MURDER IN PEMBROKESHIRE an absolutely gripping crime mystery full of twists (Tyrone Swift Detective , GRETTA MULROONEY [books to read now .txt] 📗

her woodcarvings. A huge ginger cat lay on top of the roof of her wood store, enjoying the evening sun. Swift knocked at the door and was relieved when there was no answer. He’d just stuck a note under the door when Kat popped out from a nearby polytunnel. She was perspiring, wearing denim shorts with a sleeveless vest.

‘Hi, I’m sorry to disturb you. I just wanted to say that I can’t make it for a meal tonight.’

Her bottom lip curled down. ‘Oh, that’s a disappointment. I’ve already made a strawberry trifle and I was just picking leaves and herbs for a salad. You might have said earlier.’

‘I apologise for not telling you. I’ve been busy today and I lost track of time.’

‘Busy? Really? What can you have been doing?’ She limped closer to him and he could see the sweat on her forehead.

He resented the assumption in her question. ‘Various things.’

‘And what’s so important that you can’t come tonight?’

‘I have to attend to some work,’ he said truthfully.

‘Work? On a Friday night?’ Clearly, she didn’t believe him.

‘My kind of work isn’t nine-to-five. Things happen and I have to respond.’

She stared at him and said doggedly, ‘So, what will you be doing tonight that’s more important than eating the lovely meal I’ve prepared? Where do you have to go?’

‘I can’t go into that, it’s a confidential matter.’

She stepped right into his space. Her hands were caked with soil. He saw a hair dangling from her bottom lip. She sounded truculent. ‘Oh, like that, is it? I can see I’d better mind my own business.’ Her voice changed to a wheedling tone. ‘Well, come for dinner another night. I could really do with the company and we hit it off so well. I’d love to get to know you better. I keep missing Afan really badly and the nights are sad and empty. How about tomorrow?’

‘I don’t want to make an arrangement I might not be able to keep, that would really be bad manners. I’ve put you out enough as it is.’

She clicked her fingers. ‘Let’s go foraging early one morning. I bet you’d enjoy it. I could show you the places I went with Afan.’

‘Maybe, Kat. Let’s leave it there for now. I have to get on.’

He turned the bike and she followed him onto the path, touching his arm.

‘Are you coming to Jasmine’s concert Sunday night?’

‘Yes, I expect I’ll see you there.’

‘I can come and call for you if you like, and we can go together.’

‘That’s okay. I’ll see you in there. Have a good evening.’

He walked away quickly, before she could attempt another delaying tactic. He sensed her gaze on him until he turned off the path and was screened by trees. She was one of the creepiest women he’d ever met.

Chapter 13

‘Have a seat, love, thanks for coming. I can’t offer you tea or anything. I’m a bit whacked this time of evening. Just about all I can do to wash up my dinner plate and take my tablets.’

‘That’s fine.’ Swift sat near Ms Murray, in the corduroy-covered armchair of a three-piece suite. Her chair was positioned beside a grey oxygen cylinder and a mask attached to it lay in her lap. The back room was tiny, with faded embossed wallpaper and a three-bar gas fire inset to a tiled fireplace. Half a dozen houseplants cheered the restricted space. The back window had been replaced with French doors. They stood open onto a small square patch of paved yard, bounded by a pocked, frost-damaged brick wall. The yard was crammed with tubs of bright flowers: dahlias, pinks, zinnias, cosmos and love-in-a-mist. An empty washing line stretched across the yard and a rabbit stared disconsolately from a hutch by the back wall.

‘So, Ms Murray, why did you want to see me?’

She was a woman who’d once been well-built but had shrunk with age and illness. She must have been in her late fifties, but her face was a worn seventy. Her skirt and short-sleeved blouse were much too big, with the shoulder seams drooping down her arms, where flaps of skin hung. She had a kindly expression. She’d have been a buxom, pretty young woman. Caris had inherited her cheekbones. She raised her mask to her face and took a puff of oxygen.

‘Call me Lori. I don’t like going behind my Caris’s back, but truth is I’m ever so worried about her.’ Her voice was listless and faint.

‘If I can help, I will. You said that you heard me at the door the other night, asking about Afan Griffith.’

‘That’s right, and I heard Caris being downright rude to you,’ she said apologetically. ‘I didn’t bring her up to behave like that.’

‘I’m used to it. You’ll have seen from my card that I’m a private investigator. People often dislike my questions and it’s a difficult time for anyone associated with Tir Melys. It struck me that Caris is stressed out.’

‘She is, that’s true, but that doesn’t mean she shouldn’t mind her manners. Caris was very fond of Mr Griffith. She was crying here when she heard he’d been found dead. She’s been on edge all week.’

‘Afan was my friend. I’d come here to visit him. I heard from people at Tir Melys that he and Caris got on well.’

‘They did. I was thrilled when she volunteered there and got so interested in gardening. We’ve nowhere to grow things here, although she does wonders with the little space we’ve got, and I love the tubs.’ She gestured to the back yard. ‘It was good for her, going there and meeting new people, learning new things. And she gets to bring home loads of lovely fresh fruit and veg. Eggs, too and sometimes cuts of lamb or chicken. That’s a real help, what with me being on