Page 80 of Her Last Walk Home

‘Coffee, if you’re having one yourself,’ Boyd said.

‘Yes, coffee would be good.’ Lottie squeezed her fingers into her palms in an attempt to calm down. Collins was grating on her nerves. Maybe it was the money oozing out of the grey granite floor and the white quartz countertop or perhaps it was just the glorious heat beneath her boots.

When they were seated at the table by the glass wall, Lottie sipped her coffee, hoping it would be horrible. It was delicious. She glared at the industrial-sized coffee machine. She must be getting old if she was jealous of a fecking coffee machine.

‘So, you wanted to talk to me?’ Collins said expectantly.

‘You spoke a few days ago with our colleague, Detective Kirby. I wanted to follow up on that.’

‘John’s murder was such a tragedy. I still can’t believe it happened in one of my new houses. And in the very one his mother had purchased. She had intended to return to live in Ireland. Doubt she will now.’

‘Do you have any notion as to why John was murdered there?’

‘Is the location relevant?’

‘Mr Collins?—’

‘Please, call me Gordon.’

‘Gordon, three people have been murdered over the last few days and one of them was your employee. His mother told me he attended rehab last year. Now I find out it was a facility to which you make large donations.’ She was glad of McKeown’s hurried call supplying this information.

‘I make a lot of donations.’

‘Why do you donate to Cuan in Delvin?’

‘I just do.’ He gulped down his coffee.

‘I doubt you’re the type of person to stick a pin in a map and say, yep, today I’ll give two hundred K to Cuan.’

‘Okay.’ His body slumped a little. ‘Not many people know this, but I had an addiction problem in my twenties. Alcohol. I spent a few months in Cuan. It helped me enormously, even though back then it was a bit of a dive. When I can, I make a donation. It’s tax-deductible.’

That figures, Lottie thought. ‘Have you visited it in recent years?’

‘What has that got to do with anything?’

‘Answer the question.’

‘I don’t know what your point is, but yes, I visited it to present my annual donation, last February.’

‘Are you aware that this is where John Morgan was resident for a time?’

‘I suggested the facility when his mother asked me.’

‘You seem awfully pally with Mrs Morgan.’

‘Brenda is a business acquaintance. Nothing more.’

This was going round in circles. Lottie changed direction. ‘I’d like to show you photos of two women. One of them is deceased in the photo. Are you okay with that?’

‘Why do you want me to look at them?’ He seemed to catch Lottie’s cold stare and added, ‘Okay, show me.’

‘I want to know if you recognise either of them.’ She showed him Laura Nolan’s photo first.

He shook his head. ‘I don’t know her, but I did see her mentioned on the news. May she rest in peace.’

Lottie slid the second photo across the table, keeping her eyes firmly latched to Collins.

‘This is the girl we found dead this morning.’

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