The Invisible Heiress: A Gripping Psychological Thriller Filled with Nail-Biting Suspense by Kathleen O'Donnell

Author:Kathleen O'Donnell [O'Donnell, Kathleen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Italics Publishing
Published: 2019-02-14T16:00:00+00:00

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Another herd of smut-rag reporters pawed and snorted outside St. Gertrude’s cemetery. The fact they didn’t intrude on the congregated meant the Blair Fitzgeralds still brandished some clout. I steeled myself for another assault. Smiley gunned the SUV through the iron gates. Some of the waiting reporters scattered, some didn’t. He weaved toward the persistent ones, pressing harder on the gas, then slammed on the brakes right as one jumped just in time to avoid the Rover’s front end then threw himself to the ground. The screaming almost drowned out our cackling.

“That was fun,” he said.

“It so was.”

We raced down the winding road past the neat, gray headstones lined up like tiny infantry. Drove ’til we got to the tail end of a long line of parked cars.

Smiley whistled. “Whose Bentley?”

“My dad’s.”

He’d pleaded to escort me, but I couldn’t handle his overbearing futzing.

“Of course.” Smiley slowed. “I’ll let you out ahead, then park.”

He chauffeured me to the gravesite dotted with more attendees than I’d anticipated. Guess they came to rubberneck. All dressed appropriately in black, their milling around and discreet waves to one another looked like birds gently flapping their wings—a murder of crows. How appropriate.

Brendan’s sleek black casket up on its stand, wreathed in flowers I’d chosen, rocked me. I stared from behind the tinted windows of my Rover. The hole in the dirt, hidden by the best box money could buy, waited to embrace my Irishman for eternity. Soon he’d belong to the earth, to the god I’d never believed in. Whatever life I’d lived with Brendan had run its course. No more chances. I wouldn’t wake up from this.

“Preston, you’ve got to get out,” Smiley said.

“I can’t.”

“You can.”

I hardly recognized anyone. Brendan’s usual crowd didn’t do funerals, particularly those surrounded by the police. I hadn’t heard one peep from the Finneys, which I still found difficult to fathom. Brendan’s parents disapproved of his life and his death. Stubborn Irish don’t like to bend, but I knew they loved their son.

No one who mattered to my husband showed—except me. No one came for me either. My friends, the few I’d had, voted themselves off the island when I got carted off to the psych ward. Parasites attached themselves to me like swine flu for drugs, money, entre into the hottest clubs, or the occasional blurb in the society page. When access to living la vida loca dispersed so did my peeps.

“See your parents?” Smiley said.

“No. They wouldn’t come together.”

“The rich are different, I guess.”

“That’s generous. I don’t remember a time they didn’t live separate lives. My mother will come with her driver. You saw my father’s here under his own steam.”

I opened the passenger side door a crack, which opened the floodgates. Brendan deserved my crying. Smiley double-parked to see me safely to my seat. The assembled parted like the Red Sea to let me through. Staring daggers.

“What exactly is going on with the Finneys?” I said. “Do you have any idea? I get they blame Brendan for his own downfall but—”

“You didn’t hear?”

“Hear what?”

“They’ve left town.

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