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“We’ll find him.” Podge tried to appease me as I sat in the passenger seat of his Ford Fiesta, with my entire body racking with shivers, on the way back to Ballylaggin. “It’s only been a couple of hours since he left the hospital, Aoife.”
“Exactly,” Alec and Casey agreed from the back seat. “He won’t have gone far.”
“You guys don’t get it,” I strangled out, knees bopping restlessly as I tried his phone for the millionth time, only to be sent to voicemail again. “He’s not in his right frame of mind.”
His sister was lying in a hospital bed with a collapsed lung. He was too injured to be out on the streets, but that was exactly what was happening. I knew in my heart of hearts that there was a ninety-nine percent chance that he had gone off the deep end. I hoped with everything I had inside of me that he hadn’t, but the fear still festered away inside of me.
“So? Lynchy’s never in his right mind,” Alec piped up. “He spends a solid eighty percent of his time off his trolley, and it’s never stopped him from looking after himself.”
“Not helping, Al,” Casey grumbled.
“He has a concussion,” I hissed, brushing my hair off my face. “A really bad one, and his head is all smashed up. He shouldn’t be out of bed, let alone wandering around by himself.”
“Don’t do that in here,” Casey snapped, and I twisted around to see her smack an unlit cigarette out of Alec’s hand. “She’s pregnant, asshole.”
“Oh shit, yeah.” He rummaged around the floor of the car for his cigarette. “My bad, Sexy Legs.”
“Can you drop me off at Elk’s Terrace?” I asked Podge. “I’ll check his house and ask around his neighbors.”
“No problem,” Podge replied. “I’ll take a spin over to the GAA grounds and search there.”
“Yeah, and I’ll check Biddies,” Casey offered.
“I’ll go with you,” Alec chimed in.
“No, Al, you need to go to Shane Holland’s gaff,” Podge interrupted. “See if Joey’s been there.”
“What? No fucking way,” Alec vehemently protested. “That prick’s a psycho. He’s as likely to stab me as he is to speak to me.”
“Come on, Al.”
“Why me?”
“Because you’re… Well, you’re you,” Podge settled on. “Come on. You know Lynchy would do it for you.”
“Fine,” he huffed. “But if anything happens to me, it’s on you, Ginger Pubes!”
______________________
Casey: He’s not at Biddies, babe.
Podge: No sign of him at the pavilion.
Alec: Nobody home @ psycho’s house.
Anxious, I tapped out a two-word response and clicked Send before sliding my phone back into my pocket.
Aoife: Keep looking.
The night air whipped at my face as I stood at the Lynchs’ front door with my fist banging incessantly on the frosted panel of the door.
“What did you do?” I demanded when Darren finally swung the door inward. “What did you say to him?”
“Maybe you should calm down—”
“Don’t bullshit me, Darren.”
Furious, I pushed past him and stalked into their house, unwilling to pander to anyone’s bullshit, not when Joey was teetering on the edge like I knew he was.
