Stolen Souls

2

SCREAMS WOKE DETECTIVE Inspector Jack Lennon. He shot upright on the couch. How long ago had he dozed off? Not that long. The film still played on the television.

Another scream and he was on his feet. It had been a week or more since Ellen had last erupted from her sleep, howling at the nightmares that dwelled there.

His daughter had witnessed more suffering than any human ever should. Lennon was constantly surprised that she could function at all, that she had the inner strength to go on. Maybe it was the stubborn streak she had inherited from the mother who died beside her. He had left Marie McKenna’s body to the flames when he carried Ellen unconscious out of that house near Drogheda. She never spoke of what happened there. Perhaps she didn’t remember, or simply didn’t want to recount the events. Either way, Lennon was relieved. He wasn’t sure he could bear to hear it from her lips.

Alert now, Lennon went to her bedroom, opened the door, and flicked on the light. Ellen stared at him from under her twisted duvet, no hint of recognition on her face. She screamed again.

Lennon knelt beside the bed, placed a hand on her small cheek. He had learned not to take the child in his arms when she awoke pursued by night terrors, the shock of it too much for her.

“It’s me,” he said. “Daddy’s here. You’re all right.”

Ellen blinked at him, her face softening. He’d almost forgotten how old she looked when she emerged from her nightmares, a girl of seven carrying centuries of pain behind her eyes.

“You were only dreaming,” Lennon said. “You’re safe.”

Her fingers went to her throat, brushed the skin as if it were tender.

“What did you dream about?” he asked.

Ellen frowned and burrowed into her pillow, pulling the duvet up so he could only see the crown of her head.

“You can tell me,” Lennon said. “Might make you feel better.”

She peeked out. “I was all cold and wet, then I couldn’t breathe. I was choking.”

“Like drowning?”

“Uh-uh. Like something around my neck. Then there was this old lady. She wanted to talk to me, but I ran away.”

“Was she scary?”

“Uh-uh.”

“Then why did you run away?”

“Don’t know,” Ellen said.

“You think you can get back to sleep?”

“Don’t know.”

“Can you try?”

“Okay.”

Lennon stroked her hair. “Good girl,” he said.

He watched her in silence as her eyelids drooped and her breathing steadied. The ring of the telephone in the living room caused her to stir for a moment. He held his breath until she settled, exhaled when it seemed the phone had not woken her, and went to answer it.

“It’s Bernie McKenna here,” the caller said, her voice hard.

They had spoken on the phone and in person more times than he could count over the last few months, but still she introduced herself with that stiff formality.

“How are you?” Lennon asked. His only interest in her well-being was to gauge how the conversation might flow. Their discussions rarely went well.

“I’m fine,” she said. She did not enquire after Lennon’s health. “What about Ellen?” she asked instead.

“What about her?” Lennon regretted the hostility that edged into his voice as soon as he’d spoken.

“No need for that tone,” Bernie said, the words delivered in a staccato rhythm, as if squeezed through tight lips. “She’s my grandniece. I’ve every right to ask after her, more right than you—”

“You didn’t want to know her for six years,” Lennon said. He winced.

“Neither did you,” she said.

Lennon swallowed his anger. “Well, she’s fine. She’s in bed.” “Any more dreams?”

“Some.”

Bernie clucked. “Her eyes were hanging on her last time I saw the cratur.”

“Some nights are better than others,” Lennon said.

“Did you call Dr. Moran for her?”

“My GP has her on the waiting list for the child psych—”

“But she’ll be waiting for months. Dr. Moran can see her straight away.”

Lennon saw the rest of the conversation spreading out in front of him. He closed his eyes. “I can’t afford to go private,” he said.

“I can,” Bernie said. “Michael saw us right. I can spare whatever she needs.”

Lennon had heard rumors of the substantial estate Michael McKenna’s kin had inherited when he got his brains blown out last year. He didn’t doubt Bernie could afford to pass on a few shekels, but the idea of it burned him.

“I don’t want Michael McKenna’s money,” Lennon said.

“And what’s wrong with my brother’s money?”

“I know where it came from.”

He listened to her hard breathing for a few seconds before she said, “I don’t have to take that from the likes of you.”

“Then don’t,” Lennon said. “I’ve things to do, so if—”

“Hold your horses,” Bernie said. “I haven’t even got asking what I called you for.”

He sighed loud enough for her to hear. “All right. What?”

“Christmas.”

“We talked about this already. Ellen’s spending the day with—”

“But her granny wants to see her. That poor woman’s been through hell. Ellen’s all she’s got left of her own daughter. What’s the sense in making the child spend the day all alone in that flat of yours?”

“She won’t be alone. She’ll be with me.”

“She should be with her family,” Bernie said. “Her grandmother, her cousins, all of our ones will be here. Let her have a nice day. A happy day. Just because you’re miserable, don’t make her miserable too.”

“I’m taking her to see her grandmother—my mother— then she’s spending the day with me. We’re having dinner with Susan from upstairs, her and her wee girl, Lucy. They’re best friends. She’ll be happy here.”

“You’re taking her to your mother? Sure, what’s the point of that? Your mother hasn’t the wit to know her own children when they’re in front of her, let alone—”

“That’s enough,” Lennon said, his throat tightening. “I have to go.”

“But what about Chr—”

He hung up and placed the handset back on the coffee table, fighting the urge to throw it against the wall. How many times would he have to argue this out with Bernie McKenna? Ever since Marie died, her family had been circling, waiting for him to slip up so they could claim his daughter for their own.

True, he hadn’t been a father to the girl for the first six years of her life, but they had been no more a family to her. Marie’s people had cut her off when she took up with him, a cop, long before Republicans changed the stance they’d held for decades and acknowledged the legitimacy of the police service. Until then, any young Catholic who joined the police immediately became a target for assassination, and anyone who associated with them risked being ostracised from their community. Marie had done just that, and he had repaid her sacrifice by abandoning her when she fell pregnant. These arguments only served to remind him that they had all failed Ellen, and they always left him wishing he had some moral high ground he could take. But there was none. His was the worst betrayal of all, and Bernie McKenna would always hold that over him. Anger bubbled in him after every call, and only force of will would quell it.

Before he could fully calm himself, the phone rang again. He snatched it from the coffee table, ranting before he hit the answer button. “For Christ’s sake, you’re going to wake her up. I am not discussing this anymore, so for the last time, you can—”

“Jack?”

“—shove Christmas up your—”

“Jack?”

Lennon paused. “Who’s this?”

“Chief Inspector Uprichard.”

Lennon sat down on the couch, covered his eyes with his free hand. “No,” he said.

“I need you in, Jack,” Uprichard said.

“No,” Lennon said. “Not again. I told you, didn’t I? We agreed on this. I’m not doing nights over Christmas. I can’t.”

“DI Shilliday’s taken ill,” Uprichard said. “I’ve no one else to cover for him.”

“No,” Lennon said.

“It’ll be an easy night. It’s quiet out. You can sleep in your office. Just so I have someone on site, that’s all.”

“No,” Lennon said, but there was no conviction behind it.

“I’m not really asking you, Jack,” Uprichard said, his voice hardening. “Don’t make me order you.”

“Fuck,” Lennon said.

“Now, there’s no call for that.”

“Yes there bloody is,” Lennon said as he stood. “That’s the fourth time this month.”

He almost said he knew where it was coming from, that DCI Dan Hewitt of C3 Intelligence Branch was pulling strings to make his life difficult, but he thought better of it.

“I’m sorry,” Uprichard said. “That’s just the way it is. I want you here in an hour.”

SUSAN OPENED THE door wearing a dressing gown pulled tight around her. In the few minutes between Lennon phoning her and knocking her door, she had tidied her hair and applied as much makeup as she could manage. Either that or she went to bed wearing lip gloss.

Ellen huffed and mewled in Lennon’s arms, her bare feet kicking at his sides.

“You’re a diamond,” he said to Susan. “I can’t thank you enough.”

Susan gave him a smile that was at once warm and weary. “It’s all right. I hadn’t gotten to sleep yet.”

Lennon knew a lie when he heard one, but still he was glad of it. “I’ll be back before you get up in the morning.”

Susan reached for Ellen. “C’mere, pet, I’ve got you.”

Ellen whimpered and rubbed her eyes.

Susan kissed her hair. “You can sleep in with Lucy, all right?”

Ellen buried her head beneath Susan’s chin. She had been ferried here while she slept many times before.

Lennon touched Susan’s forearm. “Thank you,” he said.

She smiled again. “When you come back, why don’t you come in for breakfast?”

“The neighbors might talk,” Lennon said.

“Let them,” she said.