After work I wandered around town for a while. I was due to meet up with Matt, but that wasn’t for another hour, so I had some time to kill. He’d called me earlier, during my afternoon coffee break, and said he wanted to introduce me to some of the other members of Operation Trail, and also to Kayla’s other half-sister, Hazel. We were going to meet in Rage Rock Bar, where Hazel worked, and where Electric were having their unsigned gig next week. I’d heard lots about the bar before, but I’d never actually been inside it because they were really strict on IDs. It was famous for its Acoustic Tuesdays – on the first Tuesday of every month a different musician would play a live acoustic set. But the cool thing was you never knew who the artist was going to be until they walked out on stage. So you could get a local singer-songwriter, a famous frontman or an international superstar. The guy who owned Rage apparently knew everybody in the music business, so people like Bruce Springsteen and Joni Mitchell had played there in the past. I was really looking forward to visiting it.
As I walked around, I decided to go to a charity shop, the one where I’d found my vintage microphone and pink typewriter. I love browsing in second-hand shops because you find really cool stuff that nobody else has. You have to do some serious rooting though, because the best things are the hardest to find. As I stepped inside, the woman at the counter smiled at me, then turned her attention to the broken porcelain owl that she was gluing back together. Its head had become detached from its body.
I sifted through the clothes, the hangers scraping against the steel rail as I pushed dated blouses and sequined tops aside. There was a musty smell in the air – the kind you just can’t shake from a collection of old objects. I spotted a grey Janis Joplin T-shirt hidden under a denim shirt, and took it out to have a look. It was a little bit big for me, but at one euro it was an absolute bargain, so I decided to buy it. I also looked through the small stack of books they had, searching for any music biographies. I still had lots at home that I hadn’t had a chance to finish yet, but I liked adding to my collection because they were my favourite things to read. There weren’t any this time, but I found a Definitive Guide to Manga for two euro and bought it for Colin.
As I was leaving the shop, my phone started to ring. I thought it might be Sergeant Lawlor. I searched through all the stuff in my bag and finally found it, but it wasn’t him calling me, it was Hannah.
‘Hey,’ I said.
‘You have some nerve.’
‘Um… what?’ I had no idea what she was talking about.
‘When were you going to tell me that you’re in Dublin?’ she said, sounding very annoyed.
‘Oh, sorry, Han, I’ve just been crazy busy and -’
‘Do you know who I had to find out from? Mark. My brother knows more about you than I do.’
He must have been talking to Dillon. I’d forgotten how fast news travels around here.
‘I’m doing work experience,’ I said. ‘It was sort of a last-minute thing.’
‘Yeah, I heard. You’re working at Electric? You kept that quiet. Like… when did this happen?’
‘I only found out the other day; I’ve just been really busy.’ I’d been so caught up in the case I hadn’t even thought to tell Hannah that I was in town.
‘Are you too busy to hang out now?’
‘Well, actually, I have to -’
Hannah did one of her dramatic sighs.
‘Tomorrow,’ I gave in. ‘I’ll meet you after school?’
‘Fine!’ she said, and then hung up. I wasn’t worried – she never stayed mad for long.
I put my phone in my bag and headed for Temple Bar.
I walked through the cobbled streets, past the buskers and groups of tourists, until I arrived at Rage Rock Bar. In the window there was a faded missing-person poster of Kayla, the same picture I had in my bag. Tape was peeling away from the poster’s corners. I pushed open the door and stepped into an almost empty pub. A girl stood in front of the bar. She wore black skinny jeans, a studded belt and a Clash T-shirt. She was quite a bit taller than me, and her black hair was cut into a blunt bob. She was beautiful.
‘Jacki, right?’ she said with a smile.
‘Yeah; you must be Hazel,’ I said as I closed the door behind me. The floor was covered in a kind of transparent plastic and underneath it were thousands of guitar plecs, all scattered around. On the walls there were photographs of all the musicians who had played there over the years, signed and securely nailed in place. Each table was made of two old amps pushed together, and the place mats were iconic album covers. All this was pretty cool, but my eyes were transfixed on the back wall, staring at the best thing in the entire place.
‘Is that an -’
‘Original Thin Lizzy stage sign?’ said Hazel. ‘Yep. One of only three ever made.’
‘Oh, my gosh,’ I said. It was so striking. The letters of the band’s name were made from lots of small square mirrored tiles; a few were broken or missing, but that only added to its charm. And round the edges of the letters were little light bulbs.
‘I’ll turn it on,’ said Hazel, and a few seconds later it was illuminated, the lights reflecting off the glass, making the whole thing sparkle in the most magnificent way.
‘Wow,’ I said. This sign had actually hung behind Thin Lizzy when they’d played on tour, and now I was standing right in front of it.
‘You a Lizzy fan?’ said Hazel, motioning to my T-shirt.
‘Yeah, possibly their biggest fan,’ I said. ‘Are you?’
‘I think they’re deadly,’ she said. ‘But Kayla is way more into them than me.’
For a moment I’d forgotten why I was there. It didn’t feel right to stare at the sign any longer, so I turned back round.
‘Sergeant Lawlor called,’ she said. ‘He mentioned they’re running a little bit late, but they’ll be here soon. Can I get you something to eat? We have fries, burgers… I’ll show you a menu.’
‘Oh, no thanks,’ I said.
‘How about a drink?’
‘Sure. I’ll have a Coke, please.’
Hazel walked behind the bar and poured me a glass. She moved so gracefully, every movement so effortless. She had lots of piercings in her ears, and a few tattoos on her arms, including one that said Kayla on the inside of her left wrist.
‘Do they hurt?’ I asked. ‘Tattoos, I mean. I’m thinking of getting one.’
‘Sort of,’ she said. ‘It’s like a hot needle continuously jabbing into your skin. But it’s so worth it… What are you going to get?’
‘A treble clef.’
‘Cool.’
She handed me the Coke and I sat up on one of the barstools.
‘I got this one to remind me never to give up,’ she said, pointing to her wrist. ‘To remind me never to stop looking for her.’ I nodded. It broke my heart to hear her say that.
‘So, you ever been here before?’ she said, resting her elbows on the bar.
‘Nope, but I’ve heard about your Acoustic Tuesdays,’ I said. ‘They sound deadly.’
‘Yeah, they’re pretty cool all right. We’re always sworn to secrecy about who’s playing; we can’t tell a soul. Rumours circulate, of course, but we can’t confirm or deny them. I’ll never forget the time U2 walked out there,’ she said, pointing to the raised stage in the corner. ‘That was crazy. We do Acoustic Tuesdays once a month, then we have karaoke every Friday, which is usually good fun, although it does get head-wrecking after a while, listening to people crucify your favourite songs. And on weekends we get a DJ in; he plays rock and indie, mainly the popular stuff, but it’s a lot better than most of the crap they play in the clubs around here.’
‘How long have you worked here?’ I asked.
‘Since I left school,’ said Hazel. ‘I planned to take a year out and then go to college, but I guess I sort of fell in love with this place. Every night there’s something different going on. I’m assistant manager now, so it’s pretty sweet. Matt was saying you might want to ask me some questions?’ she said. ‘About the party?’
‘Yeah, if that’s OK?’ I said. It was weird hearing her refer to him as Matt, like they were friends or something. I guess he would have spent a lot of time talking to her while he was working on the case though.
‘Sure,’ she said with a smile. She sat up on the bar and swung her legs round, so that she was sitting right beside me. ‘Ask me anything.’
Hazel had such an air of confidence about her; she gave off that vibe that some people just have, like they don’t really care what anybody thinks.
‘The night Kayla went missing, did you notice anything strange about her?’ I asked. ‘Was she in a good mood?’
‘Yeah, the thing is, she was in a great mood. And if she hadn’t been I’d definitely have noticed, or she would have told me.’
‘So you two are close?’
‘Yeah, really close. We get on great, but we also have screaming matches when she steals my clothes and breaks my CD cases. We’re just like regular sisters.’
‘When did you first notice she was missing?’
‘Well, I went to sleep kinda early. I’d been working all day and was wrecked. My boyfriend Barry and I went out to get chips around one, then we went to bed. But Libby woke me at about four a.m., saying she couldn’t find Kayla anywhere. The last time I’d seen her, she was dancing with her friend Amy. I’m a bit older than Kayla and Libby, so I’d spent some of the party in my room with Barry watching TV. I didn’t want to cramp their style. I was basically there to make sure the house didn’t get trashed. Not that Kayla’s friends are likely to do that; they’re all pretty well behaved.’
‘Can you remember what happened when Libby woke you?’
‘Yeah, she was in a panic, saying she’d looked everywhere, but she couldn’t find Kayla. I knew something was wrong straight away – you know when you just get a feeling? I called Kev, her ex, and asked if she was with him. He just said “I wish” and then hung up. Libby and I phoned all of her friends, but nobody had seen her. I remember having the horrible thought that maybe someone had abducted her. The others were out looking to see if she’d tripped and hurt herself on her way home, but I knew something was seriously wrong.’ Although Hazel talked about Kayla like she was still here, I got the feeling that she wasn’t as optimistic as Libby and Ellie – that she was a bit more realistic. The tattoo, especially, seemed like a remembrance of her life rather than a reminder to keep looking for her.
‘Some creep did this,’ she said. ‘He tore our lives apart. I’m so glad you’re going to find him, Jacki.’
She touched my arm. I felt so sorry for her.
There was a knock on the door. Hazel walked over to it, again moving so gracefully it was almost hypnotizing.
‘Delivery for Hazel Byrne,’ said the guy outside.
‘Thanks, hun,’ said Hazel as she signed for it. I was sure I saw the delivery guy blush. She seemed like the kind of girl who could have anyone she wanted. The kind of girl people wrote songs about. She walked back across the bar like she owned it. She was a punk-rock princess and this was her palace.
Hazel dropped the box down on the counter.
‘You know,’ she said, ‘sometimes I wake up in the morning, and for one second I forget all this has happened. It’s just so unbelievable. I thought we lived in the safest part of Dublin.’
‘Libby gave me one of Kayla’s necklaces,’ I said, taking it out of my pocket. ‘Hope that’s OK?’
‘Oh yeah, that’s cool. She likes that one; she wears it a lot. So… what exactly do you do? Do you, like, use something that belongs to the person to help lead you to them?’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Something like that.’
‘That’s crazy. Ooh, you should meet my friend Lauren. Actually, she was at the party so you’re probably going to meet her anyway. She does fortune-telling in George’s Street Arcade; she’s into all that supernatural stuff. Anything like that freaks me out. But I think there’s probably some truth to it all.’
‘Well, I know there is,’ I said.
‘In a way I suppose I find it comforting,’ she continued. ‘Even though it scares me. My mum died when I was thirteen, so I like to think there’s something there after you die. I like to think that I’ll see her again.’
‘My dad died when I was nine,’ I said. She nodded. We didn’t need to say anything. No ‘I’m so sorry to hear that.’ We both got it; we understood.
‘Did Kayla ever come here?’ I asked.
‘Yeah,’ said Hazel. ‘She loves taking pictures at the gigs, and if there was somebody playing on Tuesdays that I knew she really wanted to see I’d text her and tell her to come down. We aren’t meant to tell anybody, but I know Kayla can keep a secret. One time, Robert Smith from the Cure was here, and she was so excited. She loves them. When we first moved in with Kayla and her mum, Anna, and I heard they were her favourite band, I knew we were going to get along.’
I remembered the Cure song from my dream – ‘Pictures of You’ – barely recognizable on the radio. It took all my concentration not to dwell on the image of the man in the balaclava.
The door of the bar opened and Sergeant Lawlor came in.
‘Hi, Matt,’ said Hazel cheerfully. ‘Can I get you anything?’
‘No, thank you, Hazel,’ he said abruptly. ‘I’m going to take Jacki to meet the rest of the team.’ He turned to me. ‘Sorry I’m late. We better get going; they’re waiting for us.’
‘See you soon,’ said Hazel with a smile.
I followed Sergeant Lawlor through Temple Bar, across the road and over to Ming’s. Again it was deserted, apart from two men sitting at a table in the corner. One looked older than Sergeant Lawlor and had a grey moustache. The other was a lot younger; he had short blond hair and was fairly good-looking, if you were into the conventionally attractive type.
I walked behind Sergeant Lawlor over to the table and sat down. ‘This is Sergeant Ray Harte,’ he said, pointing to the younger man. ‘And this is Detective Sergeant Tony Lonergan.’ They both shook my hand.
‘We’re happy to have you on board,’ said Tony, although he didn’t sound like he meant a word of it. He seemed to be eyeing me with suspicion, like I was some sort of imposter. Ray, on the other hand, smiled at me, and was considerably less intimidating.
‘It’s amazing what you can do,’ said Ray. ‘Really amazing. Delighted to have you working with us, Jacki.’
‘Jacki is going to interview the eight suspects,’ said Matt.
‘So that’s what we’re calling them now,’ said Tony with a smirk.
‘I think Matt might be on to something with that,’ said Ray. ‘As you know, I’ve worked on the case from the beginning, and I think there’s something seriously strange about the whole thing.’
‘As do I,’ said Matt. ‘Jacki has already met with some of them, haven’t you?’
‘Well, just three so far,’ I said. ‘Her friend Ellie, and her sister Libby. And Hazel, of course. I asked Libby for an object of Kayla’s; I’m hoping it will help me connect with her.’
‘And she gave it to you?’ said Matt.
‘Yeah, she gave me a necklace. Why?’
‘I’m just impressed, that’s all,’ he said. ‘I didn’t think she’d be so cooperative.’
I was glad I’d impressed him, although getting a necklace was a long way from solving a murder.
‘I still think we’re looking at a serial killer,’ said Tony.
‘You weren’t there at the initial investigation,’ said Matt. ‘There was a lot of conferring going on. Some of the anguish hinted more at guilt than grief. It’s been two years now, and they’ve had time to get used to the lies, practise what they’re going to say. This is messy, which is why I think Jacki’s help is invaluable to us right now.’
It sounded like he was trying to convince Tony that my presence was justified.
‘You can’t seriously think that the serial killer is a myth?’ said Tony.
‘Oh no, I don’t. I know he’s out there,’ said Matt. ‘I just don’t think he killed Kayla Edwards.’
‘I certainly wouldn’t trust that Calum guy,’ said Ray. ‘I don’t like him at all. And Andrew Hogan is a right creep.’
‘What do you mean?’ I asked.
‘He has a record,’ said Ray. ‘Aggravated assault.’
‘I’d prefer not to influence Jacki,’ said Matt. ‘Let’s see what she comes up with herself.’ It looked like Matt hadn’t told me everything, but I suppose that didn’t matter. Like he said, too much information might cloud my judgement. I was wary of jumping to conclusions, and also of ruling anybody out, for that matter.
‘I better get going,’ said Tony. ‘Nice to meet you, Jacki,’ he added, but his tone was still harsh. He put on his jacket and left.
‘Sorry about that,’ said Matt. ‘He’s a bit sceptical.’ That still wasn’t an excuse to be rude, but I didn’t care. I knew better than to let people like him upset me. Matt believed in me; that was enough. And I was sure that when I came up with answers for Tony he wouldn’t be so dismissive.
‘Can I ask you something?’ said Ray.
‘Yeah, go ahead,’ I said.
‘Aren’t you… afraid of the ghosts?’ His voice turned to a whisper.
‘I’ve learned it’s the people you need to be more scared of,’ I said flatly.
‘Well,’ said Matt, ‘there’s no arguing with that.’