The Silent Dead (Paula Maguire 3) (30 page)

Flaherty spoke again, wearily. ‘Leave it now, girl. It’s too late.’

Lorcan seized Flaherty’s wrists and pulled the cuffs. They fell away easily, clattering to the floor. ‘All this time?’ Lorcan was in disbelief. ‘Why didn’t you fight back?’

‘I gave my word.’ The contempt sounded in Flaherty’s voice. ‘As did you. Not to take anyone who didn’t deserve it. And you’ve brought this woman here all the same.’

‘You can say that? You?’

‘Aye. Because I know what it’s like to have your soul burned out. You wanted to kill – well, this is how it is, son. Every time you kill you put the knife in yourself too. Think on that. Now finish it.’ He looked at Dominic, who was holding the gun. ‘Finish me. I’ve had enough of this. I’m dying anyway, and I’ve done my piece, so let me go.’

Kira was moving towards him. ‘Mr – I . . .’

Flaherty looked at her, his eyes almost kind. ‘You started it, wee girl. This is how it ends.’

‘But I didn’t know – I never thought this would happen . . .’

‘Unforeseen escalation,’ said Flaherty. Kira was crying. He shut his eyes. ‘Finish it, man, for God’s sake. You promised.’

Dominic had the gun trained on him, but his arm shook and Paula saw it in his eyes –
he can’t do it.
‘Look, maybe we should just . . .’

Then Lorcan was behind Paula, squeezing her neck with his arm. ‘This doesn’t end here. Not like this.’

Paula tried to buckle, kick back with her booted feet, but he was strong, much stronger than she’d imagined, and she was so weak from her stitches, and he didn’t even flinch. His breath was in her ear, his smell of panicky sweat reeking from under the aftershave, and she couldn’t believe she’d ever thought him attractive.

‘Lorcan,’ said Dominic quietly. ‘What are you doing?’

‘I won’t go to prison. Not when those animals got away with it. She said we can sort it out. You know what that means. She’s going to shop us.’

The pressure on Paula’s windpipe increased. She gasped. She thought of Maggie, Maggie in her cot, clutching her fists, eyes jewel-bright. She thought of Guy watching her feed and Aidan holding the baby in his arms. A thousand futures began to spin away. This wasn’t how it ended.

Dominic was trying to keep his voice calm. ‘I trust Dr Maguire. She’s known loss. She’ll help us. We can stick to the plan, stage a shoot-out like you said.’

‘I don’t believe you.’ He tightened his grip. Paula felt a tattoo of panic release into her blood –
he isn’t stopping. Oh God, he means this.

‘Lorcan!’ Lily screamed. ‘You’re hurting her! For God’s sake, Dominic, do something!’

With her fading vision, Paula looked to the man with the gun for help, and saw he was just as helpless as her.

She wasn’t sure what happened next. There was a loud noise, and she felt Lorcan sag and release her, and she fell to her knees, panting. When she looked up Flaherty was somehow holding the gun. Lily was screaming on and on. Flaherty held the gun to his own chin. ‘No –’ Kira said, swallowing it down into a cry. She was standing in front of the terrorist. ‘Stop, I take it back.’

‘You can’t take things back, girl,’ said Flaherty. ‘That’s what I kept trying to tell you. Do you feel you’ve got justice now for your Rose?’

‘No . . . I didn’t mean . . . this wasn’t . . .’

‘God bless you, child. None of this was your fault.’ And he fired.

The whole thing took seconds, the space in between heartbeats. She blinked and Lorcan was on the floor slumped against her legs, clearly dead. Blood seeped from the perfect black hole in his forehead – Flaherty, the expert marksman, had not missed his target. Her throat was raw and bruised. Flaherty had fallen to the ground, and Kira was scrabbling at his bloody throat. ‘I killed him.’ Her voice was empty with shock. ‘I killed him. It was me. It was all my idea.’

Lily’s screaming had become a background drone. Dominic was frozen. After what seemed like hours he gave a shuddering sigh and took a phone from his pocket. He wiped blood from it – Flaherty’s had sodden him – and handed it to Paula. ‘It’s up to you. I don’t know any more. I don’t what we’re doing. Lorcan – he had you – all I could see was your baby.’ His hands were bloody, and when he raked them over his face he looked as he had on the day of the bomb five years before, staggering up to find his child’s dead body beneath him. ‘He had you and I did nothing – I couldn’t shoot.’

It was a cheap phone, disposable. Paula looked at the number he’d keyed in. ‘Dominic – I—’

‘I know. Do what you have to.’ He bent to Kira, who was also as covered in blood as she’d been after the bomb. She was cradling the dead terrorist in the same way she’d held her sister – her mother – on the day of the bombing, howling and wailing. Lily was the only one not blood-soaked, and she was keening, rocking herself in a corner. Dominic lifted Kira to her feet, half carrying her, and put out his hand to the other girl. ‘It’s over. Come on, Lily, love. It’s over.’

She crept to him, dazed as a child. ‘What will happen now?’ She averted her eyes from all three dead bodies.

‘Dr Maguire is going to ring someone to get us.’

‘OK.’ Lily was shaking. ‘Can we go home? I want to see my mum.’

‘Yes, pet. It’s over.’ He met Paula’s eyes over Lily’s smooth head, and nodded. She looked down at the phone. Plastic, cheap, the same as the one meant to trigger the bombs, setting off so many shockwaves that they were still detonating. It seemed crazy that such a little button, pressed in the space of a heartbeat, could bring down a mountain, topple onto you, rebound back and keep on rolling until nothing stayed standing. She thought about what Guy had said – how you could lose your ability to judge, to say who was right and who was wrong, and that was why we had the law, so we didn’t have to make those choices ourselves, in all our human weakness and pain. She looked at Flaherty. The terrorist’s face seemed strangely at peace. From the way the gun had torn his mouth, he could almost have been smiling.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said – she wasn’t sure who to – and she pressed the button.

Epilogue

‘What will happen to her?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Guy. They were watching Kira Woods through the window of the hospital room where she was currently in bed, looking tiny amid the medical equipment. An officer was posted just inside the door. ‘I’ve sent for a juvenile liaison officer. She really planned the whole thing?’

‘It seems so. She was the one convinced Kenny to help them, and Flaherty to bring the others in, make amends. Or at least what he thought amounted to that. I don’t think she had any idea Finney was planning to kill them all. I don’t think the other families knew what was going on – or at least not enough. Maybe they let it happen, turned a blind eye.’

‘You were very lucky.’

She knew he was looking at her, but she couldn’t bear his gaze. ‘I’m fine.’

‘You need to get yourself checked out. Finney choked you, you said.’

‘A bit. What will happen to Corry?’

As soon as Paula had broken the news, Corry had confessed to her relationship with Finney, who had been able to derail the investigation from within and leak information to the press. Guy winced. ‘I don’t know. There’ll be a standards hearing to see just how far her misconduct went.’

‘It’s not fair. She couldn’t have known. No one knew who he was.’

‘Still, it could have been a lot worse. Are you sure you’re OK?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why don’t you tell me before you run off and do these things? There’s Maggie to think of now.’

Paula bit her tongue. She remembered Corry’s words about the unit possibly closing – what was Guy not telling her? ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’ll get myself checked out. Since you’re so concerned.’

As she turned she saw a young man had approached. He was dressed in oil-stained overalls and his face was with raw with shaving over acne. ‘I . . . is Kira . . . is she OK?’

‘She’s fine, physically at least.’ Guy frowned at him. ‘Could I take your name, sir? We’re waiting for Mrs Woods to arrive and no one can see her until then.’

‘I’m . . .’ He was twisting a baseball cap in his nervous hands. ‘I’m Jamesie . . . James Carter.’

‘Are you some relation to Kira?’

‘Well, yeah. I’m her dad.’

Aidan sighed. ‘Bit sick of this, Maguire. Seeing you in a hospital bed, I mean.’

‘I’m just sitting on it this time.’ She pointed to it. ‘It’s only a bruised neck, I’m fine.’

After Maggie had been fed, PJ and Pat had taken her to the canteen, perhaps tactfully giving Aidan and Paula a bit of space.

‘A man tried to strangle you. You asked me for help and I wouldn’t give it.’ He shuddered. ‘It’s only a miracle you didn’t take the wee one with you. Christ. Doesn’t bear thinking about.’

‘Well, I did tell you to fuck off.’

‘Not for the first time. But I deserved it.’

‘Maybe.’

‘What about wee Maggie?’

‘Oh for God’s sake . . . I don’t have to listen to you pontificate. It wasn’t my fault – the girl tricked me, OK?’ She wondered what they’d do with a thirteen-year-old girl who’d somehow masterminded the kidnap and murder of five hardened terrorists. Dominic was doing his best to take the blame, but with Lorcan dead and clearly the leak they’d been looking for, she thought he’d probably get away with Accessory to Murder. Either way, Lily wouldn’t be seeing him for a while. She might get away with it herself, though she’d obviously been involved. Paula wondered if it had made things any better, taking their retribution.

‘Woah now.’ Aidan held up both palms. ‘I’m not a, whatever you said, misogynistic dinosaur from the dark ages. Incidentally, they didn’t have dinosaurs in the dark ages. I’m not going to say you can’t work because you’ve a child and you’re a woman. But Maguire, you’re all that wee girl has. She has no da. And you of all people know what it’s like when you’ve only the one parent to depend on.’

‘So you’re saying I need to get the DNA test, is that it? And a father will magically appear for her? Cos it’s that simple.’

‘Jesus, Maguire. You’re a terrible woman for jumping ahead in rows. I’m on my best behaviour here. George Mitchell and his peacekeeping team have nothing on me. Did I say anything about a test?’

‘Fine, fine,’ she said grouchily. ‘Just make your point. As you say, Maggie has no one else, so I have to get back to her.’ The several hours she’d been gone from her that morning had seemed like forever.

‘What if she did have someone else?’

‘Who?’ She said it casually, but her heart began to beat.

‘This fella Brooking – he’s not such a bad being, I’ll admit. He does his best. He was frantic when they realised you hadn’t made it home from the hospital. But he has a wife, yes?’

‘I don’t know what’s happening with them. They were splitting up, I thought.’

‘For now, though, there’s a wife, and a kid, am I right?’

‘She’s sixteen.’

‘Maguire . . .’

‘Yes, yes, Guy is married, OK? I didn’t exactly plan all this.’

‘Never mind. He can’t be there for you, that’s my point. But there’s me, Maguire. I’m unwed.’

She looked away. ‘You’re seeing Maeve, though, aren’t you?’

‘Maeve? Maeve Cooley?’

‘Yes, Maeve who was lying upstairs there in the ICU, whose bedside you’ve hardly left in weeks. You were in her bedroom in your pants, that time in Dublin. Don’t pretend you don’t remember. I’m not stupid.’

‘Ah Maguire.’ Aidan began to laugh heartily, leaning on his knees. ‘Me and Maeve?’

‘Is it so unlikely? I saw you, Aidan. I saw how upset you were when she got hurt.’

‘And here’s me thinking you were observant, Maguire. I love Maeve, right enough, but like a sister. That woman who was there at the ICU, giving out to you about your phone?’

‘Yeah?’ He meant the one with the dark bob. Some friend, she’d assumed.

‘Maeve’s girlfriend. Sinead. Nice girl, you’d like her.’

‘Oh.’ Paula thought about this, things fell into place.
Oh
.

‘So I’m not with Maeve, or anyone, and you’re not with Brooking, nor are you likely to be any time soon.’

‘What exactly is your point?’ She folded her arms huffily.

‘You. Me. How about it? Get the old band back together.’

‘You want me to go out with you? Again? After everything?’ She was gaping. ‘Jesus, Aidan, you’re mad.’

‘Am I? Anyway, that’s not what I mean. We’re not eighteen this time. I don’t want you to “go steady” with me.’

‘So?’

‘Thought we could do better this time. I want you to marry me.’

She just stared at him. ‘Fucking hell. You’ve lost it. I better call a psych consult.’

He took her hand, which was lying limp on the bed, and she let him, still in disbelief. His was rough and warm, inkstains on the knuckles. ‘I mean it. Don’t do a paternity test. Forget about all that bollocks. Just marry me. I’ll be Maggie’s da – honest. I don’t care whose she is. We’re family anyway, you and me. We should be there for each other. Especially if you keep doing mad things. I want to be there for you, and for her. What do you say, Maguire? Will you marry me?’

A jingle of the curtains announced three new arrivals into the cubicle – PJ, Pat, and baby Maggie, held in Aidan’s mother’s arms.

‘Are we interrupting?’ said Pat, looking between the two of them.

Kira

She was surprised by how little Rose’s grave had changed over time. Someone else had been looking after it – Mammy, probably, though they hadn’t talked about it. Someone had put daffodils in the jar, fresh and yellow, the colour of hope, and cut the grass. Otherwise it was all the same, the black granite stone, the wind through the trees, the quiet of the place. Kira walked a few steps and then dropped onto her knees. She’d get grass stains on her jeans but she didn’t care.

‘Hi,’ she said out loud. ‘I’m sorry I haven’t been for a long time. I’ve been . . . away.’

She didn’t tell the truth, but she felt Rose would know anyway. Maybe she’d even been watching over Kira in the young offender place, with all the angry girls, scars up their arms, bruises under their eyes. It had been a year now and Kira was out. Ready to get on with her life, whatever that meant. Lily was still in the women’s prison, though she’d get out in another year. Dominic had been sent to jail for a long time, but Kira thought in some weird way he was glad. There was no one outside he really wanted to see now his little girl was dead. Ann had managed to get off without prison, since she hadn’t been there at the end, and Liam had been inside for six months. No one else had really known what they’d planned, or if they had, they were dead. So many other graves to visit after this – John, and the new memorial in town, and even Lorcan deserved a visit from someone, she thought, though no one else wanted to mention his name.

She heard the breeze through the leaves, like a soft whisper, like a hand across her forehead. ‘I’m all right,’ she told Rose. ‘Mammy’s better, and there’s Jamesie . . . I’ve been spending time with him. I think that’s what you wanted, isn’t it? He says I should call him Dad.’

No answer. She had stopped expecting one, and maybe that was right. She stood up, resting her hand on the cool stone of the grave.
Rose Sarah Woods. 1983–2006. Beloved sister and daughter.
Beloved mother, it should read, but it didn’t matter. Everyone important knew the truth. She knew. Jamesie knew. And Rose, wherever she was, Rose knew too. ‘Goodbye,’ said Kira softly. ‘I hope that you’re all right. And maybe . . . maybe I’ll see you again.’

A bird sounded again in the tree, sweet, out of sight. Kira smiled, and turned to go back to the car where Jamesie was waiting for her. She shut the gate to the graveyard with a squeak, and she didn’t look back.