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‘Okay,’ she said. ‘I’ll have to tell Detective Sergeant Mooney about this, and I’m sure he’ll be sending out his forensic guys to sift through those ashes.’

‘You will do no such thing. I’m living a quiet life here. Minding my own business. I did nothing to nobody. Never have. Never will. Leave me alone.’

She heard it then. In his tone, in the quiver in his voice. ‘Who are you afraid of, Mickey?’

He stopped his seemingly mindless task and kept his back to her as he said, ‘You’d be best served to not ask too many questions. Questions get you into trouble.’

Mickey Fox was scared, not dangerous.

She was almost certain of that.

Almost.

30

Back at the house, Boyd told Lottie that Bryan was outside somewhere and Grace had gone to the village of Spiddal for a dress fitting. He was drinking a mug of tea with a sulky face. Oh-oh, she thought.

‘She’s a bit annoyed at you,’ he said as she filled her own mug with tepid tea from the pot.

‘Grace is? Why?’

‘She wanted you to see the dress or something.’

‘She never said.’

‘I think she expected you to go with her. That you were here to help her make final decisions. Or something like that.’

‘If she’d asked me, I’d have gone. I’m not a mind-reader.’

‘No, but you’re getting yourself involved in things that don’t concern you.’ Boyd was definitely not impressed with her. She wasn’t letting him get away with it.

‘Bryan asked me to find someone for him.’

‘He didn’t ask you to investigate a murder.’

‘I’m not investigating a murder,’ she said. ‘That’s Mooney’s case.’

‘Yes, and you met him yesterday and told him what you had to. So you’re done with it now.’

‘But he wanted me to make a formal statement. I refused. I’m sure he’ll contact me again.’

‘You do know this is the first time we’ve had a week away together in like for ever? I left Sergio with Amy so that we could enjoy ourselves without work. So tell me, where were you all morning? And don’t tell me you were shopping in the city.’

She hated lying to him, but she could do without another row. ‘I was going into the city, but you know what the traffic is like. I had to turn and come back.’

He sighed. ‘You’re deflecting from the truth. As usual.’

She sat opposite him, nursing her mug of tea. He was right, of course. ‘Okay, so I went to the convent. To see Mickey Fox, the gardener who worked for the nuns.’

‘Why would you even do that?’

‘Because he might have known this old girlfriend Bryan asked me to find.’ Shit, she hadn’t even asked the old man about her.

‘And did he know anything?’

‘He was busy burning stuff in an oil drum. I was trying to find out what it was, because it looked suspicious.’

‘Did you discover what was he burning?’