Aftermath (15 page)

"
A
bit of a different tune
," she said.

Kennedy nodded. “I remember thinking at the time that he sounded like a cynical kind of bloke.”

"Any chance we could have another chat with him?"

"Be a hell of a lot easier than Annabel's twelve year-old daughter, anyway. Look Reilly, I want to help you, and I'll do what I can. But if you do find something, you know we’ll need to bring Chris in on it.”

“Of course. Goes without saying. But not just yet, OK?”

He sighed. “I’m not crazy about it, and he’ll have my guts for garters if he finds out, but …”

“Thank you.” She stood up and gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

Reddening afresh, he packed up the file and left.

She stayed on a while, poking at Kennedy's toast crumbs.

She was onto something, she was sure of it.

Every couple had disagreements and they didn't so adamantly deny that. Nor did their friends.

It was like everyone was going out of their way to ram home the long-prevailing notion of Josh and Annabel’s oh-so-perfect marriage.

“
W
ith
us now is Helen Marsh, official Garda liaison to the Department of Public Prosecution. Ms Marsh, thank you for joining us on Prime Time this evening."

“You’re welcome. Please, call me Helen."

“OK, thank you Helen. It has been now four days since the heinous attack on Josh Morrison was reported, and the general public are becoming concerned that his attacker has not yet been detained. Can you tell us a bit about what is going on behind the scenes with the investigation?"

"As you well know, it is not our job to arrest just anyone. It is our job to arrest who we believe committed the crime. It is crucially important that our detectives find evidence that can prove a suspect committed the crime."

"OK yes, I don't think anyone expects the Gardai to arrest just anyone. But there is the expectation that suspects are referred to as such because the evidence suggests as much. What I'm saying is, shouldn't you have a suspect by now? How long before this crime becomes just another to add to the list of unsolved serious crimes in our city?"

“Naturally, we will do everything we can, and take as long as necessary to ensure we find the person responsible. But we can only do so entirely within the confines of available evidence."

"Sure...and again, no one is suggesting you should just arrest someone without cause. I suppose what I'm saying is, don't you have enough evidence by now? Surely there are leads. Surely there are suspects."

"A crime of this nature has many variables and investigating those variables takes time. It's that simple. This cannot be rushed simply because it is a high profile case."

"Okay, perhaps we need to move on at this point. You say you have more work to do, fine. Can we please though, talk about the recent detentions you did make in the Josh Morrison investigation - Ted O’Donnell and his brother Richard?"

“The GFU found an indication that a known larcenist had ready access to the Morrison household, along with - it turns out, circumstantial - forensic evidence relating to his person there. However, the investigative team subsequently concluded that the suspect was not involved in Mr Morrison’s attack, so he was released. This kind of unfortunate incident can be quite common during the early stages of an investigation, which is why we must be so careful."

"So you were entirely convinced that this man, Richard O’Donnell attacked Josh Morrison in his own home on Friday night, and within a few hours’ became entirely convinced that he did not."

"Again, we must defer to the evidence …”

"It sounds like our detectives are flailing. Where are the interviews? The suspects? Frankly, where is the sense of urgency? Josh Morrison is in a coma, you are his only hope for justice."

“This investigation is not about justice, Miriam.”

"What is it about then?"

"Evidence."

"
G
ood morning Dublin
, it'll be a sunny day today, reaching a sultry 23 degrees, its 6:35 and you are listening to Breakfast with Shelly Frost. We have a great show for you this morning as always.

First up, we have novelist and screenwriter Rita Dowling in to talk about her latest book,
Hot Mustard,
released this week. Also look forward to our segment following the city council protest that has taken place over the past few days, as locals try to force local government's hand on better funding for north Dublin schools.

"In other news, a pedestrian was struck by a motorbike in Rathfarnham, a Facebook rant puts Tesco's bacon under the spotlight after a video goes viral, and plans are revealed for a yet another pedestrian bridge across the Liffey. New photo of the adorable baby Princess Charlotte has the entire world saying ‘awww’ and Dublin’s truck drivers should expect more delays as roadworks continue on the M50.

"Of course our biggest headline story this week is still weighing on all of our minds as we try to make sense of this horrible tragedy that has befallen Ireland’s golden couple, Josh and Annabel Morrison.

For all listeners out there thinking about hero Josh lying in that hospital, and about his gorgeous wife trying to stay strong through this tragedy, this one's for you..."

R
eilly tried to resist
. Waking up in this state was much akin to waking up after a paramedic brings one back from the light at the end of a tunnel with a defibrillator.

The light was so beautiful, so peaceful. The body so cold and full of pain. Fogginess slurped through her waking eyes. The world spun a bit and her eyes clenched in retaliation.

There was little to do about her buzzing iPhone except to pick it up and throw it.

Fortunately for her, it was tethered to the charging plug and just tumbled its way softly to the floor. Unfortunately for her, it continued buzzing. She slapped at the floor, futilely finding the noisy perpetrator and when she did at last, consciousness signed in.

It was time to get up.

Reilly lurched out of bed and pried her eyes open. The clock on her phone said 6:39. She had to look at it several times before it registered what that meant. She had about twenty minutes to shower, get to her car and head to the GFU.

Wait, no… less than twenty.

So no shower then, she thought. After brushing her teeth and pulling her hair back into a tight ponytail, she put on some sport-strength deodorant and her wrinkled clothes from yesterday.

The sun was long up, and that cutting morning briskness common in Dublin at this hour, tickled her nose.

The weight of sleepiness began to subside and tiredness soon morphed into its uglier step cousin, grumpiness.

She was intolerant of the cold temperatures, of cyclists, of drivers who took too long to turn. She was especially annoyed at the email alerts appearing on her phone.

That radio program was also irritating her; those chirpy DJs talking too loudly and energetically. Their moods were unnaturally cheerful. No one was this cheerful every morning. These morons were phoning it and had been for years.

She shut off the radio.

The GFU building was humbly lit from morning light. It took too long for the car ahead of her to get into the garage. Once there, it took long for that person to park. Then she whipped her car into a spot, but misjudged the lines, so had to redo it.

Stomping out she marched her way to the lift. It took too long for the lift to come. The woman next to her was wearing too much perfume. Bvlgari
The Blanc.

She liked that one actually.

Looking up, the young woman had a friendly expression and greeted her. "Good morning!”

Great, more chirpiness.

Finally, she arrived on her floor and made her way toward her office.

The team wouldn't be in just yet, so she had a bit of time to kill before the arduous work of sorting through the shattered glass they’d taken from the Morrison place, hoping to isolate the mysterious Jack Daniels drinker.

Reilly turned on the computer, and started going through Josh's emails while she waited, this time looking specifically for correspondence with the wife.

She clicked on a few and scanned though them on the preview window.

T
o
: Josh Morrison

From: Annabel Morrison

Subject: ???

I guess you've never heard the adage “never go to sleep on an argument.” Because I'm still annoyed and you're acting like nothing's wrong.

T
o
: Annabel Morrison

From: Josh Morrison

Subject: RE: ???

Stop being so dramatic. I had to work early and you knew that. Talk tonight.

T
o
: Josh Morrison

From: Annabel Morrison

Subject: RE: RE: ???

I won't be in tonight. So now you get to wonder where I'll be.

T
hat was
it from that thread. Not exactly loved-up, but still not far off from the mark, she supposed. Couples fight.

No matter what the friends all insisted, Annabel and Josh weren't special non-fighting marriage unicorns.

She kept going. Most of the exchanges between them were mundane, or they were sharing links--talking about weekend plans. There wasn't a lot, really.

She supposed they texted too, but fat lot of good that would do her. According to Rory none of Josh’s texts were retrievable from the Cloud. And there was nowhere near enough evidence to subpoena Apple for them.

The further back she went, the less she found and then after a time started to believe she was wasting her time.

Sitting back, she took a breath and then scanned absently through the subject lines. One caught her eye. It was from Cormac Flanagan the solicitor, with the subject ‘Documentation.’

T
o
: Josh Morrison

From: Cormac Flanagan

Subject: Documentation

J
osh
,

I know you are avoiding me and I know you received Annabel's documents. You can't ignore this forever. Please respond asap.

T
o
: Cormac Flanagan

From: Josh Morrison

Subject: RE: Documents

C
ormac
,

Fuck off.

Josh

H
er eyes widened
. Well now, what was that all about?

Printing the email, she then dialed the Dublin City Clerk's office.

"This is Reilly Steel GFU, I'm working the Morrison case."

"Okay... oh right, of course, what can I help you?"

"Can you see if there was a court action of any kind filed by solicitor Cormac Flanagan…” she checked the email date, “in the past sixty days?"

"Let me check. Can you hold?"

"Sure."

A couple minutes later the voice returned. "Yes I have a record. Should I fax it?"

"Please do, you have the number?"

"Yes, it's in the directory."

"Thanks, I'll wait for it."

She hung up and waited.

Annabel’s documents
. Certainly sounded like the D word didn’t it?

What else could it be? If Annabel had recently initiated a divorce or separation, then that certainly put things in a whole new light.

The disingenuous assertions that they had the best marriage in the world really stank on ice now.

And if they were heading for the courts, was it such a big deal? Really, who cared? Reilly was no PR expert, but she couldn't imagine there being some sort of collapse of the Morrison brand just because they were separating.

If Tom and Nicole could do it, so could they. Why hold it so close to the chest? Unless there were details they didn't want the public to know. That could very well be likely--especially if there were children involved, affairs, bad business investments, who knows. Divorce brought all skeletons out of the closet.

The fax came in. She went over it about thirty times, but it revealed nothing at all to do with the Morrisons.

So if Flanagan had in fact been talking about legal separation documents, they were never processed.

She decided it was time to talk to Cormac Flanagan. No time like the present.

She dialed his office, of course there was no answer as it was red-eye-thirty in the morning, so she left a message and sent an email saying she needed to discuss something urgent.

Surprisingly, he responded right away from his iPhone. "
On my way into office, meet me there?”

At first she wondered why he was so responsive, but she supposed it made sense considering his client was under the microscope.

Perhaps he could use his wiles to sway everyone away from suspicion. But then, what would they have to be suspicious about?

The whole think stunk like yesterday's laundry.

Reilly grabbed her jumper and headed out.

S
he arrived
at Harcourt Street inside of thirty minutes. Parking was for once easy, so she walked briskly to the modern office building, signed in at security and took the lift to the third floor.

Flanagan's firm occupied the entire floor. Even at this early hour there was a secretary present, perked up with coffee and smiling broadly. At least a dozen others were in the office already, shuffling around, eating pastries and making phone calls.

"Hello, may I help you?"

"Here to see Cormac Flanagan."

“Hold on."

She escorted Reilly through a maze of cubicles and finally to a glass-paned corner office where Flanagan sat, feet on desk, shirt untucked and coat and tie hanging from a chair.

"Come in," he said and gave her a shudder-inducing Steve Buscemi smile. "We start early sometimes," he explained. "Our firm has a lot of Japanese clients."

She nodded. "Thanks for seeing me on such short notice."

"How's the investigation going?"

"I wish I had more to report," she said, shrugging.

"Annabel's a mess, I'm sure you understand. And I know her account of the night isn’t as … helpful as you’d hoped."

“We’re getting there," she replied, trying not to betray her annoyance.

"So, what can I help you with? Anything at all of course."

She handed the email over and let him read it. "Can you tell me what this was concerning?"

Flanagan looked visibly annoyed and put his feet back on the floor.

“This is an ongoing criminal investigation,” Reilly said, before he could fall back on attorney-client privilege. “We can wait for the DPP to request the information, or you can just tell me and keep things hidden from the public record.”

He sighed. ”Josh wanted a separation," he said after a moment of thought. "The documents in question were provisions in the paperwork concerning disclosure."

"Disclosure?"

"Annabel didn't want to proceed without assurances that Josh wouldn't blab about their marriage."

"That's kind of odd, isn't it?"

"Not really, I mean you've all seen the tell-all books hit the shops after high-profile divorces. She wanted to stop that before it even became an idea. She has a reputation to protect."

She nodded, "Okay, so they were going for a legal separation…what happened?”

"Well, we never got past the initial negotiations. As a matter of fact, we had a meeting planned next week where we were going to go through all the finances, amendments, and disclosure provision.”

“I see," she said, satisfied that he was telling the truth.

“In any case, what does it have to do with the investigation?”

"I'm just trying to get to the bottom of what's going on."

"They were having marital problems. That didn't mean they wanted to stab each other."

"Of course not," Reilly said. "That's not what I'm suggesting. Anyway, thanks for your time."

"Let me know if you need anything else," he said.

"Now that you mention it..."

"What is it?"

"Would it be possible to speak with Lottie?"

"I really don't think that's a good idea," Flanagan said, darkening.

"It would help our line of investigation."

"What line is that precisely? Lottie wasn't even at the house when it happened."

"Our team is trying to clear up some inconsistent accounts. We think she could help."

He shook his head, "The only way you interview Lottie Morrison is if she is served."

Reilly nodded and offered an apologetic smile. "Let's hope it doesn't come to that. Thanks again."

She mentally kicked herself. Now he was going to be on high alert, and this would inevitably get back to Annabel.

She needed to go further down this road in any case.

But she would have to do so much more carefully now.