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Tiredness was eating into her bones and every muscle felt like it was being gnawed by a rat. Lottie switched off the engine and got out of the car.

Shading her eyes from the watery early-morning sun with her hand, she looked around. The field to her left was awash with crows, as if a black blanket had been thrown across the waterlogged earth. She said hello to the couple of gardaí who had arrived before her.

Garda Lei was tying crime-scene tape to a tree protruding from the ditch. He turned round as she approached.

‘Oh, Inspector, you got here quickly. Another nightmare. I really don’t know what?—’

‘What have we got?’

‘Female. Deceased, God help her. It’s awful. Some people… What’s the world coming to at all?’

‘Garda Lei?’ She had to stop him or he would go off on so many tangents you’d need a map to get him back on track.

‘I believe she was murdered.’

‘What makes you reach that conclusion?

‘Bloodstained clothing. She may have been stabbed. Plus she was dumped in a field. No coat or shoes. Hardly natural causes, if you ask me. Not that I?—’

‘Who discovered the body?’

‘A farmer. He was herding cows into the field because he had to repair their barn. He’d already opened the gate when he noticed the bird activity. He was quick-thinking, to give him his due, kept the cows back while he went to investigate. Thought it might be a fox or badger ravaged by a dog but turned out to be much worse. That’s what he said when he phoned it in.’

She surveyed the adjoining field through squinting eyes. The birds seemed to be lying in wait for a second chance at the body. ‘I’ll have a look now, so.’

‘You’ll need wellingtons. Have you got any?’

‘No, but feck it, I have to see what we’re dealing with. Any missing person reports?’

‘Nothing new that I’ve heard, but I’ll check back at the station. SOCOs have been alerted. You might want to call the pathologist yourself, or will I do that?’

‘I’ll call her. Finish up with that tape and put up a secondary cordon, maybe halfway down the road. Do both ends when more reinforcements arrive. Only authorised personnel allowed entry. And keep an eye out for drones. We need a tent over her too.’

‘All in hand.’

She slipped a pair of protective gloves on over her cold fingers. The body wasn’t far from the edge of the ditch that lined the road. Similar to how Laura Nolan’s body had been left. But this location in the townland of Drinock was around five kilometres from the outskirts of Ragmullin. Fields all around, with the town on the horizon. Through the morning mist the town’s cathedral spires spiked the sky in the distance. If she was dealing with the same killer, did the choice of location mean something to him? And how did he transport the bodies? There were no tyre tracks in the wet grass beneath her feet.

The body was covered with a sheet of plastic.

‘Lei?’ she called over her shoulder. ‘Where did that plastic come from?’

‘Farmer had it in his jeep. He thought it might keep the birds away.’

‘Hmm.’ She hoped it hadn’t destroyed any potential evidence. But he was probably right to try and protect the body from further avian carnage.

She stopped before she reached it. The two uniforms who had been standing guard moved to one side to let her through. Noses blue with the cold, they tipped their caps. She nodded in solemn greeting.

It felt odd to be the first detective on the scene. She usually arrived to the hustle and bustle of activity from detectives and SOCOs. This morning, it was her private domain. She felt a fissure of distrust in her ability to remain professional as she lifted the plastic sheet from the deceased’s face.

The dead woman was unknown to her. Her face had a bluish-grey tinge. Not long dead, experience told her, but it could still be eight or nine hours. So young. Mid to late twenties, maybe, though in death it was difficult to judge age correctly.

She swallowed the bile that had risen from her stomach on seeing the evidence of the birds’ activity. Pecks in the skin, here and there. Eyelids shut, with no marks around them. She was grateful they had not got that far, and thankful for the farmer’s quick thinking in covering up the body. He had definitely done the right thing.

Biting her lip, she squinted at the dead woman’s hair. It was shorn short. Shorn was the only word she could think of to describe it. Ragged ends, odd lengths. Unwashed. She filed away these initial observations to return to later. She peeled down the plastic covering and gulped away her rising anger. Red-hot anger.

There appeared to be a single stab wound to the chest, just below the victim’s breast. The pathologist would tell her more, but there didn’t seem to be any other injuries on the painfully thin body. Unless they discovered more when she was turned over. Through the light material of her ripped and blood-soaked grey cotton shift dress, Lottie could see protruding ribs. She glanced at the woman’s hands, forcing herself not to take hold of one of them to comfort her. The bones of her thin wrists and elbows stuck out and her stomach was distended. Her legs were like two hawthorn sticks. Thin, dirty and bare, as were her feet.

‘What happened to you, pet?’ Lottie whispered. ‘Who did this to you?’ She was aware that she was referring to more than the knife wound that had ended the girl’s life.

Carefully she replaced the plastic sheeting, hoping the tent would arrive soon. She rose to her feet and scanned the surrounding terrain. She could make out a criss-cross of boot prints. The farmer’s and the initial gardaí who’d arrived on scene, she surmised. Were the killer’s prints there somewhere too? She didn’t notice any small prints like there had been at the site where Laura Nolan had been found. But SOCOs would check.

She allowed her thoughts to return to the face beneath the plastic. Eyes closed. Mouth slightly open. A spectre of pain and horror. What had the girl seen in the last moments of her life? What pain had she endured in the weeks or months prior to that? Lottie bit down on her lip again so that she wouldn’t cry. She was certain something awful had been done to the young woman in the time before her murder. She’d have to wait for the post-mortem, because she knew this body had a lot to say.