One Way Ticket by Evie Evans

her?”
    “No. She has a pension from her late
husband as well as her own. She’s not rich but she’s not badly off.”
    “And her sister knew the apartment wasn’t
Tina’s?”
    “Yes, she knows these Burkiss people as
well.”
    “And Tina didn’t have any children?” I
asked.
    “Nope.”
    “We can rule out matricide then. What
about her love life?”
    “Well,” Addi adjusted his position on the
rock we were leaning on, “that’s a bit more complicated. We’ve linked her to a
few men since she’s been in Cyprus but at the time of her death she was
apparently single.”
    He pulled out his police notebook and
flicked to a page. It was a list with five men’s names. I didn’t recognise any
of them.
    “Do they have alibis?”
    “Pretty much. We couldn’t find any real
motive for any of them either.”
    “Nothing else juicy come out of your
interviews?”
    “A few more men were mentioned, but they
all deny being involved with Tina.”
    “What if one of these men was hoping to
inherit something in her will, especially if everyone thought she owned that
flat?”
    “Tina made no secret of the fact she was
leaving everything to her sister since she had no family of her own. It was
something she told people quite freely, probably to get sympathy. There’s no
indication anyone else would hope to get anything. Not unless a new will
suddenly pops up. Otherwise it was all settled years ago.”
    “So, what we’re saying is, she had nothing
worth killing for, no kids, no bloke, and no enemies.”
    “Exactly.”
    “That doesn’t leave much, does it? I’m
beginning to see why this case is still unsolved.”
    Addi gave me a ‘tell me about it’ kind of
look.
    “Most murders boil down to money or love,
don’t they?” I asked.
    By Addi’s blank look I could see he hadn’t
read the same women’s magazines as me.
    “Trust me, they do. What about her bank
accounts? Had there been much activity?”
    “I got statements from her bank, no major
transactions lately. Apart from her pension and rent, nothing larger than 40 euros
had gone in or out for a long time.”
    “She sounds a bit tight-fisted.” The
little crease appeared on Addi’s forehead again. “Never mind. Tell me what she
was like. What was her apartment like? “
    “Nice, roomy. But it belonged to the other
people.”
    “No, I mean what about her stuff? What
sort of things did she have? You know, did she collect anything? Handbags?
Jewellery? Books?”
    He thought about it for a moment. “I can’t
remember.”
    “You’ve still got access to the apartment?”
    Addi nodded.
    I stood up. “Well, let’s go have a look. I
haven’t seen her place yet, just one of the neighbours. It might give us some
idea of what sort of person she was.”
    “Her stuff isn’t there anymore. Her
neighbour packed most of it up and sent anything of worth to Tina’s sister when
we’d finished with it.”
    I went back to leaning again. “Great, so
there’s nothing left?”
    “Probably not. We bagged up some things.
They’re in the evidence room.”
    “Can we have a look?”
    I’m not sure how Addi explained my
presence to the officer responsible for the evidence room, but he didn’t bat an
eyelid when I entered. There was a box of personal papers that had belonged to
Tina, and a large plastic sack of her personal belongings. I noticed Addi
didn’t bother putting on gloves to touch them.
    Tina, it seemed, had been keen on garishly
coloured, plastic jewellery.
    “Not worth anything,” Addi commented as I
pulled some of the pieces out.
    There were also a couple of bright red
lipsticks among her possessions, well used. A picture of Tina was forming in my
mind, it was a little different from the rather more conservative image that
had appeared in the local newspaper report of her death.
    Luckily, whoever had bagged these
seemingly random items had picked up some photographs. They confirmed my
impressions of Tina Lloyd. In one photo, she was laughing at