The Missing Ones: An absolutely gripping thriller with a jaw-dropping twist (Detective Lottie Parker Book 1)

by Patricia Gibney

  Lottie could see what Lynch had been talking about. Dirty dishes piled high in the sink; a pot with potatoes, half of them peeled, on the table; an open sliced pan; a jam-pot with a knife protruding from it and white mould circling the rim. A bowl, encrusted with the remains of porridge, sat in the midst of the mess. It was difficult to determine if the woman had just had breakfast or dinner. Maybe both together. The floor was dirty, crumbs and dust everywhere.

  ‘The sitting room is worse,’ Lynch said. ‘Have a look.’

  Lottie turned out of the kitchen, followed her colleague’s pointed finger and stood at the door.

  ‘Holy shit,’ she said.

  ‘Good God,’ Boyd said.

  ‘Agreed,’ Lynch said.

  There were hundreds of newspapers stacked in every conceivable space in the room. On the floor, the armchairs, the couch and on top of the television. Some were yellowing and others appeared to have been shredded by a mouse. The room was dust-covered. Lottie picked up a paper from the nearest bundle. December 29th. Sullivan had been working her way outwards. Lottie began counting the newspapers in her head.

  ‘Some mountain of rubbish in here,’ she said. ‘Must be at least a couple of years’ worth.’

  ‘This woman had serious issues,’ Lynch said, from behind her.

  Lottie shook her head.

  ‘I can’t marry this scene with the absolute tidiness of her office. It’s like she was two different people.’

  ‘You sure you got the right house?’ Boyd queried.

  Two sets of eyes glared at him.

  ‘Only asking,’ he said and slouched up the stairs, dipping his head beneath the low ceiling.

  ‘Keep looking,’ Lottie said to Lynch. ‘We need to locate her phone. It’ll give us her contacts and maybe information as to who wanted to kill her. I don’t see any sign of a laptop or computer.’

  ‘I’ll look for them. The SOCOs are almost done here.’ Detective Maria Lynch squeezed back into the crowded kitchen.

  Lottie followed Boyd upstairs. He was in the bathroom.

  ‘Pills for everything, from a pain in the arse to a pain in the elbow,’ he said.

  He sounded like her mother. She pushed him out of her way and peered into the medicine cabinet. Sullivan should have been on suicide watch, she thought, eyeing packets of Prozac, Xanax, Temazepam.

  ‘Looks like she wasn’t taking her medicine,’ she said, quelling the urge to pocket a few blisters of Xanax. Jesus, she could function for at least three months on this lot.

  ‘Because there’s so much still here?’ he asked.

  ‘Yeah. Oxycontin too.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Morphine,’ said Lottie, remembering her own medicine cabinet, before Adam died. She checked the prescription details, recording the pharmacy name in her phone to follow up later. She looked around the bathroom. It was filthy. She edged out past Boyd and entered the bedroom.

  ‘In here,’ she called.

  He joined her. ‘Incredible.’

  ‘What was going on in this woman’s head, in her life?’ Lottie asked.

  The bedroom was sparkling clean, sterile. Nothing out of place. The bed, dressed to army standards in pure white, clean linen. A dresser, naked of any cosmetics. Wooden floor, shining. That was it.

  ‘I can almost see myself in the floor,’ she said and opened the dressing table drawer. Everything was folded with military precision. She closed it again. Someone else’s job to desecrate the belongings of the dead. She wouldn’t do it. Not after Adam. ‘This woman was a contradiction.’

  ‘And she lived alone,’ Boyd said, checking the other bedroom.

  Lottie glanced over his shoulder. It was bare. Four white walls and a wooden floor. She shook her head in confusion. Susan Sullivan was definitely an enigma.

  Downstairs, she looked around again. Something didn’t gel. What was she was missing? She couldn’t quite draw her thoughts to a conclusion.

  She had to get out.

  Boyd joined her outside, a cigarette between his fingers.

  ‘Where to now?’ he asked, taking a deep pull on the cigarette. Lottie gladly inhaled the smoke and yawned.

  ‘I better go home and feed my kids.’

  ‘They’re teenagers and well able to look after themselves,’ he said. ‘You need to look after yourself.’

  A statement that did not require a reply. It was the truth.

  ‘I have to digest this case. I want to pull together the few facts we have, to see if I can make sense of it all. I need space.’

  ‘And you’ll get that at home?’

  ‘Don’t be smart.’

  She felt his closeness, not just bodily close, but in mind. Boyd unnerved her. Conversely, she would love to feel his arm around her in a comforting hug. In the same instant, she knew she would repel it. Welcome to the world of frosty Lottie Parker. Her mood just about matched the weather.

  ‘There’s nothing else we can do this evening. I’m going to walk. I’ll see you in the morning. Remember, team meeting at six a.m. Corrigan will be there, so don’t be late.’ Redundant words, she thought. Boyd was never late.

  She trudged along the icy footpaths towards home, alone.

  Six

  The Governor’s House, a nineteenth-century building adjoining the new council offices, had once been part of the old town jail. The fact that it had access to the new offices was unknown to the gardaí currently cordoning off the main building.

  In the depths of the house, dungeons had been preserved and were used as meeting rooms. Few staff ventured down there. Rumour had it that those awaiting death had spent their last hours within the walls; walls which reportedly pulsed with the breaths of condemned souls.

  The history of the building was not lost on the men gathered in one of the catacomb dungeons. They stood in a circle like condemned prisoners awaiting a stay of execution.

  ‘This afternoon a member of the planning department, Susan Sullivan, was killed in suspicious circumstances,’ the official said. ‘It is regrettable. Terrible actually. For us, it will be a tense time. The gardaí will more than likely go through her files line by line. You need to be aware that your names may come up in the course of their investigation and it’s likely you will be interviewed.’

  He paused, looking at the three men in front of him.

  ‘If our dealings become known, we could well be seen as murder suspects,’ he added.

  ‘At least her knowledge died with her,’ the developer said. ‘But the investigation will swing the spotlight on us.’

  The banker visibly shivered. If anything, the temperatures had dropped since they arrived in the dungeon. The evening darkness outside seemed to penetrate through the walls.

  ‘There’s still James Brown to think of,’ the banker said.

  ‘Without Sullivan, it’s just his word against ours,’ the official said. ‘However, you’re right. I think we need to prepare contingency plans in light of potential garda interviews. We must maintain the appearance of working individually. They might not stumble over what we are doing.’ He rubbed his hands together, trying to instil heat into his fingers.

  ‘Don’t be fooled,’ said the developer. ‘They are very shrewd and we’ll need to be more so. If it’s Detective Inspector Lottie Parker leading the investigation, I can guarantee we’ll need to be careful.’

  ‘Do you know her?’ asked the banker.

  ‘I’ve heard of her. She solved that traveller murder a few years ago. She was threatened and intimidated but carried on. And she got her man. She’ll be like a dog with a bone once she gets her teeth into this one.’

  The clergyman said nothing and the official knew this man’s calculating mind was internally analysing the situation.

  They huddled deeper into their wool coats, eyeing each other.

  ‘Gentlemen, there are millions of euro involved. We have to be very vigilant. And we can’t meet here again. Be careful.’ The official closed the meeting and opened the dungeon door. H
e glanced outside. A single light illuminated the deserted private car park.

  One by one, they left.

  Each of them now wary of the other.

  One of them could be a murderer.

  Seven

  James Brown parked his black Toyota Avensis in the courtyard outside his cottage, switched off the lights, took out the keys and, as the internal beam dimmed to darkness, he sat listening to the engine cool down.

  Normally he loved coming home after work, especially in springtime. Home to the serenity of the countryside, renewing his sense of wellbeing, with the sounds from the trees and glimpses of the meadows stretching untouched behind his small garden. It instilled in him a freedom he rarely felt elsewhere. Not now though. This evening he was sad and angry. Sad for Susan and angry at the rebuff he had suffered from the man on the phone. He’d contacted him to see what, if anything, he knew about Susan’s death. But as he’d begun to speak, the man had hung up on him. Maybe he’d been the wrong person to call, after all.

  He gripped the steering wheel with tight fists and banged his head against his hands. Susan was gone. He had to keep reminding himself. She’d rescued him from his demons all those years ago and now he had failed her.

  He didn’t want to leave the security of his car. He felt safe in it and he thought of the many times he and Susan had cradled each other as children, she whispering in his ear to be strong, to stand tall and proud, and he whimpering like a lost kitten in her arms. He thought of how Susan, as a child, had shown him how to make his bed to the standards dictated, how to fold his clothes and pick fluff from the floor so that it was pristine. He was convinced that she had subsequently developed a thing about clean bedrooms. Who could blame her? He thought of all they had witnessed and never spoken about, and he cried silent tears for her, for her memory and for her goodness to him. Now, he had to stand on his own two feet and be strong. For Susan if nothing else.

  At last, he willed himself out of the vehicle as the temperature dissolved to ice. Lifting his briefcase from the back seat he stepped on to the snow-blanketed courtyard and locked the car with a click. The old moon was getting ready for its new phase and its light appeared dimmer than he thought it should be.

  A shadow fell before him and he squinted upwards expecting to see a cloud sheathing the moon. But there was no cloud in the frosty starlit sky. A figure stood tall in front of him, a ski mask covering the face, two dark eyes visible.

  Jumping back against his car, James dropped his briefcase, then remembered his phone was inside it. Too late now.

  ‘What . . . what . . . do you want?’ His tongue tightened over his words, fear dripping down his face in droplets, along his nose, dribbling like snot. What could he do? He couldn’t think clearly.

  ‘You could not stop interfering,’ the man was saying, his voice a low, menacing drone.

  James swung his head from side to side wondering why he hadn’t noticed the car when he’d pulled up. He now glimpsed a metallic glint behind the oak tree to his right. Who was this man? How had he known he could shield his car over there?

  ‘What? Why?’ James whispered, scuffing his feet on the icy snow and staring up at the huge figure looming in front of him. The flashlight in the gloved hand blinded him.

  ‘You and your friend made nuisances of yourselves. Not for the first time.’

  ‘My friend?’ James asked, but he knew the man meant Susan.

  The man laughed, grabbed him by the elbow and propelled him along the path. James felt a suffocating ball gathering mucus in his throat and his breathing quickened as the sky clouded and snow began to fall in round thick lumps.

  ‘What do you want?’ James’ fear quickly turned to terror, his brain constricting like a snail into its shell. He had to think fast. He needed to get control of the situation. He could call out for help, if only his voice wasn’t lost somewhere deep in his chest. And he knew no one would hear him. There wasn’t another house within two miles of his cottage.

  Maybe he should make a run for it? No. His attacker was taller, broader and looked so much stronger, making James feel like an insect trapped in the jaws of a fly.

  Panic swelled and strapped itself squarely inside his chest, halting him after a couple of steps. He couldn’t continue. He felt like he was walking with only one shoe on. The man stopped too, pulling a length of rope from his pocket. That did it.

  James leapt forward, surprising the man, who lost the grip on his elbow and fell, the flashlight lodging in a clump of snow. Skidding toward the front door, James searched with one hand in his pocket for the key. Ice crunched behind him. He had the key in the door when an arm slithered around his neck, gripped tight, and he was pulled back against a solid chest.

  James fought, managing to loosen the hold on his neck, but an elbow crashed into the back of his skull. His head exploded with pain.

  ‘You should not have done that!’

  He thought he knew the voice, struggled to recognise it, but failed. He turned quickly and tried to run but felt the rope slipping around his neck, harsh nylon scraping his skin. This might be his last chance.

  He drew back his arm and connected with the man’s midriff but it bounced back. Pain shot through his elbow, up into his shoulder. The rope slackened and he collapsed to the ground. He turned over and scrambled to his knees. Run, he had to run. But he couldn’t get his feet under him. He shouted then. As loud as he could, from his terrified throat.

  ‘Help me. Help!’ His voice sounded like someone else’s echoing off the trees.

  The rope tugged tighter. He tried to dig his hands into the frozen earth. He tried to halt the pull. He tried to shout once more, but the rope was taut, biting into his skin, dangerously close to cutting off his air. What could he do? Talk, he thought. I have to get him talking. He ceased his resistance but the man tightened the rope.

  ‘Come,’ the man said.

  He steered James away from the cottage toward the oak tree with its branches casting demonic shapes on the whitewashed walls of the cottage. Beneath it, two wrought iron chairs, placed there for summer shade, looked out of place covered with mounds of snow.

  ‘What are you doing?’ James said, when the rope eased slightly.

  The man threw one end of it into the air, looping it around a branch midway up the crusted bark. James prayed for a cloud to blot out the moon, to darken the garden into total blackness. With his eyes accustomed to the dusky light, he could see too much now and his brain filled with irrational thoughts and flashing, unframed pictures. One was an image of his mother, whom he never remembered having seen in his life. I’m going to die, he thought. He’s going to kill me and I can do nothing. His whole body convulsed in an unending trembling. He needed Susan. She always knew what to do. The man pivoted round and James looked into the masked face, stared at the eyes waltzing a wicked dance to a silent tune and he recognised them. Eyes he could never forget; eyes he would always remember.

  ‘It was you . . . Susan . . . you . . .’ he said. ‘I know you. I remember . . .’

  James struggled weakly, attempting to pull away, but each movement collided with a further twist of the nylon. Now he was remembering. Too late? He tried to form words to delay the man.

  ‘The . . . night of the candles . . . the belt . . .’

  ‘You think you are clever. You were not always the smart one, were you? Back then, you had a girl to stand up for you. Not any more.’ The voice was so clear it could cut the ice into shards. The eyes ceased gyrating.

  James frantically tore at the rope, pulling and jerking, scrunching his fingers under it, his stomach heaving with the strain. He couldn’t breathe. He tried to wrench free. He kicked out with his legs, showering snow into the air. He had to survive. He had to get help. He had the rest of his life to live. In a desperate attempt to wrong-foot his opponent, he allowed his body to flop into a dead weight. How could the man heave him upwards then?

  ‘Stand on the chair,’ the man commanded, swiping away a mound of snow with on
e sweep of his hand.

  James stood still as if hypnotised, the rope furrowing a ridge into his neck, the man’s body heat overpowering his senses. He tasted saltiness at the back of his throat. Two arms encircled his body and lifted him on to one of the garden chairs. The furniture legs sank into the snow, wobbled, then settled. Before James could jump back down, the man hauled the rope further round the branch.

  The snow fell faster and thicker. James swayed as the man stood on the other chair and knotted the rope.

  ‘It would be a fitting destiny for you to swing from the apple tree, James, but its branches are not strong enough. This oak will do the job instead.’

  The rope was secure around the thick limb, midway up the bark. The falling snow darkened the moon but its thin light still cast a yellow ray over the courtyard. The laden branches trembled with the additional weight and James pleaded, moving his lips without sound.

  Before he could action further thoughts from his brain to his body, the man kicked over the chair and it settled into the snow-covered earth.

  As his chest ceased to inflate, his tongue protruded from purple lips, blood leaked dots on to the whites of his eyes and James saw the moon dance along the sky through a million white lights. He thought he could smell fresh apples as his body swayed in the windless air and his bowels opened. He heard the crunch of receding footsteps, before the white lights turned red, then black.

  A thick blizzard of snow tumbled earthwards. A sharp snowstorm of biblical proportions. The body paled. Merging into its white surroundings, it cooled in death.

  Eight

  Rap music blared as Lottie opened her front door. Why did she let her kids listen to this trash? Because they’d listen to it somewhere else if she tried to stop them. Anyway, she couldn’t monitor the hundreds of songs on their iPods and phones and online. Live and let live.

  ‘I’m home,’ she called over the din.

  No reply.