Chapter 27
Skye
By early afternoon, Declan O'Brien's study no longer looked like a room preserved in grief. It looked like an investigation.
We had opened the curtains fully, brought lamps in from the sitting room, cleared dust from the desk without disturbing anything that might matter, and covered nearly every available surface with documents pulled carefully from the hidden archive behind the bookcase.
Cipher had insisted we work in numbered groups rather than allowing curiosity to dictate what came out next, which meant each box was photographed before opening, every folder received a temporary label, and nothing left its original order without being documented first. It was tedious, painstaking work, exactly the sort of process that would have driven me mad a month ago when Isla was missing and every minute felt like a personal betrayal.
Now I understood why precision mattered.
Declan had spent years building a case against people who survived by making evidence disappear, changing names, altering ownership, and moving human beings between respectable institutions until nobody could see the pattern.
If his records were finally going to speak for him, we owed him the courtesy of making sure nobody could dismiss them because we had been careless.
Irish worked beside me without saying much.
He had changed after reading his father's letter, though not in the simple way grief stories pretended people changed once somebody handed them the truth.
Fifteen years of guilt hadn't vanished because a piece of paper proved the attack had been planned before he left.
He still went quiet whenever his eyes landed on Declan's handwriting, still paused when one of the records mentioned Siobhan, Maeve, or Finn, and still carried himself like a man braced for another sentence to hurt more than the last. The difference was subtler.
The blame had shifted. Not disappeared, but moved far enough away from himself that anger had somewhere else to go.
Harrow.
The Order.
The men who had watched this family and decided murder was an acceptable method of document recovery.
Darkness looked different on Irish when it had a target.
I was sorting Saint Brigid's restoration records when he stopped beside me and slid another folder onto the desk.
"What?"
"You're doing the thing."
I looked up. "You'll need to narrow that down."
"Staring at measurements like they've personally offended you."
"They have."
His mouth moved faintly.
I turned the Saint Brigid's plan toward him.
"Your father's version doesn't match the public plan Cipher pulled."
"Thought we knew that."
"We knew there were concealed residential areas. This is different."
I pointed toward the northern side of the former convalescent home, where an old chapel connected to the main building through what looked like a narrow enclosed passage.
"Public plans show this corridor ending at the sacristy."
"And Da's?"
"Continues another twenty-one feet."
Irish leaned closer.
"To what?"
"That's the problem. He doesn't label it."
The hidden extension ended against an unusually thick section of masonry bordering the old infirmary wing. Declan had circled the area twice and written a question in the margin.
Original service connection? Ask E. Byrne re lower wall.
Irish read the note.
Then went completely still.
"E. Byrne?"
"Eamon?"
"Aye."
I sat back.
"Was he working construction then?"
"Apprentice. His da had a small contracting company. Eamon worked weekends and summers before taking it over."
"Would Declan have asked him about old masonry?"
"Absolutely."
That was enough.
Irish reached for his phone.
"Before you call him, are you sure?"
He looked at me.
"About involving him."
His expression tightened.
There it was again, the instinct to protect people by excluding them and deciding for them how close they were allowed to stand to danger.
This time he recognized it before I had to say anything.
"No," he admitted. "But Da already involved him enough to write his name on the plan."
"Then ask him," I said, emphasizing the distinction because this time Eamon deserved an invitation rather than another decision made on his behalf.
Irish called.
Eamon answered with, "You disappear again already?"
Irish closed his eyes.
I covered my mouth.
"I'm calling you."
"That doesn't answer the question."
"I need to ask you something about Saint Brigid's."
The humor disappeared so quickly that even from several feet away I could hear the change in Eamon's voice.
"What about it?"
Irish's gaze found mine.
"You know the old convalescent home?"
A long silence followed.
"Everyone around here knew it."
"Da ever ask you about the building?"
Another silence.
Longer.
"Aye."
Irish straightened.
"When?"
"Jesus, Rory. Years ago."
"What did he ask?"
"I don't remember exactly."
"Try."
The word came out harder than necessary, sharp enough that I reached across and touched Irish's wrist before frustration could push him into demanding something Eamon might need a moment to remember.
Irish looked toward me immediately, and when I gave the slightest shake of my head, I watched the tension work through his jaw as he recognized what he was doing and deliberately brought himself back under control.
When he spoke again, the edge had left his voice.
"Sorry. I found something Da left. Your name's on one of his plans. I need to know what you remember, but I'm not dragging you into this unless you want to help."
The line stayed quiet.
Then Eamon said, "I'll be there in twenty minutes."
Irish ended the call.
"You learned that quickly," I said.
"Don't sound so surprised."
"I'm impressed."
"That's worse."
I smiled.
He didn't quite return it, but some of the tension eased.
Brigid arrived before Eamon did, carrying enough food for six people and absolutely no respect for the concept of waiting to be invited into a house she had apparently entered freely for most of her life.
I heard the front door open, followed by the unmistakable sound of her muttering about dust and men who could dismantle criminal organizations but apparently couldn't remember lunch.
Irish stepped into the hallway.
"How did you get in?"
"The door."
"I locked it."
Brigid lifted a key.
He stared at it.
"You have a key to my house?"
"Your mother gave it to me."
"Fifteen years ago."
"And?"
I leaned against the study doorway. Irish looked toward me as though I might somehow control this.
I wisely said nothing. Brigid walked past him and entered the study. Her irritation vanished the moment she saw the open bookcase and she stopped.
For perhaps ten seconds, the woman who had spent two days teasing Irish about everything from childhood sheep incidents to his inability to purchase batteries simply stared at the hidden archive.
"Declan built that."
Irish nodded.
"Aye."
"I knew he was putting shelves in."
Her voice had changed.
"Didn't know why."
She moved closer but didn't cross into the concealed space.
"What did you find?"
Irish looked toward his father's desk.
"Proof."
Brigid's face tightened.
"Of what?"
"That Da's work got them killed."
The sentence landed heavily and Brigid closed her eyes. When she opened them again, anger had replaced surprise.
"I always knew that robbery story was shite."
"Brigid."
"It was. Your father had nothing worth murdering four people for unless somebody had developed a violent interest in old furniture and paperwork. Half the village knew something was wrong."
Irish stared at her.
"Nobody told me."
"You left."
The words weren't cruel.
They still cut.
Brigid softened slightly. "And the few times Eamon or Niamh got near you afterward, you made it very clear you wanted nothing from anyone here."
Irish looked away.
Brigid didn't pursue the wound. Instead, she set the food on the corner of the desk and looked at the plans spread across it.
"Saint Brigid's."
I glanced toward her.
"You know the property?"
"Of course."
"How well?"
She gave me a look. "This isn't America, love. We know which families owned fields three generations before anyone thought to write it down."
Irish muttered, "This is why village gossip should be classified as intelligence."
Brigid ignored him.
"The sisters ran a convalescent home there when I was young. Then it became some sort of residential charity. Women's housing, mostly. At least that's what everyone was told. They had donations from half the parish for years."
"When did people stop going there?" I asked.
"Gradually. New management didn't want volunteers wandering through. Said residents needed privacy. Then they stopped holding parish events. After that the place supposedly closed."
"Did anyone question why it stayed maintained?"
Brigid's expression darkened.
"People did. The answers were always boring enough to discourage the next question. Heritage grants. Agricultural leasing. Storage. A caretaker. You hear enough ordinary explanations and eventually you stop looking."
That was how the Order survived—not by making everything invisible, but by making it dull, administrative, respectable, and ordinary enough that anyone who kept questioning it risked looking paranoid.
I showed her Declan's plan.
"Does this corridor mean anything?"
Brigid leaned closer.
Her finger hovered over the chapel.
"There used to be a passage underneath."
Irish and I looked at her simultaneously.
"What passage?" he asked.
"Old service tunnel."
My pulse jumped.
Brigid frowned at both of us. "Why are you looking at me like that?"
"Because it's not on any modern plan," I said.
"It wouldn't be. Half of it collapsed before you two were born."
Irish leaned over the table.
"Where did it run?"
"Chapel to the old infirmary, I think. The sisters used it in winter so supplies could be moved without crossing the courtyard."
"Underground?"
"Partly. The ground slopes there."