Watcher

by Grace Monroe

  ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘I thought I’d done all I could …’ There was a wistful tone in his voice that even I, in my weakened state, picked up. ‘It was my intention to keep my head down and get through it. But my opposition to him excited Thomas and he started to kill even more frequently.’

  ‘Soul mates, soul brothers, whatever … I thought the whole point was that you supported each other, kept each other’s secrets no matter what. Isn’t that how you got away with so much?’

  He was quiet for a moment. Was he toying with me again, even at this stage?

  ‘Ah well. Part of the rite, of course, is that I also had to confess everything to Thomas. Unfortunately that included my own proclivities, functions and dysfunctions, the main one being a complete inability on my part to have sexual relationships with anyone.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s personality disorder. Treatment has been futile. I have lurid fantasies … most of which would make your hair curl even more, Brodie.’ He looked at my hair. His eyes bottomless, like a shark’s. I felt the menace and feared it.

  ‘There’s not much point in being anything but honest with you. You’ll never tell anyone now,’ he went on in a chillingly casual tone.

  ‘My tastes are … extreme. Violent and brutal, yet filled with longing. If you could see into my mind, well … you would have nightmares forever. Call it a curse or a blessing. It can be both. But the fact is I will never know the satisfaction of physically realizing them … except alone. I’ve learned to apply my own … controls, over myself and others.

  ‘That information could be as damaging to my career as the society is advantageous. You can imagine how complex my relationship with Foster became. It was as if with every victim he felt he was taunting me more. We alone knew the full extent of each other’s secrets. I was his only audience. He was showing off how he could manipulate women sexually, physically, fatally. Every performance was for me.

  ‘The extra twist being that he laid my DNA at the scene … it’s ridiculously easy. Drop a few stray hairs here and there … bingo! I was now the main suspect in the New Haven killings. Actually I hate killing. Recently I had to kill a cat. It was distressing and revolting but, alas, necessary. Thomas, on the other hand, is a psychopath.’

  ‘Your name has been scrubbed from the FBI record.’

  ‘True … people within the Skull and Bones knew what Thomas was like. They protect their own … up to a point. He went past that point and was becoming an embarrassment.’

  ‘So you were sent across to Scotland to keep an eye on him.’

  The Watcher nodded.

  ‘His choice of victims changed. Before, he had chosen redheads because of me. Typical pop psychology … a man targeting redheads must have a redheaded mother?’ He shook his head disdainfully. At the same time, he peeled off the gray beard, wincing and revealing ‘Cal’s’ chin underneath.

  ‘I noticed your ginger roots. Real Dark Angels never let their roots grow in. Your Breitling watch was obviously genuine, and the handmade brogues gave you away in George Street when you were selling drugs with Blind Bruce.’

  ‘Well … whoop-de-doo … It’s all very well being wise after the event, Ms McLennan.’ He sounded annoyed.

  ‘The peroxide burnt my scalp; it was horrible.’ He sat down on the edge of the bed. ‘I followed him the night he murdered Katya.’

  I opened my mouth to speak.

  ‘He got lucky … I made a mistake.’ A tinge of red coloured his pale complexion.

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I didn’t watch him properly; Katya had her dress and bag on the cannon. She went into her bag – I thought she was getting a condom. She wasn’t. It was lipstick … he wrote a message on her … Katya couldn’t see or understand what he had written … to her it was a mild fetish.’

  ‘That explains the message “more will die”.’ I pushed myself back against the pillows, and allowed the drugs to wash over me. I felt the slow relaxed smile fill my face; everything seemed marvellous.

  ‘I took the photograph of Thomas and Katya but I didn’t catch the moment of him writing the message or him throwing the handbag after the body.’ He smiled apologetically.

  ‘What about The Hobbyist site?’ I asked.

  ‘That was a genuine site. But Thomas found a better use for it. He used it to incriminate me, to send me warnings or leave clues.’

  ‘Why did I appear on it?’

  ‘Thomas knew me like no other person. I went to boarding school in Perthshire and I was aware of you … very aware. I wanted to follow you in studying law but I won a scholarship to Yale. He knows I like older women …’

  He could not meet my eye.

  ‘It was because of you I thought of joining the Dark Angels. It provided a perfect cover … and if you ever want to punish me, believe me the time I spent with them was more than enough retribution.’

  ‘Why couldn’t Patch categorize the knife Thomas used?’

  The Watcher went into his trouser pocket and pulled out a round disc. He pressed a button and three serrated blades popped out.

  ‘A custom-made bear claw, serrated titanium edges – we were given it at the initiation ceremony.’ I heard the same awe in The Watcher’s voice that Sonia described in Thomas Foster’s.

  ‘Why would someone describe that as a pirate’s knife?’ I slurred. The drugs were fuddling my brain now.

  He chuckled and held the bear claw in front of my face: the skull and crossbones, the sign of the Bonesmen. But Sonia knew it from the pirate’s flag.

  ‘I’m sorry, Thomas Foster wanted you to suffer because of me. I knew it wouldn’t be long before he attacked Connie … that’s why I took her.’

  ‘You evil fucker—’

  ‘I kidnapped her and saved her life… do you still think I was wrong? Active evil is better than passive good: I left you a note.’

  ‘Did you hurt her?’

  ‘No, I gave her a sedative and then I took her up to Perthshire to my mother’s. Connie knows me and likes me; she’s clever and funny. We played on the Internet every day. She kept me sane. My mother knew what Thomas was capable of… and I had to watch him so I took Connie out of Edinburgh. I explained it to her. It wasn’t difficult. She trusts me and she was willing to do anything to save you. Her upbringing has, shall we say, made her more willing to accept dramatic turns in life.’

  ‘So what was the link between the Bonesmen and the Enlightenment Society?’

  ‘The head of the Enlightenment knew that Thomas was a menace. He was supposed to tell you to keep him in jail until we could get more evidence on him.’

  Of course, that was exactly what Lord Port Soy had tried to do at the function.

  ‘Why did Thomas Foster choose these locations? They weren’t random.’

  ‘He was firing a shot across the bows of the Bonesmen – threatening to expose them.’

  ‘Who was he trying to expose when he picked on Eastern European sex slaves?’

  The Watcher raised his eyebrow.

  ‘Why, his father. Thomas hates his all-controlling, untouchable father. Didn’t you know Adie Foster was one of the eight American defence contractors hauled before a Senate committee hearing for running sex slaves in Bosnia? Nothing happened, of course. He used his connections to ensure the US did nothing significant to stop sex trafficking. It’s the new slave trade.’

  ‘No. I didn’t know any of that. But if you’re not involved, that explains why no murders were committed while Thomas was in prison. All the bodies we found had been killed before he was locked up behind bars.’

  ‘If you’re wondering why you’re alone … I spoke to your family and said you needed complete rest.’

  Didn’t they watch The Godfather? I wanted to scream. He saw the terror on my face.

  ‘It’s only diazepam – it will wear off,’ he said as he rose from the chair and towered over me.

  He bent down. ‘I’m hard to find, Brodie … don’t come looking for me,’ he rasped in my ear. Then
he planted a kiss on my forehead and turned the television up.

  ‘I don’t make promises I can’t keep.’

  The door slammed and he left me watching the match; the TV cameras kept panning to Connie and her family. It was one–nil to Hibs at half time. The commentators were discussing the play when the announcer at Easter Road said they had a request for Connie Coutts’s big sister. I smiled until the song started playing. He was letting me know he would be ‘watching me’. It was The Police: ‘Every Breath You Take.’

  Fancy some more chills and thrills? Then take a trip into the bloody history of Scotland’s creepy capital city …

  1. Burke and Hare

  Graverobbers-cum-serial killers Burke and Hare brought terror to the streets of 19th-century Edinburgh. It became apparent in the 1800s that the allocation of one executed criminal per year to each anatomy school was insufficient for the growing amount of students. Out of this need was born the sinister trade of the ‘bodysnatchers’ (also known as ‘resurrectionists’) who would make money by digging up fresh corpses from graves and selling them on for medical research. William Burke and William Hare were Irish immigrants from Ulster who came to Edinburgh to work as labourers on the then New Union Canal – but at night they took up their more sinister and profitable trade of grave-robbing, which developed into serial murder. Their victims were the waifs and strays on the streets of Edinburgh’s Old Town, people no one would necessarily miss. It is believed that Burke and Hare were responsible for the death of between thirteen and thirty people; however, only Burke was ever prosecuted. In an ironic end to the story, Burke’s body was donated to a medical school for what they called ‘useful dissection’.

  2. Mary King’s Close

  Mary King’s Close remained shrouded in mystery for many years, with myths of plague victims being walled up to die adding to the eerie quality of the location. This maze of narrow streets – running through tenement buildings stretching seven stories high – became home to many impoverished people in the 17th century. But when the plague hit Edinburgh, one particularly virulent strain affected the residents of Mary King’s Close to such an extent that the city administrators took the decision to wall up this whole section of the city – and it remained shut off from the world until recent times. The Close is named after Mary King who lived at the top of one of the narrow roads off the Royal Mile until her death in 1644. Mary and the other deceased occupants of the area are said to haunt the streets of Mary King’s Close to this day.

  3. The real life Jekyll and Hyde

  It is believed that one of Edinburgh’s most beloved literary sons, Robert Louis Stevenson, got the inspiration for one of his most famous works, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde from the case of Thomas Weir. Weir was a 17th century preacher, a deeply religious Presbyterian and wholly upstanding member of the community. Shockwaves ran through the city when he confessed at the age of 70 to a number of depraved acts, including bestiality, a long-running incestuous relationship with his sister Jean and an interest in the occult. Sentenced to death in 1670 by burning at the stake, Weir was the last man to be executed for witchcraft in Scotland and reputedly uttered the words “I have lived as a beast, and I must die as a beast,” before his death. Theories abound that Stevenson’s nanny told him about Weir’s exploits as a disturbing bedtime story, and the idea of Weir’s duplicitous nature planted the seed for Stevenson’s novella of a man fighting to control the dark side of his personality.

  4. The strange legend of Greyfriars Bobby

  Perhaps one of the most endearing stories of Edinburgh’s ghostly past is the tale of Greyfriars Bobby whose barks are still said to haunt Greyfriars cemetery. After the death of his master, John Grey, in 1858, Bobby kept a constant watch by the unmarked grave for 14 years – until his own death in 1872. He was buried close to his master’s grave inside the gate of Greyfriars cemetery.

  A statue commemorating Greyfriars Bobby can be found on the corner of Candlemaker Row and George IV Bridge in Edinburgh.

  Acknowledgments

  From Maria:

  Once again I find myself indebted to so many people. Principally I would like to thank my girlfriends who encouraged me – Debbie, Helen and Marissa. Jenny Brown you are a star agent and not forgetting the superb team at Avon, Maxine Hitchcock, Keshini Naidoo and Sammia Rafique. Thank you for making this book possible.

  From Linda:

  Many thanks as always to everyone who has helped so much with this book in so many different ways – Maxine, Keshini and Sammia as always, as well as anyone at Avon who I don’t even know but who actually manages to get this on the shelves at the end of the day (if they do want to let me know who they are, I will put them on my Xmas card list, promise). Jenny Brown of Jenny Brown Associates has gone beyond the call of duty, and I get the feeling that a thankful nod in the direction of Stan and Lucy there wouldn’t go amiss either! Thanks to all the people whose books I’ve been ghostwriting as this book has gone along as they’ve been thrown into a process that they didn’t expect – Donna and Jeff have given me huge amounts of support in a tables-turned-sort-of-way. To my Auntie Frances for the lovely words (you don’t know how much they meant to me) and to three people who have been particularly amazing for this one – Iain, Norman and Fiona; gold stars all round!

  About the Author

  THE WATCHER

  Grace Monroe is the pseudonym of Maria Thomson and Linda Watson-Brown. Maria graduated with a law degree in her 20s and soon met her future husband. The couple now have four children. Since finishing her law career she has worked as a hypnotherapist, stage hypnotist and fertility counsellor amongst others. She is now working on the first of a new psychic thriller series under her own name. After 10 years as a Politics lecturer, Linda began her journalistic career as a columnist at The Scotsman. She went on to write regularly for the Daily Mail, Sunday Herald and Independent and also started ghostwriting. In 2006, her first ghost-written book, The Step Child, was a Sunday Times bestseller. She has followed that up since with a number of other top 20 titles and is currently working on a new crime fiction series under her own name.

  For more information on Grace Monroe go to www.gracemonroe.net and visit www.Author Tracker.co.uk for exclusive updates.

  By the same author

  Dark Angels

  Blood Lines

  Copyright

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction.

  The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are

  the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to

  actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is

  entirely coincidental.

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  First published in Great Britain by

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  Copyright © Grace Monroe 2008

  Grace Monroe asserts the moral right to

  be identified as the author of this work

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