The safe itself was a small steel door, painted dark grey, with a handle and a combination dial. Sean tried the handle. It was locked.
“Do we assume Jacob would have changed the combination after his ex moved out?” he said.
I thought of Jamie’s comment the night before about his father being a creature of habit and shook my head. “Somehow I doubt it.”
“So, either Isobel’s been into the safe and re-locked the door behind her,” he said, “or she didn’t have time to get into it in the first place. What’s your guess?”
I frowned. “When I arrived she was throwing stuff all over the floor and not being too careful about it,” I said. “She didn’t strike me as the type who would have even shut the safe door, never mind put the panelling and the picture back.”
Sean shook his head. “The art of distraction,” he said. “What better way to make us think she hadn’t touched it?”
Something about Jamie nudged at my memory. When I’d entered the room I’d stood with my back to the wall where the doorway was – the same wall which housed the safe – and Jamie’s gaze had slid past me. “When Isobel said we were after the same thing, I thought Jamie couldn’t look at me, but he could just as easily have been looking at the safe behind me,” I said.
“One way to find out,” Sean said. He sighed. “OK,” he said. “I haven’t had to sneak my way into one of these for a while but it’s an old model so I might get lucky.” He shifted a small table away from the wall so he could get up close to the safe. “Why don’t you make yourself useful,” he said, smiling over his shoulder, “and go and put some coffee on?”
“Yes sir,” I said, sarky. But I went back to the kitchen and fed the dogs and messed about with the cafetiere as I was told. As I waited for the water to heat I leaned against the sink and absently rubbed at the bruise on the side of my arm where Eamonn had hit me, and tried not to think about Sean’s ultimatum.
That I loved him wasn’t in doubt. I’d admitted as much to myself when I thought I’d lost him for good in America. But the reality of Sean was more complicated than the idea. He brought out the best and the worst in me and confirmed my darkest fears about what I was capable of. In the end, it wasn’t Sean I was scared of.
It was me.
When I took the filled cafetiere through to the study, Sean was still up against the wall in a half crouch with his ear pressed against the safe door, inching the lock dial to the right with those long agile fingers of his. His movements slowed and finally stopped. He reached for the handle and I was aware of holding my breath.
It opened.
I grinned back. It was hard not to.
The safe turned out to be much smaller on the inside that it had first appeared.
“Data safe,” Sean said, as though I’d voiced the question. “There’s a canister of coolant in here that goes off if the temperature rises too high. Stops your computer disks getting corrupted if you have a fire.”
Sure enough, there were two boxes of floppy disks and several recordable CDs inside, together with a bundle of papers. He slid the whole lot out onto the nearest chair and started leafing through it.
“Sean,” I said, uncomfortable. “Are you sure we should be doing this? I mean, we don’t know Isobel knew the combination to—”
By way of answer Sean passed across a single sheet of paper. I took it reluctantly. It was a withdrawal slip from the local branch of a bank in Lancaster, for the sum of ten thousand pounds.
“Ten grand?” I echoed blankly. “Jacob might have taken it with him to Ireland. Supposing he wanted to pay cash at an auction—”
“He would have taken euros,” Sean interrupted. “And look at the date.”
I found the stamp and checked it. The slip was dated three days previously. Friday. The day Jacob had caught the ferry to Dublin. Even if he’d had time to get to the bank before he set off, why would he have taken the wrong currency with him?
“I don’t suppose there’s any sign of the money?”
Sean moved to run his hand round the inside of the safe, just to be certain, then shook his head. “Nothing,” he said. “So either Clare went on a serious shopping bender on Saturday, or she had it with her on Sunday when she and Slick crashed.”
“Or someone’s been in here since and taken it,” I finished for him. I sat down heavily on the edge of the desk. “Shit,” I muttered. “How the hell am I going to explain this one to Clare?”
He put the disks and papers back into the safe and shut the door again. Gloomy, I pressed the plunger on the cafetiere and poured two coffees. As I handed one across I saw Sean’s face go tense, like he’d been steamrollered by a sudden thought.
“What is it?” I said.
“Come with me.”
I almost had to run to keep up with his long stride down the hallway. He paused only to duck into the kitchen, quickly scanning the keys hanging on the rack behind the door and selecting a set.
“Sean?” I said. “Come on, talk to me!”
But he was already outside and halfway across the forecourt towards the coach house. I caught him up again as he was unlocking the door.
“Why did Clare say she accepted a lift with Slick Grannell in the first place?” he asked then.
