“Sunshine, you would be amazed at how often that happens. Amazed. Like I said, if you can’t handle it, not only do you need to know that, but so do I. Both of us might have to do some rethinking about your career goals.”
The corners of Stephen’s mouth tightened. “If I don’t do this,” he said, “I can forget about a place in Undercover.”
“Not out of spite, kid. Don’t fool yourself. A guy could bang both my sisters at once, stick the video on YouTube, and I’d happily work with him, as long as I thought he’d get the job done. But if you make it clear to me that you’re fundamentally unsuited to undercover work, then no, I’m not going to recommend you. Call me crazy.”
“Can I have a few hours to think about it?”
“Nope,” I said, flicking my cigarette away. “If you can’t make this call fast, I don’t need you to make it at all. I’ve got places to go and people to see, and I’m sure you have too. Here’s what it comes down to, Stephen. For the next few weeks, you can be Scorcher Kennedy’s typist, or you can be my detective. Which one of those sounds more like what you signed up for?”
Stephen bit his lip and wrapped the end of his scarf around his hand. “If we did this,” he said. “If. What kind of thing would you be wanting to know? Just for example.”
“Just for example, when the fingerprint results come back, I’d be fascinated to hear whose prints, if any, were on that suitcase, on the contents of that suitcase, on the two halves of that note, and on the window Kevin went out of. I’d also be interested in a full description of his injuries, preferably with the diagrams and the post-mortem report. That might well be enough info to keep me going for a while; who knows, it might even turn out to be all I ever need. And that should be back within the next couple of days, no?”
After a moment Stephen let out a long breath, a trail of white in the cold air, and lifted his head. “No offense,” he said, “but before I go spilling inside info on a murder case to a total stranger, I’d like to see some ID.”
I burst out laughing. “Stephen,” I said, finding my ID, “you’re a man after my own heart. We’re going to be good for each other, you and me.”
“Yeah,” Stephen said, a little dryly. “I’m hoping.” I watched his disorganized red head bent over the ID, and just for a second, under the hard throb of triumph-Up yours, Scorchie baby, he’s my boy now-I felt a little pulse of affection towards the kid. It felt good to have someone on my side.
And that was about as long as I could put off going home. I tried fortifying myself for it at Burdock’s-the thought of Burdock’s was the only thing that had ever tempted me to go back to the Liberties-but even the finest smoked cod and chips have their limits. Like most undercovers, I don’t have much of a knack for fear. I’ve walked into meetings with men who had every intention of chopping me into convenient sections and arranging me artistically under the nearest patch of concrete, and never broken a sweat. This, though, had me shitting an entire brickworks. I told myself what I had told young Stephen: count this as an undercover op, Frankie the Intrepid Detective on his most daring mission yet, into the jaws of doom.
The flat was a different place. The house was unlocked, and as soon as I stepped into the hall the wave came rolling down the stairs and hit me: warmth and voices and the smell of hot whiskey and cloves, all pouring out of our open door. The heating was on full blast and the sitting room was packed with people, crying, hugging, clumping up to put their heads together and enjoy the horror of it all, carrying six-packs or babies or plates of EasiSingle sandwiches covered in plastic wrap. Even the Dalys were there; Mr. Daly looked tense as hell and Mrs. Daly looked like she was on some pretty high-powered happy peanuts, but death trumps everything. I clocked Da instantly and automatically, but he and Shay and a few other lads had staked out a man-zone in the kitchen, with smokes and cans and monosyllabic conversation, and so far he looked fine. On a table under the Sacred Heart, propped up between flowers and Mass cards and electric candles, were photos of Kevin: Kevin as a fat red sausage of a baby, in a spiffy white Miami Vice suit at his confirmation, on a beach with a gang of shouting, sun-broiled lads waving lurid cocktails.
“There you are,” Ma snapped, elbowing someone out of her way. She had changed into an eye-popping lavender getup that was clearly her top-level finery, and she had done some fairly serious crying since that afternoon. “You took your time, didn’t you?”
“I came back as fast as I could. Are you holding up all right?”
She got the soft part of my arm in that lobster pinch I remembered so well. “Come here, you. That fella from your work, the one with the jaw on him, he’s been saying Kevin fell out a window.”
She had apparently decided to take this as a personal insult. With Ma, you never know what’s going to fit that bill. I said, “That’s what it looks like, yeah.”
