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Chapter 59

The wind was still harsh for a spring morning and Detective Inspector John Smith wrapped his coat a little more tightly around his body as he stood on the edge of the cliffs and stared down at the corpse that was sprawled out across the stones where only a couple of months ago, they had found the body of Bonnie Moore. There may have been something poetic about the way this case ended, but John couldn't see it. All he saw was the lifeless figure of Ciaran O'Neill as the waves gently moved his legs. A part of him waited for the man to get up and laugh in everyone's faces, but he was dead and everything else was just in his mind.

"It's Ciaran O'Neill without a doubt," Kate said with a heavy sigh as she appeared next to him. His boss seemed relieved regardless of how they had closed this case, but he couldn't blame her for it. An IRA agent and murderer on the loose on this island? It was only natural that Kate felt glad it was over. "I just went down to check. Had to see it for myself."

"Any idea how he died?" John asked coldly. Maybe that was the part where Kate would reveal a pair of handcuffs and arrest him for the part he had played in O'Neill's death.

He wasn't surprised when Kate frowned at him and took a closer look at his face. Finally, she noticed the bruise around his eye, although he had assumed she never would.

"What happened to your face?" she wanted to know, sounding shocked as she nodded towards the black eye.

John shrugged. "Headbutted my dog last night."

His boss chuckled softly and he guessed that she was picturing it in her head right now, picturing something that had never happened. He decided to focus on the matter at hand.

"So, Ciaran O'Neill?" he asked.

Kate shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine. Accident. Suicide. Murder. But isn't it odd that we found him just where we found Bonnie Moore?"

"You said the bodies usually wash up around here. And I wouldn't say odd, I'd call it poetic justice," John replied and he even meant it. At least a little. "He killed Bonnie and he died just like her."

"Mm," Kate uttered, her voice sounding curious as she raised her eyebrows at him. "Funny you should mention that."

"Why?"

"Because a few minutes ago, plod told me they've found a box where they thought O'Neill must have fallen. A box that appears to have belonged to Bonnie Moore. It looks like an excellent motive for murder."

"Interesting," John replied, trying his best to sound surprised even though he knew he didn't sound particularly convincing. "What was in that box?"

His boss inhaled deeply, gathering her thoughts before she spoke. "Well, we were both right and wrong in our guesses. Bonnie Moore was in the IRA, but she was an investigative journalist, writing a piece on them. I've only had a quick look at what's inside, but it looks like a lot of information. I have no doubt that O'Neill murdered Bonnie for it. Hell, she even had proof that O'Neill was responsible for the death of Clara's boyfriend. It's all in there."

John knew, but he couldn't tell Kate that. Last night, instead of sleeping, John had gone through the contents of the box piece by piece and he had come up with a plan. It wasn't a good plan. It wasn't something a detective should do, but despite his anger, he still felt the inexplicable urge to protect Clara. So he had gone out in the small hours, covered his tracks and placed the box where people were sure to find it.

"That does indeed sound like a good motive for murder," he agreed. "Not that I had any doubts before. But now we know that O'Neill killed Bonnie because she knew too much."

"But why did she come here? Why this island?"

He granted her a sad smile. "Well, she's not exactly around to ask," he said. "But assuming Danny was collateral damage, Bonnie might have realised she had a twin and that being in Clara's vicinity could serve as some kind of protection. Hence the note with Clara's address in her pocket. Would O'Neill strike if he couldn't be sure who he was about to kill? And we know that O'Neill thought Clara knew something or had something, maybe a copy of what's inside this box, so he stuck around and threatened her. He couldn't have known that the twins had no connection."

Kate hesitated for a moment, letting his words sink in, but eventually, she nodded. "That makes sense, I guess. But we'll never prove it, seeing that the only people who could tell us are both dead."

"Well, I'd say this was either suicide or an accident," John concluded. "No one had a motive to kill O'Neill and he probably figured that there was no way off this island without getting caught. Or it was an accident and he got lost in the storm and fell down the cliffs. That's it."

To his surprise, his boss chuckled. "Is that what you want me to write in my report?" Kate asked. "'Looked at the body, came up with a wild theory and put it down as accident or suicide'?"

"What else are you going to do? You can't question the dead," he argued. He had to try very hard not to sound annoyed when he really just wanted this entire thing to be over. "Forensics found no traces. There's no motive. A murderer is dead. It's over and he won't hurt anyone ever again. Case closed. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to inform Clara."

John turned around, tired of talking to Kate because he knew that sooner or later, she would arrive at the same conclusion, if he hadn't made a mistake – and he really hadn't. Yet as he started to walk away, he heard Kate's voice one more time.

"You had a motive. As did Clara," his boss said a little too matter-of-factly. Was she suspicious of him?

John spun around and glared at her for a moment. She was within her rights to ask him that and she wasn't wrong. He and Clara were the only possible suspects in this, but John had prepared for everything, even for that.

"What did Osgood say about the time of death?" John wanted to know.

"Last night between seven pm and midnight."

He took a deep breath, knowing that once the words were out, there was no way to take them back. There was one more step he had to take to cover everything up, including Clara's involvement. "Clara was with me last night," John said and it wasn't even a lie.

"You made up?" Kate asked hopefully.

"No," John growled and turned his back on her before he resumed his stride back to his car.

He told himself that what he was covering up wasn't a crime. John hadn't killed anyone and neither had Clara. Ciaran O'Neill's death was an accident and a part of John thought that he deserved it. O'Neill had killed Danny, he would have killed Bonnie too if it hadn't been for the tragic circumstances under which she had lost her life, and he might even have killed Clara. The world was safer without him and at some point, the nightmares would fade, as would the memories of last night. John would move on and Clara finally had a chance to do the same now that her fiancé's killer had been brought to justice. But that didn't mean he could forgive her so easily.

There was one thing he had learned from this experience and it wasn't pleasant to think about his own failure. His father had been right all along. John wasn't a great detective. A great detective wouldn't have covered up the accident just to keep a woman safe; a great detective wouldn't have fallen in love with a suspect; a great detective wouldn't have ignored his gut instinct just because he was blinded by a pretty face. No matter how he put it, John had failed and it felt a little as if his father was looking down on him right now, laughing and muttering 'I told you so.'