Page 97 of Her Last Walk Home

‘Don’t care.’ He nuzzled deep into her throat, then tracked to her mouth.

She welcomed his lips on hers, but her eyes wandered towards the table. ‘This isn’t what I called you over for.’

‘Oh, and I thought you couldn’t live without me and wanted to tell me you’d agreed to buy a house in Pine Grove.’

‘I mentioned Pine Grove on the phone, but not for that reason.’ She filled him in on what she’d learned from Irene Dunbar, and her visit to Hill Point, then indicated the two brochures on the table. ‘There’s one for Cuan, which I can understand as Aneta worked there. But this one is for Pine Grove.’ She held it up. ‘Why would she have it?’

‘She might have got it from John Morgan while he was in Cuan, but I’ve really no idea. Was she intending to buy? Maybe she had money we don’t know about.’

‘I only discovered her identity this afternoon, so I’ve had no time to check anything.’

‘This is a long shot, but I wonder if she’s one of Plunkett’s escorts.’

Lottie shook her head. ‘I showed him her photo and he said no.’

‘When did you see him?’

‘Long story, and now isn’t the time for that conversation.’ She was too tired to go down that awkward road with him.

‘Okay so. Back to Pine Grove. Maybe she wanted to buy a house. I can check with Charlie tomorrow.’

‘Okay. Get gloves on, and we can go through the box together.’

They settled into the task, removing each item, shaking the pages to see if anything fell out, then scrutinising it. Most of the leaflets were in Polish, but there were some old tourist brochures too.

‘Had she a laptop?’ Boyd asked.

‘I don’t know. Unless it’s in the suitcase, but the caretaker didn’t mention one. Why?’

‘Because if she had, I’m sure she could have looked all this stuff up online.’

‘I wondered about that myself,’ Lottie said. ‘She could have used her phone, too, which we don’t have either. We’ll go through the suitcase when we finish with the box.’

‘This is all rubbish as far as I can see.’

‘But why did the caretaker keep it? I was thinking maybe someone else packed up her things. I’ll ring him in the morning.’

‘If someone else packed the box, why didn’t they take it?’

‘Maybe they found what they were after and left the rest hoping it would be destroyed.’ She thought for a moment. ‘There’s no sign of her passport. They might have taken that.’

With no more interesting discoveries in the box, they put it to one side. ‘I’ll get Garda Lei to read through everything tomorrow,’ Lottie said.

‘Good idea.’ Boyd hefted the red suitcase up on the table, and pulled back the rusted zipper. The case was packed with clothes. Simple and cheap. Like the stuff Lottie’s girls wore. It didn’t help the argument that Aneta might have had money.

‘Judging by these sizes, she was an awful lot thinner when she died.’ She held up a T-shirt. ‘Someone took that girl, held her and starved her for months.’

‘Doesn’t bear thinking about.’ He was going through a bundle of jeans, searching the pockets, turning them inside out. ‘Hold on a minute. There’s something here.’

‘What is it?’ Lottie dropped the clothes she was checking.

‘I don’t want to rip it.’ He slid the paper out of the jeans back pocket and laid it on the table. ‘A photograph. It’s like it went through the wash. It’s all faded.’

‘If it was washed, it would be in pieces. It’s just old.’ She touched the image. ‘It’s a group of teenagers, male and female, with two slightly older males either side of the group.’ Shecounted the heads. ‘And I think two women, one beside each man. Turn it over to see if it’s dated or has names. Careful.’

He turned it over. ‘Blank.’

‘They seem to be on the steps of a building. Do you recognise it?’

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