Broken Harbor (51 page)

“I haven’t got a clue what you’re on about.”

“Fine. I’ll let our lab fill me in on the squirrels. Here’s the thing I really want to know: was it just you, this animal? Or was Jenny in on it too?”

Conor shoved back his chair, hard enough that it went tumbling, and stalked off across the room. I went after him so fast I didn’t even feel myself move. My rush backed him against the wall. “You don’t fucking walk away from me. I’m talking to you, sonny boy. When I talk, you fucking listen.”

His face was rigid, a mask carved from hard wood. He was staring past me, eyes narrowed and focused on nothing.

“She was helping you, wasn’t she? Did the two of you have a laugh about it, up in your little hideout? That eejit Pat, that sucker, falling for every piece of crap you fed him—”

“Jenny did nothing.”

“Everything was going so well, wasn’t it? Pat getting crazier every day, Jenny snuggling up closer to you. And then this happened.” I shoved the evidence bag at him, so close that I felt it brush his cheek. I just managed not to grind it into his face. “Turned out to be a big mistake, didn’t it? You thought it’d be a lovely romantic gesture, but all it did was send Jenny on a massive guilt trip. Like you said, she was happy, that summer. Happy with Pat. And you went and reminded her of it. All of a sudden, she felt like shit about slutting around on him. She decided it had to stop.”

“She wasn’t slutting—”

“How did she tell you? A note in your hideout? She didn’t even bother to break it off face-to-face, did she?”

“There was nothing
to
break off. She didn’t even know I was—”

I threw the evidence bag somewhere and slammed my hands against the wall on either side of Conor’s head, pinning him in. My voice was rising and I didn’t care. “Did you decide right then that you were going to kill them all? Or were you just going to get Jenny, and then you figured what the hell, might as well go the whole hog? Or was this how you planned it all along: Pat and the kids dead, Jenny alive and in hell?”

Nothing. I banged my hands off the wall; he didn’t even jump.

“All this, Conor, all of this, because you wanted Pat’s life instead of getting your own. Was it worth it? How good a fuck is this woman?”

“I never—”

“Shut the fuck up. I
know
you were banging her. I know it. I know it for a fact. I know it because that’s the only way this whole fucking nightmare makes any sense.”

“Get away from me.”

“Make me. Come on, Conor. Hit me. Push me away. Just one shove.” I was shouting, straight into his face. My palms hit the wall again and again and the judders ran up through my bones, but if there was pain I didn’t feel it. I had never done anything like this before and I couldn’t remember why because it felt incredible, it felt like pure savage joy. “You were a big man when you were fucking your best mate’s wife, big man when you were smothering a three-year-old—where’s the big man now that you’re up against someone your own size? Come on, big man, show me what you’ve got—”

Conor wasn’t moving a muscle, those narrow eyes were still fixed on the nothing over my shoulder. We were almost touching from faces to shoes, inches between us, less. I knew the video camera would never catch it, just one jab to the stomach, one lift of the knee, Richie would back me up— “Come on, you motherfucker, you cocksucker, hit me, I’m begging you, give me an excuse—”

One thing was warm and solid: something on my shoulder, holding me in place, holding my feet down on the ground. I almost threw it off before I understood that it was Richie’s hand. “Detective Kennedy,” his voice said mildly, in my ear. “This fella’s definite that there was nothing going on between him and Jenny. I figure that’s fair enough. Don’t you?”

I stared at him like an idiot, mouth open. I didn’t know whether to punch him or clutch at him for dear life.

Richie said matter-of-factly, “I’d love a quick chat with Conor. Is that all right?”

I still couldn’t speak. I nodded and backed away. The walls had printed their ragged texture deep into my palms.

Richie turned two chairs away from the table to face each other, just a couple of feet apart. “Conor,” he said, motioning to one of them. “Have a seat.”

Conor didn’t move. His face still had that rigidity. I couldn’t tell if he had heard the words.

“Go on. I’m not gonna ask about your motive, and I don’t think you and Jenny were doing the bold thing. Swear to God. I just need to clear up a couple of bits and pieces, just for myself. OK?”

After a moment Conor dropped into the chair. Something in the movement—the sudden looseness of it, as if his legs had gone under him—made me realize: I had been getting to him, after all. He had been a hairsbreadth from breaking: howling at me, hitting me, I would never know what. I could have been a hairsbreadth from the answer.

I wanted to roar, send Richie flying and get my hands around Conor’s throat. Instead I stood there, with my hands hanging at my sides and my mouth open, gawking uselessly at the pair of them. After a moment I saw the evidence bag, crumpled in a corner, and bent to get it. The movement sent heartburn shooting up my throat, hot and corrosive.

Richie asked Conor, “You all right?”

Conor had his elbows braced on his knees and his hands clasped tight. “I’m fine.”

“Would you have a cup of tea? Coffee? Water?”

“I’m fine.”

“Good,” Richie said peacefully, taking the other chair and shifting himself comfortable. “I just want to make sure I’m clear on a few things. OK?”

“Whatever.”

“Deadly. Just to start with: how bad did Pat get, exactly?”

“He was depressed. He wasn’t going up the walls, but yeah, he was down. I said that.”

Richie scraped at something on the knee of his trousers, tilted his head to squint at it. He said, “Tell you something I’ve noticed. Every time we start talking about Pat, you’re straight in to tell us he wasn’t crazy. Did you notice that?”

“Because he wasn’t.”

Richie nodded, still inspecting his trousers. He said, “When you went in, Monday night. Was the computer on?”

Conor examined that from every angle before he answered. “No. Off.”

“It had a password. How’d you get past that?”

“Guessed. Once, back before Jack was born, I gave Pat shit about using ‘Emma’ for some password. He just laughed, said it’d be grand. I figured there was a decent chance any password since Jack came along would be ‘EmmaJack.’”

“Fair play to you. So you turned on the computer, wiped all the internet stuff. Why?”

“It was none of your business.”

“Is that where you’d found out about the animal, yeah? On the computer?”

Conor’s eyes, empty of everything except wariness, came up to meet Richie’s. Richie didn’t blink. He said steadily, “We’ve read the lot. We already know.”

Conor said, “I went in one day, a couple of months back. The computer was on. Some board full of hunters, all trying to figure out what was in Pat and Jenny’s gaff. I went through the browser history: more of the same.”

“Why didn’t you tell us to start with?”

“Didn’t want you getting the wrong idea.”

Richie said, “You mean you didn’t want us thinking Pat went mental and killed his family. Am I right?”

“Because he didn’t. I did.”

“Fair enough. But the stuff on the computer, that had to tell you Pat wasn’t in great shape. Didn’t it?”

Conor’s head moved. “It’s the internet. You can’t go by what people say on there.”

“Still, but. If that was one of my mates, I’d’ve been worried.”

“I was.”

“I figured that, all right. Ever see him crying?”

“Yeah. Twice.”

“Arguing with Jenny?”

“Yeah.”

“Giving her a slap?” Conor’s chin shot up angrily, but Richie had a hand raised, silencing him. “Hang on. I’m not just pulling this out of my arse. We’ve got evidence that says he was hitting her.”

“That’s a load of—”

“Just give me a sec, yeah? I want to be sure I say this right. Pat had been following the rules all along, doing everything he was told, and then the rules dropped him in the shite, big-time. Like you said yourself: who was he, once that happened? People who don’t know who they are, man, they’re dangerous. They could do anything. I don’t think anyone’d be shocked if Pat lost the run of himself, now and then. I’m not excusing it or nothing; just saying I can see how it could happen even to a good guy.”

Conor said, “Can I answer now?”

“Go ahead.”

“Pat
never
hurt Jenny. Never hurt the kids, either. Yeah, he was in tatters. Yeah, I saw him punch a wall a couple of times—the last time, he couldn’t use that hand for days after; probably it was bad enough that he should’ve gone to the hospital. But her, the kids . . .
never
.”

Richie asked, “Why didn’t you get in touch with him, man?”

He sounded genuinely curious. Conor said, “I wanted to. Thought about it all the time. But Pat, he’s a stubborn bollix. If things had been going great for him, then he’d have been delighted to hear from me again. But with everything gone to shite, with me having been right . . . he’d have slammed the door in my face.”

“You could’ve tried anyway.”

“Yeah. I could’ve.”

The bitterness in his voice burned. Richie was leaning forward, his head bent close to Conor’s. “And you feel bad about that, right? About not even trying.”

“Yeah. I feel like shit.”

“So would I, man. What would you do to make up for it?”

“Whatever. Anything.”

Richie’s clasped hands were almost touching Conor’s. He said, very gently, “You’ve done great for Pat. You’ve been a good mate; you’ve taken good care of him. If there’s someplace after we die, he’s thanking you now.”

Conor stared at the floor and bit down on his lips, hard. He was trying not to cry.

“But Pat’s dead, man. Where he is now, there’s nothing left that can hurt him. Whatever people know about him, whatever people think: it doesn’t matter to him now.”

Conor caught his breath, one great raw heave, and bit down again.

“Time to tell me, man. You were up in your hide, and you saw Pat going for Jenny. You legged it down there, but you were too late. That’s what happened, isn’t it?”

Another heave, wrenching his body like a sob.

“I know you wish you’d done more, but it’s time to stop making up for that. You don’t need to protect Pat any more. He’s safe. It’s OK.”

He sounded like a best friend, like a brother, like the one person in the world who cared. Conor managed to look up, openmouthed and gasping. In that moment I was sure Richie had him. I couldn’t tell which one was strongest: the relief, or the shame, or the fury.

Then Conor leaned back in the chair and dragged his hands over his face. He said, through his fingers, “Pat never touched them.”

After a moment Richie eased backwards too. “OK,” he said, nodding. “OK. Grand. Just one more question, and I’ll fuck off and leave you alone. Answer me this and Pat’s in the clear. What did you do to the kids?”

“Get your doctors to tell you.”

“They have. Like I told you before: cross-checking.”

No one had gone upstairs from the kitchen, after the bloodshed began. If Conor had come running when he saw the struggle, he had come through the back door, into the kitchen, and he had left the same way, without ever going upstairs. If he knew how Emma and Jack had died, it was because he was our man.

Conor folded his arms, braced a foot against the table and shoved his chair around to face me, giving Richie his back. His eyes were red. He said, to me, “I did it because I was mad for Jenny and she wouldn’t go near me. That’s the motive. Put that in a statement. I’ll sign.”

* * *

The corridor felt cold as a ruin. We needed to take Conor’s statement and send him back to his cell, update the Super and the floaters, write up our reports. Neither of us moved away from the interview-room door.

Richie said, “You all right?”

“Yeah.”

“Was that OK? What I did. I wasn’t sure if . . .”

He let it trail off. I said, without looking at him, “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

“No problem.”

“You were good, in there. I thought you had him.”

Richie said, “So did I.” His voice sounded strange. We were both near the end of our strength.

I found my comb and tried to get my hair back in place, but I had no mirror and I couldn’t focus. I said, “That motive he’s giving us, that’s crap. He’s still lying to us.”

“Yeah.”

“There’s still something we’re missing. We’ve got all of tomorrow, and most of tomorrow night if we need it.” The thought made me close my eyes.

Richie said, “You wanted to be sure.”

“Yeah.”

“Are you?”

I groped for that feeling, that sweet patter of things falling into all the right places. It was nowhere; it felt like some pathetic fantasy, like a child’s stories about his stuffed toys fighting off the monsters in the dark. “No,” I said. My eyes were still closed. “I’m not sure.”

* * *

That night I woke up hearing the ocean. Not the restless, insistent shove and tug of the waves on Broken Harbor; this was a sound like a great hand stroking my hair, the miles-wide roll of breakers on some gentle Pacific beach. It was coming from outside my bedroom door.

Dina
, I told myself, feeling my heartbeat in the roof of my mouth.
Dina watching something on the TV, to put herself to sleep.
The relief took my breath away. Then I remembered: Dina was somewhere else, on Jezzer’s flea-ridden sofa, in a reeking laneway. For an upside-down second my stomach jerked with pure terror, like I was the one on my own with nobody to keep down the wilds of my mind, like she was the one who had been protecting me.

I kept my eyes on the door and eased open the drawer of my bedside table. The cold weight of my gun was comforting, solid. Outside the door the waves soothed on, unperturbed.

I had the bedroom door open, my back against the wall and my gun up and ready all in one move. The living room was empty and dark, wan rectangles of off-black in the windows, my coat huddled over the arm of the sofa. There was a thin line of white light around the kitchen door. The sound of waves surged louder. It was coming from the kitchen.