Those We Left Behind (21 page)

CIARAN HAS BEEN
waiting and waiting for her to return. He’s waited so long it’s light outside. Somewhere in those hours he fell asleep, and revisited Mother-Serena in the hospital bed where she made him beautiful promises that he can no longer remember.

He knows she will return. She will come back and set him free. Free of this cell, and free of his brother. And she will take him to the seaside.

And what then?

Ciaran doesn’t know, but the idea of it is bright and glowing in his mind when the cell door opens. He looks to the door, joy flowering in him, but it isn’t Serena. Instead, it’s a uniformed policeman and the other policewoman, the one with the long blonde hair and hard eyes.

‘You’re free to go,’ she says.

‘I’m waiting for Serena,’ he says. ‘I want to talk to her.’

‘DCI Flanagan is no longer working on this investigation,’ the policewoman says. ‘You won’t have any further contact with her.’

Ciaran’s mind cannot absorb what the policewoman has told him. ‘But I need to talk to her,’ he says. He hears the quiver in his own voice.

‘The Crime Prevention Order DCI Flanagan requested is still in force,’ she said. ‘You’re to have no contact with Thomas Devine unless under supervision. For the time being, you’re free to go.’ She stepped away from the door, leaving a space exactly as wide as Ciaran. ‘So go. Now.’

Mr Wheatley comes and gets him at six in the morning. He barely says a word as he drives along the motorway from Antrim, his eyes dark with fatigue.

As Mr Wheatley parks at the hostel, he says, ‘The van will be here to lift the other boys in about ten minutes. If you’re quick, you can still go to work today. If you don’t, you’ll probably get the sack.’

Ciaran says, ‘Okay.’

‘Good. Away you go.’

Fifteen minutes later, Ciaran waits with the other boys on the pavement. They don’t speak to him, or even look at him. The van arrives, and they climb in. The seat next to Emmet is free, so Ciaran sits beside him once more.

‘Jesus, did you forget your lunch again?’ Emmet asks.

‘Yeah,’ Ciaran says.

‘Well, I’m not sharing with you today.’

Ciaran doesn’t answer as the van pulls away. He thinks only about Serena Flanagan and how she broke her promise.

They’re all the same, Thomas would say.

All the same.

CUNNINGHAM WAITED AT
the long table in the boardroom listening to her boss’s breathing. Edward Hughes sat at the other side of the table, his head nodding forward then jerking up again. He stirred himself, blinked, checked his wristwatch and said, ‘Fifteen minutes.’

Cunningham didn’t answer. The meeting was supposed to start at ten. Flanagan hadn’t struck her as the type to miss appointments. She checked her own watch to be sure Hughes had got the time right.

Sixteen minutes, now.

She quietly thanked God when there was a knock at the boardroom door.

‘Come,’ Hughes said.

A man Cunningham didn’t recognise entered, a file tucked under his arm. Mid-to-late fifties, around her boss’s age. Hughes had frozen halfway out of his seat. He remained there, hunched over the table, staring at the new arrival.

‘DSI William Purdy,’ the man said. ‘I’m here to talk about the Ciaran Devine case.’

Hughes finally stood upright, extended his hand. Cunningham did the same. As Purdy shook hers, she said, ‘I was expecting DCI Flanagan.’

He released her hand. ‘DCI Flanagan is no longer working on this case.’

‘Why not?’ Cunningham asked.

‘It’s an internal matter,’ Purdy said as he took a seat at the end of the table. ‘Can we get started?’

Cunningham remained on her feet. ‘But DCI Flanagan knows Ciaran’s case inside out.’

Purdy gave her a tight-lipped smile. ‘Seeing as I led the investigation that resulted in Ciaran’s conviction, I’d say I’m pretty familiar with it myself, wouldn’t you?’

Cunningham studied him as she lowered herself to her seat, suddenly worried for Flanagan. Purdy had the demeanour of a man more concerned with the safety of his pension than with the moral obligations of his job. Had he pushed Flanagan aside for his own benefit? Or had she done something to deserve to be stood down?

Hughes cleared his throat. ‘So, the purpose of this Risk Management Meeting is to establish whether Ciaran Devine poses a threat to himself or anyone else and, accordingly, if there are grounds for his release licence to be revoked. Paula, do you want to start?’

Cunningham swallowed before she spoke. ‘This hinges entirely on the killing of Daniel Rolston. Ciaran and Thomas Devine are suspects in that killing, therefore—’

‘Just a moment,’ Purdy said. ‘Sorry to interrupt, but it’s a stretch to call them suspects given that the only thing we really have to connect them is some sort of an altercation at a shopping centre earlier in the day. We have nothing physical to put them at the scene of the killing, no CCTV footage, no witnesses who can place them there. All we’ve really got is supposition.’

‘Supposition?’ Cunningham echoed. ‘Are you being serious?’

‘Paula,’ Hughes said, his tone a warning.

‘Murder isn’t something I joke about,’ Purdy said, giving her a hard look.

Cunningham stared back, her concern for Flanagan deepening. ‘You had grounds enough to arrest the Devines, interview them under caution. Now you’re telling me it was just supposition.’

‘DCI Flanagan had all of yesterday evening to turn something up. She didn’t get a scrap out of either of them. Now, I’ve talked with the officers who searched Thomas Devine’s flat and Ciaran Devine’s room at the hostel. They took some clothes away, but there were no obvious traces from the murder, and no weapon. It’ll be a day or two before the analysis of the clothes comes back, but when it does, I’d bet my house there’ll be nothing.’

Cunningham shook her head. ‘But they’re the only possible suspects.’

‘Based on what? That they had a row with the victim? There are at least two of Daniel Rolston’s workmates that have had disagreements with him in the last few days, one of which got physical. Should I take them into custody too?’

‘How can you be so wilfully blind?’ Cunningham asked.

Purdy sat back in his chair, contempt on his face. He turned to Hughes. ‘Are you going to let her talk to me like that?’

‘Paula, enough,’ Hughes said.

‘No,’ Cunningham said. ‘It’s not enough. It’s not nearly enough. You can’t dismiss this as if it’s—’

‘Stop, Paula.’

‘—some punch-up outside a pub. A young man has lost his life. The last of his family. All of them wiped out by Thomas Devine and—’

‘Thomas Devine was never convicted of murder,’ Purdy said.

‘—you’re telling me there’s not enough evidence?’

‘Paula, please stop,’ Hughes said.

‘No, I won’t stop, this is—’

Hughes’s voice rang between the walls of the boardroom. ‘Shut your mouth right now or I will take this case away from you.’

Cunningham closed her eyes and exhaled, tried to breathe away the anger. It didn’t work: the rage still sparked in her. But when she opened her eyes again, she could at least pretend to be calm.

‘All right,’ Hughes said, ‘now settle yourself.’

Cunningham nodded her assent.

‘Good.’ Hughes spoke to Purdy. ‘So I take it you’re not recommending Ciaran’s licence be revoked.’

‘No, I’m not,’ Purdy said. ‘I think it would do more harm than good at this stage.’

‘Paula, you disagree?’

‘I strongly disagree,’ she said. ‘Ciaran Devine and his brother are clearly a danger to themselves and to others. I believe Thomas Devine killed Daniel Rolston and Ciaran is covering for him purely out of loyalty. I also believe Thomas Devine posted a threatening note through my door.’

Hughes leaned forward, his elbows on the table. ‘But it’s not Thomas Devine we’re talking about sending back to prison. Even if your suspicions are proven to be true, it’s Thomas who’s the danger, not Ciaran.’

‘That’s not the point,’ Cunningham said, but Hughes raised a hand to silence her.

‘Now, both of you disagree on whether or not Ciaran’s licence should be revoked, so it looks like it’s up to me to make the decision.’

Cunningham’s stomach felt heavy inside. She sat back, closed her notebook, resigned to the outcome.

‘As I understand it, the Crime Prevention Order that DCI Flanagan got at court is still in effect. The Devine brothers are prohibited from seeing each other. And, in your opinion, Paula, it’s Thomas Devine who presents a danger, not Ciaran. So I’m inclined to side with DSI Purdy on this, and I’m not going to recommend that Ciaran’s licence be revoked.’

Cunningham got to her feet and gathered her things.

As she went to the door, she said, ‘I just pray to God you don’t regret this.’

FLANAGAN SAW DCI
Conn approach through the crowd outside the church. She braced herself.

‘You were told to stay away from Julie Walker,’ he said.

‘Penny Walker was my friend, and I’ve as much right to go to her funeral as anyone else.’

She had stood at the back of the church for the service, crammed in with those who arrived too late to get a seat. The two coffins stood side by side at the top of the central aisle, flowers arranged on each. At the end of the first pew, Julie Walker and her boyfriend, both of them standing with their heads bowed.

Flanagan had swallowed her anger as the minister segued from his sermon to a droning hymn.

‘At least stay out of Miss Walker’s sight,’ Conn said as mourners brushed past him. ‘Show a little sensitivity.’

‘I’ll try,’ Flanagan said, though in truth she didn’t care one jot about sparing Julie Walker’s feelings.

She remained among the stragglers, well away from the procession that moved away from the church at the top of the hill and down the slope to the terraces of graves. Penny had been quietly religious, rarely discussing her faith, but Flanagan knew she attended Sunday morning services here, dragging poor Ronnie along with her at Christmas and Easter.

Some of the members of the support group clustered near the front of the crowd. Flanagan had succeeded in remaining unnoticed by them. They would wonder why they hadn’t seen her. She would never have to explain; she would not go back to the group again, tainted as it now was by the manner of Penny’s death.

The procession paused as pallbearers swapped places, men young and old locking arms beneath the caskets. The older of them stoical, the younger with fear on their faces. Alistair had once told Flanagan about the first time he had carried a coffin at the age of nineteen, and how he had lain awake the night before his grandfather’s funeral, terrified of slipping and falling while performing this sacred duty, how he pictured the coffin crashing to the ground in front of the horrified mourners.

‘It was fine in the end,’ he had said, ‘but I had a hell of a bruise on my shoulder the next day.’

The sound of suppressed coughs and hundreds of shuffling feet all around as the pallbearers began the final leg of their short journey. The Walkers had a family plot on the south-western edge of the graveyard. Green felt covered the mound of excavated earth beside it. A small digger parked beneath a tree a respectful distance away, a man in overalls leaning against it.

Flanagan could not make out the minister’s words over the grave. She watched Julie Walker, the dryness of her eyes, Barry Timmons on her arm. Barry’s face hollowed by fear. Flanagan felt a small stab of pity for him. He was not made for murder. One day he would crack under the pressure of his conscience; it was only a question of how many weeks, months or years that would take. Flanagan hoped he would go to the police and tell the truth rather than harm himself. But Barry Timmons looked like a coward, and she felt in her gut that he would take the coward’s way.

‘God help him,’ Flanagan whispered under her breath.

The larger coffin was lowered first, then the smaller. A sob escaped Flanagan, surprising her. Grief at her friend being taken before she was ready. The grief slowly turned to anger. She resisted the shift at her centre for as long as she could, but it was no good.

A line formed as friends of the family went to express their condolences to the Walkers’ sole surviving child. One after the other, hands were shaken, shoulders patted, heads bowed. With little thought of her actions, Flanagan joined the queue that wound down towards the graveside.

In a few minutes she was twenty feet away from Julie Walker, and DCI Conn had spotted her once more. He picked his way through the thinning crowd to Flanagan’s side.

‘What are you doing?’ he asked, leaning in close, his voice low.

‘Paying my respects,’ Flanagan said as the line advanced.

He gripped her elbow. ‘Come on.’

‘Get your hand off me.’

His fingers tightened on her arm. ‘I told you to stay away, now for God’s sake—’

‘Let go of me,’ Flanagan said, ‘or I will break your fucking nose right here in front of everybody.’

Conn stood silent for a moment, breathing hard. ‘Don’t think you’ll get away with this,’ he said before turning and walking back towards the church.

Less than a minute passed before Flanagan came face to face with Julie. The younger woman automatically extended her hand before realising who stood before her. Flanagan closed her fingers hard around Julie’s, felt the sudden tension.

‘It shouldn’t have been like this,’ Flanagan said. ‘There was no need for it.’

Julie’s gaze, her eyes laced with red, flitted across the mourners around them. ‘I’d rather you hadn’t come,’ she said.

‘I guessed so,’ Flanagan said, ‘but I came anyway.’

‘All right. Now you can go.’

‘There’ll be no investigation,’ Flanagan said. She gave Barry a glance. As he looked away, she said, ‘Not unless something changes. Not unless someone tells the truth. Otherwise, well done. You got away with it. Not many do.’

Julie couldn’t meet Flanagan’s stare. ‘Please leave now.’

‘Yes, I’m going. I just wanted to make sure you know what I know. You got away with it, but you didn’t go unnoticed. This will haunt you for the rest of your days. How will you live with it?’

Julie’s features hardened as her eyes flashed. ‘Please just fuck off.’

A hush all around, then a wave of murmurs.

Flanagan gave Barry Timmons a last smile before heading towards the church gates, ignoring the attention of those who watched her leave.