The Secret Place (Dublin Murder Squad, #5)(75)

Orla took one look at the Thérèse book and bit down on both lips, hard. Hiss of in-breath through her nose.

Conway said, ‘Do us a favour. Don’t try to tell us you don’t know what’s in there.’

Orla tried to shake her head and shrug and look innocent, all at once. It came out like some kind of spasm.

‘Orla. Pay attention. I’m not asking you if this was yours. I’m telling you we already know. You try to lie about it, all that’ll happen is you’ll get us pissed off and you’ll get Chris pissed off. You want to do that?’

Trapped between thick and terrified, Orla dived for the only way out she could see. ‘It’s Joanne’s!’

‘What is?’

‘The key. That was Joanne’s. It wasn’t mine.’

And bingo. Straight in there, our Orla, dobbing her mates in as quick as she could. The flare of Conway’s nose said she smelled it too. ‘Same difference. Yous robbed it out of the nurse’s office.’

‘No! Swear to God, we never stole anything.’

‘Then how’d you get it? You telling me the nurse gave it to you ’cause she couldn’t resist your pretty faces?’

Orla’s face lit up with that thin malice. ‘Julia Harte had it. Probably she stole it, or one of them did. We got a copy off her – Joanne got it, I mean. Not me.’

Not bingo. All eight of them in the frame for the card, now all eight in the frame for eyewitnesses. And all eight in the frame, opportunity clicking into place, for the killer.

Conway’s eyebrow was up. ‘Right. Joanne asked nicely, Julia said, “No problem, anything for you, darling.” Yeah? ’Cause you’re all best buddies?’

Orla shrugged. ‘I mean, I don’t know. I wasn’t there.’

I hadn’t been there either, but I knew. Blackmail: Joanne had spotted Julia on her way in or out, Share or we tell.

‘When was that?’

‘Like, forever ago.’

‘When’s forever?’

‘After Christmas – last Christmas. I haven’t even, ohmyGod, thought about it all year?’

‘How many times did you use it?’

Orla remembered she could get in trouble here. ‘I didn’t. I swear. I totally swear.’

‘You gonna keep swearing when we find your prints all over it?’

‘I got it out a few times, or put it back. But for Joanne, and Gemma. Not for me.’

‘You never snuck out? Not once?’

Orla went cagey. Ducked her head down.

‘Orla,’ Conway said, close above her. ‘You need me to explain again why keeping your mouth shut is a bad idea?’

Another flash of that fear. Orla said, ‘I mean, I went one time. All four of us went. We were meeting some guys from Colm’s out in the grounds, just for a laugh.’ And a can and a spliff and a snog. ‘But it was so scary out there. I mean, it was really dark; I hadn’t realised it would be that dark. And there were all these noises in the bushes, like animals – the guys kept saying they were rats, ew? And we’d have been expelled if we got caught. And the guys . . .’ A wiggle, uncomfortable. ‘I mean, they were weird, that night. Mean. They were, they kept . . .’

The guys had tried to push the girls. Drunk, maybe. Maybe not. No way to know how that had ended. Not our problem.

‘So no thank you, no way was I going again. And I never went out on my own.’

‘Joanne did, though. And Gemma.’

Orla sucked in her bottom lip and did the titter. That fear, forgotten, just like that: zapped away, the moment sex gossip came into the story. ‘Yeah. Only a few times.’

‘They were meeting guys. Who?’

Hunched-up shrug.

‘Chris? No, hang on—’ Conway’s finger going up, warning. ‘Remember: you don’t want to lie on this one.’

Promptly: ‘Uh-uh. Not Chris. And they would’ve said if it was.’

‘Was he there the night yous all went out?’

Head-shake.

I said, ‘Is that how you guys knew Selena and Chris were together, yeah? Saw them outside one night?’

Orla swayed forward towards me, wet-lipped smirk widening, loving her moment. ‘Gemma saw them. Right here in the grounds. They were, like, all over each other. She said, if she’d watched for another five minutes, they’d’ve been . . .’ Breathy snigger. ‘See? They were with each other. You guys were all “Oh, you’re just making it up.” Obviously we couldn’t tell you how we knew, but see? We totally did know.’

This was some kind of triumph, apparently. ‘Fair play to yous,’ I said.

Conway said, ‘When was this?’

Blank look. ‘Like, last spring? Maybe March or April? Before Chris . . . you know.’

My eye caught Conway’s for a second. ‘Yeah, we figured that much,’ she said. ‘Did yous tell anyone you’d seen them?’

‘We talked to Julia. We were like, “Em, excuse me, hello, that needs sorting out?”’

‘And? Did she sort it out?’

‘I guess.’

‘Why?’ I asked, all fascinated. ‘Why didn’t yous want Selena going out with Chris?’

Orla’s mouth popped open, popped shut. ‘Because. We just didn’t.’