by Caz Frear
“Ah, they won’t bother with me. Knives and guns is all they care about.” Translation: a good old-fashioned beating isn’t worth the paperwork. “One of the nurses, Keeley, was telling me . . .”
“First-name terms already. Good work, Dad. Glad to see ‘Ange’ isn’t cramping your style.”
I can no sooner stop myself baiting this man than I can stop myself loving him. I’ve been doing both for so long, I don’t know who I’d be if I stopped.
“Christ, not now, Cat.” He sounds tired and defeated. Tired from the day’s drama and tired of mine, my incessant needling. “Ange was a bloody angel today. She doesn’t deserve your . . . your . . .”
“My what?”
“Your pettiness. Either be happy for me or say nothing, OK?”
“Nothing sounds fine.”
He shrugs, wincing again. “Anyway, as I was saying, the nurse said they had three stabbings and one gunshot wound on Saturday night alone.” He points at himself. “Seriously, they’ll be happy to turn a blind eye to this.”
“And does that mean I have to?”
That gets a laugh. “And what are you going to do? Arrest them? Go all Charles Bronson? I wouldn’t waste your time, sweetheart. It’s not a bad break and the rib pain will pass. A bit of sympathy and a couple of aspirin and I’ll be grand.”
I sit at the side of the bed; Dad’s good arm side. “It must have been bad for you to come here. I was there that night you were stabbed, remember?” Paddy’s Day, 1999. Dad bleeding onto the carpet, Mum screaming that she cursed the day she ever met him. “You called Dennis Foley—a frigging vet—rather than come to the hospital.”
“You remember that?” He looks at a point past my head, eyes reddening. “Christ, what sort of a father am I? I wish you only had happy memories.”
And I do, a whole warehouse of them. Parties, presents, pancakes on a Saturday morning. Singalongs in the pub, long after any normal child’s bedtime. Sweets after mass—sometimes even popping candy if Mum’s eye was off the ball.
And then Dad met Maryanne and it wrecked everything.
“Ah, don’t worry about it,” I say flippantly. “Jacqui’s got enough false happy memories to last us all a lifetime.” I take the apple out of my bag—the bruised pear’s past saving. “She got you this, by the way. Hungry?”
“An apple?” He points at his jaw. “With this?”
“Can I have it then?” I take a bite, not waiting for the answer.
“She misses you, you know, Cat. I get why you can’t be around me so much, not now, but there’s no need to lose Jacqui too.” The implication he’s lost to me burns my eyes, blurring my vision. “She’s got this floristry competition next month—she was just telling me about it, she’s really excited—and she’s desperate to invite you, but she knows you’ll say no.”
Dad and Jacqui, splashing about in the shallow end of conversation: floristry, X-ray results, oatmeal stouts, Finn.
Me and Dad, it’s always straight into the deep end. One reckless plunge and we’re off. No topic too toxic. No pain left unexplored.
“It’s because of the lad, isn’t it? Aiden.” Talking of painful topics. “You can’t hide him from her forever. Not if it’s the real thing.”
“So what do you suggest? I bring him round to Jacqui’s for her famous beef and Guinness stew, and then she says, ‘Aiden Doyle? Wasn’t that the name of the lad who lived near Gran’s place, you know the one? His sister went missing while we were on holiday. Come to think of it, you look a bit like him . . .’ Yeah, that’s really going to work, Dad.”
“Then you’re going to have to pick a team at some point.”
I swipe the thought away. “At some point, yeah. But for now, Jacqui’s too busy with her own life to worry about mine. And that suits me just fine.”
“I worry about you.”
“Says the guy with his arm in a sling and a chest like a punching bag.” I take another bite of the apple, looking him over, the different shades of skin. “So is this it now? Frank Hickey pisses someone off and you pay the price? A beating every few months. Maybe a stabbing or a shooting every now and again and just hope they miss the vital organs?”
He says nothing, but I’m not letting up. “Jacqui said Frank was here earlier. Good of him to drop by. I don’t remember him bothering that time you had pneumonia.”
“It was good of him. He’s a good friend.”
I laugh sharply. “Oh, he’s the best, Dad, the absolute best. So good he threatened to make sure my boss and Aiden found out about Maryanne unless I fed him information.” I lower my voice. “Information that could get people killed. Is that what good friends do? Blackmail each other’s kids? Threaten to ruin their lives?”
“And he backed off as soon as I told him to.”
“Told him to,” I scoff. “As soon as you gave him a better offer, you mean. His right-hand man, his blood brother, back in the firm, under his thumb—he wasn’t going to turn that down, was he?” I pause, pretending to work something out. “Remind me, Dad, how long did you actually manage to go straight for? Eighteen months? Two years?”
He has my wrist before I blink. “You need to wise the fuck up, sweetheart.” And there it is—doting father to snarling villain. Dad could always turn on a sixpence. “You wanted Frank off your back and he wanted me back in the fold, so we made an agreement and he’s honored it. Now get off your high horse and stop acting like an ungrateful little bitch.”
My eyes swoop over his bruised body. “I didn’t want this. And get off, you’re hurting me.”
“I’m sorry . . . I’m . . .” His grip loosens. He stares at his hand, at my wrist, dazed by his own aggression. “I’m so sorry . . . but you have to understand, this was the only way I could stop him, the only way I could protect you. This is the life I lead now. And if you work for Frank Hickey, you’re going to upset some people along the way. Sometimes you’ll come off better and sometimes you’ll come off worse. End of story. No drama.”
Just par for the course. An industrial accident of sorts.
“What was it you thought I’d do, Cat?”
Even with the circus of sound behind the curtain—the shouts, the moans, the endless pairs of shoes scuffing across floors—right now, there’s only us. Me, him, and the ever-present specter of guilt.
“Did you think I’d just say, ‘Ah now, Frank, would you leave the young one alone? Don’t be threatening her, it’s not nice,’ and he’d listen?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“So what did you think . . . how did you think . . . ?”
Unfinished questions clog the air, a dense mist of noxious gas.
So did I want Frank Hickey dead?
Yeah, I’m not ashamed to admit I did.
I wanted him falling off a ladder, struck by lightning, maybe floored by a fatal bout of dysentery. I’d have even settled for a peaceful passing in his bed, surrounded by the acolytes he calls family, if it meant never having to fear what he could unleash ever again.
But did I want Dad to kill him?
I’m a police officer.
Of course not.
It’s late when I get to Aiden’s. Too late to eat the plate of picnic food he’s left in the fridge, covered in tinfoil—a scrap of paper on top, speared with a cocktail stick.
You’d test the patience of a saint, Kinsella.
Not too late for an argument, though.
“Since when have you been a heavy sleeper? I rang the bell five times.” There’s accusation in my voice, a cherry tomato in my hand. “What did you double-lock the door for?”
He’s standing in the hallway, rubbing sleep out of his left eye and looking like everything I ever wanted in a pair of white Calvin Kleins.
“It got so late, I didn’t think you were coming back here. I mean, you wouldn’t know if the mighty detective was going to grace you with her presence or not.”
“You’ve been graced nearly every night for the past month. It’d have been a fair assumption.”
“Yeah, your furnace of a flat isn’t much fun in a heat wave, is it? Having to leave all the windows open, getting eaten alive by mosquitoes. Much cooler—more convenient—to crash here.”
I give him a flat stare. “Oh, because that’s the only reason I stay. I’m only after you for your floor fan.”
“OK, truth?” he says, his look a little haughty. It’s a look he doesn’t carry well; Aiden’s the living antonym of haughty. “I locked the door to piss you off, plain and simple. Was that petty of me? Yeah. Does it make me feel two percent better? Hell, yeah.” He steps into the half-light of the living room. “So come on then, eyes down for a full house—Cat Kinsella Excuse Bingo. What was it tonight? Bad reception? Battery died? Too many Bad Guys to nail to spare a thought for the Good Guy at home, waiting for one lousy update?” He shakes his head. Disgust would be too strong a word, despair its closest ally. “Seriously, Cat—‘Sorry, can’t make picnic’ and then nothing? That’s lame, even for you.”
I know I deserve it but his anger still stings. I’m not used to this version. Not familiar with the hard lines of his face. I pause, buying time, eating the tomato and then poking my tongue into a filling I should have got sorted months ago.
Should I say “work”—the catch-all excuse?
“My dad was in A&E. I had to stay with him. I’m really sorry.”
It’s out before I overthink it. Aiden bolts over, comfort always his primal response.
“Jesus, is he OK? What happened? Are you OK?”
I could tell him the truth. Aiden knows that Dad’s “dodgy.” He never presses beyond that description and I never expand on it, because “dodgy” I can live with. “Dodgy” is benign. An almost comic interpretation. It’s geezers selling gold chains in pub car parks. It’s not paying the VAT. Dishing out a few slaps for an unpaid debt. It doesn’t touch the sides of the stuff Dad’s been involved in. It doesn’t come close to the death of Aiden’s sister, Maryanne.
Not Dad’s doing, but arguably Dad’s fault.
“Broken arm. Beer barrel.” I tell him, toeing the party line.
“Ouch.”
A simple response and I love him for it. For not asking for details.
“Not to make this about me,” he says after a few seconds, instinctively knowing I’ll be only too happy to make it about him, the subject of Dad now closed, “did I ever tell you about the time I broke my arm? I was only five. I did it a few hours before the biggest match in Ireland’s history. Quarterfinals of the World Cup—Ireland v Italy. No one had a bit of sympathy for me. Dad had to drive me and Mam to the hospital in Castlebar and he’d had a feed of beer already—said if he got pulled over by the guards, he’d break the other arm and my two legs. And Mam was hopping mad about missing the game. Like, she could hardly look at me. Even the nurses seemed fecked off at having to work their shift.”
Five-year-old Aiden. If he’s this sweet-natured now, after all the childhood baggage of his disappearing sister, and all the crap that adulthood throws at everyone, he must have been a complete dote back then. A rush of tenderness ripples through me. I want to be back in that hospital, telling him it doesn’t matter about the game because he’s the most precious thing in the world. I want to make him laugh. Kiss it better.
And I guess it’s never too late.
“Which arm?” I ask, taking both his hands in mine.
He wiggles his left. “This one. Hairline fracture of the radius. There was nothing ‘hairline’ about the pain, I tell you. Mam reckoned they heard me screaming in Mogadishu.”
I kiss it better, then Aiden kisses me better. Those cushiony Doyle lips soothing away bones and Belmarsh and the bacteria of my family.
Eventually I pull away, exhaustion settling over. While Aiden fetches glasses of water, I walk into the bedroom and brush my teeth in the en suite, splashing my face, then smearing something called a “skin souffle” across my forehead, nose, and cheeks.
The bedroom’s cool, the fan whirring at breakneck speed.
“Here.”
Aiden hands me my water and, bladder be damned, I slug it down in three noisy gulps.
“So how’d you do it then?” I ask, wiping my mouth. “Your arm?”
I need more soothing before I sleep. I need a bedtime story, tales of the old country.
“Ah sure, acting the eijit, what else?” He sprawls back on the bed, arms flung the entire width. “Fell off a haystack in this oul fella’s field. A contrary old bastard called Pat Hannon.”
I laugh, a desperate cover for the fact that I remember Pat Hannon. I remember that field. Noel promising he’d buy me a Push Pop if I touched the electric fence for five seconds. Me like a gormless fool complying.
Dad telling Noel he’d “wipe him off the face of the earth” if he ever pulled a stunt like that again.
“I should have a shower, really,” I say, letting my new suit fall to the floor. “I got rained on this morning and burned alive this afternoon. Not good.”
He holds his nose, pulling a face. “Well, go on, then, stinker. But for the love of God, pull the cord afterward. You cost me a fortune in electricity.”
Lights, shower switches, hairdryers, phones. There’s no end to the list of things I apparently don’t turn off. Aiden says my only saving grace is the fact that I turn him on. That, and the fact he loves me. Unequivocally.
Naively.
“Ah no, I can’t be bothered.” I pointedly turn off the fan, taking a small bow. “Anyway, I had a shower this morning. We’re supposed to be saving water.”
“Top marks.” He pulls me onto the bed. “I’ll make a friend of the earth out of you yet.”
I nuzzle into him, enjoying a few minutes of closeness before we decamp to opposite sides of the bed—heat waves aren’t exactly great for your sex life. “So, we’re good, then?” I murmur. “You’re not in a mood with me about the picnic.” I have to check, despite his arms around me. Aiden’s moods are light and infrequent. So light, you’d hardly notice them at all if it wasn’t for the stream of kisses missing from his texts. “I mean, I haven’t properly explained about earlier—about the abrupt text, why I left you hanging. I was flustered, you see. I’d just come out of a meeting in prison, and I was miles from the hospital and I just wanted to get going because I didn’t know exactly what was happening. And then when I got to the hospital, I was wrapped up in Dad, and . . .”
He turns on his side to face me, his cheek smudged into his offensively soft pillow. “Jesus, take a breath, stress head. I’m not in a mood. Will you promise me something, though?”
“I’m gonna say yes.” I prod him on the nose. “Although it’s actually impossible to promise something until you know what you’re promising. Just saying.”
He ignores the technicality. “Promise me that whatever happens, if you have a meeting on the moon, or your dad’s decapitated in a freak chainsaw accident, you’ll make dinner with The Americans on Thursday.”
The Americans. A visit from Aiden’s Head Office that feels papal in scope.
I adopt a pompous tone. “I hereby swear on my honor and conscience that I, Catrina Anne Kinsella, will make dinner with The Americans on Thursday.”
“And you’ll laugh at their jokes and not go on too much about bloated bodies and severed feet?”
“They might like a bit of morgue chat.”
“Actually, Kyle, our Chief Ops guy, might. He’s a bit of a dark fucker. Did I ever tell you about the time he . . .”
I turn my back and curl into him, half-listening and “uh-huh-ing” periodically, but mainly trying, and failing, to imagine a life without this. Without us. No picnics in the fridge. No spooning in the bed. No laughing until I can’t breathe at his take on something utterly mundane that happened in the day.
Then again, no lies.
5
“Well, his arm’s still broken, if that’s what you mean?”
That’s been my stock response to “How’s your dad?” all morning, because while the team’s concer
n has been nothing short of lovely, on the freak-out scale, I’m a little north of ten. With just one fractured humerus, Dad’s gone from being someone I never talk about to everyone’s favorite topic of conversation. Advice doled out. Comparisons made. Even a full-scale reenactment of Ben Swaines thundering down the black run at St. Moritz, two French girls plowing into him and his wrist cracking in two places.
We’re only getting away with this, of course, because Steele’s “in with Blake”—a euphemism for “the shit’s hit the fan” and the main reason we’re all canceling weekend plans before we even know why his polished black brogues have deigned to grace our humble floor.
“Something’s up,” insists Parnell, buttering toast in our store-cupboard-cum-kitchen. “I haven’t heard her fake-laugh once, and she didn’t send out for pastries either.”
“Christ, if it’s not a pastry kind of catch-up, we’re definitely doomed.”
I’m not joking either.
I steal a slice of toast and take myself over to the incident board, where Christopher Masters stares back at me with dark, impassive eyes. There are two photos, actually: his official mug shot and a casual snap taken on holiday or just a sunny day out. Skinny white legs poking out of green cargo shorts. Pipe-cleaner arms. A jaunty thumbs-up to the camera.
A reminder that the worst monsters are real.
“Hard to believe all the fuss,” I say, taking in his middle-aged ordinariness. “He looks like a geography teacher on a field trip.”
“Not my geography teacher,” grins Swaines. “Miss Fenwick, or Jules once we got into sixth form. I’m telling you, Megan Fox wouldn’t have got a look in . . .”
The creak of Steele’s door brings a halt to Swaines’ drooling. Out she motors with Chief Superintendent Blake trailing behind. There might be a foot and £25K in salary between them, but for all his self-importance, Blake always looks nervous next to Steele. Like a teenager with his mum, waiting in the queue at parents’ evening.