Conviction

by Denise Mina

  I saw a flicker of terror in Gretchen’s eyes. She knew I was right.

  She raised a hand and Scarface came for me. I was so shocked by the speed with which he moved that I spat in his face. Pink saliva and raspberry pips dripped off his scarred chin.

  Then I saw the gun in his hand. He was holding it by the barrel and he raised it over my head.

  One word, over and over again. That was all I heard before the blackness. It was Fin’s voice and he was screaming.

  ‘NOW! NOW! NOW!’

  49

  I WOKE UP. MY head was so sore I couldn’t open my eyes. I moved my fingers first. Then my bare feet. Soft. A cool breeze brushed hair on to my cheek. I opened my burning eyes one at a time.

  The bed board above me was grey silk. I was in the big bed, in crisp linen sheets. I was alone. The windows were open to the rooftops of Paris. I was back in our hotel suite.

  I tried to sit up but an electric pain shot through my head, back to front, making me cry out and lie still. My eyes throbbed with pain.

  ‘Hello.’ Fin was standing in the door.

  ‘God–how long have I been here?’

  ‘A day.’ He sat on the edge of the bed. ‘Awake some of the time.’

  ‘A whole day?’ I felt my head. There was an egg-sized lump on my scalp above my right eyebrow; it was hot to the touch.

  ‘You’ve been scanned for a haematoma but they’ll have to do it again. He left pills for the pain. They’re worried about a concussion.’

  ‘Did it drop?’

  Fin slid his phone out of the breast pocket of his jacket and looked into the lens. ‘No. The live-stream stayed up the whole time. We got everything. Scarface in vivid close-up, Violetta’s confession, everything. But,’ he said seriously, ‘it’s not all good news: we lost a lot of numbers during the wait in the hall. They picked back up when you called Violetta out. Went stratospheric then. The cops were watching and, obviously, when Scarface came in they were mobilised. He’s already wanted by police forces in a number of territories. The police were waiting outside.’

  ‘Outside?’

  ‘Well, the maid wouldn’t open the gate because they didn’t have an appointment. They had to climb over the wall.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Gretchen and Violetta were arrested by the French police for conspiracy to murder us but the Italians want to interview Violetta about Julia. They’ve got CCTV of her passing Malik’s store. The board of the football club have issued a statement saying the allegations about the stadium sell-off are unfounded but the press are all over them. They’re reopening the Dana investigation. I told them what Albert did at Skibo but they said we’d need more evidence of a crime. You can’t arrest someone for being a turd.’

  ‘That seems unfair. What are the numbers like?’

  ‘Millions. Trina Keany’s second. She wants to do a crossover podcast.’

  ‘Let’s do it. I like her.’

  I was slowly becoming aware of noises in the living room, hissing and whispering and the distant growl of a TV.

  Fin saw me look towards it and smiled. ‘So, anyway…’

  Then he got up and walked out. Didn’t even shut the door.

  But I was glad he didn’t shut the door because I heard him say something and I heard squeals. I knew who it was. Jessica and Lizzie ran into the room and got into bed with me.

  They touched my lump and said it felt hot. I held on to them. I was crying so much that I made their little chubby hands wet. Lizzie thought I was crying because my head hurt and they took turns kissing my bump better, jabbing it with passionate little kisses, taking turns. It was incredibly painful and I never wanted it to stop. With each kiss I thought of Sabine’s love for Amila, of my mum’s love for my dad, and how close I came to suicide. Trina was right. It is a passing impulse, a signal that change is needed. If I had done it I wouldn’t be here, in a giant bed in Paris, having my sore face kissed by tiny lips. I was in the afterwards, it was glorious, and a lot of people didn’t make it here.

  That is all I’m saying about that. There’s been more than enough emotional stuff in this story, crying and despair and so on.

  Hamish was out there as well, with Estelle. I was still angry, I was, but there are times in this life for hating and this wasn’t one of them. I was grateful to have such lovely people to be angry with. Maybe it was the bang on the head.

  The doctor was called back to the hotel room and his technicians used a portable scanner to check me for brain bleeds or clots. No sign of long-term damage but we were to call if there were any changes.

  It was an amazing day. A day of amnesty.

  Fin ate, my girls were there, Hamish and I talked about all my lies and sadnesses, about my mum. She was kind and tall and her face was mostly a glorious Persian nose and she was terribly proud of it. She liked gardening, and omelettes, and taught at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, and she wrote books on genre and Middle Eastern poetry. She was amazing. I think part of the reason I ran away and never came back was that I couldn’t deal with her death. And the attempt on your life, said Hamish, and the court case. I said, yes, that too. We sat on the bed together and talked about the court case, what was said, what they asked me. Hamish cried. He’s a lawyer and he cried over how they treated me in court. I found that very moving.

  He didn’t mind that I had lied about everything. I apologised for thinking about killing him so much. He apologised for telling Estelle that I hit him. He said it was to excuse himself and malign me. He was sorry, he’d been angry with me. He would come clean to Estelle. I still don’t know if he has, though.

  You know, Hamish sounds like a prick in this book but he isn’t. He’s the father of my children. He’s a good father and he has been a dear friend to me. We’re both flawed. If he told this story I might sound like a prick, or maybe a bigger prick than I already do.

  Fin went out for a walk with Estelle and when they came back he spent some time lying on the bed with me and we talked. He said she still loved him but couldn’t live with his illness. She wanted more from life and he thought that was honest. I think his heart was broken and I took his hand and told him kindly lies: it would be all right. The feelings would pass. He was ‘still an attractive woman’.

  We talked about Dauphine Loire and poor Mark Parker, both dead, and Leon. I didn’t think Leon was my friend any more, I knew he was dishonest and grasping, but he was also charismatic and charming, superficially lovely and I like shiny things. But mostly we talked about the other girl, who she might have been, the astonishing courage it took for her to stand up when she’d witnessed what happened to me. What a hero she was.

  ‘I think we should find out who she was,’ said Fin. ‘We should honour her.’

  I didn’t know. I liked to think of her as an unknown soldier, a symbol of all the girls who stood up, all those brave bold girls who saw the girls before them crucified and spoke up anyway. Many were felled and she stood for all of them.

  We watched cartoons on TV, ignored calls. We didn’t need to speak to anyone else. We spent the evening all together. Everyone that mattered was in that hotel suite and we knew it and were grateful for each other. Most people never get an hour like that.

  About ten o’clock, the medication started to lift, the fog cleared and I suddenly realised my situation: oh Christ.

  I had not been murdered. I was still alive. A doctor with a portable brain scanner and two technicians had examined me in a suite in the most expensive hotel in Paris. We were all staying here. I’d left Hamish’s car in an airport short-stay car park for five days and I had spent all of my cash running around Europe, making a podcast, something with no discernible market value whatsoever.

  That could mean only one thing: I was going to have to write this fucking book.

  Acknowledgements

  For any number of reasons, this book had a long, complicated gestation. The best editor is a good friend who’ll give you the bad word. It could not have ha
ppened without the guiding hands of Jade Chandler and Emily Giglierano. They insulted my baby with kindness and patience and understanding and I cannot thank them enough.

  Many thanks are also due to Peter Robinson and Henry Dunow, Reagan Arthur and Liz Foley.

  For the times they were and the reason I wrote a whole book about getting lost in someone else’s story to save your life, thank you Fergus.

  For the time it was and people in it: Stephen Evans, Jane Scoular, Edith Mina, Monica Toner, Owen Evans, Brian McNeill, Eve McNeill and Ellie Dowling, thank you.

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  About the Author

  Denise Mina is the author of thirteen novels, including The Long Drop, winner of the 2017 McIlvanney Prize for Scottish crime book of the year, and the Garnethill trilogy, the first installment of which won the John Creasey Memorial Award for best first crime novel. Mina has twice received the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award. She lives in Glasgow.

  denisemina.com

  @damedenisemina

  Facebook.com/deniseminabooks

  Also by Denise Mina

  The Long Drop

  Deception

  Alex Morrow Novels

  Still Midnight

  The End of the Wasp Season

  Gods and Beasts

  The Red Road

  Blood, Salt, Water

  Paddy Meehan Novels

  Field of Blood

  The Dead Hour

  Slip of the Knife

  Garnethill Trilogy

  Garnethill

  Exile

  Resolution