‘I know.’ He seemed unwilling to meet Shepherd’s eye.
‘Just because I’m away, it doesn’t mean I’m not worried about you or that I’m not thinking about you.’
‘Are you going away again?’ asked Liam.
‘Hopefully not for a while,’ said Shepherd.
‘You always say that,’ said Liam, ruefully.
‘And I always mean it,’ said Shepherd. ‘But sometimes there’s work that needs doing and I have to do it.’
‘Why can’t someone else do it?’
‘It’s my job.’
‘But you could get another job, couldn’t you?’
Shepherd laughed. ‘Like what?’
‘You could work in a bank, like Granddad.’
‘Liam, I was a soldier. Now I’m a policeman. Well, sort of a policeman. Anyway, guys like me, we can’t work in an office.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because I’d be bored,’ Shepherd said. It was the best answer he could come up with.
‘So you do it because it’s exciting, not because it’s your job?’
‘Everyone has to work,’ said Shepherd. ‘Everyone has to do something.’
‘I just wish you weren’t away such a lot,’ said Liam.
‘If I was a salesman I’d be away all the time. People have to travel for all sorts of jobs. Look at airline pilots. If I was a pilot, I’d never be here, would I?’
‘At least people don’t shoot at pilots,’ said Liam, flatly.
‘What?’ said Shepherd.
‘Nothing.’
‘Who says I’m being shot at?’ asked Shepherd. ‘Have Gran and Granddad said something?’
‘I just heard them talking, that’s all, last time I was at their house.’
‘And what did they say?’
‘Nothing,’ said Liam. ‘Really, nothing.’
‘They said I was shot at?’
Liam shrugged. ‘That’s what Mum used to say, too.’
Shepherd flopped down on to the grass. ‘Sit,’ he said. Slowly Liam sank down next to him, but turned his back. ‘I help to catch criminals,’ said Shepherd, ‘but it’s not like on the TV – the bad guys don’t go around shooting the men who are trying to catch them. They honestly don’t. They know that if they shoot someone, they’ll go to prison for a long, long time.’
‘Sometimes policemen get killed.’
‘Not very often, Liam, and if I do my job properly, which I do, no one’s going to get the chance to hurt me. I have partners, I have a boss, I have a whole lot of people watching out for me.’
‘But you have a gun, right?’
Shepherd sighed. Yes, he had a gun. It was in the house, locked in a drawer in his wardrobe. A SIG-Sauer,his favourite weapon. It had always been a bone of contention with Sue, but Shepherd had argued that it was just a tool he needed to carry out his job effectively. She had always insisted that it be hidden from Liam, but when the boy was ten Shepherd had decided he was old enough to know about firearms. Most firearm accidents involving children arose from ignorance so he had shown the gun to Liam and explained how it worked, how dangerous it was, and that it was never, ever, to be taken from the locked drawer. ‘I have a gun, yes.’
‘Because you shoot people, right?’
‘Liam, I don’t go around shooting people.’
‘Granddad says you do.’
‘He said what?’
‘He said you’ve shot people. Is that true, Dad? Have you shot people?’
‘What did Granddad say to you?’
‘Nothing. I was upstairs and he was talking to Gran.’
‘And what did he say?’
‘Nothing.’
‘I just want to know what he was saying, Liam. You’re not in any trouble. And neither is your granddad.’
Liam sighed. ‘Gran said she wished you had a job that wasn’t so dangerous because I’d already lost one parent and it was stupid of you to take risks when you were all I had left. Granddad said you were a hero and that you only shot people to save lives.’
Shepherd smiled ruefully. ‘They’re both right.’
Now Liam turned to him. ‘So you have shot people, right?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘But it’s not something I want to talk about now. Maybe when you’re older.’
‘Why not now?’
‘Because it’s not easy to explain, Liam. And because you’re too young to understand.’
‘I’ll be a teenager in two years.’
‘And I can’t tell you how much I’m looking forward to it.’ He put his arm round his son. ‘One day I’ll talk it all through with you, I promise. Okay?’
‘Okay,’ said Liam.
‘Some people like to talk about what they do,’ said Shepherd. ‘They like to tell war stories. I don’t. A lot of what I’ve done is locked away, deep inside, like it’s in a vault. And it’s a big thing for me to open that vault. I did for your mum, and one day I will for you.’
‘Dad, I understand. I’m not a kid.’
Shepherd laughed. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Now, shall we have another kick-about before we eat those cow brains?’
‘Pig brains,’ said Liam. ‘I bet I can get six past you one after the other.’
Shepherd groaned. ‘I bet you can, too.’
Joseph McFee blinked as the hood was pulled off his head. He was kneeling opposite a blindingly bright light that was shining into his face. He coughed and spat on the floor. A figure was standing in front of him. ‘Who the fuck are you?’ he asked. He strained against the duct tape that had been wrapped tightly round his wrists.
The figure walked to the lamp and twisted it so that it was shining at a framed photograph, on a metal table, of a man in his twenties, wearing the uniform of an RUC inspector. There was a half-smile on the subject’s face, as if he was flirting with whoever had taken the shot. Recognition dawned. ‘Robbie Carter,’ McFee said. He knew then that there was no hope. ‘You killed Adrian Dunne? He was a good man.’
The figure grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, dragging him to his feet.
‘We served our time, all of us did,’ said McFee. All he could hear was deep breathing. In and out, slow and controlled. ‘Look, it was Dunne and Lynn killed the peeler. I didn’t even have a gun. I broke down the door and I was there when it happened. That was what they said at the trial and it was the truth. I was there but it wasn’t me who killed him.’
The sound of the gun was deafening in the confined space and McFee’s left leg felt as though an iron bar had been slammed against it. He fell to the side and staggered, trying to regain his balance. He clamped his teeth together to stop himself screaming. ‘I didn’t kill him,’ said McFee. He winced as pain lanced through his leg. ‘I didn’t even have a gun. I was there but I didn’t kill him.’
The gun roared again and McFee’s right leg collapsed. He pitched forward. He managed to turn his head just before he hit the floor so he didn’t smash his face, but the fall had knocked the breath out of him.
He felt rather than heard footsteps as he gasped for breath. He could feel the blood pouring from his shattered knees and his ribs hurt with every breath he took. Not that the pain mattered. He knew that nothing mattered any more. He wanted to beg for his life but he knew there was nothing he could say that would prevent what was about to happen.
He began to pray. ‘Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name . . .’ The gun barked again.
Shepherd heard the rat-tat-tat of an assault rifle being fired on automatic as he pushed open the door to the indoor range. The Major was standing with his back to the door and looked over his shoulder as Shepherd came
