He shakes his head. ‘No. No, Ingrid. You don’t understand. I can’t do the right thing. I can’t tell anyone and you can’t, either.’ He reaches for my arm. I feel his grip again. ‘Look at me, Ingrid. Do you understand? You can’t tell anyone. This is bigger than you and me. People will get hurt. You’ll get hurt.’

Chapter Fifty

Declan

Declan slips the bracelet into his pocket and closes the box back up, pushing it back into the corner. As he makes his way down the ladder, he hears the front door open and then slam close.

‘Frankie, is that you?’ His ma’s voice rings out again.

‘Who else would it be?’ his da answers, but it isn’t in a joky way.

There is an anger to his tone that takes Declan right back to that night. He stops, waiting at the top of the stairs, trying to gauge what has his da angry.

‘Did you know, Kathleen?’ he asks.

‘Know what?’

Declan recognises his mother’s tone of voice, the one she used to use when his da needed placating, as he so often did back then in those angry years, before he got support. Knocked the drink on the head. Found a forgiving God who assured him he wasn’t going straight to hell.

‘That Niall was off meeting that Devlin girl! I was told at Mass my car had been seen up in the country park. And herself’s car, too.’

Declan freezes. The country park. Why would they be there? What was Niall at?

‘No, I didn’t know, but I think he’s a bit long in the tooth for me to be checking his every move anyway. So what if he’s meeting her? It’s probably to do with Jamesy Harte being murdered. I’ve no time for that man and what he did, but still, it feels sad, doesn’t it?’

‘I told him to stay away from her,’ his da bites back. Angrier. Louder.

If that bastard raises a hand to his ma, Declan won’t be long raising his own hand to him and knocking him out cold. He’s not a frightened ten-year-old any more. He has spent too long being frightened of his da. And frightened of his brother. Both of them sauntering around as if they don’t have a care in the world.

‘Is he stupid or something? Does he have a death wish? Because God alone knows that Devlin one must have. How many times does she have to be told?’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ his ma answers.

Declan hears the tremor in her voice.

‘Don’t lie, Kathleen. You’re not as stupid as you look. You know as well as I do what happened back then …’