Aftermath (24 page)

F
lanagan was a defender
. Highly paid and entirely in the confidence of his client. Clients, even.

Still, there was something a bit odd about all this, Reilly thought.

The man seemed completely upended and by his shell-shocked demeanor, it was clear that he felt out of his element, perhaps out of his pay grade.

He was convinced all along his clients were innocent, wasn't he? And when confronted with evidence nearly impossible to refute, he immediately had to go into mitigation mode.

What's worse, Chris had sat in that interview room just the day before with him and laid out their entire case.

He knew they were out to get the client. He especially knew how they were out to get the client. And he’d laughed at them.

Once the case was laid out, the son of bitch had started laughing.

None of that mattered now. The shoe had dropped. They’d been right all along and now Flanagan had to do the right thing.

He had to defend his client in the best way legally possible. He was going to make sure she didn't get the full book thrown at her. That her trial would go smoothly and the charges minimized. He would make sure that once sentenced, that Annabel could get out on good behavior. That custody was loosened. That she would have a life and career after the whole thing.

How could he make this process as painless as possible?

That was a job Reilly could never understand, and she witnessed it a lot. Once it was clear the state would win, no matter how the case was stacked, the solicitor immediately went into damage control. Trying to minimize the effects of the sentence on the client. She could never do that work. In her opinion these so-called precious clients deserved every bit of punishment the book suggested. That's why there
was
a book.

"Why do you want to be there for the arrest?” she asked him now, as they made their way up the driveway behind the detectives to the Morrison house.

"This may be difficult to understand Steel, but I consider the Morrisons friends. I've represented them for more than twenty years. This is an utter tragedy and I want to be there for Annabel's support."

"And to help build a defense case."

"The defense of my clients is always my top priority. But there is more to it than that. I was at their wedding. I was there when the kids were born. I saw Dylan off to university. This is every bit a personal tragedy as it a professional duty. I want to see to it that she has the support she needs."

Reilly stayed quiet after that. She wondered if his personal relations were somehow clouding his judgement.

It was perfectly ethical, of course, for a solicitor to be present during an arrest, just very rarely done. Too many things could go wrong, she supposed.

She just wondered if he was being honest. If he was looking for some sort of mess-up that could be used against them.

In truth, the whole thing was rather unconventional. But then, most things about this case were rather unconventional.

The house was still mobbed by media and as the cars went through the gates, questions had been lobbed at them from all quarters.

"Did you find something else?"

"Are you making an arrest?"

"Didn't you already do this?"

"Detectives! Any comments? Updates?"

Chris and Kennedy went in first with another uniform.

"Mrs. Morrison? Detective Delaney here, please open the door."

There was no response. The media was overtly watching, rapt, from the gateway.

"Mrs. Morrison! We have a warrant."

Nothing.

He gestured to the uniform who kicked in the door. The cameras loved it. Flashes, shouting, questions, scuttling of reporters.

Quite the different scenario than at to hotel where they’d whisked her away for questioning without anyone's knowledge.

Chris went inside first, followed by the others. The lights were out. It was completely quiet inside. Reilly looked closely around. It seemed too still, yet there was some sort of tension around. Her heart rate was going crazy.

"She got the news and buggered off," said Kennedy. "That's just great."

"I'll check upstairs, Kennedy you and Rourke check the back. Reilly stay put."

She snorted at that and followed Chris up the stairs as he cautiously hit the landing.

"Mrs. Morrison? Are you home?"

Rourke shouted from downstairs, "All clear down here."

Then Kennedy called up. "I think she buggered off."

Chris and Reilly proceeded down the hall to the master bedroom and stopped suddenly. Chris turned around, visibly annoyed she had followed, and gestured for her to go back down.

She shook her head and he gave her a stern look. Reilly shook her head back. He sighed, rolled his eyes and then continued forward.

Then she heard it inside the bedroom. Muffled crying.

"Mrs. Morrison, is that you? Don't worry, we'll sort this all out."

Chris slowly went into the room, and terror clinched as Reilly suddenly thought of something.

Her heart stopped, and she lost her breath as she remembered what Lucy had found in the wardrobe last time they were here.

“Chris…”

A
nnabel was sitting
on the bed with her back against the headboard, pointing the shotgun at them.

Her face was streaked with tears and worry. Her clothes unkempt, and hair wild. She was sobbing uncontrollably as she pointed the weapon.

"Okay. Okay, Mrs. Morrison. You don't want to do this," said Chris. "Remember your daughter. You don’t want Lottie to grow up knowing her mother shot a policeman. Now please, put the gun down."

Annabel shook her head, grief warping her beautiful face.

The woman was desperate. That calm, cool, calculated persona completely fell apart in the face of her collapsing life. She was a wild animal, incapable of doing anything but reacting. The most dangerous type of animal, cornered, desperate. Worried about her kids. Her whole world falling apart second by second. Everything she thought safe was now destroying her.

"You took my boy," she said between tears. "You have him. You took him."

"Mrs. Morrison, he is in good hands. Mr. Flanagan will work on the terms of custody. Please don't escalate this."

"...Flanagan..." she said, a roll of weeps forcing her to lower the gun, but then she straightened as Chris stepped forward.

"Don't move a step!” she warned.

"Mrs. Morrison, let's talk, okay? I know this has been horrible. Your husband was attacked. You tried to protect your son. No one wants to bring you more trouble, okay? We just want to get through this as peacefully and painlessly as possible."

"He deserved it," she whispered. "He let this all happen. He forced me to let it all happen."

"What do you mean?" Reilly asked, unable to stop herself.

"Josh is a coward," she spat. "He was always a coward."

"Please, Mrs. Morrison. Put the weapon down. If you shoot us your life will be over."

"I don't care about my life."

"What about your daughter, then? Think about Lottie."

Annabel started crying again, but held up the shotgun

"Ye all right up there?" Kennedy shouted guilelessly.

Annabel looked scared and sat up. "Tell them to go away!"

"Kennedy, everything is under control," Chris said calmly and loudly. "We are talking with Mrs. Morrison now. We're talking, aren't we?"

"Hey!" someone else shouted from below. "Hey! No! You can't go up there!"

"Who's that?" Annabel said and jumped to her feet, wildly casting the shotgun around.

Reilly turned and wanted to scream profanities at the sight of Flanagan running down the hall.

"Annabel! Annabel, don't do this!"

She trained her gun on the solicitor.

"You. This was all you. Every part of this was you."

"You don't want to do this Annabel. Please lower the gun and let the detectives take you in."

"You'd like that wouldn't you?” she said beneath a growl. "You set this all up. You told us how to stage it, how to make it look like an accident. You did all of it. You scared my coward husband into it. You made murderers out of us! You convinced us they would put us away forever. Now look at us! Look at what you did! My life is over! My boy... my sweet Dylan. Years being made to feel small by that sniveling spineless rat of a husband. This is all your fault!"

Reilly felt faint as the connections starting coming into place. No wonder the entire thing seemed watertight. No wonder everyone got away with everything.

This solicitor master-minded the whole thing. But why? Oh, she could suspect. And she guessed that it was coming out now. She should have seen it all along. He was too close to them; he had his paws into everything they did.

He was the master puppeteer, keeping them safe from prosecution all of these years. He was the one that kept their life in balanced control, always holding the murder above their heads. And when they were finally ready to call it quits, he was the one that insisted they tied "secrets" into their money. Not to protect them, but so that his involvement would never come to surface. As a couple he controlled them. As individuals, he was at risk.

Kennedy and Rourke were carefully approaching from behind, even as Flanagan held his hands up in the bedroom.

"I only did it for you, darling,” he said just above a whisper, tears starting to form.

"I know," she said falling into tears again. "I know you did. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Don't," he whispered, coming closer to her.

Then she fired. A deafening blast split through the room, and Flanagan fell backward, stunned and stuttering as his chest erupted.

Reilly was too stunned to move, but Chris wasn't. He leapt forward to tackle her, but she was too quick. She turned the gun on herself and fired.

Reilly knelt over Flanagan, but the light had left his eyes. He was gone and the lack of a pulse confirmed it.

Seconds later, Annabel Morrison was gone too.

They stood quietly in the room, in disbelief. Shouts erupted from outside as the media undoubtedly heard the gunfire. Uniforms were rushing in. Someone else radioed the incident in.

Reilly wanted to cry, she wanted to scream. She wanted to throw something through the window. It wasn't supposed to end like this. Not like this. This wasn't justice. There could be no retribution. It would be yet another ghost she'd have to shoulder--that all of them would have to shoulder.

The memories would be replayed time and time again. They would wonder what they could have done differently, how they could have moved quicker. How they could have prevented this disaster.

The silence was broken by a text Chris received. He reluctantly checked his phone.

"Josh Morrison is conscious."

"
O
ne of Dublin's
most prominent families, he was the nation's star athlete, and a multi-million euro business tycoon. She, a successful entertainment personality rising the media ladder to become the star of Dublin's favorite morning TV show.

A son in Silicon Valley. A beautiful young daughter.

Was the Morrison family as picture-perfect as it seemed? Or was there something beneath the surface, a sordid and confused past, hiding a ticking time bomb?

"In this special Prime Time Report we will go deep into the history of Josh and Annabel Morrison, childhood sweethearts and Ireland’s glossiest power couple. We will meet old school friends, teammates from Josh's rugby years, and some of their closest friends and business associates.

"You will see a picturesque life sitting precariously on a house of cards. You will learn the dark secrets that poisoned them all these years, and the events that would lead to their bloody collapse.

"Join us as we go behind the scenes, concluding with the investigation that sent the country into a tail spin. Join us as we Uncover The Morrisons, tonight’s Prime Time Special Report.”

R
eilly sipped coffee
, watching Chris play with his biscuit. The cafe was noisy, allowing them to be anonymous. She liked the way his brows furrowed when he was thinking really hard about something.

And he would get fidgety. Such a cool, collected guy, yet anyone that knew him would get strong signals whenever he was uncomfortable.

“What’s up?" she asked.

Chris shrugged and avoided eye contact, looking out the window at passersby.

"We've been a team a long time, Reilly. I should know when to listen to you."

"Oh, yes," she said containing a laugh. "And I should continue to overstep boundaries, and work behind your back. A very productive way to find the bad guy."

"Well that might be true," he said loosening up a bit and offering a smile. "But something was bugging your gut."

"I'm supposed to be looking at evidence, I'm not supposed to have a gut.
You're
supposed to have a gut."

"And I didn't," he said. "The fact that Annabel could realistically be responsible was so far removed from any possibility in my mind."

"Well it wasn't her, as it turned out. And petty jealousy shouldn't constitute a gut feeling."

He chuckled at that. "Jealous? You - jealous?”

"Petty jealous," she corrected. "Not enough to swing chandeliers over, but yes. A bit. Women like that, they always get everything they wanted. It was true in California and it's true here. So many people like that. Celebrities living in a different atmosphere to everyone else."

He smiled but said nothing.

Reilly changed the subject after the silence persisted too long. "Are you mad? I mean that I confided in Kennedy instead of you?"

"Yes, actually," he said with no hint of irony. "That really hurt. On many levels. I always thought you and I could talk about anything, but I
knew
Kennedy and I could. I mean, things are grand between us all the same, but that really stung, Reilly. You better not make a habit of it though,” he added grinning, “Josie would flatten you.”

She nodded, and now was the one avoiding eye contact, "I suppose the whole thing was a mess. And the Morrison thing too. And just for the record, Pete’s not my type.”

He nodded and blushed a little, "I don't know, Reilly. There's a lot of mixed signals lately, so I'm just going to come out straight with it; I’m sick of guessing. What's going on? I mean with us."

She took a breath, and then subsidized some time with a sip of coffee.

"There will always be an us I suppose," she said. "Let's not make it complicated."

"That's pretty vague."

"It's a weird time, Chris. I'm vague on purpose. Because when this is all over, and everything is on the right track and I feel like myself again... after all that, I know you'll still be here. And so will I. Let's just leave it at that for the moment, and see how things go.”

M
uch later
, Reilly went home, the weight of the world falling from her shoulders as she closed the door of her flat, and collapsed on the bed.

Her shoulders were relaxed, she felt calm and collected. Watching the ceiling for a while, her eyes then settled on the unclean and increasingly evaporated fish tank.

Glubs was inside dancing around with his angelic fins. Or was Glubs a female? She didn't know how to tell with fish. She’d always thought of him as male.

Hours later, she started wondereing if the Morrison cat was going to be okay. Or if it needed a home, and if her landlady would allow it. And if she did steal the Morrison cat, would it try to eat Glubs.

Two hours later, she checked the time. It was 1:30 in the morning Florida time.

Digging out her phone from her pocket, she found and opened FaceTime and then thumbed a message to Todd.

You awake?

The "typing" message appeared.

Sadly.

Insomnia must be contagious.

:D

Do you want to talk?

Yep,
he responded.

She dialed him. He was lying on his back in dim light, unshaven, squinting and without his shirt.

"Nice.”

"You flirting with me?"

"Not exactly.” She smiled. "How are you doing?"

"It's more important if you answer that question."

"Much better. We got the bad guy."

"How did it turn out?"

"Not very pretty, and I'd rather not talk about it. Needless to say, I was right all along."

“Of course you were."

"That's not true. I was partially right. But I was right about the most important aspect of it."

He laughed, a steady and deep chuckle. “So how's Blob doing?"

"I'm guessing okay. How am I supposed to know?"

"Well if you'd stop drinking all that Guinness, and smoking those damn cigarettes …”

“And give up the finer things in life?"

"I heard in Dublin they treat everything with Guinness. Pregnancies included."

She laughed. "Not so sure about that, but I wouldn't be surprised."

He turned serious after a moment, "Reilly?"

"Yeah?"

"I really do want to be a part of this kid's life you know."

"I know," she said softly.

"I'm going to find a way to do it."

“Great. Let me know how I can help with that."

"You could give me a place to stay," he said.

"What do you mean?"

"I'm coming out in a couple weeks, it'd be great if I didn't have to spring for a hotel."

"Well that's kinda … unexpected.”

"I'll behave," he said.

"That I seriously doubt." Then, without giving it too much thought she nodded and said, "Okay, sure. Why not."

And much later, after she and Todd Forrest had chatted for an hour about the kind of things Reilly Steel had never in a million years thought they’d talk about, she lay back on her pillow, and drifted into glorious, dreamless sleep.