The Grotto's Secret: A Historical Conspiracy Mystery Thriller (36 page)

169

A sob escaped Kelby. She lifted her gaze from the USB memory stick to Roy and whispered, ‘His foot
was
itching. He left us evidence.’

‘How do you know?’

Kelby screwed up her nose. ‘It’s a horrific place, but 42A is under that building.’ She pointed to the derelict mansion. ‘Let’s get out of here, quick. We’ll check at home, but I can almost guarantee this stick will have evidence of the rizado murders. Or whatever Gary found out about MG.’

A little hand slipped over Kelby’s shoulder. ‘Is that Daddy’s lost foot?’

Startled, Kelby swivelled around to see Annie’s face close to hers. ‘Yes, pumpkin. Daddy was right, his foot is itching. When you speak to him again, you tell him Aunt Kel will scratch his foot for him, okay?’

Annie burst into giggles. ‘Oh, Aunt Kel, you and Daddy crack me up.’ She sagged onto the back seat like a graceful ballerina completing her performance.

‘Hey, I didn’t get to see much of Spain. How about you and I have our swimming lessons there?’

Annie perched up and punched the air. ‘Double yippee!’

‘Is that okay, Rob Roy? Can Annie travel?’

‘Sure, she’d love it. I know a good swimming teacher.’

‘Who’s this teacher? Let’s set it up.’

He grinned at her. ‘Right away.’

Roy opened the front door for Kelby and leaned close to her. ‘What about the TV stuff? That’s a full-time job, but so is looking after Annie.’

‘I don’t care. I’m giving up public life.’

He grinned. ‘That deserves another hug. But not in front of the children.’

‘Why? Annie won’t mind.’

‘Because each time I hug you, I want to stay there.’ Roy dropped a light kiss on her forehead and pushed her into the passenger seat. ‘I’m taking you two girls home.’

Kelby called Jimmy, and he answered with a screech, ‘Be-jaysus, it’s yourself.’

‘I’m sorry about the silence.’

‘You’re not gonna believe this? The producers called, they want you to head up a new series.’

‘Forget it!’

‘Sure, I told them already. I said Miss Wade is going to —’

She interrupted him, ‘Stop and smell the flowers.’

‘Roses. You stop to smell roses, not flowers.’

‘Well, that’s where we’re going.’

‘We?’

‘Didn’t you say you should run the office?’

‘Of course! But where are
we
going?’

‘Torcal.’ Kelby kept her eyes on Roy. Even with his eyes staring at the road ahead, a smile creased his face.

‘What?’ yelled Jimmy down the phone, ‘Where on God’s good earth is that?’

‘It’s in Spain where I can —’
She stopped in mid-sentence and started again, ‘Where we can chill out for a few months until things settle down.’

‘Why am I going with you to Spain, when you need me to run things here?’

‘You’re going to set up a home office for me. You can have a place of your own close by — maybe Malaga — and commute for meetings with me in Spain.’

For once in his life, Jimmy was speechless.

‘I’ll be spending most of my time with Annie, so you need to get things set up how you want them.’

He yelled again, ‘You’re not the Kelby Wade I used to know. But I like this one better!’

She glanced at Roy. Smiling, she said, ‘One more thing, Jim, please set up a trust fund for Hawk’s wife and child. He died saving me and I want to care for them the same way he would’ve.’

‘That’s grand. Well done, Kel.’

‘I’ll see you tomorrow to tie up the details.’

‘Sure. Oh, wait, I nearly forgot to tell you. Zelda has pulled off a coup. She has the charities lined up to auction your dresses. And she’s helping them to invite a pile of celebs and high profilers to get involved. The charities are hopping with excitement at the money they’ll make.’

‘Oh, wow! That’s brilliant. You’ll have to give her a bonus.’

Smiling, Kelby ended the call and turned to check on Annie, still curled up on the back seat.

‘You okay, pumpkin?’

Annie nodded.

She turned back and glanced at Roy, only to find him staring at her.

‘You’re going to try it, then?’

‘Yes.’

His squared jaw dropped. ‘Really?’

‘If rizado helps Annie, I’ll fund the research myself.’

‘Marina will be thrilled you believe in it that much.’ He leaned over and squeezed her hand. ‘But forget the funding. Get Annie back on her feet.’

‘Yes, and we have to sort out these pharma monsters. I have other evidence, so they won’t get away with this. I nicked Willow’s journal with lots of notes on toxins. His lab is full of body parts.’

‘Ooh,’ Roy pulled a face, ‘but the journal sounds intriguing.’

‘Don’t get too excited, it’s your homework.’ Kelby relaxed back in her seat. ‘Will you help me get settled?’

‘Of course! But you know I can’t join you. I have my practice here and …’ his voice sounded wistful.

‘Marina told me you visit your family often. If I’m near them, you can visit me too.’

‘Nothing will keep me away.’ His hand reached over and squeezed hers.

‘By the way, when are you going to tell me about all that stuff you kept telling Marina
not
to tell me? You know, all about secret societies and an abbey in Torcal.’

‘That was only because you were pushed for time. Jimmy warned us that your diary was stacked.’

‘Funny thing, my diary seems to have come apart at the seams. Looks like I’m about to have plenty time on my hands.’

Roy said, ‘Let’s chat about it over a glass of Rioja.’

At that moment, they pulled up outside Kelby’s gates, a security guard jumped up demanding to know who they were. As Roy hopped out of the car and explained, Kelby glanced up the drive at a hive of activity.

An army of people scuttled in and out of two police cars and three security vans. She spotted someone attaching a surveillance camera to one side of the house. Another set of cameras were being fitted to the opposite side. A man on the roof ran wires along the gutters.

An alarm suddenly shrieked and everyone stopped dead in their tracks.

A voice bellowed, ‘Okay everyone, that’s the last test.’ Then the owner of the voice appeared in the doorway and shouted at the men with the cameras. ‘Alarm done. How you guys doing?’

The man running cables near the gutter shouted back, ‘Every point between the boundary and the house is covered. No blind spots.’

Roy slipped back into the car. He leaned over and whispered to Kelby, ‘You’re finally verified and able to go inside your own home.’

Kelby stared at Roy and shook her head. ‘Hawk.’ She choked up and muttered, ‘He did this.’

‘Good man. He came through.’

After squeezing the car between the security vehicles, Roy jumped out and lifted Annie out of the car. She pushed his hands away gently. ‘I’m fine, Rob Roy, I want to walk. Daddy taught me to never give up.’

As Kelby’s breath caught in her throat, she exchanged a look with Roy.

Annie stood between them and took each of their hands in her own. ‘I promised him he could share my two feet.’

A pair of silver-grey doves flew over them. Annie pointed up as one of them let out a woo-oo-oo cry. ‘See, Aunt Kel, Daddy and Mummy are with us. Up there.’

Kelby watched the birds hide themselves in amongst the pine needles. A quiver ran through her. Was it the same dove she’d seen outside Gary’s shed?

She shook her head. Now
she
was imagining things. Yet the sensation Gary was watching over them still lingered. Talking to him, as she had done with her mother, helped to heal the gaping hole he’d left in her life. She chuckled to herself, maybe she’d be talking to him through Annie in future.

They ambled to the front door and Annie tugged on Kelby’s hand. ‘No big work handbag, Aunt Kel?’

‘Don’t need one.’ As Annie smiled at her, Kelby thought her heart would burst. ‘It’s just us three, Pumpkin.’

‘And our ants.’

The End of
The Grotto’s Secret

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The Grotto’s Secret
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Bonus Material

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The Grotto’s Secret
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* A map of the grotto’s location

* Behind the scenes information

* Q&A with Paula about her inspiration behind
the story creation

* Things you don’t know about some characters

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Author’s Notes

Writing a historical novel creates challenges for an author. Especially when it comes to what is and isn’t true.

The facts about the Spanish Inquisition have been carefully researched and are true. The witch hunts and torture methods are true. Many horrific devices were used to force people into being heretics or witches. I was fascinated with the idea that many ‘witches’ burnt at the stake may have been innocent mothers, like Madre.

I was inspired by Nicholas Culpeper (1616-1654) who  wrote his own complete herbal. He was prosecuted for witchcraft by the Society of Apothecaries, but acquitted by a jury.
Culpeper’s Complete Herbal
is still in print today.

Most of the facts I have used about plankton are true. However, rizado is completely fabricated.

The poisonous plants I have used to kill fictional characters can really kill humans and dogs. Some cause agonising deaths. The popular oleander bush, prolific in Spain, almost killed my puppy. You can read his story on my website at

http://paulawynne.com/the-grottos-secret
.

You can also read about toxic plants on my Pinterest board:
https://
uk.pinterest.com/paulagracewynne/writing-the-grottos-secret/

You can also check out my notes and timelines for the story at
http://paulawynne.com/infographics

Acknowledgments

Firstly, I want to thank my readers who trusted me enough to buy this book. Thank you for your faith in me.

I would like to express my gratitude to the many people who saw me through this book; to all those who provided support, talked things over, read, wrote, offered comments, allowed me to quote their remarks and assisted in the editing, proofreading and design.

Above all, I want to thank my husband, Ken, my son Kent, my mad puppy Dexter, and the rest of my family, who supported and encouraged me in spite of all the time it took me away from them.

Expert help

As I have researched and written
The Grotto’s Secret
some extremely kind, generous and knowledgeable people have provided me with information. Their expertise and help has been rich in detail, brimming with constructive feedback. A thousand thanks to them all.

The following people are experts in their field and I am hugely grateful for their advice and feedback which has helped to improve the book. In no particular order I would like to thank:

Bob Bedford, Executive Director at the Foundation for the Advancement of Sephardic Studies and Culture. Bob enriched the chapters and discussion between Tío and María. His advice and suggestions added colour and authenticity to the characters.

Paul Newman, author of
Daily Life In The Middle Ages
and
Growing Up in the Middle Ages
helped in verifying facts about daily life in medieval times.

Timothy Graham, Professor of History at The University of New Mexico also helped me in ensuring the historical details were correct. Tim teaches keen students about handling medieval documents and manuscripts. He has had the privilege to work with the finest collections of medieval manuscripts in Cambridge and Oxford in England, along with rare collections in France and the USA. As proof of his expertise, Tim was awarded the 2016 Award for Excellence in Teaching by the Medieval Academy of America Committee on Centers and Regional Associations (CARA).

Frank Morey from Virtus Risk Management whose information and advice on celebrities needing security when threatened by internet stalkers made those sections come alive.

Kevin Robinson a retired West Yorkshire police inspector, who has over thirty years of British and international policing experience. Since retiring Kevin supports writers in making their fictional police officers and procedures more realistic.

Doctor Mike Rossiter, Consultant in Sport, Exercise and Musculoskeletal Medicine who helped me to ensure the doctors and nurses in my book sounded like real medical staff.

Rob MacNevin for reading the crash chapters to be sure even the tiniest details are correct.

And finally, thank you to Kent Wynne and Ryan and Niall Sheridan for being supportive sons.

My awesome beta readers

Beta readers are avid book-lovers who read final drafts of novels to advise the author of any major hiccups before the book goes into the editing process. These wonderful, caring friends read the book and gave their feedback and constructive advice on how to improve some sections of the book.

I am deeply thankful for the help given by Ros Brookman, Graham Bird, Angela Crouch, Helen Johnson, Mary Murphy and Amanda Connery.

And a huge thank you to my husband, Ken Sheridan, who picked out things that didn’t make sense and suggested many ways of improving the book.

Last and not least: I ask forgiveness of anyone whose name I have failed to mention.