by Jay Stringer
“You’ve got a plan?”
“More like a fallback option. A guard against his stupidity, just in case he decides to try and take me down. You remember I helped him out when he was first looking to go into politics?” I did. I’d uncovered his corruption back when I’d helped him find his son. “I helped him get a few steps up the rung, gave him some money, greased a few palms.”
“But he’s the one who ordered this investigation. He’ll have known to cover those tracks.”
“Oh, yes. Those tracks. We both made those disappear a long time ago. But I laid others. He gave me his sort code and account number for a transfer once. It’s a great thing, getting access to someone’s bank account. Then you can get the rest. I even got his mortgage details, just a matter of knowing who to ask.”
“So he set himself up. What did you do?”
“House payments. Every six months for the past two years I’ve been sending payments to his mortgage account. Another one went to his partner’s pension. Not large enough that he would notice—nothing that’s going to mean he suddenly gets a letter saying that his mortgage is paid off—but large enough that anyone who was looking for it would see a pattern.”
“How will Becker’s people know to look for it?”
“I did it from an account under the name Linda Haines. You said Becker’s team were on to that, right?” I nodded. “It matches up to money that’s paid into the Haines account from a tanning salon in Chapel Ash, one that they would find is still under Channy Mann’s name. They won’t find anything that links to me. But what they will find are regular payments they can’t account for. They’ll follow the trail to see where they go, looking for something that links to me. Instead they’ll find their own Police and Crime Commissioner.”
“Surely they’ll smell a setup?”
“If it was only recent, yes. But this is going back years. I set it up before he even took office. It’s been going on too long, and he’s profited too much from it with his mortgage. The minute they find it, they’ll bring him down. Your man Becker might still have evidence on us, and Laura, but once he gets a sniff of bringing down the Commissioner I’m sure he’ll see sense.”
She was brilliant. Not for the first time, I wondered what kind of career she would have had in politics or her first choice—law.
“So it’s only a matter of time before he’s out of the game,” I said. “If he doesn’t resign over it, we’ll make sure the press do the job for us. That means his hard-on for us won’t be a problem. Let me talk to Laura, maybe Becker. We offer Perry up as a package, along with your information on the cartel, wrap it all up nice. I’m sure we can walk away free.”
We came across a low concrete wall, a defense against possible floods. Gaines settled onto it and patted the space next to her. I paused for a second then slid in.
“No police,” she said. “Whatever it costs. They might well offer a deal. If they don’t, the CPS would. Commissioner or no, it would be too big a case for them to turn down. But for what kind of life? Begging for whatever scraps of freedom they’re willing to throw my way? Humiliated? Made to feel like I’m lucky to get a new name and a new town, always on guard because they might call me back for more evidence, or the political wind might shift and make me an easy target for them? No. This is who I am. I’m going to ride out the next couple of days on my own terms. Or die trying.”
I leaned in a few inches closer. “Let’s try and avoid that last one.”
She chewed her bottom lip at the side of her mouth. Then shrugged. Decision made. “Okay. That’s me. What’s you. What are you in this for?”
“It’s my job.”
I knew what she’d really been asking. She knew I’d dodged it on purpose. She shook her head and smiled. Then stayed silent and waited me out, daring me to crack.
It took me less than a minute. “You know why. You’ve always known why. You use it to make me follow you around like a lost puppy, and you know what? I’ve never minded it. I’d rather that than be on the outside.”
She nodded and stayed silent. We sat and listened to the water. Each wondering who was going to say the words that there would be no going back from.
“You’re right,” she said. “I do know. Have known longer than you, I think. It’s been easy, comfortable. There are so many people out to trick me or lie to me, I’ve liked having someone I can count on. But it’s not right. I need you to be with me in this, but I want it to be for the right reasons.”
I leaned in and kissed her gently on the lips. She pulled back, just a little, and redirected her own lips to my cheek, where she planted a very solemn kiss.
“You really are an idiot,” she said, her voice a cocktail of humor and anger. “You can track runaways and killers, find rapists and stick-up men, but you can’t spot this?”
I felt something tug at my stomach. A nagging feeling that there was something I’d known all along. Something obvious. “What?”
She scratched behind her ear for a moment.
“I’m gay.”
“How gay? I mean, on a sliding scale?”
My world had turned upside down. In moments like this I usually reach for insults or jokes, but I was too dumbstruck to try either.
“All the way,” she said. Humoring me.
“I’m not that bad a kisser, am I?”
She cracked a smile, and I followed. We both laughed. It was a nervous laughter, two people’s emotions teetering on the edge of the cliff. I knew I had to get this moment right. The problem was I didn’t know what right was. Even as she laughed I could see Gaines assessing me, trying to read my reaction. I figured she didn’t know what right was either in that moment.
I took the bottle from her and swigged, making a noise as the burn hit the back of my throat. “How the hell did I miss that?”
She shrugged. “I’ve been wondering too.”
“Who else knows?”
Now her smile dropped away. The question had tapped into something that ate at her. “It’s not that big a secret. I don’t talk about it, but I don’t hide it either. I’ve had girlfriends in the time you’ve been working with me, but I keep them away from the day job. It never lasts long, anyway. It was easier when I lived further from home. When I wasn’t involved in the family business, I could live a normal life.”
“And how did the news go over with your family?”
“Daddy tries hard. He’s old fashioned, I know he’s not really comfortable with it, but he tries not to let on. He just doesn’t want to hear details, or ever hear a word about who I’m with.”
“And Claire?”
She rolled her eyes. “Is just Claire. Who knows what goes through her head. Sometimes she’s the best sister in the world, sometimes she wants to turn my life upside down. I think that’s why she likes fucking you.” She eyed me again. “Yes, of course I know. She’s my sister. I think she’s liked messing with you. Probably thinks she’s messing with me, too. I should have stopped her game sooner.”
I swallowed that, along with whatever was left of my pride, and moved on. “But people on the street? At the job? They don’t know?”
“Again, I’ve never much cared. I don’t talk about it on the job, but then I don’t talk about any other part of my personal life either. Some people know, some don’t. Before we burned down Legs a few of the dancers tried flirting, I think they thought they could get in good with me, but I brushed that off. It’s impossible to keep it a total secret. I’ve heard the rumors that go on behind my back.”
I’d heard them too, but always assumed that kind of talk came with the territory when a woman was in charge. The men always wanted to gossip, to find some way to bring her down a peg. Now I realized I’d just been the only one not seeing it.
“That’s part of why I played that role. The business suits, the cold attitude, the whole mobster thing. I was building a wall. Creati
ng a version of myself that was completely different from the real deal, a shield to protect myself. And when I figured out what was happening with you, I felt good that at least the new me had someone to count on. When you came back for me that time, saved me from Channy Mann, it showed me I was right.”
“You mean it made you confused?”
She laughed, and I didn’t like the tone. “No. I’ve never been confused. I think you are, but not me. But I liked feeling that someone cared what happened to me, even if it was a man. It felt safe, and there’s not a lot of that going around in our line.”
I looked down at my feet. After a while I felt Gaines’s hand take my chin and lift it up until we were making eye contact again. “How are you doing?”
I didn’t know.
“I don’t know.” I drank deep from the bottle and then went for honesty. “It feels like there’s a test here that I need to pass. Like you tell me all this and I’m meant to know how to react. But I don’t.”
“Eoin, I like having you around. I trust you, and I’m comfortable with you. And the two of us are good together. I’ve always, I mean I do—” Her own words collapsed into the same embarrassed fumble that I’d managed earlier. She couldn’t say the words either. “I remember more than you do. I remember us playing together as kids. You were in my life, and then you weren’t, and then you came back in again. You’re a moody dick, but you’re my moody dick. I just don’t want that. Wouldn’t even know how to think about it. We’re wired for different things. I’ve never needed a boyfriend, but I’ve always wanted a big brother.”
I nodded for a long time, slowly.
Could I live with that? I had no idea. I wanted to say yes, but I wanted a lot of things, and I’d never been able to judge which ones were achievable. I looked up at her and smiled. I hoped that would do as an answer.
“And you,” she said. “You have enough issues as it is. You have a wife that you’re sleeping with again. You have my sister. You have a drug habit that you think nobody knows about. And now you have an empty.”
I looked down at the empty bottle held between my hands and just like that, all the booze hit me at once. I laughed and thought about standing up, then almost lost my balance.
Gaines stepped down off the wall. “You stay here and figure your head out. I’m going to bed. We’ve got to go be gangsters tomorrow, if you’re still on my side in the morning.”
Still holding the empty bottle in my hands, I staggered back across the settlement to my Dad’s caravan. In the living room, I flopped down onto the sofa. He was still sitting in his chair, but he’d taken off his coat and was reading from a book, The Third Policeman, by Flann O’Brien. He looked up at my expression and chuckled. It came out as a low rumble. He put his book down and leaned forward, nudged my knee with his hand.
“Women, eh?”
He climbed to his feet and went into the kitchen, returning after a moment with two fresh glasses and a full bottle. He poured two glasses and set the bottle on a table by my feet before he lowered himself down into his chair. I heard both his knees make popping sounds as he sat, and he stretched his legs out before settling down.
“Any good?” I said, pointing to the book.
He eyed me for a second, remembering that the Eoin he knew had hated reading. “Ask me again when I’m finished,” he said.
“The story of my life.”
He laughed. “I used to think getting older would mean I’d know how to figure things out. Most especially, that I’d learn how women work.”
“And?”
He smiled as he sipped his drink. “Then I got older, and realized you’re always the same prick you were at twenty, you’ve just run out of mistakes to make. What happened, she tell you she goes the other way?”
“How did you know?”
He let out his low chuckle again. “You remember the first time we watched Planet of the Apes? You were about ten, I think, and it was on TV. Past your bed time, but me and your mum were never good at that. You sat up and watched it with us, you remember?” I nodded. I vaguely remembered. “You talked us through the whole film. First time you’d seen it, but you were explaining it to us. Space travel, suspended animation, evolution, how apes could rule a planet. You told us the film was about racism, and showing how the white men wouldn’t like it if they were judged for their skin. Then we got to the end and you remember what you said?”
I did, but I said I didn’t. I wanted to hear his version.
He let out a loud laugh. “You asked how come their planet had a Statue of Liberty just like ours.”
I smiled and drank. It was a good memory and I wanted to treasure that moment, to concentrate on the few times things worked the way they were supposed to.
“I tell you, you’re the smartest person in any room you walk into, but you don’t half miss the obvious sometimes. Speaking of smart, you were right to throw that letter back at me. It was a cheap trick.”
I started to mumble my regret but he put his hand up to wave it away. “Forget it. Wouldn’t have worked anyway. Your sister lost the appeal at the high court. She’ll get here tomorrow. The eviction will start in a couple days now that they have the go-ahead. I’m just glad you got to see the place before they try and take it from us.”
I watched him think that through. I didn’t know who this man was. All my life I’d had an idea of my father. A mythic figure. The demon behind all my problems and the motivation behind my few successes. The loud voice that used to argue with my mother, and the slamming door that used to mean my Dai would be gone for days. Now I was sitting drinking with him, two adults shooting the shit, and he was nothing like the person I’d been holding a grudge against. Did he change or did I?
“She’s a good kid, Veronica. Doesn’t deserve the family she’s been stuck with. But none of you did. I’d like to think I didn’t either. Maybe at some point it stops, the bad blood can only roll on for so many years.” He ran a hand over his harsh beard. “Your mum was right about that. Wanted different for you, your brother and sister, all of you. I wouldn’t listen.”
“Sounds a bit like me.”
He nodded, and I saw myself in his smile. I was seeing more and more of me and my brother in his movements. “She fought harder for you, you know that? When we had your brother, she was a teenage runaway—lost in the romance of being with a Gypsy, I think. You don’t know much about my side of the family, do you?” I shook my head. “No, you wouldn’t. The Smiths and the Petulengros, most of them coming from the Black Patch at some point, they were good people. My mai’s side, your grandmother. Hard working, god fearing. Never spent a penny they didn’t earn with their own hands. But there’s always been a bad drop in the Millers. There’s a choice made when you’re born, when you’re given a name. Some names mean you can be anything you want. But if you’re a Miller there were only certain names, and each one meant you were walking in the same boots as men before you. There were Noahs. Aarons. Samsons. Josephs. They’re a life sentence, saying you can only be that one thing, same as all the others. Your mum didn’t know better when your brother was born, thought Noah sounded nice. And I thought—well, I was young—I thought I was strong enough to carry my family away from its past. To be what my mai wanted and escape the bad drop. But we made a Noah, and look how that turned out.”
My older brother was the dictionary definition of a fuckup. I’d lost count of the times I’d watched him run away from a mess of his own making.
“You, when it was your turn, your mum fought hard. I wanted a Sam, Samson, like my brother, god bless him. He was thoughtful but hard. Didn’t drink like the rest of us. Worked hard, mostly straight and narrow. I thought it would be a good sign for you. But she wasn’t having it. Said you were going to have a name from her family, that you were going to be whatever you wanted to be.”
“What happened to your brother?”
“He pulled over to
the side of the road in his van for a kip—back in 1985, I think—and someone torched it with him still inside. Police never did anything about it, were more worried about whether Sammy had been breaking the law by sleeping at the side of the road.”
“And then your son became a copper. You must have been so proud.”
I poured myself another full glass, some of the liquid spilling over the side because of my drunken grip. I’d never talked to him about my decision to join the force, but this was a night of long-overdue talks.
When I looked up from the drink he had his eyes fixed on me. I couldn’t read the look on his face. Was it anger? Regret? I realized a beard can hide a lot of emotions, and wished I had one.
“You know why I stopped talking to you after you joined the police?”
“Yeah, Noah told me. You were ashamed.”
“Is that right?” He stared down into his drink. The silence stretched out. A moment filled the room like an inflating balloon. Then he took a quick sip and looked up at me with an emotion I could read. Shame. “I’ve handled a lot of things badly. Your brother most among them, and you not far behind. But he was right. I was ashamed. Too ashamed to tell you how proud I was.”
That cut through the booze to half sober me up. “Proud?”
He raised his drink in a mock toast, his arm leaning from the effect of the alcohol. “Proud. We’re born with a lot to prove. Not just as a Miller, but as a Romanichal. I spent half my life thinking I needed to disprove everyone’s stereotypes, to show the Gorjers that they’re wrong. Then I spend the other half of my life fucking that up. Because I’m just a man, I’m an idiot. Then you come along, and your mum has fought so hard to make you different, to break the cycle. You grow up not caring what other people think, and you go on to be a cop. Something I would never have been able to do. And I was holding you back. It wasn’t enough that you were a Gypsy and having to deal with all that, you had to deal with your old man, too. I was ashamed because of me, not you.”
