Her Secret Past (DI Jessie Blake #3) by Kerry Watts
Genre: Crime fiction, police procedural, thriller
Read: 25th March 2020
Purchase: Amazon
(publication date: 22nd January 2020)
★★★ 3 stars
I absolutely loved loved loved Kerry Watts' first two books in the wonderful Jessie Blake series, so of course I needed no persuading to read this one. But unfortunately I don't think it was as up to par as the first two. It was an OK read and upon reading other rave reviews on HER SECRET PAST, I found myself wondering if we'd been reading the same book. It certainly had promise...but this one just wasn't as thrilling as "Heartlands" or "Her Missing Child".
Alice Connor was just 14 years old when she and her 19 year old boyfriend David Law blugeoned her grandparents with hammers in their cottage on Boxing Day 1990. Because they told her that David was too old for her and she couldn't see him anymore. They were the only parents she'd known having brought her up after the death of her own when she was a baby. But sentiment played no part in the gruesome slaughter as Alice relished in the killings. And then she and David could be together forever.
But a neighbour heard the screams and called the police...who arrived just in time to see Alice covered in her grandparents' blood.
Thirty years later and with a new identity, Rachel is now living in a remote Perthshire town in Scotland. Her husband, wealthy businessman Kenny Ferguson, knows all about her past. Rachel knows all too well the crime she committed and not a day goes by that she doesn't remember and feel remorse. Due to her age at the time, it was alleged she had been groomed by the adult David and after spending six months in a young offenders home, she was given a new name and a foster placement...while David spent 25 years in prison for the murders.
Malcolm and Jean Angus are Rachel's elderly neighbours on a neighbouring farm. Recently there had been words exchanged regarding the use of a paddock Rachel had purchased from the Angus' to train her racehorses and a disagreement over the proposed application the Fergusons had filed with the council. And now, twenty nine years to the day after the Connor murders, someone has shot Malcolm and Jean Angus through the head.
DI Jessie Blake, accompanied by her partner DC Dylan Logan, is called to the brutal murder scene on Boxing Day. They are immediately bemused by the indifferent behaviour of the elderly couple's 21 year old grandson Gordon who is seated beside his dead grandfather enjoying a chicken sandwich seemingly without a care. Gordon's father Tommy, who called it in, is in the sitting room in shock.
After questioning Tommy, Jessie and Dylan learn about the couple's recent dispute with Rachel and Kenny over the land, so they set off for the neighbouring farmhouse to question the couple. But nothing prepared them for the confession Rachel makes...which immediately makes her the prime suspect.
But then money is withdrawn from the dead couple's bank account. So who had access to their money? Rachel surely didn't need the money - her husband is wealthy enough - so who else could it have been? But when evidence at the murder scene is identified as belonging to Rachel, Jessie has no alternative but to arrest her for the murders. Rachel swears her innocence but the evidence is damning.
Not only is the case taking its toll but Jessie's abusive ex-husband Dan is back on the scene, as we have seen in the first two books, but this time he is in plain sight and not hiding in the shadows. Jessie is sure he is up to something but she doesn't know what so she endeavours to keep herself on her toes...and to expect the unexpected. What she didn't expect was for Dan to have a new girlfriend, Hayley, who co-incidentally works with Jessie's boyfriend forensic pathologist Benito Capello in Edinburgh. She has to wonder, is there something in that? And while Hayley means nothing to her Jessie feels she must warn the young woman about Dan...for she feels sure that history is only going to repeat itself. Men like Dan don't change...and it's only a matter of time before Hayley ends up in a hospital room, having "tripped and fallen".
But Dan is not the only person watching Jessie. It seems she has come to the attention of someone with murderous intentions and one night with Ben back in Edinburgh, Jessie answers the door to an unexpected visitor...and finds herself fighting for her life.
Told in dual timelines beginning in 1990 with a series of flashbacks and the present day's investigation, HER SECRET PAST is quite a complex, convoluted tale that carefully weaves the past and the present. And as the secrets begin to unravel, we are left wondering exactly what role everyone had in the bigger picture.
There were twists and reveals that you may or may not see coming. I figured one of them out rather early in the story but was disappointed to see that it didn't play a bigger part. The other twists, though, I never saw coming. And I certainly never guessed till just before it was revealed who the villain actually was.
What I did love in HER SECRET PAST is what I love to see in every book - short snappy chapters! They keep the pace moving quickly and the tension palpable.
I really love Jessie. She is a detective with heart and not your stereotypical copper that grumps and ends every night with a bottle of prosecco. But after three books, I would have thought we would have more insight as to what is going on with her ex-husband Dan. In all three books he has been clearly stalking her, more secretly in the first two though still with some stealth in this one, it doesn't seem to have gone anywhere. He is still just there and we still don't know to what purpose. I thought by now there should be something more happening there.
I also love Dylan. He has just become a father again and things at home are a little tense as they tend to be with new babies. I would like to see a little more of Dylan and his personal life maybe somehow connected to a future investigation. Something to spice things up while we learn a little more about him in the process. He still seems a bit tight-lipped on his personal life no matter how often Jessie has offered her ear.
Although HER SECRET PAST is the third in the series, it cane be read as a standalone as with the previous two. There is an underlying theme regarding Dan but readers won't miss out on anything as all he seems to be doing is stalking Jessie and keeping track of her in each book. Plus, any backstory information is given to readers to keep them appraised.
While I didn't enjoy HER SECRET PAST as much as the first two books in the series, it is still an OK read. I will still be coming back for more with the next book in the hope it is more on a part with the previous ones. And I would still recommend it to fans of the crime fiction genre.
Bring on book four! I cannot wait!
I would like to thank #KerryWatts, #NetGalley and #Bookouture for an ARC of #HerSecretPast in exchange for an honest review.
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