He had only just been allowed to return to active duty, but already he was wondering if he should have taken the offer of another month's paid leave instead.
Recalling what he'd seen this evening, he knew this was a case he was never going to forget.
One thing was for certain.
Whoever was behind this was one sick, depraved bastard.
And he needed to be caught.
Before he killed again.
-------------------------
On the side of the street
Further along the road from Portobello High School
03.45
Sitting in the back of the white van parked several hundred metres down the road, the man put down his cup of thermos flask coffee and raised his pair of military night vision binoculars to his eyes.
“Patience is a virtue”, one of his fathers, the last one, used to say. Mostly just before another beating was dished out. Looking back now it certainly gave a new meaning to the phrase, ‘I'll beat some sense into you’.
Slowly, over the years, yes, he’d learned many a useful idiom, but he’d never really appreciated the why, how, or what for. He just remembered the bruises. And the hate. And the look in his father’s eyes.
Nowadays however, some of it was beginning to make sense.
Like now.
His patience had paid off.
The policeman getting into the taxi was DCI Campbell McKenzie. The man in the van had been listening to the police chatter over the hacked police radio he’d bought from a guy in Leith, and he’d picked up that McKenzie would take a taxi as soon as another detective, Mather, arrived.
Focussing his binoculars on McKenzie through the one-way glass windows, the man had watched as McKenzie waited beside the road for his cab. He’d watched him staring up at the hulking edifice of the old school before finally stooping forward and climbing into the back seat of a private hire.
This wasn’t the first time he’d seen McKenzie.
The man already knew a lot about him.
McKenzie looked like his old photograph. He hadn’t changed much. He had a colourful track record. He’d recently been cleared of any wrong doing in connection with the death of his previous partner, DI Danielle Wessex, and had only just returned to duty after several months off.
But now he was back.
Just in time.
It couldn’t have worked out better.
McKenzie’s appointment to lead the investigation had been nothing more than a coincidence, but the man in the van still couldn’t quite believe his luck. He couldn’t have chosen a better or more appropriate person himself!
The man in the van had listened to all McKenzie's Airwave conversations earlier today. Writing down anything of interest. Updating his profile of the man who would now be responsible for tracking him down.
After McKenzie's taxi drove off, heading towards Duddingston, the man in the van tuned back to the police airways and spent the next thirty minutes listening to random conversations, before finally settling on a conversation between DI Mather and Fettes Road.
Now he had Mather’s frequency, he would easily be able to follow his conversations too.
Which would be essential in the coming days.
Staying one step ahead of McKenzie and Mather, and anyone else who was to subsequently lead the investigation or direct actions around the school, would be key.
Today had gone brilliantly.
No one had a clue how he'd done it.
Or what he'd actually done.
So far, he was Scot free.
Which was the way he would have to remain if he was going to complete the rest of his plan.
Today had been exciting.
Two deaths.
Two rights wronged.
But there was a lot more work to do.
This was only the beginning.
-------------------------
The Grange
Edinburgh
04.15
“What are you still doing up?” McKenzie reprimanded his wife as he walked into their kitchen and saw her sitting at the island, eating ice-cream from a carton.
“Cravings. Driving me insane. I woke up. Couldn’t get back to sleep.”
“Fiona, you need to rest. You've only got another two months before Little Bump comes, and once it arrives, you'll never get any rest again!” He laughed, grabbing a spoon from a drawer and sitting down beside her.
“Get your own, this is mine.” She laughed back, pushing him playfully away as he went to dip his spoon into her carton.
“Any more in the fridge?”
“Nope. Sorry... that’s why I’m being so possessive.”
“You’re going to eat the whole tub?”
“Don’t just blame me. Little Bump is hungry.”
McKenzie knelt down and kissed Little Bump through Fiona’s pyjama top.
“Naught boy.”
“Girl...”
“Boy...” McKenzie insisted, standing up and crossing over to the American-style fridge-freezer.
“There’s some cold lasagne in the oven.”
“Thanks.”
“So, can you talk about it?” she asked, not forcefully, but interested.
“Two deaths. Murders. Very gruesome. Looks like the same person did it. That’s all I can say.”
A few minutes later McKenzie was standing in front of the microwave waiting for the lasagne to heat up, when he heard his Airwave ringing.
He retrieved it from his jacket in the hallway and called DI Mather back.
“You've seen it then?” Mather asked.
“What?”
“Ah, …so you haven’t. Someone posted a video on Facebook of the man falling to his death from the roof of the school. It's gone viral...”
McKenzie swore loudly. “Text me the link. I’ll call you back.”
McKenzie hung up, waited for the link and then watched the video several times. Now angry, he returned Mather’s call.
“I can’t believe it! Who’d post something like that? I thought we’d got a news blackout on this?”
“This is Social Media, not the news. And there’s more than one. I've seen three. Obviously filmed from different phones in the crowd on the street. It doesn't surprise me in the slightest, Guv, it’s what people do nowadays. They’ll probably be on YouTube soon as well.”
“I want you to get them pulled. Wherever they appear. As soon as possible.”
“You mean call Facebook?”
“Whatever it takes, just get them pulled by the time I get back to the school later this morning.”
“I’ll leave that to the Media team in Fettes Row. I’ll chase them. But don’t forget it’s almost four-thirty in the morning. And it’s Saturday.”
“Do what you can.”
“Guv, do you know about tonight?”
“What about tonight?”
“I just heard from one of the officers here who’s going... if it’s still on.”
“If what's still on?”
“The Portobello High School Reunion Ball.”
“The what?”
“The School Reunion. Apparently it’s the first time all the pupils who left between 1990 and 2000 will be getting back together again.”
McKenzie looked up and glanced at his wife.
He ended the call with Mather and then walked over to Fiona.
“Did you know about the reunion ball at your old school?” he asked.
She stared back at him, licking the last remnants of the ice-cream from her spoon.
“Campbell, exactly what planet are you on? I've told you about it a thousand times. Hence the new red dress I just bought. And why your kilt went to the dry cleaners.”
It rang a vague bell. McKenzie swore again under his breath, as he returned his gaze to the video on his mobile.
Hitting play again, he watched for the fifth time as the man fell off the edge of the Portobello High School.
McKenzie shook his head.
Thin
gs were going from bad to worse.
A school reunion was the last thing they needed just now.
And he could think of at least two people who wouldn't be going.
Chapter 6
Cramond
Edinburgh
Saturday
09.30
Stuart Nisbet parked his Ducati in his garage, hung his helmet on the hook on the wall, and then pressed the button on his key fob to close the garage door.
After watching the large metal door slide back into place, he left the garage by pressing his fingerprint against a sensor on the wall, waiting a few seconds for the door to slide sideways, and then stepping through into the opulent house beyond.
Placing his finger on a panel on the inside wall, he then waited for the door to slide shut behind him, effectively sealing off the garage and its contents - the Ducati and two luxury cars - from the main house.
As he walked through his spacious hallway, he called out to his electronic assistant and told her to run his bath and pour his coffee.
“And Sabrina, tell me the latest stock prices for New Zealand Hydro and GlaxoSmithKlein.”
As he picked up his coffee from his expansive kitchen-diner with its floor-to-ceiling, sweeping glass-filled panoramic view of the River Forth, he mulled over the recent stock prices Sabrina recited to him, and made some quick, calculated decisions.
The markets were closed now, but if he sold the stock electronically as soon as the markets opened again on Monday, he'd make another killing.
After instructing Sabrina to call his broker, a human's voice filled the air.
“Mr Nisbet, It's Duncan. How can I help you, sir?”
“As soon as the markets open on Monday, sell forty percent of the stock in GlaxoSmithKlein, and all of the stock in New Zealand Hydro, so long as they don't drop more than ten percent upon opening. Confirm the sales once done.”
“Yes, Mr Nisbet. Understood.”
As he picked up the paper from the table in the hallway and took the stairs two at a time up the circular staircase to the third floor, Nisbet did the mental maths. Even if they dropped the full ten percent, he'd still make a cool four hundred thousand dollars.
Stripping quickly out of his leathers, he lowered himself into his marble bath in the floor of his penthouse bedroom, took another sip from his coffee, and thought about the day and night ahead.
There was so much to do.
He'd been looking forward to the school Reunion for over twenty years. Twenty years of planning how he'd rub the noses in it of all those who'd treated him like shit while he was at school; all those who hadn’t believed he would ever succeed or make anything of his life. Well, he'd have the last laugh. Not them.
Stuart Nisbet was perhaps the richest Scotsman of his age, one of only a handful of billionaires in the country.
He mixed with celebrities, dined with Royals, and raced his horses at Ascot every year.
Not bad for a little boy who grew up in Portobello and left school with only a few elementary qualifications to his name.
After a stint in the Army he'd realised in an incredible moment of epiphany in Afghanistan that it was mostly the uneducated that made up the cannon fodder of warfare. And life. If he wanted to survive, and to make anything of himself, he had to get smarter. Incredibly he'd survived Afghanistan, and as soon as he returned home and left the service, he'd enrolled himself in college, spent years studying, got into University and then graduated with a degree in Economics.
His determination to turn his life around was impressive, and his drive to succeed was inspiring.
He'd easily passed the interviews he’d chased with the financial houses in Edinburgh, and after rapid progression upwards through the ranks, within years he was heading up and managing his own funds.
Several years later he'd left the rat race - being employed by others who pocketed most of his profits was no longer for him. Confident he could do just as well, if not better, by himself, he’d founded his own investment business, establishing and running several incredibly successful funds that invested in high-tech stocks, energy and pharmaceuticals.
He'd taken some gambles - albeit calculated gambles - and made several small fortunes.
Which he'd then turned into bigger fortunes.
And which in turn, had then been transformed into a vast fortune.
His success knew no bounds.
Stuart Nisbet had the Midas touch.
He now lived in one of the most beautiful and richest areas of the UK. His house was amazing, with sweeping views across the River Forth that were unparalleled anywhere. He drove fast cars, dated fast women, did whatever he wanted.
He lacked only two things.
True friends.
And real love.
Of which money could buy neither, no matter how much he had.
Nevertheless, Stuart was looking forward to tonight.
Not only would he get the chance to awe those who had dismissed him as trash all those years ago, but we would get a chance to see the few friends he did once have.
And then there was also Maggie Sutherland.
Even thinking of her now made his heart flutter.
He'd had many women since he'd first fallen in love with Maggie. Some famous, some beautiful - and sometimes more than one at the same time - but he knew that one day when he was dying and his life flashed before his eyes, it would be Maggie Sutherland and her blue, blue eyes that he would think of during his last few seconds.
She'd had the softest lips.
The sweetest smile.
And the cutest dimple in the world.
The reality of it all, however, was that at the time Stuart had only been a pathetic little second-year. Not a man like the others in Sixth Form, or even some of the teachers.
He hadn't blamed Maggie - he understood her reactions, he knew her only too well, and anyway, the chase had and would make the catch so much more worthwhile - but still it had hurt, a lot, when she had so publicly thrown his Valentine’s Card into the bucket in front of all her laughing friends.
Later, he'd heard that one of the teachers had given her a Valentine’s card. And two of the Sixth Formers.
Bastards all of them.
The opportunity had been a long time coming, but tonight there would be scores to settle. Not one, but several.
Looking back, Stuart had few regrets. He'd faced life the best way he could: accepting his lot in life, he'd taken charge of his own destiny, and forged a new future for himself.
So yes, Stuart had few regrets.
But tonight, he'd make up for the ones he did.
Stuart had a plan.
-------------------------
Duddingston Road
Edinburgh
10.00
Irene Quinn had been dreading this day. For months. Ever since some stupid person had decided to plan the bloody thing and her husband had found out about it. No one had ever considered planning a Reunion before, so why now all of a sudden?
Irene had enjoyed school. She'd done well, had good friends, passed all her exams, and even made it to university.
Now she had two children, and unlike some of her friends, she still even had the same husband.
Barry Quinn and Irene had been married for almost twenty years now. Twenty years ago, Barry had been a catch. He'd played rugby in the First Fifteen in the year above hers, and when they were married, she had been proud.
Over the years, she had got less proud, - as Irene knew Barry had of her - and together they had both descended into a life of mediocrity. They lived in a mediocre house. Did mediocre jobs. Lived mediocre lives.
Yet, in spite of all the mediocrity, their lives were not too bad. In fact, truth be told, they were probably both happy with their lot.
Barry and Irene knew their place in society, and until Barry had come home that day full of the news about the school Reunion, they had been content with what they’d had and the lives they lived.
Lives which wer
e not great. Not bad. But ok.
Since that day however, it had been a very different story.
“Do you think Peter Black will be there?” Barry has asked Irene within an hour of starting to think about the Reunion. “He was a right bastard! Always putting me down and showing off and always going on about all the great things he was going to do when he left school. And what about Andrew Jessop? He was going to be a doctor... or was it a surgeon? And Cammie? He wanted to open up a string of garages and make millions. They all had such big plans. And what have I got? What did I end up doing?”
“You married me. We had two wonderful children. We're happy. Never mind about the others. You can't go about comparing yourself with everyone else...” Irene had started to defend her life, even though Barry had a fair point. What had they done with their lives? Apart from stagnate.
“What about Fiona? I wonder...”
“Fiona who?”
“Lewis. Fiona Lewis. She was beautiful.”
“Was she the one that you snogged at the Christmas disco, before you and I got together?”
“Aye, but nothing else happened.”
“But you still fancy her...”
“How can I? I don't even know what she looks like now. Anyway, what about you and that guy, Paul Bentford? That English guy, whose mum and dad owned that hotel in Joppa?”
Irene started to blush.
“What about him?”
“I bet you sometimes wish you'd married him instead of me? He was taller than me, his parents were loaded and you got off with him once, didn't you?”
“I went out with him for a whole term, until he dumped me.”
“But you still fancy him? You're not going to tell me you've never thought about him?”
Barry was pacing round their front room, playing with his car keys in his hands.
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