Page 162 of Three Widows

‘Everything I’ve looked at so far,’ she said, ‘and what Kirby discovered, involves bereaved women signing over part of their estates to Tyler Keating’s company. Damien O’Loughlin was the solicitor in each case.’

‘And I’m sure Orla Keating was able to doctor the accounts,’ said Kirby.

‘Her name doesn’t appear on these files,’ Lottie said, ‘but we know Tyler was also an accountant. We can follow it up when we arrest the murderer.’

‘The file that led me to where Orla was being held contained a deed of transfer showing that Kathleen had signed the house over to this Widow Island.’

‘Okay. Let’s recap.’ Lottie paced. ‘Could Jennifer have found out what her husband was up to from something she overheard in the clinic? Or did she discover it when she took the files from Damien’s office?’

Boyd said, ‘Doesn’t matter how she made the discovery. The fact that all these dealings affected grieving widows must have inspired Éilis and Jennifer to form the Life After Loss group.’

‘Why allow Orla into the group,’ McKeown said, ‘if she was involved in the scheme?’

‘She mightn’t have been a willing participant in the fraud,’ Lottie said. ‘I think the widows’ group was set up to gain enough support and information to unmask the corrupt dealings.’

Kirby scratched his chin. ‘Maybe Orla joined them in order to help, after her husband disappeared.’

Lottie folded her arms in determination. ‘Or she wanted to keep an eye on what they were up to. The women who have been killed or physically abused this week may have been working towards exposing the fraud, but they then became targets of someone who didn’t want it to be exposed.’

Boyd agreed. ‘So who had so much to lose that they resorted to gruesome murder?’

Lottie was as bewildered as her team. ‘I can’t figure out why Frankie and Owen were murdered if that scenario is true.’

‘I don’t like it, but I think the killer has to be Helena McCaul,’ Lynch said. ‘She’s still unaccounted for, and it’s possible she had access to her mother’s old property, where Orla was found.’

Lottie said, ‘But if it’s her, why would she want to keep the fraud secret? It could even be her mother.’

Garda Lei entered with a sharp knock on the door. ‘Luke Bray is downstairs. He seems agitated. Asking for Detective Kirby. He wants to see those photos again.’

Kirby stood up and Lottie nodded for him to go.

‘You okay now, Garda Lei?’ she asked.

‘Right as rain, thanks. That house was such an awful bloodletting den. Those poor victims. How are you able to sleep after witnessing such horrors, Inspector?’

‘Not very well,’ Lottie said.

* * *

Luke Bray was dressed in his work clothes and sweat bubbled in pools around his eyebrow piercing.

‘I should have told you before but I was scared. After I thought about what happened to Amy, I phoned her in the hospital.’

‘Yeah, pull the other one,’ Kirby said. He tried to sneer but was too exhausted to get it right.

‘You can think what you like about me. I don’t care. I want to tell you who gave me the money to open the back door of Herbal Heaven.’

Kirby opened the folder of photos, updated with all the people of interest in the case. He laid them out on the desk.

‘Her.’ Luke pointed to one image as soon as it appeared.

Kirby leaned over and stared at it with surprise. ‘Are you sure?’

‘One hundred per cent. I know her.’

This was going to throw a spanner into the discussion they’d just had in the incident room. They’d been totally wrong.

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