A Good Liar by Amanda Brooke

Author:Amanda Brooke [Brooke, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2021-01-29T17:00:00+00:00

16

Sitting cross-legged on the futon with her laptop resting on a cushion, Leanne closed her eyes and listened to the gentle lap of water hitting the sides of the boat. She was entering her third week of enforced leave and was getting nowhere fast. She hadn’t been ashore for days, and spent most of her time surfing the internet. Today’s session had drawn another blank, and there wasn’t a YouTube video, witness account, or committee report left that she hadn’t dissected and devoured.

When she slammed her laptop shut, a chorus of quacks rose up nearby. The resident family of ducks had wrongly assumed that the noise heralded an appearance on deck, but the container of oats and seeds that Lois had kept to feed her feathered friends was empty, and had been for some time.

Rearranging her work environment without getting up, Leanne shoved her laptop between a cereal bowl plastered with the dried-up remnants of breakfast, and a buttery plate from last night’s supper. From beneath some clean, or possibly dirty laundry, she retrieved a file that had grown at the same rate as her frustration. It contained a typed transcript of the exchange between Claudia and Amelia on the night of the anniversary, and the notes that Leanne had put together from all her other interviews, including the most recent ones.

Leanne had managed to track down the paramedic, but she had nothing new to add. Apparently, her speech had been vetted by Justin, and everything else would remain confidential. Reading between the lines, there was nothing more anyway.

Rex Russell, meanwhile, was happy to talk to Leanne, but it had reached the point where, if someone wanted to suggest that Amelia’s rescuer had been walking around in a Donald Duck outfit, he would happily agree. As leads went, it was a dead end.

Leafing through her accumulated evidence, she picked up a child’s drawing of a torch. It was the sketch Amelia had promised her, but it lacked any real detail, even for a ten-year-old. The schoolgirl could remember the light, but distinctly less about the item that had produced it, and her depiction was based almost entirely on its shape and touch as she clenched it in her fist. It wasn’t much, but it was all Leanne had.

Two things struck her about the torch. Firstly, there was no doubt that it was small enough for Amelia to hold in her palm, so it couldn’t be the kind used by ushers, and Leanne had already spoken to an ex member of staff to confirm this. The second thing was that there were at least two keys also attached to the key ring, according to Amelia’s drawing. If they were house keys, it would explain why the woman who rescued Amelia had made sure to get the key ring back, and it would also indicate that it was an item in daily use. It wasn’t something half-forgotten at the bottom of a designer handbag. It didn’t sound like it should be forgotten at all.

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