Sleep Sister: A page-turning novel of psychological suspense by Laura Elliot Read Free Book Online Page A

Beth thought. Trouble and strife, no matter where her father laid his head. She wanted to return to Anaskeagh and climb to the top of the headland with Jess. She longed to see Sara, to snuggle against her in the dip of the mattress, to hold her warm and cosy as they drifted off to sleep. But Anaskeagh was also her dark shadow and she knew she would never return to its shade.

Chapter 8
    B eth had spent six months on her machine when she discovered that a typist had been sacked for arriving late. She approached Mrs Wallace and told her she had studied shorthand and typing for a year before leaving the Star of the Sea Convent.
    ‘If you give me a chance to show you what I can do you won’t regret it.’ She tried to sound confident under the astute gaze of her employer and succeeded.
    ‘A week’s trial,’ agreed Della Wallace. ‘One mistake and you’re out on your ear. Start on Monday.’
    The office staff ignored Beth. It was the first time anyone from the factory floor had become part of the clerical section and her sudden promotion upset the insular pecking order that existed in the company. The machinists were also suspicious of her.
    ‘Stuck-up cow,’ said Marina. ‘She thinks she’s too good for us since she moved up with the la-di-das.’
    Marina had been expelled from school for smoking. She did it openly during her commerce and bookkeeping class and blew smoke rings at her teacher. Shortly afterwards, she joined Della Designs, sulking as she sewed collars onto coats, only brightening up when Peter came to the factory to tease the older women and whisper in her ear. She ignored Beth, making jokes about culchies and bog accents when she walked past. Sandwiched between the factions in the factory and the office, Beth kept her head down. The sales manager’s secretary had become engaged. She flaunted a large solitaire and confided to her friends that she intended conceiving a baby on her honeymoon. When her job fell vacant, Beth would be ready to take it over.
    At the weekly disco, called the Sweat Pit by those who packed the small parish hall, Marina danced with her friends until the music slowed and she could twine her arms around Peter’s neck. She confided intimate secrets to Beth across the bolster. She ‘did it’ regularly with him on bales of blue velvet material in the stockroom. She posed nude for him in his artist’s studio when his mother was out. She was his Mona Lisa. She laughed at Beth’s shocked expression and tossed her long dark hair. ‘When he finishes art college he’s going to become a famous artist and we’re getting married. I’m going to live in Havenstone – then we’ll see who’s the la-di-da around here.’
    Havenstone, where Mrs Wallace and her son lived, was a large house set in its own grounds with a back view over the estuary. Beth imagined Marina in her high boots and leather trousers strutting through the rooms and smiled to herself. She suspected that Marina’s escapades mostly happened in her head. But untangling the lies from the truth was a tedious task so she stayed silent and listened to fantastic stories that ended abruptly in the Sweat Pit when Peter danced the slow numbers with Sharon from quality control. Later, reported Marina’s best friend, they were seen outside, kissing each other against the wall.
    ‘She’s a bike,’ Marina sneered. ‘Cheap peroxide slut.’ She was going to move to London and become a proper model on a catwalk instead of a canvas. Oldport was the tomb of the living dead.
    ‘I have my eyes set on higher things,’ she said when Beth found her in the bedroom wiping mascara from her eyes. ‘Peter Wallace can stay down on his bended knees forever but he won’t make me change my mind.’ She blew her nose and applied a heavy layer of panstick make-up, demanding to know why Beth was staring. Peter Wallace was nothing but a swollen ego and a tiny prick. She hated his guts. Beth left her weeping into the bolster.
    A week later Marina