Wish You Were Here, page 26
‘Your mum is your mum,’ Sian finished. ‘You’re not Courtney.’
‘How can you be so sure? Unless Courtney’s ever found?’
Sian found she wanted to tell her. She wanted to tell someone. There was a part of her that wanted to shout from the rafters that she’d found the missing girl. But it was so complicated. And she’d made a promise. Whose life would she improve by busting this secret wide open? If Mandy was to be believed, she could be putting people at risk. ‘I’m pretty certain,’ she said, ‘as sure as I can be. I wouldn’t lie to you about it.’
Ana nodded. She believed Sian. She finished her wine and stood up, unsteady on her feet.
‘Can I call your mum? Or give you a lift somewhere?’ Sian was really concerned. ‘Can I take you to the drop-in centre and get you some help? Your mum doesn’t need to be involved.’
‘No,’ Ana said. She steadied herself and smiled, just slightly. ‘I have a therapist, and don’t need another one.’ She looked shy then and reached into her pocket, taking out a small piece of card. She held it out.
Sian took the card in her hand and realised: it was her own business card. Someone had highlighted the phrase at the bottom in bright yellow – find out who you really are. Sian looked up at Ana and then back at the card. Flipping it over, she saw her own address written, in her own handwriting. She realised now how Ana had found her office; it hadn’t been the usual internet search at all. And now she knew where she’d got her home address too. Sian had left the card on Morgan’s desk, the patient side of it, at her first ever appointment. She remembered that clearly now as she looked at the card again.
It hadn’t been her therapist’s fault at all. ‘Thanks for giving me this,’ Sian said.
‘That’s OK,’ Ana said. ‘And I’ll be alright. Honest.’
‘OK,’ Sian said. Ana walked out of the door, and Sian watched her down the street. She closed the front door with a sigh, then put on the bolt. She would wait up for Kris tonight. She didn’t want to climb into the cold bed on her own.
Was Mandy right? Were there bigger people involved in all of this, or was that just paranoia? Sian had always been dismissive of conspiracies before, and now she’d gone and dug up one all of her own. But what if this turned out to be just the tailbone of something much, much bigger? She wasn’t sure she wanted to know. In fact, Dominic had told her she didn’t want to know, when she’d tried to follow up on Daniel Harris. She’d become surer that she’d seen him that day at Belmarsh and insisted Wilkinson should look into it. He’d not told her much but had said one thing very clearly: that it was above his pay grade. And then he’d smiled and suggested she focus on things that she could do something about.
Sian smiled as she thought about everything she’d learned in the last few weeks. This case had started out with a massive coincidence. Two paternity cases, both related to the same showbiz pair. Perhaps they’d come through her door because she was the only DNA detective in town. Or there was another reason she hadn’t seen yet. Whatever else, Sian’s theory of relative coincidence meant that she couldn’t believe it was just random. A huge conspiracy was one thing, but she wasn’t ready to believe in an anonymous God, not yet.
One thing was for sure, though; she wasn’t always right.
The doctor’s waiting room had that all too familiar smell that Sian associated with feeling ill as a child. She had been asthmatic, although she’d grown out of it, and had spent a lot of time at the doctors. She breathed in, then out. Yep, definitely better now. She noticed that she was jiggling her leg and tried to stop, then realised she was clicking the fastener on her phone case open and closed. There was a beep, and her name was displayed on the electronic sign at the front of the room. Sian stood up. She walked towards Room 6, as the sign instructed.
The door was slightly open, but Sian still knocked before going in.
‘Come in.’ Morgan’s voice had the same professional chime to it that it had always had.
Sian gritted her teeth and opened the door, feeling weirdly sheepish. ‘Hello,’ she said, taking a seat.
Morgan looked up from her desk where she was writing something down. She slipped off her glasses and put them on the table, then looked at Sian properly. ‘Hello,’ she said. ‘Thanks for coming back.’
Sian shrugged. She wasn’t sure what to say so she just said, ‘OK.’ Then she cleared her throat. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t believe you,’ she said.
It was Morgan’s turn to shrug. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. She waved a hand towards the chairs across the room and waited for Sian to sit down. Then she walked over with her writing pad and sat in her usual seat.
Sian wrung her hands together and tried to look anywhere but at Morgan.
‘Do you think that it was just that you didn’t believe me?’ Morgan asked.
Sian leaned back in the chair and chewed on a nail. She felt like a mardy teenager. Morgan seemed to bring this out in her. She closed her eyes, breathed in deeply, then sat up. ‘What are you getting at?’
‘What do you think I’m getting at?’ Morgan said with that patient smile.
Sian sighed again and thought about all the things that had driven her mad about therapy. And then something folded in on itself inside her. She wanted to get better. She wanted to be better. She’d been wrong about Morgan, but she’d always known that really; her therapist might be many things, but she wasn’t unprofessional.
Morgan stared at Sian; Sian stared back. The two women had a staring match for several moments. But it was Sian who looked away first with a strange half-laugh.
Sian looked at the floor, still smiling. ‘Look, OK, it was my get-out clause.’ She was shaking her head. ‘It was an excuse not to do the work.’
Morgan could have claimed her victory now. She could have smiled in a self-satisfied way. But she didn’t. ‘Perhaps,’ she said. ‘So, where do we start?’
‘Isn’t that up to you?’ Sian said. She realised she was staring at her nails as if looking for chips in the polish that she didn’t even use. She looked up at Morgan and smiled. ‘I’m doing it again, aren’t I?’ she said.
‘Little bit,’ Morgan said, making a sign with her fingers to indicate the smallness of that.
They both sat back in their chairs and relaxed slightly. Morgan waited, the way she always did.
‘I do yoga now,’ Sian told her.
‘Really?’ Morgan sounded surprised. ‘You’ve embraced all the mindfulness stuff, then?’
Sian shrugged. ‘I wouldn’t go that far. Not all of it. But I like yoga, and I really enjoy the meditation at the end. I listen to a sleepcast when I go to bed.’ She swallowed. ‘I guess I’m starting to see there might be something in it.’
Morgan nodded and smiled. ‘Well, that’s very positive. I think that could help you a lot.’
‘Can we talk about one of my work problems?’ Sian said.
‘OK,’ Morgan said.
Sian took a deep breath. She needed to talk to someone about this. Kris was as conflicted as she was, and there was no one else she could discuss it with. No one she could trust. But her therapist had a professional duty to maintain confidentiality about the things Sian told her, provided they didn’t constitute a safeguarding issue. In this case, Kitty was probably safer with her real identity hidden from the world. And so Sian told Morgan about her dilemma. About Bennett’s children scattered across the country. About Mandy Johnson and her wild assertions over Bennett’s death, and her sister’s, and the idea that someone big was behind it all. And finally, about Courtney and Kitty. About what the young girl wanted and what might be the right thing to do.
‘What would you want if it were you?’
Sian shook her head. This was typical of the kind of questions Morgan asked. It was what made these sessions difficult, but maybe what might make them worth it in the end. ‘It’s not me,’ she said. She looked up from under her lashes at Morgan. ‘If it were, I’d want the truth out there. But she loved her father.’ Sian was shaking her head. ‘She sees it differently. And, anyway, my concern is that the truth won’t necessarily keep Kitty safe.’
Morgan nodded. ‘Yes, I can see that. So, what are you going to do?’
Sian sighed again. She was bored of hearing herself sighing. ‘If in doubt, do nowt,’ she said.
Morgan gave her a questioning look.
‘It was one of my uncle’s sayings,’ she said. ‘He had loads of them.’
‘So, you’re not going to do anything about Kitty?’
She cleared her throat. ‘I don’t see what’s to be gained. Kitty doesn’t want it. Her mother’s dead, her father too. And if Mandy is right and there are big forces at play here, well, then I might not be doing Kitty any favours.’
‘Sounds logical.’
‘Maybe,’ Sian said. People often said that, that she was logical. But she wasn’t sure anymore. ‘Except this is how I feel about it too. Head and heart,’ she said.
Morgan nodded, then waited.
‘I’m not sure I’m all that logical, really,’ Sian said. She made eye contact with Morgan for what felt like slightly too long and then she looked away. ‘I think logic is where I go to hide.’
Morgan smiled in recognition at that.
‘So you agree?’ Sian said.
‘Being right is not my job,’ Morgan said, her smile broadening.
‘Hey!’ Sian was smiling too, though.
Morgan sat and waited some more.
Sian watched her therapist, thinking that being able to wait like that was a very special skill. All she wanted to do right now was fill the silence. ‘Do you think I’ve made progress?’ she said.
Morgan smiled again, just slightly. ‘It’s not all a contest,’ she said. ‘Not all something we can measure and tick off on a list of things to do.’
‘SMART goals,’ Sian said.
‘Yeah, that’s not how therapy works.’ Another small shrug.
‘Does it work, though? Really? Am I wasting my time?’ Sian took a big breath after she’d said this and waited, expectant. She needed to know.
‘That will depend on you,’ Morgan told her. ‘Whether you need to be right or need to be well.’
Sian was rolling her eyes. ‘I wish I’d never gone to that dinner party,’ she said.
Morgan smiled at that. And then she waited some more and let the silence swell between them. Sian didn’t say anything. She sat still and paid attention to her own breathing. She stayed in the moment and was at peace with the silence. She let her mind wander and time drifted, and then it was Morgan who spoke next for a change.
‘The signs are good,’ she said, sounding like a magic eight ball.
Acknowledgements
My heartfelt thanks to Jenna and the team at VERVE for so much patience, hard work and dedication in getting Sian Love back onto the page. Huge thanks too to all my family and friends, who’ve seen me through some remarkably difficult times during the writing of this book. There are far too many to list here, but you know who you are. Thanks also to Professor John Brookfield, for extremely knowledgeable and helpful advice about DNA analysis and its use in criminal justice.
About the Author
Nicola Monaghan is the author of the Sian Love mystery series including the critically acclaimed Dead Flowers and Wish You Were Here. Her debut novel, The Killing Jar, won a Betty Trask Award, the Authors’ Club First Novel Prize and the Waverton Good Read. She taught creative writing for many years and is currently writing a thriller about that experience, as well as studying for her PhD at the University of Nottingham.
vervebooks.co.uk/Nicola-Monaghan
nicolamonaghan.com
@nicolanovelist
Also by Nicola Monaghan
The Killing Jar
Starfishing
The Okinawa Dragon
The Night Lingers and other stories
The Troll trilogy
Dead Flowers
If you enjoyed Wish You Were Here, look out for Dead Flowers, the first gripping Dr Sian Love Mystery
She doesn’t trust the police. She used to be one of them.
Hardened by ten years on the murder squad, DNA analyst Doctor Sian Love has seen it all. So when she finds human remains in the basement of her new home, she knows the drill.
Except this time it’s different. This time, it’s personal…
A page-turning cold case investigation, Dead Flowers is an intriguing, multi-layered story perfect for fans of Kate Atkinson’s Case Histories and British crime dramas like Line Of Duty and Unforgotten.
‘Tension builds slowly but surely in this dark gripper’ – SUNDAY SPORT
‘An intriguing murder mystery… Monaghan has a flair for leading the reader in a certain direction only to shift path further along’ – NB MAGAZINE
VERVEBOOKS.CO.UK/DEAD-FLOWERS
Looking for your next page-turning read?
Why not try By Way of Sorrow by Robyn Gigl?
Erin McCabe has been referred the biggest case of her career. Four months ago, the son of a New Jersey state senator was found fatally stabbed in a rundown motel near Atlantic City. Sharise Barnes, a nineteen-year-old transgender sex worker, is in custody, and, based on the evidence against her, there seems little doubt of a guilty verdict.
As a transgender woman herself, Erin knows that defending Sharise will blow her own private life wide open and doubtless deepen her estrangement from her family. Yet she feels uniquely qualified to help Sharise and duty-bound to protect her from the possibility of a death sentence.
While Erin works with her law partner, former-FBI-agent Duane Swisher, to show Sharise acted in self-defense, the senator begins using the full force of his influence to publicly discredit them and their efforts to mount a defense for Sharise. And behind the scenes, his tactics are even more dangerous. For his son had secrets that could destroy the senator’s own political aspirations – secrets worth killing for...
‘An authentic and powerful thriller’ – TIMES & SUNDAY TIMES CRIME CLUB
VERVEBOOKS.CO.UK/BY-WAY-OF-SORROW
We think you’ll love Rosalie Knecht’s Vera Kelly series!
Meet Vera Kelly: a brilliant, wry and whip-smart female spy for the twenty-first century.
New York City, 1962. Vera Kelly is struggling to make rent and blend into the underground gay scene in Greenwich Village. She’s working night shifts at a radio station when her quick wits, sharp tongue, and technical skills get her noticed by a recruiter for the CIA.
Next thing she knows she’s in Argentina, tasked with wiretapping a congressman and infiltrating a group of student activists in Buenos Aires. As Vera becomes more and more enmeshed with the young radicals, the fragile local government begins to split at the seams. When a betrayal leaves her stranded in the wake of a coup, Vera learns war makes for strange and unexpected bedfellows, and she’s forced to take extreme measures to save herself.
‘Vera, outwardly cool but inwardly seething, makes for great company. Rosalie Knecht – proving it can be done – has created something truly original’ – Times & Sunday Times Crime Club
‘Knecht writes crisply, with salt and sharp wit... a smart, intelligent mystery’ – Irish Times
VERVEBOOKS.CO.UK/WHO-IS-VERA-KELLY
Copyright
This eBook edition first published in the UK in 2023 by VERVE Books,
an imprint of The Crime & Mystery Club Ltd,
Harpenden, UK
vervebooks.co.uk
@VERVE_Books
© Nicola Monaghan, 2023
The right of Nicola Monaghan to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of the publishers.
Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
ISBN
978-0-85730-808-5 (Paperback)
978-0-85730-809-2 (eBook)
2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1
eBook by Avocet Typeset, Bideford, Devon, EX39 2BP
Nicola Monaghan, Wish You Were Here
