The Suicide Pact (The Tick-Tock Trilogy Book 3)

by David B Lyons

  ‘What was, love?’ he says, squinting over his glasses at me.

  ‘They’re up to something.’

  ‘Who, love?’

  ‘What d’ye mean who? Those two. Ingrid and Ciara.’

  He just pushes back his glasses on the bridge of his nose and looks back down at his paperwork. Course he does.

  I sit back in to the sofa, pick up the wafer I’d left on the side table and lick at a melting drop of ice cream as I sink into my thoughts.

  ‘She couldn’t look at us going out that door. Lying, she is. Saying she’s going over to Ciara’s house.’

  Terry looks over the rim of his glasses at me again, then back down at his notes.

  It’s not like Ingrid to lie. I knew she would eventually. I guess turning thirteen is the ideal time for little girls to start lying to their parents. I used to lie to my parents all the time as a teen. Couldn’t let them know I was off doing modelling shoots. They’d have killed me. Swedish households are much stricter than here in Ireland. Certainly much more strict than our house. Terry’s way too laid back as a father. Especially in comparison to mine. Even had he known I’d grow up to be a successful model, my father still wouldn’t have let me do the shoots back then. He was way too conservative.

  That could be what Ingrid’s doing. Modelling shoots. Same lie as I had when I was a teenager. She certainly has the looks for it. Not sure why Ciara’d be going along though. Maybe for some moral support.

  Nah.

  That can’t be it. I bet they have boyfriends. It’s probably boyfriends. Ingrid would be starting to attract boys now. They’d love her long golden hair and golden eyebrows. She certainly got a lot more of my Swedish genes than the Irish genes of her father. Both our kids did. Sven’s hair is practically snow white.

  I wonder if Ciara’s got a boyfriend too. I love Ciara. She’s a great character and I’m delighted Ingrid has such a close bond with a girl who only lives down the end of our avenue, but she’s not the prettiest. She’s slightly overweight and I’m not sure the sharp bob haircut does much to hide that. If anything, it makes her face look even plumper.

  ‘Bet it’s boyfriends,’ I say, before licking at my ice cream again.

  Terry stares over the rim of his glasses.

  ‘Better fuckin not be,’ he says. That’s about the extent of his parenting. Laying down the odd opinion without so much as doing anything about it. I guess he’s used to it; giving opinions and then doing sweet fuck all about them. It’s what he does for a living.

  ‘Who’s on the show tomorrow?’ I ask.

  He removes his glasses this time. That’s the only way I can ever get real engagement from him; ask him about his job.

  ‘We’ve got the transport minister on. Have to try and catch him out over these plans for the M50 upgrade,’ he says.

  ‘No better man,’ I reply, then take another lick.

  ‘Yeah — I want to get him to admit live on air that he’s blown the budget, that he’s overspent. Just trying to think of the best way to go about it.’

  I’m not really that interested. Terry thinks he has the most important job in the world. So I play along. Would never admit that I don’t think he’s as much of a major player in society as he thinks he is. I used to love that he was a famous broadcaster. If he wasn’t, we never would have bumped into each other. We met at the Eurovision Song contest in Sweden seventeen years ago. He was doing a backstage broadcast for RTE. I was there as a guest of the promoters. Jaysus, I used to be on the guest list for everything back then. I don’t miss it. Not really.

  Terry’s still talking interview tactics with me when I tune back into his words. When he stops talking, I nod my head.

  ‘Yeah good idea,’ I say.

  That usually works; telling him that his plans are A-Okay.

  I twist my neck and look over my shoulder at Sven playing with his action figures on the floor. Where else would he be?

  ‘Ten more minutes, Sven,’ I say to him. He doesn’t look around. Poor thing. I don’t know what he hears and what he doesn’t hear. I’ve researched his condition so many times but still can’t find definite answers to the questions I need answering.

  ‘Do you hear me, Sven? Ten more minutes.’

  Nothing.

  So I lick my ice cream again and think about my daughter. I wonder who her boyfriend is. She was at a birthday party last night. I bet she met somebody. That’s why they’re snooping around. Ah, sure I shouldn’t be worrying. I’ll leave them to it. Didn’t we all snoop around at that age?

  ◈

  Helen drums her thumbs repeatedly on the top of the steering wheel any time she’s impatient. Which is somewhere close to always when she’s driving. She automatically hates the stranger in the car in front of her, no matter who they are. She’ll find a reason readily; perhaps because they’re driving too slow, or maybe they forgot to indicate properly at a roundabout. Sometimes she’ll decide to hate them simply because she doesn’t like the colour of their car. No matter the reason, if you happen to be driving in front of Helen Brennan, you’re bound to hear her car horn blast every couple minutes.

  ‘Fuck sake,’ she mutters under her breath as she stops at another red light. She picks up her handbag, roots inside and pulls out a small tub. She’s staring up at the Rathmines Clock Tower, snarling at it as she always does, as she tries to pop open the lid. But the light turns green before she can, so she just throws the tub back into her bag, the pills rattling, and then steps on the accelerator. She wheel spins the car, turns on to the canal road and makes her way to Terenure Garda Station.

  She’s still mumbling to herself in frustration when she steps out and paces — in her own unique robotic way — to the entrance, not hiding the sigh she produces when she steps inside to see a young woman struggling to contain her two children at the front desk. The young woman’s trying to get information on a boyfriend. Something about a raid at their flat this morning and his subsequent “unfair” arrest.

  Helen shuffles her feet from side to side, her attempt to get the attention of the officer dealing with the woman — and her two snotty little brats.

  One of the kids turns around, drops his bottom lip open when he stares at the vision behind him. Helen sure does look intimidating to a child. To anyone really. Her upright posture makes her stand out, but more so because she always tries to hide it under a long leather overcoat. The coat falls all the way down to her ankles; just her red Converse sneakers on show under it today. And her hair doesn’t help blend her into the crowd either. She doesn’t have the patience to allow her brown hair dye to soak into her greying strands for the full hour as is recommended on the bottle. It means her short bob is a streaky shade of rusty oranges.

  She stares back at the kid, his face smudged with stickiness, and then scoffs.

  ‘Sorry,’ she says eventually, taking one large stride forward. ‘I’m Helen Brennan; Detective from Rathmines Garda station,’ she lies. ‘I’m here to talk with the Detective looking into the phone call that was made about two eh…’ she stops herself, looks at the young woman and her two snotty little brats, then leans forward to the officer behind the desk and whispers, ‘the eh… hoax suicide call.’

  The officer raises his eyebrow.

  ‘Let me buzz you through, Detective Brennan,’ he says, reaching under his desk. Helen hears the double doors to her left release and then pushes through them without even turning to thank the officer who opened them for her.

  When she steps inside, she gasps. Terenure Garda station is a helluva lot more modern than Rathmines. Rathmines has barely changed in the thirty-seven years she’s known it. Aside from maybe the office chairs. They needed to be updated to comply with modern health and safety requirements a few years ago, but the desks are still the same old-school oak desks she sat at on her very first day.

  Here, though — in Terenure — the desks are a modern white. As are the walls. They look as if they’ve just been painted. She can’t remember the last time anyone p
ainted the walls at Rathmines Garda station. They’re supposed to be magnolia, but time has turned them dirty yellow.

  She stops a young plain-clothed officer who was about to walk past by holding up a hand.

  ‘Detective Helen Brennan from Rathmines,’ she lies again. ‘I need to speak with the Detective who’s looking into the two girls reported to be planning suicide tonight.’

  ‘The hoax call?’ the woman says.

  ‘No, well… I want to find the Detective looking into the two girls. As if the call is legitimate.’

  ‘Oh,’ the young woman says, tugging at her ear. ‘It’s not a Detective looking into that. This is definitely a hoax call. So eh… Charlie, I think… yeah Charlie Guilfoyle is taking care of that.’

  Helen raises both eyebrows and then shrugs her shoulders.

  ‘Who?’ she says.

  ‘Oh, he’s eh…’ the woman looks around the room. ‘That guy there; the spikey hair.’

  ‘The uniform?’ Helen says, all high-pitched.

  The woman huffs out a small snigger as she nods her head, then walks on.

  Helen sucks her lips, making a pop sound before she strides towards the spikey hair. She can’t believe her eyes as she nears; the face below the spikes is way too fresh. Way too young. There isn’t a trace of even light stubble on it. Plenty of acne, but no hair.

  ‘Charlie Guilfoyle,’ she says standing over him. ’I’m Detective Helen Brennan from Rathmines Garda station. Believe you are looking into the phone call.’

  Charlie swallows a lump down his throat when he sees the woman hovering behind him, then he coughs into his hand.

  ‘Yeah… well, kinda… yeah.’

  ‘Kind of?’ Helen hisses.

  ‘Well, I’m just, well eh…’ he looks down at his lap, then back up, ‘all the intel leads us to believe this is a hoax call, right? Alan Keating.’

  ‘Intel?’ Helen says, nodding her head sarcastically.

  ‘Well, Keating’s done this before, hasn’t he?’ Charlie says. ‘Besides, who would report a suicide attempt and then just hang up without giving us any names? It don’t make no sense.’

  Helen wipes her face with her hand and then she squints at the young man sitting in front of her. His ears stick out below his black spikey hair, his nose slightly upturned and pointy at the nub end, making him look like some sort of human-rodent hybrid.

  ‘How old are you, Charlie?’ Helen asks.

  He creases his brow. ‘Twenty-three.’

  ‘Twenty-three? You look ten years younger than that.’

  Charlie’s brow creases even more. He’s not sure if what he’s just heard was a compliment or not. It wasn’t.

  ‘Well,’ Helen says, pulling at a chair from the desk beside Charlie’s and wheeling it behind her so she can drop into it. ‘I’ve been asked to look into the suicide angle for Rathmines station. What have you got for me so far?’

  Charlie coughs into his hand again, then turns back around to his desk and begins to fidget with his mouse. After a couple silent seconds, he turns to Helen again, the palms of his hands facing upwards.

  ‘I eh… don’t really have anything yet. Telephone network can’t tell us where the phone call was made from. It was too short… only lasted eighteen seconds.’

  ‘The two of em?’ Helen asks.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Did both phone calls last eighteen seconds?’

  ‘Both calls?’

  ‘Yes, Charlie. Two calls were made. One here, one to Rathmines.’

  Charlie makes an ‘O’ shape with his mouth and as he does so, Helen tuts.

  ‘Listen, if two girls commit suicide tonight, you’re gonna take a serious amount of time getting over it, d’ye hear me?’ she says. ‘You and I both. We’re gonna find them, we’re gonna save them.’

  Charlie creases his brow again.

  ‘Do you… eh… do you really think the phone call is legit?’ he asks.

  Helen looks around herself, swivelling ever so slightly on the chair.

  ‘It’s your job — and mine,’ she says, pointing at her own chest, ‘to take this phone call as legit. Everybody else, here, and at Rathmines, is treating it as a hoax and getting their knickers in a twist about Alan Keating. But me and you; we’re the ones who owe it to these girls to save them. If the call is legit, we can be heroes. If it’s not… well, fuck it, there’s enough of the force looking into what it might be.’

  Charlie offers Helen a smile that makes him look even younger. He stands up, readjusts his navy tie into his sky-blue shirt by repositioning his tiepin and then holds his palm towards Helen.

  ‘You wait here a second, Detective Brennan. I’ll go find out what the latest is with tracking the call.’

  ‘It’s eh…’ Helen says holding her hand out in front of him, ‘it’s Helen, call me Helen. And,’ she looks around again, ‘don’t tell anybody I’m looking into this with you. I’m off duty, but I can’t live with the guilt of two girls dying by suicide. I need to be looking into this, whether it’s legit or not. Besides, you can use a helping hand, right?’

  Charlie smiles again, then winks before pacing to the back of the station. Helen stretches her legs wide apart and swivels side-to-side in the chair again, her fingers forming a diamond shape just above her naval. She’s popping her lips with impatience when the pocket of her coat begins to vibrate. She reaches inside, grabs her mobile phone and then winces when she notices who’s calling.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hel, listen, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have talked to you like that. It was…’ Eddie doesn’t want to finish his sentence, but Helen’s silence forces him to continue. ‘It’s just, we’re pretty certain this is Keating. Fucker’s done this to us before, had us running around all night looking for two missing girls when… well… you know. I just wanted to ring you to apologise for being… for being short with you.’

  Helen sighs.

  ‘Apology accepted,’ she says. ‘How’s the investigation going?’

  There’s a slight pause on the other end of the line before Eddie finally speaks up.

  ‘We’ve got guys all over Keating and his cronies, but God knows what’s going on. Chances are they aren’t going to be the ones carrying anything out, ye know how Keating operates. So, I guess all we can do is gauge things as we go.’

  ‘But what about the calls that were made… any progress tracking them?’

  Another pause.

  ‘Yeah… one phone network gave us an approximate area — somewhere along the Grand Canal between Inchicore and Drimnagh, but no specific number. Anyway…’ he says, ‘nothing for you to worry about. I’ll fill you in in the morning. How about I treat you to breakfast — Bark about ten-ish in the morning?’ Helen nods her head. She loves a breakfast at Bark. Best Poached Eggs in Dublin.

  ‘Okay,’ she says.

  ‘Good. So… did you get home safe?’ Eddie asks.

  Helen looks around herself, taking in the cleanliness of Terenure Garda station, noting it in comparison to the one she and her husband work in.

  ‘Yep, all curled up on the sofa… watching Coronation Street.’

  The line falls silent. For way too long.

  ‘Good… good,’ Eddie eventually says. ‘So I’ll see you, okay? I guess you’ll be asleep by the time I get back tonight… we’ll do that breakfast when we wake up, huh?’

  Helen doesn’t answer, she just takes the phone from her ear and presses at the red button. Then she clicks into her news feed; just to see if there have been any oddities reported by the national media recently; something that might offer her some sort of lead. It’s rare that the media would be a step ahead of the cops… but it still doesn’t stop Helen from checking. She scrolls. And scrolls. Nothing. The media are just running with the same story they’ve been running with all day: the two Dublin guys who’ve been arrested in Rome for stealing from American Central Banks last year. She clicks out of her news feed and places her phone back into her pocket. Then she stands and peers down
at Charlie’s desk. A framed picture of a pretty girl, way too pretty for Charlie, smiles back at her. She picks it up, puts it back down. Then she picks up a bunch of keys and turns them over in her hand before placing them down. Then an open bottle of Coke. Then a notepad. She’s flicking through it when she hears him breathing behind her.

  ‘Charlie,’ she says, turning around and dropping his pad back on to his desk, ‘whatcha got for me?’

  ‘Don’t think anybody’s been able to determine where the call was made,’ he says, sitting back into his chair. Helen rolls her eyes. ‘But I do know it was made — to this station anyway — at six forty-nine p.m.’

  ‘That it?’ Helen says.

  ‘Nope,’ Charlie responds, shuffling his chair back into his desk. ‘I have it here.’ He slips a USB stick into the side of his computer screen, then fiddles with his mouse. Helen reaches for the chair she had been sitting in earlier, wheels it closer and plonks herself in it.

  ‘Terenure Garda station, how can I help you?’

  ‘Two girls from my school are going to commit suicide tonight…’ the voice sounds panicky. ‘I heard them talking about it. They’ve made a pact. Please help them. They’re good girls. Just misunderstood.’

  ‘Thank you for your call, Sir,’ a female voice says. ‘Can you give me your name to begin with and then I can—’

  A dead tone pierces through Charlie’s computer.

  He turns around and stares at Helen.

  ‘Can’t be legit. Who’d ring in a suicide warning without giving us the names—’

  ‘Replay that,’ Helen says, interrupting him, ‘the bit where he says “please help them”.’

  Charlie’s brow creases, but he turns back to his computer and drags at his mouse again.

  ‘They’ve made a pact. Please help them.’

  ‘There, hear it?’ Helen says.

  ‘Hear what?’

  ‘The Luas. The chiming of a Luas tram.’

  Charlie drags at his mouse again.

  ‘Oh yeah,’ he says listening to the same two lines over and over. ‘The call musta been made somewhere close to the Luas tracks. But sure that could be anywhere.’