Follow the Dead

by Lin Anderson

McNab pulled himself together. ‘First, I need to know if you found anything on there relating to Brodie. Brodie’s my investigation,’ he stressed.

  Ollie looked uncomfortable.

  ‘You found something?’

  When Ollie didn’t answer, McNab exploded: ‘For fuck’s sake. That’s why I brought you the laptop in the first place. The guy who owns it has connections with Brodie.’

  ‘That’s not what you told me. You said it was a friend …’

  ‘He is – was a friend. He said he was being threatened by Brodie. I wanted to know why.’

  ‘Well now you do.’

  McNab sat in the shadows of his kitchen. Through the window, the city’s continuing sound and movement suggested all was normal, but it wasn’t, and would never be again. The bottle of whisky he’d kept as a reminder of his sobriety stood empty on the table.

  The sickness and distaste he’d felt at Ollie’s revelation about Davey had brought him back here, with a desperate need to drown the images he’d viewed. His horror at these had been partially numbed by the alcohol, but McNab knew it would soon be back in force, and probably threefold.

  He wanted to know the truth, was desperate to ask Davey outright, but he’d have to move quickly before Ollie reported the material he’d found, after which Davey would be off-limits to him at least.

  Draining the last drop from his glass, McNab decided it was a relief to let go. For the first time since he’d embarked on his caffeine crusade, he felt … what? Human wasn’t right. It was more like being free again. Free to be a pisshead. Free to make mistakes. Free to fail.

  And he’d definitely done that. He’d forgotten that the first rule of a detective was that everyone was a suspect. Everyone was guilty until proved innocent. Instead, he’d assumed that Davey was his pal. That Mary still had a soft spot for him. That Davey was the Davey he’d known. That he wasn’t a fucking paedophile wanker that snorted cocaine while fucking wee lassies who’d run away from war and other bastards like him.

  McNab’s stomach, unused to processing alcohol in such speed and quantity, was threatening to rebel. As he bent over the sink, he contemplated the irony of it all, even as the walls of certainty that surrounded him, his professional and personal life crumbled to dust.

  The only brick left to shatter was the one he’d allotted to Dr Rhona MacLeod. Surely she wouldn’t let him down?

  55

  The meandering river had crested its banks in places, adding to the already sodden nature of the neighbouring fields. Twice on her journey from Aviemore they’d met flooding where the ditches that lined the narrow road had disgorged their load. A combination of fast-melting snow from the higher reaches of Cairngorm, plus heavy overnight rain had transformed the landscape.

  Inspector Olsen had departed for Inverness, then Aberdeen, his intention to meet McNab there seemingly in place. Rhona hadn’t quizzed Olsen about what was planned, although it appeared to involve Petter Lund and the Statoil connection with Stavanger. She only hoped McNab was in a better frame of mind by the time he got there.

  As the Land Rover eased its way along the track to the airfield, Rhona glanced up to the escarpment, now virtually free of its snow cover. The light wind that brushed the trees would no doubt provide the required updraft for any glider who wished to take advantage of the lull in the wintry weather.

  Even as she thought this, she spied a car parked outside the hangar, the doors of which stood open.

  Ruaridh seemed to be sharing her thoughts. ‘Looks like someone’s planning a flight.’

  ‘Can you drop me here?’ Rhona said. ‘I’d like a word with them.’ She didn’t respond to Ruaridh’s puzzled expression, unsure whether the question she planned to ask of the possible flier was even sensible. ‘I’ll be with you shortly.’

  As she approached the hangar, the tow truck appeared, trundling the Robin light aircraft out. Rhona waited until it was clear of the building before approaching the driver and introducing herself. The man got out and shook hands with her.

  ‘Ben Cruikshank. The Robin pilot.’

  ‘You’re taking her up?’

  He nodded. ‘Weather’s ideal for a flight.’ He glanced at the distant forensic tents. ‘I was sorry to hear about the missing girl. I hope she’s okay.’ He waited then, sensing Rhona wanted to ask him something.

  ‘Would you be able to tell if an aircraft other than this one had used the runway recently?’

  Her question had surprised him. Rhona watched as he processed it. ‘This one hasn’t been out for a week, so probably yes.’

  As they walked together towards the exposed runway, he elaborated. ‘You’re thinking of the night the melt started?’

  That was exactly what she was thinking. If a plane had landed and taken off from here as the thaw set in, then there might be evidence of that in the now-softened ground surface.

  They had to walk half the length of the runway before they found it. Ben halted suddenly then crouched. ‘Here,’ he said, pointing at the bruised and muddy grass. ‘That’s not our tracks. If you can take a print you might be able to identify the make of the tyre and possibly the aircraft.’

  Rhona thanked him and placed a marker at the spot. ‘Can you delay your flight until I lift the evidence?’

  ‘Sure thing. I’ll be in the clubhouse if you need me.’

  The two SOCOs from Inverness were already on site. Rhona sent them to do the necessary on the runway, including taking soil samples from the tyre track. If they did locate the plane there was a chance it would still have soil evidence in its tyres that would prove it had landed and taken off from this exact location.

  Buoyed up by possible confirmation that she and Olsen had been right about the suspect’s escape from the valley, Rhona made for the blue tent just inside the wood, hoping that if he had taken flight from here, Isla, alive, had been with him.

  Rhona contemplated stepping outside briefly for some fresh air. A winter sun shining on the tent, plus her own multiple layers under the forensic suit, were combining to raise her temperature. That was the problem with this outfit. You were never sure just how much you needed to wear underneath it.

  Had Chrissy been here, they would have worked swiftly and in tandem. Chrissy had recovered human remains with Rhona on numerous occasions. Her forensic assistant knew what was required and when, without instruction. As it was, Rhona had thought it easier to tackle the ground cover herself, without the aid of the other SOCOs. Hence her slower and warmer progress.

  Once begun, it had become obvious that the heap of branches wasn’t the result of managed woodland, where off-cuts tended to be fresh on top, with successively decomposing layers beneath. In this case, the pile Rhona was carefully working her way through appeared to have been drawn together, and to be all of the same vintage.

  Picking away the last of it, Rhona studied the now fully exposed rectangular area of moist, disturbed earth. Breathing in, she picked up, without a doubt, the telltale scent of decomposition. Faint but present.

  Something’s buried here. Something in the process of decay.

  Rhona realized in that moment how much she wanted that not to be the case. With every twig she’d removed, every photograph she’d taken, she’d hoped to find nothing of any consequence below.

  Immediately her brain moved into analysis. If it was Isla, how long had she lain here? How decomposed could her body be when the weather had been so cold? Then came the realization that the disturbed area appeared too small to accommodate even the slight figure of the girl she’d strapped to the stretcher in the ice cave.

  Unless of course the body had been dismembered.

  Rhona began to remove the first layer of topsoil.

  56

  He’d forsaken his plan to head for Inverness when the preliminary report from AAIB on the downed plane had arrived via email. Its initial findings had indicated that the pilot had been flying by Visual Flight Rules and had been in receipt of Flight Information Service from Air Traffic Control. The Robin li
ght aircraft had been on a non-commercial flight from Stavanger to Inverness, and had encountered severe weather conditions over the Cairngorm plateau which had resulted in icing. The outcome had been an emergency landing on Loch A’an.

  The dead pilot had yet to be identified, but he’d brought the plane down safely when he could just as likely have flown into a mountainside in the blizzard conditions.

  And for that he’d been rewarded with death.

  Olsen had his own theories about that non-commercial trip and its reasons, but they were only theories. As for why the pilot had been murdered, he suspected that he’d become a liability. Why, he didn’t know.

  He flipped on the windscreen wipers in response to the latest deluge. The heavy rain that had dispersed the snow from Cairngorm had seemingly moved east, in tandem with his journey. Here the open fields were dotted with flood water, the sheep huddled on higher ground. It was obvious the blizzard that had swept Cairngorm hadn’t hit Aberdeenshire with the same ferocity, but the following rain had.

  Having headed eastward via Grantown and Aberlour, the journey was proving to be much shorter. He’d done it before with Marita, but in summer, although like Norway, that hadn’t guaranteed an absence of rain. Olsen found himself noting various familiar landmarks and remembering incidents they’d encountered, in particular Marita’s desire not to hit the large number of pheasants that had had a habit of dashing out in front of their vehicle.

  On one occasion they’d thought they’d avoided one such bird only to be honked at by various cars once they’d entered Aberdeen. Further puzzled by the aghast stares of pedestrians at traffic lights, the truth had finally been revealed by a bus driver, who, rolling down his window, had informed them that they had a chicken stuck to their radiator grille. The chicken had turned out to be a pheasant displayed like a trophy on a wall. Olsen had been the one to prise it out and dispose of it in the nearest bin. Not an easy job. Marita’s expression, Olsen remembered, had been a mix of horror and intense amusement.

  With a startling rush of emotion, Olsen realized just how much he missed the sound of his wife’s laughter.

  That painful thought was interrupted by his mobile ringing. On the last stretch before his entry to the city, he found himself sandwiched in a line of lorries, with no chance to park. The mobile rang impatiently a few more times, then stopped. Reaching to the seat where it lay, he expected to discover Dr MacLeod’s name, but instead found an unknown landline number.

  The juxtaposition of Marita and Rhona in his thoughts had an unsettling effect on Olsen, the result of which was a sudden stab of guilt suggesting he had cheated on his wife.

  Marita’s dead.

  This internal reminder only served to increase his self-reproach. And Olsen instinctively knew why … last night when he’d been with Rhona, he’d briefly forgotten to mourn Marita.

  A kerb minus a double yellow line eventually presented itself and Olsen pulled in. The unknown number rang a few times before being answered by a male voice that said, ‘Feshie Flying Club?’

  Taken off guard by this unexpected response, Olsen explained who he was and why he’d called the number.

  ‘Dr MacLeod asked to use this phone,’ the man explained. ‘There wasn’t a signal for her mobile.’

  ‘Is she still on site?’ Olsen asked.

  ‘I don’t think so. The police cars have all left.’

  ‘Have you any idea why she called?’ he tried.

  ‘I’m sorry, I don’t.’

  As Olsen thanked the man and proceeded to ring off, he was offered one piece of important news regarding a study Dr MacLeod had made of the landing strip, which brought the semblance of a smile to his lips.

  ‘Well done, Rhona.’

  Aberdeen and Stavanger, separated by some 300 miles of harsh North Sea, had much in common, although the centre of the grey Granite City bore little resemblance to the eighteenth-century wooden structures of old Stavanger.

  The two cities, however, did owe their twentieth-century rapid growth to the same thing – petroleum harvested from the neighbouring sea which they shared. The flow of money, and influx of foreign as well as local personnel, had helped encourage the usual problems encountered by any city whose inhabitants had cash to burn.

  The company Olsen was about to visit had been set up by former police officers as a forensic service, developing state-of-the-art software to process and record crime scenes. The versatility of their product had seen them move into other areas – including the oil business, and counterterrorism, all of which had spread their work internationally. He and one of the founders, Roy Hunter, went way back.

  Olsen smiled as he pressed the entry button. Despite the circumstances, he was looking forward to seeing Roy again.

  The small conference room Olsen was shown into at R2S reminded him of the room in the Commissariat de Polis where he’d shared his tentative findings with his fellow officers. On this occasion coffee was also provided, but without the pannekaken. The other difference being that the two men and one woman who sat round the table weren’t police officers, or at least not any longer, although they arguably pursued the same goals – the collection and processing of forensic evidence pertinent to major crimes.

  The general discussion that had followed Olsen’s presentation had centred on the downed plane, the likely route it had taken and its possible cargo. Roy’s team had reacted with studied interest to the video, photographs and forensic evidence taken by Dr MacLeod at the crash scene and later at the deposition site.

  The story of the young climbing party’s demise at the Shelter Stone and the attack on Isla Crawford had followed, to which Olsen had added the ambiguous result of the subsequent postmortems.

  ‘You don’t know if they were murdered?’ Roy had said.

  Olsen had acknowledged this. ‘However, we do know that someone attacked the fourth member of the party, Isla Crawford, who was lucky to survive that attempt on her life. She fell down the mountain, landing in a snow cave over a stream from which she was rescued by Dr MacLeod and a member of the local rescue team.

  ‘After discharge from the hospital in Inverness, Isla and the van used by her party disappeared from Aviemore only to turn up here.’ Olsen now brought up an image of the van in situ near the airstrip, followed by the recordings Rhona had taken internally.

  ‘Evidence suggests the young woman had been forcibly taken from Aviemore and transported here in an injured state, but we have as yet found no human remains in the vicinity, and we believe there’s a possibility she may have been removed alive from there by plane.’

  ‘That’s the Feshie airstrip?’ Roy said, staring at the screen.

  ‘You know it?’ Olsen asked.

  ‘I’ve used it on occasion.’ Roy thought for a moment. ‘If the perpetrator was eliminating witnesses to his presence on Cairngorm, then went to the bother of kidnapping Isla Crawford, why would he keep her alive?’

  It was a question Olsen had been asking himself. He gave the only answer he could.

  ‘Something happened that changed his mind.’

  The Glasgow end of the investigation had proved to be the missing link. McNab had neither turned up nor been in contact to say why. Olsen’s annoyance at this had been tempered by concern, particularly after his conversation with Rhona about McNab earlier in the day. The detective, he knew, had a history of going off-grid and doing his own thing. That wasn’t what worried Olsen.

  It was why McNab was missing that concerned him.

  In McNab’s absence, Olsen had done his best to outline the suspected connections of his own investigation with the Glasgow drugs raid on the Delta Club and the subsequent disappearance of the Syrian refugee Amena Tamar. Neil Brodie’s name in particular had sparked a reaction, which had surprised Olsen, having been given the impression from McNab that Brodie was in no way attached to Aberdeen.

  He said as much.

  ‘Brodie’s name cropped up in a recent dockland investigation we’re working on,’ Roy had explai
ned. ‘A face appeared on CCTV which one of our observers maintained was a Glasgow-based criminal called Neil Brodie, whom he knew from previous work in the city.’

  ‘And Petter Lund?’

  ‘Someone we’re looking into as requested.’

  Roy indicated that the others in the team should now leave, seemingly intent on speaking to Olsen alone.

  ‘So, old friend,’ Roy said, when the door clicked shut, ‘what’s the bit you haven’t told me?’

  Coming to R2S had been a decision he’d taken on the flight from Stavanger. It was necessary to involve Police Scotland, but some aspects of the investigation were better kept off the table both at home and here. R2S could work independently if required, which meant what he had planned was under the radar for now, at least. The image on the Coire Cas CCTV had been the trigger for their involvement. Viewing it had rung the alarm bells even louder, because Olsen suspected he knew who Isla’s abductor might be.

  If he was proved right, then the link he’d suspected between the drug barons, the traffickers and the establishment on both sides of the North Sea was no longer tenuous, but a certainty. Exposure would be dangerous without sufficient proof, and even with, if it wasn’t handled properly. Petter Lund’s involvement at McNab’s raid on the Delta Club and Amena’s presence had signalled that the up-to-now shaky connections Olsen had sought to establish were probably true.

  Roy listened to Olsen’s sorry tale and his reason for approaching an independent forensic company. His response was, ‘If this is exposed, it puts you in the firing line.’

  ‘And if you help, you could be in it too,’ Olsen reminded him.

  Roy’s expression didn’t alter. ‘I know DS McNab, and of course Dr MacLeod. We’ve worked on many cases together before Police Scotland moved to make the most of their scene capture in-house.’ He paused. ‘McNab’s a brilliant detective …’ He halted again. ‘The establishment don’t like him. DI Wilson, his boss, has saved him on more than one occasion.’ Roy eyed Olsen. ‘He trusts Rhona.’

  Olsen gave a half-smile. ‘So I’ve chosen wisely?’

  ‘McNab’s coming?’