Page 43 of Three Widows

‘Did she have an alibi for all five days?’

‘She worked from home. She was there all week.’

‘How did you check that?’

‘Jesus, you’re like a dog with a bone.’

‘Humour me.’

‘Gary looked at her computer. Her phone. We talked to the neighbours. She went nowhere further than Tesco that week.’

‘I think you should review the case all the same.’

‘Why?’

‘I find it odd that the very day we find a murdered woman, Orla Keating wants an update on her husband who disappeared a year ago.’

‘It was an accidental meeting.’

‘Maybe she had something to do with Jennifer’s murder. What if her missing husband is still alive and was involved with the murder too?’

‘That’s the weirdest theory I’ve ever come across.’

‘I think you need to come up with a new vocabulary.’

‘Feck off, Boyd, and let me think.’ He took his cigar out of his shirt pocket and twirled it between his fingers, dead ash fluttering to his desk, before returning it to its safe place.

‘I’m calling out to her to have a word. Want to accompany me?’

‘If you don’t mind, I’ll pass.’ Kirby lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘I have a… I mean, I have to meet someone this evening and need to finish up stuff here first.’

‘Don’t let the boss hear you.’ Boyd thumped him good-naturedly on the back.

‘What am I not supposed to hear?’ Lottie walked into the office.

‘Nothing,’ they said simultaneously.

Boyd added, ‘I’m about to go talk to Orla Keating. She’s a member of that widows’ group and she was in Fallon’s last night.’

‘The woman whose husband disappeared last year?’

‘Yeah.’

‘I’ll go with you. By the way, Kirby, you need to find middle ground with McKeown. He’s staying for the foreseeable and I need a motivated team, not one with you all at loggerheads every time I turn my back. Got it?’

‘Sure, boss.’

‘What about the information I asked you to find about the site where Jennifer O’Loughlin’s body was discovered?’

‘I started it, then I got sidetracked. I’m on it now.’

‘You better be.’

‘Boss, what time do you think we can knock off this evening?’

‘Got somewhere important to be, have you?’

‘Well, not exactly, but—’