by French, Tana
“Nah. Holly could’ve stashed Chris’s phone when she took Selena’s.”
I said, “Why, but? Say she had Chris’s phone, or access to it: why not dump it in the lost-and-found bin along with Selena’s, if she was trying to take suspicion off her lot? Or if she was trying to frame Selena, why not leave both phones behind her bed? There’s no reason why she’d want to do different things with the two phones. Holly’s out.” A couple of hours too late. We had Mackey for an enemy now, not an ally.
Conway thought that through for two fast steps, gave it the nod. “Rebecca. All on her ownio.”
I thought of that triple creature, still and watching. All on her ownio seemed like the wrong words.
Conway said, “We still don’t have enough on her. It’s all circumstantial, and the prosecutors don’t like that. Specially when it’s a kid. Extra-specially when it’s a little rich kid.”
“It’s circumstantial, but there’s a load of it. Rebecca had plenty of reasons to be pissed off with Chris. She was able to get out at night. She was seen with the weapon the day before the murder. She’s one of the only two people who could’ve put Chris’s phone where it was found—”
“If you believe a dozen stories from half a dozen other teenage girls who’ve all lied their little arses off to us. A decent defense barrister’ll have reasonable doubt all over it inside five minutes. Plenty of girls had better reasons to be pissed off with Chris. Seven others could get out at night, and that’s just the ones we know about; how do we prove no one else had found out where Joanne kept her key? Chris’s phone: Rebecca or Selena could’ve found it wherever the killer dumped it, stashed it behind the bed while they worked out what to do with it.”
“So what was Rebecca doing messing about with the murder weapon?”
“Gemma made that up. Or Rebecca was there to buy drugs. Or she actually was into gardening. Pick your favorite.” Conway’s stride was lengthening. By now I knew that was frustration. “Or she was scouting for Julia, or Selena, or Holly. We know they’re out, but we’ve got nothing solid to prove it. Which means we’ve got nothing solid that proves Rebecca.”
I said, “We need a confession.”
“Yeah, that’d be great. You go pick us up one of those. Get next week’s Lotto numbers, while you’re at it.”
I ignored that. “Here’s what I’ve spotted about Rebecca: she’s not scared. And she should be. Her situation, anyone but an idiot would be petrified, and she’s no idiot. But she’s still not scared of us.”
“So?”
“So she must think she’s safe.”
Conway shoved a branch out of her face. “She fucking is, unless we come up with something amazing.”
I said, “Tell you the one time I’ve seen her scared. In the common room, when everyone was losing the head about the ghost. We were so busy with Alison, we paid no attention to Rebecca, but she was terrified. We don’t scare her; doesn’t matter what we throw at her, evidence, witnesses, it won’t shake her. Chris’s ghost does.”
“So what? You wanna dress up in a sheet and wave your arms at her from behind a tree? Because I swear to God, I’m almost that desperate.”
I said, “I just want to talk to her about the ghost. Just talk to her. See where it goes.”
It had hit me while I was on the grass with Joanne’s lot: every girl in that common room had thought Chris was there specially for her. Rebecca had known it.
That made Conway glance my way. She said, “Thin ice.”
If the ghost got something out of Rebecca, we were in for a fight, down the line. The defense would scream coercion, intimidation, scream about no appropriate adult present, try to get whatever she said ruled inadmissible. We would argue exigent circumstances: we needed to get Rebecca out of there, that night. Might work, might not.
If we didn’t get something now, we were getting nothing, ever.
I said, “I’ll be careful.”
“OK,” Conway said. “Go for it. Fuck knows I’ve got nothing better.”
I knew the raw-scraped sound in her voice by now. Knew better than to try and soothe it. “Thanks,” I said.
“Yeah.”
Around the bend in the path, in under the trees—it felt like a drop into nothing, that step into the streaked black—and I smelled smoke. Could’ve been schoolgirl boldness, but I knew.
Mackey, leaning against a tree, all shoulder-slope and crossed ankles. “Nice night for it,” he said.
We braked like kids caught snogging. I went red. Felt him see it through the dark, amused.
“Good to see you two crazy kids sorted out your problems. I wondered if you might. Been having fun?”
Behind his shoulder, the hyacinth bed. The flowers glowed blue-white like they were lit from inside. Behind that, up the slope, Selena and Rebecca had their heads bent close. Mackey was guarding them.
Conway said, “We’d like you to go inside and stay with your daughter. We’ll be with you as soon as we can.”
Cigarette caught between his knuckles, looked like the ember was blooming deep inside his black fist. He said, “It’s been a long day. And these girls, in fairness to them, they’re only kids. They’re shattered, stressed-out, all the rest. Not trying to teach you two your job—God forbid—but I’m just saying: I wouldn’t put too much stock in anything you get out of them at this point. A jury wouldn’t.”
I said, “We don’t suspect Holly of the murder.”
“No? That’s nice to know.”
Smoke curling through the stripes of moonlight. He didn’t believe me.
“We’ve got new information,” Conway said. “It points away from Holly.”
“Well done. And in the morning, you can go galloping off wherever that information takes you. Now it’s time to go home. Stop in the pub on the way, get yourselves a nice pint to celebrate the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
Behind him, a shadow slipped out of the trees, fitted itself into place beside Selena. Julia.
Conway said, “We’re not done here yet.”
“Yes, Detective. You are.”
Gentle voice, but the glint of his eyes. Mackey meant it. “I’ve been picking up some information of my own. Three lovely girls saw me wandering around looking for you two, and they called me over.” That dark hand with the burning core, lifting to point at me. “Detective Moran. You’ve been a bad boy.”
Conway said, “If anyone’s got a problem with Detective Moran, they need to take it to his superintendent. Not to you.”
“Ah, but they’ve come to me now. I think I can convince them that Detective Moran didn’t actually try to seduce their irresistible selves, and that one of them—blond, skinny, no eyebrows?—didn’t actually feel her virtue was in imminent danger. But you’re going to need to get out of my way and let me do it in peace. Is that clear?”
I said, “I can look after myself. Thanks all the same.”
“I wish I agreed with you, kid. I really do.”
“If I’m wrong, it’s not your problem. And who we talk to isn’t your call.”
The words felt strange and strong, rising out of me, strong as trees. Conway’s shoulder was against mine, level and solid.
Lift of Mackey’s eyebrow, in a stripe of light. “Oo, get you. Did you grow those yourself, or did you borrow them off your new pal?”
“Mr. Mackey,” Conway said. “Let me explain to you what’s going to happen now. Detective Moran’s going to talk to these three girls. I’m going to observe, with my mouth shut. If you think you can manage the same, feel free. If you can’t, then fuck off and leave us to it.”
The eyebrow stayed up. To me: “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
About Conway, about what Joanne could do, about what he would do. He was right, on every one of them. And—what a guy—he was giving me one last chance, for old times’ sake, to play nice.
“I won’t,” I said. “Word of honor, man: I’d never claim that.”
Quick sniff of laughter from Conway. Then the two of us turned our backs on Mackey and moved through the miasma of hyacinths, up the slope towards the glade.
Under the cypresses Conway stopped. I heard Mackey’s long leisurely stride catch up with her, felt her stretch out an arm: far enough.
He stopped because he’d been going to anyway. If anything led even an inch towards Holly, Conway wouldn’t be able to hold him back.
I stepped out into the clearing and stood in front of those three girls.
The moon stripped my face bare to them. It turned them black-invisible, blazed their outline like a great white rune written on the air. Joanne and her lot were danger, bad danger. They were nothing compared to this.
I cleared my throat. They didn’t move.
I said, “Do yous not have to head indoors for lights-out, no?”
My voice came out weak, a limp thread. One of them said, “We’ll go in a minute.”
“Right. Grand. I just wanted to say . . .” Foot to foot, rustling in the long grass. “Thanks for all your help. It’s been great. Really made a difference.”
A voice asked, “Where’s Holly?”
“She’s inside.”
“Why?”
I twisted. “She’s a bit shaken up. I mean, she’s grand, but that thing back in the common room, with the . . . you know. Chris’s ghost.”
Julia’s voice said, “There wasn’t any ghost. That was just people looking for attention.”
A shift, under the curves of that rune sign. Selena’s voice said softly, “I saw him.”
Another movement, quicker and cut off. Julia had elbowed Selena, kicked her, something.
I asked, “Rebecca? How about you?”
After a moment, from inside the dark: “I saw him.”
“Yeah? What was he doing?”
Another ripple through that rune, changed the meaning in subtle ways I couldn’t read.
“He was talking. Fast, like jabbering; like, he never stopped to breathe. I guess he doesn’t need to.”
“What was he saying?”
“I couldn’t tell. I was trying to read his lips, but he was going too fast. One time he . . .” Rebecca’s voice split on a shiver. “He laughed.”
“Could you tell who he was talking to?”
Silence. Then—so soft, I would’ve missed it, only my ears were wide open as an animal’s—“To me.”
A tiny catch of breath, almost a gasp, from somewhere else in that condensation of darkness.
I asked, “Why you?”
“I told you. I couldn’t hear.”
“This morning you said you and Chris weren’t close.”
“We weren’t.”
“So it’s not like he misses you so much, he had to come back and tell you that.”
Nothing.
“Rebecca.”
“Probably not. I guess. I don’t know.”
“Not like he was secretly in love with you, no?”
“No!”
I said, “You know how you looked, in there? Scared. Like, really scared.”
“I saw a ghost. You’d be scared too.”
The raw flick of defiance: she didn’t sound like a mystery now, not like a danger. Sounded like a kid, just a teenage kid. The power was seeping out of her; fear was seeping in.
Julia said, “Don’t talk to him any more.”
I said, “Did you think he was going to hurt you?”
“How would I know?”
“Becs. Shut up.”
No way to tell if Julia was just wary, or if she was starting to understand. “But,” I said, fast, “but Rebecca, I thought you liked Chris. You told us he was sound. Was that a lie? He was actually a dickhead?”
“No. He wasn’t. He was kind.”
That flare of defiance again, hotter. This mattered to her.
I shrugged. “Everything we’ve learned, he sounds like a dickhead. He used girls for whatever he could get, dumped them as soon as he wasn’t getting it. A real prize.”
“No. Colm’s is full of those—they don’t care what they wreck, they’ll do anything to anyone as long as they get what they want. I know the difference. Chris wasn’t like that.”
The white outline moved. Things rising up underneath it, bubbling.
Rebecca felt them. She said, “I know the stuff he did. Obviously I know he wasn’t perfect. But he wasn’t like the rest of them.”
A raw choke that could have been a laugh, out of Julia.
“Lenie. He wasn’t. Was he?”
Selena moved. She said, “He was a lot of things.”
“Lenie.”
They had forgotten me. Selena said, “He wanted not to be like them. He tried really hard. I don’t know how much it worked.”
“It did.” Rebecca’s voice was spiraling towards panic. “It worked.”
That ugly twist of sound again, from Julia.
“It did. It did.”
Something crunched behind me, a branch whipped. Something was happening. I couldn’t tell what, couldn’t afford to turn. Had to trust Conway and keep going.
I said, “So how come you were scared of his ghost? Why would it want to hurt you, if Chris never would’ve?”
Julia said, “Specially since it’s not fucking real. Becca? Hello? They made you imagine it like some Omen thing. If you decide to imagine it as a purple turtle instead, then that’s what you’ll see. Hello?”
“Hello yourself, I saw him—”
“Rebecca. Why would it want to hurt you?”
“Because ghosts are angry. You guys said that, remember? This afternoon.” But the panic was taking up more and more of Rebecca’s voice. “And anyway, he didn’t hurt me.”
I said, “This time he didn’t. What about next time?”
“Who says there’ll be a next time?”
“I do. Chris had something to say to you, something he wants from you, and he didn’t get through. He’ll be back. Again and again, till he gets what he wants.”
“He won’t. It was because you were here, you got him all—”
“Selena,” I said. “You know he was there. You want to tell us whether you think he’ll be back?”
In the slow fall of silence, I heard something. Murmur of voices, away down at the bottom of the slope. A man. A girl.
Closer, in the cypresses behind me: a sound like the muted first breath of a roar. Conway, moving among the branches to cover the voices. “Selena,” I said. “Is Chris going to be back?”
Selena said, “He’s there the whole time. Even when I don’t see him, I can feel him. I hear him, like this humming noise right inside the backs of my ears, like when the telly’s on mute. All the time.”
I believed her. Believed every word. I said, heard the hoarse note in my voice, “What does he want?”
“At first I was sure he was looking for me. Oh God I tried so hard but I could never make him see me, he never heard me, I was begging him Chris I’m here I’m right here but he just looked right past me and kept doing whatever he was doing, I tried to hold him but he just dissolved before I could—”
A high keening sound from Rebecca.
“I thought it was because we weren’t allowed, like punishment, always looking for each other but we’d never be allowed to—But it’s because it isn’t me he wants. All that time—”
Julia said, “Shut up.”
“All that time, he was never looking for—”
“Jesus Christ, can you shut up?”
Something like a sob, from Selena. Then nothing. The low roar among the cypresses wavered through the air and was gone, rock in a cold pool. The voices at the bottom of the slope sank with it.
Rebecca s
aid, in the empty space, “Lenie. What’s he want?”
Julia said, “Can we please fucking please talk about it later?”
“Why? I’m not scared of him.” Me.
“Then duh, start paying attention. He’s the only thing we need to be scared of. There isn’t anything else. This ghost bullshit—”
“Lenie. What do you think he wants? Chris?”
“OhmyGod, he doesn’t fucking exist, what do I have to do—”
Kids fighting, they sounded like. That was all. Not like Joanne’s lot, cheap sneer-and-peck by numbers, every word and thought worn threadbare before it ever reached them, not that; but not the enchanted girls, soaring among tumbling arpeggios of gold, that I had come hoping for just that morning. What I had seen before, that triple power, that had been the last flicker of something lost a long time ago. Light from a dead star.
“Lenie. Lenie. Is it me he’s after?”
Selena said, “I wanted it to be me so much.”
The rune shimmered and crumpled. One fragment snapped off that solid dark mass, found a shape of its own: Rebecca. Sliver-thin, kneeling on the grass.
She said, to me: “I didn’t think it was going to be Chris.”
I said, “The ghost?”
Rebecca shook her head. She said, simply, “No, when I texted him to meet me here. I didn’t know who it was going to be. I’d’ve bet anything it wouldn’t be Chris.”
“Oh, Becs,” Julia said. She sounded folded over a gut-punch. “Oh, Becs.”
In the cypress shadow behind me, Conway said, “You are not obliged to say anything unless you wish to do so, but anything you do say will be taken down in writing and may be used in evidence. Do you understand?”
Rebecca nodded. She looked frozen to the bones, too cold even to shiver.
I said, “So when you got here that night, you were expecting to meet one of the dickheads.”
“Yeah. Andrew Moore, maybe.”
“When you saw Chris, you didn’t have second thoughts, no?”
Rebecca said, “You don’t understand. It wasn’t like that. I wasn’t trying to figure it out, ‘Oh am I right am I wrong what should I do?’ I knew.”