Chapter 9 #3
‘I know you must feel terribly guilty, but don’t beat yourself up,’ she says.
‘Look, you don’t have to take my advice – people rarely do – but I think the best thing you could do is just be normal around Giles.
Show him how sorry you are that it happened on your watch, even though you didn’t do anything to poor Willow.
I just think trying to say the vet got it wrong might not be what he’s willing to hear right now.
It was a terrible accident, that’s all. When Giles can see things clearly, he’ll realise that. ’
‘Mum, Ria has the right to say that if it’s what she believes,’ Declan says, appearing with four bags and placing them on the table.
‘I know that, Declan, but he might lose his dog, and I don’t think any of us should say anything to make it worse. We can have our own opinions, but Giles doesn’t need to hear about them, does he?’
Declan rolls his eyes. ‘He’s a grown man, Mum, not a child.’ He holds out his palm. ‘Car keys, please?’
Georgia sighs, placing them in his hand and shaking her head as he leaves with a muttered goodbye. ‘Honestly, you’d think at twenty-one he’d be a bit more . . . I don’t know. He’s just so down on this place and everyone in it. I can’t understand why. The neighbours are all such lovely people.’
‘Maybe Declan feels like he doesn’t fit in. Just like me.’
She considers my words. ‘But we’ve been here for nearly two years. And he couldn’t wait to leave Dublin for London.’ She frowns. ‘Did he tell you that he doesn’t fit in here? I’ve been so wrapped up in looking for a job and everything, maybe I haven’t let him know he can always talk to me.’
I place my hand on her arm. ‘It’s not that. Sometimes it’s easier to talk to people outside of family.’
Georgia nods. ‘True. And maybe he misses his twin sister. He and Ciara are very close. It threw him off course when she said she wasn’t moving here with us and was going off travelling instead. I don’t think he feels at home here without her.’
I don’t share that Declan seems very independent, and that this isn’t the reason he doesn’t like Silverleaf.
I didn’t get a chance to ask him what he thinks of each of the neighbours, but I will make an opportunity to do that.
My thoughts quickly turn to Eleanor, and how she was scurrying out of Giles’s house late at night.
‘What time did the barbecue finish the other night?’ I ask.
Georgia frowns. ‘Oh, I don’t know. Around eleven, I think.’
‘Did everyone leave together?’
She stops unpacking the bags and studies me. ‘Why do you ask? You can’t be thinking that one of us snuck into your house?’
‘No, no, nothing like that. I was just wondering. I thought I saw Eleanor leaving, that’s all. It was in the early hours of the morning.’
Deep lines appear on her forehead. ‘It couldn’t have been her – she left even earlier than I did.
Said she had a stomach ache. To be honest, I don’t think she was feeling very sociable, but she’d never turn down an invitation from Giles.
I wish she’d talk to me and tell me what’s going on with her and Rufus.
I know there’s trouble in their marriage.
I feel it. Kind of like a sixth sense. But not the one from that movie where the kid sees dead people.
’ She laughs, but I can’t bring myself to share in her humour.
If Georgia is right, then Eleanor must have gone back to Giles’s after everyone had left. But why?
‘I’d better let you get on,’ I say.
‘Oh, stay for a cup of tea, won’t you?’
‘Another time. There are some things I need to do.’
‘Okay. Well, I’m here any time you need to talk,’ Georgia says. ‘But just be careful around Giles. He fell apart when Moira died and, well, dogs are part of the family, aren’t they?’
The rest of Sunday passes with Leo and me trying to avoid discussing Willow or Giles. Every time one of our phones pings, my heart stops and I rush to check if it’s mine to see if there are any other warnings.
We fill the void with small talk over lunch, something we’ve never done before.
Behind it all, I want to ask him again what he said to Giles when he visited him this morning, but all Leo has told me is that Giles is distraught and it wasn’t the right moment to bring up getting a second opinion about how Willow fell ill so suddenly.
‘Maybe we should go away for a bit?’ Leo says, pushing his unfinished sandwich aside. ‘Let things cool down here. We could go to that beautiful hotel in Salcombe again?’
‘I’m not running away, Leo. I haven’t done anything.’
‘Okay,’ he says, but I sense his disappointment and catch the glances he gives me while I’m forcing down my cheese sandwich. Leo doesn’t know what to say to me, when we’ve always been able to manage difficult conversations.
After our awkward lunch, Leo retreats to his office upstairs, telling me he has to work on his speech for a conference he’s a keynote speaker at.
With everything that’s been happening, I’d forgotten he’s leaving for New York on Wednesday.
And I’ll be alone here. He’d offered to cancel, but there’s no way I’d let him, no matter how uneasy I feel here.
In the part-furnished living room, I sit on the sofa, attempting to read a book, but I replay all the events of the last few days.
A woman was killed right in front of me and everyone claims not to know her.
I’ve been sent a fake video of me being attacked and killed, Willow might have been poisoned, and now I’ve received a threatening text.
All of this is real; none of it’s trauma from my attack.
I know that from the Facebook message I got.
Something I don’t understand is happening.
I google Alex Vale again, but there’s still nothing useful.
Giving up, I pick up my book and stare at the words, unable to take anything in.
Sitting here doing nothing feels futile, like I’m just waiting for something else to happen.
But I can’t let it; I need to do something.
Despite Leo having already been, I decide I will go to see Giles.
I slip my phone into my pocket and stand just as Leo thunders down the stairs.
He stops in the living-room doorway, staring at me, out of breath.
‘What is it? What’s the matter?’
He opens his mouth to speak, but no words come out. Instead, he holds something up.
I walk over to him to get a closer look. ‘What’s that?’
‘I found it . . . it was right there.’ His voice is strained, as if he’s struggling to get his words out. He pushes it towards me. ‘What the hell, Ria?’
And I stare at the white bottle in his hand, the word on its blue label blurring in front of me. Antifreeze. Nausea and disbelief flood through me. ‘I don’t understand. No . . . no . . . that’s not ours.’
‘Ria!’ he says, raising his voice louder than I’ve heard it since I’ve known him. ‘I found it hidden in your underwear drawer!’