Page 42 of Final Betrayal

‘Who’s organising interviews?’ Lottie sat down again, facing him.

‘We need more staff, boss.’

‘I’m working on it.’ She made a mental note to follow up with McMahon.

‘I drew up a list. Penny was unemployed, but she did manicures and gel nails, whatever that is, based at her apartment. SOCOs are there now. She might have a customer list.’

‘I doubt her killer has gel nails,’ Lottie said, ‘but I’ll head there and have a look around. What else?’

‘Amy’s colleagues have to be interviewed again. I’ll do that myself.’ Kirby ticked an item on his list.

‘Good. Check your notes and cover anything you missed at the pharmacy last time.’

‘Will do.’

She caught a glance from the detective. ‘What?’

‘Were the victims sexually assaulted?’

‘No evidence to suggest it.’

‘That’s one small mercy in this brutal world we live in.’

She stood and squeezed his shoulder. ‘Keep at it, Kirby. Keep busy. It helps.’

Leaving him scouring a list of people who had to be interviewed, she went to find where Boyd had disappeared to. Anything to keep her mind off Leo Belfield and what he’d done.

TWENTY-TWO

Penny Brogan’s apartment was situated in a three-storey block on Columb Street, just down from the car dismantler’s yard and across from a coal depot. The road was black from the tyre tracks of trucks pulling in and out of the fuel yard. Lottie gazed over at the mounds of coal and briquettes, shielded beneath a struggling Perspex roof.

‘First floor,’ Boyd said.

‘I’m coming.’ She followed him into the small courtyard.

The garda technical van was positioned in front of the terrace of apartments. She entered through the open door. Two SOCOs were dusting and searching. She could do with ten minutes on her own in here, but they had their work to do too.

Boyd said, ‘It’s like a shoebox.’

‘You can talk. Yours isn’t much bigger.’

‘I suppose she was happy to have her own place, though I’d say it was tough trying to pay the rent in today’s economy, especially as she had no job.’

Lottie spied a small table in the corner of the room and made her way around a settee that she guessed doubled as a bed. On the table sat all the equipment needed to run a little black-market business in nail care. A wooden shelf held baskets filled with bottles of varnish, polish and cleansing products.

‘Penny must have worked on Amy’s nails.’ Lottie picked up a see-through container no bigger than a matchbox and shook it. The rhinestones glittered as they slid around.

She opened a drawer in the small bedside-type cabinet pushed beneath the table and drew out a black plastic-covered appointment book.

‘This might help us,’ she said.

‘It’ll give us a bigger headache,’ Boyd said, ‘leading to a ton of interviews and no doubt nothing of interest to our investigation.’

‘Ever the optimist,’ Lottie mumbled as she flicked through the pages with her gloved fingers. Nothing jumped out at her, so she bagged the book and glanced around.

A kitchenette was separated from the main room by a three-foot-long breakfast bar with two high stools. Upturned mugs and plates sat on the draining board. The sink was empty. She moved through a door to her right. A small bathroom; the walls and shower door were smeared with false tan.

‘Just like mine,’ she said.

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