No Safe Place(Detective Lottie Parker #4)(41)

‘I’ll get McMahon to organise a press release. He can make an appeal for information. We need to speak with witnesses from the Last Hurdle, where Elizabeth was Saturday night, and witnesses from the train.’

When she had allocated those jobs, she said, ‘I’ll call to the station again. We need to determine if she actually got off the train at Ragmullin.’

She eyed the team, all ready and eager except Kirby and Lynch.

‘You two look like corpses. Go home. Get two hours’ sleep, and then I want you both back here.’

She dished out more tasks and said, ‘Okay, you all have jobs. Let’s catch the bastard who buried this young woman alive.’



* * *



‘Donal, I know you’re in there. Open up.’

Keelan pressed the doorbell again. Peered in through the glass on the upper half of the door. No shadows. No movement. No sound. But his bicycle was parked up under the window and she knew he didn’t walk anywhere. Maybe he’d phoned for a taxi.

She turned away from the door and walked down the cracked pathway, avoiding the rambling weeds encroaching from the overgrown winter lawn. Glancing over her shoulder, she looked up at the two-storey terraced house that had been Cillian’s childhood home. It was the only house in the line of ten that remained inhabited. The rest were tumbling down around themselves, some with the roofs caved in and others with the bare branches of bushes growing up around the chimney stacks. Most of the windows were boarded up.

Maybe now that Maura was dead, Donal might move out. Ten years waiting for a ghost to appear while the walls crumbled around you was long enough. She would speak with Cillian about it tonight. Maybe he could get his father to see sense.

The rusted gate creaked shut behind her and she made her way under the railway bridge and back into town.

She didn’t see the curtain twitch.





Thirty-Three





Kirby smiled as Garda Gilly O’Donoghue walked towards him. He was standing in the covered smoking area at the rear of the station, which doubled as a bicycle rack. He hadn’t time to hide the cigar he was puffing.

‘Yuck. The smell of that,’ Gilly said, indicating the bin of cigarette butts.

‘Want one?’ Kirby offered.

‘No thanks. I knew I’d find you here.’

‘How so?’

‘Because I was sure you hadn’t fully given up smoking. Did you discover anything enlightening last night?’

‘Last night?’

‘You were working, so you said. You cancelled our date.’

‘Sorry, babe.’

‘Doesn’t suit you.’

‘What?’

‘The American twang. Even if you could do it correctly.’

‘Not making much of an impression this morning, am I?’

‘Try a little harder.’

‘How about this then?’ He reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and handed over an envelope, smiling as Gilly’s face lit up.

‘Hey, this is the play I wanted to see. You’re a star,’ she said.

‘It’s for tonight,’ he said.

‘Can’t wait. And we can go for a drink afterwards.’

Running his hand over his stubbled chin, Kirby shook his head. ‘We’ll see. I’m absolutely shattered.’

‘What are you doing here then, if you’ve been working nights?’

‘On my way home.’

‘I’m beginning to think you have another woman.’

‘You’re woman enough for me.’ He stubbed out the cigar and palmed the butt into his pocket. ‘How was your evening with that friend of yours?’

‘Mollie? She never turned up.’

‘That’s a bit Irish, isn’t it? Being stood up twice the one night.’ He grinned.

‘It’s not funny.’ Gilly raised her eyebrows, pocketed the tickets and went to move away.

‘Do I not get a good-morning kiss?’ Kirby said.

‘You won’t even get a goodnight kiss if you keep this up.’

‘Women!’ Kirby said to the empty space Gilly had left in the frosty air. He was debating relighting his cigar when Lynch rounded the side of the building.

‘We have a call,’ she said.

‘No we don’t. I need some shut-eye.’

‘We have to go to the traveller site. It’s urgent. Come on.’

‘Maybe our night-time ventures are paying off,’ Kirby said, and followed her to the car.



* * *



Sitting at her computer, Lottie clicked into her email.

‘What the hell?’ The message in her inbox was from a name she recognised. She blinked and opened a drawer. Had she taken a pill this morning? She couldn’t remember, but she found one anyway and gulped it down. If she wasn’t careful, she thought, she’d end up as bad as she’d been a year ago.

She was about to call in Boyd but thought that maybe this was too personal. Shit, it was personal. Her finger hovered over the mouse. What had prompted this communication? Read it and see, she told herself. With her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth, her legs jittering, her hand remained frozen in mid-air.

The door opened and Boyd put his head round.