Now You See Her Page 0,51

holiday.”

“Alone?”

“Yes, alone. Is that a crime?” She noted the look that passed between the two men. The look warned her to watch her tone. “Sorry. I just don’t understand the point of these questions.”

“Your husband didn’t come with you?” the older garda asked, more statement than question.

“No.”

“May I ask why?”

“No, you may not.”

Another shared glance.

“We’re getting a divorce,” Marcy finally offered, sensing that this information diminished her even further in their eyes. Now she was not only a troublemaking foreigner, she was pathetic as well, a woman whose wild, unpredictable ways had no doubt cost her the love of a stable orthodontist. She felt the sudden threat of tears and raised her hand to her cheek, as if to ward them off.

“Cheek still sore?” Colleen Donnelly asked. “Would you like more ice?”

“No, thank you. I’m fine.” It did hurt and she wasn’t fine, but what the hell. She’d tend to her black eye later. She’d wasted enough time. All she wanted was to get out of there as soon as possible.

“You’re Canadian, I see.”

“Yes.”

“Toronto’s a lovely city.”

“Yes, it is.”

“When are you going back?”

Marcy almost laughed. The Irish were many things, she was discovering, but subtle wasn’t one of them. “I’m booked to go home at the end of next week.” Another shared glance between the two men. “Is that it? Are we finished? Can I go now?”

“Who’s Audrey?” Christopher Murphy asked, as if Marcy hadn’t spoken.

“What?”

“Miss Farrell said you seemed awfully interested in a friend of hers named Audrey.”

Marcy shrugged, lifting her hands into the air and opening her palms toward the recessed ceiling, then bringing them back together in her lap. “Shannon mentioned her. I was just making conversation.”

“She said you asked a lot of questions about Audrey and a young man named Jackson.” Again, he checked his notes. “Jax,” he stated, putting particular emphasis on the X.

“You say that name as if you know him,” Marcy said hopefully, trying to keep her voice as neutral as possible. Hadn’t Shannon told her that Jax had something of a reputation? Was it possible he’d ever gotten into trouble with the law, that these officers were familiar with him?

“Can’t say the name rings any bells,” Christopher Murphy said, answering her silent question. “What about you, Johnny? You know anyone named Jax?”

The younger garda shook his head.

“My cousin just named her baby Jax,” Colleen Donnelly said.

“Like I said,” Marcy told them, “I was just making conversation, trying to be polite.”

Officer Murphy waved his hand in the direction of her bruised face. “This is you trying to be polite?”

“Look. None of this is my fault. I’m the victim here. I was the one who was attacked.”

“And we can press charges, if you’d like.”

“I don’t want to press charges. I told you that. I just want to get out of here.”

“Then tell us what’s really going on, Mrs. Taggart,” Colleen Donnelly said. “Maybe we can help you.”

Marcy looked from one garda’s face to the next, all three of the officers staring back at her with varying degrees of compassion and curiosity. Could they help her? she wondered. Could she trust them with the truth?

“Audrey is my daughter,” she said after a lengthy pause, deciding she had no other choice but to trust them.

“Your daughter,” all three repeated, their voices overlapping.

“She disappeared almost two years ago.”

They waited for her to continue. Christopher Murphy raised one thin eyebrow and brought his lips together, as if he were about to whistle.

How much could she tell them? “We thought she was dead—”

“Why would you think that?” John Sweeny interjected.

“Because that’s what she wanted us to think. Because she was confused and depressed.” Marcy answered their next question before they could ask it. She told them about Devon going up to their cottage and the subsequent discovery of her overturned canoe in the middle of the bay. She told them of her marriage’s disintegration and her husband’s desertion. She told them of coming to Ireland and seeing Devon walk by Grogan’s House, of Liam and Kelly identifying her daughter’s picture as the girl they knew as Audrey, and their revelation that Audrey was friendly with a girl named Shannon who worked as a nanny for a wealthy local family.

“So, let me get this straight,” Christopher Murphy said when she was through. “You’re saying you spied on the O’Connor house, that you followed Shannon to the park—”

“I didn’t follow her to the park. I was already there—”

“But you had followed her previous to that meeting in the park?”

“I was hoping