Page 32 of The Dead Come to Stay

and cast her eyes over the pub room, as though seeing something else. “If he hadn’t got in trouble, I imagine we’d have run

off together somewhere, the three of us. Maybe even made a go of things. At least till the next time he got himself in trouble

and needed to bug out.”

MacAdams had been writing it all down, which is probably why he caught the slip.

“Three of you,” he said. For a moment, Tula said nothing at all, her face as hard and bright as jasper.

“There might have been three of us. But I was on my own, all of a sudden, and no father coming back. So.” Her face relaxed again. “Plenty

of water under that bridge; I choose not to regret it. Anyhow, I’ve all I wanted and more in life. And Rhyan—or Ronan or whate’er

he called himself—is right where he was headed all along.”

MacAdams managed to break the tip of his pencil, embedding lead in the page.

“To a ditch?” he asked.

Tula leaned over, full lips parted and eyes half-closed.

“I’ve a motive now, I expect,” she said.

She did, and it gave Ben a motive, too, for that matter. Did he think they were suspects? No. Did he need to know their movements

the night of the murder? Hell yes.

“Statement. Both of you. And you know what I’ll need—”

“To eliminate us from your enquiries,” Tula finished for him. “You’ll have ’em. But just remember, James, I needn’t have told

you. And without me, you’d never know.” She gave him a wink after that, a touch triumphant because utterly true.

Green let out a long, low whistle. “Fuck me,” she said.

“Quite.”

“What are we to do with all that?”

“Find previous on Rhyan Flannery,” MacAdams said, reaching for his buzzing phone. “And see if our man Foley was preparing

to cut and run again. MacAdams here.”

He was in for a shock.

“It’s the Abington Arms,” said the voice on the line. “Your mystery woman just turned up... and then disappeared just as

quickly.”

“Right, Green, call in Uniform; Foley’s woman has turned up—” He’d headed back toward the car but Arianna’s voice cut into

the phone line.

“That’s not all ,” she said. “She came here to pick something up.”

***

Arianna was waiting for them, arms crossed over her green blazer. As it turned out, the Abington Arms provided lockers to

their esteemed returning guests. The idea, said Arianna, was to provide regulars with “convenience.” It was hard for MacAdams

not to see the potential implications for less-legal activity. Like storing stolen art.

“Why didn’t you say this before?” Green asked, despite promising to mostly stay mum. Arianna chose to answer MacAdams instead.

“I didn’t know she’d left anything. I’m not the coat check.” She led the way to a large room in the back, possibly a sort

of livery service at some point. The tall units were large enough to hang several large coats—even a small wardrobe.

“How many of your guests get this sort of special treatment?” MacAdams asked.

“It’s technically available to everyone, if they ask,” Arianna told him.

Green stepped ever so slightly between them. “That wasn’t the question, though, was it?”

“Five,” Arianna barked. “You can see that for yourself.” She swept a long arm toward the lockers, five of which had been bolted

shut. Then she continued to address MacAdams exclusively. “I was at the desk when she arrived.”

“Tell me everything she said from beginning to end,” MacAdams said.

“Not difficult; she didn’t say anything. Just presented me with a ticket for number twelve.” Arianna held up the key. “I asked

her name. She wouldn’t speak. So I told her to wait and came to call you. When I returned, she’d gone. I sent the bell hop

running out after, and the security guard, too.”

“But she didn’t get what she wanted?” MacAdams said, nodding. “Well done. She might be back.”

“Not if all the hotel staff are chasing around town for her, and us here in marked cars,” Green suggested. And it was a fair point. He drummed his fingers against the locker.

“All right. Arianna, let’s see what’s inside.”

“It’s a private client’s locker.”

“Yes, and you called the police because you know it’s a murder investigation—do you want us to wait for a search warrant?”

MacAdams asked.

Beside him, Green smiled toothily. “We’ll be sure to search the whole hotel,” she said. “Your boss Evans should like that.”

Arianna narrowed her eyes. “Look. I have to resist or I wouldn’t be doing my job—and I like my job. But yes, you can have

the bloody key. I don’t even know what’s in there.”

MacAdams took it from her. A twist in the lock and the door sprung open.

Inside was a pale pink gown of silk, a fitted jacket in white and a dappled scarf of pink and red and blue.

“And... shoes again,” Green said. She pulled a glove from one pocket and used it to pick up a pair of wedge heels. “I’m

no expert. Are these as fancy as Foley’s?”

“Those are J’Adior pumps from DIOR,” Arianna said.

“Expensive?” MacAdams asked.

“Oh yes,” she said. “What’s that?” Arianna pointed to a white envelope near the bottom. MacAdams borrowed Green’s glove and

lifted it out. That, it turned out, was fifteen hundred pounds in cash... and a necklace.

“Well, well, boss. I think I know what the earrings were for,” Green said, indicating the chain. The pendant displayed the

same open design, like a little golden basket of delicate filigree. MacAdams watched its half-moon shape, studded with rubies,

glint in the light. Then he turned back to Arianna.

“In fact, we will get a search warrant. I want to see inside each of these. And I want the names of who uses them,” he said.

Arianna pointed a painted nail at the bills poking out from the envelope.

“It’s not the first client we’ve had who likes to keep cash,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“Perhaps not. But this is a Syrian artifact,” MacAdams said of the pendant. “And I want to know who else keeps antiquities in their lockups.”

“What are you talking about?” Arianna demanded, but MacAdams wasn’t finished.

“You saw this woman, on more than one occasion. Today, you have seen her up close. I’m calling in a sketch artist and I want

you to give them every detail. Understood?” Perhaps it was his tone, or the urgency with which he ordered the sketch artist

over the phone, but Arianna seemed to be having a crisis of faith.

“Is she dangerous? Is she the murderer?” She flashed a look at Green. “I thought you left Newcastle to get away from this sort of mess.”

Green’s face remained impassable. “Is that why you left?” she asked.

Arianna dropped her gaze. “I left for a promotion in hospitality—”

“In Abington. How convenient.”

“I went where there was work ,” Arianna snapped back.

Green tilted her head, as if to recapture direct eye contact.

“I guess that makes two of us,” she said, voice flat, placid, yet also white-hot.

MacAdams cleared his throat. “Lock it back up until forensics gets here. They’ll bag it for the station. And you have my number

if the woman returns.” He put one hand very loosely against Green’s clavicle and steered her toward the door. She went without

remonstrance, but the tension didn’t lift until they were back outside.

“Before you say anything, she and I were never, ever an item,” she said.

“I wouldn’t dare suggest it.”

“Good.” She seethed a moment, then took a long breath. “What do we do next?”

“Repeat the procedure,” MacAdams said. “Foley’s image turned up Tula. We’ll get a composite image and post it here and in

Newcastle. Did you notice anything about what’s in the locker?”

“Bit fancy for Abington.”

“Fancy like Foley’s last outfit. Minus the bespoke shoes.” MacAdams headed to the car, already rearranging the incident board

in his head.

***

Gridley had already opened all the available windows, but the room remained hot and humid, with rain misting through the open

panes.

“I think we’ve a desk fan someplace,” she said, poking through the read cupboard. MacAdams was already performing his zoo-tiger

stride at the front of the room, divested of coat, jacket, tie, and in his shirtsleeves. The middle of the board had been

cleared, and he just waited for the others to take their places.

“Gridley, Andrews, spill the details.”

“Yes sir,” Andrews said, waving his coffee mug. “First, phone records. We went after all the numbers we could find, and every

one of them’s a burner. End to end it doesn’t help us much, or wouldn’t have, until we picked up Benny. One of the burners

was his .”

“Right,” Gridley said, sitting on the edge of his desk. “Official proof he’s connected to Her Majesty’s Young Offenders. These

phones were being activated and deactivated over a few days. Kids got their directions off ’em, marching orders, and sometimes

warnings.”

“As far as the numbers Foley called that weren’t burners: the hotel, the offices at Hammersmith—”

“Presumably coworker Trisha Simmons?” Gridley interrupted.

“And Burnhope. But get this, he wasn’t calling Burnhope’s mobile. He called his house ,” Andrews finished. “An honest to God landline.”

MacAdams turned to face Green.

He knew what they were both thinking. Clandestine phone calls with Ms. Ava?

Green sucked her teeth. “It’s damn well starting to look like an affair, isn’t it? Especially since Burnhope claimed he never

let business and home intersect.”

“Hang on to the Ava-and-Ronan idea for a minute and let us give you the authentic Rhyan Flannery ,” Gridley said, going back to her own desk and swiveling her chair to face the monitor. “Ronan Foley appears after 1998,

no form—but old Rhyan had plenty . As a lad, he was caught housebreaking. Brought up on charges for pickpocketing, too. There’s a hint that he may have been

questioned about a series of robberies later tied to a gang called the Belfast Seven. Then he’s clean for a few years, no

convictions.”

“But not because he wasn’t doing dirty work,” Andrews said. “North-Irish police had been tracking him, figured he might lead

them to bigger fish.”