by T F Muir
Baxter handed Gilchrist a closed file. ‘That’s her statement. She denies everything.’
Gilchrist opened the report, scanned through it. But it told him nothing, and he handed it back. ‘I’d like to talk to her, with you as a silent witness, and not a word.’
The room seemed more spartan now that Jack had gone, as if by his absence he had stripped it clean. The door clicked, and DS Baxter entered, followed by a young woman and the same officer who had escorted Jack.
At around six feet tall, with a pair of breasts that threatened to burst the buttons of her black blouse, and jeans tight enough to leave little to the imagination, Tess looked every bit the twenty-two years she’d told Jack she was, and then some. Jet-black hair in an overgrown crew-cut style – Rod Stewart dipped in ink, sprang to his mind – did what it could to hide a ceramic-white face. Purple eye shadow plastered eyes that had seen more of life than most people in their thirties. As she crossed the floor, she glanced at Gilchrist for the briefest of moments. Two metal rings defined the end of each eyebrow. And not a tattoo in sight.
Well, that was something, he supposed.
The officer said, ‘Sit.’
She sat, and the officer retreated to the door.
Gilchrist slid his business card across the table, as Baxter took the seat next to him.
‘I’m Jack’s father,’ he said to Tess.
Silence.
Gilchrist explained her rights to her, then said, ‘You also have the right to have a solicitor present, which you can waive if you choose. But I really only want to ask you a couple of questions which could help me on another matter, then I’m out of here.’
She refused to engage his look, just stared at her hands on the table. Fingernails that had been bitten to the quick were painted a purple that almost matched her eye shadow.
Gilchrist reached forward, switched off the recorder. ‘To prove I’m asking for your help,’ he said, ‘this is off the record. Okay?’
She eyed the tape recorder, but said nothing.
‘Do you know Sammie Bell?’ he asked.
Her eyes flickered and flared, then died with a shrug of her shoulders.
‘I take it that’s a yes.’
Another shrug.
‘That’s what you do, isn’t it? Pick up young men, offer them sex and a free reefer, then it’s on to the harder stuff, and within the week you’ve got another name to add to Bell’s ever-growing list for his supply-and-demand chain.’ He pressed closer. ‘But it can’t be much fun for you,’ he said. ‘What do you get out of it? Free drugs? Good sex? Not a lot of money, I bet.’
Silence. Only a dead stare at her hands.
‘But you can never have a normal relationship with anyone, can you? You don’t have a boyfriend, only a driver, Sammie Bell. And you can never be free from him, because he’s got you addicted, too.’ He sat back. ‘But what if I told you I could get you away from him?’ He caught a tensing in her fingers, and knew he had her attention. ‘Do you know Sammie Bell’s dead?’
Her lips parted, and she gave the tiniest of gasps.
‘That’s right, Tess. Sammie Bell is dead. We don’t know why yet, although we have our suspicions. But I’ll tell you what, Tess, I think you lucked out.’
She looked at him then, her question in her eyes.
‘How old are you?’ he asked. ‘And don’t even think about lying.’
She searched for her hands again, twisted her fingers. ‘Nearly sixteen.’
‘When did you last see your parents?’
She shrugged.
‘I can help you,’ he said.
Fire danced in her eyes. ‘No you can’t. He has a team.’
‘Who has?’
‘Sammie,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve tried before.’
‘You have?’
She unbuttoned the sleeve of her blouse, pushed it up to reveal half a dozen raised and reddened welts, each the size of a five-pence piece. Gilchrist eyed the burn-marks, and made a mental promise to himself to do what he could to help her.
‘Can you give a description of his team?’ he asked. ‘Any of them?’
‘You’re kidding, yeah? They’ll have me for grassing on them.’
‘They’ll never find out.’
Her eyes blazed with the fire of an anger he could only imagine. Here was a young woman, a teenager, little more than a child, who had seen and done things that many women twice her age had never experienced. As he returned her gaze, watched her eyes moisten and tears swell until they spilled down her cheeks, a wild thought came to him, a possibility that might just win her over – a long shot, he knew. Maybe too long.
‘There are three in his team, right?’
She jerked in surprise, then sniffed and ran the back of her hand under her nose.
‘I’ve seen them,’ he said, pressing on. ‘I need you to help us ID them.’
She wrapped her arms around herself, as if to fend off a chill.
‘Are you willing to do that?’
She pulled her arms tighter, pressed her lips into a tight line as tears swelled from her eyes, and Gilchrist found himself pushing to his feet and walking around the table to knead her shoulder. As his fingers squeezed, and the tears flowed, he caught Baxter’s eye, his brow furrowed with concern. Baxter had a ten-year-old daughter, Gilchrist knew. And from the strain on the man’s face he was asking himself – how would he feel if this were his own daughter in a few years?
Tess sniffed again, and Gilchrist sensed the tensing in her muscles.
He released his grip as she shrugged his hand free with an irritated, ‘Get off.’
He retreated to his side of the desk, expecting to be glared at in anger all the way. But Tess’s eyes were lowered, and back to staring at her fingers; for one unsettling moment, from the petted lip and smouldering scowl, she could have been his own daughter, Maureen, after he’d given her a telling off. And experience told him that trying to engage her in any meaningful discussion was beyond Baxter and him at the moment, that it would be better to have someone talk to her again first thing in the morning.
He signalled for the officer to take Tess back to her cell, and waited while she rose to her feet and shuffled from the room without a backward glance.
When the door closed, Baxter said, ‘What d’you think?’
‘That she could help us. If we help her.’
‘She needs a right good clout around the back of the head, is what she needs.’
‘I’m sure she does, but that’s only going to alienate her.’ Gilchrist moved towards the door. ‘Try softly softly,’ he said. ‘You’d be surprised how well that works.’ He was about to step into the corridor when he paused and said, ‘She’s the key.’
Baxter narrowed his eyes, but said nothing.
‘Find out what she knows, and she’ll lead you to Bell’s killer.’
‘You think?’
‘It’ll also help Jack. And if you haven’t already done so, I want you to take a blood sample from him,’ he added. ‘So you’ll find he’s drug-clean.’ He hoped to God he was right. He didn’t wait to hear Baxter’s ridicule. The surprised smile on the man’s face was enough to tell him that he thought Jack was in it up to his drug-laden armpits.
Gilchrist closed the door and left the building, striding across the car park.
In his car, he stabbed the key into the ignition and jerked the engine to life. It always amazed him how the mind worked, how it pecked away in the subconscious, nibbling at ideas that shimmied and shifted in neural shadows, until it came up with what seemed like a lateral step in thinking.
Just as an outsider, Tess McKenzie, could be the key to solving Bell’s murder – or so Gilchrist’s gut was telling him – so, too, was Rachel Novo the key in the abduction of Katie Davis. It had been Novo’s surname that triggered it for him; not Italian, as he’d first thought, but Russian, which he’d stumbled across while looking through Jackie’s files in The Central.
He’d taken no notice of it at the time, just skimmed over th
e name without giving any thought as to why she’d shortened Novokoff to the more romantic sounding Novo, after her divorce – no divorce papers attached. Her marriage had lasted eighteen months, according to Jackie’s research. So what better way to get beyond the past, than to redefine yourself by changing your name?
Of course, the same could be said for reverting to her original birth-name, Davis. But for Rachel Novo, the visceral hatred she felt for her father, Dougal, and the memory of abuse at his hands, would ensure she would never carry his name through any part of her life.
But was there another reason for her to change her name?
He eased into Napier Road and depressed the accelerator.
Tomorrow, after he’d slept on it, he might have a better idea.
CHAPTER 19
Wednesday morning
Gilchrist checked the time on his mobile – 04.42 – and groaned.
He lay there in the warmth of a debilitating need to sleep. Usually he slept straight through until his mobile woke him, but he’d had a fitful night. As he eased back the quilt, and set his feet on the floor, the ghostly remnants of a disturbing dream clung to his mind with the persistence of a spider’s web.
Jack had featured in his dream, he was sure of that. And Maureen, too. But the what and the why remained as elusive as smoke in fog. Perhaps he’d been troubled by the thought of Jack spending a night in custody. Or Maureen’s cutting remark about Cooper – Please don’t tell me you’re going to get married, Dad. Not to that bitch – had maybe nibbled away at his subconscious. But a piping hot shower did nothing to recover the memory, and by the time he’d dressed, the dream had all but faded to oblivion.
In the kitchen, he opened a packet of Gourmet Perle Ocean Delicacies and selected a pouch of Salmon and Whole Shrimps. Then he eased himself out the back door as quietly as he could and crept along the slabbed footpath, his breath fogging thickly in the early morning chill.
Movement at the hut door pulled him to a halt.
The cat looked at him, wide-eyed, body low and almost hugging the ground, as if undecided whether or not to make a run for it.
As slowly as he could, Gilchrist squatted. ‘I’m not going to hurt you, puss,’ he said, and gave the pouch a gentle shake. But the cat gave a slow blink, then slid from the hut and slunk around the door in a fluid movement as smooth as oil.
By the time he reached the hut, she was nowhere to be seen. But it pleased him to see that both bowls were empty, which he cleaned using the garden hose and his fingers. Then he filled one with water, and emptied the pouch into the other.
Back in the kitchen, he halved and sliced a grapefruit and mango, added strawberries, and peeled a banana, then carried the plate to the table. He powered up his tower computer, an ageing Dell connected to an overloaded double socket, with wires that spilled across the carpet like a nest of snakes. Maureen had been on at him to bin the Dell and purchase a new laptop, Wi-Fi compatible, which he could take to the office. But he’d decided years ago that computers were for the youngsters with gelled hair and fresh faces. As long as he could access the Internet, he was happy to let others keep abreast of the technical side of it all.
He opened Jackie’s file, and found where he had left off.
Rachel Novo’s ex-husband, Dimitri Novokoff – born in Dorking, Surrey, to a Russian diplomat – graduated from the University of London with a second class in Economics. His early years as a financial consultant took him to the Far East, after which he returned to the UK for two years to marry and divorce Rachel Davis – still no sight of the divorce papers. Dimitri had since left the UK to live in Maroochydore on Australia’s Sunshine Coast, where he was allegedly a partner in a newly launched microbrewery. But a search for the brewery on the Internet left Gilchrist none the wiser.
Rachel Novo’s life appeared more normal – if you didn’t include her short marriage to Novokoff. She’d left school at sixteen with sufficient Highers to study Economics and Finance at the University of York, from which she graduated with a first-class honours. Super-intelligent, and mature beyond her years, she landed a job with Lloyd’s where she’d been employed ever since, working her way into the upper echelons of a global company—
Gilchrist jerked at the sound of his mobile.
He picked it up – ID Baxter – and took the call with, ‘You’re up early.’
‘Haven’t been to bed yet.’
Gilchrist felt his throat constrict. Something had happened to Jack. He held his breath, swallowed the lump in his throat. ‘I’m listening.’
‘Got a call from the Anstruther Office last night, sir, the other side of midnight. A man’s body was found floating in Cellardyke harbour.’
Despite the grim news, relief flooded Gilchrist. ‘ID?’ he said.
‘Not on the body, sir, but I was intrigued by your interview of Theresa McKenzie last night. So I showed her a photograph.’ Baxter cleared his throat. ‘And bingo. She recognised him straight away. Stevie Graham. Twenty-two. From Edinburgh. Last known address, Perth. Been in and out of juvenile detention centres like a yoyo, but managed to avoid being found guilty of anything since he turned seventeen.’
‘Was he one of Sammie Bell’s team?’ Gilchrist asked.
‘No doubt about it. And get this.’ Baxter’s voice rang with victory. ‘She also coughed up the names of his two mates. Pete Sweeney, a tosser from Glasgow, and Mac Binnie from Dundee. Last known address of both of them, the same as Stevie Graham’s.’
Gilchrist’s mind fired in staccato bursts. ‘Have you found Sweeney and Binnie?’
‘Not yet, sir. But I’ve put out an alert through all airwave channels, and a request through the PNC.’
‘Do they have any previous?’
‘Sweeney’s been in court on four occasions for possession, but he’s got off each time, not proven. And Binnie’s had no drug-related charges, but two for alleged rape—’
‘Of children?’
‘No, sir. In both cases the women were in their twenties.’
‘Did he get off with these, too?’
‘He did indeed, sir.’
Gilchrist felt oddly deflated by Baxter’s response, as if he could still somehow tie Bell to Katie Davis’s abduction. So he went for the outrageous, and said, ‘Was their solicitor Hughes Copestake?’
‘Hang on,’ Baxter said, then told him – some Glasgow firm he’d never heard of.
Well, it was worth a try. He pressed on. ‘We need to check CCTV—’
‘Already on it, sir. I’ve put out a request for footage in and around Cellardyke and Anstruther, sir, so I’m hopeful it won’t be long until we pull them in.’
Gilchrist grimaced at Baxter’s optimism. With a bit of care, and a little know-how, any pair of hoodlums could make their way to England via Scotland’s network of country roads without ever coming across a CCTV camera. Still, Baxter was doing what he could.
‘Did you find anything on Stevie Graham’s body?’ he asked Baxter.
‘Pockets were emptied.’
‘Emptied? As opposed to being empty?’
‘Correct, sir. Turned inside out.’
‘How was he killed?’
‘We don’t know it’s murder yet, sir, although it’s looking that way. But we haven’t found any physical injuries. The PF instructed the body to be transferred to Dundee in the early hours, so we should know later this morning, sir. I’d be willing to put money on a drug overdose.’
Gilchrist nodded at Baxter’s words. Bell had overdosed, so it was likely that Stevie Graham had done the same. But why? First Bell? Then Graham? And what about his own killer’s signature theory? Bell and Graham might both have overdosed, but their deaths – joint murders? – could not have been more different.
Gilchrist had witnessed Bell’s strength and muscled physique, so it was unlikely that three lightweight youths could have taken him on and killed him, unless they used their guile to overdose him first, then batter him to death. But his killer’s signature theory persuaded him tha
t the youths had not killed Bell. He thought back to that fleeting sighting in the Golf Hotel, the too-thin faces, bodies undernourished and underfed, a sign of drug abuse if ever there was. Had Sweeney and Binnie watched Stevie Graham take an overdose, then held his head under water until he drowned?
But if so, why? And if not, then who—?
‘I’ll call the forensic pathologist,’ Baxter said, ‘and tell her we need confirmation on Graham’s death as soon as.’
‘What about fingerprints?’ Gilchrist asked.
‘Haven’t done anything with these yet—’
‘Check Graham’s prints against those on the hammer found next to Bell’s body. I’m willing to bet his prints are on it. Maybe Sweeney and Binnie got rid of Graham to make it look like a one-man hit, excuse the pun.’ And even as he spoke, his mind was reminding him of some recent memory, something he’d seen or heard or . . .
Then he had it.
‘This common address in Perth,’ he asked Baxter. ‘Do you have it?’
Baxter had, and read it out – an address in Scott Street.
Gilchrist scribbled it down. ‘That’s not where Tess McKenzie lives, is it?’
‘Not her registered address, sir. That would be her parents’ home. I’ve already sent a uniform to check that out.’
‘Get back to me when you bring in Sweeney and Binnie. And be careful how you handle it. Something tells me they’ve got good legal representation.’
‘Will do, sir.’
Gilchrist ended the call, then picked up Jackie’s file. He flipped his way through the loose-leaf pages, searching for what he thought he had read – one statement of many in the passing, nothing that jumped out at him, just a note that scratched his curiosity and had him wondering if the connection were possible.
It had to do with Sandy Rutherford, and how he earned a living. Vera Davis and he lived in an immaculate mansion in Perth, in a lifestyle that dripped with money – Bentley in the driveway, Range Rover in the garage; tiled conservatory; expensive furniture throughout; landscaped gardens.
He flipped over the pages, but still couldn’t find it.
Three minutes later, he came across it.