Galway Girl Read online

  GALWAY GIRL

  Ken Bruen

  www.headofzeus.com

  Also by Ken Bruen

  Once Were Cops

  Sancutary Cross

  Priest

  The Dramatist

  The Magdalen Martyrs

  The Killing of the Tinkers

  Funeral: Tales of Irish Morbidities

  Shades of Grace

  Martyrs

  Sherry and Other Stories

  Time of Serena-May/Upon the Third Class

  Her Last Call to Louis MacNeice

  Rilke on Black

  The Hackman Blues

  A White Arrest

  Taming the Alien

  The Guards

  London Boulevard

  Blitz

  The McDead

  Vixen

  Dispatching Baudelaire

  The Dead Room

  American Skin

  Bust (with Jason Starr)

  Calibre

  A Fifth of Bruen

  Slide (with Jason Starr)

  Ammunition

  The Max (with Jason Starr)

  All the Old Songs and Nothing to Lose

  Headstone

  Purgatory

  Green Hell

  The Emerald Lie

  The Ghosts of Galway

  In the Galway Silence

  First published in the UK in 2019 by Head of Zeus Ltd

  Copyright © Ken Bruen, 2019

  The moral right of Ken Bruen to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  This book was set in 12-point Adobe Garamond Pro by Alpha Design & Composition of Pittsfield, NH.

  ISBN (HB): 9781838933067

  ISBN (XTPB): 9781838933074

  ISBN (E): 9781838933098

  Image: © Shutterstock

  Head of Zeus Ltd

  First Floor East

  5–8 Hardwick Street

  London EC1R 4RG

  WWW.HEADOFZEUS.COM

  Contents

  Welcome Page

  Also by Ken Bruen

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  About the author

  An Invitation from the Publisher

  For

  Caroline Diviney

  “The Angel

  of Bohermore”

  and

  Ban Garda Claire Burke

  GG

  Galway Girl and Galway Guard

  with

  Shuan (Siobhan) Quarter

  and must mention

  Eoghan McDonagh, Pat Cantwell, Danny Doherty

  1

  A Galway girl

  Doesn’t necessarily believe she

  Is the best catch of all.

  It’s more that she’d love

  You to prove

  She isn’t.

  The first Guard was killed on a Friday.

  The new Garda superintendent Mary Wilson (who was more than a little sick of the Supremes jokes) declared to the assembled Guards,

  “This is horrendous.”

  Owen Daglish, a long-serving, not to mention long-suffering, sergeant, muttered,

  “Not much escapes the bould Mary.”

  Sheridan, a loan to the beleaguered Galway station, gave him a look, said,

  “Watch your mouth, Sonny.”

  Sonny!

  Owen had a good ten years plus fifty pounds on the American.

  American is used loosely as Sheridan gave the impression of being a Quantico guy but other elements, such as his fucked-up accent and Irish cynicism, pointed to a more likely Irish heritage but he was nevertheless, as he liked to cut it,

  “A very influential swinging dick.”

  The Galway guys put it in their own tribal accent.

  Like this:

  “A prick.”

  Sheridan belonged to a new offshoot of Special Branch whose brief ranged wide and definitely included counterterrorism.

  His pet obsession was Jack Taylor, the so-called PI who was on the periphiery, as he mauled the term, of so many recent violent deaths and yet stayed one beat ahead—or perhaps behind—an arrest.

  It was a new young ban Garda named Nora McEntee who discovered the note at the murder scene. The forensic guys, horrified at the sheer violence of the scene, focused on the body and, owing to the pressure for rapid results, overlooked the most basic item.

  The wastepaper basket.

  Nora had been left to secure the scene as the professionals treated her like shite, with,

  “Don’t touch anything, girlie!”

  You fucking believe it?

  Girlie!

  This was after she’d been told to grab some coffees for the teams, and the edict,

  “Don’t fuck up the pastries.”

  She sneered quietly at these macho blokes fussing over pastries.

  How freaking gay were they?

  Did they share the treats with her?

  Or even refund the twenty euros for the designer java?

  Did they fuck.

  She’d picked up the trash basket out of curiosity and, lo and behold, a sheaf of parchment, curled at the edges. To age it? Or add grim authenticity?

  Unfurled the paper and, smart girl, wearing crime scene gloves,

  Read,

  Unconsciously admiring the beautiful handwriting, in bold Gothic script,

  Ta bronach orm

  When Wilson, the super, read this she was not pleased, especially as she had to ask the novice ban Garda, the aforementioned Nora McEntee, to translate.

  None of her close-knit team, the favored ones, spoke a word of their native tongue. Time was, you didn’t speak Irish or, worse, didn’t play hurling, you hadn’t a Protestant prayer of joining the Guards.

  But now, as the writer Charlie Stella put it,

  “Fugget about it!”

  Best intoned in New York hard vowels.

  *

  Nora duly obliged, translated,

  “I am sorry or, actually, I am heartbroken.”

  Snicker from one of the bright sparks with,

  “Geez, really, which is it?”

  Wilson, more than miles beyond patience, sent him to traffic on the Headford road, the roundabout ni
ghtmare. He resigned.

  Shortly after, thanks to his utter contempt for people, he rapidly became a rising star in the charities racket.

  Nora McEntee looked at the framed photos of Guards who had died in the line of duty.

  End of watch, as they say in the U.S.

  She was gripped by the portrait of ban Garda Ni Iomaire.

  Ridge.

  She was Nora’s hero.

  Ridge had been noted for:

  Being gay, in an obscenely misogynist force;

  Her utter dedication;

  Her fearlessness;

  Her patience with new recruits.

  Nora had gone to her a few times and she always said the same thing:

  “Never back down and never, ever let the bastards see you are vulnerable.”

  She had also introduced her to

  Kai tai yung.

  A ferociously vicious form of self-defense that mutated in Galway from what had been a benign form of tai chi. To a Guard on the Galway streets when the clubs let out at four in the nasty morning and the fast-food joints were shutting their doors, gentleness was about as useful as a nun’s rosary beads.

  The blot on Ridge’s almost brilliant career had been her relationship with Jack Taylor, a notorious drunk and former Guard. Despite repeated warnings, she had stayed in his corner even as her personal feelings toward him soured.

  And soured fiercely.

  Taylor had been MIA for many months after the death of his daughter.

  Nora felt he was far from done. As Ridge had once said,

  “Taylor always turns up, no matter how fucked he is, and God knows few do fucked like him, but he somehow drags all his bedraggled act in some form of together and shows up.”

  Ridge had gone silent for a bit, then added,

  “There is something to be said for a man who does always show up. Not a lot, but you know something.”

  In those broken words Nora detected a kind of twisted admiration.

  2

  On any given

  Day in Galway

  You will hear at least one busker mutilate the

  Words of “Galway Girl.”

  But, if you listen carefully,

  Sincerity

  Sometimes overcomes

  The sheer banality

  Of the performance.

  Twyford

  Makes the very best toilet bowls.

  I know because I spent so much time lying on my back, under the bowl, having the first drink to be sick enough for the second one to stay down.

  Hopefully.

  It had been four months

  Since my daughter had been shot dead

  Right before my very eyes.

  I missed Christmas.

  In the sense it came and went and I lay under the bowl, if not the volcano. Then, mid-January, I began to cut back, no reason, maybe just sick of being sick.

  Was even trying some exercises to restore some feeling to my shattered body.

  If there are exercises for grief I don’t know them.

  I was living in an apartment off the Salthill promenade. I could look out across the bay, but now the once wonderful yearning I’d had was no more.

  Years, years of that odd yearning, and I had never quite known for what it was I yearned. But now, no more mythical or mystical shite.

  In a fit of blind rage and, yes, booze, I grabbed my favorite books, stumbled down to the beach, and began to fling them out across the ocean.

  Pathetic?

  You betcha.

  A few days later, I was attempting to sip some coffee and not to smoke, least until the day grew up. A knock at the door. I shouted,

  “Fuck off.”

  More banging.

  Right.

  I pulled the door near off its hinges, muttering,

  “What.”

  A young female guard, ban Garda. And, oh Lord, she looked like a teenager.

  Pretty, but something in the eyes, hint of granite.

  She asked,

  “Jack Taylor?”

  I let out a frustrated breath, said,

  “You’re at my door, you obviously checked before you came, so unless you’re a complete ejit take a wild guess.”

  She backed up, her body tensed, said,

  “There is no need for that tone.”

  I turned, went back into the apartment, sat and stared at the ocean. She followed me in, with extreme care. She stood before me, said,

  “I was a huge admirer of Sergeant Ridge.”

  I felt the guilt kick in, harsh, hard, and merciless, bit down, and said,

  “How wonderful for you.”

  Threw her.

  She had perhaps been schooled in how to deal with the likes of me but it wasn’t working. I snapped,

  “What do you want? You liked Ridge, so fucking what?”

  She gazed around, seeking something to help. There was nothing, just my wall of hostility, but she did try, asked,

  “There are no books?”

  I laughed, said,

  “You’ll make a fine detective.”

  She held firm, said,

  “You’ll have heard of the recent death of a Guard.”

  I said nothing.

  She did some figures in her head, trying to make a decision, then,

  “The man was Ridge’s uncle.”

  I was surprised. I tried,

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  She glared at me and looked uncannily like Ridge. I asked, as I moved toward the door,

  “Was there something else?”

  She shook her head, asked,

  “Is that it, you’re sorry?”

  I felt tired, opened the door, said,

  “You need to go now.”

  She considered, then,

  “They’re right, what they say about you, that you’re . . .”

  She searched for some scotching term, settled on,

  “Pathetic.”

  She was out in the hall. I shut the door as she was gearing up for more.

  I thought,

  “Nice wee girl.”

  Moved to the window, watched as she strode away from my apartment. A man got out of a car, crossed the street, walked right up to her, shot her in the face.

  3

  “We pursue all criminals

  With vigor.

  But if one of our own

  Is murdered

  We will pursue

  With a ferocity

  Of thundering devotion.”

  Superintendent Mary Wilson

  Scott looked at himself in the mirror.

  Saw:

  Young man in his twenties,

  Blond hair,

  Scar along his left cheek, not blatant but noticeable,

  Muscular build.

  He said,

  “No psycho vibe there.”

  He lived in a house off Taylor’s Hill. His father, one of the first prominent Guards in the country, had bought it before the Celtic Tiger disaster.

  Had said to Scott,

  “When you join the Guards, you can live here, then just a smash ’n’ grab to the station.”

  That was a vague attempt at humor. His father could be accused of many things and, indeed, in his long career, was accused of most, but humor, no.

  He had serious plans for his retirement; death never occurred to him. He was washing his prized Audi when a thundering heart attack canceled his plans.

  The funeral was a grand affair.

  Lots of

  Dignitaries,

  Clergy,

  Top brass.

  Scott had to force himself not to puke when they handed the national flag to his mother after the burial. One of the numerous elite guys took Scott aside, whispered,

  “Look, sorry you didn’t make it onto the force.”

  Pause.

  “But apply again. Maybe we can view you in a more favorable light.”

  Scott stood back, gave the man his practiced stare, the one he believed was ice. He
asked,

  “You think maybe if I work very hard, shite on everyone, perhaps one day I might be like you, a sad cunt?”

  The obscenity shocked the man. He’d heard almost every epithet in his long career, but in a graveyard? He tried with,

  “I’m going to cut you some slack seeing as the day it is.”

  Scott laughed, an eerie echoing sound among the headstones. He said,

  “Cut me some slack? Dude, you are so far up your own arse you look like you couldn’t cut air.”

  The man looked round for some of his troops. Nope, not a one; gone to the pub already. He decided to try the trusted older statesman gig, put his hand on Scott’s shoulder, said,

  “Son, you are troubled, I get that. Now go home and say your prayers.”

  Scott leaned back, made a gurgling throat sound as if he were drawing his very heart up, then spat full face on the man, said,

  “Pray that.”

  *

  Scott didn’t immediately hit on killing Guards but the incident in the graveyard set the basis. In one of those weird moments of serendipity, he was stopped by a Guard ten minutes after leaving the cemetery, driving his father’s Audi.

  Was he speeding?

  Yeah, okay, a bit.

  He pulled over and the Guard ambled toward him, did the circular finger motion as seen on cop shows. Scott resolved to bite down, keep it together.

  The Guard asked,

  “License and insurance.”

  Fuck.

  Scott tried,

  “I’m coming from my dad’s burial.”

  The Guard was chewing gum. Were they allowed that shit?

  Asked,

  “Did I ask you where you’d been?”

  Scott felt that resolve dip a little, said,

  “See, it’s my father’s car and—”

  The Guard cut him off with,

  “Out.”

  Just that.

  Designed to intimidate.

  Scott began to open the door and the Guard slammed the door against him, then pulled Scott from the car, body-slammed him against the bonnet, muttered,

  “Pup, think you own the world.”

  Then cuffed Scott, who said,

  “Ah, for fuck’s sake.”

  Scott was duly booked, appeared in court, got banned from driving.

  He glared at the judge,

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  The judge threw in six months for what he called impertinence.