The Secret Place (Dublin Murder Squad, #5)(180)

Another movement, quicker and cut off. Julia had elbowed Selena, kicked her, something.

I asked, ‘Rebecca? How about you?’

After a moment, from inside the dark: ‘I saw him.’

‘Yeah? What was he doing?’

Another ripple through that rune, changed the meaning in subtle ways I couldn’t read.

‘He was talking. Fast, like jabbering; like, he never stopped to breathe. I guess he doesn’t need to.’

‘What was he saying?’

‘I couldn’t tell. I was trying to read his lips, but he was going too fast. One time he . . .’ Rebecca’s voice split on a shiver. ‘He laughed.’

‘Could you tell who he was talking to?’

Silence. Then – so soft, I would’ve missed it, only my ears were wide open as an animal’s – ‘To me.’

A tiny catch of breath, almost a gasp, from somewhere else in that condensation of darkness.

I asked, ‘Why you?’

‘I told you. I couldn’t hear.’

‘This morning you said you and Chris weren’t close.’

‘We weren’t.’

‘So it’s not like he misses you so much, he had to come back and tell you that.’

Nothing.

‘Rebecca.’

‘Probably not. I guess. I don’t know.’

‘Not like he was secretly in love with you, no?’

‘No!’

I said, ‘You know how you looked, in there? Scared. Like, really scared.’

‘I saw a ghost. You’d be scared too.’

The raw flick of defiance: she didn’t sound like a mystery now, not like a danger. Sounded like a kid, just a teenage kid. The power was seeping out of her; fear was seeping in.

Julia said, ‘Don’t talk to him any more.’

I said, ‘Did you think he was going to hurt you?’

‘How would I know?’

‘Becs. Shut up.’

No way to tell if Julia was just wary, or if she was starting to understand. ‘But,’ I said, fast, ‘but Rebecca, I thought you liked Chris. You told us he was sound. Was that a lie? He was actually a dickhead?’

‘No. He wasn’t. He was kind.’

That flare of defiance again, hotter. This mattered to her.

I shrugged. ‘Everything we’ve learned, he sounds like a dickhead. He used girls for whatever he could get, dumped them as soon as he wasn’t getting it. A real prize.’

‘No. Colm’s is full of those – they don’t care what they wreck, they’ll do anything to anyone as long as they get what they want. I know the difference. Chris wasn’t like that.’

The white outline moved. Things rising up underneath it, bubbling.

Rebecca felt them. She said, ‘I know the stuff he did. Obviously I know he wasn’t perfect. But he wasn’t like the rest of them.’

A raw choke that could have been a laugh, out of Julia.

‘Lenie. He wasn’t. Was he?’

Selena moved. She said, ‘He was a lot of things.’

‘Lenie.’

They had forgotten me. Selena said, ‘He wanted not to be like them. He tried really hard. I don’t know how much it worked.’

‘It did.’ Rebecca’s voice was spiralling towards panic. ‘It worked.’

That ugly twist of sound again, from Julia.

‘It did. It did.’

Something crunched behind me, a branch whipped. Something was happening. I couldn’t tell what, couldn’t afford to turn. Had to trust Conway and keep going.

I said, ‘So how come you were scared of his ghost? Why would it want to hurt you, if Chris never would’ve?’

Julia said, ‘Specially since it’s not f*cking real. Becca? Hello? They made you imagine it like some Omen thing. If you decide to imagine it as a purple turtle instead, then that’s what you’ll see. Hello?’

‘Hello yourself, I saw him—’

‘Rebecca. Why would it want to hurt you?’

‘Because ghosts are angry. You guys said that, remember? This afternoon.’ But the panic was taking up more and more of Rebecca’s voice. ‘And anyway, he didn’t hurt me.’

I said, ‘This time he didn’t. What about next time?’

‘Who says there’ll be a next time?’

‘I do. Chris had something to say to you, something he wants from you, and he didn’t get through. He’ll be back. Again and again, till he gets what he wants.’

‘He won’t. It was because you were here, you got him all—’

‘Selena,’ I said. ‘You know he was there. You want to tell us whether you think he’ll be back?’

In the slow fall of silence, I heard something. Murmur of voices, away down at the bottom of the slope. A man. A girl.

Closer, in the cypresses behind me: a sound like the muted first breath of a roar. Conway, moving among the braches to cover the voices. ‘Selena,’ I said. ‘Is Chris going to be back?’

Selena said, ‘He’s there the whole time. Even when I don’t see him, I can feel him. I hear him, like this humming noise right inside the backs of my ears, like when the telly’s on mute. All the time.’