by T F Muir
‘Close the door, sonny.’
The young man spun round, hatred twisting his features. ‘Who the fuck’re you?’
‘I’m the guy who’s going to arrest you for spilling blood all over his nice car.’
‘Blood? What blood? I’ve no laid a fucking finger on her yet.’
‘I’m not talking about her,’ Gilchrist said.
Something seemed to dawn on the young man then, and he grinned, more grimace than smile. He flexed his muscles, stretched the tendons in his neck, as if readying to charge.
‘Don’t get yourself in serious trouble, sonny.’
‘The name’s Terry,’ he said, ‘and ah’ve been in serious trouble afore.’
‘You tell him, Terry,’ Jessie said, shaking her head. ‘Just close the door and go back upstairs, will you?’
Terry turned to Jessie. ‘You ever set one foot in this street again, just one foot, and I’m warning you, Jessie, I’ll fucking have you, cop or no cop. Got that?’
‘Sure, Terry.’
He slammed the door, hard enough for Jessie to wince, then turned and strode towards Gilchrist who did the honourable thing and tried to step out of the way. Not quick enough, as Terry shouldered him on the way past.
Gilchrist turned, grabbed Terry’s arm, twisted it, and knocked the legs out from under him. As Terry tumbled, Gilchrist spun him so that Terry hit the ground face down with his arm jammed up between his shoulder blades. A knee into the middle of his back had Terry howling with pain, and gasping for breath.
‘Let him go, Andy.’ Jessie now stood at the front of the Merc.
Gilchrist looked up at her. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I’m fine.’
A high-pitched voice from the top-floor window had them both lifting their heads.
‘I seen that, you fuckers. Police brutality’s what it is. Youse’ll be hearing from my solicitor. I’ll be making a formal complaint. I’ll get you flung out the force, you fucking wee bitch.’
‘Let’s go, Andy. I shouldn’t have come.’
Gilchrist shifted his knee, eased Terry’s arm down his back. He stood back as Terry pulled himself to his feet, his bare chest grazed and oozing blood where he had landed on the pavement. Terry slid an arm under his nose, then spat to the ground.
‘Go home, Terry. This is nothing to do with you.’
‘It’s everything to do with me.’
‘Give it up, Terry. I’m through with you lot.’
Terry pointed at her, his lean arm as tattooed as a yakuza’s. ‘I’m warning you—’
‘Are you threatening a police officer?’ Gilchrist asked.
Terry’s jaw rippled with anger, his eyes danced with indecision. Then he said, ‘Ach, away and fuck, the pair of youse.’
Gilchrist waited until Terry was stomping his way back to his flat before he turned to Jessie. She shrugged a grimace, then retreated to the car.
As Gilchrist opened the car door, he glanced at the upper-floor window. But Jeannie with her matriarchal vitriol was gone. Silent, he retraced their route back to the M8.
As he accelerated down the slip road, he said, ‘Who’s Terry?’
‘My brother.’
‘Mr Angry.’
She snorted. ‘Here’s hoping you never meet Tommy.’
Gilchrist gave her words some thought, then said, ‘So what’s going on is more than just you and your mother not liking each other.’
‘I’m not ready for this.’
‘That doesn’t cut it, Jessie. I was attacked by—’
‘Terry bumped into you, Andy. You didn’t need to take him down like that.’
‘If I hadn’t been there, would he have hit you?’
Jessie shrugged. ‘You overreacted.’
‘You’re not answering the question.’
‘Maybe.’
‘Even though he knows you’re police?’
Another snort. ‘That’s like a red rag to a bull.’
Gilchrist pulled into the fast lane and eased up to sixty. ‘Terry seemed proud that he’d been in serious trouble before. Do you know the details?’
‘Eighteen months in Barlinnie for GBH. But he was lucky.’
Gilchrist let her words settle. GBH – grievous bodily harm. Mr Angry lashes out. ‘So he’s good with his fists,’ he said.
‘Terry doesn’t think it’s a fair fight until it’s two of them against one of him,’ Jessie said. ‘You’ve no idea how lucky you were, Andy.’
Gilchrist gripped the steering wheel. You’ve no idea how lucky you were. How true those words were. Bigger, harder, tougher men than he could ever be had taken on criminals filled with hatred for the police and come off the worse for it. But luck often favoured he who struck first, a lesson worth remembering.
‘So where’s your other brother, Tommy?’
‘Back in Barlinnie. For stabbing someone. He’s the nutcase of the family.’
‘Jesus, Jessie.’
‘Jesus Jessie right enough,’ she said, and looked at him. ‘Now you’re beginning to understand. Welcome to happy families.’
CHAPTER 19
Gilchrist was driving through Auchtermuchty when Jessie’s mobile rang.
‘Could I speak to Jessica?’ In the car’s cabin, the voice was as clear as if she was on speakerphone.
‘Who’s this?’ Jessie said.
‘Caryl Dillanos.’
Jessie flapped her hand for Gilchrist to pull over. ‘Hang on a minute,’ she said. ‘I’m driving. Let me stop the car.’ She waited until Gilchrist pulled down a side street and drew to a halt. ‘That’s me pulled over. So you got my message?’
‘I did. It sounds interesting.’
The voice sounded fragile and tinny from the mobile’s mic, but Gilchrist thought he caught an accent, not English, but foreign – maybe east European. But he could not be sure.
‘I’d like to see it. Where is it?’
‘St Andrews. D’you know it?’
‘Yeah. How’d you get my phone number?’
Gilchrist caught the serious tone, the underlying suspicion.
‘From Angus McCarron,’ Jessie said.
‘You know him?’
‘He drinks with my boyfriend. Well, more like man-friend,’ she said, then grimaced, embarrassed by her rambling.
‘So, what’s the car like?’
‘It’s silver. My favourite colour. It’s a Mercedes. A 350 SKL,’ she said, and frowned when Gilchrist put his hand to his forehead. ‘And it’s six months old.’
‘Mileage?’
‘Mileage is, let me see . . .’ Gilchrist drew the figure three in the air and mouthed, Three thousand. ‘Three thousand,’ she said.
‘What’s the price?’
‘That’s up to you.’
Caryl laughed, a high-pitched cackle that sounded forced.
‘First reasonable offer I get,’ Jessie said, ‘I’m dumping it.’ She looked over at Gilchrist, and he read the panic in her eyes. He drew 20K on the dashboard and mouthed, Twenty thousand.
A pause, then, ‘Why are you selling it?’
‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned,’ Jessie said. ‘I’ve just found out my man-friend’s been boinking his twenty-year-old secretary for the last three months. So, I’m going to sell his car, then tell him to fuck off.’ She held on to her mobile. ‘Is that a good enough reason?’
‘Six months old? Three thousand miles? No dents, dings or scratches?’
‘It could be straight out the showroom. Doughball polishes it every weekend. Pays it more attention than he pays me. He’s even given it a nickname. Tinkerbell.’
Gilchrist frowned at her. Tinkerbell?
Jessie shrugged, as if to say she had no idea where Tinkerbell came from either.
‘How does ten thousand sound?’
‘I want to get back at him, not bankrupt the bastard. First reasonable offer is what I said. If you’re looking for a freebie, then you’re looking in the wrong place.’
‘Do you have anything i
n mind, then?’
‘Won’t let it go for a penny below twenty.’
An intake of breath, followed by a long whistle. ‘Do you have all the paperwork?’
‘I do.’
‘Isn’t the car his?’
‘It is. But I have power of attorney. Don’t ask.’
‘When can I see it?’
‘He’s flying to London tomorrow for the day. I’d like to give him his going-away present tomorrow night, followed by the big heaveho. Think you can do that?’
‘Whereabouts in St Andrews?’
For a moment Gilchrist thought Jessie looked lost, then she recovered with, ‘You know the cathedral ruins? I’ll meet you there. You can’t miss them.’
‘What time?’
‘Hang on, let me check.’ Gilchrist mouthed eleven. ‘How does eleven in the morning sound?’
‘Perfect.’
‘Cash only.’
‘What other way is there to do business?’
The line died.
Jessie let out a rush of air. ‘Jeez-oh. That was worse than a Saturday night gig in the students’ union.’ Then she said, ‘You’d better get hold of Angus. That bitch’ll call him to check my story.’
Gilchrist poked at his mobile, held it to his ear. ‘Mhairi? Have you got Angus’s mobile number?’ He repeated it out loud as she read it off, then he hung up, and dialled. He gave Jessie a wink of reassurance, then said, ‘Angus? DCI Gilchrist. You might get a call from your friend Caryl. If she does, here’s what you’re going to tell her . . .’
Without complaint, Angus listened to Gilchrist tell him about Jessie’s imaginary man-friend, and how he and Angus were good mates, close enough to exchange mobile numbers. When he hung up, Jessie said, ‘What now?’
‘We need to find a six-month-old silver Mercedes 350 SLK,’ he said, emphasising the initials. ‘You had them the wrong way round. It’s an SLK, not an SKL.’
‘Bugger off.’
They cleared the town of Auchtermuchty in silence, and Gilchrist pushed the speed up to seventy, before he said, ‘I thought you handled it well.’
‘I thought I kind of fluffed my way through it,’ she said, then asked, ‘So where are we going to find a 350 . . . a silver Mercedes?’
‘That could be a bit of a problem,’ he said at length. ‘We’re going to be hard pressed to set this up.’
‘We’re going to be hard pressed. You’re the one getting paid the big bucks.’
‘Clearly you’ve never seen my payslip.’
A visit to a dealership in Cupar and four phone calls later warned Gilchrist that he might have overstepped his act – until the fifth call. He gave Jessie a victory smile, and said, ‘Shuggie’s going to pick one up in Perth and trailer it over. It’ll be in St Andrews this evening. But it needs to be back in the dealership tomorrow night, or it starts costing us. I’ll have Nance work out its safe return.’
‘Why trailer?’
‘It’s brand new.’
‘So how much does a brand new SKL thingie cost, anyway?’
‘You’ve still got it the wrong way round. It’s an SLK. And for a 350 . . . ? Upwards of thirty thousand.’
‘And that cheeky bitch offered me ten?’ Jessie gasped.
‘That would have been the deal of the decade.’
‘How about the deal of the century? Who did she think she was talking to?’ She looked at her watch, then said, ‘Can you run me to a mobile phone shop, then drop me at home? I need to give Robert his lunch.’
From anger to concern in zero seconds flat. As if she clicked a switch. ‘What age did you say he was?’ he asked.
‘Old enough to masturbate, and young enough to need his mum to cook his meals.’
‘Well, let’s hope you never get that the wrong way round.’
Jessie glared at him.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘A joke that came out—’
‘The wrong way round?’
‘Exactly.’
CHAPTER 20
He double-parked while Jessie ran in and out of Orange on South Street.
Then he drove her home, and agreed to pick her up after three o’clock.
Back at the office, he checked his emails, saw he had another one from Cooper – Can you call? Not urgent. R xx. Back to the two kisses, which meant . . . ?
He waded through the rest of his emails, stopped at one from Jackie, and skimmed through it – Galyna Grabowski. Polish citizen. 19 years old. A year ago in March, failed to turn up for her job as a waitress in Trattoria Guidi, Airdrie. Reported missing by her two flatmates. Her body was found in Clydebank, Dunbartonshire, six months later, severely emaciated, with evidence of drug abuse . . .
He clicked on the jpeg attachment.
An image of a young woman, as blonde as a Scandinavian, with the glazed stare of the dead, looked out at him. He would have put her in her mid-thirties, not twenty. Her skin reflected her poor diet and health – pockmark scars and the roseate glare of infected spots. A dark bruise tinted her right cheekbone and dulled the skin under her eye. Here was a young woman who had ended at the bottom of the drug pile and died before she ever had the chance to live. She had been attractive too, with eyes set wide apart and a face that narrowed to . . .
He leaned closer, enlarged the image.
It was her jaw that intrigued him, how her face had an almost triangular shape that led the eye to a small chin verging on the pointed.
He pulled up Jackie’s email again and continued reading.
. . . evidence of drug abuse, and vaginal infection. She died from a single stab wound to the heart. Suspected weapon an ice pick. Her body had a total of seventeen tattoos, ranging from a pair of wings that spread across her shoulders to a tiny number eleven in her left armpit, less than half an inch in size . . .
Two tattoos in particular caught his attention – the pair of shoulder wings and the number eleven in her left armpit. He opened the jpeg again, placed one hand over the left side of her face. He would not bet on it, but was he looking at the sister of the woman on the Coastal Path?
He printed out the image, pushed from his chair and walked along the hall to Jackie’s room. He held up the photo. ‘Galyna Grabowski,’ he said. ‘What drew you to her?’
Jackie opened her mouth, then raised her left arm and patted her armpit.
‘The number eleven tattoo?’
She nodded.
‘Did you find any others with the same tattoo?’
She moaned a No, and shook her head.
‘OK, get me a copy of her full report, post-mortem, investigation file.’
She tried OK, but nodded instead.
‘Great work, Jackie. Keep me posted.’
Back in his office, he found Cooper’s mobile number, and dialled it.
‘So you got my email?’ she said.
He kept her on track with, ‘I might have a lead that could help us ID our Coastal Path woman. I’ll have Jackie send you DNA from another victim—’
‘You think they’re related?’
‘Could be. They have similar facial features. So it’s a long shot.’ He gave her Jackie’s email address, then said, ‘You wanted me to call?’
‘Yes, I thought you might consider letting me buy you a pint tomorrow night. It is Saturday, after all.’
Gilchrist thought of just saying he was busy. But despite his workload, he always tried to keep Saturday night open. ‘Where did you have in mind?’
‘Somewhere noisy and full of students, like the Central. Isn’t that your local?’
‘One of them, but . . .’
‘So we have a date?’
‘A date?’
‘Yes, boy meets girl, girl meets boy.’ She chuckled, a throaty growl that sent a signal to his groin. ‘Bring others along, if you’d prefer. Safety in numbers. We’ll probably all want to talk shop anyway. Say, seven o’clock? I’ll contact you when I get there.’ The line died.
Gilchrist returned his mobile to his jacket, trying to shift the feeling that
he had just been manipulated, and resisting the petty urge to call back and cancel their date. But just the sound of that word – date – pulled a wry smile to his face. It would be Saturday, after all.
Before leaving the office, he made another copy of the photograph.
He collected Jessie from her home, and said, ‘How is he?’
‘He didn’t masturbate, if that’s what you’re asking.’
‘Jesus, Jessie, it was a slip of the—’
‘Lighten up, Andy. Where’s your sense of humour?’
‘That was a joke?’
‘Dry delivery. So, where are we off to?’
Again, her change in tack almost threw him. He showed her Galyna’s photo, but she was unable to help. She remembered the body being found in a back street on the outskirts of Clydebank, a stone’s throw from Duntocher and the Krukovs’ barn. But she could not recall a tattoo in the shape of an eleven.
‘I’d need to revisit Strathclyde’s records,’ she said.
‘Jackie’s already ordered them.’
‘If she was found in September last year, that was before we raided the Krukovs. Which might explain why we never picked up on the significance of the tattoo.’
Gilchrist nodded. How often were clues not noticed through poor timing? ‘Do you think we’re missing something?’ he said. ‘I mean, we look at the tattoo and the first thing we see is the number eleven. Then bones. But maybe it’s not bones or the number eleven we should be concentrating on. Maybe it’s something else,’ he said.
‘Like what?’
He chewed through his rationale, but could not push it forward. ‘I don’t know.’
‘Therein lies the problem.’
‘Indeed.’
Gilchrist spent the next ten minutes contacting each member of his investigation team and asking them to report for debriefing for 5.00 p.m. The occasional early night was good for morale, particularly at the start of the weekend. Besides, they were beginning to make some real progress. They had Dillanos driving up to St Andrews tomorrow morning, which could give them their first lead to the renter of the cottage. They had a possible connection to the girl on the Coastal Path, with a DNA comparative sample ordered, which might – and it was a big might – ID her. But one thing still worried him, which was not related to any crime.
