Free Irish Eyes by Mary Kay Andrews

“Nickells got you on a diet?”
    Linda Nickells was C.W.’s wife and one of my best friends. They were both cops, that is, former cops. C. W. had been captain of the robbery squad when both Bucky and I worked there; Linda, his second wife, was a homicide detective whom I met when I was working for an antiques-dealer client accused of killing a teenage girl.
    We had a lot of history, me, C.W., Bucky, and Linda.
    C.W. struggled to his feet, reached for his canes. “Let’s take a walk,” he said, looking around.
    It was painful, watching him walk like that. Linda assures me that he isn’t in pain, doesn’t mind the canes, but it hurts me just the same. The sight of him always reminds me that he needs those canes because of me, because a homicide suspect had shot him when I’d been too slow-moving. After the accident, they’d given C.W. a desk job. Not long after that, he took a disability pension and bought a security business. And not long after that, Linda, worn out from trying to be a good cop and a good mother to their two-year-old son, Wash, had quit too, to work in the security business with C.W.
    I followed C.W. out to the vending area. He got a pack of gum, offered me a stick. “Sorry. I didn’t feel like talking about Bucky in front of those Irish assholes back there.”
    “Boylan,” I said. “He’s not one of my favorites either. The other guy, I don’t know.”
    “You don’t know Michael Kehoe?”
    I thought about it. “I’ve heard his name recently, but I don’t know the guy.”
    “You wouldn’t,” C.W. said. “Kehoe is with the DeKalb S.O.”
    “Since when did these guys get so tight with Bucky?” I asked. “I never heard him mention them before. And what’s with the Irish assholes bit?” I asked. “Remember who you’re talking to here, laddie.”
    “You may be Irish, but you’re not one of them,” C.W. said. “Sorry. I just can’t take their racist bullshit, you know?”
    It dawned on me then. “Kehoe. He’s the one who’s president of the Shamrock Society. With Boylan. Bucky’s new best buddies.”
    Now it was C.W.’s turn to be surprised. “Since when did Deavers get buddy-buddy with those guys?”
    “Recently, I guess. Bucky came over last night, wanted me to go to this St. Patrick’s Day party they were throwing. He wanted me to meet his new girlfriend. She never showed, but I did have an unhappy reunion with Johnny Boylan.”
    “Your old boyfriend,” C.W. said.
    “We went out once. I didn’t know he was married. The guy makes my skin crawl. I can’t understand how Bucky got mixed up with a loser like Boylan.”
    “You don’t know the half of it,” C.W. said.
    “What’s that supposed to mean?” I wanted to know.
    C.W. gestured toward the waiting room. “Those guys—those assholes. Supposed to be some damn Irish-American police fraternal organization—right?”
    “I guess. That’s how McNabb described it. They march in parades and drink green beer. Harmless fun.”
    “That’s a load of crap,” C.W. said vehemently. “Boylan. You know what he’s famous for?”
    “Besides chasing anything in a skirt? What?”
    “Bashing in heads down in the projects. Loves to beat up the brothers, then come back to the squad room, trade nigger jokes with his buddies. He worked for me once, back in the early nineties. I had him transferred down to the airport precinct, get him out of my sight. How he’s stayed in the department this long—and the chief’s black and knows the score—I don’t get it.”
    “So he’s a bigot,” I said. “The world’s full of bigots, C. W. We Irish do not have the exclusive franchise on hatred.”
    “Those guys do,” C.W. insisted. “They might as well be the Klan. You take a look at their membership roster. All white, all good old boy. All asshole.”
    C. W. was a third-generation Atlanta police officer. His grandfather was one of the first black officers sworn into service with the city, back in the days when black cops