Way before then, I should have spotted it. I had spent almost fifteen years keeping myself and my boys and girls alive by never, ever missing the signs: the sharp burnt-paper smell in the air when you walk into a room, the raw animal edge to a voice in a casual phone call. It was bad enough I had somehow missed them in Kevin; I should never, in a million years, have missed them in Holly. I should have seen it flickering like heat lightning around the stuffed toys, filling up that cozy little bedroom like poison gas: danger.

Instead I eased myself off the bed, switched off the lamp and moved Holly’s bag so it wouldn’t block the night-light. She lifted her face towards me and murmured something; I leaned over to kiss her forehead, and she snuggled deeper into the duvet and let out a contented little breath. I took a long look at her, pale hair swirled on the pillow and lashes throwing spiky shadows onto her cheeks, and then I moved softly out of the room and closed the door behind me.

Chapter 20

20

Every cop who’s been undercover knows there’s nothing in the world quite like the day before you go into a job. I figure astronauts on countdown know the feeling, and parachute regiments lining up for the jump. The light turns dazzling and unbreakable as diamonds, every face you see is beautiful enough to take your breath away; your mind is crystal clear, every second spreads itself out in front of you in one great smooth landscape, things that have baffled you for months suddenly make perfect sense. You could drink all day and be stone-cold sober; cryptic crosswords are easy as kids’ jigsaws. That day lasts a hundred years.

It had been a long time since I’d been under, but I recognized the feeling the second I woke up on Saturday morning. I spotted it in the sway of the shadows on my bedroom ceiling and tasted it at the bottom of my coffee. Slowly and surely, while Holly and I flew her kite in the Phoenix Park and while I helped her with her English homework and while we cooked ourselves too much macaroni with too much cheese, things clicked into place in my mind. By early Sunday afternoon, when the two of us got into my car and headed across the river, I knew what I was going to do.

Faithful Place looked tidy and innocent as something out of a dream, filled to the brim with a clear lemony light floating over the cracked cobbles. Holly’s hand tightened around mine. “What’s up, chickadee?” I asked. “Changed your mind?”

She shook her head. I said, “You can if you want, you know. Just say the word and we’ll go find ourselves a nice DVD full of fairy princesses and a bucket of popcorn bigger than your head.”