Faithful Place (Dublin Murder Squad, #3)(39)
“Probably not.”
“You anything to the Mackeys up on Faithful Place?”
The eyes. “Long story,” I said.
“Ah,” the barman said, like he understood everything there was to know about me, “we’ve all got one of those,” and he slid a glass under the tap with a neat flourish.
The last time Rosie Daly and I touched was on a Friday, nine days before Zero Hour. Town was crisp and cold and packed that evening, all the Christmas lights on and the shoppers hurrying and the street hawkers selling wrapping paper five for a pound. I wasn’t a huge fan of Christmas in general—my ma’s crazy always hit its impressive annual peak at Christmas dinner, so did my da’s drinking, something always wound up broken and at least one person always wound up in tears—but that year it all felt unreal and glassy, right on the edge between enchanting and sinister: the shiny-haired private-school girls singing “Joy to the World” for charity were just a little too clean and blank-faced, the kids pressing their noses up against Switzer’s windows to stare at the fairy-tale scenes looked just a little too drugged on all that color and rhythm. I kept a hand in the pocket of my army parka as I headed through the crowds; that day of all days, the last thing I wanted was to get robbed.
Rosie and I always met in O’Neill’s on Pearse Street—it was a Trinity student pub, which meant the wanker count was a little high, but we didn’t stick out and there was no chance of running into anyone we knew. The Dalys thought Rosie was out with the girls; my family didn’t give a damn where I was. O’Neill’s is big, it was filling up fast and billowing with warmth and smoke and laughter, but I picked out Rosie right away by that burst of copper hair: leaning on the bar, saying something to make the barman grin. By the time she paid for our pints I had found us a table in a nice private corner.
“Little tosser,” she said, putting the pints on the table and nodding backwards at a clump of snickering students up at the bar. “Tried to look down my top when I leaned over.”
“Which one?”
I was already getting up, but Rosie threw me a look and pushed my pint towards me. “Sit down there, you, and drink that. I’ll sort him myself.” She slid onto the bench next to me, close enough that our thighs touched. “That fella there, lookit.”
Rugby jersey, no neck, turning away from the bar with his precarious double handful of pints. Rosie gave him a wave to get his attention back; then she batted her lashes, leaned forward and swirled the tip of her tongue in little circles in the head of her pint. Rugby Boy’s eyes popped, his mouth fell open, he got his ankles tangled in a stool and half his pints went down someone’s back. “Now,” Rosie said, giving him the finger and forgetting about him. “Did you get them?”
I put a hand into my coat, slung over the arm of the seat where I could keep an eye on it, and found the envelope. “There,” I said, “all ours,” and I fanned out two tickets and laid them on the banged-up wooden table between us. DUN LAOGHAIRE-HOLYHEAD, DEPARTING 06:30AM, MONDAY 16 DECEMBER. PLEASE ARRIVE AT LEAST 30 MINUTES BEFORE DEPARTURE.
The sight of them made my adrenaline spike all over again. The breath went out of Rosie in an amazed little laugh.
I said, “I thought the early boat was better. We could’ve had the overnight one, but it’d be harder to get our stuff and get away in the evening. This way we can head out to the harbor on Sunday night, whenever we get a chance, and then wait there till it’s time. Yeah?”
“God,” Rosie said after a moment, still breathless. “My God. I feel like we should be—” Her arm curved round the tickets, shielding them from the people at the next tables. “You know?”
I wove my fingers through hers. “We’re all right here. We’ve never seen anyone we know, have we?”
“It’s still Dublin. I won’t feel safe till that ferry’s out of Dun Laoghaire. Put them away, will you?”
“Will you look after them? My ma goes through our stuff.”
Rosie grinned. “Not surprised. I wouldn’t be surprised if my da goes through mine, as well, but he won’t touch the knicker drawer. Give us those.” She picked up the tickets like they were made of fine lace, slid them carefully into the envelope and tucked it into the top pocket of her jeans jacket. Her fingers stayed there for a moment, over her breast. “Wow. Nine days, and then . . .”
“And then,” I said, lifting my pint, “here’s to you and me and our new life.”
We clinked glasses and took a drink, and I kissed her. The pint was top-notch, the warmth of the pub was starting to thaw out my feet after the walk through town, there was tinsel draped over the picture frames on the walls, and the bunch of students at the next table burst into loud tipsy laughter. I should have been the happiest camper in the whole pub, but the evening still had that precarious feel to it, like a brilliant sparkly dream that could turn nasty in a blink. I let Rosie go because I was afraid I was going to kiss her hard enough to hurt.
“We’ll have to meet late,” she said, hooking one knee over mine. “Midnight, or after. My da doesn’t go to bed till eleven, and I’ll have to give him a while to go asleep.”
“My lot are conked out by half past ten, on a Sunday. Sometimes Shay stays out late, but as long as I don’t run into him on his way in, no problem. Even if I do, he won’t stop us; he’ll be delighted to see the back of me.” Rosie flicked an eyebrow and took another swig of her pint. I said, “I’ll head out by midnight. If it takes you a little longer, no bother.”