Fatal Transaction: A DCI MacBain Scottish Crime Thriller

by Oliver Davies

  I held the door to the hall open for her, and she swept through with a nod of thanks, wiping a dribble of juice from her apple off on her trousers. I spotted Owens coming down the corridor toward us, and he raised a hand in greetings, picking up his pace so he could meet up with us.

  “I put them in one, two, and three,” he said. “The lawyer is waiting for you out in the corridor. He wants to be there as you interview each of them.”

  “Thanks, Owens,” I said, and he smiled at me as he slid past Fletcher and me to head back to the station’s main room.

  We walked another ten feet, turned the corner, and finally spotted Carmichael’s hired lawyer standing in the centre of the corridor, pacing a little awkwardly while he continually swapped his grip on the handle of his briefcase. I cleared my throat to catch his attention, and he took a moment to tug down the hem of his black suit coat before he turned around, a not entirely believable expression of confidence on his slightly pudgy, red-cheeked face. He was starting to go bald as his hairline receded, and he was doing his best to hide it with a comb-over without much success, and he clearly had too much greasy product in his hair.

  He stuck out his hand to me as Fletcher and I finished our approach, and I shook it obligingly, though I didn’t exactly smile at him.

  “I’m Aaron Lamwood, lawyer to Mr Carmichael,” he said as he released my hand.

  “DCI MacBain,” I replied. “And my partner, DI Fletcher.”

  “If there’s anything I can do to help…” he began, then trailed off as if he’d lost steam.

  “We’ll speak with Ms Dune first,” I said. “If you really want to help, advise her to tell us where the stolen money is.”

  “And who killed Mr Crane,” Fletcher added.

  “I will check in with her,” Lamwood said with a swift nod.

  “We’ll be there in a second,” I told him.

  Lamwood glanced up and down the hall to orient himself, then walked through the door into room number three. Fletcher and I didn’t go directly into the same room but stepped into the little viewing area that let us look in on the room beyond. Ella Dune sat cuffed to the table, her counsel beside her. She looked a little pale, and there was a large, dark bruise blooming along one of her cheeks, matching the bags under her eyes from lack of sleep in the holding cell. Lamwood was speaking quietly to her, but she didn’t really seem to be listening, her gaze a little slack and distant.

  “Do you think it was her?” Fletcher wondered, referring to Crane’s death.

  “I’m not sure,” I said as I watched her. She didn’t seem to be squirming too much. She seemed more blank than anything else, and in my experience, murderers usually squirmed when they were in interrogation. Though I suppose she simply could have been too tired to feel much of anything.

  “Let’s go see what she has to say,” I said, clapping my hands together to indicate that it was time to go in.

  Fletcher nodded, pulled her stolen half a chocolate bar from her pocket, and broke off a piece as she followed me out the door and over into the interview room proper. I didn’t knock, just swung the door open and let myself into the room. Dune immediately looked up at me and licked her lips, shifting in her seat as she tried to pull her hands down to sit on them before she remembered that they were currently cuffed in front of her.

  There were two chairs across from Dune and Lamwood, and Fletcher and I each took one, and I made sure to scrape mine across the floor as I pulled it out, just to get on Dune’s nerves that extra little bit. She flinched, just as I thought she would, but she took a deep breath and steadied herself as best she could, given her circumstances.

  “So we want to know two things,” I said after the usual preamble of a formal interview, introducing ourselves, giving the time, date, and subject matter for the benefit of the recording. “First and foremost, we want to know where Carmichael stashed the money. Secondly, we want to know who killed Barney Crane, the bank manager, or was that more of a group effort as well?”

  Dune chewed on her bottom lip so hard that I thought I saw a drop of blood well up before she licked it away. She glanced over at her lawyer, who gave her a nod to go ahead.

  “Carmichael’s the only one who knows where the money is,” Dune said, and I watched her body language to see if I should believe her. She was nervous, of course… who wouldn’t be, in her situation?... but her eyes didn’t slide away from mine as she spoke, and I felt almost inclined to believe her. “But I can tell you who killed that man. If you’d be willing to let me off a little easier.”

  “Maybe,” I said, unwilling to make any kind of definitive deal until I knew for sure her information would pan out. “We may be able to offer you a reduced charge if you flip on your partners.”

  “It was Owen,” Dune told me swiftly, desperately. “That Crane guy spotted him and bolted, and Owen lost his head and ran after him. He’s your killer.”

  I looked over at Fletcher to see what she thought. She was staring at Dune intently as she very, very slowly ate another piece of her chocolate bar. Dune couldn’t seem to stop herself from glancing over at Fletcher, no doubt disconcerted by her little act. I knew it was a lot harder to lie convincingly when there was something weird and distracting like that going on, so I felt that was a point in favour of Dune’s story, though I wasn’t ready to take it at face value yet.

  “We’ll have to confirm that before we cut any kind of deal, of course,” I said as Fletcher gave a single nod beside me. “But you’ve really got no idea where the money might be?”

  “That’s his whole process,” Dune explained, anxiety welling up in her eyes. “He brings on us newbies to help with the job, but he doesn’t quite trust us with any of the big stuff, like where he’s hidden the money. I don’t know if he’s worried one of us will jack it or if we’ll give it up in a situation like this, but after the robbery, he left us at a cafe and went to stash it somewhere. Then he went back for it before our meeting with the fence, and when you interrupted that, he left us behind to go stash it again.”

  Dune spoke incredibly fast like she was desperate to get the whole story out before we had a chance to pass judgement on her or something. When she finished, she licked her lips again, clearly parched, but I wasn’t feeling quite generous enough to offer her some water.

  “Did he give any sort of hint as to its location?” Fletcher asked. She held up a finger as Dune opened her mouth to let out another barrage of words, stalling the robber out so that she almost swallowed her tongue.

  “Really think about it,” Fletcher continued. “It could have been a super small detail or a passing comment.”

  Dune screwed her mouth shut and squinted down at the table, and I could practically see the gears grinding behind her skull as she tried to think of some answer for us. I thought she was actually going to give herself an aneurysm concentrating so hard, but finally, she shrugged and gave up, her face anxious and apologetic.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know.”

  I hummed and clucked my tongue softly. “Then I guess we’re done here, then,” I said as I gathered myself and rose to my full height. Fletcher popped one last bite of chocolate into her mouth before she followed suit, twisting her spine so that her back cracked rather spectacularly. Dune flinched, and even I was a little bit grossed out by that one.

  “Wait, what about the deal?” Dune called desperately as we started for the door. “We didn’t set any terms.”

  “I said we’d see after we verify your intel,” I replied without glancing back over my shoulder at her.

  I opened the door for Fletcher, and she sauntered through, out into the hall. It took Lamwood a beat to realise we were actually done in there, and it wasn’t just an act, but then he hurriedly jumped to his feet and followed us, casting what was probably supposed to be one last, comforting look Dune’s way before I shut the door behind him. It wasn’t all that convincing.

  “We’ll speak with O’Connor next,” I said to him. “Which room is he in?”

&
nbsp; “This one here,” Lamwood replied, gesturing to the one across the hall from Dune’s. “Might I have a moment alone with him first, though?”

  I looked to Fletcher, who shrugged.

  “I don’t see why not,” I said and gestured for him to go ahead.

  He let himself into the next interrogation room while Fletcher and I remained out in the hall, and I crossed my arms as I leaned up against the wall.

  “Do we believe Dune?” Fletcher wondered.

  “I’m taking it with a pinch of salt for now,” I said, looking back at the door we’d just vacated. “She’s got plenty of reasons to lie, after all. She didn’t give off any tells, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Though we can still use her against the others, or against O’Connor, at least.”

  “He’ll probably crack pretty easily,” Fletcher said with a small smirk. “He definitely seems like the most nervous of the three. I bet we can rattle him into telling us what we want to know without even breaking a sweat.”

  “Speaking of which…” I glanced at the time on my phone then pushed myself away from the wall. “I think we’ve given Lamwood enough time in there. Let’s go.”

  Fletcher cracked her neck by pushing it from side to side, and I glared at her to tell her to stop doing that while she grinned back at me. Then I shoved the door open, and we strode into the next interrogation room.

  “Ella killed that guy!” O’Connor yelled the moment I stepped through the door, and I saw Lamwood sigh and pinch the bridge of his nose, sinking down into his seat like he could disappear through it.

  “I saw the whole thing!” O’Connor continued. He stood up as much as his cuffs would allow and kept his voice loud as if that would somehow make him more right. “She said something about no witnesses then whacked him with the crowbar! It was terrible! He fell like a sack of potatoes!”

  “Sit down, Mr O’Connor,” Lamwood hissed, tugging at O’Connor’s sleeve in a vain attempt to get him to shut up and sit down.

  “I’d do as your lawyer says,” I added when O’Connor ignored Lamwood and geared up to shout something else.

  At my cool tone, he suddenly swallowed whatever it was he’d been about to say and plopped back down to his chair with a thud and whoosh of expelled breath. The room fell almost deathly silent, but Fletcher and I didn’t do anything to break it as we crossed the short expanse of floor to the table and sat down. I pulled my chair out quietly this time. That seemed like it would make O’Connor more nervous than the sound would.

  I leant back in my seat and propped one ankle up on the opposite foot, still silent as I stared across the table at O’Connor to get a read on him. Fletcher was definitely right; he was the most nervous of the three, though that had been obvious from the first moment we’d seen them all together outside Barron’s house. He didn’t seem capable of staying still, and he constantly squirmed in his chair, shifting his weight from one bum cheek to the other before tapping his fingers against whatever was in reach, his eyes moving from Fletcher to me and back to Fletcher over and over and over again.

  “So,” I said finally, and some warped form of relief spread over O’Connor’s face that I’d finally broken the silence. “You’re trying to claim that Ella Dune killed the bank manager? That’s funny. She said the exact same thing about you, didn’t she, Fletcher?”

  “That she did, Callum. That she did,” Fletcher replied helpfully. She kicked her feet up onto the table, and the thump of her boots on the metal made O’Connor flinch. She rocked back so her front two chair legs hung in the air then stayed like that, bobbing gently back and forth while O’Connor stared at her like he was waiting to see if she would fall.

  “Anything you’d like to say about that?” I asked, snapping my fingers to force O’Connor’s attention back to me. His divided concentration would make it much harder for him to lie.

  He took a deep breath, held it, then let it go in a shaky rush. He opened his mouth to reply, but I cut him off to rattle him further.

  “Because it sounds to me like you’re blaming it on her in some desperate attempt to try to discredit her.” I shrugged and raised an eyebrow at O’Connor. “I wonder what Carmichael would say about the matter?”

  O’Connor went white as a ghost at the mention of Carmichael’s name. “I swear--” he began, but Lamwood put a hand on his shoulder and shook his head when O’Connor looked at him.

  But O’Connor still tried again. “I didn’t--” He lost steam quickly, the thread of whatever yarn he’d been trying to spin falling away from him all at once. “I didn’t…” His voice dropped to a whisper, and it took him a third try to finally get a full sentence out. “I didn’t mean to.”

  “Didn’t mean to what?” I asked, needing the exact words from him.

  O’Connor looked over at Lamwood as if expecting the lawyer to tell him to keep his mouth shut, but Lamwood seemed to think that it was in his clients’ best interests to come completely clean. I wondered if this was something that Carmichael had cooked up, feed us the underlings so that he would be more likely to get away, if not clean, then at least cleaner.

  O’Connor sighed and shifted in his seat once more, his head drooping all the way down to his chest. “Didn’t mean to kill him,” he murmured so quietly that I almost didn’t hear him.

  “And the stolen money?” I asked. “Do you know where that is?”

  “Carmichael never told us,” O’Connor said just like Dune had. “He wanted to keep that to himself. I guess for all the talk of training us, he didn’t actually trust us.”

  “What about anything we can use against him?” Fletcher asked though she gave Lamwood a hard look as she said that. “He certainly hasn’t been doing you any favours. There’s no need for you to protect him.”

  “Well, he got me a decent lawyer,” O’Connor pointed out. “That’s got to count for something.”

  I shrugged, glanced at Lamwood, then dismissed him and made the man turn red. “And if he decides to throw you to the wolves? We haven’t spoken to him yet, but Ms Dune already turned you over pretty quickly. Who’s saying Carmichael won’t do the same?”

  “He--he gave me a job,” O’Connor insisted, but he was starting to sound just a little doubtful. “He told me it was going to be alright after… after I hurt that guy. He’s the one who threw out the crowbar. I was frozen, in shock. I had no idea what to do. He took care of it.”

  “By throwing something with your prints on it right where we’d be sure to find it?” I asked.

  O’Connor turned even whiter. He seemed to have forgotten about that detail.

  “He screwed you over from the first,” I said softly. “He could have ditched that crowbar far from the crime scene, somewhere we’d never find it, but he chose to throw it in the bin and link you to Mr Crane’s death completely and utterly. So why continue to protect him?”

  O’Connor looked to Lamwood again, but the man seemed to be at a loss for words. He really wasn’t very good at his job.

  “He didn’t tell us much,” O’Connor began slowly. “He just told us what our specific jobs were, what we’d be doing on the day, that sort of thing, but he didn’t really let us in on the big picture stuff. But after that other guy, Alex, or whatever his name was…”

  “Alec,” I corrected on reflex.

  “Right,” O’Connor agreed and swallowed heavily before he continued. “After he called, Carmichael went out without telling us anything about where he’d be or when he’d be back. He returned maybe three hours later, and he had this weird, heavy mud on his boots. Like clay, almost. I don’t know. Does that help?”

  “Maybe,” I said, though I wasn’t entirely sure. I had no idea how many places in or around town had clay-like mud by them, but I could send the information to Martin to see if he could come up with anything.

  “Do I get anything for that? For helping you find the money?” he asked eagerly, his face perking up slightly.

  “Hard to say,” I said, and his entire demeanour plummeted toward
the floor. “It’s not very much, and if it doesn’t lead to anything, then definitely not. And you killed someone, accidentally or not. I can’t say I’m entirely inclined to give you any sort of deal.”

  O’Connor sank as far down in his chair as his cuffed hands would allow, and all the colour seemed to drain from his skin, leaving him pale and tired.

  “We’ll send someone in to take your full statement,” I said as I rose from my chair. This time, Lamwood was on top of things and stood at the same time Fletcher did, coughing into his hand before he gathered up his briefcase. O’Connor nodded but didn’t say anything else like he simply couldn’t conjure up the energy to continue.

  Fletcher and I walked for the door, leaving Lamwood to trail along behind us. He was a heavy mouth breather, and having him at my back like that made me feel a little strange and twitchy even though I knew the man had to be harmless. He certainly didn’t have much going on for him physically, but I couldn’t help but wonder if there was some brand of shrewdness behind his incompetent behaviour or if that was who he actually was.

  As Fletcher closed the door to the interrogation room behind us, I turned on him, crossing my arms over my chest as I fixed him with a dark stare. He immediately seemed to quail and even took half a step back, holding his briefcase in front of him like it was some kind of shield.

  “What’s your game here?” I demanded. “Carmichael’s smart. He wouldn’t hire a buffoon of a lawyer unless he had some kind of trick up his sleeve, so out with it. What’s going on?”

  “Game?” Lamwood asked uncertainly, and he sounded like he was honestly confused as to why I would be asking him that.

  “Yeah, something’s fishy,” Fletcher agreed, moving in, so she was standing uncomfortably close to Lamwood. He backed away from her, but she just followed him step for step until he was pressed up against the wall. I moved closer as well, though I kept some space between us, letting Fletcher play up the threat of her braced posture.

  Lamwood glanced between the two of us as he shrank against the wall and gripped his briefcase. “I’m just… I’m all he could afford, alright? And I’m barely hanging on at my firm. If he hadn’t hired me, I would have lost my job. I owe him.”