Our Little Secrets

by Peter Ritchie

  ‘One thing, my friend, before we go any further. Want to know who you’re describing?’

  Something like ‘Aye’ came out through the bampot’s clenched teeth.

  As soon as they told him, he withdrew his complaint, just before they booked him for possession of the duster.

  Lesley Thompson had never met Hamilton before, but she could see what she’d seen often enough in the service. How loss can ravage a close relative in a matter of hours. He was a big man, but both eyes looked like they’d been bruised, and the rims were inflamed with the result of grief. He was wearing a short-sleeved top but for all his years his arms were still strong, and she saw the tattoo of a thistle and the words ‘Scotland forever’ just below it.

  ‘Jesus Christ, the lassie’s murdered and they send Ronnie Slade.’

  ‘I’m the senior officer on this, Arthur. That’s just how it is. Can we come in?’ Slade waited but knew how these things played out – the man was making a show because that’s what men like him had to do.

  Hamilton waited for a moment then nodded them inside and led the way to his study. Even in grief, he couldn’t avoid showing off his prized room.

  They sat down and there was no offer of a drink to Slade, who decided he had to take control before this loose cannon started to go off in all directions. He tried opening up with sympathy for the man’s loss.

  ‘Shove it up your arse, Slade. I want to know what’s happenin’ wi’ this. Suspects or anythin’ – you better tell me or I’ll make your life a fuckin’ misery.’

  ‘Why did you throw the detectives and family liaison officer out today? We need your help and we need your statement. If you really care, you’ll work with us on this, Arthur. Now are you going to help or what? Either way, we do the job, but we need you to help us here.’ Slade had been ready for what Hamilton had thrown at him, but he wasn’t prepared to lose control of the situation.

  ‘I’ll make enquiries, Slade, an’ if I find the guy first, you won’t need a trial for the bastard. You hear me, son?’

  ‘That’s what I expected, Arthur. Have it your own way but get this. Some might take the fact that you refuse to cooperate as suspicious. The papers for instance. How would the world see that one? You’ve always been a man with an image and people will see smoke even if there’s no fire.’ He leaned forward as the words left his lips.

  Hamilton had made his display and he seemed to shrink a size.

  ‘She was all I had left in the world. Only family an’ no grandchildren. Jesus Christ.’ He put his face into his hands. The fight had gone for the time being.

  Hamilton cooperated from then, but every so often he threw a bit of abuse about, though that was a price worth paying as far as Slade was concerned. He still refused to have anything to do with a family liaison officer, but it was clear that he would make his own moves to find who’d killed his daughter and everyone knew it. If it was just some ned housebreaker, it wouldn’t take a man in the know long to find out who was doing what at that level of crime. The tea leafs had to sell their gear, and it would be a piece of cake finding out who the current resetters were in the town.

  Slade decided that it might cause offence but he would move to get a surveillance operation running on Hamilton. The executive would probably have a canary, but they’d look equally stupid if the killer turned up with his throat cut by the heartbroken father.

  When he closed the door behind the two detectives, Hamilton wondered about calling his son-in-law, but that would stick in his throat, and no matter what had happened that bastard would bear some responsibility. It might be indirect in that the marriage was a sham, but if he’d been there, if the marriage had been sound, then in another life Jude might have lived and that meant Dominic fucking Grainger was liable.

  Moral amnesia meant he missed completely the irony that he had been a violent fucker himself all the years of his marriage and his wife had decided she really was going to a better place when she was told she was dying.

  He would have to speak to Grainger at some point but not just yet. If it was the last thing he did, he’d find the killer, whoever it was, before the cops did and look into his eyes while he cut him up as slowly as possible.

  45

  Ronnie Slade always made a point of not judging people before he met them and especially where it was a murder investigation. The fact that so many of the killers were one of the deceased’s nearest and dearest made it tempting to focus too narrowly on possible suspects. This one was tempting – the intel was that Dominic Grainger was a major player but protected behind legitimate businesses. It was so often the case that the main men had multiple firewalls between them and the reach of the law. He’d admitted already that the marriage was broken and on the night Jude Hamilton was dispatched he was with a five-star hooker. Some detectives would have him convicted already.

  Just after they’d left Arthur Hamilton’s place, Slade took a call that Jude’s body was at the mortuary and the locus was clear if he wanted Grainger to go there. He headed for the Leith office and said he’d pick him up himself then take him to the locus to see if anything was missing or out of place. It had to be done whether he was the killer or not.

  First things first though, he would take him to the mortuary to identify the body, because they wanted the post-mortem carried out as soon as. There had been a run of accidental deaths and suicides, so the mortuary was already stacking up with its never-ending business. Some of the more cynical detectives claimed it was Rangers fans deciding enough was enough as the Celtic just kept winning everything in sight.

  He’d never met Dominic Grainger before and apart from a couple of photos in criminal intelligence briefings hadn’t seen him in the flesh either. When Slade walked into the office in Leith, the family liaison officer who was with him stood up and said, ‘Sir.’

  ‘Get yourself a break and we’ll take it from here.’

  Slade looked at the man half the murder squad hoped was the killer so they could have a piss-up and get back to normal.

  As the FLO left the room, Grainger got to his feet and offered his hand to Slade, who took it and gave him full eye contact as they gripped flesh. They were both strong men but knew enough about social interaction just to squeeze, but not too much. So many modern men seemed to think crushing someone’s hand put them on top of the evolutionary pile.

  Slade introduced Lesley Thompson and he watched as Grainger gave her a slightly altered expression with just a hint more of a smile and his eyes crunched a little at the sides. The detective realised Grainger was one of those men who, despite the situation and the fact he was about to view his wife’s remains, still sent out those little signals to the opposite sex that he was interested. It was like voicemail – you got the same reply whatever the call. He just couldn’t help it.

  They sat round the table unloading the formalities and saying what had to be said procedurally. A lot of SIOs didn’t get the importance of these little moments and what they could tell the investigator. Grieving was something that took place on many levels inside someone close to the deceased, and even in Grainger’s circumstances where the marriage was broken, the effect could be devastating on the surviving spouse. Some people were just plain relieved that the person they’d shared so much unhappiness with was gone. There was always trauma, the reminder for the ordinary man or woman that people died without warning and it would never leave the survivors unmarked.

  But Grainger didn’t seem to fit any of the templates Slade recognised, though that didn’t make him the killer. His eyes were red-rimmed and he looked weary, but anyone would be when they’d been told their wife had been slaughtered and then had to sit for hours telling a couple of detectives all they could about the deceased, their marriage and all their little secrets. It might not all come out at the start but inevitable a major investigation team, backed up by the HOLMES system, would examine every detail of a possible suspect’s life, and Dominic Grainger was all of that.

  He shook his head at some in
ner thought every so often. It seemed almost timed, too regular, but it still didn’t make him the killer.

  After half an hour, Slade decided it was time to make a move and play out the next two acts.

  ‘Look, we need to go to the mortuary to identify Jude. It has to be done. Are you okay for this?’ It wasn’t really a question; it had to be done, but there were conventions to stick to. No matter what Grainger was in his professional life, he was the victim’s husband, and it wouldn’t be long before Slade stood in front of the cameras and said the usual stuff about ‘a heinous crime’ and ‘Police Scotland’s thoughts being with the family’. All bollocks of course, but it was twenty-first-century PR and no career, no matter how efficient, would survive without that level of bullshit. Slade was a pragmatist, and as good a detective as he was, he could also communicate with the best of them, so he gave the hacks and the executive exactly what they wanted but never believed a word of it.

  Grainger broke down at the mortuary after identifying his wife, and if he was putting it on, it was a class act. Slade always trusted women’s instincts more than men in these situations, and when Grainger took a natural break for the toilet, he asked Lesley Thompson what she thought.

  ‘Don’t know, Ronnie, but just doesn’t feel right to me. Can’t put my finger on why though.’

  ‘That’s fine, Les. We keep an open mind and Christ knows he’s the prime suspect till we can prove otherwise.’

  They drove Grainger to his house to see if he could see something out of place or missing. If he was the killer, Slade knew this would be an interesting moment if he was the man.

  When they arrived outside, the police presence was still significant – there was a uniform at the door and patrol cars each end of the street. The press had been sniffing around, but they had their pictures of the house and had mostly drifted away.

  Grainger stopped at the front gate as if he’d been stopped by someone, and he looked from Thompson to Slade like a child looking for help.

  ‘Don’t know if I can do this.’

  Grainger had completely immersed himself in the role of the distraught husband and it was part of his insanity that he became just that.

  ‘We need you to do this, Dominic. If we’re going to find this person, you might see something in here that means nothing to us.’

  Slade glanced over at Thompson, who was frowning, and he knew what that meant. She just wasn’t buying it. Slade wasn’t so sure, but if Grainger was the killer, they would need a convincing case to get him to admit anything.

  Inside the house Grainger walked slowly, and the detectives missed the involuntary pause and surprise when he realised that the ground floor was undisturbed, apart from the obvious attention of the SOCOs. It was a small fuck-up, but he’d told Tonto over and over again to trash the ground floor first. His act was shaken. He hadn’t planned for Tonto doing it the wrong way round, but he knew he should have factored it in. It was important that it didn’t look like the killer had gone straight for the cupboard and box. His stomach started to jangle and he asked the wrong question.

  ‘Was nothing disturbed down here then?’

  As soon as the words left his mouth he knew it sounded wrong. He was asking the detectives something they couldn’t know. There was just a faint hint in his voice that this was not what he’d expected and he watched the detectives picking up those tiny signals.

  Slade kept reminding himself it still didn’t make Grainger the killer. People said the wrong things when they were faced with the reality of a murder locus.

  ‘That’s why you’re here, Dominic, to tell us what you see.’

  Slade tightened his lips, his senses now heightened to a level where people can almost touch the energy in the room, their primitive instincts alert to the tiniest prompt.

  They went upstairs and Grainger’s gut tightened. From what he could see, nothing had been disturbed from the moments after he’d killed his wife, changed into a fresh sterile suit and shoe covers close to her body then left the house to change again in the cover of the rear garden.

  He was finding it difficult to maintain the act he’d played so well earlier on. He knew there were flaws in his plan and he needed to keep cool. The detectives were looking for clues, and they always went for someone close to start with. There was a culprit decomposing in his flat and he just had to ride it out till they found Tonto.

  Before he’d left the flat, he’d turned the heating on full as he knew rapid decomposition would cause them a shitload of problems. It was a gamble, but he still had a good hand and he pulled it back together.

  They’d stopped on the landing, just short of Jude’s room, and Slade asked Grainger again if he’d noticed anything.

  ‘Nothing so far; you’d hardly know anyone had been here.’ He pulled out an already soaked hanky and blew his nose.

  ‘We have to go into the room where Jude was killed now. There’s still evidence in there and we need you to look carefully. Take your time and tell me what you see.’

  Grainger stood at the door and studied the room carefully. Tonto had fucked up, but it was still all to play for.

  He looked from left to right a few times. The cupboard door was half-open, and it had obviously been forced, but nothing else seemed disturbed. For a moment, he wished he’d made Tonto suffer a bit more. He did his best not to look towards the bed and the area where he’d sunk the working end of a hammer into his wife’s skull. That moment was something he’d never experienced before: it was special, a rush. He’d never taken class A but he guessed it had to feel the same, from what users had told him.

  ‘The cupboard’s been forced. Do you want me to look inside?’

  He glanced round at Slade, who was behind him and nodded without speaking.

  Grainger took the few steps towards the cupboard. Slade moved to his side and pulled open the door, as his hands were gloved up.

  Grainger stepped inside. It was more of a box room than a cupboard. He stood in the centre and cursed Tonto again. Almost nothing was moved apart from the fucking box, but he was left with no choice.

  ‘It’s all her bags and shoes in here, but the only other thing was a jewellery box with some bits and pieces in it. Nothing special. It was mostly sentimental, that kind of thing. I don’t see it.’

  Slade was happy with that. If Grainger was the killer, he wondered why the whole thing was so pish poor and why he’d gone straight for the cupboard, unless there was actually good gear in it and he was having that for himself. The other option was that he’d had fuck all to do with it. Either way, it was still good for him because if the killer had it, then they might still get lucky if he or she still had it or tried to punt whatever was in it.

  ‘We never saw that in there, Dominic, so might prove important. Thanks. You okay to carry on?’

  Grainger nodded and thought, You bet your life the box’ll prove fucking important. He had to work at not smiling at that particular observation.

  They walked him round the bed so he’d come face-to-face with the dark staining on the carpet where blood, bone and some of his wife’s brain matter had seeped onto the expensive pile.

  He said, ‘Oh God,’ and turned away from the truth. ‘I’m sorry.’

  It was all he said and it told the detectives nothing. But they had something to work on with the jewellery box, and once they’d taken a description they decided it was time to call it a day. There was no photograph, but Arthur Hamilton had given it to her for her eighteenth birthday. There wasn’t much chance he could add to the description or provide a photo, but the HOLMES system would demand it from the team. Nothing was left to chance.

  They dropped Grainger off at a hotel he used for his favourite hobby, and he said he’d stay there for a few days till the house became available again.

  ‘What do you think, Ronnie?’ Thompson asked, because that was always the first question detectives asked each other when they left the spouse, whatever they might turn out to be.

  ‘Whatever this is
, it ain’t a housebreaking gone wrong. Think we’ve a few surprises in store before we wrap this up.’ He turned and smiled at Thompson. ‘Anyway, time we both got a few hours’ rest. I’ll call the ranch and tell them I’ll be in at six unless something turns up. I’ll drop you off.’

  ‘Hallelujah. I’m starving and going to empty the fridge when I get in.’

  Grainger sat on the edge of his hotel bed and weighed up the game so far. He sank a gin and tonic then poured another one. There was always going to be some fuck-ups along the way and Tonto had made a bad one, but he was still in one piece, and sometime soon the police were going to be faced with a very dead but cast-iron murder suspect. That was the plan anyway. For a moment, he thought about getting hold of an escort but that would be stupid – tempting but stupid.

  46

  It was nearly twenty-four hours since Jude Hamilton had watched her husband’s grinning face as he swung the hammer that would end her life, and Sean Grainger had decided enough was enough. The brothers were in full revenge mode and wanted everybody out trying to find out who’d killed Dominic’s wife. For all the problems between Paul and his brothers, this was an attack on the family, a fucking outrage, and in the world of gangsters that had to be answered. If someone wasn’t composted for what had happened, then there would be a credibility question on top of the existing problems of merchandise being lost to the pigs.

  Sean and Paul had watched Dominic’s tear-stained face and seen how racked with guilt he was. The marriage had been fucked and he quite naturally blamed himself for not being there. His brothers said the right things, that it wasn’t his fault and, most importantly, that they believed him. Though Paul had doubts initially – he’d always known that under Dominic’s snake-smooth exterior lay the heart of an absolute bastard – the act he put on was so good that he decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. He couldn’t really believe that Dominic would be stupid enough to do anything that might lead Arthur Hamilton to point an accusing finger at him anyway.