Thursday Legends

by Quintin Jardine

  in med school, but that was no barrier to their relationship, which had

  all the intensity and vigour of youth. She had taken him home at an

  early stage, and in turn she had met Crystal. All round, assumptions

  had been made.

  And then the moment of choice had come; Ron's graduation, and with it,

  the prospect of a pro football career. Under a selection system that

  would have been illegal in Europe and in most other first world

  countries, he had been a first-round draft pick of the Seattle

  Seahawks, who had traded him at once to Dallas. The process had come

  as a bombshell to Sarah who, innocently, had believed that he would be

  able simply to sign up with his home town team, the Bills.

  She had been two years short of graduation when it had happened; he had

  asked her to switch colleges and come with him, and she had countered

  by suggesting that he have himself traded again to a New York team, or

  forget football and practise law. She had given him no outright

  ultimatum, but when he left she had made a choice, nonetheless; she

  would not be anyone's camp follower.

  When he returned in triumph at the end of his first pro season, she had

  told him that she was too involved with her studies to become involved

  in anything else, although in truth she had had two relationships over

  the winter, one of which was still active. A year after that, she had

  graduated herself and had moved to New York City as an intern, and to

  begin postgraduate study in forensic pathology.

  She had followed Ron's career with more than a touch of pride, but as

  her own life had developed, professionally and personally, she had felt

  no longing for him. Nor, after her marriage, had she ever felt the

  need or the inclination to discuss him with her husband. Over the

  years she had come to see him as no more than the prize name on her

  sexual cv, not imagining that they would ever meet again, especially

  when her mother had told her that Crystal had left Buffalo for

  Hawaii.

  And then Barbara Walker, her dear, devious friend Babs, had thrown them

  back together, in the very moment of Sarah's vulnerability. She had

  known damn well what would happen, and as usual she had been right; for

  sure, an interrogation would follow. Unconsciously, Sarah's mouth

  tightened as she thought about it.

  "How you doing?" Ron called upstairs.

  She slipped her feet into her shoes, and walked to the door. "Just

  about there," she replied. "Crystal didn't leave a hair drier here,

  did she?"

  "Not that I know of; sorry."

  "That's okay. I guess it's still warm outside; it'll be dry by the

  time I get home." She picked up her bag and her reassembled but

  inactive cellphone, checked that she had left nothing else behind and

  walked downstairs, feeling a tenderness as she moved that took her back

  to her college days. People had often wondered how a quarterback had

  come to be nicknamed "Rhino'.

  The percolator had run its cycle as she walked into the kitchen; she

  sniffed. "Brazilian?"

  "Colombian."

  "I'll take that."

  "Black?"

  "No, with a little milk."

  He chuckled. "You've been in England too long."

  "Scotland, as my older son would be quick to tell you."

  "Sorry, Mark; Scotland then."

  "Maybe I have."

  He handed her a mug. "From what I heard upstairs, you ain't going

  back, though."

  "Don't make assumptions," she snapped.

  "Hey, I wasn't; but you sure put the shoe leather to old Bob there. You

  didn't leave much room for doubt."

  "Maybe not, but there are other things to think of; my career for a

  start."

  "What career?"

  "Are you kidding? My medical career, that's what. I'm a practising

  consultant pathologist, with a reputation as one of the best in the

  business. I have a personal investment in Scotland that's quite

  distinct from my marriage."

  "Yeah," he said quietly, 'but they do pathology in the States, don't

  they? And a hell of a lot more of it, I'd guess."

  "But why should I come back to the States?"

  He bowed his head and looked at her, from under his heavy eyebrows.

  "Are you asking me something here, Ron?" she challenged.

  "Maybe I am."

  "Aren't you a couple of assumptions ahead of yourself?"

  "Am I? After this afternoon?"

  She sighed, loudly. "Ron, we just made love, that was all. I was

  horny, so were you; I wanted you, you wanted me. So we had each other.

  But that doesn't wipe out the last dozen years of my life."

  "That's in the past."

  "Not in mine it isn't; it's a current issue." She stared at him. "Ron,

  why did you come back to Buffalo?"

  "To attend your parents' funeral."

  Sarah was taken by surprise. "You did?"

  "Yes. I was there, among the crowd. It was hardly surprising that you

  didn't see me given what happened."

  "How did you find out about it?"

  "I read about it in a newspaper in Maui, but Babs Walker called to tell

  me too."

  "Ah," she murmured. "And what made you decide to stick around

  afterwards?"

  He shrugged his shoulders. "After what happened with Bob, I just

  thought you might need support."

  "You just thought?"

  He took a sip of coffee. "Yeah. Babs suggested it, and when she did,

  I agreed."

  "Good old Babs. Ron, do you think we might have been manipulated just

  a little?"

  "Eh?" He gasped in surprise. "How can that be?"

  She laughed. "For such a smart guy you can be so innocent."

  "Are you trying to say Babs set us up to get back together?"

  "I'm saying that she's playing games with us, and that so far things

  have gone in line with her plan."

  "Why the hell would she do that?"

  "I've told you why. She detests Bob. She's had a down on him since

  our first separation, but it goes deeper than that. He terrifies her

  because of everything he is, and isn't. Babs was brought up to believe

  in the all-American hero. When we were kids you and I were the ideal

  couple, in the world as she sees it. Bob, on the other hand, is as far

  from the Pro-Bowl as you can get. He's from another planet as far as

  she's concerned. He shares our values, but he plays by a completely

  different set of rules. On top of all that, he has this ... charisma,

  let's call it. It can radiate from him, and to Babs it expresses

  itself as pure danger."

  "And what is it to you?" Ron asked quietly.

  "Excitement. There's something about him that's thrilled me, from the

  moment I met him. I could say the same about you. With you it's sheer

  sexual attraction, allied to your sheer unadulterated niceness. With

  him it's ... everything."

  "So why...?"

  "Because," she said, cutting him off, 'there's a single mindedness

  about him that can turn into remoteness, and that cannot be deflected.

  Bob's about control, not simply over me, but over his whole life. He

  can't even stand to be a passenger in an automobile. Anyone who

  threatens that control, or
tries to interfere with his life, is in for

  huge trouble. It's happened now, and it's pushed even me and the kids

  into second place. I don't know if I can ever get over that."

  "Don't I give you a reason not to want to?"

  Sarah sighed then smiled at him. "I want you to pick up that knife

  over there," she said, 'and make a cut in your left thumb."

  "Uhh. Why?"

  "Because if you're even going to start giving me that reason, it'll be

  by putting me first. I want you to give me a written declaration that

  you will not leave me behind to go off and play just one more season

  for the Nashville Cats. And to make me believe it, I'm going to want

  it signed in your own blood."

  She walked over to the counter beside the sink, picked up the knife by

  the handle and offered it to him. "Go on," she said. "But only if, in

  your heart, you really mean it, and you know for certain that never in

  your life will you blame me for making you miss out on the chance of

  that one last great moment."

  Ron took the knife from her and held it to his thumb. For a moment she

  though that he really was going to cut himself open, but just as she

  gasped, he laid it back down.

  "No," he murmured. "I can't promise you all of that. Some of it,

  maybe, but not the last part."

  She patted his chest. "See? You guys, you're both the devils I know,

  and you both say you want me, on your terms. So the way I see it, I've

  got to figure out which devil I'm better off with, or whether I should

  leave you both in your different underworlds."

  The giant smiled down at her, gently. "While you're doing that, are

  you going to carry on seeing this horny devil?"

  "I don't know whether I should. I doubt if it would help me think

  objectively."

  "I tell you what," he said. "Mom wants me to sell this house for her,

  so I'm going to stick around for a while." He reached into his pocket,

  and brought something out. "I don't think it would be right for me to

  be around your kids too much, so here's a key to the front door. If

  you feel you want to be with me, don't even call; just come. If I'm

  not here, the alarm code's eleven ninety-one. Deal?"

  She took the key from his hand. "No promises, but okay. If I find I

  can't resist you any longer, I'll come. But that won't necessarily

  imply anything, understood? It might just mean that.. . Hell, you

  know what it might just mean."

  He chuckled. "Sure. Understood."

  "Right. Now get me back to my kids."

  Seventeen.

  Skinner and Martin were heading for the stairs when Rod Greatorix stuck

  his head out of the door of the main CID office. "Mr. Skinner," he

  called. "Can I have a word before you go?"

  The two stopped and went back to join him in the private room. "There's

  a couple of things I need to deal with," he began. "First and foremost

  we'll need to announce the identification. As soon as we've got the

  post-mortem findings I want to issue a public appeal for information

  about your brother's movements in the period leading up to his death.

  We need to get a handle on where he was when he went into the river, or

  we can't even start a proper investigation."

  "Of course, "Skinner agreed.

  "How do you want us to handle it? I mean I don't have to say that

  Michael was your brother."

  "You don't, Rod, that's true. But it'll get out, as sure as God made

  wee sour apples. You need the press working for you on this. If they

  start to dig into the story of the black sheep of my family, they might

  come up with useful information faster than you. By and large,

  journalists are better than detectives at asking questions. I'll talk

  to them about my estrangement from my brother if they want." He

  frowned. "There's just one thing, though. I want to speak to a couple

  of people before this hits the press. There's my daughter, for one;

  she has to hear it from me. Then there's Neil Mcllhenney; after Andy

  here, he's my closest friend."

  "How much time do you need?"

  "If you brief the press at midday tomorrow, that'll be okay. Alex is

  flying up from London tomorrow morning for a business meeting on

  Monday. I'm picking her up at the airport at eleven-thirty. I'll see

  Neil before that; there's something else I want to talk to him about,

  anyway."

  "Okay, sir. You've got that; the press won't be awake much before noon

  on a Sunday anyway."

  "Thanks. Now what else did you want?"

  "I'd like the name and address of the hostel where your brother lived,

  and the name of the manager. He'll have to be interviewed, and

  possibly some of the other residents as well."

  "It's called Oak Lodge, it's in Gourock like I said, and it's run by

  the Jesuits. That's as much as I can tell you. I'm going to want to

  talk to them myself, though."

  "Bob .. ." Martin began.

  "It's for my own peace of mind, Andy. I have to find out how he

  was."

  "You won't go running your own investigation now, will you?"

  Skinner looked at him, wide-eyed. "Who? Me? Listen, a complaint from

  your chief constable to my police authority about my conduct is just

  what I don't need right now."

  Eighteen.

  Maggie Rose found the divisional CID office in Torphichen Place

  depressing at the best of times; on a Sunday morning, with the normal

  buzz of the rest of the building reduced to a murmur, it seemed to drop

  to a new level of drabness.

  The faces around her were keen, though, and in the main, fresh. Stevie

  Steele, on her right, was as sharp as the razor that had shaved him.

  Opposite her across the table, Detective Constable Alice Cowan sat

  straight-backed, disturbingly young, but in no way overawed. On either

  side of her, Ray Wilding and George Regan, detective sergeants both,

  leaned back in their chairs, exchanging glances behind the girl's back.

  And in the doorway, carrying a tray with six mugs, PC Sauce Haddock

  looked at least three years older in plain clothes than he did in his

  baggy uniform.

  "Okay," the detective superintendent began, as Haddock found a place on

  the table, and began handing round mugs, 'let's get on with it. I'm

  sorry to pull everyone in on a Sunday, but this one can't wait till

  tomorrow. It's already taken on a high profile, and we can't be seen

  to be holding back on it.

  "I'm giving it priority, and so, I have to tell you is the head of CID.

  Mr. Pringle would have taken this meeting himself, but he had an

  engagement last night, so he's sent Ray Wilding, his exec, both as a

  member of the team and to report back to him." The irreverent George

  Regan, who had served directly under Dan Pringle in the past and knew

  his Saturday night habits, grinned broadly, but she let it pass.

  "There's another in-house consideration we'd all do well to remember,"

  she continued. "The chief constable was on the invitation list for

  yesterday's event; as it happened, he couldn't go, but that doesn't

  mean that he won't be taking a keener interest than usual in our

  progress.