Red After Dark (Blackwood Security #13) - Elise Noble Page 0,30

myself from giving her a hug when we got out into the hallway, professionalism be damned.

“Are you okay?”

“Not really. It’s just hard, you know? Mom had a heart attack—one minute she was there, and the next, she was gone—and I was heartbroken because I didn’t get to say a proper goodbye, but this slow decline is a hundred times worse to deal with.”

“I’m sure Dan wouldn’t mind talking to the nurse on her own.”

“No, I should be there.”

Barkley joined us too, curled up beside the kitchen table on an old horse blanket. She seemed to like being around people, which was a minor miracle considering the start she’d had in life.

Rosaria was a smiley middle-aged lady from a small town on the Mexican coast, so she said over drinks while we waited for Dan to finish a phone call. According to Stéphane, the senator didn’t like Rosaria much, but Harriet said he wasn’t keen on any of his caregivers. They reminded him of his own limitations.

Once everyone was settled with biscuits—cookies—Dan kicked off with the questions. I’d offered to take notes, but she said she was recording everything. Standard Blackwood procedure, it appeared.

“I understand you attended to Mr. Carnes the Wednesday before last.”

“Sí, I checked the schedule. I was here.”

“Can you talk us through your visit?”

“I come in the afternoon. Mr. Carnes, he tell me to go again, but he always say that. I made him lunch. Chicken and dumplings, but he didn’t eat it.”

“Does he usually?”

Rosaria bobbed her head, black curls bouncing. “Always. He might lose his thoughts sometimes, but he never lose his appetite before.”

“Did you clear the food away?”

“Sí. And when I get back with his pills, he was out of bed, trying to button himself into a shirt. Then he told me he have a guest coming in half an hour.”

Dan, Harriet, and I all looked at each other. Surely this had to be our courier?

“Did he say who?” Dan asked.

“No, and he also got the time wrong. The man didn’t arrive until four o’clock. I was meant to finish by then, but Stéphane hadn’t come back, and I didn’t want to leave Mr. Carnes alone with a stranger.”

Harriet managed a smile. “I appreciate that.”

“So they were strangers?” Dan asked. “Not friends?”

“Not friends, I don’t think. The man, he acted more like he was there to work. Said it was good to meet Mr. Carnes, and was he ready to get started?”

“Started on what?”

Rosaria shrugged. “Mr. Carnes asked me to wait in the kitchen.”

“You didn’t hear anything that was said?”

“Lo siento. No, I didn’t.”

So near, yet so far. But Dan didn’t give up. Rather than act defeated, she gave Rosaria an encouraging smile.

“I’m sure you know more than you think. Let’s start with the moment you realised Irvine’s visitor had arrived…”

Dan walked Rosaria through the whole afternoon once, and then she did it again. Unfortunately, Rosaria had spent her time waiting in the kitchen on the phone to her niece rather than being just a tiny bit nosy about what was going on in Irvine’s bedroom. The courier could have arrived by car, horse, or spaceship—she didn’t have a clue. At least we knew he had a local accent.

“You said he was white, in his forties, with brown hair,” Dan said. “Did he have any distinguishing marks at all? A scar? A beard?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Would you be able to describe him to a sketch artist? We’d pay you for your time, of course.”

Rosaria agreed, but I suspected it was the promise of cash that persuaded her rather than a conviction that she could provide a good likeness. Then they went over the clothes again—jeans, a grey T-shirt, and one of those man-bags. Wait. She hadn’t mentioned the bag the first time around. Dan picked up on it too.

“Could you tell me a little more about the bag?”

“It was a green colour. Khaki? And it had leather edges.”

“What shape was it? Slim, for a laptop?”

“No, fatter than that. And shorter. Maybe a foot long?”

“Did it have a logo?”

“Not that I saw, but there was something stamped into the leather.”

“Can you remember what?”

“Billington? Billings?”

“Billingham,” I blurted. “They make camera bags, the expensive kind. My ex-husband had one.”

All the gear, no idea—that was Piers. After he found out photography was harder than he thought, the camera spent several years languishing in the stair cupboard until it went obsolete. But the pieces clicked into place, and I saw from Dan’s expression that her lightbulb came on at about the