Irish Kiss

by Sienna Blake

  Arms I’d never feel again.

  Just when I didn’t think my heart could shatter any further, it did. I pressed my face into my hands as another wave of tears stung my lids, my future stretching like a lonely and broken road.

  It took days for me to get enough energy to shower. The hot water beating some element of life into my body.

  What the hell was I going to do now? I needed a job, or to study or…a distraction. I couldn’t stay at Moina’s forever.

  Wrapped in a towel, I stood in Moina’s bedroom, my bag still on the chair, unpacked. Moina was at work so I was here alone. I pawed through my meagre belongings. A crumple of paper at the bottom of my bag caught my attention.

  I pulled it out.

  It was my scholarship to University of Queensland in Australia.

  The deadline hadn’t passed.

  I could still accept.

  For the first time in days a tiny ray of light peeked through the bleak landscape of my heart.

  After I changed I borrowed Moina’s laptop and logged into the university website using the passcode they’d given me.

  Welcome, Saoirse Quinn.

  Congratulations on being awarded a full scholarship with us. We hope you accept.

  Please choose below.

  My mouse hovered over the Accept button. Once I accepted there was no going back. I would be moving to the other side of the world where I knew no one. Where no one knew me as the daughter of a criminal.

  It would be a fresh start.

  A new beginning.

  My chest filled with resolve.

  Without Diarmuid I needed a new beginning. Outside of Ireland, because everything here and everywhere here just reminded me of him.

  I clicked Accept.

  76

  ____________

  Diarmuid

  I never thought I’d be looking out from this side of the bars.

  As I sat in my own cell in Limerick jail, awaiting the arrival of my lawyer, I spotted a lot of my old colleagues peering at me from the entrance to the holding cells, accusing eyes, hateful stares.

  I didn’t care what they thought.

  There was only one person I cared about. And she was getting farther and farther away from me.

  It turned out that Ava had stolen my phone from my desk that day she’d confronted me at work. After I rejected her, she’d hand-delivered the phone with Saoirse and my text messages to the nearest Garda station. A warrant was immediately issued for my arrest.

  When the highway Gards had run my licence through the database, the outstanding warrant pinged. Hence, my arrest.

  My lawyer, Gerard Boland, finally arrived. He was an old friend of Brian’s, probably the only reason why he took me on as a client. He sat opposite me in the visitor’s room, a damp grey box with no windows, dressed in dark jeans but with a sports jacket on over a white button-up shirt.

  For the longest time he just sat there looking at me.

  “The charges are bogus,” I finally said.

  Gerard folded his fingers together calmly, too fucking calmly. “You tried to resist arrest.”

  I let out a sigh of frustration. “I wasn’t resisting arrest. I had something important and time sensitive to do.”

  “What?”

  I remained quiet. There was no way I could admit to chasing after Saoirse, not with this charge over my fucking head. “That’s not important anymore.”

  Any chance I had of intercepting Saoirse at the train station in Dublin was long gone.

  The lawyer sighed. “I can’t help you if you won’t help me.”

  I leaned in, the cold metal cuffs around my wrists clanking against the edge of the table.

  “Find Saoirse,” I begged. “She’ll testify on my behalf.”

  But more importantly, find her.

  77

  ____________

  Diarmuid

  I clambered out of Moina’s car just outside of Terminal 1 at Dublin airport. I pulled my new suitcase only half full out of her trunk and adjusted the carry-on backpack on my back.

  “Thanks for dropping me off,” I said.

  “Of course. Oh, I’m going to miss you, girl,” Moina said, her eyes filling with tears.

  “I’m going to miss you too.” I clasped her in a hug.

  She clung to me as if I were a life raft. “You better not forget me. Keep me updated with how you’re going.”

  “I’m going to Skype you so often you’ll be sick of me.”

  “You better.”

  I pulled away and shot her one last nervous grin before I turned to the terminal.

  “I’m so proud of you, Saoirse,” Moina called to me as I walked away. “You go kick some Aussie science butt.”

  I laughed, even though my stomach was twisting in my body.

  I checked in.

  Then made my way towards the security clearance. Before I passed through, I looked back, expecting to see a certain Irish giant running after me to stop me.

  But he wasn’t there.

  This isn’t a cliched movie, stupid girl.

  It hurt that he hadn’t even bothered to come and find me.

  It was what I had intended with my cruel goodbye letter. But deep down I thought he would still come looking anyway.

  And now I was leaving to go where he’d never find me.

  78

  ____________

  Diarmuid

  This last two months had been a fucking headache.

  I rubbed my forehead with my fingers, trying to ease the growing headache as I sat in my armchair, my lawyer sitting opposite me on my couch. I’d been released under house arrest, a tag locked around my ankle. It still sat there, beeping every so often to remind me that I was effectively a prisoner.

  “I was able to get the text messages thrown out as evidence,” Gerard said. “Without the text messages and without Saoirse’s testimony they have insufficient evidence.”

  Neither my lawyer nor the Garda had been able to locate Saoirse. Her bank records showed that she withdrew all of her money five weeks ago, making it impossible to track her.

  She could be anywhere.

  She might not even be in Ireland anymore. If she were here, she would have stepped forward to clear me. Surely.

  “Did the Gards check the passenger manifests of all outgoing flights these last six weeks?” I asked.

  Gerard pursed his lips. He was a good enough guy and did his job well, but he was still weary of me.

  “The Garda are understaffed, you know this. They’re not going to spend manpower chasing after a girl who doesn’t want to be found. Besides, they’ve dropped the criminal case against you for insufficient evidence.”

  My shoulders sagged.

  If I still had my work log-ins, I could walk right into the station and look this information up myself. It would take a while, and my eyes would probably bleed from my head, but I wouldn’t stop until I knew where she’d gone.

  But there was no way in hell they were going to let me past the front desk.

  “You should be happy about this,” Gerard said.

  “Yeah, I am. You did a good job, thanks.”

  The damage was done, though. My reputation was ruined.

  The Garda had tried to keep my arrest quiet while I was being investigated. It didn’t look good for them to hold me up as a public hero one minute for helping with the arrest of Ireland’s most notorious drug lord, then demonise me the next for allegedly having a sexual relationship with the said drug lord’s daughter.

  The story had been leaked anyway. No prizes for guessing who leaked it.

  Once the story broke, there was no way the Garda couldn’t react.

  I was suspended without pay from my JLO position. I’d received hate mail from several parents of kids I’d previously worked with. Someone had spray-painted pedophile across the side of my truck.

  All these things I could handle.

  I’d been hated before when I was a juvenile delinquent and causing trouble. I
was judged because of my size, my tats and my gruff demeanour.

  This wasn’t what cut me.

  What cut me was I hadn’t been able to go after her.

  My lead was cold. She could be anywhere by now.

  “The Garda should be round soon to take off that cuff.” Gerard pointed at my electronic shackle.

  I let out a gruff noise. “So, it’s over. I can go where I want?”

  My lawyer leaned forward, letting out a sigh. “I’m afraid not.”

  What now?

  “It appears Ava is suing you under civil law. She wants to take your house and most of the cash you have saved up because you cheated on her with a minor. In a civil case, unfortunately, the text messages are admissible.”

  “I didn’t fucking cheat on Ava. We’d been separated for almost four fucking years.”

  Gerard shifted in his chair. He always got uncomfortable when I swore. “Technically you are still married to her.”

  “She cheated on me.”

  “Do you have proof?”

  I spluttered. “Half the fucking city knows. She moved in with the guy.”

  Gerard tilted his head. “She’s claiming that they were just housemates.”

  I snorted. “She’s a fucking liar.”

  “Unfortunately, unless you have proof, she’ll have the upper hand in your divorce proceedings.”

  I sank my face back into my hands. I was out of a job. This house and my life savings was all that I had. Ava was going to take it from me.

  I was so fucked.

  79

  ____________

  Saoirse

  Sunny Queensland, beautiful one day. Perfect the next.

  That’s what their slogan was. And it was true. I’d never seen such blue skies in my life. Never felt the heat like I felt here.

  The university had set me up in an off-campus student accommodation, a building made up of three- and four-bed apartments filled with only students, only a fifteen-minute walk from campus.

  I got along with all three of my female housemates, all of them also doing a science major. Two of them were from Australia, the other an Asian student with perfect English.

  I loved my new life: studying, learning and the occasional party (hey, I was a college student after all).

  I loved my classes. Loved this sprawling campus with its rows of purple jacaranda trees and beautiful old sandstone buildings curling around open courtyards.

  I loved being away from Ireland and no longer being the girl whose ma was a whore or the daughter of a criminal.

  But something was missing.

  Diarmuid.

  For three months I’d missed him so much it felt like I carried a knife around in my guts. I walked around only partly alive, a hollow space sitting in my chest.

  I hoped Diarmuid was okay.

  I prayed that he didn’t hate me too much.

  Would this aching ever fade?

  Perhaps. Given enough time the wind could brush away a mountain. But by then my body would have long turned to dust and ash.

  I emailed Moina often, sometimes daring to ask if she’d heard from him. Her answer, like always, was no.

  Diarmuid hadn’t even come looking for me, it seemed.

  This thought always brought a sharp pain to my guts. I shoved it aside. I had been the one who broke his heart. I worded my Dear John letter so that he’d hate me. So it’d be easier to let me go.

  Even though I didn’t want him to let me go.

  Stupid.

  “Is this seat taken?”

  I shook myself out of my reverie and looked up. Standing by my desk was a boy about my age, blue eyes and a shock of dirty blonde hair cut short. He was the opposite of Diarmuid Brennan if I’d ever seen one.

  “No. Go for it.”

  “I’m Tim,” he said as he sat down. He had a cute drawling Australian accent.

  “Saoirse,” I said as we shook hands.

  His hands were soft, unlike Diarmuid’s rough ones.

  He tilted his head and I noticed how clear his blue eyes were. “Sorry, how do you say your name again?”

  “Sier-sha,” I pronounced. “It’s Irish.”

  He smiled. “I thought you had a cute accent.”

  I blinked. He was flirting with me.

  “Um, thanks.”

  “What brings you to Australia?”

  I hesitated just for a moment before smiling. “Just needed a change. To see what’s out there.”

  He nodded. “I get you.”

  He thought he did. But he didn’t really.

  No one did.

  Except for Diarmuid.

  A flash of pain went through me at the thought of him. Would there ever be a day when I wasn’t reminded of him?

  Tim and I chatted while we waited for the lecture to start. He was from a farm in the countryside and he’d moved to Brisbane to study agricultural science. He laughed at my jokes that weren’t that funny. And he smiled at me the whole time we were talking.

  I couldn’t say it wasn’t nice to be the centre of someone’s attention.

  But still, I felt like there was a chasm between us. Like maybe he might not be so friendly if he knew where I’d come from.

  “Hey, so… I wasn’t here at last week’s lecture. I was hoping you’d let me buy you a coffee after class. To pick your brain about what I missed, of course.” He smiled at me.

  I wasn’t so ignorant that I couldn’t read between the lines. He was asking me out.

  I waited for the flip in my stomach, the kind of flip I got when Diarmuid was around.

  It never came.

  But Tim was here. And Diarmuid was not. He would never be.

  Once again, the pain punched me in the stomach, and I felt for a second like I might pass out.

  “You okay?”

  I waved off his sweet concerns.

  I had to move on. Right? At least, I had to try.

  I forced a smile even though I felt like I was betraying Diarmuid. “Sure. Let’s have coffee.”

  80

  ____________

  Diarmuid

  I knocked on my supervisor’s door.

  Coilin’s head lifted and his eyes widened for a split second before he waved me in.

  I walked into this familiar office for the last time. Sank into the chair in front of him for the last time.

  “You look like shit, Diarmuid.”

  I snorted. “That’s what happens when the world turns against you.”

  Coilin had the decency to look uncomfortable. “The charges against you have been dropped but we—”

  I waved my arm at him, cutting him off. “Save it, Coilin. I quit.”

  Coilin opened his mouth, then shut it. Then he nodded. “It’s for the best, Diarmuid.”

  Fuck him.

  Fuck them all.

  I gave the Irish Garda eight years of loyal service and they couldn’t even have my back when shit went south.

  I would still keep making a difference with troubled teens. That was my life’s passion. But I’d just have to find a different way of doing it.

  Once I fought my way out of this divorce case with Ava.

  I picked up the few personal items at my desk. I could feel everyone’s eyes on me, which I ignored. I waved goodbye to Nina, the office girl, probably the only one in here who I actually didn’t mind.

  “We’ll miss you around here, Brennan,” she said.

  I gave her a half-smile. “No, you won’t because I’m a pain in the ass. But thanks for saying so.”

  No one else spoke to me, no one else came to say goodbye.

  Except…

  “Brennan!”

  Niall Lynch called out to me as I strode down the hallway. I gritted my teeth. He was already in my bad books for letting it slip publicly that I had been the one to give him the tip-off about the location of Liam Byrne’s drug manufacturing plant. He’d promised me he’d keep me out of it. Fucking liar.

  “What the fuck do you want now, Niall?”
>
  “Why are you such a cunt, Brennan? I was coming to wish you well. You could have ended up with a promotion if you hadn’t done anything as stupid as fuck your assignment.”

  I bristled as I turned to face Niall. If he spoke about Saoirse in that way one more fucking time…

  “I was not fucking my assignment.”

  Niall let out a snort. He leaned in, voice low. “I know you were sleeping with her, Diarmuid. I saw you with her the night I searched her house.”

  He searched her house.

  A puzzle piece clicked into place.

  He was the one who had broken into Saoirse’s house. He was the guy that knocked her over.

  “Hold that.” I shoved my box of personal items into the arms of a passing junior.

  Crack.

  My fist connected with Niall’s nose. He sprawled back, landing on his ass on the carpet.

  I stood over him and pointed a stern finger at him. “That’s for hurting her when you knocked her over, asshole.”

  Then I grabbed my box and stormed out the building, never to return again.

  81

  ____________

  Saoirse

  I stopped at my door and paused. A hand slid onto my waist and I turned to face him. I looked up into clear blue eyes.

  “Thanks for another lovely evening, Tim,” I said.

  He grinned. “You are very welcome.”

  He leaned in and pressed his lips to mine. I kissed him back, wrapping my arms around his neck, ignoring the rush of guilt. He was always sweet and soft when I wanted it to be hard and fierce. I wanted to lose myself. I wanted him to make me forget.

  Instead, the face of a certain dark-haired giant rose up in my mind as clear as if he were here. I broke off the kiss.

  “Good night.”

  “Hey.” Tim kept his arms around me, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “When are you going to be mine, huh?”

  I frowned. I hated when he brought this up.

  “Tim, we’ve only been seeing each other for a few weeks.”