‘Mmm.’ The car was silent, for long enough to make him wonder if the connection had been lost.
‘Aileen?’ he exclaimed into the darkness.
‘I’m still here,’ she replied. ‘Thinking, that’s all. I’m not sure I want it going out through your daughter’s law firm.’
‘Listen,’ he retorted. ‘You don’t have a regular bloody lawyer that I know of. I can hardly use the Strathclyde Police press office for this, and I’ll be damned if I’ll have the end of my marriage announced by the Labour Party. Alex will have no sight of the statement, I promise.’
She drew in a deep breath, loudly enough for him to hear it clearly. ‘Okay,’ she agreed. ‘What else do you want to put in it?’
‘The minimum.’
‘Should I say that we intend to divorce?’
‘I include that among the minimum. Don’t you? If you want you can say that we’ll do it when we’ve completed the legal period of separation. Unless you want to marry Joey straight away, that is.’
‘Don’t be funny.’
‘Sorry. How’s the guy taking it anyway?’
‘He’s been lovely,’ she said.
‘I’m assuming that you and he had been over the course in the past. Yes?’
‘For God’s sake!’ Aileen protested. ‘Do you think he was a quick pick-up?’
‘Not at all; hence the assumption. What else is he likely to say?’
‘Nothing beyond what I told you. And he’s going to leave for America tomorrow, a few days earlier than planned.’
‘He probably thinks that’s very wise on his part. I mean, hanging around in a city after being caught banging the chief constable’s wife, all sorts of misfortunes might come your way. But tell him not to worry, if he is worrying, that is.’
‘I will. And I’ll tell him as well that he’s probably done you a favour.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ he asked.
‘Isn’t it obvious? When you show up somewhere with another lady on your arm, everybody’s going to say, “Aw, is that no’ nice, after what the poor man went through.” I could even hazard a guess as to who she might be.’
‘Don’t bother yourself, Aileen. You just get on with your brilliant career. I wish you every success.’
‘And you get on with yours, my dear. And you remember what I said. Now you’re wedged in the Stratchlyde chief’s chair, you’ll find it impossible to leave. And when the new single force is created, and your case against it has been knocked back, as you know will happen, you’ll want that job too, because you won’t be able to help yourself. The one and only thing that you and I have in common, my dear, is this: we are both driven by ambition.’
‘You could not be more wrong. I have only one motivation.’
‘Oh aye,’ she said, mockery in her voice. ‘And what’s that?’
‘Love.’ He continued, cutting off her gasp of derision. ‘Send me your draft. I’ll be home in fifteen minutes.’ He ended the call.
He thought about his final exchange with Aileen for the rest of the journey to Gullane. Never before had he encapsulated his driving forces in one word, but he realised that it was entirely appropriate. He loved his children, all of them with equal intensity, and he loved Sarah. And he loved his job as well, because it was his vocation, and it enabled him to be the best he could be for all of them.
He had never loved Aileen. He realised that. He had been attracted to a personality as powerful as his own, but had discovered that they could not co-exist in the same union. Eventually each had sought to dominate the other and the marriage had broken apart. This was not to say that Aileen was incapable of love herself. She had her tender side, but she would always be a leader, never a follower, and her soulmate, if he existed, would have to know that and be compliant.
The draft joint announcement was waiting for him as an email attachment when he reached home and turned on the computer in his small office. He read through it, found it factual and unemotional, and forwarded it, unamended, in a message to Mitchell Laidlaw asking him to issue it to the media at 10 a.m. next morning through his firm’s PR company. He copied the mail to Aileen, then sent Laidlaw a text message from his personal mobile advising him that it was on its way.
He had expected no reply until the morning, but within a minute, his phone rang.
‘Bob,’ Mitch Laidlaw exclaimed. ‘What a shocker. This is completely out of the blue. This will shake a few people.’
‘Clearly you haven’t seen the telly news tonight. From what I’m told it has already.’
‘No, I missed that. We were watching a film. Why, has it leaked?’
‘Not in the way you mean, but . . . go online and look at the Daily News website, you may find that explains a lot.’
‘Intriguing, but I will. There’s no chance of any . . .’
‘No, chum; not a prayer. We both know what we want to say and we’re not backing off from it. When your PR people put it out, they can add that I’m making no further comment. What Aileen chooses to do is up to her.’
‘What about the legal side of it?’ the solicitor asked.
‘We haven’t discussed that. Look after my kids’ interests if it becomes necessary; that’s all the instruction I’ll give you at this stage.’
‘I will do. The fact is, you’re pretty much divorce-proofed after the last time.’
‘Ouch!’ Skinner winced. ‘You make me sound like a recidivist.’
‘Two’s above average in our community, Bob.’
He laughed. ‘I know, but I’m coming round to the view that the first one doesn’t count.’
‘Oh yes? What does that mean?’
‘Nothing; just idle banter. Now, go on with you.’ As he spoke his landline rang out, on his desk. He peered at the caller display. ‘Incoming from my daughter,’ he said. ‘I suspect she has seen the TV news.’
He killed the mobile call and picked up the other. ‘Yes, Alex.’
‘Pops,’ his elder daughter exclaimed in his ear, ‘what the hell is this about Aileen and tomorrow’s press? I’ve just had a call from Andy. He’s been watching . . .’
‘I know. Kid, go easy on her; it wasn’t her fault.’
‘Wasn’t her . . .’
‘Alexis,’ he said, using her Sunday name for added emphasis. ‘Stop and think back, not very far back, to a time when someone was out to make trouble for me, and you left your bedroom curtains open. You with me?’
‘Yes, Pops,’ she murmured. ‘I suppose I live in a glass house.’
‘We all do,’ he replied. ‘Fortunately, you’ve minimised the chances of a repeat by moving to a penthouse.’
‘I know. I suppose I’m only angry because of the effect her behaviour might have on you.’
‘Well, don’t be. While she was with Morocco, whose bed do you think I was sleeping in? Where did I go on Saturday, when I got free of the concert hall and Glasgow? Where did you and Andy see me?’
‘At . . .’ she paused. ‘You and Sarah? You’re back together?’
‘Let’s just say we’ve got a hell of a lot in common, with three kids and a lot of personal mileage.’
‘Plus the fact that she loves you,’ his daughter pointed out, ‘and that’s the main reason why she came back from America and took the job at the university.’
‘Plus the fact that I love her,’ he conceded. ‘But the key word, darling, is “discreet”. Aileen will find out eventually, and the last thing I want is for her to get vindictive. So neither I, nor any member of my family or circle of friends, is going to say a single hard word about her. She had every right to be with Morocco, with or without the horror at the concert hall, but as it happens the guy was there for her when she chose to go to him. So be cool, promise me.’
‘I promise. What are you going to do?’
‘We, that’s Aileen and me, have done it already through Mitch, but you’re not to be involved. Don’t talk to anyone, not even people within the firm. Understood?’
‘Yes.’
‘Pops,’ she sighed. ‘Don’t be so Goddamned conscientious; do what anyone else would to and unplug the phone from the socket.’
‘Is that your legal advice?’ he chuckled.
‘No, it’s pure Alex, and I’m not advising, I’m ordering. Just bloody do it.’
‘Yes, boss,’ he replied, then, not for the first time in his life, did as she had told him.
Twenty
‘I think I preferred it when you were just another DI, and Max Allan kept you in the background.’ Scott Mann stared at the kitchen wall clock; it showed five minutes to midnight. ‘What the hell time’s this tae be comin’ in?’
His wife stared at him. ‘Don’t you bloody start,’ she warned. ‘The number of times I’ve asked you that question. That and “Where the hell have you been?” although it was always all too obvious.’
‘Ye’ll never let me forget, will ye?’
‘Bloody right I won’t; not when you start digging me up about my work. I’ve had the day from hell and I don’t need you narking at me. I didn’t ask to catch the shout to the concert hall last night, but I did and that’s the end of it. Okay?’ She barked out the last word.
He winced and glanced towards the ceiling. ‘Shh,’ he whispered. ‘Ye’ll wake the wee man. He’s no’ long asleep. He tried to stay awake for you. Ah made him put his light out at half nine, but he did his best tae hang on.’
She smiled, with a gentleness that none of her colleagues would have recognised. ‘Wee darlin’,’ she murmured. An instant later she glared at her husband. ‘As well for you though that it’s the holidays, and tomorrow’s not a school day.’
‘Well it’s no’,’ he shot back, ‘and that’s an end of it.’
‘Aye fine,’ Lottie sighed, deciding that further hostilities were pointless. ‘Where did you go, the pair of you?’ she asked.
‘We got the bus out tae Strathclyde Park. There’s a big funfair there; he had a great time. Ah got him a ticket . . . a wristband thing, it was . . . for all the rides.’
‘What about you? Did you go on any?’
‘Shite, no! Me?’
‘Come on, Scottie,’ she chuckled. ‘You’re just a big kid at heart. What was it? Too dear for both of you?’
‘No, Ah just didnae fancy it.’
‘Did I not give you enough money?’
He shook his head. ‘No, no,’ he insisted. ‘I had enough if Ah’d wanted.’ He paused. ‘Have you eaten?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ she lied. ‘I had a sandwich earlier. I just want a cup of something then I’m off.’
In truth, she would have considered committing murder for a brandy and dry ginger, but she refused to keep alcohol in the house, unless they were entertaining, when she bought wine for their guests. She had seen her husband drunk too often to do anything to undermine his constant, daily, effort to stay sober.
‘Ah’ll make you a cup o’ tea,’ Scott said. ‘Go and take the weight off your plates.’
She did as he told her, slipping off her shoes and her jacket, then slumping into her armchair. She was almost asleep when he came into the living room a few minutes later, carrying what she saw was a new mug, with the theme park logo, and a plate, loaded with cheese sandwiches and a round, individual, pork pie.
‘Eaten?’ he laughed. ‘My arse! Where are you going tae get a sandwich anywhere near Pitt Street on a Sunday night? Wee Danny Provan’s no’ going to run out and get you something, that’s for bloody sure.’
She squeezed his arm as he laid her supper on a side table. ‘You’re a good lad, Scott,’ she murmured.
‘Ah do my best,’ he replied. ‘Honest, Ah really do.’
‘I know.’
‘So,’ he continued, ‘how’s it goin’? Have you solved the case yet? No’ that there’s much to solve.’
She laughed. ‘Oh, but there bloody is. For a start, we’ve established who the two dead guys were.’
‘Ah thought you knew.’
‘We knew who they had been, through our “intelligence sources”,’ she held up both hands and made a ‘quotation mark’ gesture with her fingers, ‘so called. But now we know about them. That’s why I’m so late in. One of them went under the name of Bryan Lightbody. He lived in Hamilton, New Zealand, with a wife and a wee boy Jakey’s age, and he owned four taxis there.
‘The other one was known as Richie Mallett, single, well-off, low-handicap golfer. He lived in Sydney, in an apartment near somewhere called Circular Quay, and he had a bar there. Both of them seem to have been very respectable guys, apart from when they were moonlighting and killing people.’
Scott whistled. ‘They’ll no’ kill any more, though.’
‘No, but they did leave us a wee present.’ She broke off to demolish half of the pork pie. ‘Do you remember when you were in the job,’ she continued, when she was ready, ‘hearing of a guy called Bazza Brown?’
He frowned. ‘Remind me,’ he murmured.
‘Gangster. Fairly small time in your day, but come up in the world since then.’
‘Mmm,’ he said. ‘Aye, but vaguely.’
‘Well, they’d heard of him,’ Lottie declared. ‘We traced their car this afternoon, and we found Bazza shut in the boot.’
‘Eh?’ her husband exclaimed. ‘So he must have been in it all night. Was he still alive?’
‘No.’
‘Did he suffocate?’
‘I don’t think so. I doubt if he’d time before they shot him in the chest.’
His eyes widened. ‘Fuck me!’ he gasped.
She chuckled. ‘Those may very well have been his last words.’ She ate the other half of the pie and washed it down with a mouthful of tea.
‘No’ much use to you dead, though, is he?’ Scott remarked, recovering his composure. ‘He’ll no’ be much of a witness.’
‘He’s not going to tell us a hell of a lot,’ she conceded. ‘But nevertheless, even dead, he’s a lead of sorts. We think we know why he was involved with them. I don’t believe for a minute that he was behind the whole thing, too small a player for that, but if we can find who he was in touch with before he died, that may lead us to whoever ordered Toni Field killed.’
‘My God,’ he whispered. He looked at her, frowning. ‘You’re sure she was the target, and no’ the de Marco woman?’
Lottie nodded. ‘Oh yes,’ she replied. ‘There’s no doubt about that now, sunshine. The crime scene team found her photo, tucked away in Botha’s false passport.’
Twenty-One
‘Sod this!’ Skinner muttered. When he had plugged his landline into the wall ten minutes before six o’clock, it had told him that nineteen messages had been left for him. In theory his number was private and unlisted; he knew that some of the Scottish news outlets had acquired it by means he had chosen not to investigate, but he had no idea how many. The call counter gave him a clue. Making a mental note to have it changed, he held his finger on the ‘erase’ button until the box was empty. If any friends or family had called him, he guessed they would have rung his personal mobile as back-up.
He switched that on; there were no message waiting, but he had only just stepped out of the shower when it rang. He answered without checking the caller. No journalists had the number . . . no active journalists, but there was a retired one who did.
‘Bob,’ a deep familiar voice rumbled, the accent basically Scottish but overlaid with something else.
‘Xavi,’ Skinner exclaimed. ‘How are you doing, big fella? And those lovely girls of yours?’
Xavier Aislado, and his ancient half-brother, Joe, were the owners of the Saltire newspaper. Their father had escaped from Civil War Spain to Scotland, and eventually they had chosen to return, although in different circumstances and at different times.
Xavi, after a promising football career cut short by injury, had been the Saltire’s top journalist, and had been resp
onsible for its acquisition by the media chain that Joe, thirty years his senior, had built in Catalunya.
Their family structure was complicated. Xavi’s mother had left him behind as a child, and had gone on to have twin daughters, by a police colleague of Skinner. One of the two had taken over from Xavi as the Saltire’s managing editor, although she had been completely unaware of their relationship until then.
‘We’re all fine,’ he said. ‘Sheila and Paloma are blooming and Joe’s hanging in there. He wasn’t too well during the winter, but he’s got his love to keep him warm too. But more to the point, what is happening in your life? June called me at some God-awful hour about a story that everybody’s chasing, about your wife. She and I want you to know that we owe you plenty, so if it’s all balls, you have open access to the Saltire to help knock it down. If it’s true . . . we’ll ignore it if that’s what you want.’
‘I appreciate that, Xavi,’ Bob assured his friend. ‘As it happens it is true, but we’re proposing to deal with it like two grown-ups. Tell June to be ready for a joint statement this morning; that should put a lid on it.’
‘How about this man Morocco? Look, I’ve been there; I know how you’re liable to be feeling about him.’
‘Liable to be,’ he agreed, ‘but I’m not. Morocco’s a relative innocent in this carry-on, so don’t go looking to give him an editorial hard time. Let him stay a Scottish celebrity hero. Between you and me, the guy’s done me a favour.’
‘If that’s what you want, I’ll pass it on to June.’ He chuckled, a deep sound that made Skinner think of one of his vices, a secret that he shared with Seonaid, his younger daughter: a spoonful of Nutella, scooped straight from the jar. ‘I don’t tell her anything, you understand. On the Saltire, she’s the boss.’
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