“No, he didn’t.”
I shared a look with Fletcher. That left us with a very small window of time for Finn’s disappearance. “What time does your class start?”
“3:30. Finn usually came right after school and did homework. But he didn’t show this Tuesday. I thought maybe he was ill.” Lena forced herself to loosen her grip on the water bottle, leaving dents crinkled in the weak plastic, and she smoothed the front of her dress though I couldn’t see a wrinkle there.
Primary schools usually let out at half-past two. That left us with an hour of missing time during which Finn could have gotten lost or, more likely, taken. The real question was why. Why kidnap a seven-year-old kid? What did they want with him? There were several very dark answers to that question, and I hoped none of them was true.
“Listen, we’re about to jump back into things,” Lena said, gesturing to her band as they gathered their instruments and moved back into place. “Would it be okay if I came to the station tomorrow to give a full statement?”
I nodded. If she did know something, we wouldn’t be able to do anything with it this late at night. I handed her my card. “Ask for me when you arrive.”
Her fingers brushed mine as she took the slip of paper, warm and soft and a little electric as if they were still charged by the beat of the music. She smiled at me and settled back onto her stool as Fletcher and I returned to our booth. I drained the rest of my drink and headed to the bar for another.
Fletcher followed, leaning up against the counter beside me. “Listen, I’m meeting someone here, so I’m going to ditch you for the night if you don’t mind.”
“We’re done for the day, so go. Have some fun.”
“Great, because she just walked in. I’ll see you tomorrow, MacBain.” Fletcher winked at me, and I watched her hurry to meet the short-haired woman who’d just walked in the door. Fletcher greeted her with a light kiss, and then the two of them moved to claim the booth she and I had just exited.
I spun my stool around to face the band, thanking the bartender for the whiskey he’d just placed by my elbow. The fiddler opened the first set, but I watched Lena Taggert play. With each beat of the drum, her face smoothed out, the worry and fear I’d brought her draining away. her passion for the music utterly consumed her.
I wished I had something like that. My father was enraptured by the Loch Ness Monster, my sister her art, my mother bird watching, of all things, but being “consumed by my work” just made it sound like I had no life at all, which was true if I thought about it too hard. It had been different when Reilly and I were partners… we went fishing together on weekends… but since he’d left, I hadn’t found something of my own to fill that time.
I had four whiskeys but was only lightly buzzed by the time Lena’s band finished for the night, and I waved her over once she finished packing up her drum.
“Buy you a drink?” I asked.
She smiled, rested her case on the stool beside me. “Is that standard procedure?”
“No, but I won’t tell if you don’t.”
“Alright then, since you’re buying.” She sat down and scooted closer to the counter, flagging the barman down to order a gin and tonic. “Where’s your partner?”
“Abandoned me for her date.”
“Her mistake.”
“Yeah, I’m definitely not her type.”
“More for me then.” Lena’s face flushed, and she took a huge gulp of her newly arrived drink as if she couldn’t believe she’d just said that.
I changed the subject for her. “How long have you been with the band?”
“Five years now. I’ve been playing the bodhran for about twenty.” Her face brightened at the mention of her music. “Do you play?”
“No.” I was the rare Scot who didn’t have at least some connection to music.
“Must be hard to find time for much else with your job.” She managed to hit the nail right on the head.
“Good thing I like my work then,” I said.
“What’s it like, working for the police?” Lena asked. She swivelled her stool, so that she faced me more fully, and her knee knocked against mine for a second, a jolt racing through me at the contact.
Everyone asked that question. They wanted to know about the excitement of chasing bad guys or firing a gun, or they wanted to hear about grisly murders and convoluted cases. But I didn’t think that was what Lena meant. Something in her eyes told me she was genuinely curious about what it was like for me, specifically.
“It’s boring most of the time,” I admitted. “Lots of paperwork. Lots of waiting for a case to get dropped in your lap. And it’s also surprisingly disappointing.”
Her face furrowed curiously, delicate eyebrows drawing together. “What do you mean?”
I sighed. It was something I’d often thought about but never put into words. “Every kid thinks being in the police means helping people, but once you get there, that’s not really true. Who does a parking ticket help? What good is an unsolved theft or break-in or mugging? What good is arresting a kid for a minor drug offence?”
“So why do it?” Lena asked softly, curiously.
“Because of cases like this. Because of the tangible difference solving this will make.”
Something in Lena’s face twisted just slightly, but she looked down on her drink before I could decipher it.
“My mum was a police officer, too, before she retired,” I continued, the words drawn out of me by some kind of force held within her silence. “But that wasn’t why I joined.” And it wasn’t because of my father’s disappearance, either, despite popular belief amongst my family. “I don’t really know
