Little Bones

by Sam Blake

  ‘She can’t go home, love, not on her own. That flat’s so, so grim.’

  It took Tony a moment to work out what Emily was implying, then he raised his thick eyebrows, looking at her in horror. He’d seen that look before. But last time it had been the cats. And he couldn’t even pretend he was allergic to old ladies.

  ‘Oh, no. I have to be able to get away from my job, Emily. And you do too. We have to have a bit of space.’

  ‘I know, but –’

  ‘But nothing.’ Even as he cut her off, she turned to look at him, switching on the glow in her brown eyes. Tony took a deep breath. ‘And it’s Thanksgiving.’

  ‘Exactly. It’s Thanksgiving.’ Emily paused. ‘It won’t be for long, just a few days until she gets back on her feet.’

  ‘I think it’ll take longer than that.’

  ‘But she’s had a terrible shock. I’m sure that’s what’s made her wander. You’re always saying yourself how much stress is a factor in exacerbating symptoms.’

  ‘Psychiatric symptoms, Emily.’ Tony crossed his arms, his no-nonsense, let’s-be-practical, I’m-in-charge voice firmly in place. ‘Mary’s confused, rambling. I’m pretty sure she’s suffering from auditory and olfactory hallucinations. She could be suffering from anything from dementia to schizophrenia. We’ve discussed it.’

  ‘Exactly. Which is why she has to come home with us, just until she gets back on her feet. She needs medication and help. And she must have family somewhere . . .’

  ‘And you’re going to find them, are you?’

  Emily didn’t reply, pursed her lips stubbornly. ‘We’ve got loads of space. The spare room’s all made up.’

  Tony looked at her stoically, trying hard to think of an objection. Mary wasn’t his patient yet, so he couldn’t even claim a conflict of interests. Hell, why was Emily so stubborn? He thought of the cats. This was ridiculous. Why was he such a pushover?

  13

  The changing room was empty when Cathy arrived, gunmetal-grey doors hanging open, the tiled floor beside the showers still wet from the last class of the evening. The odour of sweat was strong, and as she got to her locker she was hit by a choking cloud of body spray. Kicking off her boots, she changed quickly into her black Lycra vest top and shorts and slipped in her gum shield. She’d taken off her silver necklace in the car, hiding it in a black velvet bag in the door compartment, invisible to prying eyes. It was far too precious to risk getting pinched from the locker room. Rolling up her clothes, she grabbed her water bottle and phone and slung her kitbag into her locker, punching the code in to lock it.

  Thank goodness she was the only person here. She wasn’t up to conversation tonight; there was so much going on in her head she felt like it might burst.

  As she headed through the double swing doors into the gym, her bare feet silent on the padded matting, she glanced into The Boss’s office. There was no sign of him but she knew he was around somewhere, probably reorganising the equipment in the container out back. Ex-British military, Belfast-born Niall McIntyre had a need for order that was bordering on OCD, but it was his systems and schedules that had her at the top of her game. And they had a unique relationship, understood each other. He’d trained her brothers, all of them, and although Phoenix Martial Arts was on the north side of the city in Dublin’s notorious Ballymun, a major trek daily for training, she wouldn’t dream of moving closer to home.

  Cathy’s warm-up was as brief as she could get away with, tucks and press-ups alternated with skipping, the rope whistling through the air as she spun it faster and faster. Each set in short, sharp bursts, just like a fight. She wasn’t in the mood for circuits, wanted, needed, to get into a rhythm with the punchbag.

  The chain securing the navy and red PVC bag rattled as she hit it, the thud of her gloves dull. She could feel the power of each blow: left jab, right jab, left hook. She kicked high: front kick, then spun into a roundhouse kick, the noise reverberating off the raw red brick walls, cutting through the beat of chart music.

  Out of the corner of her eye she caught a movement, saw The Boss raise his hand behind the etched glass wall that partitioned the office from the gym itself, the image of a phoenix, its wings extended, watching over them. He sat down at his desk. When his classes were finished he got on with his paperwork and Cathy knew he’d let her train on her own for as long as she needed. She’d escaped as soon as O’Rourke had let her go that evening, leaving Donovan’s Undertakers to remove the body, the techs to process Oleander House, and Zoë and Steve to sort themselves out.

  ‘We’ll be in touch tomorrow,’ Cathy had told her, ‘to give you an idea of when you’ll be able to get back into your own house.’

  Zoë had nodded, still in shock. ‘Steve said I could stay at his place.’

  I bet he did. Cathy stopped herself from saying it, just.

  Now she was at the gym Cathy had the space and time she needed to think – Zoë Grant could wait.

  What the hell was she going to do? What a fecking mess. Before she could stop them, tears pricked like needles at the corners of her eyes. Turning, she lunged at the bag with an uppercut, sending it reeling away from her, hitting it hard again as it came back on the chain.

  She was twenty-four, for God’s sake. Twenty-four and doing a job she loved. Twenty-four and SINGLE. The word reverberated around Cathy’s head like a ball bearing in a pinball machine echoing the sound of her punches. SINGLE. Very single. And absolutely not about to get hitched whatever the situation. Jesus, why had she had so much champagne? What the hell had she been thinking? One fabulous red dress, one look from across the room and look what had happened . . .

  She’d always fancied him, but when his eyes had met hers – Christ, it was such a cliché – it had been like someone had switched on an electromagnet. He’d come over to top up her glass, said she looked gorgeous, and she’d just felt so good. They’d talked, and when he reached over to kiss her the charge was positively electric. She’d forgotten everything and just gone with it. And it had been amazing. Not that that was any consolation now – if it had been a bit less amazing she might have been a bit more sensible.

  It wasn’t like she was some slapper who specialised in one-night stands. Cathy danced backwards, her gloves under her chin, sweat running down her back. Far from it – her relationship history was positively unspectacular. Even Áine, her best friend from school who had already raced into marriage and motherhood, had seen more action than she had. Cathy drew in a sharp breath as she jabbed again, her conscience pulling at her. They hadn’t been in touch for ages but she knew she should talk to Áine, tell her the whole thing. Part of her was crying out to, but Cathy knew that even her best pal wouldn’t be able to give her unbiased advice, wouldn’t understand how it felt from her end.

  Before Áine had had her twin boys she would have been the first person Cathy would have called, but now, despite the stress and the sleepless nights, Cathy knew there was no way, with her TV news anchor husband and her beautiful house in the Wicklow Mountains, her four-by-four and her Tumble Tots mornings, that she could possibly grasp how catastrophic this was. Maybe Cathy was underestimating their friendship, but Áine had proved you could have it all, and was one of those people who got on with things, always saw the positive.

  The only positive Cathy had seen in any of this had been a thin blue line on a pregnancy test.

  Everything had been going so right; she was the fittest she’d ever been, had taken gold for the third year running at the Kickboxing Irish Open in April. The Boss had raised her arm so proudly in the victory salute that his grip had hurt more than the fight bruises. She loved her job: she knew she’d walk the sergeant’s exams, and her brother Aidan was engaged to the Assistant Commissioner, for God’s sake, which couldn’t hurt anyone’s career. The lads in the house were brilliant – the new guy Eamonn hilariously driven demented by Decko’s latest fad for astronaut impersonations, ‘Houston, we have a problem’ and Yuri Gagarin’s ‘I can see Earth. It is so bea
utiful’ getting into every conversation. The boys were sound, just like her brothers, even if they didn’t have any earthly idea how to clean a cooker.

  She felt great, she looked great and look what had happened.

  Jesus Christ. How could her life have changed so fast?

  Cathy struggled to stay practical, to assess the problem objectively. The thoughts that had kept her awake the past few nights reran in her head as she pounded the bag.

  What had the ad said at the back of that magazine she’d got in London? Something about choices . . . single motherhood, adoption, abortion?

  Were they choices?

  Hardly able to say the words even to herself, Cathy flinched and, pausing, pulled at the Velcro on the back of her glove with her teeth, slipping it off and reaching for her water bottle.

  She might not go to church, but Cathy had been dragged up a Catholic. Abortion. The word rolled around, picking up impact as it bounced off the sides of her head. Was it an option, honestly? Cathy doubted it. And if her mother ever found out, she’d never speak to her again. Ever. That was a given. And how would she live with herself?

  Pushing her hair out of her face, she lay down on the matting, her abs pulling as she worked through her press-ups, hearing The Boss’s voice in her head, ‘sixty seconds, go!’ Jumping up, she pulled her glove back on and turned back into the bag with even more intent than before.

  Could she give her child up for adoption? The very sound of the word made Cathy feel heavy, weighted down. She doubted that too, realistically. Would her mum let her? No, of course not. But her mum had worked too hard all her life to be saddled with a baby now. Theresa Connolly had kept down three jobs to keep them in school uniforms and shoe leather, and now her dad, Pat, was retired, they were starting to travel a bit for the first time in their lives, were right now in Lanzarote soaking up some budget winter sun. Which was probably a good thing, gave her time to think. Cathy knew her mum would help, of course she would, but it was so much to ask.

  So how the feck was she going to manage? Garda pay didn’t exactly stretch to nannies, Cathy didn’t have any sisters – and Niamh, Aidan’s fiancée, was hardly going to be in a position to help, she had the whole bloody An Garda Síochána to run. And she lived with three lads – actually really enjoyed living with three lads – but what the feck would they say to sharing with a newborn? Jesus Christ . . .

  Her arms were tiring now, her abs aching, sweat running off the tip of her nose.

  Adoption, adoption, adoption.

  And what on earth was she going to tell The Boss? The thought jumped into her mind like a sparring partner jumping into the ring. Niall McIntyre had an instinct for untruths that was almost psychic. Thank God they were in the middle of a case. The job was the only reason he’d let her miss training at Phoenix unless she was dying in her bed, and she had to make up any missed sessions with extra pool work, or at the gym in Dún Laoghaire.

  An image of the bones flashed back into her head.

  Tiny carpals and metacarpals. Baby’s bones. Cathy felt her stomach turn, a potent blend of revulsion and despair.

  Carpals and metacarpals. The words that sprang to mind whenever Cathy thought of bones. Words she’d learned by rote at school when she’d memorised the skeleton, words that had a sort of poetic ring to them. The tiny bones of the hands and fingers. Tarsals and metatarsals. The tiny bones of the feet and toes. It was mad, but of all the subjects Cathy had taken for the Leaving, biology had been the most useful, the one she recalled most often. Christ, that was ironic now.

  Cathy slowed, shaking her arms out between volleys of punches, her mind distracted from her own problems by the case. Most of a baby’s bones were soft, unformed, deteriorated fast. The bones they had found had been clean. Ribs and the jaw. The stronger, formed bones. Old enough that the flesh had rotted away. So where had the body been?

  Something wasn’t right with this case. Something really wasn’t right. And the memory of the feeling she’d had in Zoë Grant’s bedroom took her straight back to a hot summer’s day when she was twelve years old, a day when Cathy had learned to listen to her gut instincts.

  Even when the Guards had asked her afterwards, Cathy couldn’t remember what had made her look up from her magazine, what had drawn her attention to the little girl standing in the centre of the green across from their house, bald patches in the grass beaten hard from games of football. Denim pinafore; red and white checked blouse; toffee-coloured hair slipping haphazardly from plastic hair slides. Not more than four or five, she had appeared from nowhere, chasing a cat, or maybe just skipping along in the August sunshine, not watching where she was going.

  But as she had turned in the middle of the huge green, her sandalled feet moving in a tight circle of distress, realising she was lost, huge tears had started to fall, waves of shock spreading from her tiny frame like a depth charge. Sitting straddling their low block garden wall in her cut-off denims and swimsuit, the stone hot on her bare legs, sun beating down on her tanned back, Cathy had watched the little girl for a few moments, looking for a big sister or a woman with a pram to take ownership of the child.

  When had she noticed the car? Surely only moments after she had spotted the child. It had pulled up on the opposite side of the green, the sun glinting off paintwork shiny like a black beetle. Then the driver had flung open the door, glancing anxiously from side to side, thrusting his hands deep in his tracksuit pockets as he trotted across the road, shoulders hunched as if he didn’t want anyone to see his face. Heading straight for the girl.

  Cathy still didn’t know precisely what had triggered her movement, exactly what it was about the scene that had rung all the alarm bells, but she’d thrown her leg over the wall and started running, trainers pounding like machine-gun fire on the baked earth, her voice trailing like a streamer behind her, yelling for her brothers to come and help, yelling at the girl to run.

  That had been the day she’d decided to join the Guards. The day she’d realised that there were people in society who meant harm to others and who needed to be stopped, and others who needed to be looked out for, and how one small act could change the course of someone’s life for ever.

  ‘You good, miss?’ The Boss’s voice interrupted her thoughts. Cathy lowered her gloves; pulling at the Velcro with her teeth, she eased them off as he crossed the gym towards her, reaching for her water bottle again. Compact and wiry, he looked too small to be a soldier but she knew he’d had a colourful career, the tattoos on his arms like a map of the world.

  ‘Got a case on . . .’ She picked up her towel and rubbed the sweat from her face.

  ‘Needed some thinking time?’ He finished the sentence for her. She smiled, he knew her so well.

  ‘Here, go have a shower, it’s late. I want you back sparring as soon as that slave driver lets you go.’ His face cracked into a grin. He’d patrolled O’Rourke’s home territory from the other side of the border, had discovered their shared history the first time Cathy had invited O’Rourke to a tournament.

  The Boss held up his hand for a high five as she walked past him. ‘There’s talk of an exhibition fight in Norway in February. Make sure you keep on top of your weight.’

  It was just as well he couldn’t see her face.

  14

  ‘So what do you think?’ O’Rourke popped a chip into his mouth and shook the bag on his knee, redistributing the salt. Otis Redding filled the car, ‘Sittin’ on the dock of the bay . . .’

  Back in the changing room she’d picked up her phone to see a text from him. One word. Chips? And suddenly she’d felt overwhelmingly hungry.

  She’d texted back: At the gym. U at the station?

  The reply had been instantaneous, like he’d been waiting. Yep.

  It was past eleven by the time they pulled up at the end of Cathy’s street and Cathy had hopped out of her car and into his so they could talk while they ate. It had started raining now, his windscreen gleaming with a million drops, magnifying t
he yellow of the street lights that marched into the darkness like a battalion of warrior angels.

  ‘I reckon fish and chips are seriously underrated. Especially in the middle of the night.’ Cathy tore off a strip of fresh cod and stuck it into her mouth, savouring the tang of vinegar on her tongue. ‘This is heaven.’

  ‘Better not tell McIntyre. He’ll be after my guts.’

  Cathy shook her head. ‘Carbs are fine if I’m burning them – in moderation obviously. I’ve done two sessions today, was down at the pool before work, reckon I deserve it.’

  O’Rourke grinned. ‘I don’t think a large fish and chips is moderation, do you?’

  ‘It’s all relative. Where’s the water?’

  ‘So?’ O’Rourke rolled his hands. ‘Lavinia Grant, what do you think?’

  Cathy tore open the side of the bag on her knee, looking for the crispy chips at the bottom. ‘There doesn’t seem to be any love lost between her and Zoë. From what Zoë says she doesn’t sound like the easiest person in the world to get along with. I detected a distinct coolness there.’

  O’Rourke nodded. ‘D’you reckon they had a row?’

  Cathy stared thoughtfully out into the night. ‘Zoë took an age getting back after we called her. She said it was traffic, but maybe she nipped to Monkstown on the way out of town. She’d almost have to drive past there to get to Dalkey – maybe they did have an argument and it ended badly.’

  O’Rourke took a swig of his Coke. ‘She said she came straight from the gallery when she heard about the breakin. We should be able to pick up her car on CCTV on the N11, work out the timing.’

  Cathy wrinkled her nose as she thought. ‘The traffic was bad.’ She paused to chew. ‘But I mean, really, what are the chances of this happening today of all days and it being totally unrelated?’ She took another chip, continued speaking with her mouth full. ‘Actually, I think they’re all utterly nuts. Did you hear how that Trish one spoke to the housekeeper? Honestly, we’d get hauled up on a harassment charge if we bullied people like that.’