‘Here’s a fiver, Tobes,’ Max said. ‘Run down to the corner shop and get me a chicken fillet roll. Don’t be long. This hangover isn’t going to cure itself. Go on, move your arse.’
Toby grabbed the money, glad to have a reason to flee the increasingly confined atmosphere of the house. He knew there was a word to describe that feeling. Something-phobia. He couldn’t think of it.
But Mikey would have known.
Mikey knew everything.
Lottie wasn’t sure how much longer she could do this kind of work. Breaking bad news to distraught families.
The Shanleys lived in a four-bed house on Greenway Road. All the houses were individual in style but similar in status. They exuded their worth. The Shanleys’ lawn was so neatly trimmed she thought it might be AstroTurf. Two silver-coloured saloon cars stood in the driveway. Sensible yet cool.
Inside, the easy feel continued until Lottie, followed by Boyd, entered the crowded living room. Everyone froze before she even opened her mouth. Instantly, she knew which of them was the boy’s mother. With a wail, Sheila Shanley crumpled into an armchair.
‘Can we have a word with Mr and Mrs Shanley, please?’ Lottie said.
A silent procession of visitors exited the room and out the front door. Victor Shanley stood, hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, steeling himself for what was ahead. His chest strained beneath the buttons of his short-sleeved blue shirt. Gym freak, Lottie concluded.
‘We’re trying to organise searches. You know. In the fields, by the canal. Anywhere really …’ Victor stood awkwardly by his wife’s chair.
Good God, Lottie thought. I hate this. She was about to shatter the tenuous hope of this family.
‘I’m afraid—’ she began, but before she could finish her sentence, Sheila sobbed loudly into the arm of the chair.
Boyd made to go and comfort her, but Victor instantly folded his body over hers. She was like a bird with an injured wing in his arms.
He stared up at Lottie, eyes deep and dark.
‘Spit it out,’ he said. ‘Don’t prolong our agony.’
‘I’m so sorry to have to tell you this, but a short while ago we found the body of a young boy by the shore of Ladystown Lake.’
‘It can’t be our Kev.’ Sheila raised her head, wild mane of hair flying outwards, eyes lined with day-old mascara. ‘He can’t swim. He wouldn’t go near the lake. How would he get out there? This is bullshit. He’s off playing football somewhere. You have it wrong. All wrong.’
Boyd stepped forward. ‘I’m afraid the photograph you provided Garda O’Donoghue with matches the description of the body.’
‘Get out.’ Victor stood up and took a step forward. ‘I don’t want to hear any more shite out of you.’
Lottie noticed Boyd moving towards the door, but she sat down on the chair nearest to her. She wasn’t budging.
‘I know this is painful for you both, but I have to ask some questions.’
‘Another time. Not now.’ Victor’s hard-man act instantly disintegrated. ‘Please, can you just leave us alone?’
‘We can’t. Not yet. You see, the body of another boy was discovered yesterday and we need to find out if there is anything connecting the two deaths.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Sheila raised her head. ‘I thought you said this boy … the one you think is my Kevin … that he drowned.’
‘He was found at the lake all right. But we don’t think he drowned. We have reason to believe his death is suspicious.’
‘That other boy … I heard about him on the news. He was murdered, wasn’t he?’ Victor said.
‘We believe so,’ Boyd replied.
‘It’s not confirmed as yet,’ Lottie said, looking at him with a dagger stare.
‘But how … I don’t understand.’ Victor slumped down beside his wife. They clung to each other in disbelief.
Lottie leaned forward. ‘When you reported Kevin missing, where did you think he had been?’
‘He was out playing football. He never came home.’
‘I know you called the station during the night, but you only reported him officially missing this morning. Why wait?’
‘I thought he’d come home.’
‘Did you have an argument?’ Lottie caught the look passing between husband and wife. ‘You had a row with Kevin and he ran off? Is that it?’
Sheila nodded.
‘Has this happened before?’
Victor spoke up. ‘A few times. Kevin’s changed. Over the last year.’
‘His mood has deteriorated since the school holidays began,’ Sheila said. ‘He’s more withdrawn. In his room a lot. Not playing sports. I suppose I nagged him, the way a mother does, you know. The weather’s been too nice to be stuck inside all the time.’
Lottie thought of Sean and his gaming. His only outlet had been hurling, and when he did go out to fish, he found a body. Life was too shit at times.
‘Did you speak to his teachers about his behaviour?’
‘I was called up to the school on a few occasions. Kev had been in a couple of rows. So unlike him.’
‘I need a list of his friends,’ Lottie said. ‘Had he any new friends? Someone you might not have approved of, maybe?’
Sheila thought for a moment. ‘No. If anything, he lost the few he had. He didn’t even go to the soccer final on Sunday. I hope he still gets a medal. It might cheer him up.’
Lottie winced at the continued denial in Sheila’s voice.
‘Was Kevin on the same team as Mikey Driscoll?’
‘He used to go to all the training sessions but over the last number of months he stopped, and on Sunday he refused to go to the match to support the team.’
‘Did you ask why?’
‘He was belligerent. Said it was none of my business. Can you believe that? From an eleven-year-old?’
‘Did you punish him?’ Maybe this was the reason for the boy being out at night.
‘No, we did not,’ Victor butted in. ‘Sport is recreation, not compulsory. If my boy didn’t want to play, he had a very good reason.’
‘What reason?’ Lottie persisted.
‘I don’t know. But what has that to do with the boy you found dead at the clubhouse?’
‘Probably nothing. Just that Kev and Mikey played for the same team.’ She caught another look passing between the Shanleys. ‘Did you know Mikey Driscoll or his mum?’
Sheila dropped her head and began to sob again. Victor shook his quickly. ‘I can’t see what this has to do with anything. Can I see my boy?’
Lottie decided to let her question hang in the air. She would ask the difficult ones later. But she had a feeling there was a connection between the Shanleys and the Driscolls, apart from school and the soccer team. Whatever it might be, she would find out soon enough.
‘Can I have a look in Kevin’s room?’
‘Why? What are you looking for?’ Victor said. ‘Kev wasn’t into drugs if that’s what you’re thinking. He’s just a kid.’
‘I need to have a look,’ Lottie said softly but firmly.
‘You’d better not touch anything.’
‘Does he have a phone? I might need to check his contacts.’
‘I confiscated it a month ago,’ Sheila said. ‘Punishment for … Well, he stayed out half the night then too. But that time he came home.’
‘He’s only eleven. Were you concerned at his actions?’
‘Like we told you,’ Victor said, ‘he had become difficult to manage.’
Lottie let it go. They were too upset. ‘I would like to see his phone, though.’
Sheila said, ‘He only used it for streaming music.’
‘I’d like to check it all the same. And his computer.’
‘His computer is up in his room,’ Victor said.
‘I’ll head up there, then.’
‘My son is gone.’ Sheila buried her face in a tissue.
Lottie stood.
‘I’ll show you up.’ Victor headed for t
he door.
‘Stay with your wife. She needs you.’
He relented, his muscular arms hanging uselessly by his sides, his short fair hair damp with perspiration. ‘Second on the left, beside the bathroom.’
Sheila’s voice followed Lottie as she took off after Boyd.
‘All I have left of my Kev is up in that room.’
* * *
A Liverpool FC duvet on the boy’s single bed and a poster of the team on the wall told Lottie of his love of the sport. A bag was flung in the bottom of the wardrobe. She went through it and found football boots, an empty water bottle, a towel and a green kit which she had learned was the colour of the Munbally team.
Boyd was looking through the contents of the desk in the far corner.
‘Big room,’ Lottie said. ‘Find anything?’
His long fingers nudged the mouse and an action game, paused in motion, filled the screen.
She looked over his shoulder. ‘Sean has that game. It’s online. We might be able to find out who Kevin interacted with.’
‘I’ll get our tech crew to have a look,’ Boyd said.
‘Remind me to ask Sheila for his phone again.’
‘Eleven-year-olds with phones.’ Boyd shook his head.
Lottie got down on her knees and scanned under the bed. One sock curled up in a ball, inside out, and plenty of dust. She flicked back the duvet and found the other sock. She smiled sadly and opened a drawer in the chest beside the bed.
‘He was neat and tidy. For a boy. My Sean has his stuff littered from one end of the room to the other.’ The three drawers held the boy’s underwear, T-shirts and jogging pants. No white football shorts to be seen.
She went back to the wardrobe. Kevin’s old school uniform hung beside his brand-new one. For the school he would never get to attend. She feathered her gloved fingers over it and tried to distance herself from the human side of what she was dealing with.
‘You found nothing incriminating then?’ Victor stood at the door.
‘We are only trying to get a sense of your son,’ Lottie said, unable to hide the defensiveness in her voice. ‘Where is his school bag?’
Victor shrugged. ‘Might be in the utility room. Haven’t seen it since the holidays started. Sheila was going to buy his new books this week.’
‘Can I have a look?’ Lottie sidestepped past the boy’s father and walked down the stairs.
In the utility room, she noticed the stack of bottles lined up along the wall. She had counted fourteen before Victor bulldozed in front of her.
‘This is his bag.’ He took down a red rucksack from a hook on the wall. ‘Here, have a look. You won’t find any drugs.’
‘Mr Shanley,’ Lottie sighed. ‘I’m not looking for drugs. I’m trying to find a reason why someone would want to harm your son. And I want to discover who that might have been.’
‘I know, I know.’ He rubbed his face and pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and finger. ‘His mother … Sheila … she didn’t get Kevin. They were always rowing. But she loves him. Loved him.’
Lottie saw that he was staring at the line of bottles. ‘Did you have a party recently?’
‘I’ve been meaning to go to the bottle bank. Busy at work.’
He hadn’t answered the question.
‘Where do you work?’
He must have misheard her, Lottie thought, when he answered, ‘Sweat-It-Out gym.’
‘No, I wasn’t asking where you work out. I meant where do you work?’
‘That’s where I work. I’m a personal trainer.’
Lottie raised an eyebrow towards Boyd standing at the door. Victor worked at the same gym as Mikey’s mum. ‘So you do know Jen Driscoll?’
‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ The broad shoulders appeared to shrink in contradiction to his defiant question.
‘I asked you earlier if you knew Mikey and his mum, and you denied it.’
‘I didn’t deny it. I just didn’t say anything.’
True. ‘Have you been round to the Driscolls’ since yesterday?’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
‘I didn’t hear about Mikey until this morning.’
‘Right.’ Lottie didn’t believe that for a second.
‘Do you think they could be connected?’
‘What?’
‘Their … deaths. Mikey and Kevin?’
‘I don’t know. But I know this, Mr Shanley. I will be back to take a formal statement from you and your wife.’
‘What for?’
‘I believe you’re withholding something. Think long and hard about this. I will find out who killed Kevin, so you better decide to ditch the lies and half-truths.’
Without another word, Lottie grabbed Kevin’s school bag and walked out with Boyd, leaving Victor mouthing like a goldfish.
On her way to the front door, she glanced in at Sheila, huddled like a lost child in the armchair. Hair shrouding her face, shoulders heaving with her weeping.
‘Our scene-of-crime officers will be here soon. They’ll need to check the house. And I’m sending round a family liaison officer to stay with you for a few days. Get some rest. You’ll need it.’
Victor opened the front door. Lottie stepped out into the welcome fresh air and blinding sunlight. She hadn’t realised how dark it was inside the house.
‘You’ll need this,’ Victor said. She took the small black iPhone from him. ‘It’s Kevin’s. But he hasn’t had it for the last month.’
‘Why was it confiscated? What did he do to warrant that?’
‘Like we told you already, he stayed out half the night.’
‘What happened?’
‘I can’t rightly remember. And it doesn’t matter now, does it? He’s never coming back. Our Kev is gone forever.’
Lottie made her way to the car. Boyd opened the boot for her. She put Kevin’s phone into an evidence bag and the rucksack into a larger paper bag. She placed both in the boot and slammed it shut. SOCOs could take the computer. Sooner rather than later.
With one last look at the smart lawn and Victor standing at the door, she shook her head and sat into the car, a hundred more questions for the Shanleys running through her head. What the hell was she missing here?
Thirty-Five
Sean Parker leaned back in Barry’s leather gaming chair while his friend sat on a cushion on the floor. He had to admit, it felt a bit weird after all that had happened yesterday. They had a controller each and were playing FIFA. He’d rather be in his own room, but there was no space for the two of them at his gran’s. The sooner they moved into the new house the better. Before he was done for murdering one or both of his sisters.
‘It’s unbearable,’ he said.
‘I’d like a sister,’ Barry said.
‘No you would not. Not like mine, anyway. They’re always fighting. If it’s not over make-up, it’s over jeans or shoes. They never stop. Even baby Louis is getting fed up with it.’
‘How do you know how a baby feels?’ Barry said. ‘Goal!’
‘Shite, I wasn’t watching my defender.’ Sean gritted his teeth and tried to concentrate on the game. The screen must be sixty inches. It took up most of the wall. Lucky prick, he thought, envying all the luxury that Barry had. When they moved house, he was bagging the biggest room.
‘Goal!’ Barry screamed again.
‘Ah, shit. Can we start again?’
The door opened.
‘Hi, Mrs Duffy,’ Sean said.
‘You know you can call me Julia,’ she said. ‘What’s all the noise about?’
‘Sorry, Mrs Duffy … I mean Julia. We’re playing FIFA.’
‘And I’m beating ten shades of shite out of him.’
‘Barry! Language, please.’
‘Sorry, Mum.’
‘I have lemonade and biscuits for you in the sun room. Whenever you’re ready.’
She left silently.
Lemonade? Sun room? Sean wondered if they would ha
ve a sun room in the new house. Somehow he doubted it.
‘Feck the lemonade,’ Barry said. ‘Let’s find somewhere to kick a real ball around.’
Bertie Harris was small and overweight, his appearance belying the fact that he was the under-twelves’ assistant coach, as well as being caretaker, bar manager and jack-of-all-trades.
‘Hard to get anyone to volunteer nowadays,’ he said, unlocking the door.
Kirby followed him into the clubhouse. ‘But you’re paid, aren’t you?’ He reckoned Harris was aged anything from thirty to fifty years old. He cast a downward glance at his own rotund waist and wondered if Gilly saw him in the same way. He realised the other man was talking.
‘Minimum wage. Better than nothing, I suppose.’
‘What was on here, on Sunday night?’
‘The boys’ match finished around seven thirty, quarter to eight at the latest. It was nearly eight thirty by the time the last of the stragglers left. Then it was party time. Twenty-first birthday. Local girl. Natalie or Naomi or something fancy like that. Big crowd. Cheap booze. You know the score.’
‘Did you go to McDonald’s for the after-match grub?’
‘I did. Went down to show my face but was back here by nine.’
‘What time did the birthday party finish up?’
‘One. Got everyone cleared out by one thirty.’
‘And what time did you leave?’
‘Locked the door at quarter to two and was home in my bed by two.’
‘Can that be verified by anyone?’
Two beady eyes scrutinised Kirby. He didn’t flinch. Bertie looked away first.
‘Nah. Not really. Unless one of the nosy neighbours heard my car pull up. I live on my own.’
‘Have you cleaned up the place yet?’ Kirby found his feet sticking to the floor as he walked.
‘Of course I have. I was in at eight yesterday morning and wasn’t home till one. Just need to do the floors.’
‘And you didn’t notice anything unusual outside?’
Harris turned his head slightly. ‘Like the boy’s body? No, I did not see that. I was in here all the time. Parked out front, just like you.’
‘You hadn’t to use the bins? The recycling?’ Surely he would at least have had to put the empties out, Kirby thought.
Tell Nobody: Absolutely gripping crime fiction with unputdownable mystery and suspense Page 12