth. ‘
You’re
the woman who took my baby?’

‘Well done, Geniver,’ Morgan says sarcastically. She’s wearing pale blue leather gloves that match her cap. In a single, terrifying moment I realize that she is the woman
Bernard O’Donnell saw going into the lock-up with Art. Which means Morgan must be the woman who killed him.

I stare at her, completely bewildered.

Lorcan stamps his feet, rocking in his chair. I fumble with the knot tying his gag. It’s too tight to unpick. I move my hands down to the rope that holds him to the chair and start tugging
at that again. I don’t take my eyes off Morgan. She is still watching me, a look of contempt in her eyes.

‘Leave him alone,’ she orders. ‘Or I’ll call Jared to make you.’

I glance towards the door into the kitchen. It has swung slightly open and I can just make out the bulky profile of the large man. He’s standing like a soldier, his hands clasped behind
his back, legs slightly apart. He looks brutal. I let go of Lorcan’s bindings, aware I haven’t loosened them at all.

‘What the hell is this, Morgan?’ I say. An image of Ed flashes into my mind. ‘What did I ever do to you?’

Morgan rolls her eyes. ‘It wasn’t about
you
,’ she says. ‘It was about me and Art.’

‘What does that mean?’ I frown, remembering Art’s words . . . that giving away our baby was . . . what had he said? . . . an
atonement
. ‘How is our child
anything to do with you?’

Morgan tilts her head to one side. ‘How dare you break into my house and make demands?’

‘
Me
make demands?’ I can’t take in what she’s saying. ‘You . . . you stole my baby from me!’

‘He came to me before you even knew who he was,’ she says. ‘I think that’s a far cry from what, if I’m very much mistaken, you and Lorcan were just attempting: the
kidnapping of a small child away from the only mother he knows.’

I stare at her. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. I can’t believe any of this.

‘Art has you so wrong,’ Morgan sneers. ‘He said you would back off if he warned you, that you always did what he wanted. But I knew you wouldn’t be able to. And I was
right. You went straight to the police after he saw you, didn’t you?’ She snorts. ‘Art didn’t believe you’d be prepared to flush his entire career down the toilet
either . . . not until Jared brought back Rodriguez’s CCTV footage.’

I glance at Jared. He’s still standing guard by the door, blocking most of the light coming through from the kitchen. ‘You sent him to mug me?’

Morgan nods. ‘Jared was my father’s driver. After Daddy died, my mother kept him on. He’s known me since I was a little girl. He’d do anything for me.’

I glance over at the giant again. His eyes are dark and hard and fixed on Morgan’s face. I have no doubt she’s telling the truth about his loyalty.

‘Why did you want the CCTV film on that memory stick?’ I ask.

‘Because it’s incriminating to Art,’ Morgan says softly. ‘After Rodriguez told me you’d stolen it, I had to get it back to protect him.’

‘Protect Art?’ I shake my head. ‘I don’t get any of this, Morgan. Art’s your
brother
. What have
you
got to do with our . . . our baby?’

Morgan taps her elegant feet on the floor. She seems to be considering something.

‘I would have spared you this, Geniver,’ she says. ‘But, frankly, right now I’m so angry with you I don’t care any more.’

‘Spared me what?’

Morgan points to the door. ‘This way,’ she says. ‘I’ll show you.’

I glance round at Lorcan. He’s rocking more wildly in his chair now, clearly not wanting me to leave. But I don’t see that

I have a choice. Even if Morgan isn’t armed, Jared has that gun.

Anyway, I’m desperate for answers.

I walk into the kitchen and past Jared. Morgan removes her cap and blonde wig and lays them on the counter. She directs me through the kitchen, out into the hallway and into a living room.
It’s a large, square space, full of the same pear-wood furniture as much of the rest of the house. A large-screen TV stands in the corner opposite a leather couch. Two sleek armchairs sit on
either side of the sofa. It’s a more lived-in space than the rest of the house. Books and magazines are spread across the coffee table and a stack of children’s DVDs teeters on the
floor in front of the TV.

Morgan crosses the room, pushes the DVDs aside and opens the cupboard underneath the TV. She draws a disk from her coat pocket and places it into the machine, then she steps back.

‘This is a copy,’ she says. ‘The original was made on video.’

‘Original of
what
?’

‘You’ll see.’ She faces the screen. ‘This is who your husband really is, Geniver.’

As the screen fizzles into life, I get the impression Morgan’s in her element. That, despite what she says, she’s been dying to show me whatever is on this disk. A picture appears.
It’s grainy . . . colour, but poor-quality – a shot of a bedroom, a girl’s bedroom, with white lacy drapes around the bed and a row of dolls propped on the pink-painted shelf
above it. A warm pink light glows from the bedside lamp.

‘What is this?’

‘My bedroom at home in Edinburgh. I was home from college – the Easter holidays. I was nearly twenty.’

I stare at the screen, my heart beating wildly. What the hell amI about to see?

A very young Morgan fills the screen, backing towards the bed. Slim and tanned, she looks amazing, dressed in a mini-skirt and a pink top with thin straps. There’s a softness about her
I’ve never seen in all the years I’ve known her. She’s smiling at someone beyond the camera, flicking her dark hair – longer than it is now – off her shoulder.

She sits on the bed and holds out her hands. Art walks into the frame. He’s wearing jeans and a T-shirt and looks unbelievably young. I frown, trying to work it out. If Morgan was almost
twenty here, then Art must have been eighteen. He sits on the bed so both of them are side-on to the camera. Neither of them looks at it. I’m certain Art has no idea it is there. He would
hate the idea of being filmed. He reaches out and pulls Morgan towards him. They kiss.

My stomach retches. I look away.

‘What is this?’ I say. ‘Why are you—?’

‘Watch!’

I turn reluctantly back towards the screen. Art is peeling Morgan’s top up, his mouth is on her breast, one hand fumbling under her skirt. Morgan’s face is tipped back, her hair
sprawled over the white bedspread. She looks ecstatic.

A furious mix of hurt and jealousy and repulsion surges through me.

I turn back to the Morgan in the room beside me. She’s watching my face, a mean, thin smile curling about her lips.

‘
This
is what you wanted to show me,’ I snap. ‘It’s disgusting.’

‘It wasn’t disgusting.’ The smile falls from Morgan’s lips. ‘Certainly a lot less disgusting than you and Lorcan sneaking around in shabby hotels. Art and I loved
each other.’

‘What?’ The ecstatic look on the younger Morgan’s face flashes before my mind’s eye. ‘Maybe you had some revolting crush on him, but he must have been drunk to have
. . .’ I’m trying to keep my eyes off the screen. I don’t want to see what I know the film shows. But I can’t resist a quick glance. It’s enough to confirm what
I’ve already imagined. I look away again, quickly, but the image of Morgan and Art together has seared itself on my brain.

‘Art wasn’t drunk.’ Morgan snaps. ‘That wasn’t the first time we made love, either. We did it every time my parents were out. We couldn’t keep our hands off
each other.’

‘But he’s your
brother
.’

‘We’d only just met,’ Morgan says impatiently. ‘Art had turned up at the house the week before. Daddy refused to speak to him but Art insisted, and there was a big row at
the front door. I was watching from upstairs. Heard everything. I was almost twenty by then and knew the rumours about Daddy having other women, so it wasn’t hard to work out what was going
on. Then Art left. I ran after him.’ She pauses. ‘Remember, I told you all about that, didn’t I?’

I refuse to nod, but of course it’s true. Morgan did tell me – so vividly that I could almost see her flying out of the house in tears, offering support and friendship. The sister
Art had never known. And I’ll never forget the hurt on Art’s face – when I finally got him to talk about it – at how cold his father had been . . . how desperately rejected
Art had felt.

It hadn’t occurred to me for a second that there was more to the story than two children united against a bullying father.