The Special Dead

by Lin Anderson

  ‘You said you spoke to Bill first,’ Rhona said accusingly.

  ‘I knew you would agree if you thought the boss wanted it.’

  When Rhona didn’t respond to his honesty, he said, ‘Why did you ask about the cat?’

  ‘I retrieved blood and skin from under its claws.’

  McNab waved his unmarked hands briefly in the air. ‘Not guilty.’

  The words not guilty escaped his mouth to hang between them like a bad smell.

  McNab, sensing this, covered his dismay by suddenly upping speed, only to have to brake suddenly as a bus pulled out in front of them.

  Rhona almost felt sorry for him in that moment.

  Perhaps sensing this, McNab turned and said, ‘So, when do we go to the boss and tell him what happened that night in the stone circle?’

  It was the question Rhona didn’t want to answer.

  3

  McNab watched the door swing shut behind Rhona. He’d broached the subject for the third time and still received no answer. She’d just observed him with those eyes, examining what churchgoers might call his soul. McNab thought of it more as his Mr Hyde, although he wasn’t at all sure that his outer persona had ever reached the standards of Hyde’s better half, Dr Jekyll.

  They had to eventually talk this through. He knew that. She knew that. The unspoken secret just kept getting bigger.

  One option would be for him to go to DI Wilson alone and confess. After all, it was his actions that had created the problem. But, he acknowledged, Rhona’s inaction in not immediately revealing what had happened put her in the frame too. Which was, of course, his fault. He had gone against her wishes that terrible night barely two months ago in the stone circle. He’d let a killer die while she’d been trying to keep him alive. Let him die or made him die? Had he been Hyde that night or Dr Jekyll?

  The circular nature of these thoughts frustrated him further and brought to mind a saying of his late mother.

  When in doubt, do nothing.

  It had been her way of encouraging him to think before he acted. Acting on the spur of the moment had proved his downfall on a number of occasions. She had been well aware of that and had often sought to persuade him to go more cautiously.

  Well, he’d definitely been cautious on this occasion, and it had only made matters worse.

  McNab turned the car round and headed back to the police station.

  Shannon Jones was twenty-four years old, petite, blonde and very frightened. She’d arrived at the dead girl’s flat late Saturday afternoon, worried by the fact that her friend wasn’t answering her mobile. When she’d discovered the police presence, she’d had a nervous breakdown on the doorstep, which only got worse on hearing that her friend was dead.

  McNab had asked DS Janice Clark to talk to her before he did. He couldn’t order Janice to do anything, since he was no longer her superior officer. In fact, this was the first time he’d had to engage with Janice since his demotion.

  When he was first a DS, she was a DC. When he was promoted to DI, she was promoted to DS. In that particular game of snakes and ladders, he’d found himself quickly sliding down the snake, and was now on the same level as his former right-hand woman.

  It wasn’t a comfortable place to be, but Janice, as always, strove to make it so. McNab hadn’t encountered any animosity or glee at his demotion from that quarter, although there were others, particularly Superintendent Sutherland, who obviously relished it. He continually wore the I told you so expression. Sutherland didn’t like officers who wouldn’t play the game as dictated by him, even if they got results. The search for Stonewarrior had been a case in point. McNab going AWOL had got a result. Two results in fact. They had caught the perpetrator and McNab had lost his promotion. McNab thought that a fair exchange. Sutherland regarded it as a personal triumph. Fortunately, their paths rarely crossed now that McNab was lower down the ranks again, which suited both of them very well.

  Shannon brought the cup of coffee shakily to her lips. The movement reminded McNab of when he’d been drinking heavily and his hand had trembled just like that.

  Not any more.

  ‘Tell me about Leila,’ he said gently.

  They were seated in a side room which housed a coffee machine, a few easy chairs and a table. Used to give bad tidings, it wore the scent of absorbed despair.

  ‘She was funny and clever.’ Shannon wobbled a little on the past tense, a common reaction when the idea of someone being dead hadn’t quite registered. ‘She liked a laugh.’

  ‘And you were out having a laugh last night?’ McNab said.

  ‘We went out for something to eat and a drink after work.’

  ‘Where did Leila work?’

  ‘With me, at Glasgow University library.’

  ‘Tell me about last night.’

  She cleared her throat as though about to make a speech. It sounded guilty but probably wasn’t. She was blinking a lot, but contrary to popular opinion that didn’t mean she was about to lie, just that she was stressed. Then again, people get stressed when they’re lying.

  ‘We ate pizza in the Italian in Sauchiehall Street near the Buchanan Galleries, then went for a drink at The Pot Still in Hope Street.’

  McNab knew the place, mainly because of its extensive collection of malt whiskies. Many of which he’d enjoyed, probably too much. He nodded at her to continue.

  ‘Two guys started chatting us up. At first Leila didn’t look interested, but I knew she was playing him along, making him worry. Then she suddenly stood up, gave me a knowing look and off they went together back to her place.’ She halted, fear crossing her face. ‘He looked okay. He’d had a drink, but he wasn’t really drunk.’ She rushed on. ‘If I’d thought he would hurt Leila . . .’

  McNab interrupted her. ‘We don’t know that he did.’

  Shannon looked from McNab to Janice and back again.

  ‘I don’t understand. You said Leila was dead. How did she die if he didn’t kill her?’

  ‘She was found hanged.’

  The shock of his words hit her face like a punch, draining it of blood. ‘Hanged?’ she repeated in disbelief.

  ‘We have yet to establish whether it was suicide.’

  ‘No way.’ She shook her head vehemently. ‘Leila would never commit suicide.’

  If McNab had a tenner for every time he’d heard the friends and family of suicide victims say exactly that . . . He waited a few moments before continuing. ‘We won’t know for certain until after the post-mortem.’

  The girl wasn’t really listening to him. ‘Leila took him home for sex,’ she said firmly. ‘That’s what she wanted last night. That’s what she did. For fun. No strings attached. That’s the way she liked it.’

  McNab sat back in the chair and contemplated the young woman before him. He believed her when she said that’s what Leila did, but he wasn’t sure that was the whole story.

  ‘And what about you? Was that your intention too?’

  Blood flooded back into her face, reddening her cheeks in embarrassment. ‘Maybe, but it didn’t work out like that.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘After they left, the other guy went to the toilet and never came back.’

  McNab looked at the girl before him, pretty and probably willing with a little wooing, and wondered why her suitor had given up so easily.

  ‘Why do you think your one bailed?’

  It was a harsh question, indicated by Janice’s frown, but you couldn’t always be nice in this job.

  Shannon said outright, ‘I wondered that myself. We were getting on well, better than Leila and his mate. He looked really pissed off when they left.’ She paused. ‘I think they had a bet on who would score first. And when it wasn’t him, he lost interest.’

  ‘Do you remember their names?’

  ‘It was noisy in the pub. I think mine said George.’

  ‘And the other one?’

  She shook her head. ‘No idea.’

  ‘And you didn’t exchange
numbers?’

  ‘We hadn’t got that far.’

  ‘Is there any chance he followed Leila and his mate?’

  She looked startled by the suggestion, then took a moment to think about it.

  ‘Time-wise it’s a possibility. But why would he do that?’

  McNab could think of a number of reasons. None of them pleasant. If there had been two of them, getting the victim onto the hook would have been easy. His imagination working overtime, he did a rerun of the previous night’s events. Leila taking guy number one back to her flat. Guy number two joining them there.

  ‘She definitely didn’t hang herself,’ Shannon said again. ‘Leila wasn’t suicidal. She had . . . beliefs.’

  McNab’s ears pricked up. ‘What sort of beliefs?’

  Shannon shifted a little in her seat. ‘New Age stuff. That life is precious. That we’re one with the universe. That sort of thing.’

  ‘What about bondage and sadomasochism?’ McNab said.

  ‘What?’ Her eyes widened.

  ‘Could Leila have hanged herself during sex?’

  The face paled again. ‘No way.’

  ‘What about the room with the hanging dolls?’

  There was a moment’s silence while she digested his words and tried to make sense of them. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘There were nearly thirty Barbie-type dolls hanging from the roof in the room where we found her.’

  Shannon was definitely freaked by that. ‘No way. I never saw that room.’

  McNab changed the subject. ‘Have you given Detective Sergeant Clark a description of the two men?’

  Shannon looked a bit worried by this. ‘I did, but I was pissed to be honest, and it’s a bit of a blur.’

  ‘We need to contact Leila’s family. Do you have a phone number or address?’

  ‘She has a brother who lives in Glasgow. His name’s Daniel. He’s a musician. Plays in a band called the Spikes. They’re on Facebook if you want to contact him. I don’t have an address.’ She looked grief-stricken at the thought of him being told about his sister.

  McNab gave her a moment to collect herself, then thanked her and told her she could go.

  ‘When will you know what happened to Leila?’

  ‘In a couple of days,’ he said, hoping it was true.

  Janice was the one to show Shannon out, while McNab took advantage of the coffee machine. Strong coffee had replaced whisky as his stimulant of choice. The buzz wasn’t as good, but then again there was no hangover. He chose a double espresso, drank it in one go, then pressed the button for another.

  When Janice came back he asked if she wanted one. She asked for a latte and he did the honours. He realized he felt easier in Janice’s company since his demotion. In fact, he felt better because they were now equals. He couldn’t boss her and she couldn’t boss him.

  ‘Well,’ he said. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘That she’s telling the truth. They had a drink and met two guys. Leila took hers home. What happened next, I don’t know. When’s the post-mortem?’

  ‘Scheduled for Monday morning, first thing. D’you want to come along?’

  She nodded.

  They sat in easy silence for a moment. McNab pondered this strange turn of events. That he and DS Clark should be comfortable in one another’s company. He stole a sideways look at her as she sipped her latte. Her expression said she was also pondering something. There was a small crease in her forehead and a faraway look in her eyes. She wore no make-up. She wasn’t pretty, but she was certainly arresting to look at. He thought of a younger Annie Lennox or Tilda Swinton.

  When they’d first met he’d hit on her. She’d turned him down, which had irked at the time. So he’d put it about that she must be gay. DI Wilson had ordered him into his office and torn strips off him. McNab still flinched at the memory.

  He’d retreated after that. Janice hadn’t held a grudge. In fact, if it hadn’t been for her support in the last case, he might have lost his life, rather than just his promotion. He contemplated whether he should offer to buy her a drink as a belated thanks, then remembered he was on the wagon.

  ‘What’s the plan, then?’ Janice said.

  ‘How do you feel about contacting the brother?’

  It was by far the hardest of the jobs and she knew it.

  ‘Okay,’ she said.

  ‘I’ll speak to The Pot Still contingent.’

  Janice raised an eyebrow, which suggested that word had got out about him being off the booze.

  ‘We can swop if you like,’ McNab offered.

  ‘No need.’

  What she was really saying was that she trusted him, although in view of the Stonewarrior case, she had little reason to.

  McNab felt a surge of respect for Detective Sergeant Janice Clark. When Janice climbed the ladder to detective inspector, she wouldn’t slide back down the snake, as he had done.

  4

  The delicious smell of cooking met Rhona as she approached her front door. Her plan had been to order in food, for despite being in the presence of death most of the day, she was starving. But the aroma suggested that Sean, rather than leave, had stayed to cook for her.

  She paused before putting the key in the lock, trying to decide how to deal with this. If she appeared welcoming, that might suggest she was glad Sean had stayed on. If she was annoyed, that might give the impression she didn’t want him there at all.

  Neither way was how she felt.

  On entry, the cat came bounding towards her. Tom was no longer the small furry ball Sean had bought after her first cat, Chance, had been killed, murdered by a psychopath as a warning to her. She’d been annoyed with Sean for making the decision about a new cat without consulting her, but had gradually warmed to Tom’s presence. Yet the cat, appearing now, simply reminded her of the psychological games her former live-in lover was wont to play.

  Rather than seeking Sean out, Rhona dropped her forensic bag, removed her jacket and headed straight for the shower. Fifteen minutes later, smelling a good deal better, she entered the kitchen to find it empty.

  The table was set for one, with a note on the waiting plate.

  Food in the slow cooker. Should be ready by six, but won’t spoil. White wine in the fridge. Enjoy. Sean x

  The wrath Rhona had nursed under the heat of the shower dissipated and she felt foolish, and then a little annoyed.

  Why? Because he’d done what she’d wanted and left?

  Rhona retrieved the wine and poured herself a glass. The slow cooker, bought by Sean when they’d lived together and which she’d buried in a cupboard when she’d told him to leave, was back in pride of place on the work surface and emitting the delicious aroma she’d encountered on the stairs.

  Rhona decided not to ponder Sean’s motives or how she should interpret them, but rather just eat the food he’d prepared for her. The contents of the cooker turned out to be chicken casserole. That and the wine were definitely up to Sean’s usual standards and, she had to admit, better than the meals she generally phoned out for.

  Hunger assuaged, she took her wine through to the sitting room and settled on the couch with her laptop. There was a message from Chrissy to say she’d logged the samples taken from the flat, including the creepy dolls, then gone home. As Rhona read this, another email pinged in, this time from McNab.

  Rhona regarded it for a moment. The title ‘Monday morning’ immediately made her think he’d decided to confess to Bill Wilson. She hesitated, then opened it, and found it was simply alerting her to the post-mortem on the possible suicide.

  Her relief at this irritated her. She wasn’t usually prone to indecision, but this case wasn’t usual. If McNab would just lay off the subject, she would make up her own mind what to do. Even as she thought this, she was aware that this line of reasoning was just a way of blaming McNab for her indecision.

  Well, he’d put her in this position.

  To take her mind off McNab, she fired up
the photographs from the crime scene. Scrolling through them, she decided the images of the dolls were almost as disturbing as those of the victim.

  Now, observing the dolls en masse, Rhona realized they were arranged in three rows of nine, and that each row was divided into three, by hair colour, making nine blondes, nine brunettes and nine redheads in total. Since the cord used in the hanging was also knotted nine times, it did seem that the number nine was significant in some way or other to the victim.

  She decided to do a little online numerology research.

  When she entered ‘the significance of nine’ into the search box, Wikipedia popped up first. The detailed and substantial entry provided a great deal of information on the place of nine in mathematics, including the simple fact that when you multiply any number by nine, then add the resulting digits and reduce them to a single digit, it always becomes a nine. Intrigued by this, Rhona tried a few herself just to make sure. It seemed, said the entry, ‘that from a numerological perspective, the 9 simply takes over, like the infamous body snatchers’.

  There was also a mention of nine in Chinese lore and in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, with the nine companions of the ring and the nine Ringwraiths, matching good and evil. She learned quite a bit from her study of the number nine, but none of it offered an insight into the pattern of nine in the hanging dolls or the use of nine knots in the plaited cord.

  Of course, should the post-mortem conclusion be that it wasn’t suicide, then the cord might have been the property of the perpetrator, rather than the victim. Which led Rhona to wonder if the presence of the dolls could also be the work of the perpetrator.

  Her first thought when she heard the door buzzer was that it might be Sean returning, but she dismissed that as unlikely. At ten o’clock he would just be starting his set at the jazz club.

  When she answered the intercom, there was a moment’s silence as though her visitor might have rung the wrong flat. Rhona was about to put the receiver down when McNab finally spoke.

  ‘Can I come up?’

  ‘No.’