Disorder (Sam Keddie thriller series Book 1) by Paddy Magrane Read Free Book Online Page B

Government for putting Dad under unbearable stress. That’s how she’s making sense of it all.’ She paused, looking out of the window at an indeterminate point.
       ‘But you’re not sure?’
       ‘No,’ she said, her eyes returning to the room. ‘I think there’s something else. I mean, I know he was under stress, but I don’t think that unduly affected him. He knew what he’d signed up to.’
       She raised her fingers into an arch and pressed them to her lips. ‘Dad was such a steady man. Not always the most expressive emotionally, but he was always consistently affectionate towards me and Mum. He’d get angry of course – who doesn’t? Normally it was about bullshit in the media, unfair jibes from the Opposition or injustices in the rest of the world, particularly those beyond the reach of his brief.’
       She’d begun gesticulating with her hands, but now they came to rest on the table. ‘He got mad about Mum’s illness too, really mad. But then, despite the pain underneath, he dealt with it in a calm, measured way. What I’m trying to say is that he’d get affected by stuff you’d expect anyone to be affected by, but otherwise it was like he had a really even keel. Until recently, that is.’
       ‘Something changed.’
       ‘A couple of months back, he began acting differently, out of character I guess. This might sound odd, but he seemed to be unusually happy.’
      ‘Most of my clients would give their right arm to be described that way, but I think I know what you mean. As if he were on a high.’
       ‘Exactly. And I’d seen enough people in his state to know what was happening.’
       ‘Which was?’
       Her voice became even quieter. ‘He was in love.’
       ‘With another woman.’
       ‘Yeah. We all knew of politicians whose marriages had been destroyed by life in the Commons – the long hours, all that time away from home. But theirs had survived. They had a bond. They loved each other.’ She sighed. ‘Or at least they had. Her illness seemed to change all that.’ She smiled at a memory. ‘They’d always been great communicators. If you could have heard the conversations around this table. They were always talking – about politics, the arts, all sorts of stuff. I remember one debate that went on all night, about Hitchcock.’ She smiled. ‘Mum said he was a misogynist but Dad, who was a massive fan, defended him to the hilt.’ Eleanor’s face darkened. ‘Her disease shut all that down. And he seemed to really miss that regular communication with her. But just when I thought it was beginning to take its toll, he changed.’
       ‘He met someone?’
       ‘That’s my guess. It was my birthday and he took me out for dinner in London. I assumed he’d put on a good front for me, but this was different. He was almost unrecognisable. The only way I can describe it is exuberant.’
       ‘And this lasted till when?’
       ‘A week or so ago I saw him for the first time in ages. He’d been working incredibly hard on something at the Ministry. He came down for the weekend and seemed not just tired, but utterly spent, like the light had gone out. I tried to draw out what was up, but he was closed down.’
       ‘You think the relationship had gone badly wrong?’
       ‘That was my conclusion.’
       Sam paused. He was aware his next comment would seem selfish and insensitive, but he had to ask it. ‘But why would this Government employee be so anxious about me finding out?’
        Eleanor shrugged, seemingly unperturbed. ‘The fact that my dad may have been having an affair hardly seems of significance.’
       ‘No.’
       But then a thought crossed Sam’s mind, one which coloured the whole business. ‘I guess that depends on who the woman was.’

Chapter 13
     
    Docklands, London
     
    As the journalist who’d broken the Scott suicide story, Tony McNess was feeling rather pleased with himself. He’d been called in by the