The light danced around them as Boyd attempted to shine the phone on what had alarmed Lottie.

‘It’s just a bicycle,’ he said.

‘It’s hers,’ Lottie whispered.

‘Whose?’

‘Emma’s. I mean Natasha Kelly’s.’ She stepped closer to the red racing bike. Let her gloved hand stroke the handlebars.

‘You’ve never seen her bike. How can you know it’s this particular one?’

‘You know bikes. Tell me, is this for ladies or gents?’

‘It’s a lady’s. But that doesn’t mean anything.’

‘Why is it in Mick O’Dowd’s barn?’

‘Maybe it belongs to his mother or sister, or a friend. Jesus, Lottie, I don’t know.’ Boyd swept his hand through his hair. ‘Come on. We have to get out of here.’

‘I’m not going without the bike.’

Boyd scanned the interior of the barn with his phone light. ‘See those cameras, up there? They’re CCTV. O’Dowd is recording us.’

‘What? Why have cameras in a barn?’

‘To protect his tractor? I don’t know, but I do know I don’t like this.’

The flashlight dimmed. Lottie waited a moment for her eyes to refocus with the narrow strip of daylight coming from the doorway.

‘We can’t just leave the bicycle here. It’s evidence,’ she said.

‘From an illegal search. Use your head. We have to go back to the station and process a warrant.’

‘On what grounds? We can’t say we know it’s here.’ Boyd got the light working again. He bent down and inspected the tyres. ‘All pumped up. Plenty of mud and dung caked dry on them. It wasn’t ridden today.’

‘If Emma had it, why did she come here? And where is she?’

A terrifying thought struck Lottie as starkly as the bird that flew from the roof and clipped her hair.

She screamed. ‘I hate birds. Let’s get outside.’

Boyd didn’t argue and she followed him out. Clouds were scudding like missiles across the sky and a drizzle of rain had resumed. She looked up at the farmhouse windows.

‘She could be inside. Held against her will.’

‘If – and it’s a big if – she came here on that bike, it looks like she came voluntarily.’

‘Yes, but she could have ridden into the arms of a madman. Or maybe he picked her up on the road.’

Boyd sighed. ‘I think your mind is warped to expect the worst in every situation.’

‘Grim reapers. That’s what McGlynn called us. Maybe we are.’

She headed for the other shed. Inside, both sides were lined with cattle, chewing on meal and hay. She moved down the aisle and glanced at the slatted floor, where dung and urine seeped. She looked up. ‘More cameras.’

‘He’s protecting an expensive herd. That’s all. Nothing sinister.’

With a disgruntled sigh, Lottie left the shed and marched over to the back door of the house. She banged loudly.

‘Emma? Emma Russell, are you in there? I just want to be sure you’re okay and then I’ll go away.’

Pressing her ear to the wood, she listened. ‘Nothing. We’ll try the front door again.’

Boyd beat her to it. Hammered as hard as he could. Banged the knocker. Shook the handle. Still no answer. The howl of the dog barking catapulted him away from the door.

‘Mason,’ Lottie said.

‘Look, there’s no one else here. And don’t go telling me she’s tied up or murdered. We do our job. We’ll process a warrant and go find O’Dowd.’

Lottie turned at the sound of a vehicle approaching along the road. ‘I think he’s found us.’ Leaning against the front door, she folded her arms, and waited for O’Dowd to park at the side of the house.

‘What are you two doing here?’ O’Dowd jumped out of the vehicle almost as soon as it stopped, leaving the door open in his haste. ‘Get off my property. I’ve had enough of your crowd.’ He raised his fist and shook it, pushing his face into Lottie’s.

‘Hey, just a minute…’ Boyd said, straightening his shoulders.

‘No, let him finish,’ Lottie said. ‘I want to hear what he has to say.’

‘I don’t have to say anything to you. Clear off, ye pair of bollockses.’

‘Have a nice lunch in town?’ she goaded, spying the remnants of gravy caked dry at the corners of his mouth.

O’Dowd took a step back and appeared to mentally calm himself.

‘What do you want?’ he asked after a moment.

A blast of wind swept around the side of the house, stealing his words.

‘We need a formal statement on the events surrounding the fire at the cottage,’ Lottie said.

‘Where do you think I’ve been half the day?’

‘I’ve no idea.’

‘In town, at your station, waiting for someone to listen to me.’

‘And did they?’

‘What?’

‘Listen to you?’

‘Done and dusted. Now if you’d be so kind as to leave…’

Lottie forced a smile. ‘Kind? Mmm. I’m really not that type of person.’

‘I’ll call the—’ O’Dowd stopped mid sentence.

‘Guards?’ Lottie smirked. ‘Oh, how fortunate. We’re already here.’

‘You think you’re a smart bitch, don’t you? Like that father of yours. Remember where it got him?’

Though she worked hard not to lose it, the smile died on Lottie’s face.

‘Mr O’Dowd, my colleague DS Boyd and I would like to have a civil conversation with you. Won’t you ask us in?’ She wished she could mention the bicycle in the shed.

O’Dowd leaned in towards her. She plastered a stoical expression on her face. Boyd hovered behind, ready to intervene.

Spittle settled around O’Dowd’s teeth as he drew his lips back in a snarl. ‘You have no right to be on my property.’ His voice a threatening growl.

‘Speaking of property,’ she said, ‘how come you never mentioned you owned the cottage?’

He eyed her up and down, his mouth hardening into a grimace. ‘You never asked.’

‘You should have said.’ Lottie ran her hand through her hair. He was succeeding in giving her the feeling of lice crawling around her scalp, taking hold of the roots of her hair. ‘If you own it, surely you know who rented it?’

‘I told you that already. I don’t know.’

‘I think you’re being very economical with the truth, Mr O’Dowd.’

‘And I think that if you’re not careful, you might end up jamming your service weapon to your own forehead.’

Gulping down a spurt of bile, Lottie lifted her hand and slapped him as hard as she could across his face. His proximity to her didn’t allow her to put any strength behind the blow, but it gave her a smidgen of satisfaction.

O’Dowd laughed, a grating-on-glass sound. ‘Assault along with trespassing. I think I have you sewn up nice and neatly now, Inspector.’

Boyd grabbed Lottie away from the farmer’s towering body. ‘We’re leaving.’

‘I’ll be lodging a complaint against you, Inspector. And don’t come back here unless you have a warrant.’

Lottie planted her feet so Boyd couldn’t pull her further away.

‘Tell us about the b—’ she began.

‘Lottie!’ Boyd forcibly seized her elbow and steered her towards the car. ‘Now isn’t the time. Okay?’

All fight left her body and she slumped onto the seat when Boyd opened the door. She looked out through the windscreen at O’Dowd. He rubbed a hand over his mouth and down the stubble of his chin. With his other hand he pinched the bridge of his nose and sneezed out a long snot before summoning phlegm from this throat. A globule of mucus landed on the hood of the car.

As Boyd reversed out of the yard, Lottie opened the door, leaned out and shouted, ‘You’re an ignoramus! You old fucker!’

The brakes screeched. She felt Boyd haul her back in before he leaned over and shut the door with a bang and sped from the farm.

---

From the first-floor window, Emma watched Mick O’Dowd fuming in his own yard. Should she have come down and opened the door when the detectives had knocked? But he’d told her to stay put. Plus his rabid dog was chained up at the bottom of the stairs, inside the front door. Definitely not going down there, she thought.

When she heard him below in the kitchen, she shrank further against the wall and pulled the old blanket up to her chin. The roughness of the wool grated against her cheek and she wanted to scream. Why hadn’t she done that when the guards were here? She didn’t know who she could trust. But she’d been told to trust O’Dowd, hadn’t she?

‘Girleen, I’ll put a few spuds in the pot and have a bite of dinner for you in a short while. That okay?’ His shout came up the stairs.

Emma nodded.

‘Are you up there?’

She heard the dog bark and a foot stamp on the bottom step.

‘Yes, yes. That’s grand, but I’m not hungry,’ she yelled back.

‘You have to eat, missy. Food for the body is food for the soul.’

She heard him laughing his sharp, clinking laugh on his way back down the stairs.

He hadn’t touched her. Not a finger had he laid on her, but she was now more scared of him than the others she’d originally been frightened of.

‘I’ve a bit of written work to do here, if you care to give me a hand while the dinner is cooking?’ She heard his voice echo up through the kitchen ceiling to her room.

‘In a minute, maybe,’ she said, and stuck her fist in her mouth to stop herself from screaming.

Was there anyone she could trust?