No Safe Place(Detective Lottie Parker #4)(43)

‘I told your two monkeys out there.’

‘I need to hear it for myself. Did Paddy do this to you?’

A purple bruise had swelled on Bridie’s jaw, and dried blood had congealed in her long hair.

‘No, but those two don’t believe me.’ She moaned as she spoke, one hand rubbing her stomach.

The baby began to cry. Lottie thought of Louis, and her heart constricted. Bridie stuck a soother in the little boy’s mouth and rocked him close to her chest, wincing with the movement.

‘Tell me what happened. You know I’ll believe you.’ Lottie took her notebook and pen from her bag. ‘Do you want Boyd there to hold little Tommy while we talk?’

‘You must be joking. No one is taking my baby away.’

‘I was only trying to help,’ Lottie said. ‘You need to clean those wounds up before they get infected.’ She handed her notebook to Boyd, indicating with a nod of her head that he was to take notes.

‘Do you always talk like this?’ Bridie said. ‘First you want my story, then you want my child, and now you want me to wash.’

Smiling a little, Lottie nodded. ‘You’re right. I’m all over the place today. You do what makes you comfortable. When you’re ready, tell me what happened to cause those cuts and bruises.’

‘Well, it wasn’t Paddy, so you can get that notion right out of your head, Missus Detective.’

‘Okay. If it wasn’t Paddy, who was it? And where is Paddy?’

‘There you go again. Two questions.’

‘I’ll shut up and listen.’ Lottie set her mouth in a straight line and willed herself to keep it that way.

‘At last, a bit of silence.’ Bridie rocked Tommy slowly as the child’s eyes closed. ‘Paddy was here last night for a while. He came to bed but only stayed about an hour before he got up again and left. I don’t know where he is, so don’t ask me. Right?’

Lottie nodded.

Bridie went on to relate what had happened. Lottie wondered what had prompted the attack on a defenceless young woman with her baby in the room.

‘Can you describe your assailant?’

‘It was dark, but he was a big fucking monster.’

Lottie waited in silence as sobs broke from Bridie’s throat. She was afraid to utter a word in case the young woman refused to carry on talking.

‘Leather gloves. He was wearing dark leather gloves. Dressed all in black, now that I think of it. And before you ask, I didn’t see his face. Jesus, Paddy will go ballistic when he sees the state of me.’

‘Don’t worry. Detective Kirby will have a word with him.’

‘No one is to talk to Paddy. Not until I do.’

‘Have you contacted him?’

‘I tried his phone. He must be out of range or something.’ Bridie bit her lip as tears slid down her bruised face.

Lottie put out a tentative hand and patted the young woman’s knee. ‘You’re doing fine, Bridie,’ she said soothingly. ‘Can you remember anything else?’

‘That monster hammered the daylights out of me. Kicked me in the stomach. Hit my head with something hard. I could feel the blood flowing. And the pain. God in heaven, it was worse than when I was giving birth to Tommy. Well, maybe not worse. As bad as.’

‘Can you remember if he said anything?’

Sniffing now, Bridie said, ‘That was the worst thing. He grabbed my hair and twisted it, and said, “Stay away from the guards and the graveyard, if you don’t want to end up six feet under like the other one.” Oh God.’

Lottie glanced at Boyd. ‘What can you recall after he said that?’

‘I passed out. I woke up to Tommy screaming in his cot. And every inch of me screaming in pain along with him.’

‘Tommy wasn’t harmed, though?’

Bridie shook her head. ‘He’s okay.’ She stared into Lottie’s eyes, pleading, ‘What did he mean? Was it because I told you about the banshee? Something to do with that woman being murdered over there?’

Lottie thought for a moment. Was that the reason Bridie had been attacked? It seemed a little far-fetched. She decided to be honest. ‘I don’t know, but I’ll get the SOCOs in here to see if your assailant left behind any DNA.’

‘What’s a SOCO?’

‘Scene of crime officer.’

‘Like the CSI crowd on the telly?’

‘Something like that,’ Lottie said. She nodded at Boyd to make the call.

‘They better not leave a mess. It’s taken me two hours to wash the floor in the bedroom.’

‘You what?’ Boyd exclaimed before Lottie could stop him.

Tommy opened his mouth and the soother fell out. He began to roar.

‘Now see what you did.’ Bridie glared. ‘Of course I washed the floor. I couldn’t be walking around sticking to all that blood. And there’s someone coming to fix the door in a few minutes.’

‘Leave it for now,’ Lottie said. ‘Our people will have a look at it. And don’t worry, there’ll be a uniformed officer here to keep an eye on you until Paddy returns. Can I have his number?’

‘No, you can’t. I wouldn’t have said anything at all, only those two out there were hanging around here for the last few weeks and I knew they were pigs. She even gave me one of those card things with her number. I was going to say nothing to nobody, but sure I was so stressed, I rang her and told her everything before I realised what I was doing.’