Cat found herself in an office that seemed transplanted from one of the buildings in the paintings. Wainscoted walls. Ranks of stag heads. Furniture that was all rosewood and buttoned leather. A stunning view across the Old Town to the Castle on its rock. And, seated behind a desk in a haze of cigar smoke, a ruddy-faced, pock-marked gentleman with neat coils of grey hair raked across a sun-blotched scalp. Cat recognised him immediately, from both the newspaper photo and the portrait in the lobby, as Alistair Dunn, patrician of the Dunn family. He waved her into a seat while still speaking on the phone.
‘—two hundred and fifty million in sales and forward contracts and fifteen million to the bottom line.’ He had a smoker’s voice burred even further by alcohol (there were half-empty bottles on the sideboard). ‘Well, I want to know why the node failed. I want to know why automated recovery didn’t kick in. And most importantly I want a cast-iron guarantee that there’s been no security breach. It’s bad enough that you’ve fucked up on one of the busiest sales days of the year. But there’ll be hell to pay if the market gets spooked. So get out there and deal with it, or I’ll nail your head to my fucking wall.’
He slammed the phone down, took one last pull on his cigar, ground the butt into an ashtray, glanced at his watch – something with a high-end strap and a gold bezel – and then glanced in Cat’s direction with an irritated sigh.
‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I’ve got exactly thirty-five minutes before I’m due across town for dinner with the Justice Minister. And I desperately need to have a dump. So I’m not going to mince words. Your name is Catriona Thomas. You come from Miami. You live in Dean Village. You own a black cat. You’re fucking the guy upstairs.’
Cat opened her mouth to interject but Dunn’s voice cleaved the air.
‘Don’t even try to speak, lassie. This isn’t a two-way conversation.’ He paused just long enough to give her a look of paint-stripping disdain. ‘Now apparently my youngest and dumbest son, Mungo, has a little thing going on in Credit Cards. Something involving rewards points. And apparently you found out about it. And apparently you’ve been sitting on your discovery until you decide what to do. And meanwhile you’ve been getting “warnings” from my son to back off. And apparently you still haven’t decided what to do. Maybe now, even now, you’re wondering if I’m going to reward you. If you’re in a position to bargain with me. If I’m going to sacrifice my own fucking son. I can see it in your eyes, that you’re still wondering.’
Cat shook her head. ‘I assure you that—’
‘Shut up, lassie. I told you not to speak.’ Dunn sucked air through yellowed teeth. ‘Now let me explain something to you. I know all about you and your history – the hotel scam in Miami. And I know all about your record here, too. Nick Bellamy has told me all about you. Your insolence. Your slutty ways. The way you bat your eyelashes, lick your lips, bend over at every opportunity. But you shouldn’t delude yourself. You’re not as irresistible as you think. You’re not even as smart as you think. And you weren’t as popular as you think in Florida, either – not at all. Your little exposé cost the bank dearly. Six per cent off the share price overnight. Millions off the balance sheets. Hundreds of thousands off annual bonuses. So don’t think you’re admired there. You were a nuisance. A cockroach. You were tolerated, but only because you were too much trouble to exterminate. Because your bank hasn’t cultivated the sort of connections we have here.’
Over his shoulder dark clouds were massing around the Castle.
‘You know, lassie’ – Dunn’s lower lip had curled – ‘I personally signed off on your appointment here. As a favour to my opposite number, you know – just to get you out of the way. For your own sake as much as anyone’s. But we never thought you’d stumble upon anything damaging. More than that, we didn’t think you’d have the inclination. The fucking gall. I mean, we knew you had a fucking American puritanical mind-set. But we didn’t think you’d import that same mentality over here. We didn’t think you’d get the opportunity. I mean, hell, what was it that set this thing off again? A letter from a customer in Dundee? My God. My fucking God. From little things big things grow, eh? And so it’s come to this.’
There was a flicker of lightning in the clouds.
‘Now listen closely, lassie, because I won’t be repeating myself.’ A minor tremble as the thunder reached the office. ‘You’re going to resign from your job. Effective immediately. Before we make you resign. You’re going to pack up and leave – not just ABC but the whole fucking country. And you’re gonna forget everything you tried to investigate, every single thing that ever passed before your eyes. And if this matter ever crosses my desk again we’ll assume it was you and we’ll be forced to take action, do you understand? Because this isn’t your playground, you’ve stepped beyond your boundaries, and if you think America is the only country where stool pigeons sleep with the fishes then you don’t know much about Scottish culture. Consider yourself lucky that we’re such a hospitable people. And don’t think for a second – not a single second – that you’ll get anywhere by pouting your lips at me. Or that it will do you any good running to the cops. Or the media. Or the unions. That we’re scared of what might happen if you do that. That it troubles us for a millisecond. Do you understand what I’m saying?’
Cat was staring at the incoming storm. It was really beautiful. She missed the Florida thunderstorms.
‘Understand?’ It was Dunn again.
She nodded, refocused on him, and said, ‘I understand.’ Hoarsely.
‘Just as well.’ Dunn grunted. ‘Just as well.’ He leaned back in his chair and took another glance at his watch. ‘Now get yourself out of my sight, you bony-arsed bitch. Dunn and dusted. Go back to your boutique little apartment in Dean Village and start packing. This is Scotland, for fuck’s sake.’
Cat rose wearily, as if wading through quicksand, but by the time she reached the door she couldn’t resist an afterthought.
‘How do you like the Devil’s whisky, by the way?’
He followed her glance to a bottle of Howgate Scotch on the sideboard. Then looked back with snarling eyes. ‘I haven’t the foggiest what you’re talking about.’
‘Never mind,’ said Cat, closing the door with a thunderous boom.
CHAPTER
FOUR
She woke up with a start. In a strange bed, in a strange room. With people talking loudly outside her door. ‘And don’t forget the cookies!’
She blinked, dragging herself out of a dream
‘The cookies – the ones on the tray!’
In her dream she was a tigress on a blood-soaked veldt.
‘Next to the coffee pot. The coffee pot!’
The dream had been so satisfying – so purifying – that it was difficult for Cat now to abandon it.
‘We can eat them on the way to the airport!’
Then reality caught up to her with a thud.
‘Take the sachets too!’
She was in the budget hotel. The one that overlooked Dean Village.
‘The coffee sachets – and the milk things!’
And it all flooded back.
After leaving the Aquarium she’d wandered through the rainswept streets, her defence mechanisms crumbling under waves of mounting despair. She’d tried so hard, after departing Dunn’s office, to keep her spirits up. She’d thought about his ludicrous Mob Boss delivery and not-so-veiled threats. She’d remembered – and tried to chuckle over – his claim that Scotland had nothing to learn from America about organised crime. She’d recalled her stoicism in Miami when dealing with even greater levels of hostility. And her lack of surprise, even at nine years old in a garden shed, at being confronted by the workings of demons.
But such steely defiance hadn’t lasted long. Because she had to consider the possibility that Alistair Dunn really did have strong links to the local constabulary. She had to wonder if he’d learned about her intimacy with Robin Boucher through Boucher himself. And she had to take seriously the possibility
that if his offer – allowing her to pack up and retreat – was an act of genuine Scottish hospitality.
She had cast herself adrift, that was the truth of it. She had come to Edinburgh hoping to burn a bridge to the past, but the perfidy of men had chased her across the ocean. And all the pressure, all the dismay, all the disillusionment was now magnified to biblical proportions. It was too much. She was a victim. She had to accept it now – she was a victim.
Overflowing with Weltschmerz, she had started weeping. The rain camouflaged her tears. She huddled into her coat, avoiding all human contact, and ploughed into the deluge through New Town lanes slick with rain and flaring reflections. At the last moment she decided she could not return to her flat and instead took refuge in a basement pub, trying to prolong the moment by ordering two courses, even though she barely had an appetite. On the wall-mounted television the seven o’clock news was typically dismal: a boat carrying three hundred refugees had sunk in the Mediterranean, a wedding party somewhere had been blown apart by a missile, a river in Asia had been poisoned by a chemical dump: dead fish, choking children, weeping women. At one point Cat, her lips trembling, heard a voice.
‘Cheer up, lass.’
She came out of her trance to find a whisky-reddened fellow at a nearby table hoisting a glass.
‘God will look after you,’ the man said, and Cat couldn’t decide if he was an angel or a satanic apparition sent to mock her.
She left the rest of her meal untouched and went to a movie – something about a lone yachtsman trying to survive a hurricane – but hardly registered any of it. When she came out it was close to midnight and rain was still sweeping across the streets. Deciding she could still not go home – not while Robin Boucher was sleeping upstairs – she headed for the budget hotel and sobbed out the last of her tears. And finally – forlorn and alienated, conquered and defeated, fearing for her life, and bursting with Fuchsteufelswild – she had fallen asleep. Dreaming of Boucher, Bellamy, Alistair Dunn, and all the devils upstairs.
In the morning she forced herself out of bed and called down to the desk.
‘Mohammed,’ she croaked. ‘I made a request last night for Room 406.’
‘It’s still occupied, Ms Thomas. I’ll let you know as soon as it’s free.’
‘I’d be grateful.’
Room 406 had the hotel’s best vantage point over Dean Village. Cat’s plan was to watch until Boucher left the building and then race over to her flat, fetch her US and UK passports and her most treasured valuables – not forgetting Thomas Cat, whom she planned to take back to the shelter – and then flee Edinburgh entirely. Perhaps go back to Florida until things settled. And pray that Boucher wouldn’t find her there.
But as it happened it took until after midday before Room 406 was free. And by that stage Dean Village was cloaked in a fog so dense she could see nothing from the windows but the outline of the squat office block across the street. She called down to the desk for a weather update.
‘I’m afraid the fog is going to be around for a while,’ Mohammed admitted, as though personally responsible. ‘Would you like to order some food or drink?’
‘I’ve had the complimentary stuff, thanks,’ said Cat.
She decided to head into ABC to collect her possessions, copy her complete files to a USB, and then officially tender her resignation. If this too represented a defeat, a surrender to powers of darkness, then so be it. She’d done enough resisting to last a lifetime.
When she arrived at the office, however, she found it curiously empty. Apart from Josh Walsh, who was printing out new tabs for the filing cabinets (one of the few tasks that Bellamy still permitted him to do), everyone seemed to be crammed into the lunchroom. She wondered if they were fielding a stern lecture from the Wing Commander, with herself and Agnes used as scare stories. For a long time, in fact, she’d suspected that her colleagues – Ross, Fergus, Lesley, Skye and Isla – were content to ‘go along with things’ just to ensure survival, when in truth they hated Bellamy as much as anyone else. Well, they were probably ‘going along with things’ now.
Alone at Jenny McLeish’s computer, Cat called up her files only to find that everything was missing. She looked everywhere, including the Recycle Bin, but all her documents and spreadsheets seemed to have been permanently deleted. And to do that would have required her password. She glanced suspiciously across the office – chatter was still floating from the lunchroom – and was about to rise when an ABC security guard appeared, escorting a uniformed policeman. For a heart-stopping moment she feared they were coming for her – that she’d been framed for something – but instead the cop was ushered directly to Bellamy’s office. Here he spent some considerable time – Cat was watching in the monitor – poking around Bellamy’s desk, examining the diary, taking a couple of photos.
Then he departed, looking very grim, and the office was largely empty again.
Cat forced herself to the lunchroom, where she saw a huge box of doughnuts on the table. Cartons of takeaway coffee. Everyone present – about seven people – seemed glued to the little TV monitor. The atmosphere was one of flimsily camouflaged excitement.
The live news feed seemed to be showing a turreted mansion somewhere – a drone camera was sweeping over a well-groomed back yard and a lichen-coated roof – with police cars crowding the street outside and crime scene tape strung up like streamers at a kid’s party. It resembled her own building when Moyle’s corpse was discovered. Some slick senior detective – the chyron at the bottom of the screen said DCI Gordon Brewer, MIT – was muttering through vinegar-sucking lips.
But Cat couldn’t hear what he was saying.
‘What’s going on?’ she said.
Beside her, Fergus grappled for an appropriately sombre expression. ‘It’s Alistair Dunn – he’s been found dead, apparently.’
‘Dead?’
‘Murdered, they think.’
Cat felt her throat swell. ‘Murdered?’
‘That’s what they think.’
Cat, her mind spinning, remembered Dunn’s last words to her: ‘I haven’t the foggiest what you’re talking about.’ She remembered McReynolds talking about his sinister connections. And Boucher saying he could protect her. Then she looked back at the TV screen to see DCI Brewer staring straight into the camera – directly at her – just as her phone vibrated. Dizzy, she hauled it out and discovered a triumphant message from Agnes.
DING DONG THE FUD IS DEAD!!!!
She shoved the phone back in her pocket and was still trying to make sense of it when Fergus added mysteriously, ‘Talk about two birds with one stone.’
She wasn’t inclined to question him at first. But then a strange suspicion seized her.
‘Two birds?’
‘You didn’t hear about Biggles?’ The other nickname for Bellamy.
Cat was almost breathless. ‘What about him?’
‘Had a massive heart attack last night.’
‘He did?’
‘In a sauna, they say.’
‘A sauna?’ In Scotland that meant a brothel.
‘His heart exploded, they reckon – what a way to go, eh?’
Cat, feeling utterly drained, glanced again at Agnes’s message, looked again at the TV – where DCI Brewer was still staring at her – and withdrew swiftly and wordlessly from the room, collected the keys to her company VW and headed downstairs to the underground car park. There, in the little metal cocoon of the Golf, she sat for a long time, fogging the windows with her breath, attempting to get a grip on herself, trying to assure herself repeatedly that this was all some sort of organised crime clean-up, and nothing at all to do with her or Robin Boucher. But again and again her mind returned to the night at Aileanach Castle, the distinguished face behind the black mosquito nets, and the smirking message from her friend Agnes Sampson the witch:
DING DONG THE FUD IS DEAD!!!!
Cat gunned the motor and boomed up the ramp, erupting into the late afternoon mist and heading around the
corner for Newington. But finding a parking spot near Agnes’s place proved difficult – even in an emergency she couldn’t bring herself to occupy a disabled space – and by the time she’d entered the street for the third time Agnes was emerging from her stair door and plunging into what looked like a third-hand Clio. Cat had to complete another circuit of the block and by the time she’d returned the Clio was taking the corner into Dalkeith Road.
With great difficulty she followed Agnes through the fog-choked streets of peak hour Edinburgh, at first thinking that she was heading to the scene of Bellamy’s death – to gloat? – and then following her past the city bypass and the Ikea store. And now she knew exactly where Agnes was going. The Clio, sure enough, turned into the blackened pine forests, where the trees were sporting early spring foliage, weaved around the serpentine road and then swung through the open gates of the Aileanach estate. Cat followed her down the foggy drive.
When she arrived at the castle she found Agnes being greeted at the door by doddery Maggie Balfour. Both women turned to watch Cat screech to a halt and fling open the VW door. They were still beaming when she marched towards them, furious.
‘You did it!’ Cat exclaimed. ‘You put a curse on Bellamy!’
Agnes chortled. ‘What are you talking about, Cat?’
‘Did you put a curse on him or not?’
‘Listen to yourself! Did I put a curse on him?’
‘All of you!’
‘All of us!’ Agnes was delighted. ‘What’s the matter with you, Cat? This is another red-letter day!’
‘People have died,’ Cat said. ‘People have been killed.’
‘Aye! Torn apart! Eviscerated! In the middle of the night!’
The Devil Upstairs Page 22