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

by Patricia Gibney

being an amateur detective.

  you’re funny. do you know we found another body?

  i heard it on the news.

  do you know who it is?

  no. who?

  father angelotti.

  There was no reply for some time. But the application showed he was active. Then he replied.

  that’s terrible. i don’t understand.

  neither do i. can you see if anyone in rome knows why he was here?

  i’ll ask around. lottie?

  what?

  remember you asked if i could find out anything about st angela’s records?

  yes.

  i looked up our archive but there was nothing online. the records are in hard copy.

  where?

  normally records like this are archived by each diocese. but I cross-checked, thinking st angela’s might have been forwarded to the dublin archdiocese which is normal procedure.

  and?

  i talked to the archivist there. they had the records at one time. but he said that st angela’s records were transferred to rome.

  by who? why? that’s not normal, is it?

  not normal, no. I don’t know who requested the transfer and i’ve never come across this before but i’m going to find out what i can.

  when were they moved?

  don’t know that either. i’ll check.

  i hope you don’t get in trouble.

  i won’t. i hope i find something interesting.

  thank you.

  And i’ll try to find out if anyone knows anything about father angelotti.

  thank you, father joe.

  joe.

  okay. joe. goodnight.

  ciao, as the italians say.

  They both signed off.

  Rome. Lottie wondered what was going on. Why move St Angela’s records if that wasn’t normal procedure? She took an A4 notepad from Sean’s school bag and a pen. At the kitchen table she wrote down all she knew so far. None of it made sense. She looked at the names wondering if they were connected or if it were all a random mess.

  The front door opened and shut.

  ‘Where are you coming from at this hour of the night?’ Lottie asked as Katie sauntered into the kitchen, taking off her damp jacket.

  ‘What’s that?’ Katie asked, looking at the pages strewn on the table.

  ‘Work,’ Lottie said.

  ‘I figured that. Why have you Jason’s dad’s name written there?’

  ‘So, now I do know him?’ Lottie studied her eldest daughter. Her eyes, though rounded with thick black eyeliner, were clear.

  ‘Jason told me you called to his house this morning.’

  ‘Where were you?’

  ‘In his room. I had to stay there because there was some business meeting going on downstairs.’

  The little shit Jason had lied.

  ‘Who was at this meeting?’ asked Lottie.

  ‘How do I know? I was confined to barracks, as Dad used to say when he sent me to my room.’ Katie opened the fridge door and scanned its meagre contents. ‘Why were you there anyway?’

  ‘Because I want to get to the bottom of this weed thing. It’s serious, Katie.’

  ‘Mother! I’m not a child.’

  ‘You’re my child and I’m not going to have you dying in some doorway with a needle in your arm. And I can guarantee Jason Rickard will run a million miles from you when he loses interest.’

  ‘Whatever! I’m going to bed,’ she said, pulling the wrapper off a cheese string.

  ‘Did you eat today?’

  Katie waved the cheese from the fridge at her and hurried out of the room before Lottie could further admonish her.

  Sitting at the table, she mulled over Tom Rickard and who else might have been at the meeting. Why did he have to conduct business at his house? He had a perfectly grand office in the centre of town. Was something underhand being discussed?

  Gathering up the pages, she put them in her bag and sat on her armchair with her legs curled up. Closing her eyes, she fell into a fitful sleep and dreamt about black crows circling a bleeding statue of a woman with a blue nylon rope tight around her neck. One of the crows swooped low, stabbed its feathery body into a cot, before flying away with a squealing baby wedged in its beak.

  Lottie awoke suddenly, a cold sweat sending rivulets between her breasts.

  2nd January 1975

  Sally saw the boy sitting in the window as she followed the nun up the steps and through the door to the sound of the car leaving her behind.

  The hallway was cold and the floor threw up a wax-polish smell. Panic threatened to overwhelm her as the nun disappeared down a corridor. With her baby. A door banged and she followed the echo.

  A baby cried and she wondered if she would be able to recognise the sound of her own child and wasn’t at all sure that she could. She inched along, stepping on the wooden patterns until the floor changed to multi-coloured mosaics. She paused outside a door before turning the handle. Her knickers were sopping, the blood trickling down her legs staining her white knee-socks red. Her tiny breasts were sore and leaking. She wanted to curl up in her own bed and die.

  She twisted the handle and opened the door.

  Three rows of iron-barred cribs, five to a line and a baby in each. The nun stood in the centre of the room and turned, casting her arms wide. Sally wondered which cot held her baby. They looked like dolls. Little dolls in cages.

  ‘These are the devil’s work, children of sin, spawn of Satan,’ the nun snarled.

  Sally felt her knees buckle and blood ooze between her legs.

  The black robes swished towards her, smelling like the drawer in her dead granny’s wardrobe. Most of the nuns in her school wore shorter skirts and some even ventured to show a lock of hair. This one, shrouded in old-style robes with a stained white cotton apron tied at the waist, was tall and her transparent skin wore a washed-out threatening face.

  ‘Where is my baby?’ Sally asked, anxiously looking along a row of cots, straining to see behind the nun. All the babies were now quiet, some asleep, others awake – their little eyes pleading towards the cracked ceiling.

  ‘It is not yours any more,’ the nun said. ‘They all belong to the devil.’

  Sally gathered her strength and with fear fuelling her momentum, she pushed past the nun, ran to the end of the room and back. Tears blinded her. Frantically, she searched for her baby. But which one was hers?

  ‘Where’s my baby?’ she cried. ‘Tell me.’

  The room began to swirl. The stink of dirty nappies and sour milk clogged her nose. Babies began to wail, disturbed by her scream.

  As she hit the floor, she saw the blue and white statue at the end of the room. The Virgin Mary, a serpent wrapped around her swollen belly choking the life from the infant before it was even born.

  DAY SIX

  4th January 2015

  Forty-Nine

  The six a.m. conference was seriously in need of ‘the hair of the dog’.

  Superintendent Corrigan had a hangover. Boyd had a hangover. Kirby had a hangover. Lottie and Maria Lynch were caught in the crossfire.

  Once she had dragged herself from the kitchen armchair to bed, Lottie’s night had been filled with more nightmares. She’d woken up at five, drenched in sweat. She was glad of the early morning briefing, needing something to concentrate on, to banish the night terrors.

  Outlining the progress they’d made, she wished that today might see more success. And pigs might fly. She looked at Corrigan, dubiously.

  ‘I’m going to have a chat with Tom Rickard today,’ she said.

  ‘A chat?’ Corrigan bellowed, then winced and lowered his voice. ‘What kind of chat?’

  ‘I want to see what information I can discover about his development of St Angela’s. It’s all we have to go on. It might be a blind alley but we have to pursue it.’

  ‘Don’t go charging down any feckin’ alleys, like the proverbial bull in a china shop. He’s an acquaintance of mine. Talked with him las
t night, I did. Grand man. I don’t want him on the phone again, yelling about you harassing him. Especially not today.’ He stroked his bald head, increasing its sheen.

  ‘Of course.’ Lottie was in no mood for arguments either.

  The duty sergeant thrust his head around the door.

  ‘We hauled in a drunk last night. He’s awake now, shouting the place down. I think you need to hear him, Inspector.’

  ‘I’m in the middle of a case conference.’

  ‘He says he knew Susan Sullivan.’

  ‘Right,’ said Lottie, gathering up her papers. ‘Put him in an interview room and I’ll be there straight away.’

  ‘He’s a bit worse for wear,’ the sergeant warned.

  ‘Aren’t we all,’ said Kirby.

  Every pair of eyes in the room turned to him. Kirby dropped his head.

  ‘I’m on my way,’ said Lottie.

  The air reeked of soft rotting onions.

  Lottie’s stomach heaved and she attempted to stem the rise of bile. Boyd sat beside her and she knew he was itching to light a cigarette. She looked across the table at the drunk and checked his name on the charge sheet.

  Patrick O’Malley was a mess; his face was a map of pulsing pimples and he continuously licked, with a swollen tongue, cold sores on cracked lips. His quaking hands, sprouting long crooked nails stuffed with the remnants of whatever he’d eaten last, were sheathed in fingerless gloves. An old woollen coat, reminding Lottie of one her father had worn, hung over at least two faded hoodies. Here is a man, she thought, who wears his journey through life, not only on his clothes, but in his eyes.

  ‘Mr O’Malley,’ she said, ‘I appreciate you talking to us. You know your rights and we are recording this interview.’

  He averted his eyes, glanced longingly at the door, then lowered his head.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ she asked.

  He looked up slowly from under sticky eyelids and she realised his trembles were not only fuelled by alcohol – he was terrified of authority.

  ‘No, ma’am, Inspector,’ O’Malley said at last, his voice low and cracked. ‘I’ll be grand.’

  ‘If you’re sure?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘You had a bit of a rough night?’

  ‘Yeah, I did,’ he said, furtively looking around the small room.

  ‘Had a few of them myself, recently,’ Lottie said.

  O’Malley laughed hoarsely.

  Lottie decided he was now reasonably relaxed for her to find out what he’d been roaring about in the holding cell.

  ‘You mentioned to my colleagues that you knew Susan Sullivan. Is there something you want to tell me?’

  ‘You could say that,’ he said. ‘Then again, you might not.’

  Lottie swallowed a sigh, hoping this wasn't going to be one of those cryptic interviews, resulting from the ramblings of a drunken mind. She might puke all over him before they finished. She wondered how Boyd was coping, but dared not look at him.

  ‘Wasn’t I only lying in the doorway of Carey’s Electrical Shop, trying to keep warm, mind. It’s hard in this weather with only this old coat and a few bits of cardboard. But I suppose you wouldn't have to think about that, Inspector, would you?’

  Lottie shook her head.

  ‘Didn't think so. Fine woman like yourself. I’m sure you have a man to keep you warm at night.’ O’Malley chuckled, immediately curling up in a coughing fit. Yellow phlegm coated his lips.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Lottie looked around for tissues, found a box behind her and offered it to him. He pulled out a bunch and stuffed them deep into his pocket, without cleaning his mouth.

  ‘I’ll get you water,’ Boyd said and escaped to fetch it.

  ‘I’ve this cold, you see. Can't get rid of it.’ He paused while his lungs rattled loudly in his chest.

  Boyd returned with two plastic cups and handed one to O’Malley. He drank it in one thirsty gulp.

  ‘Here, have mine,’ Boyd said, sliding it over.

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ O’Malley said and lowered his head.

  ‘Go ahead, Mr O’Malley,’ Lottie said. ‘You have something to tell me.’

  ‘What was I saying?’

  He looked from Lottie to Boyd as if he were trying to remember where he was. Not only where he was in the conversation, but where he actually was in reality. Lottie fought to control her impatience.

  ‘You were outside Carey’s,’ she coaxed.

  ‘Having a drop of wine, before your lot hauled me in here. Minding me own business, I was. I wasn’t always a drunk or homeless, you know, like. Then again, maybe I was.’ He puckered up his face.

  Jesus, he’s going to cry. Lottie stole a glance at Boyd, but he was staring at a point on the wall above the man’s head.

  ‘You must be very busy with all these murders, Inspector. Don’t want to be wasting your time.’ He paused, allowing another fit of coughing to pass.

  I’ll choke him myself, thought Lottie, but she smiled warmly, easing the way for him to speak up.

  ‘I saw the news on the television in the shop window. The other night, you know, like. Couldn’t hear it, only saw the pictures. Her photograph was on it.’

  ‘Whose photograph?’ Lottie prompted.

  ‘I knew her.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Sally used to bring the soup round at night, to all of us sleeping rough. She was one of the few people who was nice to me.’

  He stopped talking, closed his eyes and lowered his head, his chin resting on his chest.

  Sally? Did he mean Susan? If so, delivering soup to the homeless was new information. Lottie wrote it down.

  ‘This soup kitchen? Tell me about it.’

  O’Malley choked up with a cough. After a moment, he said, ‘That’s all there’s to tell. She came with the old woman. Every night.’ Tears glistened at the corners of his yellowing eyes.

  ‘Who was this old woman?’

  O’Malley shrugged without a word.

  ‘So this Sally you’re talking about was Susan Sullivan,’ Lottie said.

  ‘Used to be called Sally, before she was Susan,’ O’Malley said. ‘I remembered her from back then, you see. The first night she brought me the soup, I looked up into her eyes. I saw that look in them.’ He scratched at the table with a dirty nail. ‘The fear. We all had it. When we were kids, not more than twelve years old. In St Angela’s.’

  Lottie locked eyes with Boyd. St Angela’s!

  2nd January 1975

  That evening he saw the girl at tea.

  The refectory was loud and smelly. She was sitting at a table with Sister Immaculata and two other boys. Patrick wanted to find out more about her so he bounded down between two rows of chairs and slid to a stop behind them.

  ‘Sit, Patrick. You make me nervous,’ said Sister Immaculata.

  He sat in noisily beside them.

  ‘This is Sally. She is staying here with us for a while. I want you to make her feel at home.’

  ‘I hate fucking home,’ Sally said, tears streaked dry on her cheeks.

  ‘Dear God in heaven, we do not allow such profanity. You will be punished. But first you must eat,’ said Sister Immaculata, picking up her fork with a bony hand.

  Patrick looked at his plate of scrambled eggs and the slice of bread with a hard, two-inch crust. Grabbing for his glass, he knocked it and the milk spilled out across his plate. It saturated the bread and watered the eggs into a runny soup.

  Sister Immaculata drew back her arm and hit him hard across the top of his head.

  Sally jumped.

  ‘You can have mine,’ she said. ‘I don’t like eggs.’ She pushed her plate towards him.

  ‘You stupid boy,’ the nun screamed.

  He smirked, insolence plastered on his face, his eyes twinkling devilment. He turned and smiled at Sally. She stared at him wide-eyed, open-mouthed.

  The nun hit him again.

  Sister Teresa hurried down between the tables. She took Patri
ck by the hand and dragged him away from Sister Immaculata’s tyranny.

  He kept looking behind him on the hurried trek from the crowded room, his eyes locked on Sally’s the whole way.

  ‘No one ever showed me much kindness before Sally arrived,’ O’Malley said. ‘She didn’t mix with the others, so me and her became friends. And then, all these years later, when she was giving out the soup, she used to have little chats with me.’ He tightened his cracked lips into a line. ‘I should say nothing.’

  ‘You can tell me,’ Lottie urged. ‘Please go on.’

  ‘I suppose I can. It won’t make much difference now the two of them are dead.’

  ‘What two? Who are you talking about?’

  ‘She told me she worked with James Brown. And now he’s dead too.’

  ‘Did you know him?’

  ‘Yeah. He used to be in St Angela’s with us.’

  Lottie stared at him, then turned to Boyd, who had quickly straightened up. This was good. The link between Susan and James that she’d been hankering after.

  ‘James Brown was in St Angela’s?’ she asked, incredulously.

  ‘Isn’t that what I’m after telling you.’

  ‘I didn’t know that.’ Lottie felt her jaw drop. She thought of the tattoo on the victims’ legs. ‘James and Susan had similar marks on the inside of their legs. Like a crude tattoo. Do you know anything about that?’

  O’Malley said nothing.

  ‘Was it something to do with St Angela’s?’

  ‘You could say that,’ he said, eventually.

  ‘What does it mean?’ Lottie pressed.

  ‘I don’t know.’ His face closed up.

  ‘Did they get the tattoos when they were in St Angela’s?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Lottie thought for a moment. ‘Do you have one?’

  O’Malley stared at her, as if he was deciding whether to tell her or not. He said, ‘I do, Inspector. I do.’

  ‘So what is it all about?’

  He licked his lips and shook his head. ‘Can’t remember.’

  He was lying but Lottie didn’t press it, afraid he might clam up totally. She wanted to hear more about St Angela’s.