Title Page

SLEEPING BEAUTIES

AN INSPECTOR TOM REYNOLDS MYSTERY

Jo Spain

Dedication

For Julie and Maureen, two beautiful ladies

PROLOGUE

Fiona, 2012

How could I have been so stupid?

Such a pathetic, moronic idiot.

I’m that woman, the one I used to scorn. I believed him when he said he didn’t mean it, when he said he was sorry. The first time. The second time. Every time. I thought he’d change.

But he’s gone too far.

He’ll kill me if I don’t end things.

No. This stops now.

I won’t be a dumb victim.

This is what Fiona tells herself, bravely and resolutely, as she slowly limps along the lonely, narrow, hedgerow-lined road that leads to her home.

The sun is setting but still retains some heat, the evening hazy with it. Her bared arms are pale; the flimsy yellow cardigan hanging loosely from her fingers is almost trailing on the ground. The string strap of her vest slips down with every other step, coming to rest on an ugly four-finger-shaped bruise before she roughly pulls it back onto her shoulder, wishing it would stay put.

She’s nearing the river. Angry midges swarm at her face and she swats them away. She accidentally swipes her mouth with her finger and winces. Her split lip still stings.

She’ll stop at the bridge, rest a little on the stone wall her grandfather built with his own hands using rocks from their land. She’s always loved that spot. She can make herself look respectable, wash away the worst of the blood and the mascara tears before she returns to her mother and father. She’ll be safe then. Fiona inhales the sweet smell of pruned cherry laurel bushes and starts to relax.

A horn blares behind her and she jumps, her heart pounding in her chest. She hadn’t even heard the car as it approached, despite the near silence of the countryside, the only sounds the late melody of the song thrush and leaves whispering in the gentle breeze.

Frightened, she turns to see who’s approaching. Is it him?

There’s little room for a car to pass; she has to stand flat against the hedge. Its sharp branches scratch her back.

It’s the blue Ford that belongs to the neighbour from two miles up. An older man who has just moved in to renovate the house vacated by his recently deceased mother.

He doesn’t observe rural custom. He doesn’t wave, doesn’t stop to offer Fiona a lift. He tries to not look at her at all, which is difficult considering she’s inches away from his bonnet as the car edges by. When he does glance sideways, she can see the shock register on his face.

He’s wondering, she realises, as the car passes but doesn’t pick up speed, if he should stop. But, no. He shifts gear. That girl looks a mess, he’s likely thinking. What if she claims he did that to her? He’s hardly here a wet week, but perhaps he already knows all about Fiona Holland. What type of girl she is.

What she doesn’t know is that later, he won’t come forward and say he saw her on that road. He will be afraid that as a single, childless, older man and the last witness to her whereabouts, they’ll try to pin something on him. He’ll keep quiet all the while they’re searching.

She drops her head in shame as the car moves past, belching exhaust fumes into the shimmering hot air in its wake. Then, defiantly, knowing he won’t be able to resist peeking in his rear-view mirror, she raises her middle finger.

‘Fuck you very much,’ she mouths at the departing vehicle. Her ribs hurt from where they were punched, her heels are blistered from shoes designed for aesthetic, not practical purposes. She would have gratefully accepted the offer of a ride.

A single tear meanders a lonely path down her cheek and she continues on her way.

She’s at the river when she hears the next car. This time, she’s aware of it. Alarmed because she’d started to relax, she’s on full alert now, her pulse that bit quicker, her senses heightened. Silly, really. Her boyfriend is far too wasted to drive. And yet she’s on edge, fearing danger in every unexpected sound, each sudden movement. He’s done that to her; he’s made her this nervous, jittery person.

The vehicle crawls to a halt and despite herself, she feels relief. She’s weary. She needs a cool shower and her soft, downy bed – her mother bringing her strong tea and bread toasted the right shade of golden-brown, smothered in real butter to the edges. No judgement, always loving her little girl no matter what. This car could belong to Jack the Ripper and she’d still take a lift. She thinks that, but Fiona knows there’s no risk. She left the real danger back in the village, downing whiskey shots from a mug, admiring his grazed knuckles and feeling like a big man.

The driver waves, but the sun’s glare on the windscreen means she can’t see his face, only the friendly movement of his hand.

Does she want to get in?

Bloody right she does. She opens the car door and slides into the passenger seat, pulling the seatbelt across and turning to smile at her knight in shining armour.

He doesn’t look at her. Instead, he keeps his eyes focused on the road ahead. The anger radiates from him, filling the small car with menace. She hears a click. He’s locked the car doors. She won’t be getting out.

Only then, too late, does she realise her mistake.

CHAPTER 1

‘He won’t let me see my mother.’

‘What?’

‘Sean. He won’t let …’

June McGuinness let the rest of the sentence trail off.

‘Sorry, what was I saying, dear?’

Louise Reynolds frowned, knowing what she’d heard but unable to repeat it. She continued to brush the older woman’s hair, gentle strokes with an old-fashioned soft-bristle brush.

‘Never mind that,’ she said, lifting June’s chin so she could see herself in the mirror. ‘Now, look how beautiful you are. We’ll go down and show the boys, shall we?’

June’s eyes lit up as she beheld her neat bob. She reached out for the make-up bag on the dressing table.

‘Not without some lippie, dear.’

They found Tom and Sean in the conservatory at the back of the house, conversing in hushed tones.

‘Well, what do you think?’

June did a little twirl for her audience, patting her grey do and smiling.

Her husband of almost half a century smiled back, the strain barely evident.

‘You look really elegant, love,’ he exclaimed, his thick Kerry accent full of forced jollity for his wife’s benefit. ‘Now, a drink. What’s it to be, lads and lassies? Tea or coffee?’

‘For heaven’s sake, Sean. It’s a beautiful summer’s afternoon. Why don’t we crack open the white wine? I’ll get the glasses.’

June glided off in the direction of the kitchen, a petite ticking time bomb, followed by her six-foot strapping husband, quivering with nerves in her wake.

Louise joined Tom on the rattan two-seater, resting her head on his shoulder. The heat-regulating glass panes were working extra hard to keep the room bearable in the hot midday sun.

Tom took his wife’s hand.

‘Tough going?’ he asked, concerned.

Louise pursed her lips.

‘Horrible,’ she replied. ‘It seems to come in waves. One minute she’s completely lucid, the next she’s telling me Sean won’t let her see her mother. Didn’t her mother die thirty years ago? I don’t know how he’s coping.’

Tom sighed.

Sean McGuinness, up until very recently, had been the Chief Superintendent of the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation. Tom Reynolds headed up the murder investigation unit, a Dublin-based specialist team under the NBCI’s remit, and Sean had been the detective inspector’s boss. They were also longtime friends.

Which had made it all the harder when the previous year June had been diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s.

Her condition had deteriorated more rapidly than expected and the chief, a man who lived for his work but loved his wife more, had taken early retirement to care for her. Not for one second had he considered placing her in a home. He was sixty, after all; it was time to go. It didn’t matter that the entire force had expected Sean to be carried out of his office in a box long after he should have headed for the hills, such was his dedication to the job.

Louise cupped her husband’s face in her hands, noticing the worried look in his usually smiling green eyes. He’d cut his hair tight this summer because the longer it grew the greyer it looked. She thought the short style suited him better – she didn’t even mind that he appeared to be sneakily growing a long-wished-for beard. He looked very handsome, in fact.

‘He seems to be just getting on with it,’ Tom said, quietly. ‘It’s his new norm. Having to repeat everything, remind her of things, expect the unexpected.’

‘Sorry that took so long.’ June led the way back into the conservatory, carrying a wooden board laden with mixed cheeses, chutney, fruit and crackers. ‘He hid the wine glasses.’

Sean followed, bearing the tray of glasses and a bottle of Riesling, his expression resigned.

‘I didn’t hide them,’ he corrected her, resting his load on the table.

‘Oh, your begonia is stunning.’ Louise diverted June’s attention.

‘Yes, the whole garden is beautiful this year,’ the older woman replied. ‘Actually, would you like to see what I found buried down the end the other day?’

Louise tried to look enthusiastic. She followed June out through the double doors and the two women made their way down a winding stone path towards the trees and wilderness at the bottom of the garden.

The conservatory was awash with scents from outside, the sweet fragrance of gardenia and dianthus and freshly mown grass filling the air. Tom watched the women as they strolled, wine glasses in hand. The scene was so peaceful and relaxed he could almost imagine it was just a normal, lazy Saturday afternoon, like they used to have.

‘So, how are you getting on with Joe Kennedy?’ Sean asked, breaking the spell. He needed a distraction from the daily struggle with June’s illness.

Tom sighed.

‘Chief Superintendent Joe Kennedy, to give him his full title,’ Sean continued with a smile. ‘Which he makes me use, as it happens.’

‘You’re joking.’

‘He doesn’t want people to get confused or imagine I’m still the boss.’

Tom cursed under his breath. In his humble opinion, the new chief wasn’t fit to lick McGuinness’ boots. He knew Sean felt the same. The inspector also knew that if he got stuck into Joe Kennedy, Sean would reprimand him and remind him he must show his new boss the respect his title deserved.

This was his old boss’s way of chiding him for not taking on the role himself.

It had been offered. The assistant commissioner, Bronwyn Maher, had summoned Tom that spring just after Sean had dropped the bombshell about leaving, and told him the job was his for the taking.

‘People in high places hold you in strong regard,’ she had said.

‘Forcing your hand, are they?’ Tom had quipped.

She’d smiled.

‘Not at all. I’m your biggest advocate. How on earth do you know the new Taoiseach, anyway?’

‘Jarlath O’Keefe? Oh, we go way back. Well, back to that case in Leinster House last autumn anyhow.’

‘Ah. You were the making of him, so. He’s pushed hard for you, Tom. He’ll be giving you my job next. Can’t say I’d mind. Look, I’d be happy to have you in as head of the Bureau. But only if you’re willing to put your heart and soul into the job. You can’t half do this role.’

And that had been the problem. The inspector didn’t want the added responsibility and pressure that being Chief of the National Bureau would bring. He liked his job and it was already demanding enough. And when he’d turned fifty the previous year, he’d begun to realise that he wanted to spend more time with his family, not less.

So he’d resisted the promotion and Joe Kennedy was appointed.

Kennedy was a master of spin. He’d cultivated a persona that was at once serious, intelligent and comforting. He wore period-rimmed spectacles and an expression of constant concern for the safety of the Irish public. He came into his own at press conferences, when reassuring rhetoric dripped from his lips like honey.

He was a complete remove from the man sitting across from Tom now, with his frenzied bushy black eyebrows and shock of grey hair, the wine glass looking dainty in a hand so large it could pull up a small tree by the root. McGuinness was brusque and intimidating, but he ran deep, as the saying went.

The decision to replace Sean with Joe Kennedy was so clichéd it made Tom nauseous.

‘It’s all quiet on the western front,’ he said, keeping his thoughts on his new boss to himself. ‘This weather’s too hot to be off killing people.’

‘I wouldn’t go planning any holidays, Tom. You might be on hiatus now, but this heat … it gets people feverish. A man can go from being mildly irritated at his wife nagging him to do the garden or stoke the barbecue, straight to feeling murderous.’

‘We’ve already been away,’ said the inspector, thinking wistfully of the trip they’d taken to Cuba in May. It had been hotter there, but they’d been better prepared for it. Not like in Ireland, where people reacted with joyous wonderment to the first proper sunny day, but after two weeks of heat couldn’t understand how on earth anybody was supposed to live in such a climate, let alone work. ‘But you’re right. It’s too quiet. I think if Louise suggests one more time I paint our shed, I’ll bury her under it.’

‘What are they up to down there?’ Sean asked distractedly, perching on the edge of his chair to peer down the garden. Barely five minutes had passed and already he was uneasy about his wife.

Louise and June were kneeling beneath a late blooming Judas tree.

‘We’ll join them, shall we?’ Tom suggested, curious himself.

As the two men approached, they could hear June chattering excitedly. Louise leaned back on her heels and turned to face them, her face pale.

‘Oh, June,’ Sean said in dismay. ‘Look at your lovely hands. They’re all mucky. Come up to the house and we’ll wash them.’

‘I was just showing Louise the treasure,’ his wife protested.

Sean helped June up and guided her back to the conservatory, ignoring the items spread out on the grass beside the disturbed soil.

Tom raised a puzzled eyebrow.

‘She’s been burying cutlery,’ Louise said, gathering up the knives and forks.

Tom opened and closed his mouth, lost for words.

His phone buzzed in his pocket, jolting him back to reality.

‘D. I. Reynolds,’ he answered, without checking the number on his screen.

‘Tom? It’s me, Laura. Sorry, I know you’re off today, but a body has been found up in Glendalough. Myself and Ray are en route, but the buzz in headquarters is that it might be that girl who went missing last week in Meath. Early reports indicate it’s a young female.’

‘They’re sure it’s not suicide?’ the inspector asked, thinking of the lakes at the scenic mountain spot.

‘They’re adamant it’s not.’

‘Ask Willie Callaghan to collect me, will you, Laura? Tell him I’m at Sean McGuinness’ house. I’ll be with you as soon as I can.’

‘Sorry,’ he said, helping Louise to a standing position. ‘Willie will pick me up, so you can take the car home at least.’

‘Can’t be helped. I’ll stay with them for a while. Get a wash on for Sean and tidy a bit.’

‘You’re an angel.’ Tom kissed her cheek tenderly.

Sean had been right about the peace not lasting.

But just how badly was it about to be shattered?

CHAPTER 2

The visitors’ car park at Glendalough was chaotic. Elongated tourist coaches and saloon cars packed with sweating, stressed families competed to reverse, u-turn, and extricate themselves from what was rapidly turning into the seventh circle of hell for the single guard on traffic duty. The old monastic site, set in a spectacular glacial valley with two lakes, was a popular tourist spot and on this, a fine summer’s day, it was humming with activity.

‘To think, the missus suggested we come up here this weekend,’ Willie Callaghan remarked. ‘What a lucky escape.’ Tom’s driver stroked his pristinely trimmed moustache, shaking his head in amazement at the close call.

Tom ignored the obvious retort, which was that Willie was now, in fact, in Glendalough.

‘Why wouldn’t you bring her?’ the inspector asked, as his driver honked the horn repeatedly at a busload of startled pensioners.

‘Glendalough on a sunny Saturday in July?’ Willie exclaimed. ‘What kind of mad bastard would you be to inflict that on yourself? Besides, there’s sport on. Which I’m bloody missing now.’

His driver spotted the area of the car park that had been marked out for official vehicles and left his hand on the horn until they reached it.

‘Jesus Christ!’ Tom said, as the car pulled up. ‘We’ll have to get you treatment for road rage.’

Detective Sergeant Ray Lennon, Tom’s deputy, was waiting inside the cordon for his boss’s car. He was wearing a short-sleeved white shirt, his tie knot pulled loose at the neck. Unlike Tom, Ray had decided to grow his hair this summer. He was taunting his boss with his naturally dark mane, not a grey strand in sight. The extra couple of inches in a heatwave seemed masochistic, and was probably, Tom suspected, something akin to Bikram yoga for his super-fit deputy.

A few feet away, a small group of women in their early twenties were whispering and giggling as they gazed at the tall detective adoringly. Ray had that effect on women and was, as usual, oblivious to it.

‘We heard you before we saw you,’ he greeted Tom.

‘Where’s the scene?’ the inspector asked. ‘And what’s going on with that crowd? Haven’t they been told the valley is off limits?’

‘The body is in woodland close to the lower lake. We’ve been trying to clear the two car parks for the last hour but new vehicles keep arriving. It’s gone out on the radio bulletins now, so people will stay away, hopefully. The normal ones, anyhow.’

‘Who found her?’ Tom asked, as they began walking.

‘A couple of kids and their dog. Aged ten and eleven.’

‘Oh, shit.’

‘No, it’s okay. The mother and father are traumatised, for sure. But the kids were thrilled. It’s like something from their favourite show – The Walking Dead – apparently. I think they’ll survive.’

Tom cast a backwards glance at the car park and the people still milling around. They’d all have a great story to tell about their trip to the Wicklow beauty spot today, each of them shivering and remarking with shocked awe: ‘It could have been me, I could have found her … to think, how close we were!’

‘Who’s up here?’ he asked.

‘Laura Brennan came out with me and a couple of the team are en route. She’s organising the ground search. We’ve set up a quarter-mile radius, but we’re concentrating on the main route of approach, along the path we’re taking. We’re working on the assumption that whoever brought her here used this car park. It would have been a twenty-minute hike if he’d left his car near the monastic ruins entrance. We’ve about ten uniforms assisting. We’ll need more. Moya and Emmet are taking care of the body and the scene.’

Tom felt a shiver, despite the burning afternoon sun. That was ominous. Moya Chambers was the new Deputy State Pathologist and Emmet McDonagh was the Chief Superintendent of the Technical Bureau, the Garda Síochána forensic unit. For both department heads to be at the same crime scene was unusual.

It took them about ten minutes to reach the site – a section of the wooded area below the main trail between the monastic settlement and the valley’s lower lake.

‘He wouldn’t have been able to get his car any closer to this spot,’ Tom observed, before they left the path.

‘I know. That’s why we’re walking.’

‘That’s my point. If he killed her at the site, she trusted him enough to walk along this path with him and go off the public trail. He couldn’t have forced her all this way and if he dragged her down to the wood, somebody might have spotted it. If he didn’t kill her here, he had to carry her body all the way from the car park. So, in that scenario, we’re talking about somebody fit, or two people. Could you carry a dead body this distance?’

Ray was a decent benchmark of what could or couldn’t be achieved, strength-wise.

His DS shrugged. ‘It would depend on her weight and how I was carrying her. Over my shoulder, a regular-sized woman, yeah – just about. But surely somebody would spot you lugging a body over your shoulder?’

‘Not if it was the dead of night. Is it her, do you think?’

‘Fiona Holland? I don’t know. I haven’t seen her yet. Emmet and Moya were just securing the scene and the body when we arrived.’

Neither of them said anything more. What was worse – for the missing girl to be found dead, or for her to still be missing, fate unknown, and this to be some other poor woman?

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