Chapters (58)
- Cover
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
- Forty
- Forty-one
- Forty-two
- Forty-three
- Forty-four
- Forty-five
- Forty-six
- Forty-seven
- Forty-eight
- Forty-nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-one
- Acknowledgements
- An Eastbourne Murder Mystery
- Canelo Crime
- About the Author
- Also by Sheila Bugler
The shock of recognition was instant. The eyes. She’d know them anywhere. But it was more than that. The shape of her nose, the way she tilted her head sideways as she stared back at Emer.
Memory after memory slammed into her. So many memories she was drowning under them. Her throat closed and she couldn’t breathe. She clawed the collar of her T-shirt, pulling it away from her neck as if that might help. A buzzing sound inside her head blocked out Lana’s voice and all the other noises around her.
Somehow, she became aware that the train had stopped and the woman in the dress was putting her book into her pale pink leather rucksack and was stepping off the train.
‘Stop.’ Emer’s voice was hoarse and the word was no more than a whisper. Forgetting about the plane she had to catch, she stood up and pushed her way through the crowds of people getting onto the train.
On the platform, a blast of air hit her as the train sped away to the next station. Looking around, Emer tried to locate the woman, but there were too many people and she couldn’t see her amongst the crowd. She started to think she’d made a mistake, remembering all the other times, too many to count over the years, when she’d seen someone and thought – for a split second, sometimes longer – that the person was Kitty.
But this was different. She could feel it, a certainty deep inside her. The woman she’d just seen was Kitty. No doubt about it.
A memory from earlier. Sitting across from the two women interviewing her. Ursula’s voice screeching inside her head, telling her she was useless and unemployable and a waste of space. Her voice blocking out everything else until Emer had found it impossible to focus on the questions she was being asked.
A flash of blond hair at the end of the platform. Emer pushed her way through the crowd, following the woman as she disappeared into the tunnel that led up to the exit. She walked with a faint limp, easy to miss if you didn’t know to look for it. The result of an accident when she was four years old. She’d fallen off a pony at the horse fair and broken her leg. Ever since, she’d walked with a slightly lopsided gait.
‘Kitty!’
Several people turned to look at her, but not the woman limping into the tunnel. She was moving faster now, as if she’d heard her name and didn’t want to be caught. As if she knew the person calling out to her was the same person who’d spent the last twenty-three years blaming herself for what had happened the day Kitty died.