by Alex Walters
Even before he’d reached to turn on the lights, the indicators on the alarm unit had told him the system was inactive. Shit. He hurriedly thought back over his schedule for the previous days, trying to work out who’d been here last. Had he forgotten to reset it, or had it been one of his colleagues? He realised, with some relief, that the previous visit, two days before, had been on one of his rest-days. So someone else would have been responsible.
Although the other utilities had been disconnected, the owners had left the electricity operational to power the alarm system and other essentials. It probably also didn’t do any harm to have a few lights showing from time to time. Even so, Morton carried his own flashlight and tended to use no more lights than he needed. If he accidentally left one burning, that would be another excuse to give him a bollocking.
His intention was to be in and out of here as quickly as possible tonight. He’d do a quick tour of the main reception areas and the upper corridors to make sure that there were no obvious signs of any problems. Then he’d make himself scarce.
The small inner foyer led through into what had previously been the main lobby, which in turn gave access to the various reception rooms. He turned on the lights in the lobby and walked through to the large area at the front of the hotel which he imagined had once been the main dining-room. The broad picture windows stretched the full length of the hotel frontage, giving a spectacular view of the bay and the firth. It wasn’t difficult to envisage what this place would have been like in its prime—rows of white-starched table-cloths, silver cutlery, crystal glasses. Well-off guests eating substantial dinners while watching the spread of evening across the water.
Now it was just an empty space with worn carpets and peeling wallpaper. Morton walked over to the window. The setting sun threw the shadow of the building out across the grassed area at the front, down to the beach and the shoreline. Lights were coming on in some of the houses along the road below, and the sun was glinting gold in the windows of the houses on the far side of the firth. The sky was still largely clear, darkening in the west to a bruised mauve, though clouds were gathering on the far horizon where the firth opened into the North Sea. The last fine day for a while, according to the forecast.
In other circumstances, Morton would have found the view striking. Standing here, in this abandoned space, he simply felt unease at the gathering dark. Better do what he had to do, and get the hell out.
He turned, sensing again the illusion that something had been happening behind him, out of his sight, as he’d been staring out of the windows. But of course the place was as silent and undisturbed as ever. He scanned round the room to ensure there were no visible problems, no signs of leaks or breakages. Then he hurried through into the old kitchens, and checked the areas leading to the rear doors.
He completed his tour of the ground floor and climbed the wide stairway to the first floor. This was the part he disliked most. The upper floors were given over to what had been the hotel bedrooms. He had to patrol the long corridors checking the status of each room. When he’d made his first visit, some months before, he’d made a point of opening each bedroom door so that all he had to do subsequently was peer into each in passing and check there were no obvious problems. Nevertheless, it was a lengthy process, and something about the long empty corridors increased his unease. Even more than downstairs, he felt other presences. As if each room were reoccupied as soon as he had passed.
None of this was anything he’d ever admit to his wife or friends. He saw himself as a down-to-earth sort of bugger, not the sort who’d imagine ghosts and phantoms lurking behind every corner. But that was what this bloody place did to him.
He completed his round of the first and second floors without incident. The rooms were as he’d left them, silent and unlit, no signs of any problems. Finally, he began the slow climb to the third floor. The building had a lift roomy enough to take wheelchairs and hospital beds when the building had been transformed into a care home, but that had been disconnected and, in any case, Morton would have felt no inclination to trust himself to it.
The stairs up to the third floor were narrower and steeper than those on the floors below. There were only a few small bedrooms up here, intended for the servants in the building’s original form and presumably later occupied by hotel staff. Even so, Morton had to give it a careful examination. It was up here that problems were most likely to arise—leaks from the roof or wildlife damage.
He stepped on to the landing and peered along the corridor. And stopped, holding his breath. There were five doors on the left hand side. The two nearer doors were wide open, as he’d left them, as were the two further doors.
The third door, the door in the middle, was closed.
He took a step forward, telling himself that, for some reason, the door must have been closed by whoever had carried out the patrol a couple of nights before. Morton had checked the log before he’d come out, as he always did, and there’d been no reports of any incidents or issues here, but maybe whoever was here had spotted something and thought it better to leave the door closed.
What, though?
As he stepped forward, Morton recalled the deactivated alarm downstairs. But if someone had broken in, why the hell would they wait till they got all the way up here before doing anything? Surely there would have been signs of an intruder elsewhere.
He fumbled in his pocket for the bunch of keys that included the skeleton key for the rooms. As he pressed the key into the lock, he realised, stupidly, that his hand was trembling.
It took him a moment to get the door open and press down the light-switch. And then he stood, staring blankly at what he saw.
He had no doubt what it was, even in that first moment. The room was otherwise empty, the furniture long removed. In the centre, spread out before the window, was a naked human body. A young female. Surrounding the body, as if in preparation for a funeral, there were six candle-holders each containing an unlit white candle. Between the candles, there were four vases of red roses.
Morton had taken all this in even before he had realised. Then, his breath caught in his lungs, he turned, sure somehow that whoever had prepared this scene would be standing behind him. But the corridor was empty.
Scarcely aware of what he was doing, he stumbled down the narrow stairway, almost losing his footing as he scrambled to get out of the place. Afterwards, he had no recollection of making his way down the final two staircases and out into the lobby. He was aware of nothing until he’d reached the chill of the evening air and was standing, only just able to recover his breath, his back pressed against the comforting solidity of his van, fumbling for his mobile phone.
As he dialled 999, he looked up and realised that the sky had already clouded over and that the first drops of rain were beginning to fall.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
For the first time in weeks, Helena Grant made it home in time to enjoy a half-decent evening. It wasn’t generally like that these days. They were all overworked, but at times it felt as if she never stopped. As funding and resources were squeezed, the mantras were about getting ‘more for less’ and ‘improving efficiency’. As far as Grant could see, that just meant that everyone worked longer hours without any more reward or recognition. They were also ‘exploring partnership working with other agencies’, which resulted in yet more unproductive meetings. The admin and paperwork got pushed outside normal work hours so she ended up staying late to complete it or, worse still, bringing it home so she could labour away into the night.
Mostly, she didn’t mind too much. It wasn’t exactly disrupting her active social life. She had no-one to come home to, and not much else to do once she got here. But occasionally, as tonight, she just felt weary of the whole thing. She wanted to stop and take a breath.
So this evening she’d made a point of leaving—well, not on time but at least not absurdly late. She’d exchanged the smart suit she’d worn for the press conference for jeans and a tee-shirt, and cooked hersel
f a half-decent supper rather than the frozen meal for one that was her usual exhausted fall-back and poured herself a glass of a not-bad Rioja. Life, for once, was OK.
On an evening like this, she remembered why she’d moved into this place. For the first few months after Rory had died, she’d stayed put in the smart Edwardian villa they’d bought together, wanting to retain that connection. But as the weeks went by, she realised that the memories were more painful than comforting. There was too much of Rory in the place, too much of a sense that, at any moment, he might reappear, come jogging down the stairs or out of the kitchen the way he used to. And when that didn’t happen, too much of a space where he used to be.
So she’d sold the villa in Inverness and brought herself a terraced house up here in North Kessock with ever-changing views out over the Firth. It was convenient for work, low maintenance and essentially anonymous, but that was what she needed. For the moment it was perfect, and it had left her with a few quid in the bank.
On nights like this, she could sit on the small balcony at the front of the house, sipping her glass of wine, watching as the twilight thickened over the water, thoughts of work temporarily suspended. She’d stayed out here even after the sky had clouded over and the first heavy drops of rain had begun to fall. She was sheltered as long as the wind wasn’t too strong, and she enjoyed the chill, damp feel of the air against her skin. She was, by background, a natural west coast Scot. A few days of sun and warmth left her feeling uneasy, as if something wasn’t quite right.
She was considering a second glass of wine when the phone call came. A sergeant from the contact centre. ‘Thought you’d want to know straightaway,’ he said. ‘Looks like you’ve another one.’
It took her a moment to realise what he meant. ‘Christ. You’re kidding?’
‘Don’t imagine you’d forgive me if I was. We had a call out about half an hour ago. Body found up the other side of Rosemarkie. Officers just got up there and checked it out, and it sounds like another one.’ They hadn’t formally released any details of the first two bodies, even internally, but she didn’t fool herself that word wouldn’t have got around.
‘Go on.’
‘Roses and candles.’
‘Shit. Where was this?’
‘You’re not going to believe this.’
‘Trust me, I’ll believe almost anything.’
‘You know the old retirement home up between Rosemarkie and Cromarty? Used to be a big hotel.’
She didn’t know that area well, but she recalled the large building set in its own grounds, just visible from the road, on the hills overlooking the firth. ‘Vaguely.’
‘In there. In one of the bedrooms on the top floor, would you believe? Laid out naked with the flowers and candles around her. Some security guy found her.’
‘Her?’
‘Youngish woman, apparently. That’s all I know.’
‘That’s plenty, thanks. How’s it been left?’
‘Officers have secured the building. They’re staying up there with the guy who found the body till CID gets there.’
‘I’m on my way. I’ll get things sorted.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘Imagine it’ll be half an hour or so by the time we get up there.’
She ended the call standing at the open balcony windows listening to the rain falling softly on the trees. The air smelled of damp earth. So much, she thought, for suspending all thoughts of work. After a moment, she dialled McKay’s number. ‘Hi,’ she said, when he answered. ‘Hope you didn’t have any plans for the evening.’
***
The car park was busy with blue-light vehicles. A couple of patrol cars and an ambulance, alongside the white van belonging to the crime scene examiners and some private vehicles. In the middle of the throng there was a van with a security company logo. McKay pulled in beside Helena Grant’s car.
Jesus, he thought. Just when it looked as if they finally might be making some progress, the bastard pulls another one. It’s like the bugger’s playing with us.
It was still raining. McKay turned up his coat collar and made a dash for the brightly-lit entrance. Inside he found Grant and Horton, who’d clearly both just arrived, talking to one of the uniforms.
‘What’s the story?’
Grant gestured to the uniformed officer standing awkwardly beside her. ‘PC Cowan here was just telling us.’
Cowan blinked nervously at McKay. Grant was the senior officer but McKay’s reputation tended to go before him. To McKay’s eyes Cowan, with his ill-combed blonde hair and baby-faced features, looked as if he ought to still be in school.
‘Chap over there found her.’ Cowan indicated a morose-looking middle-aged man in a badly fitting uniform. ‘Does a security round, apparently. Body was on the top floor, laid out in one of the bedrooms. Young woman,’ he added. ‘White. That’s about all I know.’
‘Examiners have just started on the room,’ Grant said, ‘so I’ve left them to it. It looks the same. Body was naked. Carefully laid out. Roses and candles around.’
‘And this one even more likely to be found quickly,’ McKay commented.
‘Looks that way, doesn’t it? Unless the killer thought this place was just abandoned.’
‘Can’t imagine it. Any sign of a break in?’
‘Not that we can see so far. Security guy reckoned the alarm was deactivated. He hadn’t thought much of it, just assumed one of his colleagues had forgotten to turn it back on.’
‘That would suggest someone who knew the place or knew what they were doing,’ McKay said.
‘The alarm’s not new, apparently. They’d tried to persuade the owners to introduce a new system now the place is standing empty, but they hadn’t got round to it. So the system was here when the place was a residential home. Someone who visited the place then might have been aware of it.’
‘Doesn’t narrow it down too much, then,’ McKay said. ‘Must have been countless people working and visiting here over the years.’
‘Probably,’ Grant agreed. ‘Though a casual visitor wouldn’t get chance to study the alarm.’
‘Then there’s the question of how they got in,’ Horton added. ‘If there wasn’t a break in it suggests they might have had keys.’
‘Again, the locks haven’t been changed since the place became unoccupied,’ Grant said, ‘so there could be countless people with access to the keys.’
‘If this bastard really does want to be caught, he’s not making it easy,’ McKay said. ‘Handing himself into the nearest station would be a damn sight quicker.’
‘They never do seem to want to make our jobs easier, Alec.’
‘Aye. Bastards. Never any consideration for us, is there?’ He smiled at Grant. Despite his words, he looked like a man who’d been saved from a night of domestic torture and brought back to life by this call to action. Anyone else might have been daunted by the prospect of a third corpse. McKay simply looked more motivated. ‘OK, then,’ he said, ‘let’s get this show on the road.’
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Kelly had survived the first few days and, in truth, was enjoying the work more than she’d expected. Sure, the place was a decrepit old shambles, and Denny Gorman even more of one. But the job was undemanding enough and the regulars seemed to have taken to her. During the lunchtime session, they were mostly elderly men who gathered to nurse their pints and stave off their solitude. One or two maybe had a drink problem—though nothing to match Gorman’s—but most were there just for a blether and a game of cards or dominoes. They commented endlessly on how good it was to have a youngster about the place but their interest seemed grandfatherly rather than pervy. She enjoyed playing up to their compliments.
The young builders had also been back a couple of times. Word of her presence had got around and the group had grown larger: one or two young men working down by the harbour had joined it. The banter from this group was more pointed, and Gorman—with a typical landlord’s hypocrisy—had had to ask them to tone down the language a few
times. But the exchanges were good natured—young men showing off to their mates rather than anything more threatening.
After their odd exchange in the cellar, Gorman had largely been unobtrusive, spending most lunchtimes working through his newspaper and array of pints. Occasionally, he’d go out to deal with a delivery or phone through an order to a supplier but otherwise showed little inclination to involve himself in anything resembling work.
He hadn’t asked her again about working in the evenings but she’d already decided to decline the offer if he raised it. Even though she was feeling more comfortable here, she wasn’t attracted by the possibility of spending any time in Gorman’s company outside daylight hours. There was still something about him that made her uneasy. It was partly the way he’d look at her as she moved about behind the bar. She’d turn back from pouring a drink or reaching for a packet of crisps to find him staring fixedly at her, even though his eyes seemed to be focused somewhere else.
A couple of days later she had to go back down to the cellar to change one of the lager casks. It took her a few moments to remember exactly what Gorman had told her, but she soon got the hang of it and found it easier than she’d expected. After the first day she’d turned up for work in jeans and a sweatshirt, so wasn’t too fussed now about the dust and grime down here. She finished the task, made sure she’d tightened the connection properly, and took a step back in satisfaction.
Gorman was standing behind her. She felt the momentary touch of his body, smelled the sour beer-scented breath. ‘Oh, Jesus,’ she said, startled. ‘Didn’t realise you were there.’
He held his arms wide in a defenceless gesture. ‘Didn’t mean to make you jump. Just came to check you were getting on all right. Looks like you managed it OK?’
‘Yes, think so. Maybe you should check it. Just to make sure.’
‘Sure it’s fine, but I can have a look.’ He stepped forward, and peered cursorily at the cask. ‘Looks OK to me. You’ve got the hang of it.’
