Last Goodbye_An absolutely gripping murder mystery thriller

by Arlene Hunt

  Lillian Colgan lived in an ex-council house in Ballyfermot, a deeply close-knit community that had so far managed to avoid being fully gentrified. Roxy parked the car on the footpath and checked the address again. Yep, this was definitely it.

  The front gate creaked alarmingly when she opened it. She walked up a concrete path flanked by snowdrops and rang the doorbell. While she waited, she worked on her delivery. Cora was right, breaking bad news was never easy, and she had never been one for emotional scenes. Her ex-boyfriend had once told her she had all the empathy of a brick.

  A middle-aged woman opened the door, smoking a cigarette. Roxy barely recognised Lillian Colgan from Andrea’s graduation photo. Her hair was dyed a harsh, unforgiving red. She wore skin-tight jeans and an off-the-shoulder pink jumper. Her feet were bare, her toenails painted red to match her hair.

  Roxy removed her hat, tucked it under her arm and cleared her throat.

  ‘Lillian Colgan?’

  Lillian looked past Roxy to the street, then back to her.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Mrs Colgan, my name is Sergeant Malloy. May I come in?’

  ‘Why? What do you want?’

  ‘I think it would be better if we spoke inside.’

  Lillian jerked her head. Roxy followed her up a narrow hall and into a kitchen at the rear of the house. It was small and sunny, but the linoleum on the floor was cracked in places and some of the cupboard doors were askew. A well-stocked aquarium took pride of place between the kitchen and a breakfast nook.

  Lillian offered Roxy one of the only two kitchen chairs, pressed against the wall nearest the back door. Roxy sat, put her hat down on her knees and watched as Lillian ground out her cigarette, leaned back against the worktop and crossed her arms. She looked like a woman who could feel Damocles’ sword hovering above her neck.

  ‘I doubt you’re here for anything good, so out with it.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Colgan—’

  ‘I’m not married, you can call me Lillian.’

  ‘Lillian, I’m … I regret to inform you that …’ Roxy swallowed, feeling her heart hammering in her chest. ‘I regret to inform you that your daughter Andrea has—’

  Lillian’s legs folded under her. She slid down the cupboard to the floor, opened her mouth and screamed. The sound was so loud and so sudden, Roxy flinched and leaped to her feet.

  She heard footsteps overhead, and moments later an older woman wearing a black kimono burst into the kitchen.

  ‘What the hell!’

  She rushed to Lillian, dropped to the floor and put her arms around her.

  ‘Lillian, my God, what is it?’

  ‘Oh God, Justine, Justine …’

  The older woman looked up at Roxy, aghast.

  ‘What is it, what did you say to her?’

  ‘I … I was about to tell her that Andrea is—’

  ‘Shut up, you shut your mouth!’ Lillian cried. ‘Don’t say it, don’t you dare say that in my house.’

  Roxy picked up her hat. Oh God, this was worse than she could ever have imagined it would be. She tried to think: what would Cora do in this situation?

  ‘Lillian.’ The word came out wrong. She cleared her throat and started again. ‘Lillian, listen to me. I’m so sorry, I’m so very sorry, but your daughter Andrea is dead.’

  Lillian threw back her head and wailed.

  ‘Where is she?’ Justine wanted to know.

  ‘The city morgue.’

  ‘What happened? Did she have an accident?’

  Roxy dug her fingers into the fabric of her hat.

  ‘We believe it was an unlawful killing.’

  The colour drained from the older woman’s face.

  ‘My God, are you sure?’

  ‘Yes, but I need someone, next of kin, to make a formal identification.’

  ‘Can I do it?’

  ‘Are you family?’

  ‘No, but I know—’

  Lillian pushed the woman away.

  ‘No, no! Andrea is my daughter, she’s my child, I will do it.’

  ‘Sweetheart, I don’t think—’

  ‘Justine!’

  The older woman fell silent. Using the cupboard behind her as leverage, Lillian got unsteadily to her feet. She was no longer crying, and when she spoke, her voice was flat and drained.

  ‘Will you take me to her?’

  ‘Yes,’ Roxy said.

  ‘Give me a minute to get ready.’

  ‘Of course.’

  Lillian left the room. Roxy wanted to go outside, breathe some cold air, but Justine was trying to get to her feet too and needed a hand up.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, pushing her hair back from her face. ‘My God, this is so awful.’

  ‘Yes, it’s … a tragedy.’

  ‘She’s just a kid.’

  Roxy thought of the photo back in the bedroom.

  ‘Is Andrea’s father still in the picture?’

  It was as if she had slapped Justine across the face.

  ‘You mean Dominic doesn’t know yet?’

  ‘If you give me his number, I will be sure to contact him.’

  Justine left the room and returned moments later with her phone in her hand, wearing a pair of reading glasses. She thrust the phone at Roxy.

  ‘Here.’

  Roxy typed the number into her EN.

  ‘You need to call him right away,’ Justine said.

  ‘Would it not be best if he heard the news from family?’

  ‘Family?’ Justine looked as if she was torn between laughing and crying. ‘You don’t know, do you?’

  ‘Know what?’

  ‘Who Andrea’s father is.’

  Roxy shook her head, puzzled.

  ‘You’re lucky,’ Justine said bitterly. ‘How I wish I had the luxury.’ She shook her head and pointed at the number. ‘Call him. His name is Dominic Travers.’

  ‘You say that as though I should know him.’

  ‘Run his name,’ Justine said. ‘It won’t take you long to see the kind of man he is. Excuse me, I need to help Lillian.’

  While she waited, Roxy ran Dominic Travers’ name through the GSN database and was rewarded with an immediate hit.

  Andrea Colgan’s father was a career criminal – or rather he had been. His last case was fifteen years before. When Roxy tried to access it, she found the file heavily redacted; moments later an official warning report appeared saying the material she wished to retrieve was not available and that she should direct all further enquiry to the office of Superintendent Augustus O’Connor.

  Weird, Roxy thought, closing her EN.

  Chapter Nine

  Terry Peel’s legs were heavy as he climbed the metal steps to the cabin door. He’d rehearsed his lines on the drive over, but now that he was here he was filled with the overwhelming desire to turn round, get back into his car and drive, preferably somewhere far away, a remote island perhaps, another planet. In the yard below, men in hard hats scurried to and fro, oblivious to his pain.

  He envied their ignorance. He wondered how they would feel if they knew the news he carried that morning: would they feel sorry for him, resent him?

  Blame him?

  The rain had plastered what little hair he had to his head, but he let it be. Somehow he doubted his appearance mattered much in the grand scheme of things. With a last miserable sigh, he knocked on the door and heard a man’s voice bellow, ‘Come.’

  At least the cabin was warm, thanks to the small space heater in the corner pumping out hot air. His boss, Dominic Travers, sat behind a paper-strewn desk, working, always working. He had his jacket off and his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. Both arms were heavily tattooed, and the backs of his hands were cross-hatched with scars. When he looked up, his pale-grey eyes seemed to glitter in the harsh overhead light. Predator’s eyes, Terry thought, merciless.

  ‘Well?’

  Terry put his briefcase on the floor, removed a handkerchief from his inside pocket and dabbed at his foreh
ead with it. When he was done, he put it back in his pocket.

  ‘It’s not good news, I’m afraid.’

  It was true, he was afraid. He’d spent much of that morning traipsing around a muddy field trying to talk sense into a man who for the most part responded with grunts and then total silence. For Terry, a smooth talker and used to getting his own way, it had been a demoralising experience and a complete waste of time.

  Dominic Travers looked at him expectantly.

  ‘Don’t stand there like a tree; what did he say?’

  ‘He won’t sell the land. I did as you said and offered him twenty-five thousand over the previous offer, and he didn’t even bat an eyelid.’

  ‘So offer him another twenty.’

  ‘It won’t matter what I offer him. He’s dug in, Dominic.’

  ‘Then dig him out.’

  Terry spread his hands and tried to adopt what he hoped was a knowing yet exasperated expression. Dominic Travers didn’t understand the concept of ‘no’; for him, an obstacle was a minor hindrance and nothing more, something to be tackled and shunted aside. The notion that there were people out there who were equally stubborn never seemed to occur to him. Unfortunately, John Brown was one of those people.

  ‘He’s resolute.’

  ‘Bollocks. The old fuck is nearly seventy years old, Terry, eking out a living on scrubland; you’re really going to stand there and tell me you couldn’t convince him to sell?’

  ‘He said he was born on the land, he’ll die on the land.’

  Dominic snorted. ‘That can be fucking arranged.’

  Terry blinked. It was always difficult to tell with Dominic if he was being serious or not. These days his boss was to all intents and purposes a legitimate businessman, with considerable holdings and assets. But he had never fully shed his other skin, the skin of a man who it was rumoured had so many skeletons in his closet, literally as well as figuratively, he could raise an army of bone if he felt like it.

  Dominic pushed his chair back and walked to the window of the office, where he stood with his hands behind his back, looking down. Terry tracked his movement without turning his head. His boss was a big man, a shade under six feet five, broad-shouldered and powerfully built, yet he was as light on his feet as a dancer.

  ‘I tried to reason with him, Dominic.’

  ‘You tried,’ Dominic said softly, which for some reason was more terrifying than if he had yelled. ‘I have an entire crew ready to break ground, Terry, machinery, cranes, the works. You assured me you had this in hand.’

  ‘I did, I did have it in hand,’ Terry said, hating how squeaky his voice sounded.

  ‘My land is next to worthless without the acquisition. Brown’s shit-heap of a farm is slap bang in the middle of the development zone.’

  ‘It’s remarkable, really,’ Terry prattled on, his nerves getting the better of him. ‘I mean, like you say, he’s practically living in squalor. You’d think he’d jump at the chance to move.’

  ‘You know, for a smart man, sometimes you’re as dumb as a box of rocks.’

  Dumb or not, Terry had enough sense to stop talking. He was relieved when Dominic’s phone chirruped. He took it out from his pocket, checked the number and cut the call.

  ‘What he’s got there, livestock and the like? Sheep? Cattle? Pigs?’

  ‘Sheep, as far as I can tell; the land wouldn’t be great for grazing.’

  ‘Mm,’ Dominic mused. ‘It’s January, so likely those sheep will be full of lambs.’

  ‘Um, I imagine so.’

  ‘Who do we know has dogs?’

  ‘Dogs?’

  ‘Are you deaf, man? Dogs.’

  ‘I … What kind of dogs?’

  Dominic’s phone rang again. He swore, but this time he answered.

  ‘Whatever it is, I’m not—’ He stopped talking. Terry glanced his way, and wished he hadn’t. ‘Say that again.’

  He listened in silence. When the caller was finished talking, he hung up, grabbed his coat and left the office. Terry walked to the window. He saw Dominic get into his car, gun the engine and tear out of the yard, tyres spinning, spraying wet gravel behind them.

  Terry let out a long breath and leaned his forehead against the glass. He would rather fight a bear with his bare hands than be wherever the hell it was Dominic Travers was heading.

  Chapter Ten

  Eli Quinn and Miranda Lynn were standing in the street. There was a no-smoking policy operational in the station, and since brass frowned on officers hanging around outside like errant hoodlums, everyone who smoked did so across the street.

  Quinn offered a cigarette to Miranda, who shook her head. She was trying to quit and had managed to ration herself down to four a day. He lit his and blew a stream of smoke into the freezing air.

  ‘I suppose you saw the story in the paper this morning,’ he said after a moment.

  Miranda leaned back against the wall and crossed her legs at the ankles.

  ‘I read it, it’s trash.’

  ‘Trash or not, it’s going to put added pressure on us.’ He gave a bitter laugh. ‘Did you see what they’re calling the killer?’

  ‘The Sweetheart Killer, I saw it. Tabloids love a good nickname.’

  ‘Catchy. I’ve already had Gussy chewing my ear about it.’ Superintendent Augustus O’Connor was the station boss.

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘He wants to know why after a month we’re still no closer to discovering the killer or killers of Lorraine Dell and Sean Kilbride. He wants to know what we’ve been doing with our time.’

  ‘Are you serious?’ Miranda was angry on his behalf, and on behalf of the squad. They’d been working day and night on the double homicide; they’d spoken to neighbours, friends, colleagues, ex-lovers, ex-friends, casual friends, everyone and anyone who’d had a passing chat with the victims – and nothing. But it wasn’t from a lack of effort at their end.

  ‘Gussy should know better than to let the press push his buttons,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t think it’s the press. I get the feeling he’s getting it in the neck from higher up the food chain, trickle-down whip-cracking.’

  Miranda glanced at him. He looked tired and a little worn around the edges, his face full of new lines she hadn’t noticed before. People made assumptions about Quinn, based on little more than conjecture: they thought he was aloof, arrogant, a man who needed taking down a peg. Maybe there was a grain of truth to that, maybe. But she’d worked with him on and off for almost four years, and by now she knew how he ticked. She knew that failure cost him a great deal. He took it personally; he always did.

  ‘We’re going to have to go back to the start, Sergeant, go over the evidence with a fine-tooth comb: we’ve missed something and we need to bloody find it.’

  ‘You done, Inspector? It’s freezing out here.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Quinn pitched what remained of his cigarette into the street and they began to walk back across the road. As they reached the footpath, his phone bleeped in his pocket. He glanced at the screen.

  ‘That was Johnson. He wants to see us in the lab.’ He gave her a weak smile. ‘Who knows, maybe he has some good news for a change.’

  * * *

  The forensics department was housed in a square single-storey building directly behind the station house, accessed from the central courtyard. Johnson came bounding out to admin as soon as he heard Quinn and Miranda had arrived.

  He looked very excited, Miranda thought, like a skinny leopard seal wearing glasses.

  ‘What have you got?’ Quinn asked.

  ‘Follow me, my good man,’ Johnson said, pushing his glasses back up his nose. ‘Let me show you my goodies.’

  ‘I hate it when he pulls this cryptic shit,’ Miranda muttered as they followed him deep into the bowels of the unit. ‘Why can’t he answer a straight question like a normal person? Why all the hoopla?’

  Quinn flapped a hand at her to be quiet before Johnson heard her. The forensic scientist
was a little odd at times, but he was useful. Insulting him was foolish and no use to anyone.

  ‘Now,’ Johnson said, as he entered his office, ‘wait until you see what turned up this morning.’

  He unlocked the top drawer of his desk and handed a brown evidence envelope to Quinn. ‘They’re still detailing the video, but I thought you’d like to see a few stills I’ve pulled.’

  Quinn undid the flap and removed a number of photos, spreading them out on Johnson’s desk. Miranda leaned in, her shoulder slightly pressed against his.

  ‘Yellow roses,’ Quinn said.

  ‘That’s right,’ Johnson said. ‘Keep looking.’

  Quinn looked at another picture.

  ‘Champagne.’

  ‘Champagne and roses: where have we seen this before?’

  Quinn lowered the photo and looked directly at Johnson, who was grinning like the Cheshire cat. ‘Where did you get these?’

  ‘From a homicide in Dundrum.’

  ‘Tell me about the victim.’

  ‘She was young, pretty, blonde, in her twenties, not unlike Lorraine Dell.’

  ‘Do we have an ID on her?’

  ‘Andrea Colgan.’

  Miranda took the photo of the roses from Quinn, her brow furrowed as she read the date on the prints. ‘Whose case is this?’

  ‘I believe Morrissey is running lead at the moment.’

  ‘You believe?’

  ‘Well …’

  ‘Does he know we’re looking at these?’

  Johnson’s grin faded a little.

  ‘I doubt he’d object.’

  Miranda gave him a long, hard look.

  ‘This is not how we operate, Inspector. If this is Inspector Morrissey’s case, you should have run these by him first.’

  ‘It’s clearly the work of the same man you’re investigating.’

  But Miranda was not going to be fobbed off that easily.

  ‘Clearly? I only see one body here.’

  ‘Yes, but the—’

  ‘Was there a note found with the roses?’

  ‘We haven’t located one.’

  She tapped the photo of Andrea. ‘This woman has been violently assaulted.’

  ‘She’s wearing fancy underwear,’ Johnson said. ‘Look at the bathroom, see all those candles? They’re burned right down, exactly like at the Dell/Kilbride murder scene.’