Page 135 of Final Betrayal

‘Just trying to read my handwriting here. Oh, yes. McGlynn thinks from the bone structure that the body might be of Asian origin. And it’s female. Just in his opinion, he said.’

Lottie tried to make sense of this. ‘I know you’re up to your proverbial, but could you do a quick search on the missing persons database? An Asian woman, missing for ten years.’

Leo Belfield checked the email when it pinged on his phone. Detective McKeown had sent him a new description of Bernie. He studied the image. He thought he had seen someone like that in the distance a few hours earlier. He leaned against the shopfront and scanned the street. It was busy. But he missed the noise and rush of New York. Once he had righted his wrong over losing his half-sister, he decided he no longer wanted anything to do with his heritage or Farranstown House. Lottie Parker was welcome to their fractured family history. But maybe he should take one more look out there.

Pushing himself away from the wall, he went to fetch his rental car. A drive into the countryside might just activate his detective’s brain into motion.

Kirby had been at Megan’s house yesterday, but now he remembered it from the Bill Thompson file. Megan still lived in her stepfather’s home. He’d had no reason to make the connection before.

As he stepped from the car, he lit a cigar and took a deep drag. Coughed out the smoke and looked around. Trees surrounded the old two-storey building. The lights from the canal walkway cast yellow shadows on the bare branches. He wondered how Louise and Amy had seen Conor Dowling in this area. And what were they doing out this way late at night? They’d only been fourteen years old at the time. He’d have to read their witness statements again.

The ground floor had a bay window, and a garage attached to the house. He noticed that the blue paint on the front door was cracked and peeling. Megan wasn’t keeping the place very well, he remarked to himself. Not that he could talk.

He rang the bell. Listened. Waited. Rang it again. He walked around to the back of the house and hammered on the door there. He heard a sound. Like a muffled yelp. Did Megan have a dog? He had no idea. Maybe he’d have been better off checking her Facebook page.

He put his ear to the door.

Silence.

Lighting his cigar again, he walked back round to his car. He took a pull, puffed out the smoke and stopped. Could something have happened to Megan on her break from work? Shit. He moved over to the garage. It was timber, double-doored. On one door there was a small silver handle with a Yale-type slit. He tried it. Not a budge. Nothing was that easy.

As he turned to leave, he heard the muffled sound once more. The front door opened and Megan stepped out.

‘What the hell are you doing here?’

Lottie wanted to be anywhere but in this house, oozing money and coldness.

She eyed Boyd, willing him to take the lead, but he was staring at the marble floor. Glassy-eyed, Belinda Gill poured herself a cup of water from a dispenser on her massive black fridge.

‘I know this is an awful shock. If there’s anything we can do, just let us know.’

‘I think you’ve done enough already. First you come to search my murdered daughter’s room, and then you arrive to tell me my husband is dead.’ She looked wildly around the mausoleum of a kitchen. ‘I need a proper drink.’

‘Sit down, Belinda. We need to talk to you.’

‘You’d better come through to the living room.’

Lottie and Boyd followed the woman and stood waiting as she poured herself a large brandy. They weren’t offered anything, though Lottie felt she could do with a drink to still the racing in her chest. So far she had resisted the urge to drown her anxiety in alcohol. She wasn’t sure how long that would last.

‘At least Cyril died doing something he loved.’

‘Pardon?’

‘His job. Louise first, work second. I didn’t even register.’

‘It was an accident, Mrs Gill,’ Boyd said.

‘Oh, for God’s sake, call me Belinda. I ceased being Mrs Gill a long time ago. Cyril was an entrepreneur in more things than building projects.’

‘I don’t follow,’ Boyd said, and Lottie caught his confused glance. She felt the same way.

‘Women,’ Belinda said. ‘He liked them all, except me.’

Lottie tried to get the conversation on track. ‘Do you recall any trouble he may have experienced with the project he was pioneering a decade ago?’

‘That pie-in-the-sky development that almost bankrupted him?’ She snorted. ‘Yes, I remember. Cost him a fortune buying up property before he even had a deal. Then Bill Thompson stuck his oar in and scuppered the whole thing.’

‘Really?’ Lottie hadn’t heard anything about that. She’d been aware that Thompson opposed the project, but that was all.

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