‘Do you know where he’s gone? What’s happened to him? No one’s telling me anything!’
‘We don’t know yet, but I’m sure he’s—’
‘Has he said anything about why? Did he, like, leave a note or something?’
Paula looked at the girl. For once, her air of disaffection had slipped and she looked genuinely afraid. ‘What do you mean, Katy?’ She had to be careful. Nothing the girl said to her now would be admissible.
‘I just – I don’t know what’s going on.’
‘Katy?’ Another girl was approaching. Slim, also in jeans and a vest top, flip-flops. Avril. Paula let her eyes train over her friend, trying to give no flicker of recognition. Avril also pretended not to know Paula. ‘I’m going now. You know, I’m away for the weekend. Will you be OK?’ She was going away for Paula’s wedding. Paula squinted at the gravel she was standing on.
‘Yeah,’ said Katy distractedly. ‘It’s just – where would he go? I don’t understand it.’ There it was, the concern she hadn’t shown for Alice.
‘I’m sure they’re looking for him,’ said Avril soothingly. Even her voice sounded different undercover – higher, less sure of herself. ‘Anyway, I need to go say bye to Peter. I know he’s worried about Dermot too. See you Monday, hon?’
Katy’s eyes narrowed, just a fraction. ‘Peter? He talked to you about Dermot?’
Avril flushed slightly. It might have been having Paula there, or it might even have been slightly real. ‘Well, yeah. I think he’s scared.’
‘Why didn’t he talk to me? I’m his friend. He hardly knows you.’
Avril’s eyes flicked to Paula’s, just for a second. ‘I don’t know, hon. Maybe he didn’t want to worry you, since you and Dermot are so close, like. Anyway, I have to run.’
Katy hesitated. Her manner had grown colder. ‘All right. Bye.’
‘You can text me anytime, OK?’ Avril gave her a hug, which was barely reciprocated, and managing not to look at Paula, dashed off down the path to the lake, where a small wooden boathouse could just be seen in the distance. Standing on the path, outlined in shimmering haze, was a tall boy, straight as a tree. At that distance he looked like a god – beautiful, even. It was hard to imagine the things he’d done to Colette, and maybe to Alice too. It was almost too easy, if you didn’t stop yourself, to look for answers. Oh she led him on, oh she was drunk, oh he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t. Would he? Paula hoped Avril remembered that he had. She even ran like a student – young, light, happy.
Paula realised Katy was watching too. She said, ‘I’m sorry, Katy, I really can’t tell you anything more. We’re looking for Dermot, and for Alice. We’re doing everything we can.’
Katy met her eyes for a moment. They looked hollow behind her glasses. Despite the heat of the summer her skin was pale, as if she’d never been outside. ‘You’re not doing anything,’ she muttered. ‘You haven’t a clue.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Never mind.’ She hurried off, shoulders hunched.
‘Was that Avril?’ Corry appeared beside Paula, shading her eyes.
‘Yeah. I don’t think Katy picked up on it, though. Did you get something?’
In answer, Corry held up an evidence bag. Paula peered into it. ‘His phone?’
‘Found it in his desk drawer.’
‘Why would he leave his phone behind?’
‘He knows we can track them, that’s why. Not stupid, Mr Healy.’
‘That means he doesn’t want to be followed, so maybe he’s done something to Alice. We should—’
‘What’s this we?’ said Corry. ‘It’s Friday, Maguire. End of the road for you, I’m afraid.’
She’d forgotten. Tonight, of all things, was her hen do (under extreme sufferance). And tomorrow . . . ‘Bollocks,’ she said softly.
‘Yep. Two weeks’ leave for you. And if we don’t have this sorted by then, I may as well hand in my notice and get a job selling wedding dresses.’
WhatsApp conversation
Katy: Hello
Katy: Hello?
Katy: Are u ignoring me?
Katy: Look we need to talk. D is gone off now it’s just u and me. Do you know why he went? Did he tell you where?
Katy: Hello?
Katy: Ur making a big mistake if you think you can just blow me off like that. Warning u.
Peter has left the conversation.
Chapter Thirty-Three
‘Cheers!’
Paula looked with distaste at the cheap white wine, the summit of the pub’s meagre ‘cellar’ – i.e. one fridge half-stocked with alcopops. For a Friday night the place was quiet, a few old men in flat caps and some couples enjoying the two-for-one deal on steak, chips and a Portobello mushroom. The steaks were so large they were hanging over the side of the plates.
Her hen do – something she had thought, and secretly hoped, would never happen – was here. And that meant her wedding was suddenly tomorrow and she was meant to be off for two weeks. The honeymoon in Spain was booked. Maggie was staying with PJ and Pat. Paula had supposedly handed over her case notes that afternoon – though Alice and Dermot were still not found, and that meant she was turning it over and over in her mind, like a stone worn smooth with handling. No answers. Nothing put back in its place. It didn’t feel right to stop.
‘So,’ said Corry, setting down her own glass with a small grimace. ‘I don’t think we can make any jokes about your last night of freedom and so on, seeing as you’ve already a wee one at home.’
‘Please don’t.’ She’d stipulated it: no willy straws, no sex jokes, no innuendo, no pink. Avril had still turned up with a sparkly pink tiara. Paula had worn it for ten minutes then accidentally on purpose left it in the ladies. The pink L-plates she had refused entirely. She wondered if Avril was feeling sad about her own aborted wedding – she loved all this, the fake-naughty screams, the glitter, the teary laughter. Hers had never taken place, the engagement to all intents and purposes falling apart the minute she’d met Gerard Monaghan. As it was she seemed subdued – out of her cover for the night and with the wedding the next day, it could be hard to manage the shifts in tone. Corry and Paula were deliberately not asking her anything about it. Paula herself just wanted to go home and drink gin in front of Newsnight. She forced a smile. ‘It’s hard to believe sometimes – I never thought I’d get married.’
‘I knew you and Aidan would end up together,’ said Saoirse, who was waiting to start IVF again, and drinking J2O. ‘They were the cutest couple at school,’ she confided to the table. ‘Like Angel and Buffy or something. Dawson and Joey. All intense and lovey-dovey. So much angst and drama!’
‘He never climbed in my window. My dad would have arrested him on the spot.’
‘My da’s still like that.’ Avril fished around in her wine spritzer with a straw. ‘Mind you, Gerard’s lot are as bad. I was round the other week and his mammy got out the holy pictures and started testing me on the saints.’
Everyone laughed, though Avril’s strained expression did not ease. Sectarianism was now a gentle joke, and no one would really stand in the way if Gerard and Avril got married. It was all easy, too easy. Paula felt a prickle of anxiety between her shoulders.
This feeling was exacerbated when the door opened and two striking women came in, one with short dark hair and a trouser suit, the other fair-haired, in a print dress. She lit the place up, though she was leaning on a stick. Paula jumped up. ‘It’s Maeve and Sinead.’ She had a brief moment of wondering how her uber-Catholic cousin Cassie would take to this, Aidan’s best friend and her new wife, then reached out to them.
‘I was expecting more pink,’ said Maeve, scrutinising her. ‘Do you not need an L-plate or two?’
‘Don’t you dare.’
As Maeve leaned to hug Paula, the left side of her face was exposed, still red with scar tissue. Two years before she’d been badly burned, her lovely face damaged. But her hair was salon-shiny and her blue eyes sharp as ever. ‘We’d have been here so
oner but the missus refuses to use Satnav.’
‘And my missus can’t drive to save her life. Hi, Paula.’ Sinead, a razor-sharp lawyer, hugged Paula. Ever since Aidan and Paula’s rapprochement, the four had become good friends. Paula was slightly ashamed she’d ever suspected Maeve of designs on Aidan; some behavioural expert she was.
The party shook down, with greater and lesser degrees of success. Saoirse and Maeve were soon nose to nose talking about IVF. Sinead and Corry were having a good bitch about Southern court judges. Paula’s cousin Cassie, who’d got married the previous year, was telling Avril a very long and complicated story about some issues they’d had with their hotel: ‘. . . and I told them and told them, there’s English people coming, we need a vegetarian choice, and they said it was extra . . .’
After a while, Paula saw Avril get up, swaying, and head to the ladies. Saoirse, the non-drinker, cocked a head at her. Paula nodded – she’d go.
It was cool and quiet in the ladies, a respite from the pounding Shania Twain in the bar, which apparently was stuck in a nineties time warp. ‘Avril?’
A voice came out of a stall. ‘Yeah.’
‘You all right?’
‘Yes, I just . . .’ She sighed. ‘I’m really tired. The wine’s going to my head.’
‘Well, nothing wrong in taking it easy. The wedding’s tomorrow, we don’t want to be too hungover.’
‘No. OK.’
The door opened and Avril came out. Up close, Paula saw there were dark circles under her make-up. She was wearing a short floral dress and lots of foundation, her fair hair straightened, as if trying to distance herself from her student get-up. She washed her hands under the tap.
‘Is it getting to you?’ asked Paula. The psychology of being undercover was harder than people imagined. The strain, day and night, of pretending to be someone else. Holding yourself rigid even in your sleep. Not to mention the fact that if someone had hurt Alice, they might still be around.
‘I can handle it.’
‘I’m sure you can.’
‘But – it’s just so hard, Paula.’ Avril leaned her head against the hand dryer. ‘It’s so hard. Even if I’m nice to Katy I just feel like I’m lying – she’s really upset, you know, even if she doesn’t show it sometimes – and I keep thinking of Alice, if someone did something to her . . . I’m sleeping in her bed, even. It’s weird. And now Dermot going too—’
‘It’ll be over soon,’ said Paula soothingly. ‘You don’t have to go back after the wedding if you don’t want to. Especially now we know about this rape allegation.’
‘No, I do. Someone knows something, I’m sure of it. I just don’t know who. Or what. I think Peter likes me, so he might tell me something – and Katy, she’s starting to trust me, so maybe I’ll be able to find out what—’ Avril shook herself. ‘Listen to me. It’s your big night! I shouldn’t be talking shop. Let me get you another drink.’
‘Oh, no, I don’t—’
She was gone. Paula turned to look at her own reflection. In the mirror she too looked pale and tired. A discarded feather from a pink boa hung in her hair, clashing horribly with the red. Tomorrow she’d be primped and preened to within an inch of her life. And one person, the one who should be lacing her into corsets and driving her as mad as Auntie Phil had driven Cassie, would not be there. Her mother was still gone, and all these milestones – Maggie’s birth, the wedding, renovating the house – just felt like throwing more dirt on her grave. Kicking over her traces, until it would be one day as if she’d never existed.
There was a bang and Maeve hobbled in on her shiny pink crutch. Paula moved to hold the cubicle door for her.
‘Ta.’ Maeve went in and closed the door, calling out as she peed. ‘Where’s the quare fella tonight?’
‘Oh, he’s out with Saoirse’s husband and a few guys from the paper.’
‘And the wee one?’
‘She’s at her granny’s.’ Paula had wondered about inviting Pat tonight, but baulked – you could invite your stepmother to your hen do, of course, but not your soon-to-be mother-in-law. ‘You’re sure you don’t want to stay at mine?’
‘No thanks, I’m not too good with stairs. We’re booked into a nice hotel. Well, nice-ish, I mean, it is still Ballyterrin.’
So that meant Paula would spend the night alone – Saoirse couldn’t sleep over as she needed Dave to inject her with hormones in the middle of the night, and Aidan was supposed to be staying with them too. She could have slept at PJ and Pat’s, but she felt it would be fitting, to have one last night truly alone. Just her and the ghost of her mother.
Maeve came out and leaned her stick against the sink as she washed her hands. ‘He seems great, I must say. I’ve never seen him so well.’
‘Oh. Good. This Conlon news threw him a bit.’
‘He’ll be OK. He’s a daddy now, it’s changed things for him.’ Maeve caught her eye in the mirror. ‘I heard your man was back. Brooking.’
Of course, as a journalist, Maeve always knew things. ‘Um. Yeah – they brought him over for this Alice Morgan case. I didn’t know.’
Maeve hesitated. She wanted to say something, clearly, acknowledge the elephant in the room, and Paula suddenly couldn’t let her. ‘We’re doing our best,’ she said in a rush. ‘Aidan and me. I didn’t want any of this, the wedding and that, but we’re OK. He loves Maggie. He’s a great dad.’
‘Ah, I know he is. Sure he never stops going on about her.’ Maeve nudged her affectionately. ‘Anyway, I knew it as soon as I saw you, Maguire. I said to myself, that’s the woman who’s fit for Aidan O’Hara.’
‘You did?’
‘Oh aye. Only person I know who’s even nosier and more stubborn than he is.’
‘You’re a fine one to talk, Ms Investigative Journalist of the Year.’ Maeve had won this award the year before, despite her injuries.
Maeve pulled another feather from Paula’s hair. ‘Thank God for Google, eh? My days of running down alleys are over, I think. Now come on, Bridezilla. You’ve got a big day tomorrow.’
Chapter Thirty-Four
‘You take this one.’ Saoirse, sober and bossy, was putting people in cabs, checking her phone. Avril was already slumped in one, eyes closed. Paula hoped she wouldn’t be sick.
‘How are things on the “lads about town” stag do?’ Paula nodded to Saoirse’s phone.
‘Dave says he’s home already. Got a dodgy pint or something. Couldn’t handle his booze, more like.’ Saoirse’s husband was a huge, rugby-playing bear of a man, and Paula imagined he’d actually come home early in order to see his adored wife.
‘Any sign of the groom?’ she said lightly, thinking how odd that sounded.
‘Not sure. Still out, I guess.’
‘Well, just make sure he gets there tomorrow.’ She had visions of Aidan passed out in a ditch. ‘I don’t want to be standing up there like a gom in a big white dress and no groom.’
Saoirse’s phone bleeped again. ‘Dave says he behaved himself. Only on the beers.’
‘Good.’ She hugged her friend, loosened up by booze. ‘Thanks for this. See you tomorrow for getting Tangoed?’
‘You will indeed. Hair and make-up at nine.’
Paula shuddered. ‘Promise you won’t let them make me too orange? I mean, seriously, with this hair I can’t pull it off.’
‘I’ll do my best. Off you go.’
In the cab she leaned her head against the cool window, checking her phone. There was a chaotic text from Pat, who had just discovered emojis, or the ‘wee picture yokes’ as she called them, about how she’d be up at six to steam her hat and how Maggie had gone off to sleep clutching her headband for tomorrow. Tomorrow Paula would marry Aidan. Her fingers hesitated over the screen, thumbing his number. He’d behave. It was his stag do, she wasn’t going to bother him.
She paid the driver and let herself in. In the hall she saw a light was on upstairs. A memory grabbed her – the day two years back when she’d come home to find an intrude
r there, fleeing, but not before stabbing Paula and leaving PJ for dead. He’d been lying on the kitchen floor in a pool of blood. She flicked on the lights – nothing, of course. Silly. ‘Hello?’
From upstairs, Aidan’s voice, muffled. ‘Maguire. You’re back early.’
‘Yeah, early start and that – are you not meant to be at Dave’s?’
‘Ach. I didn’t want to disturb him. Can’t handle his drink, for all the size of him.’ She stood at the bottom of the stairs. The bathroom door was ajar, but as she watched, Aidan moved to shut it, and she heard the lock go. Aidan rarely even closed the door when he was in the bathroom – she was always moaning at him as he peed in full view, whistling a tune.
‘What are you doing?’ She could hear running water.
‘Shaving. Get a head-start for tomorrow.’
‘Did you not leave your gear at Saoirse and Dave’s?’ He didn’t answer. Frustrated, she went into the kitchen. Maybe he’d overdone it on the booze and come home hoping he’d be passed out before she got back. His jacket was over a chair. She looked at it, but didn’t touch. That was a road she did not want to go down. One of Maggie’s toys was on the side, an irritating Barbie-like doll, all legs and boobs and fake blond hair. A present from Paula’s Auntie Phil. Paula saw it had been dressed up in a confection of lace and net – a bride. Maggie had scribbled on its face with red crayon, perhaps in a cry for greater diversity. Paula set it down carefully, decided she couldn’t be bothered making herself a cup of tea. The kitchen looked surprisingly clean – she’d meant to give it a wipe before people landed in the next day, but she hadn’t managed it. It was unlike Aidan to notice dirt, yet she saw a streak of cleaner drying on the floor. Had he mopped? She didn’t think he had ever mopped before; in fact it was a source of some discord.
On impulse, an impulse she hated, Paula opened the high cupboard where they kept a bottle of whiskey. She wasn’t even sure why they had it, except it would seem wrong in an Irish home not to have one round the place. She squinted at the level of the amber liquid. It hadn’t gone down. At least she didn’t think so.
A Savage Hunger (Paula Maguire 4) Page 20
