Corn Dolls

  Corn Dolls

  An Annie O’Malley Novel

  K.T. Galloway

  CORN DOLLS

  Published worldwide by A.W.E. Publishing.

  This edition published in 2021

  Copyright © 2021 by K.T. Galloway. The right of K.T. Galloway to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Also by K.T. Galloway

  The Annie O’Malley Crime Thrillers

  Corn Dolls

  Foxton Girls

  For my daughter. My world.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Foxton Girls

  Foxton Girls

  Prologue

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  One

  Sunday

  “… ninety-eight, nighty-nine, one hundred. Here I come, ready or not.”

  Maggie Finch opened her eyes expecting to see her daughter half-hiding behind the curtains. At four years old it was always the curtains, or under the covers of the beds, occasionally in the pantry—but that was only when there were biscuits on offer, and the last few weeks had been quite tight for money, so the biscuit tin was empty.

  “Orla?” Maggie sing-songed, as she started searching in earnest.

  She hauled her weary body off the sagging couch and stretched to the ceiling.

  It’s easier when it’s the curtains.

  “Orla?” she sang again, peeking behind the curtains just in case.

  There was no-one there. Just an obstructed view out to the North Norfolk salt marshes beyond the old Ford Ka standing rusty in the drive, and the knee-high weeds in the front garden. Another chore to add to the ever-increasing list.

  Maggie sighed and went to check behind the rest of the downstairs curtains.

  Please be downstairs. Please be downstairs.

  But the curtains gave up no answers. The thought of hauling her body up the narrow stairs when she couldn’t even see down to her feet anymore made Maggie want to throw herself back on the sofa and fall asleep. She was sure she hadn’t been this exhausted last time around. When she had been pregnant with Orla, she had been the epitome of blooming. Now she was just fat and tired. But she hadn’t been doing it all on her own back then, with a four-year-old to deal with on top of it all.

  He’s such a dick.

  Maggie pulled back the heavy curtains that were drawn over the front door to keep out the draught. Not that there should be draughts in August, but these old flint houses held the cold as if it had burrowed into their bones, and every little bit of warmth was precious.

  “Gotcha!” she yelled, laughing.

  But there was no-one there either. Maggie rattled the handle.

  Still locked.

  She turned around. The stairs loomed over her like Everest. They may as well have been an unattainable mountain peak the way she was feeling. But when her daughter wanted to play hide and seek, she went along with it, even if it was just for the hundred seconds of peace while she was counting.

  The bannister was barely attached to the wall, the lime plaster around the fixings giving up the ghost before Maggie had even moved in. But there was no other way of getting up there safely. She took a deep breath and placed her foot on the first step.

  “I’m coming to get you,” she growled, hoping that Orla’s squeals would give away her position.

  She also hoped that Orla wouldn’t want her to take a turn at hiding next. Really, as an adult there were few places to hide effectively anyway. At eight months pregnant those places were almost non-existent.

  The upper floor of the old flint cottage was smaller than downstairs. Maggie often thought about this weird curveball of physics, given that the house looked symmetrical from each axis. But today she was thankful for the anomaly. Only two bedrooms and a creaky old airing cupboard to check. And Orla had been known to run as fast as she could past the airing cupboard to get from the stairs to her bedroom at the back of the house. There was always a witch or a ghost or a baddie lurking behind the door. The noise of the water tank could quite easily be a dragon or a howling wind, bringing with it some unseen threat that would exponentially develop in Orla’s mind until she was screaming with hysterical terror, until she reached the safety of her bed.

  Maggie’s own room was at the top of the stairs, so she checked there first. The mattress on her bed looked inviting, despite sagging almost to the floor. But a small cold niggle of fear was starting to spread its fingers through Maggie’s stomach. The house was quiet. Too quiet. Orla was never normally not emitting some sort of noise, even when she was asleep. Was she stepping her hiding game up a notch?

  Yes, that’s probably it. She’s very competitive when it comes to hiding.

  Maggie shook out her own curtains, revealing nothing but a cloud of dust. Coughing, she undid the latch and pushed open her window, breathing in the fresh, salty air, feeling it stick to her face the way it clung to everything it touched. Maggie’s window looked out over the marshes and onto the North Sea. Even today, with the sun belting through the mist brought in by the water, the sea looked cold and dirty. The tide was out, leaving behind a liminal landscape of twisted, muddy creeks dotted with purple specks of sea lavender. It should be beautiful, but Maggie had always found it left her with an ominous sense of unease; the Pied Piper luring the children to their watery fate with his hypnotic tunes.

  There was something amiss. Maggie couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Was it the way the water was throwing itself about in waves with no direction; tops white with froth, hiding the treacherous sandbanks underneath? Was it the lonely piping of the oystercatchers?

  Maggie tried to calm her breathing, wrapping her arms around her bump. She must protect her unborn child.

  I can’t even look after the one I have. What hope is there?

  “Orla!” Maggie shouted now, the fun sapped from her voice.

  There was no way Orla could be under Maggie’s bed, it was too low. And there was nowhere else she could have hidden in Maggie’s small room. The walls closed in on Maggie as she half ran out of the room and threw open the airing cupboard door. The water tank grumbled as she threw towels onto the landing floor, but they gave up nothing but empty shelves.

  “Orla, answer Mummy now. Let’s have a snack. How about some chocolate?” Maggie lied. There was no chocolate, but a screaming, angry Orla was better than no Orla at all.

  The rush of blood in Maggie’s ears sounded just like the sea. Orla knew not to go anywhere near the sea, didn’t she? Maggie had drummed it into her since she was born. Besides, the front door was still locked.

  “ORLA!”

  Something wasn’t right. Ducking into Orla’s room, Maggie gave it a cursory check. The bed was still neatly made. The c
urtains threadbare and practically see-through. She wasn’t there. There were no other places in the tiny space that could hide even a four-year-old.

  Maggie stumbled over her own feet as she tried to turn in the doorway. The narrow landing seemed to lengthen as she ran towards the stairs. The rail shook under her weight as she descended, rattling loud enough to be heard over her shouts for her daughter. The bottom step, worn into a curve with use over a hundred years, came up to meet Maggie quicker than she expected, her foot slipped out from under her and she landed with a crunch on her coccyx, the wind completely knocked out of her lungs. Everywhere hurt, her bump felt too heavy to lift back up again, but she had no choice other than to get back up and find Orla.

  There was no one else to help. Maggie spoke in whispers to her parents every day, she missed them so much. But the truth was, they had both left her a long time ago. Orla’s dad had skipped out a month ago, two years after moving them all out to the arse end of nowhere because it was more convenient for his work, never mind the fact his wife and daughter were now alone for days at a time. Neither of them had heard a word from him since the day he left.

  Maybe he’s come back.

  Maggie would have laughed at the idea was it not for the sheer paralysing terror cursing through her body. She wanted to call someone, have someone tell her everything would be okay. Most probably, Orla was so proud of her new hiding place that she didn’t want to give it up, not even for chocolate. A sob bubbled up in Maggie’s throat.

  “Orla!” she cried. “Where are you?”

  Her bump had felt lower over the last few days, her new baby was getting ready to meet the world. Not long now, Maggie could tell. She gathered it up in her arms as best she could and limped through the living room to the kitchen. She would check the downstairs again. Maybe Orla was creeping silently between hiding places, making the game more fun.

  The house was still. How many times could Maggie check each room before she gave in to the idea that Orla wasn’t here? She needed to talk it through with someone else, allay her fears with a friendly voice, because calling the police felt too extreme. It was just a game of hide and seek. They’d laugh at her for being over-dramatic. But there was no one else to talk to. Apart from the old couple next door, who already thought Maggie was a bad mother, her only neighbours were the sea birds.

  The clock in the kitchen ticked despite the layer of fat clogging the gears, counting down the minutes Orla had been missing. What else could Maggie do? It was almost supper time. Orla was ruled by her internal food clock. Maybe Maggie could sit it out and wait for her daughter to get hungry. She walked over to the door and checked it was still locked.

  Did I check this one last time?

  Maggie was sure she hadn’t. So when it swung open, the pit of dread in her stomach dropped lower, like icy liquid sloshing around in her bowels.

  “ORLA,” Maggie shouted into the weeds at the back.

  Still in her bare feet, Maggie stepped out onto the gravel. The garden was small, like the rest of the cottage. A little square of cowslips and dandelions. Maggie crunched around the side of the cottage to the front—and the open gate.

  Please, no.

  Shaking with fear, Maggie shuffled down the path, past the old car and out onto the stretch of tarmac. She looked left and right, hoping to spot the bright blonde hair flashing in the sun. Nothing. Behind the tarmac was the salt marsh, dipping away from the road with clusters of reeds that looked soft and friendly, hiding the deep mud below.

  “ORLA!”

  She didn’t want to look. If she didn’t look, everything would be okay.

  The tarmac was hot on Maggie’s bare soles as she walked to the edge of the road. Leaning as far forwards as was safe with her shift in balance, she peered into the reeds. There was nothing there but thick black mud. Another sob escaped. Tears ran down Maggie’s cheeks and she wiped them away with the cuff of her sleeve.

  “Orla, please!” she cried, turning back to face the cottage.

  Something caught her eye at the front door. She squinted in the sun, her hand up to shadow her view.

  What the…?

  Stumbling back across the road, Maggie felt the bile rising up into her throat. She didn’t notice the sharp stones of the driveway under her feet, or the stinging nettles grabbing at her ankles as she shuffled along the path. A pair of starlings nesting in the roof swooped down at her, so close that the wind from their wings whipped at her face. The rooks chattered in the trees, clacking loudly a warning for all to hear. Maggie’s head spun.

  The tears streaming from Maggie’s eyes distorted the front door until its shape was a surrealist Dali image. The paint—long since stripped back with the strength of the salt in the air—was such a dull blue that even with her less than perfect vision the object nailed to the wood stood out like an angry blight. Maggie reached a shaking hand up, afraid to touch it but unable to stop. Wiping her eyes dry with the back of her other hand, Maggie could see it wasn’t a clump of straw at all, but a crudely twisted corn husk, tied into the faceless shape of a woman.

  A corn doll.

  “ORLA!” Maggie screamed as the all-consuming fear and horror sent her sobbing to her knees.

  Two

  Monday

  “So, can I go now?”

  Annie held in a sigh, trying to remain professional when all she really wanted to do was scream, You’ve only been here for five minutes and all you’ve done is tell me how unfair it is that you can’t go and score gear anymore!

  “Maybe let’s try setting some goals before you leave?” she said instead. “Then we can look back next week and see how far you’ve come.”

  “What? I have to come back?” The man looked perplexed. He picked at the skin around his thumbnail as his legs jittered up and down in the comfortable chair.

  Annie was used to it. Hardly anyone who came to see her wanted to come back again. She would probably take it personally if they weren’t sent directly from the probation service as part of the conditions of their bail.

  “How about we start with what you missed the most while you were inside? The things you felt you couldn’t do without. Maybe those can be your priority now you are out? Any family or friends? A sport to start or a new hobby to take up? Or something for your wellbeing; a haircut to plan, or a meal to prepare. It can be anything that you would find positive and easy to engage in,” Annie prompted, handing the young man a new notebook and a Bic biro from her stash.

  His cuticles were red raw, and his hands shook as he took hold of the stationery, eyeing it warily as though Annie had just offered him napalm. His grey tracksuit looked standard issue and Annie couldn’t help but notice old track marks on his arms when he had rolled up his sleeves. Nothing phased her anymore; after almost ten years working with probationers Annie had seen it all, and she was still only thirty-five.

  The young man exclaimed; his eyes lit up with an idea.

  “Well, there was this new skunk on the street just as I was lifted. I’d like to try some of that. I kept thinking about it when I was locked up. It sounded wicked, man.” He wiped his nose on the back of his hand and opened the notebook.

  Oh, dear God. She may have seen it all, and heard even more, but that didn’t make it easier when she was working against the tide.

  “How about we start with something legal?” she said, trying to keep the smile plastered on her face. “Something that won’t lead to you being recalled back to prison for breaking the conditions of your parole.”

  He started chewing the end of the pen, slurping it loudly. When he didn’t come up for air, Annie side-eyed the clock. It was coming up to the end of his thirty minutes, but she wasn’t going to stretch out this session to make up for his lack of engagement. He was still mulling over what was important to him that he couldn’t inject, smoke, or inhale, so Annie let her eyes wander, giving him the space to come up with some realistic goals.

  Outside, the sky looked heavy, like a wet dishcloth needing to be wrung out.
There would be thunder later, Annie was sure of it. The day had been too hot, too close, the pressure had felt thick around her skull since she’d rolled out of bed and started working. She shook the tension from her jaw and turned her attention back to the young probationer.

  “So, what do you think?”

  He shook his head at her.

  “Nope, I can’t think of anything. Can I go now?” he asked, bouncing to his feet and heading to the door.

  His time was almost up and Annie knew when she was fighting a losing battle. She stood up and held out her hand.

  “Homework then,” she said, as he bounced back to her and shook her offered hand, his fingers cold and damp. “Try and think of at least a couple of small goals you’d like to achieve while we’re working together. Probation states it will be at least twelve weeks, so we have plenty of time.”

  Annie walked towards the door of her small office and held it open for her newest client, shaking her head as he tried to hand back the soaking pen.

  “You keep it, you can use it to write up your homework.”

  The young man looked chuffed.

  “Thanks Miss O’Malley. See you around.”

  Annie shut the door behind him and lent her body against it, fighting the urge to slump to the floor. She was exhausted.

  The idea of being a private sector psychotherapist had been firmly fixed in her sights throughout her two years of postgraduate training. Annie had pictured herself in an academic office with shelves of books lining the walls; working with clients to achieve goals to make their lives more meaningful. A makeshift office above a pizza parlour on an old cobbled street in Norwich, taking parole clients from the inadequately paying government wasn’t quite that picture. Still, it was a good job and Annie enjoyed the variety of people who came through her door each day. They weren’t all young men troubled by illicit substances that Annie may or may not have sampled herself during her undergraduate university days, which already were a good fifteen years behind her.