“So this guy was a US Marine?”
“That’s speculation. What I can tell you is that he was wearing a ring that may be related to the US Marines – not the same thing. We have, however, sent detailed pictures of the ring and a DNA sample to our American colleagues to see if the body matches up with any missing persons they have. Obviously the twenty-year or so potential gap makes it tricky, but the FBI typically have very good records.”
“I see. How long until they come back to us?”
Devane shrugged. “The Yanks are always a tad unpredictable. It really comes down to what they decide to care about. It could be only a week or two, could be months. It depends whose desk it lands on, I should imagine.”
“Right. Can you give us a steer on the murder weapon?”
“You’re looking for a derringer or derringer-like weapon, Detective, that’s all the help we can give you. Despite what you’ve seen on TV, we can’t CSI you up a magic solution.”
Wilson nodded, taken aback by her suddenly abrupt tone. “Sure, sorry.”
Devane quickly turned and headed back through the swing doors. “Now, if you’ll excuse me. My office will be in touch as and when.”
“OK, well, thank you for your…” Wilson stopped talking as he realised he was speaking to an empty room. He would spend the drive back to HQ trying to figure out exactly what he’d said to annoy Dr Devane, before determining that eating lunch when it wasn’t lunchtime probably put the body in a bad mood for the rest of the day.
Chapter Six
“It’s awful cold out, isn’t it?”
Bunny’s thoughts came back from where they’d been, visiting old friends. He looked at the barman, currently in the process of pulling him a pint. “What?”
“I said, it’s awful cold, isn’t it?”
“I suppose so. Y’know, it’s December and all.”
“That’s true. I’ve not seen you in here before?”
“No.”
Bunny had never drank in this pub before. It was one of those big soulless barns up on The Quays, somewhere he’d not have been caught dead in normally. He didn’t even know its name; it had just been the nearest one to him when he’d noticed the headline in the newspaper that he now held under his arm.
“Can I ask if you were enticed in by our Christmas decorations?”
“No.”
The barman looked disappointed. Clearly this wasn’t the answer he’d been hoping for. He lowered his voice slightly. “The manager and I had a bit of a ruck about it. She said she didn’t want them, but I think they give the place a bit of ambience.”
Bunny looked around. There was some anaemic tinsel and a few cheap-looking angels scattered around the place. A memory floated into his head of his schooldays back in Cork. One of the lads had managed to get Sister Morgan, the young nun tasked with teaching God to gurriers, into a discussion about heaven. If angels lived on clouds, he said, where did they go wee-wee? Did they just do it over the side? Sister Morgan had panicked, said that angels didn’t wee or poo. He could still remember the look on her face when she realised the hole she was getting herself into. A bunch of ten-year-old boys were always going to have further questions. Trying to dig her way out, she had explained that angels were smooth all over down there and didn’t do any of that stuff. None of this explained the nappies though, sister. It was at that point she had just started singing “O Come, All Ye Faithful” loudly and waving for the class to join in. She was out of teaching and off to Ethiopia within a year. It said something that bringing Jesus to people in the middle of a warzone was considered a softer option than a class of ten-year-olds in Cork. Bunny thought of all this while looking at the dismal angel sitting at the end of the bar. It had an unfortunate constipated expression, poor little sod – holding it in for all eternity.
“So, d’ye like them?”
“What?”
“The decorations?”
“No.”
“Oh,” said the barman, once again getting the answer he didn’t want. He tried to rally. “Did ye see the snowman down there at the end of the bar?”
“Any sign of that drink?” said Bunny, ignoring the question.
The barman topped up his pint of Guinness and placed it on the bar. “Four euros eighty please. You’re not much of a talker, are ye?”
“No.” Bunny handed him a five-euro note.
“I’m the same myself. Some people would talk the arse off you.”
Bunny took his change and his pint and started heading down the bar, angling for the far corner. The entire place was deserted. It’d no doubt pick up when the after-work crowd arrived later, drawn in by the excess of ambience.
As he passed by it, the motion caused the snowman on the bar to leap into song. A backhand return with the Herald sent it somersaulting off the bar.
“Ah for… you’ve no Christmas spirit, ye old scrooge.”
Bunny said nothing, taking up position at a table in the furthest corner, his back to the wall. He looked around again, confirming that the place was deserted aside from the barman, who was dusting off his snowman and looking all hurt about it.
Bunny unfolded the newspaper and looked down at the headline. It hadn’t changed since he’d bought it.
TWO BODIES FOUND IN THE WICKLOW MOUNTAINS
Two sets of human remains have been found by builders digging the foundations for the new Environmental Appreciation Centre in the Wicklow Mountains. Dubbed ‘The Bill on the Hill’, construction on the controversial project has been delayed three times as protestors objected to it through the courts, before occupying trees on the site to prevent building work from starting. The remains, which Gardaí have yet to identify, are said to be two adult males and are estimated to have been in the ground for around twenty years. The Wicklow Mountains has long been a popular dumping ground for bodies amongst the Dublin criminal fraternity, although the Gardaí have emphasised that it is too early to speculate. The Minister for Tourism, who is, of course, also the local TD for the area, was unavailable to comment at the time of going to press.
Below the article, there was a graphic that showed the approximate location of the site. Bunny looked long and hard at it. Truth to be told, he had no idea where to find the location on a map.
“Oh dear, oh dear.”
Bunny looked up with a start. Sitting opposite him, in a white suit, sunglasses and fedora hat, was a man he’d shot, killed and buried in the Wicklow Mountains eighteen years previously.
“I know what you are thinking, Detective. Maybe it is not me?”
“You’re dead.” Bunny tried to concentrate on the paper.
“Yes, I am dead, but it seems I am no longer buried.”
Bunny lifted his pint halfway to his lips and then put it down again. “Could be anything, doesn’t mean it is…”
The man smiled. His dark skin crinkled. “It’s almost eighteen years to the exact day, is it not? How poetic.”
“You deserved to die, I’ve no guilt about that.”
“Clearly.” The man shrugged. Bunny had initially known him as Lopez, only finding out after the fact that his name was Daniel Zayas. “Still, though, do the police normally bury the bodies of people they have legitimately killed? You are nothing but a common criminal.”
Bunny stabbed a finger in Zayas’s direction. “You were a shower of shite who had kidnapped…” Bunny stopped and looked down at the table.
“After all this time, you still can’t say her name, can you? Simone. The murderer that shared your bed, albeit briefly.”
“Shut up. You’re not real.”
Zayas took off his glasses, revealing the bullet hole where his right eye had been. “I might not be real, but that doesn’t mean you can ignore me, Detective.” Zayas nodded down at the newspaper. “Like it or not, your sins are no longer buried and, seeing as we’re talking, it seems like your mind is not exactly your own. Just because you’re done with the past, doesn’t mean the past is done with you.”
“Feck off.
” Bunny hurled the paper across the table, at a man that wasn’t there. The sheets divided and fluttered to the ground.
He looked up and noticed the barman, who had been joined by a younger woman. They were both standing behind the bar, looking over at him nervously. The woman nudged the barman, who gave her an annoyed glance before raising his voice. “Are you alright there, sir? Everything OK?”
Bunny gave them an embarrassed wave and then stood up. He grabbed his coat then clumsily starting to pick up the paper. He tossed it onto the table beside his untouched pint and headed for the door.
Behind him, he could hear the laughter of a dead man following in his wake.
Chapter Seven
Brigit cleared her throat and shuffled the pieces of paper around on the table in front of her, like a nervous three-card monte dealer. “Right,” she said, “I call this meeting of the MCM Investigations Board of Directors to order.”
She looked up to see Paul sitting on the opposite side of her desk, smirking at her. “That’s very formal.”
“We’re doing this properly.”
“Alright, Madam Chairman, calm down.”
Brigit looked down at the agenda again. “Attendance: present, Brigit Conroy, acting as chairperson for the meeting. Also present, Paul Mulchrone. Absent with apologies, Bernard McGarry.”
“Since when has Bunny apologised for anything?” said Paul.
Brigit ignored him. This was going to be hard enough as it was. Her hands still stung from the soaking in turpentine that had been required to get that damned paint off, then, following the phone call she had received at midnight, she had been way too angry to sleep.
“Mr McGarry, as always, has assigned his proxy to me,” she said. “First item on the agenda, the ongoing situation with Kelleher Brothers Investigations.”
“OK,” interrupted Paul, “before you say anything, what happened yesterday was ridiculous. Paint flying everywhere like that, you could have been blinded.”
“I could have,” agreed Brigit.
“This is getting completely out of hand.”
Brigit felt a wave of relief flow through her. “Exactly, I’m glad you’ve seen that.”
“Don’t worry, the situation is going to be sorted – once and for all. Have you ever seen the Michael Douglas film The Game?”
Brigit looked at Paul in confusion. “What’s that got to do with anything?”
“It was on telly last night. Michael Douglas’ brother buys him this, like, immersive adventure thing, where all these actors are involving him in this game where he falls in love with this hot woman. And then somebody gets murdered, and he has to prove it’s all a conspiracy – only somebody really does get murdered and Michael Douglas doesn’t know what’s real and what isn’t. I don’t know either to be honest, I fell asleep halfway through. But then this morning I made some calls. I’m going to make Kevin Kelleher think he really has killed someone. I think I can get a bunch of actors from this school and…” Paul opened his bag and produced several pages of scribble-filled foolscap. “I’ve worked out a basic story and, I mean, it won’t be cheap, although luckily actors will work for not much money, but there’ll be some special effects required and—”
“SHUT UP!”
Paul looked up in shock. Brigit was a little taken aback herself – she hadn’t quite meant to shout it quite so loud. It had come from a place deeper than logic. It had erupted from a place of deep frustration.
“Have you actually read the agenda for this meeting, Paul?”
“Ehm, well, I… I had a brief look but not in detail. I scanned it.”
“Did you?” asked Brigit, holding up the piece of paper and pointing at the first item. “Item number one, seen here in bold print, is the situation with the Kellehers. Either this ridiculous feud stops immediately or drastic action will be taken.”
“What do you mean ‘drastic action’?”
“You will be removed from the board of this company.”
“You can’t do that.”
“I bloody well can. I control the majority of votes and I have ample evidence of gross negligence.”
“What? Are ye mad? What evidence?”
“How did the Harrison surveillance go last night, Paul?”
Paul pulled at his ear nervously and Brigit felt herself sag. He didn’t realise it, but this was his tell when he was about to lie.
“Yeah, y’know, generally alright. Nothing too out of the ordinary.”
“Really?”
Brigit could actually see the moment Paul realised he was screwed but still decided to brazen it out.
“Well, y’know, these things are always a bit ‘hurry up and wait’, mostly dull.”
“Sure. Well, I got a phone call from a rather upset Mrs Harrison last night. She’d just received a call from her sleazebag of a husband, who admitted to having an affair while simultaneously accusing her of hiring a man to try and kill him.”
“What?”
“Yes,” said Brigit, “apparently the man from MCM Investigations burst into his room and tried to throw him off a balcony. Did you do that?”
Brigit could see Paul furiously thinking, trying to decide which path was worse.
“Yes?” He said it tentatively, like even he was surprised that he was attempting this lie.
“My arse you did. You couldn’t dangle somebody off a balcony if you tried.”
“What do you mean by that? That’s a very unkind thing to say.”
“Oh no you don’t. Do not try and throw this conversation off topic. Did you or did you not send Bunny to do a surveillance that had been assigned to you and Phil?”
“You said you wanted to get him more involved in things.”
Brigit would’ve thrown something if anything had been handy. “Involved, yes, but not dealing with stuff like this. You better than anyone know what he’s like. That was like sending a sledgehammer to scramble an egg.”
Paul held his hands up. “OK, that was a bit of a mistake on my part.”
“A mistake?” Brigit couldn’t believe that he still didn’t seem to get it. “Do you have any idea how much trouble we could be in? Bunny doing stuff like that, we could lose our licence. What the hell were you thinking?”
“Alright, look—”
“Then there’s the matter of all those boxes in reception.”
“We need a bit of security equipment to protect the office. There’s a lot of gurriers about.”
“Any gurrier that breaks in here will only be coming to steal our new security system, seeing as we apparently spent…” Brigit held up another piece of paper. “Six grand to protect an office that holds three second-hand PCs, a couple of filing cabinets and the second-cheapest self-assembly desks from IKEA, one of which still wobbles every time someone closes a door.”
“I said I was going to fix that.”
“You said you were going to do a lot of things, Paul, and frankly I’m tired of waiting for you to grow up and do them. We’re supposed to be running a business here.” Brigit took a deep breath. “As I see it, we’ve got two options: either you abandon this nonsense feud with the Kellehers once and for all—”
“Never!”
“Or you leave the company.”
Brigit had sat up all night, debating how she could approach this. She had wanted it to be a calm and reasoned discussion. So much for that plan.
“You can’t get rid of me, I own part of this company.”
Brigit looked down at the three pieces of paper in front of her again. She couldn’t bring herself to look at him as she said it. “You own a third of it, as do I, as does Bunny. I have Bunny’s proxy, which gives me the two-thirds majority. You have to either agree to end this nonsense and concentrate on what we’re supposed to be doing, or else I’m going to have to ask you to leave. In the long run, you can either retain your shares and get a fair share of the profits, assuming we have profits after the recent ‘setbacks’, or we can discuss buying you out for a reasonable price.”
She looked up to see Paul staring at her, his eyes filled with outrage and hurt. “You can’t do this.”
“I can.” She took a deep breath. “Do you agree to stop all this nonsense with the Kellehers?”
“No.” He said it in a quiet voice.
“OK then, I have no choice but to put this to a vote. All those in favour of Paul Mulchrone being removed from the day-to-day operations of MCM Investigations?” She raised her hand. “Aye, and Bunny’s votes go with me. Those against?”
Paul stood up. “Nay.”
Brigit picked up her pen and started writing. “So by majority vote, the motion has been carried and the…”
Her office door slammed, followed a few seconds later by the front door as Paul stormed out.
Chapter Eight
“Mickey, what are you doing? Don’t do that! For God’s sake, fella, use the stick or catch it!”
Johnny Canning turned away from the field in disgust and looked at the St Jude’s under-12s coach, to whom he was the assistant, despite knowing little about hurling.
“Bunny?”
He looked into the face of the man he’d known now for seventeen years, and what he saw looking back worried him. It wasn’t the splotchy red of burst capillaries that indicated an over-fondness for the drink. That did worry him, but only on the same low level it always had. Bunny and drink had been bedfellows for as long as Johnny had known him. Johnny did try and bring it up every so often, but that conversation rarely went well. Since the Skylark incident last year, Bunny had maybe been leaning on the bottle a little heavier, but even a twelve-step fundamentalist like Johnny couldn’t hold that against him. Held prisoner and tortured by a true psychopath for ten days, it had been an ordeal that would have broken a lesser man. Physically, Bunny had recovered remarkably quickly, but Johnny was perhaps one of the very few people close enough to catch a whiff of the battles that still raged. He was back bigger and badder than ever as far as most were concerned, the same foul-mouthed tornado of fury he’d always been. The indestructible, irrepressible Bunny McGarry. But Johnny knew better. What didn’t kill you didn’t always make you stronger. There’d long been that sadness at the eye of the storm, but these days there seemed to be more of it. Still, this, today, whatever it may be, was something very different. He’d never seen him like this.
Last Orders (The Dublin Trilogy Book 4) Page 5