Susie held up her hand. “I’m sorry, Mrs Pearson, but I have to ask. You know how it is. Procedure.” She made a point of glancing around the pictures on the walls again. Took a breath. No point in delaying.
“And Danny’s father, ah…” She made a show of going through her notebook. “He’s not around at all?”
Diane’s mouth worked in a chewing motion, as though she were getting ready to spit out something rotten. “No. Hasn’t been around for years. Stupid bastard got himself locked up just before Danny was born. Made no effort to stay in touch. Don’t even know if he’s out or not. If he is, we’ve not seen him, and that’s fine with me.”
Susie nodded. Made sense. A severely disabled kid and a convicted criminal for a father. No wonder she looked old.
Susie made a note to follow up on the conviction, not wanting to give Diane a distraction to rant at, and track down this Lee at the day centre. His contact details would be on the accident statement he gave to the hospital, but it would be worth talking to him. She took a moment to scan over what they had covered so far. She was aware of Diane’s cold gaze on her, a challenge to ask more idiotic questions.
“Well, thank you for your time, Mrs Pearson. And, again, my condolences for your loss and intruding at this time. Danny looked like a lovely boy.”
A twitch of a smile, like a crack racing along the surface of a melting glacier. “Thank you, Susie. He was.”
Susie stood up, made a step for the living room door. “We’re reviewing the CCTV from the hospital, talking to the nursing staff. I’ll be in touch, okay?”
Diane looked at her, unanswering, just long enough for Susie to feel uncomfortable. “Fair enough,” she said eventually. “I’m going back to work tomorrow, you can get me there.”
Susie blinked, confused. “Work? But isn’t that…? I mean…”
“What am I going to do here, detective?” Diane replied, her voice a forced casual tone. “Sit and stare at the walls? Better to stay busy. There’s work to be done. Nothing else I can do for Danny now, is there?”
Susie glanced at the front door, glad to step into the fresh air. “Well, no, I… I suppose not. But if you need anything, the liaison officer is on hand and there are people we can put you in touch with…”
Diane smiled, this time almost genuine. “Detective. I’m a counsellor. I’m the one people call to talk to. I know what they’d say. Take time to grieve, work through your loss. Talk to people. Well, I’ll best work through this by going back to work, rather than rattling around here, with reminders of Danny on every wall.”
Susie nodded, passed her a business card. “Okay, but here’s my number if you need it.”
Diane took the card and disappeared back into the house. Susie had a sudden image of her walking through the living room to the kitchen, tearing up the card before dumping it into the bin.
She headed for the car, trying to make sense of Diane Pearson and their conversation.
There’s work to be done, she had said.
At least on that, they agreed.
23
Doug sat across from Harvey in a small snug in the hotel bar built around one of the bay windows that overlooked the front of the grounds and the Sound of Sleat beyond. The bar was boutique hotel casual; mood lighting, deep carpets, leather seats and bar stools. An array of exotic whiskies, local beers and wines arranged like ornaments on the glass display shelf behind the bar, glittering in the soft downlights trained on them. Overall the place oozed class, sophistication and, with the view of the seven-figure forecourt out front, affluence.
A long, long way from the Tribune.
Harvey set down a bottle of malt, which had too many consonants in its name for Doug to even try to pronounce, along with two glasses and a small jug of water. He slid into the seat across the table from Doug, pulled the stopper and poured two generous glasses. Doug swallowed, trying to get the bilious taste out of his mouth.
Harvey raised a glass, tipped it towards Doug. “Here’s to old friends, Douglas, sorry it had to be like this. Slainte.” He downed it in a shot. Doug hesitated with his own glass, feeling the fumes of the whisky tickle his nose and prickle his eyes. Thought of Esther upstairs and the promise he made. Downed it.
Harvey rocked back and laughed. “Ever the poker player, Douglas,” he said. “I wasn’t sure you were going to manage that one, you went green as soon as I put the bottle down. Rough one last night?”
Doug smiled, pushing the glass back across the table. “Just a bad day, Harvey. Needed something to help me sleep.”
Harvey grunted an acknowledgement, topped up his own glass. Tipped the bottle to Doug, who shook his head. “Hell of a thing,” he said. “I saw the reports, obviously, but what actually happened, Doug?”
Doug took a shaky breath. Closed his eyes. Focused on the detail and building the story – the who, what, when, where and how, just as Harvey had taught him. There was another element, the crucial one that evaded him. The why. Why would someone execute Jonathan Greig. Any why so violently, so brutally?
Doug opened his eyes, took a deep breath and swallowed down the cold terror in the back of his throat. Slowly, he started talking, taking Harvey through everything that happened, from getting ready for conference to the first shot, the moment of stunned silence as the window cracked, Greig clawing for his throat as it was torn open, and then…
Look at me.
…then…
“Shit,” Harvey whispered, his face tight, eyes unreadable. “I’m sorry, Doug, really. What a fucking mess. You heard anything about how the investigation is going?”
Doug shook his head. “Not a thing. Walter D-listed me from the story as soon as I was out of the hospital, ordered me to take a holiday. Makes sense. Can’t have a witness investigating a murder before he gives evidence about it in court. Still, I…” He fidgeted with the glass, spun it in his hands. “Doesn’t feel right, you know? Greig was a shit, but he deserved better than that. And there’s something else, something…”
Three shots. Two hits. One fatality.
“What?” Harvey asked, glass paused halfway to his mouth, intense concentration on his face, as though he were trying to read the thought in Doug’s eyes. “What is it, Douglas, you got something?”
Doug grunted in frustration. “No, not really. It’s just there’s something… niggling… about this, you know? And it’s like I can’t see it because I’m too close to it. Because I can’t get the look in Greig’s eyes out of my mind.”
He moved for the bottle out of frustration. Harvey reached out, strong hand wrapping around his, eyes boring straight into Doug’s.
“Not the answer, Douglas. Believe me. I almost fell into a bottle when we found out about Esther’s cancer. And it worked, for a little while. Until I realised I wasn’t sleeping at night but blacking out, that the hammering heartbeat and queasiness in the morning weren’t the angina but the hangover. Until I realised whole conversations were being deleted and I couldn’t remember things I’d been told five minutes ago.” He smiled ruefully. “And then Esther confronted me at the back of the hotel. And the shit really hit the fan.”
“Back of the hotel?” Doug asked, taking his hand off the bottle.
“Yeah. You see, we’ve got recycling bins here, local businesses get a rebate if they do their bit. Nothing big, but everything helps, especially with a place like this. But then Esther noticed that the glass bin was filling up a little too quickly, especially as we were in off-season and the tourists who love to buy a ‘traditional Scotch whis-KAY for an evening dram’ weren’t around. It’s a scary thing, Douglas, to see how much you’ve drunk laid out in front of you like that. So please, take a telling. Don’t go down that road. You want to enjoy a drink with me, fine. But don’t use it as an escape. Please.”
Doug smiled, the relief from Harvey’s initial call flooding back. Still the teacher. No matter what ha
d happened, Harvey would help. He always did.
“So,” Doug said, leaning back. “Esther, how is she? Really?”
Harvey’s gaze twitched to the bottle then back to Doug, that same unreadable look in his eyes. He leaned forward, hunching his shoulders, staring at the table, tracing a pattern only he could see on the surface with the base of his glass.
“You saw her, Douglas. Good days and bad. She’s in a lot of pain, and the chemo took a hell of a lot out of her. But, like she said, there’s the doctor to see next month and…”
“But the prognosis is hopeful?”
For the third time, Harvey gave Doug an unfathomable look. Contemplative. Speculative. Appraising. Doug suddenly realised it was the type of look he used during interviews when he was trying to push the subject that little bit further. Then the look was gone, replaced by something altogether more familiar. Determination.
“Look, Doug. The thing is…”
He was cut off by a jingle from Doug’s phone, an app on it alerting him to breaking news from the BBC, relayed by the hotel WiFi. Reflexively, he pulled the phone from his pocket, opened the app – and froze as he read the headline.
“Jesus,” he whispered, running a numb hand through his hair. “Fucking Jesus Christ.”
Harvey craned forward, trying to see the screen. “Doug? What? What the hell is it?”
Doug looked up, eyes wide with incomprehension. The feeling from the Skye Bridge was back – the forced vertigo, the lurch of the stomach. This couldn’t be happening. Couldn’t be.
“Charming Charlie’s been murdered,” he whispered, hand clenching down on the cold glass, dimly aware of the dull sparks of pain shooting up his wrist from the effort.
“Who? Charlie Montgomery? Really? Fuck’s sake…”
Doug nodded, felt his head kick into gear. Thoughts started to race in at once. Who to call first? Walter. Walter, to say he was on the way. Or Rebecca, to get the press line, something to give Walter when he called him. Or Susie, to get the line beyond the official bullshit? Or… or…
He was standing up before he knew it, Harvey rising with him, alarm clear on his face, but his voice calm. “Douglas, no. You can’t. You’ve just seen one murder, the last thing you want is to get mixed up in another one. Besides, Edinburgh is a five-hour drive away, and you’re in no shape, especially after a drink. Let someone else cover it, Doug. Please.”
“But Harvey. I… It’s my job, I don’t…”
Harvey held up a quietening hand. “Okay,” he said. “Why not make some calls, see what’s happening? If you want to, leave tomorrow. But not now, Doug. You’d spend most of the day on the road, the editions would be out and done by the time you got back. And besides, Esther would be heartbroken.”
Doug sat back down, deflated. It struck him that the old Harvey would have leapt at the story, done anything to be the first to have his byline all over it. A tickle of concern whispered through his mind as he realised how much Esther’s illness had changed the man he thought of as the best reporter he had ever known. But still, it was wrong. He should be there. Covering the story, doing his job. Getting the headlines and the bylines. Not sitting in Skye drinking whisky with his old boss and hiding like a kid from the class bully. Harvey had taught him better than that.
“All right,” he said. “But I’m going to make some calls, okay?”
“No problem,” Harvey said, pouring another two whiskies. “But go into the garden below the sun-room to do it, phone reception is shit in here. And take this with you, you look like you need it.”
Doug offered a weak smile. “What was it you said about falling into the bottle?”
“Doesn’t apply when you’re on a story, Douglas, you know that. Now go on, make some calls. You can tell me about it later. Who knows, maybe we can share a byline.”
Doug snorted a laugh. “Aye, right,” he said, heading for the exit, Harvey watching him go.
• • •
I follow him with the sight as he walks out of the room, a fluid right-to-left motion, the red dot in the centre of the sight never more than a few millimetres from his temple. I feel the old itch in my trigger finger, apply a little more pressure to make it ease. The temptation is great. Paint the bar with his blood and brains, watch the chaos and terror and confusion unfold like a breaking storm in my wake.
But no. No. Patience. Discipline. Control.
I recognise him from the Capital Tribune offices. He was with Greig when he died. But unlike the others, he didn’t run screaming from my work. No, he took a moment to look at it, bathe in it. Accept it.
Admirable. And, potentially, useful.
It was a simple matter to ascertain who he was – his picture byline was all over the paper’s website. Doug McGregor, the paper’s crime reporter. Ironic. And apt.
Following him was almost too easy.
I track him out the door then swing back through the restaurant to the bar. Mr McGregor can wait. He may be the perfect witness to what comes next, to chronicle this monstrous crime, or he may be another monster to slay.
After all, he is guilty by association to Greig, at the very least.
My cheek presses into the stock of the rifle as I smile. The thought of confronting Mr McGregor with the choice will keep me warm through the night as I prepare a gift for him.
24
The sweat was pouring off Paul as the bus crawled along Princes Street, plastering his T-shirt to his back, like steel wool being pulled over raw skin, as the waves of cramp rolled across his body.
He was heading back into the city centre after paying a visit to Matty in Dalry. He lived in a small flat just around the corner from Tynecastle, the Hearts FC ground. Growing up, Matty had been a fan of the other team in the city, Hibs. The rivalry between the two was like a microcosm of the Old Firm rivalry that existed between Rangers and Celtic in Glasgow. After a particularly bad-tempered season a couple of years ago, the government had woken up to a slew of bad headlines about “Scotland’s shame”, panicked and rushed in legislation to outlaw sectarianism and “stamp out this blight on the national game”. Arrests were made, fines handed out, cases quashed. None of which stopped Paul from hawking back and spitting every time he passed the road-end that led to Tynecastle.
Matty had been his usual languid self, the flat sickly sweet with the smell of old hash and fresh alcohol. He ushered Paul into the front room, the light bruised by the fight between the blackout curtains and the lamps dotted around, and dominated by a glass case that Paul hated – inside two huge snakes coiled lazily, tongues flicking the air for a taste of him. He dimly wondered if snakes could get stoned. If they did, they were in the right place, though the image of a snake getting the midnight munchies made him shudder.
As ever, Matty was wearing an unbuttoned blue shirt, trousers, no shoes. The cueball appearance of his head was only ruined by the shaving nicks from where he’d cut himself, probably because he was permanently stoned. McHeisenberg, Paul thought suddenly, biting down an urge to laugh.
Matty produced a wrap with a theatrical flourish, promised Paul it was “the best shit in the city, guaranteed” and would put him “on another planet”.
With the hunger snarling in his veins, Paul hadn’t quibbled about the price, handing over most of what he’d earned the night before, and left. He took the wrap in the tenement stairwell, huddled in the shadows beside the door to the communal garden that no-one ever used.
Now here he was, coming back into town, fresh from his all-too-brief trip to Planet Matty. From the burning in his nose and the jangling in his teeth, it was obvious Matty had cut the wrap with something, crushed ibuprofen most likely.
Paul ground his head against the cool of the bus window, squeezed his eyes shut. His options were limited. He’d used up most of his cash, and the last thing he wanted was another night tricking up at Calton Hill. If Carol ever found out about that�
��
His phone rang in his pocket, startling him out of his reverie and making him slam his head into the window with a dull thump. Cursing, he fumbled for the phone, fingers feeling clumsy and numb. Felt a stab of hope that cut through the pain when he saw the caller ID.
“Frankie? Frankie, that you?”
“Who the fuck else would it be?” the voice on the line hissed. “Where are you?”
Paul glanced up. “In town. Just passing HMV on Princes Street. Why?”
“You sound strung out, Paul. Have you been taking Matty Simpson’s poison again?”
“Yeah,” Paul mumbled, hot shame pouring into his cheeks like boiling water. “But Frankie, I couldn’t reach you, and I needed…”
“Stop snivelling, Paul,” Frankie said, the voice cold and harsh. Paul folded himself tighter into his seat, felt his bladder loosen. Frankie’s rages – the quiet control of them, the lack of any emotion but hatred and fury and resolve – terrified him. “I’ve spoken to Stevie Leith, you know, on Leith Walk? He’s going to take care of you until I get there. You’ll find his stuff much better than that shite Matty Simpson punts around. And I’m sure the surroundings will suit you better.”
Paul felt a rush of gratitude and tears began to roll down his cheeks. He didn’t care. Frankie would look after him. Stevie would look after him. No more tricking. No more lying to Carol. Just the sweet relief of the hit and the joy and…
The words tumbled out of his mouth, as fast and desperate as his tears. “Thank you, Frankie, thank you. I’ll do what you ask, I’ll be good, I’ll…”
Frankie’s voice was cold and final, a steel gate being slammed shut. “Fine. Fine. And Paul, if you’re contacted, you know what to say, don’t you?”
He sniffed back tears, wiped at his eyes with a dirty sleeve. Another wave of cramp twisted through him, nothing to do with the withdrawal or the poisonous hunger.
“Yes, Frankie,” he whispered into the phone, glancing around the bus. “I know exactly what to say. I won’t let you down.”
The Storm Page 9
