Ava’s lips curved in a wobbly smile. “He’d only had that new phone for a few weeks. He lost the other one while he was working. I had his old number memorized, but not this one. Not yet. The phone isn’t even paid off. God, this can’t be real.”
This brought fresh tears, her grief breaking whatever heart Quinn had left. He’d never felt so helpless. “I’m sorry, so I am.”
When she’d regained her composure, she told Quinn how Andrew Lewis and Alastair Whitehall, the MSP who’d been Jack’s employer, had stopped in with flowers to offer their condolences in person. “Whitehall said such nice things about Jack to the press. Wasn’t that kind?”
“Aye.” Quinn thought it was the least Whitehall could do. “Do you have kin nearby, someone to help wi’ the girls, make meals, get the messages… er… do the shoppin’?”
He didn’t know anything about Ava’s family, but Jack’s parents were gone—his mother in a car crash, his father of a stroke.
“I’ve lived here long enough to know what ‘get the messages’ means.” Ava smiled. “My mum and sister live in London. My mum has Alzheimer’s, and my sister is her full-time carer. She’s looking for someone to relieve her so she can stay with us for a few days. Jack’s sister, Hannah, is coming this afternoon to take us to Paisley. I’ll stay with her and her husband and their boys for a while.”
“That’s good. You shouldnae be alone at a time like this.”
“I don’t understand. What was Jack doing in that alley? Andrew said he was no longer on duty. The police have no idea—or they won’t tell me.” She reached for a tissue. “Yesterday, the detective asked me whether Jack had behaved strangely of late. I told him he’d seemed tense but nothing too unusual. Then he asked whether Jack had ever used or soldcontrolled substances. My Jack?”
“They’re only doin’ their job. We both know Jack would never touch that shite. He was a good and honest man, so he was.”
Unlike Quinn, Jack had come from honest poverty, his mother a widow on the breadline with four wee ones to raise. Jack had joined the army because he’d believed it was his duty to serve his country. Quinn had thought him a proper bampot at first, the sort of idiot easily lured into the military by lies about honor and glory. It had taken Quinn most of a year to realize that Jack was the real thing—a truly good man.
Everything Quinn knew about honor and decency he’d learned from Jack Murray.
“What if they’ve found evidence, a reason to suspect him?” Ava dabbed her eyes. “During the six years we were married, I never doubted him.”
“Then don’t start doubtin’ him now.”
Yet, itwasstrange.
What had Jack been doing in that alley so late at night? How could anyone have gotten the better of him? Jack had been a skilled trooper, a warrior who could kill as efficiently with his hands as any weapon. But somehow, he’d died from a single slash of a blade—without so much as throwing a punch.
Ava went on. “If he’d died at war, if he’d been killed in the line of duty, I could at least say he died a hero, giving his life for his country. I might learn to live with that. But to lose him like this… He died fornothing.”
“In all the years I’ve known Jack, he never did anythin’ wi’out a good reason.” Quinn poured more tea into Ava’s cup. “The police are still investigatin’. When they’ve done their job, we’ll likely find that Jack was in that alley because he thought someone needed help or saw an injured dog.”
She nodded through her tears. “He was wearing a stab vest. If only the killer had tried to stab him in the chest or back instead, he would have had time to react and fight back. He might still be here.”
“That’s a piece of bad bloody luck.”
That kind of knife wound meant that whoever had stabbed Jack wasn’t just trying to get him to hand over his money. The killer had meant for him to die.
The bell rang.
“Oh, God, I hope it’s not the press again.”
Quinn stood. “You stay here. If it’s reporters, I’ll tell ’em to bolt.”
Reporters weren’t the only people that worried Quinn, and he found himself wishing he’d brought his concealed carry piece rather than leaving it in his hotel room. It wasn’t legal here, but he didn’t care. It troubled him that police hadn’t placed a watch on the house. Whoever had murdered Jack and taken his wallet had surely gotten his address from his driving license. That could bring the bastard here.
A murderer capable of bringing down a man like Jack in one move would make short work of a woman and two wee girls.
He glanced outside, saw a man in a tan trench coat, a yellow-and-blue police car parked just behind his rental.
“It’s the police,” he called to Ava.
He opened the door, hoping to fuck there was news.
The man in the trench coat introduced himself as Detective Sergeant Wilson, sizing Quinn up through expressionless brown eyes. “And you are …?”
“Quinn McManus, a friend of the family.” Quinn stepped back, let the man enter. “I hope you’ve brought answers, detective. Mrs. Murray is in the kitchen.”