Page 101 of The Guilty Girl
‘I’ll boil the kettle in case your mother wants tea.’
Upstairs, Sharon found her mam fast asleep on Jake’s bed, his jeans cradled in her arms the way you’d hold a baby. The gap in the floor where he’d hidden his secret was still there. Sharon wasn’t stupid. Whoever Jake was keeping the little bottles for might know he’d had them in the house. What would happen when they came looking for them? No matter how nice Martina was, there was no way she could save Sharon and her mother when the bad men knocked on the door. They probably wouldn’t even knock.
She had to find them first and tell them the guards took the stuff. Then she had an idea. She emptied her money box into a sweet bag. Dressing quickly, she crept down the stairs and out the front door, tugging it ever so softly so as not to alert pretty Martina.
Without a backward glance, she ran down the terrace and through the tunnel under the canal.
She had to stop them before someone else died.
* * *
When Boyd raised the blinds, letting in the morning sunshine, he noticed a man sitting at the tiny table outside the café across the street. He was drinking an espresso, gazing up at the apartment.
Boyd moved out of the direct light. Was there something familiar about the man? The way he slouched his shoulders? He wasn’t sure, but he was certain it wasn’t the first time he’d seen him.
Sergio was in his room, asleep. He’d be fine for a few minutes, wouldn’t he?
Making his decision, Boyd put on his shoes and a light sweater over his shirt. Then he slipped out of the apartment and crossed the road.
47
Lottie ran along the corridor hoping not to bump into Superintendent Farrell. In her office, she slipped off her jacket and shoved her bag under the desk. She photographed the vials before making arrangements for them to be entered as evidence and dispatched to the lab for forensic examination.
In the incident room, she greeted her team. She was glad McKeown had dropped his sly smirk. She had to concentrate on the case. Hopefully he saw it that way too.
‘Why had Jake Flood got vials of a drug hidden under the floorboards of his bedroom? If they turn out to be GHB, he had enough to knock out a busy nightclub.’ Lottie paced, scratching her head, trying to get a straight-line thought going.
‘I’ve got a lead on the young lads on the bikes.’ Garda Lei burst into the room. The door banged into the wall behind him. ‘Oh, sorry. Didn’t mean … You know, sorry, the door.’
‘What have you got?’ Lottie asked, hoping he’d soon learn to embrace composure.
‘I called into the bicycle shop on my way back here earlier. It’s down the road where Cormac O’Flaherty lives …’
‘Breathe, then tell us.’ Lottie wheeled over a chair, indicating for him to sit.
He took a few deep breaths as instructed, and continued.
‘Yeah, well, Mr Kenny, he fixes the bikes for our bicycle unit. You wouldn’t believe the amount of punctures … Not relevant. Sorry.’ He held up a hand in apology. ‘Anyway, I asked him if he ever repaired bikes for teenage lads. Lads that come in with their own money. And he says, are you asking about the youngsters going around who might be selling drugs? Well, you could blow me over with a …’
McKeown sniggered. Lottie glared at him. Garda Lei waved his notebook in the air.
‘Mr Kenny was suspicious of these lads, but never had proof of any wrongdoing to report them. I got the names and addresses, phone numbers too, of three members of the gang. He said he saw another one of them yesterday after you left Cormac O’Flaherty’s house.’
‘Great work,’ Lottie said. ‘I’ve to call to Albert and Mary McAllister, then see Hannah Byrne. She’s been discharged from hospital. When I get back, you can come with me to have a chat with the youngsters, Garda Lei. McKeown, I want everything you can find on that PE teacher, Noel Glennon. I need to know if there’s any truth in what Sarah Robson alleged, that he was stalking a girl in the school and if so, was that girl Ivy Jones? I need it yesterday.’
* * *
Noel Glennon hated Sundays, hated days he didn’t have to work or train. Work kept him busy. Training kept his mind occupied. It figured then that school holidays were the most boring time for him, especially this year. He hadn’t saved enough to travel, so he’d had to abandon his trip to Thailand. Here he was stuck in his apartment, and the one night he ventured out, a girl was murdered.
Sitting on the damp wooden patio chair, he lit a cigarette, with a second ready to light before the first one even hit the water in the ashtray. Bad for his health, but he didn’t give a damn any more.
Scrolling through his phone, he wondered if there’d been any arrests for Lucy’s murder. He read that a teenage girl was helping with enquiries. He knew that meant she was a suspect. Hopefully it wasn’t Ivy. She was liable to say anything – maybe everything. He couldn’t risk that happening.
He’d noticed Ivy’s intense jealousy a long time ago. Could she be the reason Lucy had developed scruples in place of her normal cocksure confidence?
He had all their numbers saved in his phone. It had been easy to find them on the school’s computerised register. His finger hovered over the one name that might have the answers. Could he? Was he really that stupid? He’d saved her number under ‘Vine’. A deadly vine of poisonous ivy. He grinned. Maybe he should have been an English teacher. The way things were turning out, he wouldn’t be any kind of a teacher much longer.
Before he could tap the number, he stopped. It was too dangerous to make the call. He lit a third cigarette, then scrolled through his contacts once more. Lucy’s number was under ‘Snapdragon’, a name for one who concealed things, a deceitful person. She’d epitomised deception and now she was dead.