Carla Neggers, page 27
“I tried to get her to realize that she was my daughter and I loved her very much.” His voice was laced with fatigue and agony. He stood up from the rail and looked at Emma. “I wished I’d simply told her that, but I was so angry—so confused. I saw she would never admit what she’d done.”
“So you decided to confront her,” Emma said. “When you told her you were going to Ardmore and then coming to Declan’s Cross, she panicked.”
“Lindsey blamed me for her mother’s problems, and ultimately for her death. Cynthia wanted the Aoife O’Byrne pieces. She picked them out, recognized Aoife as a remarkable talent. I’d have never noticed. As true as that is, giving them to Cynthia would have been a mistake. She’d have sold them for a song, then hated herself for having done it. I’d planned to give them to Lindsey, but I didn’t tell her. I wanted her to get on her feet first.” He clearly struggled to go on. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know what else to do.”
“You didn’t report the theft,” Colin said.
“I didn’t see it as a theft. I still don’t. I see it as a family matter. I received an anonymous email about the same time I discovered the painting and the cross were missing. The painting isn’t large. It’s easy to transport. The cross is no bigger than a rabbit’s foot. Lindsey had only to slip them in her suitcase, or overnight them to herself. The email said I needed to pay up or they’d be destroyed.”
Colin watched the gull perch on a rock out in the water. “Did you follow the instructions?”
“To the letter,” David said. “It was surprisingly simple. I fly to London often. Arranging a last-minute business trip wasn’t a problem. I keep a considerable amount of cash on hand at home and arranged for the balance of what I needed—a hundred thousand dollars, total. I left it in a designated spot in St. Stephen’s Green. The art was delivered to my hotel. I made no effort to find out who was responsible. I didn’t want to take that chance. I suppose I also didn’t want to know.”
“Where is the art now?” Emma asked.
“At another hotel in Dublin. I planned to go there after Declan’s Cross. My own daughter stole from me. That’s how I thought of her, at least. She never really accepted me as her father. I didn’t want her hurt. I didn’t want myself hurt. I just wanted it all to go away. I wish I’d confronted her in Dublin and gotten her side of the story. I would have helped her if she was in over her head—in danger.”
Colin leaned back against the rail. “Did she give any indication she thought she was in danger?”
“No. None.” David shivered in a cool breeze. “I know you believe Lindsey was murdered. Maybe I do, too, but it’s just as possible she was upset and reckless and fell.”
Emma buttoned her leather jacket and stood straight. “You’ll need to talk to the Irish authorities,” she said. “We can ask them to meet you here, but it’s their call.”
David nodded, gray, miserable. “She really did want the field station to become a reality, even if originally it was just a prop in a ruse. She was pursuing additional grants and in touch with Irish scientists. I thought she was genuinely excited about having Julianne here. Ironic that it might have turned into a real project for her. I’d like to think that. I can’t explain why I have no animosity. I suppose it’s because I feel more responsible than I should for the rough start she had in life. For the bad choices her mother made for her.”
“Guilt,” Colin said.
“That sums it up, doesn’t it? I never should have married. I’m a solitary sort. I enjoy the company of friends and colleagues, but I’m not one for intimacy. I tend to be in my own world. Oblivious. I wish I could be oblivious again.” He started back into the cottage but stopped. “I’ve done nothing illegal. Unwise, perhaps, but not illegal. I wish I’d done things differently. Called the police when I discovered the theft, or the gardai when I arrived in Dublin. I thought I could handle this on my own, and I couldn’t. And now my daughter is dead.”
* * *
Colin walked with Emma back through the O’Byrne gardens, his mind on their conversation with David Hargreaves. “Lindsey wasn’t as interested in getting police to blame the Declan’s Cross thief as she was in getting her father to blame him. Hence her day trip to Maine. She’d see the sights. Stop at Sharpe Fine Art Recovery in case he checked, but not make a big deal of it—avoid being too obvious.”
“She hoped it wouldn’t come to that,” Emma said. “She wanted her ransom scheme to work.”
“It did work. It just got her killed.”
“What if her father killed her after all?”
“And all that back there was a show?” Colin considered the possibility. “I think he played her game until Dublin. Then when Lindsey didn’t fess up, he’d had it. The question is whether he went to Ardmore to get his head into confronting her—or whether he used it to cover for sneaking into Declan’s Cross and killing her.”
Emma ducked under a low branch of a rhododendron. “Maybe he arranged to meet her on Shepherd Head and confronted her there. Then things got out of hand, they argued—whatever—and she fell. He panicked. Here we are.”
Colin shook his head. “There were no other tire marks on the lane. He doesn’t know his way around up there. He’d have had to hike up the trail from the cove or hike out the lane.”
“If Lindsey met him and drove him out there...then how would he have gotten back to Ardmore?”
“We’ll be talking to our gardai friends soon. They’ll check out his movements in Ardmore, if they haven’t already.”
Emma slowed her pace as they came to the hotel terrace. “If we assume David is now telling the truth—which I tend to think he is—then why did Lindsey come down here on Monday and drive out to the tip of Shepherd Head?” She paused at a large flowerpot overflowing with bright cyclamen. “And where’s the money?”
“Maybe she was making a last stab at trying to blame your thief by hiding the money up by the crosses and church ruin.”
“And someone else found out—”
“Or was in on it from the start,” Colin said. “No one who knew Lindsey describes her as a good planner.”
Emma sank onto a bench overlooking the gardens and sea. “That’s what was going on at the Murphy cottage yesterday. Whoever knocked Philip was looking for the money.”
“She had an accomplice.” Colin got out his phone and called Yank, who picked up on the first ring. Colin didn’t wait for him to speak. “We need all you can get on Lindsey Hargreaves. Who her friends were. Her work at the Hargreaves Oceanographic Institute. Her diving. Everything.”
“You know it’s the middle of the night here, don’t you?”
“If you were a lobsterman, you’d be up.”
“Your brother Andy is in Ireland. He tell you?”
“He’ll be here any minute. We’ll have a pint together later.” Colin filled Yank in on David Hargreaves’ story. “I think he’s finally leveling about what happened.”
“This fits with what we’ve learned here,” Yank said, sounding less groggy. “Cynthia Hargreaves liked to brag that she owned two of Aoife O’Byrne’s early works and her ex-husband was holding on to them for her. She wasn’t a big talent herself, but she prided herself on recognizing talent. That she knew early on that Aoife would be a star meant a lot to her.”
“Whether or not Cynthia was lying, if her daughter believed her, then she wasn’t just after the money. Stealing those particular works was personal for her. She wanted her father to suffer because of them.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if she didn’t want to return them,” Yank said.
“An accomplice would be interested just in the value, and in not getting caught.” Colin thought he heard pots and pans clanking on the other end of the phone. “Yank—where are you?”
“Rock Point. I’m at your folks’ inn. It’s nice. Everybody’s up. Your father’s making muffins.”
“Hell, Yank.”
“I had whiskey with Finian Bracken last night.” Yank’s voice turned serious again. “He vouches for the garda detective, Sean Murphy. Your brother Mike was there. I told Mike that in no way, shape or form do I need his help doing my job.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing.”
“Sounds like Mike.”
Colin disconnected and sat next to Emma. He’d heard the concern in Matt Yankowski’s voice and appreciated that he was personally looking into the situation.
“How are things in Rock Point?” Emma asked.
“Yank’s having muffins with my folks.”
“Life could be worse.”
“Nope. I don’t think so.”
Emma placed a hand on his thigh. “I want to go back up to Shepherd Head where Lindsey died.”
He covered her hand with his. “I thought you might. I do, too. I want to talk to Sean Murphy and Lindsey’s diver friend, Brent Corwin.”
“It would be good to know what he was up to this weekend and on Monday when Lindsey died.”
“Yes, it would.”
As they got up, Colin saw he had a text from Julianne: I’m at the spa. It’s gorgeous.
At least she was safe. He texted her back: Good. Stay there.
26
SEAN WAS OUT at the barn when Ronan Carrick phoned him. “David Hargreaves was in Dublin, as he says. He checked out a day early. Also as he says. We talked to a waiter at his hotel who described tension between him and his daughter. The accommodation manager remembered being in the elevator with them. Lindsey was trying to explain something, and he just stared straight ahead and didn’t respond.”
“Subject?”
“Marine science.”
“It’s not much, Ronan.”
“It’s not anything. We checked with the housekeeping staff. One of the housekeepers accidentally walked in on Lindsey. She was hyperventilating. She’d been sick.”
“Not a happy reunion with the father.”
“She also had a package on the bed. Nothing like it was found on or near her body, in her car or at her field station.”
“Any idea what was in it?”
“Not a clue.”
Sean bit back a sigh of frustration. “Ronan...”
Ronan ignored him. “So, Eamon is back in Dublin. He’s down to the pub and talks to the lads, and what do they tell him? Brent Corwin was there for a pint on Saturday. He told us he was diving all weekend.”
“He could have popped into Dublin and still said he’d been diving.”
“He never mentioned dropping in at the pub to Eamon. They went diving together on Sunday.”
“Monday?”
“Eamon worked out on his boat most of Monday. He’s got a good life, that one. He’ll dive with anyone, though. Put a mask and tank on the devil, and Eamon will go underwater with him.”
It took more to earn Ronan’s trust.
“What do you think, Sean?”
“It’s something.”
“It’s just not enough, is it?”
“Did forensics find anything on Lindsey Hargreaves or in her car that suggests she’d been up to the crosses or the church ruin? Any mud or grass or dung that’s not from the lane, the trail, the rocks?”
“I don’t think so. I’ll ask. What’s on your mind, Sean?”
“Liver fluke. It’s a terrible parasite that affects sheep.” But Sean couldn’t work up any real humor. He thanked Ronan, who promised to stay in touch.
In the quiet of the barn, Sean noticed the smell of hay, manure and wet sheep. Good smells. So many times since June, as he’d made his slow recovery, he’d told himself that becoming a detective had been the wrong turn in his life, and it was farm work he was meant to do.
He went back to the house. Paddy came into the kitchen, still in his jacket and cap. He’d gone out to the fields early, ignoring Sean’s concerns about the attack on Philip yesterday.
“No gardai up here today, thank God,” Paddy said, pulling off his cap. “Just the American diver. He must want to have a look at where his friend died.”
“You saw him just now?”
“Not ten minutes ago. He was in his van. I assume it was him. I was too far away to see who was inside.”
“I’m going out to see what he’s up to,” Sean said. “You stay here and watch yourself. Lock the doors.”
“What’s wrong, Sean?”
He wanted to make a joke, say he’d been off the job too long, but he couldn’t. “I don’t know that anything’s wrong. Let’s just be on the safe side.”
The phone rang. Paddy answered it and handed it to Sean. Kitty started talking before he could say hello. “Is Julianne Maroney up there?”
“I haven’t seen her—”
“She isn’t at the hotel. She hasn’t checked out. Her car is here. She was at breakfast and said she’d be in the spa, the gardens or her room, and she’s in none of those places. Normally I wouldn’t think a thing of it.”
“Where are Emma and Colin?”
“They just left. Sean, they said the guards investigating Lindsey’s death will be here soon to talk to her father.”
“Did you see Brent Corwin at the hotel?”
“Brent? No, why?”
“I don’t have time to explain. Where’s Philip?”
“He’s working in the kitchen.”
“Keep him there. Trust me, Kitty.”
“I always have.”
“You never have. You thought I was your blasted thief.”
* * *
Julianne shivered in the damp shadows of the hollow where she’d discovered Lindsey’s car. The cool air and her mud-soaked clothes made her ripe for hypothermia, but with a 9 mm pistol shoved in her ribs, freezing to death wasn’t her most pressing concern.
“You’ve got your money,” she said, trying to keep her teeth from chattering. “Just take it and go.”
Brent Corwin shook his head. “It’s not that simple.”
He sounded almost sorry. He was close enough that she could smell his sweat and the mud caked on his hands and jacket. The money was inside the backpack he had slung over one shoulder. It, too, was muddy and wet. He’d dragged her out of this van and shoved her at the ancient stone wall and moss-covered ruins. He’d ordered her to start searching. A package wrapped in black plastic, a backpack, maybe even a small suitcase—it was here, he’d said. He’d finally figured it out. This was where Lindsey had hidden the money she and Brent had manipulated David Hargreaves into giving them.
It hadn’t been on her body or in her car. It wasn’t at the field station. It wasn’t at the Murphy cottage.
“The stupid bitch. The money’s here.”
They’d found her hiding place, a gap in the stone wall, almost inside the church ruin. Lindsey had chosen it well, and covered her tracks well—not that she’d have left much evidence of her presence in the moss, grass and rock.
Brent had leveled his gun at Julianne and made her do most of the work—digging through the browned, sodden mass of leaves and ferns that Lindsey had used to conceal the gap. She’d pulled out the muddy backpack. He’d unzipped the main compartment, and Julianne had seen a black-wrapped package inside.
He’d seemed satisfied and marched her back down to the lane at gunpoint.
She nodded to the backpack. “Are you sure it’s actually money inside the package? The wrapping is opaque. What if it’s newspapers and Lindsey hid the money somewhere else? The reason you’re in this mess is because she double-crossed you in the first place, right?”
He motioned his gun at her. “Up the trail, Julianne. Let’s move.”
She didn’t want to go up the trail. It led to the ledge, and the ledge was where Lindsey had died. Where he’d killed her. Not that he’d confessed, but Julianne knew. She’d known when she’d run into him in the O’Byrne gardens. She’d never been good at a poker face, but it wouldn’t have mattered. He’d needed a hostage. What had he said? “You’re a soft target, Julianne.”
She’d gone out for a quick walk ahead of her visit to the spa. She’d hoped pampering herself a little before Andy arrived would help clear her head. She’d been dressed for the spa. Yoga pants, yoga top, lightweight zip-up fleece—they weren’t intended for digging in cold mud and muck in an Irish ruin. Even her shoes were useless. She’d slipped into pink flip-flops Granny had given her, insisting they’d come in handy on her trip.
If she died out here, she could hear the Donovan brothers now. “What the hell was she doing out there in yoga pants and flip-flops?”
No socks, even.
She’d been at the far corner of the gardens, already cold, eager to get into the sauna and a soft hotel robe. Brent had come through the trees, up from the water, saying he’d heard about the attack on Philip Doyle and wanted to know if he was all right. Julianne hadn’t liked his flat tone, his sleepless eyes, and had suggested they go up to the hotel together and talk to Emma and Colin—then it was out with the gun, through the trees to a parking area by the water and into his van.
She wished she’d found a way to jump out of the van, knock him out while they’d searched for the money or just run away without getting shot. So far, all she could do was keep stalling for time until Colin realized she wasn’t at the spa. He’d be pissed, and he’d come looking for her.
Brent leaned in close to her. “Julianne.”
She was so damn cold. Her shivering was nearly uncontrollable now. “You don’t have to push me off a cliff. I’ll die of hypothermia first.”
“Just do as I say and you’ll be fine. It’s worked out so far, right? I have my money, and you haven’t done anything stupid. I just want to keep you with me until I’m free and clear of the gardai and your FBI friends.”
“Then leave now—by yourself.”
“I have a car down by the cove. I just need to make sure I get there without any trouble. Then we’ll part company. I get out of Ireland. You go back to your Irish vacation.”
“That’s what you did on Monday—you hiked up from the cove.” Julianne nodded at the dead-end lane. “But the trail’s that way. It’s not up on the ledge.”
