When the Time Comes (ARC)

by Adele O'Neill

‘If you don’t leave Sarah, I’m going to pick you up myself and put you out.’

  ‘And it was so heroic of you to trek across town to check on your family – just a pity you got stranded in the snow too, eh?’

  ‘Sarah, you don’t know what you’re talking about.’ He choked back his annoyance, not knowing what she was going to say next. Surely Jenny hadn’t told her, they had agreed that no one should ever know and it wasn’t as though it had been planned, it had just happened.

  ‘Oh, did you think the problem had gone away… now that Jenny’s dead?’ she asked.

  ‘Stop it,’ Liam hissed. ‘There is no problem.’

  ‘Oh, so Alex knows about what you and Jenny did? How very liberal of you.’

  He had had a mix of feelings after the night he had spent at Oakley Drive last March. Mostly annoyed with himself for being unfaithful to Alex but partly content that he had got to spend one last night with his wife – especially when Jenny had described it as a last hurrah. It had been an intimate moment between two people who used to love each other. Their old emotions reignited by a concoction of circumstance, a shared history and an intimate familiarity. Maybe if he hadn’t helped her up the stairs, they wouldn’t have been in their old bedroom together. Maybe then he wouldn’t have helped her get undressed, maybe then he wouldn’t have spent the night with her.

  ‘Well, you know what they say, once a lying cheating scumbag…’ She pulled back the door, ‘you know how the rest goes, don’t you?’ She turned on her heel and glanced backwards at him. ‘Maybe now, Alex will get to feel how Jenny felt.’

  ‘You wouldn’t dare.’

  ‘Wouldn’t I?’ She pulled the front door behind her without wasting another second, hurried to her car and drove away.

  5.

  Louise ran her finger along the line of latte and cappuccino pods in the wooden box beside the new coffee machine. The way they looked like nutcracker soldiers in their dress uniforms made her smile momentarily. It was the perfect housewarming gift that Alex and Liam had given them a fortnight ago when they moved in. Even though, because of the pregnancy, she couldn’t enjoy the speciality coffees as much as she would have liked, she was looking forward to time when she could. ‘Are you ready for a coffee now?’ She’d walked to the bottom of the stairs and called to up to Kelly when she heard the shower end.

  In the hours since she had arrived back home, she had grabbed a quick sandwich with Kelly in the kitchen at noon, spoken to Alex and pored over her notes. She was looking for the barest nugget of information that might give her an inroad to putting some shape on the mystery that surrounded everything Liam Buckley had to tell her. There were reams of online information for her to sift through, transcripts of interviews that Jennifer Buckley had done about her right to die, pages of information on regulation and law when it came to euthanasia and case studies of assisted suicide in other jurisdictions. She hadn’t been able to get the Current Issues programme that Jennifer Buckley had appeared on, on playback but she had had her colleague request it from the station. When the digital file landed in her inbox, she positioned herself on the bed upstairs and watched it right through with her headphones on. It felt odd to see Jennifer Buckley in the flesh, so articulate and passionate.

  There was so much to consider, not least of which was how all of this, whatever way it turned out, was going to impact Alex. It was only a matter of time before the Inspector weighed in and removed her or sidestepped her because of the supposed conflict of interest, so she wanted to get as much done, discover as many facts as she possibly could, before that happened. She’d ring Alex again later to check on her, once she’d had a chance to fill Kelly in.

  ‘No thanks, I’ve just had one before my shower,’ Kelly called. ‘Anyway, if I’m going to be awake all night, I hope it’s not because of the coffee.’ He stood on the landing, looking down the stairs with one towel tucked around his waist and another in his hand to dry his hair. She smiled, shook her head and went back to the kitchen. The smell of paint had somewhat evaporated thanks to the windows having been wide open all day and there was a gentle lemony fresh whiff of bleach that Kelly had used when he was cleaning. It was lovely to come downstairs and see it all finished.

  ‘Impressive,’ she commented when Kelly arrived moments later on the threshold of the kitchen, pulling a T-shirt over his head and buckling up his jeans. ‘So all finished, I see.’ She smiled, glancing at his hands. The barest rim of grey paint still coated the half-moon of his cuticles matching the grey speckles in his wet, floppy hair. ‘You really weren’t joking when you said that you wanted to get everything done.’ Her hands skimmed across the pristine countertop.

  He bent towards her to kiss her briefly on her lips, a deliberately shrewd expression on his face. ‘No, I wasn’t. I was determined to finish it before you came back down the stairs because I knew that you’d want to do it yourself .’ He took her by the hand. ‘I know that you hate being treated any differently because of the pregnancy—’ he led her towards the sitting room as he was speaking, and lowered her onto the sofa ‘—but you look tired and I wanted you to have nothing to do when you were finished working upstairs.’

  ‘You even laid out the mat.’

  ‘I did.’ He lifted her right foot and placed it against his leg to undo her laces and take her runner off and drop it on the floor beside the sofa. ‘Other one.’ He tapped her leg and she replaced it with the other. ‘I know how stressful the job can be so you need a nice, clean, newly painted house to come home and relax in.’ He rubbed her socked feet and placed them back on the floor. ‘We both needed an evening where we can just sit and do nothing, get a Chinese maybe… I’ll drink for both of us.’ He placed his hand on her bump. ‘And we can finally relax.’

  ‘I like the sound of that.’ She had thought about dinner moments ago, but decided to have a coffee first and then check what Kelly might want to eat. She was tired, Kelly was right.

  ‘Grand,’ he said and retreated to the kitchen to grab her a menu. She didn’t need to look at it, she knew from memory what they would both like and dialled the number on her phone. ‘While we’re waiting for it, I’ll update you on the case I’m working on, I think I might need your help.’

  ‘That sounds interesting,’ he said, watching her eyes flicker across the room. ‘And before you go checking whether or not I’ve done everything right, everything has been done. I’ve dusted, washed, polished and even hoovered, so there is no need for you to get up from that sofa tonight at all.’

  ‘I see that.’ She curled her feet in under her on the sofa and leaned towards him. She had pulled on a black fleece over her work clothes earlier when she had gone upstairs. ‘Except for those two boxes over there.’ She pointed to boxes of books that Kelly had hauled from the landing to the sitting room the night before. She had deliberately not unpacked them.

  ‘I had to leave something for you to do, make you think that you have some use,’ he teased.

  She smiled. ‘That, and the fact that you didn’t know where to put them, more like. Do you really want to keep them all?’ she asked, checking if he was aware of what was in them.

  ‘Well no, not necessarily, but let’s leave it until tomorrow to sort out. I’m worried that tiredness, hunger and your propensity to be ruthless is not a good combination on this occasion.’ He raised his eyebrows and smiled down at her, running his fingers along the open neck of her fleece. ‘Except for the encyclopaedias,’ he added. ‘They’re the only deal breaker,’ he said. Her sense of humour sprinkled with a touch of sarcasm had been one of the things that had drawn him to her in the first place.

  ‘So you do know what’s in them,’ she mocked gently. ‘You don’t really want to keep them, do you?’ The significance of the Vintage Childcraft encyclopaedias was clearly understood. They had been taken from the house on Castle street in Kilkenny as though they were priceless heirlooms, and she knew how much he treasured them. They had taken his mother forty-eight weeks of insta
lments to own in the Sixties and Annie particularly loved taking them from the shelf on her visits to leaf through them. They were priceless to him.

  ‘The very ones,’ Kelly answered.

  ‘See, and you say that I don’t listen to you.’ Louise laughed. She loved the way he loved the books and there was no way that she would ever have let him part with them. In fact, the reason she hadn’t found a place for them on the bookshelf upstairs yesterday was because she had wanted to display them downstairs for all visitors to see. She kissed him gently on the lips. ‘And I want to get another nice bookshelf that will fit in that alcove space there, so we can put them out on show for everyone to see. That’s why I didn’t unpack them yesterday evening.’

  ‘Why am I not surprised that you had a plan after all? And there was me thinking that you’d slipped up.’

  ‘Have you met me?’ she asked. ‘But seriously though, I think it’s—’

  ‘If you say cute, the deal is off,’ he was quick to interject. ‘You can keep the ring, the house even the baby but the deal is off. I will not marry a girl, nor will I let her be the mother of my child if she says the word cute.’ He said half-joking.

  ‘So cute is another deal-breaker. So far then, that’s Vintage Childcraft and the word cute?’ She counted them on her fingers.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Got it.’

  ‘Cute is a deal-breaker, cute in all its forms should only ever be used in the context of female girls—’

  ‘As opposed to male girls?’ she interjected with an overly dramatic confused expression on her face.

  ‘Cute,’ he repeated, ‘should only be used in the context of female babies, I mean under the age of two and only when they’re smiling, or else the deal is off.’

  ‘Just as well then, that I was going to say that I think keeping those books and the way you look after them is…’ She paused for effect. ‘… admirable.’

  ‘Ooh, by the skin of your teeth, Kennedy, although a more astute retired detective might not believe you.’ He pushed himself upwards and shrugged. ‘Maybe I’ve lost my touch, not as clued in.’

  ‘Maybe you have,’ she replied, ‘but I do miss working on cases with you. I miss having you around the office… sort of,’ she added. The image of Liam Buckley’s files were flashing across her mind.

  ‘Well, that was something I didn’t think I’d hear Detective Sergeant Kennedy say – considering you banned me from calling in to your station.’

  ‘That was only until I found my feet, showed them how brilliant and capable I was on my own.’

  ‘They knew that about you before you transferred.’

  ‘Maybe,’ she dipped her head modestly, ‘but remember that case that I was telling you about?’

  ‘The one you might need my help on?’

  ‘Yes,’ Louise said. Kelly looked at her expectantly. A flurry of doubt flooded Louise’s thoughts as she considered what she about to say. ‘The thing is, it’s a bit close to home.’ She raised her eyebrows hoping that her warning was preparing him for what he was about to hear. ‘And I could probably do with you looking into it for me…’ Louise wavered. ‘If you’re interested?’

  ‘Well, if I wasn’t before, I am now.’ Kelly’s mind raced through all the possibilities, his interest heightened by how unusual it was for Louise to say something like this. ‘Have you a past life that you haven’t told me about? Have you a load of money squirreled away in a tax exile account in Liechtenstein? Jesus, please tell me you have.’ He grinned. He was in, it didn’t matter what she wanted him to investigate.

  She swallowed. ‘It’s to do with Liam.’

  ‘Buckley?’ Kelly queried. ‘Alex’s Liam?

  ‘The very one,’ she said.

  ‘Jesus, what is it, the suspense is killing me.’ He snorted. ‘Did he run a red light in his 747? Or like the Chinese dude, traffic a load of people into Dublin airport in the airplane’s cargo hold?’ The thought that Liam was caught up in anything remotely criminal was absurd to him.

  ‘Not exactly.’ She smirked in response. ‘It’s just that, it’s quite complicated.’ She scratched her head looking for a place to start. ‘You’ll think it’s crazy.’

  ‘Only one way to find out.’

  ‘The thing is, you know about Alex and Liam and him moving back in to be with his wife and children on Saturday.’

  ‘Yes.’ His eyes squinted.

  ‘And you’ll remember when he was here with Alex two weeks ago, he was at pains to explain that he was just moving back in to care for the children as the wife’s condition deteriorates.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And that there was no timeline or significant knowledge about how long that deterioration would take so Alex didn’t know how long he would be gone for?’ she added.

  ‘Yeah.’ He bunched his eyebrows together trying to pre-empt what she was about to say. ‘Jesus, Louise, what is it, just as well you’re not paying me by the hour,’ he said.

  ‘Well, he moved in on Saturday, back into 26 Oakley Drive.’ The detail of the address had stuck with her.

  ‘Saturday,’ Kelly confirmed, getting the facts straight in his head.

  ‘And late Sunday evening…’ She paused. ‘Jennifer Buckley was found dead.’

  ‘You’re shitting me,’ he replied.

  ‘Reported suicide, post-mortem scheduled for tomorrow.’

  ‘And?’ He waited for her to confirm what he was already thinking.

  ‘And Liam Buckley arrived at the station earlier, directly from the hospital, suggesting that it may have been assisted suicide and that—’

  ‘Let me guess,’ Kelly interrupted, hoping to beat her to the punchline. ‘It wasn’t him.’

  ‘So he says,’

  ‘Shit, does Alex know?’

  ‘Yes, I spoke to her briefly earlier. I tried her again a couple of hours ago but she didn’t answer. I’ll ring her shortly to check on her. Liam said he was going straight home to the kids in Oakley Drive so I doubt that she’s seen him.’ She glanced at her phone, making sure that she hadn’t missed any calls or texts. ‘I just can’t help feeling that we missed something.’ She shook her head. ‘Like, if he is involved in this, why didn’t we cop it sooner? I knew on Friday that something wasn’t right from the way Alex was talking. I should have said something more, I should have got Alex away from him sooner.’

  ‘Or he could be telling the truth and is being careful about not getting caught in whatever assisted crossfire he expects to come down the tracks,’ Kelly suggested.

  ‘I’m worried that he had this ulterior motive for moving back in with his wife all along and it’s not him that’s caught in the crossfire but Alex.’

  ‘Have you charged him yet?’

  ‘No, I sent him home, told him that we’d be in touch. At the moment he is just a member of the public making a complaint to the Gardaí of a suspected offence.’

  ‘Shit.’ Kelly thought for a moment. ‘Or a murderer covering his arse because of what’s going to come out in the wash tomorrow when the coroner does the post-mortem… which, if it is murder, makes this a serious offence which means you are going to need the chief prosecuting solicitor’s’ office involvement.’ The CPS’s office involvement was almost like a benchmark they used to determine how big a case could get and how many detective hours would be involved in the near future.

  ‘Yeah, but I’ll probably be side-lined by then – as soon as the Inspector makes the connection from Liam to me through Alex, he’ll remove me.’

  ‘Jesus, Lou, how is Alex going to feel? This will break her heart.’

  ‘I know, I’m damned if I do find anything and I’m damned if I don’t. Either way I’m going to have to launch an official investigation when I talk to the Inspector tomorrow.’

  ‘Have forensics been?’

  ‘Yes, they were over there earlier, standard suicide forensics.’ She started to count on her fingers from memory. ‘Clear indications
of deliberate self-destructive act. Empty syringe, contents not yet confirmed, beside the deceased, suicide note…’

  ‘A suicide note?’

  ‘Well, recorded and documented suicide intentions, it wasn’t a note written immediately preceding death.

  ‘The scene?’

  ‘Contaminated… the usual… ambulance, family… forensics didn’t get there until after twelve. God knows how many times family had been back and forth out of the room.’ She exhaled loudly at the gravity of the situation. She, like everyone else in Ireland knew about Jenny Buckley and her opinions on assisted suicide and dying with dignity. There had been a flash of media interest in her ever since she had appeared on the Current Issues programme, ‘If she did take her own life, her timing was a bit shit.’ Louise screwed up her face trying to figure out what her motive would have been.

  ‘Or…’ Kelly tried to imagine what would have gone through Liam’s head, what his motives might have been or who the hell would have framed him as he was trying to suggest. Maybe he had underestimated Liam, maybe he was a shrewd operator after all. ‘It could be that Liam’s timing is a bit shit.’ He thought for a moment. ‘I think Alex should come over here, just until we clean this up. I can go over for her if you want and bring her back.’

  ‘She says she wants to stay where she is, I’ve offered already.’

  ‘So, information, evidence, statements – what have you got so far?’ He wanted to look at the file, see what needed to be done to help her. He still had a few contacts that he could call on for help too. ‘Are we looking to prove him innocent or are we looking to prove him guilty?’

  ‘I don’t really know… I don’t know what way Alex would be better off. I think for Alex’s sake we need to find out the truth.’

  ‘To think that I thought I’d be reduced to investigating insurance fraud or cheating husbands when I retired.’ He smirked.

  ‘I wish you were,’ Louise answered, her eyes glazing with tears for her sister.

  ‘Did Alex add anything to your thoughts, like does she think he could have done something like this?’ he asked. ‘Would she have known anything?’