Tea brewing, Jen went to put out some place mats and grab knives and forks from the drawer. A couple of minutes later, they were both ravenously demolishing their breakfasts. Neither of them had been joking about being hungry. Once they’d emptied their plates and cleaned up the mess, Conall suggested they get comfortable in the living room for a while. They took an end of the long couch each, propped up by cushions, lower legs intertwined in the middle. The room was warm, as ever, but a large, shared throw made it feel extra cosy. From there, they could hear anyone else coming down too.
Jen settled down happily to read her book for a while, and Conall closed his eyes, content to kill an hour by doing nothing and maybe even dozing a little until his stomach didn’t feel quite so heavy. If Jen’s curiosity hadn’t taken his mind back to the series of events that had culminated in his team’s return to Inverness on Wednesday, he might even have done that. Instead, he found himself going over it all in his head again. It wasn’t that they hadn’t done their job and done it well. Nobody was suggesting otherwise, but Conall wasn’t satisfied with the way it had all turned out.
There were still too many unanswered questions bothering him for that to be remotely possible.
One
Kaj Visser had high hopes of getting laid that night. The girl he’d been drinking with had certainly been sending him the right signals, and she was attractive enough to be worth spending a little time and money on. He could do without her mates, though. He’d definitely got the pick of the bunch with these three. Well, those two were being entertained by the old school pal who joined them and his friend, so things were looking good. He’d made the right choice, going along with this little group when they’d decided to leave Harpers and move on to the next bar. Sandy and Lenny were used to him going off without them. A night out when Kaj didn’t find some girl willing to take him home for the night was a rare thing. He cleaned up alright if he did say so himself.
Kaj (“You pronounce it Kai.”) was twenty-nine and in decent shape, especially compared to most of the local competition. He was Dutch, which made him foreign enough to be interesting, well-groomed, which gave him another edge and, most importantly, knew how to turn on the charm by the bucketload. Girls liked to be admired. They also liked to think they were fascinating, which most of them weren’t. In truth, usually, all it took was a few drinks to loosen them up a little, and they’d be only too happy to fall into bed with him. By comparison to most men here in Wick, he was an attractive catch.
This girl, Julie, had a really nice figure, and she was genuinely pretty too, although he didn’t think much of her dress sense. That red top really wasn’t her colour, even if it did show off her figure very nicely. He was also beginning to wonder how much more she was planning to drink. Julie might not be much fun if she wanted to fall asleep too soon. He’d been a little more careful with his own drinking, although he did have a nice little buzz going.
“Come on,” she’d said, pushing him off laughing as she took his hand to drag him after the others once they’d left Harpers. “One more drink, and then we’re all heading back to ours.” The girls rented a house together, a trio of no-hopers with crappy, low-paid jobs and half a brain between them. Kaj preferred women with enough self-respect to insist on paying their own way, but he was also a realist. Sometimes, you had to make do with what you could get.
They didn’t even bother to try to get a table at the last pub. Friday night, almost time for last orders, and the place was packed. Kaj waited with the girls while the other two men pushed their way to the bar to get the drinks in. Those two leeches had been buying one round between them while he paid for every other one for the last couple of hours. Still, Julie was twice as fit as her mates, so Kaj supposed she was worth double the investment. He certainly wasn’t going to say anything. That would ruin the friendly, carelessly generous impression he’d wanted to make.
One of the blokes came back soon enough with the girls’ drinks, and Julie sipped at hers, flushed and happy as she smiled at Kaj. His own whisky and coke was handed to him a minute later. Christ! What was this? The cheapest stuff on offer? The last few they’d bought had been pretty bad, but even the coke couldn’t disguise how awful this one was. Everyone else was knocking their drinks down in a hurry, eager to move on to the next stage of the night, so he did the same, trying not to pull a face. Then, finally, it was time to go.
Julie had told him that the girls’ house was only a few minutes' walk away, and Kaj was glad to get out into the cool, fresh air again and wrap his arm around a warm and softly inviting body. He was feeling a little dizzy and a little nauseous after that last drink and was fervently hoping the sensation would pass quickly.
When they reached the house, the unfashionably overweight girl, Meghan, pulled out her keys and fumbled at the door for a minute and then they all tumbled inside. Apparently, more drinks were still required, so they were dragged into the living room and instructed to make themselves at home. Kaj settled gratefully into an easy chair, wondering what the hell was the matter with him. He knew exactly how much he’d had to drink, and it wasn’t enough to make him feel the way he was currently feeling. That Anthony guy and the other girl, Monica, made themselves useful filling glasses for everyone.
“Just one last nightcap,” Julie promised as she dropped down onto the arm of the chair and handed him a tall, fizzing glass. “Cheers!” she encouraged, and he dutifully took a small swallow.
Okay, that was much better than the last one he’d been handed, although the slight, salty tang he was tasting was weird. Maybe he was coming down with a bug? He knew how messed up his taste buds became whenever that happened. Colds and flu made everything taste weird and not in a good way. At least that brief bout of nausea seemed to have abated. Kaj took another swallow and smiled up at his hostess.
The other two pairs were chatting away happily, but Julie didn’t seem to mind sitting with him quietly. In fact, she soon slipped down from the chair arm to snuggle happily into his lap, sneaking promising kisses in as they continued to sip at their drinks. It would all have been very enjoyable if the beginnings of a pounding headache weren’t starting up behind his eyes. It was a great relief when that too started to fade a few minutes later.
Kaj didn’t notice when the empty glass slipped from his hand, but the next time he opened his eyes after that, it was to find everyone gathered around staring worriedly down at him. When had Julie climbed off him?
“You don’t look so good, pal,” one of the other guys said. Kaj struggled to focus on his face, but the name eluded him. “Can you stand up?”
What an odd question. Of course he could. Only when he tried to make his muscles move, nothing happened. Well, no matter. He was too tired to bother. In fact, all he wanted to do right then was drift away. The chair was perfectly comfortable. All he had to do was close his eyes again and let the gentle rocking motion he was feeling carry him away.
Kaj didn’t know how much later it was when he became aware of being carried. It was cold, and there was a strong wind blowing. They’d been in a car, he thought, but he wasn’t certain. A splash of chill wetness on his face and the nearby sound of breaking surf made him think they must be by the shore somewhere, but he couldn’t make his eyes open. He couldn’t feel his eyelids. Maybe they were open, for all he knew. Awareness of his body seemed to be coming and going in waves. Was he being held upright, or was he lying down? He really wasn’t sure. It all seemed like some weird, darkly disturbing dream. A voice was saying something, but he couldn’t make any sense of it, apart from feeling that whoever it was sounded very angry. He was vaguely aware of distant, soft impacts striking his body as if someone hit him with a cushion. It didn’t seem important. None of this felt like it was happening to him at all.
Not long after that, the air seemed to turn to icy liquid, wet, salty and unbreathable, and Kaj found himself falling through an endless darkness, no light, no sound, no physical sensations at all. It was actually quite restful, not at all unpleasant. Finally,
there was nothing, not even thought.
Two
I had no idea what Chief Superintendent Anderson wanted to talk to me about when he asked me to ‘pop over’ to his office that Thursday morning, and I’d been trying not to worry about it on the walk over there. Whatever it was, whatever may have come up, we’d deal with it. There was a good chance that it had nothing to do with Brady O’Hara, anyway. Shay had been certain that we had nothing to worry about, and that was good enough for me. Anderson could suspect whatever he liked, but he couldn’t prove a damned thing.
None of which changed the fact that I still felt like a guilty schoolboy being called in to see the headmaster, and it certainly wouldn’t do to let the man see any of that. Mildly curious calm was what was required. Maybe he just wanted to check in with me, face to face, assure himself that my cousin really was doing okay. Not that I thought Edinburgh would have been giving him any more trouble. The Ids seemed to have resigned themselves to the new reality. Their ‘asset’ continued to function as well as ever, and it wasn’t as if they’d ever had any real control over the risks Shay decided to take. He’d made himself clear on that point. The glass would remain half full, as long as they respected his rules, until the day it got itself smashed. As for that, we were all going to die sooner or later. Better to do so saving an innocent life than in some stupid, pointless accident. I’d been telling myself that a lot lately.
“Come on in,” Anderson invited in response to my knock. I was favoured with a genial smile as I swung the door open and stepped through. He had his reading glasses on, but was already lifting a hand to remove them as I closed the door behind me.
“It’s good to see you, Conall. Thank you for coming over so quickly. Please, do sit down.” He laid the folded glasses aside. Had the Chief’s hairline receded a fraction further in the last few weeks? Anderson still had a very smooth face for his fifty-four years, just a few lines around the eyes and the mouth, but the hair loss had certainly been accelerating lately. His neat, sandy hair was thinner than it had been when I’d first come to Inverness and the exposed dome of his forehead rose much higher these days. The friendly smile remained fixed in place as I took the waiting chair across the desk from him and his pale blue eyes examined me approvingly. “You’re looking well.”
“We’ve had a dull few weeks of it, Sir. No overtime, plenty of rest. It’s easy to keep in good condition when things are so quiet.”
“For a man with your boundless energy? No doubt. I expect you’ve been putting quite a few hours in on that garden of yours too.”
I had, actually. Spring was always a busy time, clearing and planting, and I’d needed to do some repair work on the terraces where I grew most of the vegetables too. We’d had a lot of wash out over the winter, despite the walls I’d built to hold in the soil. I just nodded politely. It wasn’t like Anderson to waste much time on small talk.
“And your cousin? How’s he doing these days?”
“Shay’s absolutely fine,” I told him. “Why? Have you had a complaint? Because if you have, I’ll ask him to deal with it. Edinburgh has no reason to be unhappy about his productivity.”
“No, nothing like that.” He steepled his hands, elbows on the desk, and tapped absently at his chin. “I have a case up in Caithness, a suspicious death that’s turned into a murder. To be frank, Conall, I’m not sure what to do about it, not so soon after Black Wood.”
That made me sit up, and he couldn’t fail to notice the spark of interest he’d ignited with those words. It had been almost six weeks since Brady O’Hara had died, and honestly, the truth was that Shay was driving me nuts. Yes, he was working, and he was also working out a lot, and messing around in his woodshop and pretty much climbing the walls, trying to burn off an unwelcome surplus of nervous energy. I wouldn’t say he was bored because Shay didn’t do ‘boredom,’ but he needed a useful, diverting outlet to pour some of that energy into. A real case, right now, would be a godsend. Otherwise, I was going to have to book some leave and drag him off to the mountains for a few days so he could get it out of his system that way.
“If you want to know if we’re fit to work it, Sir, then the answer is yes. And, in my opinion, a change of scenery, and pace, would be good for both of us.”
“You want off the bench and back into the game? Already? Are you sure?” My eagerness might just have swayed Anderson in the right direction. Had he really thought there was a chance I’d have wanted to turn it down?
“Absolutely, Sir.”
“That’s good to know. I wasn’t sure you’d think it was a good idea. Alright then, here’s what I’ll do. I’ll send you the file to look over, but I want you to talk it over with your cousin before giving me your answer. You might not be quite so keen once you realise what’s involved.” Oh? Offhand, I couldn’t think of anything that would suit us better than going off by ourselves again.
Anderson sighed as I gave him a puzzled little frown. “Wick isn’t Lewis and Harris, Conall, and Rory Munro isn’t Trish Morrison.”
Munro? Right, he was the new Area Commander for the Northern Highland. He’d only been in place up there since the New Year. He was a Sutherland man, but I thought he’d been in Aberdeen for a while until his last promotion and transfer. I’d have to check.
“He’s not too thrilled about the idea of having an outside team up there,” Anderson continued. “Not while he’s still working on finding his feet, reorganising and cleaning house. If I only sent the two of you, I’m not too sure of the welcome you’d receive or how much local help he’d be prepared to offer you. That means that if you go, you’ll need to take a team of your own. Half a dozen of you should suffice, but one of them needs to be a DI.” He waved a hand to silence me before I could say anything. “Yes, I know Caitlin is getting her bump next month, but it hasn’t happened yet. Munro will expect any SIO I send to have an experienced second, with a good few years under their belt. McKinnon says it’s your choice if you take the case, but it’s either Morgan or Philips. You can take Caitlin too, of course, and two of your constables. The other two can work out of Burnett Road while you’re away, under whichever DI you decide to leave behind.”
Anderson was right. That really did change things. I wasn’t too sure that Shay would like the sound of a team like that at all. Personal feelings aside, I couldn’t choose Morgan over a much more useful officer. He’d be a dead weight, virtually useless. Philips was the only real choice there. He’d behaved very decently about that black eye I’d given him, too.
“Perfectly understandable, Sir,” he’d told me the following week. “Especially under such upsetting and stressful circumstances.” I knew that McKinnon had made him come to see me, but he’d seemed sincere enough. The idiot had gone so far as to get his cuffs out and reach towards Shay as I shepherded him out of that cell. I’d warned him to stay back and not try anything, and my reaction had been automatic and unthinking. We’d left him getting an earful from McKinnon. Shay had given me an odd look once we were safely in the car.
“I wasn’t going to hurt him, Con,” he’d said, twitching anxiously at my coiled anger. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“Yes, I did.” I’d said coldly through gritted teeth. “He had it coming. I told him to leave us alone, but he just wasn’t listening. He doesn’t seem to realise how poorly he’s been coping himself since we lost Jackie. Maybe I even managed to knock some sense into him.”
That punch had just been delayed a while. It had been almost inevitable from the moment Philips had opened his stupid mouth in our kitchen. “The man’s a damned fool!” It had taken all of my self-control not to launch myself across the table at him at the time. Well, the ‘damned fool’ had just saved Jimmy Stewart from an unthinkably horrific death. Hadn’t Philips even noticed the security measures built into that house?
I’d been quiet and thoughtful for too long, and Anderson nodded.
“I thought that might make you think twice about jumping at it. I’d suggest taking Morgan if t
here was any chance that it was going to make things easier, but we both know it wouldn’t. There’s no room for a man like that on a major investigation. He’s competent enough with minor cases and pretty harmless, but he should never have made DI. He certainly wouldn’t today, anyway.” He sighed again. “As I said, read the file and talk it over with your cousin. Let me know by lunchtime if you can. You’re my first choice, by a long shot, but I’m not going to order you to take this one, Conall. Not if you think it might be bad for Shay. I’m not going to put him in a situation he isn’t comfortable with or ready for, and I’m sure you won’t either.”
“What about accommodation up there?” I asked.
“Standard budget allowance per head applies, but what you choose to book is your own affair.” So, if Shay wanted to spend out a bit to buy himself some space, nobody was going to make an issue of it. Alright then. Hell, I didn’t want to be stuck with an extra four people outside work hours myself, if it came to that.
“Great. I’ll call you as soon as we’ve decided,” I promised. Anderson even stood up to shake my hand and see me out. As I walked back through his Divisional bullpen, I got nods and smiles from a lot of people I didn’t even know. I wasn’t too happy about that, but I suppose it was only to be expected. At least we’d managed to keep names and details out of the papers.
As far as the general public was concerned, officers with the Inverness police force had acted on information received and located Brady O’Hara. The ‘psychotic murderer’ had received a fatal defensive blow from a man he’d taken captive, drugged and repeatedly shocked. The surviving victim’s identity was being protected. Nosy journalists seeking a sensational story had soon got sick of the united ‘no comment’ game we were all playing. They’d padded things out with enough gory speculations to feed the public appetite, but we’d managed to keep them away from the Arnolds and the Gibsons until they lost interest, which was no small mercy.
Castle Killings: A DCI Keane Scottish Crime Thriller (Deadly Highlands Book 4) Page 2
