Last Orders (The Dublin Trilogy Book 4)

by Caimh McDonnell

  Phil sighed. “I hate people. Right, here we go…”

  Using his bandaged hand, Phil placed his phone on the counter and dialled the number he had written on a piece of paper. Then he picked it up and cradled it between his ear and shoulder. “Fingers crossed she’s not—” He didn’t get to the final word in the sentence – probably “in” – as the call was answered on the second ring.

  “Hello, Mrs Kilfeather, it’s Phil Nellis here from MCM Investigations. Are you alright? You sound a bit out of breath?”

  From where Paul sat, he couldn’t make out the other half of the conversation beyond the low burble of a female voice.

  “Yes,” said Phil. “I’m outside the Philbert Street apartments right now and I’m afraid your husband is inside.”

  Pause.

  “Yes, he is with a woman.”

  Pause.

  “Ehm, yes, the other woman. I suppose you could say she is that.”

  Pause.

  “Well…” Phil squirmed uncomfortably. “I suppose you could say she is a dirty girl.”

  Pause.

  “Ehm… I personally wouldn’t use that language, but I know you’re upset.”

  Pause.

  Phil grimaced. “Alright, if you insist. Yes, I supposed she is a dirty girl. She is a dirty, dirty girl.”

  A thought struck Paul. He picked up the binoculars again. The full-body customs search in the window had now very definitely passed beyond standard practices.

  “Phil, hang up the phone.”

  Phil ignored him. “Alright. She’s a wanton floozy, so she is, a hussy. She is a wicked woman.”

  “Phil,” said Paul more loudly. “Hang up the phone.”

  Phil was now looking incredibly uncomfortable, as if he were in physical pain. “Ah please, I don’t want to say that.”

  Paul reached across, snatched the phone from Phil’s shoulder and disconnected the call.

  “What the feck are you doing, Paulie? I had to tell the woman, it was part of the instructions. She wanted to know. We can’t keep losing customers like this! Brigit will bleedin’ kill me!”

  “Are you finished?” asked Paul. “If you want, you can ring Mrs Kilfeather back. Look, she has her phone handy.”

  Phil gave Paul a confused look, then he looked through the camera again.

  The woman had her phone in her hand and she was still talking into it, looking directly at the van.

  “Oh…” Phil sounded slightly confused. “Ohhhhhh.” Realisation hit. “Ughhh, I bleedin’ hate people.”

  “Yep,” said Paul, handing Phil his phone back. “I’m going home to bed. Wake me up when the world has come to its senses.”

  Chapter Ten

  Brigit sat nursing her glass of white wine and trying hard not to look like she was being stood up on a date. She wasn’t. She was meeting a friend, and that friend, while late, had sent fourteen text messages to assure her that she was still coming. The large glass of wine in her hand was almost empty and she had started looking at the one sitting opposite her on the table, bought in anticipation of her friend’s arrival. She had also put it there as a way of fending off any of the sleazoid men that wine bars seemed to attract. This was what the job was doing to her, making her cynical about the rest of humanity. The stocky guy at the bar had slipped off his wedding ring on his way in. The woman at the corner table had sent a text from one phone and then slipped away from her date to answer a call on another. The guy with the ponytail sitting near the door had, well, he had a ponytail. Brigit considered ponytails to be unacceptable, frankly – even on ponies.

  It had been a long day, she was exhausted and not in the mood for this, but a promise was a promise. She didn’t have enough friends that she could afford to let a good one down. Still, three more minutes and she was having that glass of wine.

  The honk of a car horn drew Brigit’s attention. Nora Stokes, barrister, mother of one and stressed-out force of nature, was making her way across the street outside. She was rummaging in her bag while simultaneously offering a half-arsed attempt at an apologetic wave to the driver who had just slammed on the brakes to avoid giving her some much-needed time off in hospital. She blew strands of her blonde hair out of her face and then spotted Brigit through the window – managing to cram hello, sorry and oops all into the same smile. Nora was too busy for facial expressions to have just one meaning. She bundled herself through the door and hurried across the bar, sweeping the glass of wine and Brigit up into a hug.

  “Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. Sorry.”

  “It’s fine,” Brigit assured her.

  “No, it isn’t. You were nice enough to come out with me and I left you sitting here alone amongst all these dreadful people.”

  She said it slightly too loudly and Brigit could feel the eyes of the aforementioned “dreadful people” burning into them as they sat down. Not that Nora cared, she was too busy knocking a large white wine back in one to register anyone’s disapproval.

  Brigit had first met Nora about two years ago when, as Paul’s barrister at the time, she’d been dragged into the Rapunzel affair. Brigit still felt guilty, as their actions had accidentally led to Nora, then heavily pregnant, receiving a visit from a thug who had tried to intimidate her into giving up Paul and Brigit’s location. This had led to Nora Stokes first macing and then tasering the aforementioned scumbag, a fact that even now made her something of a legend in the otherwise stuffy and male-dominated world of the Irish legal profession.

  Since then, she and Brigit had become friends in a rather haphazard manner. After the Rapunzel affair, Nora had struck out on her own, and when Brigit, Paul and Bunny had set up MCM Investigations, Nora had been the natural choice for their lawyer. Since then, they had sent each other work on a few occasions, and when it had come time for MCM Investigations to move offices, Nora had tipped them off to a suitable place that was becoming available around the corner from hers, near Christ Church Cathedral. The two women had bonded over the challenges of running their own businesses. Brigit was aware she wasn’t supposed to actually be the boss of her business partnership, but it had become quickly apparent that she was the only fully-functioning adult in the building, which she deeply resented. It must be great to be the flaky one; she was always secretly jealous of people who somehow managed to bumble through life on luck and other people’s kindness. To be fair, Nora worked alone, save for an incompetent assistant she fired three times a week, which meant she was both the boss and the flaky one. She had a two-year-old kid and hadn’t slept more than five continuous hours since giving birth. In short, they both found themselves in the position of being the closest thing the other had to a female work colleague, even though they didn’t actually work together.

  Nora finished the wine and sat down. “Christ, I needed that.” She held the glass up and whistled loudly, attracting the attention of the sour-faced, stick-thin brunette behind the bar, who glared at her. Nora tapped the glass. “Two more of these bad boys, please, barkeep.” She turned back to Brigit before the barmaid could protest that they didn’t offer table service.

  “So yes, sorry, sorry, sorry – his highness shat in my handbag.”

  “Is that a figure of speech?”

  “Nope. Got into the taxi and I thought, Christ, this guy has a serious BO problem. Then I tried to get my phone out and realised that himself had found a new place to exercise his latest hobby of random defecation.”

  “Oh.”

  “Oh indeed.”

  The shitter in question was Dan, Nora’s two-year-old son. There were a lot of euphemisms people had for his behaviour – “‘he’s a bit of a handful”, “rambunctious”, “emotional”. The reality, however…

  “I swear he is possessed by the Devil.”

  “Oh, you don’t mean that.”

  “The hell I don’t. The Devil! Did I tell you about this morning?”

  Brigit shook her head.

  “So I get a call from the nanny. The playgroup he’s in, they’ve banned
him.”

  “What?”

  “Banned him!”

  “Is this because of the biting?”

  “Surprisingly, no. Poo throwing.”

  Brigit grimaced. “He’s started throwing poo?”

  “No, he’s started encouraging other kids to do so. They hospitalised one of the other mothers. Hit her right in the eye with her own kid’s turd. Had to get it washed out and all.”

  Brigit laughed and then clamped her hand over her mouth. “Well, it shows good leadership skills.”

  “Shut up. It is not funny.”

  “Sorry,” said Brigit “It is though. It is a little bit funny.”

  It was at this point that the brunette from behind the bar appeared with two large glasses of wine and a face that seemed utterly appalled at what her body was doing. “Just so you know…”

  Nora cut her off by handing her a twenty-euro note. “Keep the change.”

  The brunette seemed suddenly happier about life.

  “Question for you,” said Nora. “How would you feel if you got a poo in the eye?”

  The barmaid shrugged and pocketed the twenty. “I’ve had worse. Guys are into all kinds of weird stuff.” She turned and walked back towards the bar.

  Nora watched her go. “She’s had worse. That’s the modern dating scene summed up right there.” Nora took a large swig then sighed. “Speaking of dating and unruly children, how’d it go with Paul?”

  It was Brigit’s turn to take a large swig of wine. From a distance, they must’ve looked like a pair of alcoholics who’d just been rescued from a desert island.

  She wiped her mouth and took a deep breath. “I fired him.”

  “Fuck off!”

  Brigit nodded. “I did it.”

  Nora put her hand up for a high five.

  Brigit looked embarrassed. “I don’t think this is really a high-five moment.”

  “The fuck it isn’t. This right here is a Beyoncé track. Throw it up, girlfriend, or I’m going to start singing.”

  Reluctantly Brigit put her hand up to receive a rambunctious high five.

  “How did he take it?”

  “Well, it’s not like I wanted to do it. I mean, I just wanted him to start taking the job seriously and not turn it into this never-ending quest for vengeance.”

  “More power to you.”

  “I feel awful.”

  “Do you know what you need?” Brigit was all too aware of what Nora felt she needed, but it wasn’t like that would stop her saying it. “Cock. A bit of meaningless, degrading, sweaty rumpy pumpy.”

  “Thank you, Dr Freud.”

  “How long has it been?”

  “You know how long it’s been.”

  “Too long.”

  “You’re one to talk.”

  “Oh stop,” said Nora. “It’s been that long, I’m not sure everything still works down there.”

  “I take it things haven’t improved with Donnacha then?”

  Nora pulled a face. She and Detective Donnacha Wilson had an on-again off-again romance that was mostly off again, and had been since they’d met. Wilson had been assigned to protect Nora after the incident with the thug. This had led to him unexpectedly delivering her baby on her kitchen floor.

  “Long story short, two things are wrong there. First off, he’s eight years younger than me and frankly I spend enough time being mummy as it is.”

  Brigit shrugged. “That’s not much of a gap.”

  “And secondly,” continued Nora, “never try to date a man who has pulled a tiny human being out of you. Every time we got anywhere near anything involving my fufu, he’d go this funny colour and make an excuse. I’m telling you, once they’ve pulled a baby out of it, they have a very hard time seeing it as the tunnel of love anymore. Now it’s like the Channel Tunnel with tiny nappy-clad refugees running through.”

  “Well, time to move on then.”

  Nora locked eyes with her. “Who are you and what have you done with Brigit Conroy?”

  “Well yeah, but my situation is different, isn’t it?”

  “Is it? You’re more of a babysitter than a partner.”

  “Oh please, let’s talk about something else. Who’s taking care of Dan the Man tonight?”

  “The service said, and I quote, ‘they had nobody available’. This was nearly two weeks ago I rang them, mind. Nobody available, my arse: we’ve been blackballed. Honestly, one teeny tiny fire and they all bottle it. I offered to pay double, too. This is just like that scene in Pretty Woman where the fancy shops won’t take Julia Roberts’s money to make her look less like a hooker – only, y’know, it’s a toddler who doesn’t look like a thingie but does have an alarming tendency towards physical and psychological torture. OK, that wasn’t a great metaphor, but… What the hell was I talking about? Oh yeah, so, I took the nuclear option. My mam has come up for a couple of days.”

  “Wow, but you said after last time—”

  “I know what I said. Don’t quote me to me. She can be as interfering and judgy as she likes, let’s see how she copes with the demon child for a night. Oh God, I don’t mean that.” Nora blessed herself and took a gulp of wine. “I’m a terrible mother.”

  Brigit shook her head emphatically. “Bollocks to that, you’re like bloody Wonder Woman. It’s the terrible twos, that’s all.”

  “Should I ring home? I mean, I said I wasn’t going to, but maybe I should just check. Should I check?” Nora started rummaging through her bag. “I’m just going to…”

  Brigit reached across and snatched Nora’s handbag away from her. “Relax. Dan will be absolutely fine.”

  “It’s actually more Mam I’m worried about.”

  “Seriously, calm down. What’s the worst that could happen?”

  Nora fixed her with a stare. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Well, I mean…”

  “D’you know what I miss most?”

  “Sex?”

  “Silence! You’ve no idea how rare silence is in my house. And d’you know what scares me the most?”

  Brigit shook her head.

  “Silence. At least when he’s making noise, I know where he is and what he’s doing. It’s when he goes quiet that I’m truly terrified. Last week, I found myself on the sofa, nodding off, then I heard it – silence! Do you know where he was? In the bathroom, flushing my rabbit down the loo.”

  “Oh my God, the poor… Wait, you don’t mean the fluffy-eared kind of rabbit do you?”

  Nora shook her head slowly.

  “How did you explain that to him?”

  “Never mind him, it was explaining it to the emergency plumber that was the tricky bit.”

  Brigit howled with laughter.

  “It’s not funny!” pleaded Nora, laughter rippling through her voice despite herself.

  “It bloody well is,” said Brigit, wiping a tear from her eye.

  “Shut up, ye bitch.”

  Brigit raised her glass and clinked it against Nora’s. “To independence.”

  “Independence.” Nora clinked her glass but didn’t drink. She was looking over Brigit’s shoulder. “Don’t look now, but you’ve got yourself an admirer.”

  Brigit began to turn her head.

  “I said don’t look!”

  Brigit sighed exasperatedly. “How am I supposed to see then?”

  “Just… hold on.” Nora swirled the remains of her wine around her glass as she looked over Brigit’s shoulder through narrowed eyes. “Do you know anybody who’s about six-foot-two, leather jacket, long black hair, with a bushy beard that, despite how hipster it sounds, he is making work. He looks like a beast of a man but with dancing eyes. The ‘read you poetry after he ravishes you’ type.”

  “OK,” said Brigit, “you’re making this up.”

  “I’m not. If he was looking at me like that, I’d be over there humping his leg right now. He is definitely looking at you though.”

  “He’s looking at the back of me, apparently.”

 
Nora pursed her lips. “That’s a good point.”

  The whole bar turned to gawp at them after Nora’s remarkably loud wolf whistle. Brigit could feel herself turning bright red. “Oh Jesus, ye mad bitch!”

  Nora pointed at her. “She’s single, in case you were wondering.”

  Brigit put her head in her hands and looked at the tabletop with the kind of intensity associated with death matches. Her voice came out in an urgent whisper. “I am going to fecking kill you.”

  Nora looked around her, seemingly oblivious. “It’s alright, everyone. Sorry, I was just moving things along. I’m on a schedule here, gotta be home by midnight. I wasn’t talking to you, Ponytail, turn around.”

  Brigit sensed someone standing beside their table, but she was too mortified to look up.

  “Hello, I’m Nora, the slightly demented friend.”

  “Hi. I’m Anthony.”

  “Anthony, hello. This is my friend Brigit.”

  Nora got a kick under the table.

  “Ouch,” she said, looking across at Brigit. “That really hurt. She’s sensitive, that’s one of her many fine qualities. She’s also not normally this red in the face. She’s caught a bit of sun.”

  “Don’t mind her,” said Brigit, actually looking at their visitor for the first time. She had to admit, he was as advertised. He had piercing blue eyes and a pretty damn cute embarrassed smile. “She’s not had a proper night’s sleep in about two years.”

  “I haven’t had a proper a lot of things in that time, but we’re not here to talk about me.”

  Nora’s bag started playing the Jaws theme tune. “Oh Christ.” She dived into it, fishing her mobile out. “Hi, Mam, is everything OK?” She listened for a moment. “No, no problem. What’s up?” Nora shot a look at Brigit. “He’s chased the cat up onto the top of the wardrobe? Right – biggest thing here, Mam, we don’t actually own a cat. Hang on a sec, I’ll go outside where it’s easier to hear you.” Nora put her hand over the phone and stood up. “Sorry, it appears we have a hostage situation. Speaking of which” – Nora nodded at Anthony – “you, sit here, be charming.” And she strode off towards the door.