Page 141 of Final Betrayal

Leo had knife wounds to his upper chest, but he was conscious, his phone in his hand. There was no sign of Katie or Chloe, and no evidence that they had been in the house.

Lottie’s phone rang.

‘What’s up, McKeown?’

‘I can’t locate Kirby anywhere. He’s not answering his phone.’

‘Did you try the pubs?’ Boyd said into Lottie’s ear, for McKeown’s benefit.

‘We’re on our way back into town,’ Lottie said. ‘Be there in five minutes.’

She hung up and walked quickly out of the house to the car.

‘Give me the keys,’ she said to Boyd. ‘I need to concentrate on something before I go out of my mind trying to figure out what Bernie was doing.’

‘I think it’s obvious. She wanted to wipe out all of her siblings.’

‘Okay, but I’m still alive, and so is Leo.’ She started the car as Boyd hauled his long legs into the passenger footwell.

‘But she might have thought Leo was dead. And you …’

‘She’s done something to Chloe and Katie. That’s how she wants me to suffer.’

She gunned the engine, and with gravel flying into the damp night air, she left Farranstown House with the body of her half-sister lying dead on a cold stone floor.

The office was abuzz with noise, heat and anxiety. No one had any idea where Kirby had got to. Lottie sat at his desk and flicked though the open documents on his computer, trying to find an answer.

‘What did the pharmacy staff say?’ she asked.

McKeown said, ‘Just that he called in looking to speak to Megan Price, and when he was told she was on her break, he left.’

‘Where does she go for her break?’

‘Sometimes she eats in town, other times she goes home.’

‘Did you get her number?’

‘Yes. Goes straight to voice message.’

‘Why haven’t you brought her in? Where does she live? Did you call to her home?’

McKeown sighed. ‘I haven’t called out there yet. This was on Kirby’s desk.’

Lottie took the photocopied page. It was from Penny Brogan’s appointment book. One name was highlighted in a yellow circle. Megan Price.

‘When I was in the pharmacy,’ McKeown said, ‘I had a look around too. I asked if Amy had a locker. An assistant, Trisha I think her name was, said Detective Kirby had asked about it early in the week, but he hadn’t looked in it.’

‘And you did?’ Lottie balled her hands into fists. She hoped Kirby hadn’t fucked up.

McKeown dropped an evidence bag of clothing on the desk. And then another, with a pink-covered notebook.

‘What’s that?’ Lottie pulled protective gloves from a drawer and dragged them over her sweaty hands. She took out the notebook and opened it to a page that had a corner turned down. ‘This is about the night Louise and Amy saw Conor Dowling. Amy says they came out of the teenage disco in Jomo’s and were waiting to be picked up when someone ran by them wearing a baseball cap. Louise said she recognised it as belonging to Conor Dowling, who worked as an apprentice for her father.’

‘Bill Thompson’s house is only a stone’s throw away from the nightclub, if you take the railway underpass by the canal,’ Boyd said.

‘But why was Dowling coming that way?’ That had always bothered Lottie. ‘If he had committed the crime, wouldn’t he have been running a million miles from town?’

‘I suppose so,’ Boyd agreed. ‘But in the heat of the moment, maybe he became disorientated and ran towards town instead of away.’

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