City of Strangers

by Louise Millar

  He lay under the balcony, his head twisted sideways.

  Footsteps approached down the stairs.

  John appeared at the bottom, the hooded man, Karl, behind him.

  He saw her face, and followed her eyes.

  ‘Grace, darlin’, it was an accident,’ he said, hand raised. ‘We were trying to find you to tell you. I’m so sorry. He was pissed. Got up on the bloody balcony and fell off backwards. We’ve just rung the ambulance.’

  She backed away. ‘Liar! You killed him!’

  ‘Grace, don’t be stupid. The boy’s like my son.’

  ‘What have you done, John?’ she roared at him. ‘What have you done?’

  His hand came out. Grace stumbled back.

  Like a cougar, Karl darted from behind him and ran.

  ‘No!’ she screamed. She found the restaurant door, and even though every muscle in her body was numb, she slammed it shut and fumbled the lock across it.

  Karl’s body slammed into the door.

  She kept walking, frozen, as the kicking started behind her, not knowing even where she was going.

  Kicks and thumps landed on the door, and she knew it was nearly over.

  The fire escape was locked.

  They were coming for her. There was nowhere to go.

  She’d die in this room, without ever seeing anything else again.

  It would be made to look like an accident, too. Her and Mac.

  She sank to the floor, thinking of Mac, and the dreams she’d never followed, and all that had been wasted.

  Then, from nowhere, Nicu’s voice appeared in her head.

  Scott in the Centre.

  The restaurant door began to buckle with the body blows outside.

  By the window, she saw a fire extinguisher.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘No.’

  She stood up, picked it up with shaking arms, and walked to the blue stained-glass window.

  ‘No.’

  Behind her the door burst open. She lifted the extinguisher and threw it. It lifted in an arc and hit the window. The main pane smashed into a hundred pieces, raining down on her. A sharp wind swept in from the water, and outside, she saw the lights of the world again.

  Footsteps came behind her.

  Without looking back, Grace climbed onto the ledge and, not knowing where she was going, jumped.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

  Seven weeks later

  The beach was busy today. Packed for the summer.

  The school holidays had started, and children in swimsuits and hats played with spades and nets among the worm casts and bladderwrack.

  Someone had made a giant heart of stones on the sand, and the tide was lapping at its edges, as yet leaving it untouched.

  The woman walked along the sand, a baby on her back, a child running ahead.

  Grace sat on a rock and took a few shots, then headed over, letting the sun warm her face.

  Anna turned and saw her.

  Grace photographed her again, her blonde hair snaking in the wind, then greeted her with a hug, and a wave for Valentin and Clara. Anna took her arm and they began to walk.

  ‘So, what did you think of the Scots Today piece?’ Grace said, checking Anna’s reaction.

  ‘I thought you did Lucian justice. Thank you. And I thought your photographs were beautiful. Even the one of him in your kitchen – so respectful, so still.’

  ‘Thank you for letting me use it.’

  ‘But the story’s not finished?’ Anna said, curious.

  ‘I can’t finish it. It’s going to take so long to get John and Karl to trial – it’s complicated by all the property fraud – it probably won’t be till next year. So I can’t run it until after, in case it’s prejudicial. That’s why I only wrote the first half – the mystery of who Lucian was. When they’re sentenced, I’ll write the second half, and put it together. Maybe syndicate it. I couldn’t mention the man under our flat in this first part either for the same reason. He’s a witness.’

  ‘This is the older man, Robbie, who worked for Mountain Rescue? Is he OK?’

  Grace squinted, watching a plane in the distance. ‘Apparently. He’s still in hospital, but Mr Singh says he’s doing better. The good news is, they’re not going to prosecute him – they’ve accepted he was mentally ill.’

  ‘What happened to him – do you know?’

  Clara gurgled. Grace saw her eyes had darkened again. They were becoming more like Lucian’s, and she wondered if that comforted Anna.

  ‘Robbie? He was in a helicopter crash during a rescue mission in the Highlands about ten years ago. He was the only survivor. He seemed to deal with it OK at the time. Then his wife died last year and it triggered this paralyzing anxiety disorder, but nobody knew because he stopped leaving the house. Then his house got repossessed and he was too ill to explain to anyone he needed help. Mr Singh was trying to help out, but he had no idea how bad it was.’

  She tickled Clara’s chin to make her laugh. ‘But if Robbie hadn’t been there, John and Karl might have got away with all of it. The evidence Robbie found in the backyard is crucial, apparently. It puts Karl at the scene. He knew he’d dropped the glove and he’d been back searching for it a few times before he figured out that it was Robbie that had taken it. A guy up in the tower block saw him in the yard.’

  Anna squeezed Grace’s arm. ‘And how are you? How are Mac’s parents?’

  They stopped to sit on a rock, and let Valentin collect mussel shells in his bucket. Grace took a stick and traced zigzags in the sand.

  ‘His parents are a mess. His dad’s threatened to kill John, and the police have had to speak to him about it.’ The tears came and she pushed them back. ‘I don’t know.’ She sniffed and Anna patted her arm. ‘I still can’t believe Mac’s gone. That I won’t see him again. And I suppose I’m struggling a lot with how much he didn’t tell me about what was happening with John. I worry that he must have been scared, and hiding it from me and his dad. I just think he got pulled in by John. Sort of hero-worshipped him. Then it was too late to get out when he realized what John was doing, because he’d become involved in it all.’

  Anna watched her carefully. ‘You were with your husband at the end, Grace. He wasn’t alone when he died.’

  They fell into silence. Grace knew Anna was thinking of Lucian, and that dark, wet night in Gallon Street. Valentin turned to watch them, his face puzzled. He lifted two shells and placed them solemnly on his eyes. They both burst out laughing.

  ‘What will you do now?’ Anna asked as they crossed the sand back to her cottage.

  ‘That’s what I came to tell you,’ Grace replied. ‘I’m leaving today.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘I’m going to the airport now.’

  ‘Where to?’ Anna said, taking Clara out of her sling.

  Grace shrugged. ‘I’m going to decide when I get there. I’m going to take any flight to Europe tonight that still has a ticket. Then, after that, I’ll see. I’ve got no plans. Maybe I’ll travel by road or train for a while.’

  ‘Just Europe?’

  Beyond the terrace wall, out on the ocean, a sail boat dipped in the wind.

  ‘I don’t know. A photographer friend from Amsterdam’s been commissioned by an American arts trust to shoot a project on urban regeneration in Detroit. He’s invited me to assist next year. So . . .’

  ‘Will you go?’

  Grace watched the ferry. ‘Maybe.’ She put her camera away and saw the envelope in her bag. ‘Anna, I forgot to give you this. It was returned to Mitti in Amsterdam.’

  Anna read the postcode. ‘London?’

  ‘Sorry. It looks like a work letter.’

  Anna opened it. A handwritten note came out.

  ‘It’s Lucian,’ she gasped. ‘He disguised it to make me read it.’

  She handed Clara to Grace to put in her buggy, and read the final letter from her lover in private. Grace lifted Valentin and swung him on the terrace till his face broke into smiles.

&
nbsp; Then she said her goodbyes, and walked back up the beach, to where Ewan waited to take her to the airport, his gangly legs on the wall, phone to his ear, trying to fob Sula off about where he was right now.

  A brush of hills lay on the horizon. Grace searched for her father in it, and said goodbye, and told him she’d be back one day, because this would always be home. Then she walked into a shard of sunshine blasting down onto the sand, and felt herself vanish.

  Killer Women is a group of established, London-based, female crime writers that was co-founded by Melanie McGrath and Louise Millar, to represent many sub-genres of crime-writing – from psychological thrillers to procedurals, comic crime, political thrillers and more.

  What we offer

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  • Resources for media and bloggers providing quotations, features, listicles and book recommendations.

  For more information visit our website at www.killerwomen.org or email us at info@killerwomen.org. To keep up to date with Killer Women events please follow us on Twitter@killerwomenorg and sign up to our newsletter on our website.

  Praise for City of Strangers

  ‘City of Strangers by Louise Millar has a brilliantly creepy opening . . . Identity is at the heart of this clever novel, which shows a woman learning things about herself while ostensibly chasing the story of a lifetime’

  Sunday Times

  ‘A twisty heart-stopper of a thriller’

  Red

  ‘Compelling . . . original and satisfying’

  Daily Mail

  ‘An easy, enjoyable read’

  Literary Review

  ‘A gripping thriller, with the Edinburgh setting an added bonus for Scottish readers’

  Scotsman

  ‘Exciting and impossible to put down – this beautifully written thriller is packed full of danger, surprises and a heroine to root for’

  Mark Edwards, author of Follow You Home

  ‘I really loved it. It does a really exciting thing, which is to take us from domestic noir to international thriller . . . fast-paced, full of heart and with a central character who is discovering herself as she uncovers a labyrinthine international mystery’

  Julia Crouch, author of The Long Fall

  ‘An engrossing, exhilarating ride. Pacy, action-packed, brilliantly written and with THE HOTTEST leading male character *fans self*’

  Tammy Cohen, author of First One Missing

  CITY OF

  STRANGERS

  Louise Millar grew up in Scotland. She began her journalism career in music and film magazines, and was a senior commissioning editor at Marie Claire. She has written for the Guardian, Psychologies, Stella, the Independent, the Observer, The Times and Stylist. She is co-founder of the crime-writing collective killerwomen.org.

  Also by Louise Millar

  The Playdate

  Accidents Happen

  The Hidden Girl

  Acknowledgements

  As always, a huge thanks to my editor Trisha Jackson, and to Natasha Harding, Sam Eades and all at Pan Macmillan. Also to Lizzy Kremer, Harriet Moore and all at David Higham Associates.

  A special thanks to my daughter who, at ten, wrote a thrilling short story called The Man in the Kitchen, and lent me the name as the working title for this book.

  And to the real-life Finley Robertson for lending me his name following a charity auction – a more perfect name for my police detective, I could not have found.

  My gratitude, too, to all the experts, family and friends who helped and guided me with research, with special mention to Nikoline Nordfred Eriksen and Milena Parker-Jurd. Any mistakes are, of course, mine.

  Finally, I have taken some creative licence with geographical locations.

  First published 2015 by Macmillan

  This electronic edition published 2016 by Pan Books

  an imprint of Pan Macmillan

  20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR

  Associated companies throughout the world

  www.panmacmillan.com

  ISBN 978-1-4472-8110-8

  Copyright © Louise Millar, 2015

  Cover image: landscape © George Clerk / iStock

  Girl: Moment / Getty Images

  The right of Louise Millar to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  Pan Macmillan does not have any control over, or any responsibility for, any author or third-party websites referred to in or on this book.

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  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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