The Day That Never comes (The Dublin Trilogy Book 2)

by Caimh McDonnell

  Not that it was a cause to celebrate. Her investigation had still been blown all to shite, and the Púca were nowhere to be found. Who they weren't, were Gearoid Lanagan and his merry band. She'd just been down in the basement for a provisional briefing from the tech boys. The man they'd known as Adam had now been identified from papers as an Israeli national called Benjamin Lewington. He'd done the mandatory national service there, but he was only ex-military in the sense that most Israeli citizens were. His main claim to fame was his abilities as a hacker. They'd been trying to drill their way into fibre cabling that travelled below the building. Their goal had been a hardwire hack into the banking systems. They'd already tried to frame it as an attempt to destroy capitalism but Burns expected that, when the truth came out, it'd emerge that it was a good old-fashioned bank job. She guessed that when Franks and his sincere protesters had taken over the building for their innocently-stated motives, Lanagan had seen an opportunity.

  All of the above was a little bit of good news for Sharpe; his operation had foiled an attempted robbery. That was the thing though, it really hadn't. ‘Adam’, who had apparently gone out last week to pick up some more equipment, had already started singing like the proverbial canary. Their whole plan was based on outdated ideas on how the communications worked. They got the idea of physically hacking into fibre cabling when somebody had tried it at a bank in Minnesota two years ago. Thing is, the whole banking industry had noticed that too. Burns hadn't understood most of the explanation that followed, but the bank security specialists they'd brought in had concurred fully with the Garda boffins; that lot would have had more luck pulling a gun on an ATM machine and demanding it hand over ten million euros.

  Burns had checked in with her people chasing down leads on Bunny McGarry. Nothing so far. They were also yet to locate Conroy and Mulchrone, but Burns didn't hold out a great deal of hope there. If they did know where McGarry was, why go to all the fuss of lodging a missing person's report? McGarry was, by all accounts, unstable and comfortable with the use of violence, but it was still a long walk from there to psychopathic serial killer. Christ, that had just occurred to her. McGarry – if it was him – would be the first confirmed serial killer in the history of the Republic of Ireland. This week just kept getting better.

  Added to all of this was Sharpe's inability to pass up a microphone. Burns could sympathise on this one. A lot of times, the determination to not look like you are hiding something while simultaneously not say anything can be your downfall. Sharpe had been accompanying the independent medical expert through the cordon, when James Marshall from RTÉ had nipped through and put a microphone in his face. They'd probably use the clip as a warning exercise for years to come on media training courses.

  'Is Father Daniel Franks dead?'

  'The Gardaí can neither confirm nor deny that at this time.'

  Ouch! Because of course, the Gardaí normally refuse to confirm or deny whether suspects in custody are alive or not. That's a thing.

  The noise outside had been steadily rising, and she could no longer ignore it. She moved across to the window and even she was taken aback. The crowd had doubled in size since she'd last looked. From above, she could see how thin the line of Gardaí holding it back was.

  The situation was highly flammable. All it would take was one spark and the sky would burn.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Sunday 6 February 2000 – Night

  JC blew into his hands and hugged himself close. It wasn't actually that cold, at least not for this time of year, but at night, in the Phoenix Park on higher ground, there was precious little shelter from the wind. Even on a summer's night it could cut through you. There was that, and then there were the shivers, goosebumps dancing across his skin. It'd been a day and a half since his last hit, and he was starting to feel the ache in his bones again.

  He'd sworn the last time he was up here would be the last. Swore blind. He and Daz had done a couple of houses together. They'd found some jewellery in some old dear's bedside cabinet, reckoned it'd really be worth something. Daz had promised he knew a guy that'd take care of 'em, not rip them off like if they went to Fish with it. He'd promised. JC felt like an idiot. Who the fuck trusts a smackhead to stand by their word? He'd have taken the money and run too.

  Car lights came up the hill, and he made an effort to put his hands down by his sides, look casual. He was a pretty boy last time he'd checked, though he avoided mirrors like a vampire these days. Still, you get that junkie shuffle about you and the citizens don't want to know. Makes it all a bit too real. You'll have the odd one who doesn't care or seems to get off on it, but those boys are the ones to avoid. Not that he had much choice. He needed money, and he'd only got one thing to sell.

  The lights passed and headed up the hill. Along the grassy verge, fading in and out of the trees, various figures stood. There'd been some hassle earlier; one body saying another body was standing way too close. It was always like this. Generally just bitching, though one bad night, before Christmas, Jar had cut some new lad who didn't know better and was too pigheaded by half. They'd all been pissed at that. Had to clear off, and there'd been cop cars driving by for the next couple of weeks after. Luckily, somebody had called an ambulance so the kid hadn't died. Wasn't no Florence Nightingale move that; everybody knew that if somebody died, the cops would be up there in force. They'd have to go find a new spot, and the citizens would be scared off.

  The lights disappeared over the hill, not stopping. Fucking lookie-loos, ‘just passing through, officer’. Yeah right! Is there something wrong with your car that it drives that slowly up a hill? Coward.

  As the night went on, the number of passing cars increased. 11 pm was the sweet spot. That's when the citizens would be done with all their family obligations, and be looking for a bit of excitement to see them through the work-a-day grind of the week ahead. Lights going up and down; two, three, four cars stopped. No interest in JC. He tried to chill. The more “desperate junkie” he looked, the less likely the citizens would be. One passed three times. He tried to give him a reassuring smile, then the fucker picks up Bazzer up the hill. Fuck him.

  Hang in there, cars are rolling by, plenty still. Hands in pockets, think James Dean. Finally, a live one pulls up. Black car, big executive job. JC casually strolls towards the window. As he looks in, he recognises him – it's the Whale. That's the name JC gave him. Big, fat guy. He'd had him before. Has a nasty way about him. Looks at you like you're trash, and seems to get off on it. A lot of the citizens are just guys who are living a lie and looking for a little truth. Some of 'em are always trying to be extra nice to you, wanting to think that everybody is getting something out of this. Happy, happy, happy. There's that fella who cries after, sometimes during. Off putting, truth be told.

  The Whale wasn't that, though. He’d a sneery way about him. Never dropped you back neither, seemed to like making you walk. All part of his little kick.

  Still, teeth and tits – JC smiled in through the window. The Whale waved him inside, and he opened the passenger door and slid in.

  "Hey there, how’s it going?"

  The Whale didn't answer, just pulled away.

  "There's a nice spot up—"

  "I know where I'm going."

  JC didn't try and engage him in any further conversation. He wasn't the chatting sort, and there wasn't any need to haggle. The Whale knew the score. Instead, JC focused on looking out of the window. The leather seats felt nice, but the urge to pick at his own skin was coursing through him. He was feeling twitchy as fuck, and trying not to show it. At one point, JC thought he saw a car on the road behind them as they turned a corner, but when he glanced back again he couldn't see any lights.

  The Whale pulled over in a spot that was about half a mile further into the park than they'd needed to be. All part of his little power trip. He was going to have to walk back through the darkness. JC hated the dark.

  "Right," said the Whale as he undid his seatbelt. "You'll do
what I tell you, when I tell you."

  JC nodded.

  The Whale threw some money onto the dash. JC reached for it.

  "No. Not until after."

  The Whale gave him a smile that was pure nasty. Then he reached across and grabbed the back of JC's head and…

  The back door suddenly opened, and a big man slipped in.

  "Evening, Councillor."

  The smile crashed from the Whale's face.

  "What is the meaning of—"

  The big guy in the back seat was cheery as he spoke in a lilting Cork accent. "I see that, like myself, you're a keen badger enthusiast." He waved a camera in the air. "It's not easy, but seeing them at night in their natural habitat, ah sure, ‘tis a sight to behold, isn't it? I've taken lots of pictures, loads of pictures."

  "Who… who are you? What are you doing in my car?"

  The big guy smacked the palm of his hand into his forehead in mock frustration. "Sorry, Your Worship – where are me manners? Detective Bunny McGarry, at your service." He extended his hand for a handshake, but it was left hanging there.

  JC wanted to run, but it didn't seem like he'd get far. This also didn't feel like an arrest. He'd been through them a few times, they weren't normally this chatty.

  "I…" said the Whale, "There's clearly been a mistake. I don't know what you think is happening here. I was just giving my nephew a lift home and…"

  The rest of the car looked at the Whale in disapproval. He now noticed that, in his shock, his hand was still on the back of JC's neck. He pulled it away. The man in the back leaned forward and whispered. "Do you want to take another run at that, Councillor?"

  "I… I mean… I was giving this young man a lift home."

  The man in the back seat leaned back and clapped his hands together. "Course you were. That makes more sense, doesn't it? Just a coincidence I was here, taking lots and lots of pictures of badgers."

  He held the camera up again, to re-emphasise his point.

  "Anyway, I'll probably bump into you again on Monday night, Councillor, I'll be at the vote about St Jude's. I'm really hoping we can save our little hurling club."

  The Whale nodded emphatically. "Yes… no, absolutely. I'm… sure we can."

  "Your support of our boys is most gratifying. I'll be happy to give your friend a lift home, if you'd like. I'm done badger watching for the night."

  "Right, yes, absolutely."

  With that, the large man leaned forward and grabbed the wad of money off the dashboard. "For the badgers."

  He opened the door and stepped out again.

  The Whale all but pushed JC out of the door. He drove off, the passenger door still open and flapping about as he sped around the corner.

  The light pollution bouncing off the clouds meant that it was never really dark in Dublin, even in the park. Not like it was in the country, where JC was from. In another life. He looked across at the big man – Bunny? Was that what he'd called himself?

  "Am I under arrest?"

  The big man looked across at him. "No, son, you're not." Then he looked down at the wad of money.

  JC felt the cold down his spine again. "Don't suppose you'll let me have that?"

  "No."

  "If you like, I can—"

  "Don't," said the other man, looking down at his feet. "Just, don't." He put his hand in his inside pocket and started rummaging around. "I'll give it to you, when you really need it."

  "I do, I—"

  The man held his hand up. "Save me the junkie ballads, there, Bosco." He pulled a card from his pocket and held it out. "You ever really want to get off that shit, then you ring me – any time, day or night. You ring that number, and I'll come get you. Friend of mine runs a place, he'll help you get clean."

  Johnny glowered at him. "Oh thanks a fucking bunch, ye fucking hypocrite. Stealing my fucking money."

  "I can still arrest you if you like?"

  "Yeah, and I can tell everybody how you're blackmailing that fella."

  "Sure you could, who wouldn't believe a junkie?" He extended the card again.

  "Fuck you," said JC.

  "Don't take it and I'll leave you here. Take it, and I'll drop you anywhere you want to go. No questions asked."

  JC reached up and scratched his right shoulder. It was cold and he did hate the dark. He reached across and took the card.

  "Right then. I'm parked just around the corner."

  The big man started trudging off back down the road. JC hesitated for a minute and then followed.

  "By the way," said the big man, "What's your name?"

  "JC."

  "As in Jesus Christ? Charmed to make your acquaintance. I wondered where you ended up."

  "You're a scream," said JC.

  The big man stopped.

  "What's your real name?"

  "Does it matter?"

  "Yes, it matters. What does your ma call you?"

  JC looked into the man's eyes, noticing for the first time that the left one was all wonky. "Do you think my ma still talks to me?"

  The big man said nothing, just continued to look at him.

  JC shrugged.

  "Johnny," he said. "Johnny Canning."

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Gerry: We’re getting reports in folks and… I’ll be honest here, I am frustrated. There are unconfirmed reports that are all over social media, but our station manager has told me that we can’t report them due to broadcast restrictions. This isn’t on the playlist, but I brought in the CD last week and… why the hell not? Here is T. Rex and ‘Children of the Revolution’.

  Inder O'Riordan was fully aware of his reputation as an odd fish. In fact, he kind of enjoyed it a little bit. It wasn't like he had ever fit in before in his life, but at least now it felt like he wasn't fitting in on his own terms. The son of a Pakistani mother and Irish father, he had managed to not fit in on two continents. On the family visits to Lahore he had felt very Irish, and in Belfast he had felt very Pakistani. Life at home had been exhausting too. His parents may well have loved each other, but they had never seemed to like each other much.

  Books had been his escape from this. Science, mathematics; he'd had a love of numbers from an early age. Even that release had come at a price. The word ‘genius’ had been attached to him since the age of four, and he'd grown to hate it. He had felt pressure from all sides. To perform, to be the best he could be, to make his parents proud. At some point in his child's mind perhaps he had believed that, if he did well enough, the wounds in his parents’ marriage would heal. He knew better now.

  Still, at sixteen, when he'd gone to Queen’s University on a full mathematics scholarship, big things had been expected of him. It had been something of a culture shock, although not in the way many might have expected. He had read extensively on what he could expect from the university experience. He had watched the National Lampoon films. He was fully prepared to engage in high-jinks, should the need arise. No, what he had not expected was the feeling of being ordinary. Being a genius meant being in the top 1% of the population. However, once they’d separated that 1% from the rest, for the first time in his life Inder had felt the sensation of being the dumbest person in the room. He had gone off the rails, but not in the National Lampoon way he had hoped for. The feeling had made him angry and bitter at the world, but he had become so at a very low volume. Over the space of a couple of years, he had very quietly fallen apart.

  Fionnuala Beckering had been the breaking point. It had happened two days before his eighteenth birthday. She had been fifteen, three years his junior. Not a significant gap now, but a vast desert to a teenager. When she had stood up in that tutorial, in that small wood-panelled room that never had enough light and always smelt oddly of lemons, and tackled the equation he had been working on for two weeks – barely eating, sleeping or bathing in that time – and she had solved it in what appeared to be five minutes, he had very quietly walked out. He hadn't even picked up his coat. The tutors had assumed he was just going t
o the bathroom.

  What followed were Inder's ‘lost years’, although he never understood that expression; he had always known where he had been. Amongst other things, he had attempted to count cards at a casino in France. It was there that he had experienced physical violence for the first time. He had always assumed he would have no flair for it, correctly as it turned out. He'd attempted bar work, which he had enjoyed for a time. He had taken a run at drinking and drugs, but he had not seen what the fuss was about on either front. He'd moved in with an older woman in Portugal called Isabella, who had taught him more in six months than he would have learned in ten years if he'd remained at Queen’s. Her last lesson to him had been heartbreak, and she had taught it well. She had ran off with a rat-faced Italian hacker who called himself Nero. Inder had crawled back to Ireland, having discovered on the ferry home that he wasn't capable of throwing himself overboard in a futile gesture of romance.

  His parents had since relocated to Dublin, his father working in his brother-in-law's booming recycling business as financial controller. Inder had stayed more or less in his room for six months, while his parents had fretted and panicked. Then, over a dinner one night, his father had laughingly explained to his mother how the company's accountancy software had developed a peculiar fault, randomly rounding up certain numbers. The next day, Inder had unexpectedly shown up at his office. He had never shown much interest in computers up until this point. Still, it had taken him all of ten minutes to confirm a theory. His father's assistant had hacked the software and was siphoning money off. When the Gardaí had been brought in, Inder had been introduced to a pleasant man called Mick Cusack, who was a civilian Garda employee tasked with computer crime. He had been impressed by Inder's abilities, and they'd stayed in contact. Eventually, Mick had got Inder a six-month placement in his team, and that had been that. Four years later, the great mystery was why someone with Inder's skills was still working for the police. His skills as an expert in computer security could have made him a very rich man. Occasionally the Gardaí lent him to other countries as a favour. He and Mick had been to Sweden, Ghana and Romania. Inder stayed because Mick never asked him to fill out a report, turn up at a very specific time or sit through an assessment. Mick got Inder, and Inder didn't like the idea of working for anyone else. A part of him also liked the idea of one day seeing police slap cuffs on Nero. He didn't like people who stole.