[ebooktalk] Quintin Jardine

• From: "David Russell" <david.russell8@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
• To: <ebooktalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
• Date: Sun, 9 Jun 2013 09:15:28 +0100

Hi

Attached is Quintin Jardine's latest in his bob skinner series.  It is
called "Pray for the dying".

Copyright © 2013 Portador Ltd



The right of Quintin Jardine to be identified as the Author of the Work has 
been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 
1988.



First published as an Ebook by Headline Publishing Group 2013



Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only 
be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior 
permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic 
production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright 
Licensing Agency.



All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real 
persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.



Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library



E-pub conversion by Avon DataSet Ltd, Bidford-on-Avon, Warwickshire



eISBN: 978 0 7553 5706 2



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Contents



Title Page

Copyright Page

About the Author

Also by Quintin Jardine

About the Book

Dedication





PreScript

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Twenty

Twenty-One

Twenty-Two

Twenty-Three

Twenty-Four

Twenty-Five

Twenty-Six

Twenty-Seven

Twenty-Eight

Twenty-Nine

Thirty

Thirty-One

Thirty-Two

Thirty-Three

Thirty-Four

Thirty-Five

Thirty-Six

Thirty-Seven

Thirty-Eight

Thirty-Nine

Forty

Forty-One

Forty-Two

Forty-Three

Forty-Four

Forty-Five

Forty-Six

Forty-Seven

Forty-Eight

Forty-Nine

Fifty

Fifty-One

Fifty-Two

Fifty-Three

Fifty-Four

Fifty-Five

Fifty-Six

Fifty-Seven

Fifty-Eight

Fifty-Nine

Sixty

Sixty-One

Sixty-Two

Sixty-Three

Sixty-Four

PostScript





About the Author



Twenty years ago Quintin Jardine abandoned the life of a media relations 
consultant for the more morally acceptable world of murder and mayhem. Over 
thirty published novels later, it’s a decision that neither he nor his global 
network of fans have ever regretted. Happily married, he splits his time 
between Scotland and Spain, but he can be tracked down through his website 
www.quintinjardine.com.





By Quintin Jardine and available from Headline

Bob Skinner series:

Skinner’s Rules

Skinner’s Festival

Skinner’s Trail

Skinner’s Round

Skinner’s Ordeal

Skinner’s Mission

Skinner’s Ghosts

Murmuring the Judges

Gallery Whispers

Thursday Legends

Autographs in the Rain

Head Shot

Fallen Gods

Stay of Execution

Lethal Intent

Dead and Buried

Death’s Door

Aftershock

Fatal Last Words

A Rush of Blood

Grievous Angel

Funeral Note

Pray for the Dying

Oz Blackstone series:

Blackstone’s Pursuits

A Coffin for Two

Wearing Purple

Screen Savers

On Honeymoon with Death

Poisoned Cherries

Unnatural Justice

Alarm Call

For the Death of Me

Primavera Blackstone series:

Inhuman Remains

Blood Red

As Easy As Murder

Deadly Business



The Loner





About the Book



‘After what happened, none of us can be sure we’re going to see tomorrow’

The killing was an expert hit. Three shots through the head as the lights 
dimmed at a celebrity concert in Glasgow. A most public crime and Edinburgh 
Chief Constable Bob Skinner is right in the centre of the storm as it breaks 
over the Strathclyde force. The shooters are dead too, killed at the scene. But 
who sent them?

The crisis finds Skinner, his private life shattered by the abrupt end of his 
marriage, taking a step that he had sworn he never would. Tasked by 
Scotland’s First Minister with the investigation of the outrage, he finds 
himself quickly uncovering some very murky deeds… and a fourth body, whose 
identity only adds to the confusion.

The trail leads to London, where national issues compromise the hunt. Skinner 
has to rattle the bars of the most formidable cage in the country, and go head 
to head with its leading power brokers… a confrontation that seems too much, 
even for him.

Can the Chief solve the most challenging mystery of his career… or will 
failure end it?





For Eileen, for ever, or as close to that as we can manage.





PreScript



From the Saltire newspaper, Sunday edition:

Strathclyde Chief Constable believed dead in Glasgow Concert Hall Shooting

By June Crampsey



Mystery still surrounds a shooting last night in Glasgow’s Royal Concert Hall 
in which a woman was killed in a VIP seat at a charity concert, inches away 
from Scotland’s First Minister, Clive Graham MSP. The identity of the victim 
has still to be confirmed officially, but it is believed that she was Antonia 
Field, the recently appointed Chief Constable of the Strathclyde Force, the 
second largest in the UK after London’s Met.



The killing was carried out by two men, who were themselves shot dead as they 
tried to escape, after murdering a police officer and critically wounding 
another.



A security cordon was thrown round the hall immediately after the incident, but 
reporters could see what appeared to be three bodies outside in Killermont 
Street, one of them in police uniform. A fourth man, said to be a police 
officer, was taken away by ambulance, and a spokesman for Glasgow Royal 
Infirmary confirmed later that he was undergoing emergency surgery for gunshot 
wounds.



Edinburgh Chief Constable Bob Skinner, husband of Scottish Labour leader Aileen 
de Marco who was a guest of the First Minister at the fund-raiser, took command 
at the scene. Briefing media in Glasgow City Chambers, he refused to name the 
victim, but did say that it was not his wife, nor was it the woman who had 
accompanied her to the concert, believed to be Edinburgh businesswoman Paula 
Viareggio, the partner of another senior police officer in the capital, 
Detective Chief Superintendent Mario McGuire.



Most of the eyewitnesses refused to speak to journalists as they were ushered 
away from the concert hall. Many seemed to be in shock. However, world-famous 
Scottish actor Joey Morocco, Master of Ceremonies for the evening, told the 
Saltire as he left, ‘There was complete confusion in there.



‘The conductor, Sir Leslie Fender, had just raised his baton and the house 
lights had dimmed when I heard three sounds that I know now were shots, one 
after the other. Then everything went completely dark, pitch black, and someone 
started screaming.



‘Before that, though,’ Mr Morocco continued, ‘I was standing in the wings 
and I was facing the audience. In the second or two before the lights went out, 
as the shots were fired, I saw movement in the front row. There were three 
women on the First Minister’s left.



‘Aileen, she’s a friend, by the way, she was sat furthest away from him, 
then her companion, Paula, and then the lady who’d arrived with Mr Graham. I 
don’t know her name, but somebody said she’s the chief constable. I saw her 
jerk in her seat then start to fall forward. That’s when the lights went out.



‘The emergency lighting came on automatically, after a few seconds. It 
wasn’t much good, but I could make out that the seat next to the First 
Minister was empty and that there was a shape on the floor.



‘There was panic after that. I heard Mr Graham shouting for help, then I 
could just make out a policeman rushing forward. I think it was Mr Allan, the 
assistant chief constable. I tried to use the mike but it was useless with the 
power being out, so I jumped up on to the conductor’s podium and yelled to 
everyone to stay in their seats and stay calm until the lighting was restored. 
But the people in the rows nearest the front, some of them realised what had 
happened and they started to panic.



‘Mr Graham was brilliant. He stood up, called out to everyone to stay where 
they were, for their own safety. It was an incredibly brave thing to do,’ Mr 
Morocco added. ‘He might have been the target himself and the gunman might 
still have been there, but he put himself right in the line of fire, then he 
took off his jacket and put it over the woman on the floor. That’s when I 
knew for sure that she was dead.



‘Thing is,’ he explained, ‘she was wearing a red dress. Normally at a big 
public event Aileen wears red, her party colours, but last night, for some 
reason, she didn’t. So I’m wondering if she was the intended target and 
whether the gunman just made a mistake.’



Addressing journalists in a hastily convened briefing in the Glasgow City 
Council Chambers, after being asked by the First Minister to take charge of the 
situation, Mr Skinner refused to comment on Mr Morocco’s speculation.



‘It’s way too early to be making any assumptions,’ he said firmly. ‘We 
believe we know who the shooters were, but we’re a long way from 
understanding their motives.’



Asked whether Al Qaeda might be involved, he replied, ‘I’m not ruling that 
out, but the gunmen were not Muslim and the nationality of a third person 
involved in the plot makes that highly unlikely. However, I can tell you that 
this was a well-planned operation carried out by people with special skills.



‘We’ve been able to establish already that the hall was blacked out by an 
explosion that took out the electricity substation serving the building. It was 
remotely detonated as soon as the shots had been fired. We’re also sure that 
the two men gained entrance to the building dressed as police officers, and 
ditched their disguises before trying to escape.’



He refused to go into detail on how they had been killed, or by whom.



When I spoke to him later, by telephone, he explained that neither of the 
victims could be identified before their next of kin had been told. He added 
that the First Minister was under close protection at his home, and that his 
wife was also being guarded at a secret location.





One



‘I put Paula in harm’s way, Mario,’ Bob Skinner murmured, as he gazed at 
his colleague, their faces pale in the glare of the freestanding spotlights 
that had been set up to illuminate the scene. ‘I am desperately sorry.’

Never before had Detective Chief Superintendent McGuire seen his boss looking 
apprehensive, and yet he was, there could be no mistaking it.

‘How exactly did you do that, sir?’ he replied, stiffly. ‘Your wife 
invited my wife to chum her to a charity concert. Given that Aileen is a former 
and possibly future First Minister of our country, most people would regard 
that as something of an honour.’

‘Someone tried to kill her,’ Skinner hissed. ‘There was intelligence that 
a hit was being planned. You know that; I knew it. I was asleep at the fucking 
wheel, or I’d have considered that as a possibility.’

‘Then it was Paula that saved her life, Bob,’ McGuire pointed out, more 
gently. ‘If she hadn’t told Aileen that she was wearing a red outfit, on 
account of her being so pregnant it was the only thing that would fit, then 
Aileen would have worn her usual colour.’

The chief constable frowned. ‘But Paula isn’t wearing red.’

‘No, she found something else. Thank your lucky stars again that she didn’t 
think to tell Aileen about it. Stop beating yourself up, man. Nobody’s going 
to blame you for anything, least of all me. Paula’s all right, she’s off 
the scene, and that’s an end of it.’

Skinner nodded towards the splayed body, a few yards away from where they 
stood, in front of the auditorium stage of Glasgow’s splendid concert arena. 
‘She would blame me, if she could.’ He put a hand to an ear. ‘If I listen 
hard enough I reckon I’ll hear her. Five minutes, that’s all it would have 
taken. If we’d got to our informant five minutes earlier…’

‘You’d probably have been caught in traffic,’ his colleague countered, 
‘and got here no quicker. Okay, if the Strathclyde communications centre 
hadn’t been on weekend mode, you might have got the word to ACC Allan and 
prevented the hit… but they were and you didn’t.’

‘Speaking of old Max,’ Skinner murmured, ‘how is he? I didn’t have time 
to talk to him when he met us at the entrance. “She’s dead,” he said. 
That was all. I assumed it was Aileen. I didn’t wait to hear any more. I just 
charged inside and left him there.’

‘He’s wasted; complete collapse. When I got there he was sitting on the 
steps in the foyer with his face in his hands. He had blood on them; it was all 
over his face, in his hair. He was a mess.’ He paused. ‘The guy you were 
with, the fellow who took Paula and Aileen away. I only caught a glimpse of 
him. Who is he?’

‘His name’s Clyde Houseman. Security Service; Glasgow regional office.’

‘He’s sound?’

‘Oh yes.’ Skinner’s eyes flashed. ‘Do you think for a minute I’d 
entrust our wives’ safety to him if I wasn’t sure of that? I told him to 
take them to the high security police station in Govan and to keep them there 
till he heard from me. And before you ask, there’s a doctor on the way there 
to check Paula out, given that she’s over eight months gone.’

‘But she was fine, as far as you could see?’ McGuire asked, anxiously.

‘Yes, like I said. Obviously, she got a fright at the time… not even 
Paula’s going to have the woman in the seat next to her shot through the head 
without batting an eyelid… but when I got to her she was calm and in control. 
Far more concerned about Toni Field than about herself.’

‘Did she see…’

‘Not much. Even when the emergency lighting came on, it wasn’t far short of 
pitch dark, and Clive Graham got between her and the body, and made his 
protection officers rush her and Aileen out of there, into the anteroom where I 
found them. Aileen screamed bloody murder, of course.’

‘Was she in shock?’

‘Hell no. It wasn’t from fright. She just didn’t want to leave. I’m a 
cynic where politicians are concerned, and my wife’s no different from any of 
them, maybe worse than most. She wanted to be seen here alongside Clive Graham, 
who appears to have been a complete fucking hero. He’ll get the headlines and 
Aileen was livid that she’ll be seen as a weak wee woman, hiding behind her 
husband. I wasn’t fucking wearing that, mate. I told Houseman to get them out 
of there, regardless of what she wanted, and I sent Graham’s people back to 
do their job.’ He grunted. ‘You know that actor guy, Joey Morocco? Didn’t 
he turn up on the bloody scene while all this was going on, demanding to know 
that Aileen was all right!’

‘Morocco? The movie star? What’s his interest in Aileen?’

‘The very question I put to him, but she said they were old friends. News to 
me, but they were all over each other. I might as well not have been here. He 
offered to take the girls to his place, but I told him that unless it was 
bomb-proof like the Govan nick, that wouldn’t be a starter. Then I told him 
to clear out, with the rest of the civilians.’

‘How long are you going to keep them there?’

The chief constable’s eyebrows rose. ‘Christ, Mario, I haven’t thought 
that far ahead. I’ve been here for twenty-five minutes, that’s all, trying 
to keep this crime scene secure till the forensic team arrive. Anyway, this 
isn’t our patch. That’s an operational decision for…’

‘Indeed.’

Both police officers turned towards the newcomer. McGuire, irked by the 
interruption, frowned, but Skinner knew the voice well enough. ‘Clive,’ he 
murmured in greeting, as the First Minister stepped into the silver light, with 
his two personal protection officers no more than a yard behind him. He was 
tartan-clad, waistcoat and trousers, but no jacket. The chief constable guessed 
that garment was draped over the body of Toni Field.

The woman had been his arch-enemy. She had been a surprise choice as head of 
the Strathclyde force, a job for which he had declined to apply, in spite of 
the entreaties of his wife and of the retiring chief. Most Scots assumed, 
therefore, that she had been appointed by default, but Skinner recognised the 
quality of her CV, and even more important its breadth, with success in the Met 
and England’s Serious Crimes Agency added to relevant experience as chief 
constable of the West Midlands.

She and Skinner had been on a collision course from their first meeting, when 
it had become clear that Field was in support of the unified Scottish police 
force advocated by Clive Graham’s government, and that she expected to be 
appointed to lead it, regardless of his own ambitions.

As it happened, those no more included heading Graham’s proposed force than 
they had inclined him towards Strathclyde. Skinner was firmly against the idea, 
on principle. He had shunned the Glasgow job because he felt that a force that 
covered half of Scotland’s land mass and most of its population was itself 
too large.

He had always believed that policing had to be as locally responsible as 
possible, and when he had discovered a few days earlier that his wife, the 
First Minister’s chief political rival as leader of the Scottish Labour 
Party, intended to back unification and help rush it through the Holyrood 
parliament, their marriage had exploded. Aileen had moved back to her flat, 
ostensibly for a few days, but they knew, both of them, that it was for good.

‘How are you?’ he asked the First Minister. He had no personal issues with 
him. His position and that of his party had been clear from the start; his 
wife’s, he was convinced, was based on political expediency, pure and simple.

‘In need of another very stiff drink,’ Graham replied. ‘Yes, I’ve 
already had one, but I suspect I’m going to get the shakes pretty soon. What 
happened… it hasn’t quite sunk in yet. Please brief me, on everything. I 
can’t get any sense out of the locals, and my protection boys don’t know 
any more than I do.’

Both Skinner and McGuire realised that he was making a determined effort not to 
look at the thing on the floor.

‘Are the ladies safe?’ he continued.

‘Yes,’ Skinner replied.

‘The pregnant one? She’s…’

‘My wife,’ McGuire whispered.

The First Minister stared at him.

‘This is DCS McGuire,’ Skinner explained. ‘My head of CID. I had promised 
my kids some attention today, so Aileen invited Paula to use the other 
ticket.’ Not a lie, not the whole truth. ‘And yes, thank you. She’s okay. 
Obviously Mario here will be keeping her in cotton wool from now on, but 
she’ll be fine, I’m sure.’

‘That’s good to hear. Now, do you believe there’s a continuing threat?’

‘No, I don’t, but we shouldn’t take any chances.’

‘What happened? None of us really knows, Bob. Who was it? Did they get 
away?’

‘It was a professional hit team. Originally there were three, but one of 
them, the planner, died a few days ago, unexpectedly, of natural causes. The 
body was dumped in Edinburgh. The other two didn’t think for a minute we’d 
identify him, but we did, and as soon as we knew who he was, we knew as well 
that something was up. We guessed the venue, but we got the target wrong. We 
thought they were after the pianist, the guy who was supposed to be playing at 
this thing.’

‘Theo Fabrizzi?’

‘Yes. For all his name, he’s Lebanese, and he’s a hate figure for the 
Israelis. We didn’t find out any of this until the last minute. When we did, 
we got him out of here. You were probably told he’d been taken ill, but that 
was bollocks. The guy’s a fanatic, a martyr with a piano; he wouldn’t back 
off, so we arrested him and took him away, spitting feathers, but safe.’

‘My God,’ the First Minister exclaimed. ‘Why wasn’t I told this at the 
time?’

‘We were too busy sorting the situation out,’ Skinner shot back, irritably. 
‘Or so we thought. And there was another reason,’ he added. ‘I 
shouldn’t have to tell you that your devolved powers do not include 
counter-terrorism. That’s reserved for Westminster.

‘As soon as we identified Cohen, the planner, MI5 got involved, with the Home 
Secretary pulling the strings. There had been intelligence that a hit was 
planned in the UK, but no details. With Cohen and his team in Scotland, 
assumptions were made, and we all bought into the piano player as the target. 
Then the Home Secretary got brave… God save us all from courageous 
politicians in fucking bunkers in Whitehall, Clive… and decided that she 
wanted her people to catch the rest of the team. She declared that it was a 
Five operation, and that the police shouldn’t be alerted, in case of crossed 
wires.’

‘So how did you get involved?’

‘I was in play by that time, having asked them for help in identifying 
Cohen.’

Graham’s face was creased into a frown that made him unrecognisable as the 
beaming man on the election posters. ‘But if…’ he growled.

Skinner nodded. ‘There was someone else involved, the man who supplied the 
weapons. My MI5 colleague and I got to him,’ he paused and checked his watch, 
‘less than ninety minutes ago. We interrogated him and he told us that from a 
remark by one of the shooters, when they collected the guns last night, the 
target was definitely female.

‘Obviously that changed everything. At that point…’ he paused, ‘. . . 
well, frankly, it was fuck the Home Secretary’s orders. We headed straight 
through here. I tried to stop the event, but in all this mighty police force, 
Clive, I could not find anyone willing to take responsibility, until it was too 
late. You know what happened then.’

‘What about the terrorists? Did they escape in all the confusion? Nobody can 
tell me, or will.’

‘They’re dead. They were making their escape when we arrived. They’d just 
shot the two cops manning the door.’ He sighed, shuddered for a second, and 
shook his head. ‘Fortunately my Five sidekick was armed or we’d have been 
in trouble. We didn’t negotiate. Captain Houseman killed one. I took down the 
other one as he tried to run off. But don’t be calling these guys terrorists, 
Clive. They weren’t. No, they were…’

He broke off as his personal mobile phone… he carried two… sounded in his 
pocket. He took it out and peered at the screen, ready to reject the call if it 
was Aileen spoiling for a renewed fight, but it was someone else. ‘Excuse 
me,’ he told the First Minister. ‘I have to take this.’

Graham nodded. ‘Of course.’

He slid the arrow to accept, and put the phone to his ear, moving a few paces 
away from the group, skirting Toni Field’s body as he did so.

‘Hi, Sarah,’ he murmured.

‘Bob!’ she exclaimed. Skinner’s ex-wife was cool and not given to panic, 
but the anxiety in her voice was undeniable.

‘Where are you? Are you okay? What’s happened? I’ve just had a call from 
Mark. He told me he heard a news flash on radio about a shooting in Glasgow, at 
an event with the First Minister and Aileen. That’s the event that she and 
Paula were going to this evening, isn’t it? He says someone’s dead and that 
your name was mentioned. Honey, what is it? Is it Aileen?’

‘Shit,’ he hissed. ‘So soon. They’re not saying that, are they, that 
it’s Aileen?’

‘I’m not sure what they said but Mark was left wondering if it might be. 
He’s scared, Bob, and most of all he’s scared for you.’

‘In that case, love, please call him back and calm him down. Yes, I am at the 
scene, yes, there is a casualty here, and others outside, but none of them are 
Aileen or anyone else he knows. And it’s certainly not Paula. They’re both 
safe.’

‘But how about you?’ Her voice was strident.

‘You can hear me, can’t you? I’m okay too. I might not be in the morning, 
when it all sinks in, but I am fine now, and in control of myself.’ As if to 
demonstrate, he paused then lowered his voice as he continued. ‘Are you 
alone?’ he asked. ‘Are you at home?’

‘Yes, of course, to both.’

‘Good. In that case, I need you to do a couple of things. Call Trish,’ 
their children had a full-time carer; their sons had reached an age at which 
they refused to allow her to be called a nanny, ‘and have her take the kids 
to your place. As soon as you’ve done that, get hold of my grown-up daughter. 
I’m guessing she hasn’t heard about this yet, or she’d have called me, 
but Alex being Alex, she’s bound to find out soon. She may be at home; if 
not, try her mobile… do you have the number?’

‘Yes.’

‘Fine, if you can’t raise her on either of those, try Andy’s place. Tell 
her what I’ve told you. I don’t have time to do it myself; the fan’s 
pretty much clogged up with shit here.’

‘Where will you be?’

‘That remains to be seen, but I’ll keep you in touch.’

‘When will you be out of there?’

‘Same answer.’

‘When you are,’ she told him, ‘come here first. It’s important that the 
kids see you as soon as they can.’

‘Yes, sure.’

‘What about Aileen?’

‘What do you mean?’ Bob asked.

‘Will she be coming back with you?’

‘No,’ he replied, with a sound that might have been a chuckle or a grunt, 
‘not even in protective custody. I told you last night, she and I are done.’

He glanced to his right. The First Minister and McGuire had been joined by a 
youngish man, in a dark suit. Strained though it was, his face was familiar to 
Skinner, but he found himself unable to put a name to it. Graham caught his 
eye, and he realised that they were waiting for him to finish his call. ‘Now, 
I must go,’ he said.

‘Take care,’ Sarah murmured.

‘Don’t I always?’

‘No.’

A brief smile flickered on his lips, but it was gone before he returned his 
phone to his pocket. He rejoined the group, and as he did so he remembered who 
the newcomer was. They had met at a reception hosted by his wife, during her 
time as Clive Graham’s predecessor in office.

‘Bob,’ the First Minister began, ‘this is…’

‘I know: Councillor Dominic Hanlon, chair of Strathclyde Police Authority.’ 
He extended his hand and they shook. ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’

Hanlon whistled, softly. ‘I could say something very inappropriate right now. 
It’s an open secret that you and Toni didn’t get on.’

‘You’ve just said it, Mr Hanlon,’ Skinner snapped. ‘You’re right; 
it’s as far from appropriate as you can get. Are you implying I’m glad to 
see her dead?’

‘No, no!’ The man held his hands up, in a defensive gesture, but the chief 
constable seemed to ignore him.

‘Colleagues don’t always agree,’ he went on, ‘any more than 
politicians. Like you two for example; anywhere else you’d be at each 
other’s ideological throats.’ He felt his anger grow, make him take the 
councillor by the elbow. ‘Come here,’ he growled. He pulled him towards the 
body on the floor, knelt beside it and removed the covering jacket, carefully.

‘This is what we’re dealing with here, chum. Look, remember it.’ The back 
of the head was caked red, and mangled where three bullets had torn into it. 
The right eye and a section of forehead above it were missing and there was 
brain tissue on the carpet.

Hanlon recoiled, with a howl that reminded the chief constable of a small 
animal in pain, as he replaced the makeshift cover.

‘Poor Toni Field and I might have had different policing agendas,’ he said, 
‘but we each of us devoted our careers to hunting down the sort of people who 
would do that sort of thing to another human being. You remember that next time 
you chair your fucking committee.’

‘I’m sorry,’ the younger man murmured.

‘You want to know how I feel?’ Skinner, not ready to let up, challenged. 
‘I feel angry, so walk carefully around me, chum.’

‘Yes, of course,’ Hanlon said, patting him on the sleeve as if to mollify 
him. ‘Surely, the chances are it wasn’t Toni they were after. Everybody 
outside is saying it’s Aileen that’s been shot… our Aileen, we call her 
in Glasgow. There’s folk in tears out there.

‘I thought it was her myself until the First Minister told me otherwise. Only 
the people in the front row could possibly know what’s really happened and I 
doubt if any of them do. They all think it’s Aileen because that’s the 
natural assumption. I think these people made a mistake, and shot the wrong 
woman.’

‘For God’s sake, man!’ Graham barked, beside him. ‘This is Aileen’s 
husband, don’t you realise that?’

‘Yes, of course! Sorry.’ The councillor seemed to collapse into his own 
confusion.

Skinner held up a hand. ‘Stop!’ he boomed. ‘Enough. We’ll get to that, 
and to Dominic’s theory. First things first.’ He turned to McGuire. 
‘Mario, did you come through here alone?’

‘No, boss,’ the massive DCS answered. ‘Lowell Payne, DCI Payne, our 
Strathclyde secondee, he’s with me. He’s outside in the foyer; it was sheer 
chaos when we arrived, with no sign of anybody in command, so I told him to 
take control out there, calm people down as best he could, and move them out 
the other exit, so they wouldn’t go past bodies outside.’

The chief nodded. ‘Well done, mate. My priority was in here when I arrived. 
With Max Allan not making any sense, all I could do was get hold of a uniformed 
inspector and tell him to contain the audience within the hall, until we could 
be sure that there was no further threat outside. Where is everyone?’

‘Payne said he would gather them in the foyer and in the smaller theatre. 
There’s enough back-up lighting for that to be managed safely.’

‘Okay, that sounds fine. Now, you shouldn’t really be here at all, but you 
charged through here like a red-taunted bull as soon as you heard your wife 
might be in danger. Whatever, your priority will always be her. Get yourself 
off to the Govan police station, pick her up from there and take her home.’

‘What about Aileen?’ McGuire asked.

‘She stays there, till someone in authority says otherwise. Find Clyde 
Houseman and tell him from me that he takes no instructions from anyone below 
chief officer rank. On your way, now.’

He turned back to the politicians. ‘Now. You two were working up to say 
something before Dominic here put his foot in it. What was it?’

‘We’ve got a crisis, Bob,’ Graham replied. ‘Strathclyde is in trouble, 
and that’s putting it mildly. The chief constable is dead, the deputy chief 
took early retirement a fortnight ago, Max Allan, the senior ACC, has just been 
taken away in an ambulance with severe chest pains, and the two other ACCs are 
far too new and inexperienced in post to move into the top job, even on a 
temporary basis… and even without the force facing one of the highest-profile 
murder investigations it’s ever known, as this will become.’

Hanlon nodded, vigorously. ‘As you’ve just pointed out to me, Mr Skinner, 
graphically, this is a major crime, and even if Toni’s killers… and the 
killers of one, maybe two police officers… are lying dead in the street 
outside, the matter isn’t closed.’

‘Maybe three, maybe four,’ Skinner murmured.

The Police Authority chairman blinked. ‘Eh?’

‘How did they get the uniforms? We don’t know that. Did they bring them, or 
did they take them from two other cops we haven’t found yet?’

‘My God,’ Hanlon gasped. ‘I hadn’t thought about that.’

‘Bob,’ the First Minister intervened. ‘This investigation needs a leader. 
This whole force needs a leader and it needs him now. We don’t have time for 
niceties here. I want to appoint you acting chief constable of Strathclyde, 
pending confirmation by an emergency meeting of Dominic’s authority. That 
will take place tomorrow morning.’

‘Me?’ Skinner gasped. ‘Strathclyde? The force whose very existence I’ve 
opposed for years? Is there nobody else? What about Andy Martin? He’s head of 
the Serious Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency. He could do the job.’

Graham shook his head. ‘He could, I agree, but everybody knows he’s your 
protégé, not to mention him being your daughter’s partner. He’d be seen 
as second choice, and I can’t have that. I need the best man available, and 
that is you. Please, help me. Your deputy in Edinburgh is more than capable; 
she can stand in there. Please take the job; in the public interest, Bob, even 
if it does go against your own beliefs.’

Skinner stared at him. ‘You’ve really boxed me in, man, haven’t you?’

‘It’s not something I’d have chosen to do.’

‘No, I believe you. That’s the way it is, nonetheless.’ He sighed. 
‘Fuck it!’ he shouted, into the darkness of the empty hall.

‘Can I take that as a yes?’ the First Minister whispered.





Two



‘And you’ve agreed?’

‘What else could I do, Andy? The Police Authority meets tomorrow to confirm 
it formally, and it’ll be announced on Monday. But it’s for three months, 
that’s all. I’ve made that clear.’

There was a silence on Andy Martin’s end of the line, until he broke it with 
a soft chuckle. ‘Would that be as clear as you’ve made it to anyone who 
would listen that you would never take the job under any circumstances?’

‘Yes, okay, I have said that,’ Skinner conceded. ‘But,’ he protested, 
‘who could have predicted these particular circumstances?’

‘Nobody,’ his best friend conceded. ‘That’s why the “any” part of 
it was a mistake. Now let me make a prediction. However hard it was for you to 
get into the job, it will be harder for you to get out.’

‘Nonsense! I said three months and I meant it. They’ll be glad to see me 
go, Andy. The politicians will hate me here; remember, most of them are 
followers of my soon to be ex-wife.’

‘Your what?’ Martin exclaimed. ‘Come on, Bob. Alex told me you’d had a 
row over police unification, but I’d no idea it was that serious. You’ll 
get over it, surely.’

‘No, we won’t. Too much was said, too much truth told. This isn’t like 
when Sarah and I broke up, or you and Karen. We haven’t drifted away from 
each other like then, we’ve torn the thing apart. Besides…’ He stopped in 
mid-sentence. ‘No, that’s for another time. I have things to do here. First 
and foremost, I’ve got a very messy crime scene to manage. Second, I’ve got 
to face the press.’

‘Where are you going to do that?’

‘I’ve told the press office to use the City Chambers. Hanlon, the Police 
Authority chair, is going to fix it. I could have done it on the front steps of 
the concert hall, but I want to move the media, or as many as I can, away from 
there, so the people who were in the auditorium can leave as easily as we can 
manage. They’re having to go that way, into Buchanan Street, since there are 
still three bodies lying in Killermont Street.’

‘I know Hanlon; he’ll want to sit alongside you.’

‘You’re right. He’s asked if he could, and not only him. Clive Graham 
tried it before him. I’ve told them both that they’re not on. This is the 
assassination of a high-profile public figure we’re dealing with and I’m 
damned if I’m having anything that sniffs of political posturing alongside 
it.’

‘Hah!’ Martin exclaimed. ‘That’s already happened. I’ve just seen 
that Joey Morocco guy vox-popped on telly, outside in Buchanan Street. The way 
he tells the story, the First Minister’s something of a hero, standing up in 
the line of fire when the emergency lights came back on. Graham’s going to 
have to give himself a gallantry medal.’

‘Stupidity medal more like.’ Skinner paused. ‘Did Morocco say who the 
victim is?’

‘No, but he did say it isn’t Aileen, or Paula. They are both unhurt, yes?’

‘Yes, fine, I’ve spoken to them both, before I had them rushed out of here. 
Aileen wanted to stay and wave the red flag, of course.’

‘Ouch! Bob, can I do anything? Personally, or through the agency?’

‘Yes, you can. I’d like you to take Alex to Sarah’s, and stay there with 
her. I don’t believe for a second there’s any sort of threat to them, but 
I’m feeling a bit prickly, and I want all my family under one roof and looked 
after till I can get to them.’

‘I understand. I’ll do that. Now, Alex wants to speak.’

Skinner could picture his elder daughter snatching the phone from her 
partner’s hand. ‘Dad!’ Her voice had the same breathless tone as 
Sarah’s, a little earlier.

‘Be cool, kid,’ he told her. ‘The panic’s over; there’s no hostage 
situation or anything like that. Andy will tell you as much as he can. I have 
things to do and then I have to go to the Royal Infirmary. We have a cop there 
fighting for his life and I have to see how he’s doing. Go now. I’ll see 
you when I can.’

He ended the call and walked back towards the pool of light in front of the 
stage. The First Minister had been escorted away by his protection officers, 
and Councillor Hanlon had gone to the Glasgow council headquarters, to have 
them made ready for the media briefing to come. But Skinner was not standing 
guard alone.

‘I’ve just spoken to your niece,’ he said to Detective Chief Inspector 
Lowell Payne. ‘I didn’t tell her you were involved, though, in case she 
phoned Jean. There’s enough anxiety in my family without spreading it to 
yours.’

There was a personal link between the two men, one that had nothing to do with 
the job. Ten years after the death of Skinner’s first wife, Myra, Alex’s 
mother, Payne had married her sister.

‘Thanks, Bob. I appreciate that.’

‘Don’t mention it. Listen, Lowell, this job I’ve taken on, temporary or 
not, I have to be on top of it from the start. That means I need to get up to 
speed very quickly on the basics of the force, areas where my knowledge may be 
lacking: its structure, its strengths and its weaknesses, as perceived within 
the force.

‘I’m going to need somebody close to me, to advise me and instruct me where 
necessary, a sound, experienced guy. You’ve got twenty-five years plus in the 
job, all of it in Strathclyde. Will you be my aide, for as long as I need one? 
Officially, mind; you’ll come off CID for the duration and operate as my 
liaison across the force. You up for it?’

The DCI seemed to hesitate. ‘Are you not worried there might be talk, about 
you and me being sort of related?’

‘No, and anyway, we’re not. My daughter being your niece does not make you 
part of my family, or me part of yours.’

‘In that case the answer’s yes.’

‘Good. Now, what’s happening outside?’

‘Everybody’s calm, and they’re leaving. They’re all potential 
witnesses, I know, but there’s no need to ask them all for contact details, 
since they’re all on a central database. They all booked through the 
internet, so they all had to leave their details.’

‘Good man. Not that we’ll need to go back to any of them. None of them can 
answer any of the questions we need to ask.’

‘Those being?’

‘Who sent the hit team, and why?’

Payne frowned. ‘Why? Does there have to be a why these days, when terrorism 
is involved, and politicians are the target?’

‘Doesn’t matter. It’s our job to look for it.’

‘And mine to help you.’

Skinner turned. He had recognised the voice, from many similar scenes over many 
years. The man who faced him was clad in a crime-scene tunic, complete with a 
paper hat that failed to contain the red hair that escaped from it. Looking at 
him the chief wondered if he would have recognised him in ordinary clothes, or, 
God forbid, in uniform.

‘Arthur,’ he exclaimed. ‘You’re looking as out of water as I feel. What 
the hell are you doing in Glasgow?’

‘You should know, boss,’ Detective Inspector Dorward replied. ‘You 
approved the set-up. Ever since forensic services were pulled together into a 
central unit, we’ve gone anywhere we’re needed and more than that, we’ve 
had a national duty rota at weekends. I drew this straw. And bloody busy I’ve 
been. I’d not long left a very messy scene in Leith when I got the call to 
come through here.’ He paused. ‘But I could ask you the same question. Why 
are you here?’

‘I was following a line of inquiry. It led me here.’

Dorward raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh aye,’ he drawled. ‘I know what that means. 
So far I’ve counted four bodies on the ground. Any of them down to you?’

‘Just the one.’

Dorward nodded towards the figure under the jacket. ‘Not her, though?’

‘Definitely not. Now don’t push your luck any further, Arthur.’

‘Fair enough, Chief; in return, you get your big feet off my crime scene.’ 
He looked at Payne. ‘And you.’ He paused. ‘Here, weren’t you at 
Leith?’

The Strathclyde DCI nodded.

‘Then what the fuck’s going on here? What’s the connection?’

‘Never mind that,’ Skinner told him. ‘This is what matters. For openers, 
we need you to recover the bullets that killed our victim here, for comparison 
with the ones that were recovered from the two bodies in Leith.’

‘Are you saying they’ll be the same?’

Skinner nodded.

‘And if they’re not?’

‘Then we’re all going to find out how deep shit can get. Go to work, 
Arthur.’

‘Errr…’ a deep contralto voice exclaimed from the relative darkness 
beyond the floodlights, ‘can we just hold on a minute here?’

Its owner stepped into the bright light. She was tall, around six feet, and 
wore, over an open-necked white shirt, a dark suit that did nothing to disguise 
the width of her shoulders. Her hair was dark, swept back from a high forehead, 
her eyes were a deep shade of blue, but her nose was her dominant feature. A 
warrant card was clipped to the right lapel of her jacket.

She eyed Skinner, up and down, no flicker of recognition on her face. ‘So who 
the hell are you, to be giving orders at my crime scene?’ she asked, slowly.

The chief constable took his own ID from a pocket and displayed it. She looked 
at it, then shrugged.

‘That doesn’t answer my question,’ the woman retorted. ‘That says 
Edinburgh. Okay, the earth might have moved for me last night, but not that 
much. As far as I know, this is still Strathclyde.’

Payne took half a pace forward. ‘Cool it, Lottie. This is Chief Constable Bob 
Skinner, and you know who I am.’

She frowned at him. ‘Sure, I know who you are. You’re a DCI and you’re in 
strategy. I’m serious crimes, which this as sure as hell is, from what I was 
told and what I saw outside. That puts me in command of this crime scene.’ 
She nodded sideways, in Skinner’s general direction. ‘As for our friend 
here…’

‘Sir,’ Payne sighed, ‘I must apologise to you, on behalf of the 
Strathclyde force. My colleague here, DI Charlotte Mann, she’s got a 
reputation for being blunt, and sometimes she takes it to the point of 
rudeness. Lottie, get off your high horse. We know what’s happened here…’

‘I don’t,’ she snapped back. ‘I know there’s a dead cop outside in 
Killermont Street, and two other gunshot victims, but I don’t know how they 
got there. I don’t know who’s under that jacket…’

‘You’d better take a look, then,’ Skinner told her.

‘You speak when you’re spoken to… sir. And don’t be trying to tell me 
my job.’ She stepped across to the body.

‘Be careful over there,’ the blue-suited Dorward warned, but she ignored 
him as she lifted the jacket from the prone form.

‘Bloody hell!’ she exclaimed as she observed the shattered head. She peered 
a little closer, then looked over her shoulder, at Payne. ‘Lowell,’ she 
murmured ‘is this… ?’

He nodded.

‘And the two men outside?’

He nodded again. ‘The shooters.’

‘So you see, Inspector,’ Skinner said. ‘We do know what’s happened 
here.’

The DI glared at him. ‘You might, chum, but the procurator fiscal doesn’t, 
and it’s my job to investigate these incidents and report to her. So you can 
shove your Edinburgh warrant card as far as it’ll go. It means nothing to me. 
As far as I’m concerned, you’re just another witness, and for all I know 
you might even be a suspect. My team should all be here within the next few 
minutes. Do not go anywhere; they will be wanting to interview you.’

‘Aw, Jesus!’ Payne laughed, out loud. ‘I’ve had enough of this.’ He 
glanced at Skinner. ‘May I, sir?’

‘You’d better,’ the chief conceded. He moved aside, letting the DCI step 
up to his CID colleague and whisper, urgently and fiercely in her ear, then 
catching her eye as she looked towards him, nodding gently, in answer to her 
surprise.

She walked towards him. ‘They didn’t waste any time filling the chair,’ 
she said.

‘They… they being the First Minister and the Police Authority chair… felt 
that they didn’t have a choice. I was asked and I accepted: end of story. 
It’ll be formalised on Monday, but as of now you take orders from me and 
anyone else I tell you to.’ He paused. ‘Now, Inspector, tell me. How are 
your traffic management skills?’

Lottie Mann held his gaze, unflinching. ‘The traffic will do what I fucking 
tell it, sir,’ she replied, ‘if it knows what’s good for it. But 
wouldn’t that be a bit of a waste?’

Skinner’s eyes softened, then he smiled. ‘Yes, it would,’ he agreed, 
‘and one I don’t plan to have happen. I know about you, Lottie. ACC Allan 
told us all about you, at a chief officers’ dinner a while back.’

For the first time, her expression grew a little less fierce. ‘What did he 
say?’ she asked.

‘He said you were barking mad, a complete loose cannon, and that you were 
under orders never to speak to the press or let yourself be filmed for TV. He 
told us a story about you, ten years ago, when you had just made DC, demanding 
to box in an interdivisional smoker that some of your male CID colleagues had 
organised, and knocking out your male opponent inside a minute. But he also 
said you were the best detective on the force and that he put up with you in 
spite of it all. I like Max, and I rate him, so I’ll take all of that as a 
recommendation.’

Mann nodded. ‘Thank you, sir. Actually it was inside thirty seconds. Can I 
take your statement now… yours and the guy I was told you arrived with?’

The chief grinned again. ‘Mine, sure, in good time. My colleague, no. His 
name won’t appear in your report and he won’t be a witness at any 
inquiry.’

‘Spook?’

‘Spook. That reminds me.’ He turned to Payne. ‘Lowell, there is bound to 
be at least one CCTV camera covering the Killermont Street entrance. I want you 
to locate it, them if there are others, and confiscate all the footage from 
this afternoon. When we have it, it goes nowhere without my say-so.’

‘Yes, sir.’

As the DCI left, Skinner led Mann away from the floodlight beam and signalled 
to Dorward that he and his people could begin their work. He stopped at an 
auditorium doorway, beneath a green exit sign and an emergency lamp.

‘Lottie, this is the scenario,’ he said. ‘On the face of it, a contract 
hit has taken place here. I can tell you there have been rumours in the 
intelligence community of a terrorist attempt on a British political figure. 
So, it’s being suggested there’s a possibility Chief Constable Field was 
mistaken for the real target: my wife, Aileen de Marco, the Scottish Labour 
leader. Aileen usually wears red to public functions. This evening she 
didn’t, but Toni Field did.’

‘That suggestion’s bollocks,’ she blurted out. ‘Sir.’

His eyebrows rose. ‘Why?’

‘A couple of reasons. First, and with respect…’

The chief grinned. ‘I didn’t think you had any of that.’

‘I do where it’s deserved. I know about you too. And I know about your 
wife. She’s my constituency MSP, and she’s a big name in Glasgow, even in 
Scotland. But not beyond. So, killing her, it’s hardly going to strike a 
major blow for Islam, is it?’

‘Go on.’

‘Okay. You say this is a contract hit. So, let’s assume that the two guys 
outside weren’t amateurs, however dead they might be now.’

‘Far from it. They were South African mercenaries, both of them.’

‘Right. That being the case, they’re going to have seen photographs of 
their target. Your wife is about five eight and blonde. Toni Field was five 
feet five with her shoes on and she had brown hair. But even more important, 
Aileen de Marco is white, and Chief Constable Field was dark-skinned. These 
people knew exactly who they were here to kill, and they didn’t make a 
mistake. That’s my professional opinion. Sir.’

Skinner gazed at the floor, then up, engaging her once again. ‘And mine too, 
Detective Inspector,’ he murmured. ‘But let’s keep it to ourselves for 
now. The media can run with whatever theories they like. We won’t confirm or 
knock down any of them. Tell me,’ he added, ‘what did you think of Toni 
Field?’

‘Honestly?’

‘I don’t believe you could tell it any other way.’

‘On the face of it, she was a role model for all female police officers. In 
reality, she was a careerist, an opportunist and another few words ending in 
“ist”, none of them very complimentary.

‘I liked DCC Theakston, but she had him out the door as fast as she could. I 
more than like ACC Allan, he’s the man I’ve always looked up to in the 
force, and she had her knife out for him as well. She might have been a good 
police officer herself, but she didn’t know one when she saw one. I have a 
feeling that you might.’

‘I believe I’m looking at one.’ He pushed the door open. ‘Come on. 
You’re with me.’

‘Where? I’m supposed to be in command here.’

‘Mmm. True,’ he conceded. ‘Okay, get your team together, and give them 
dispositions. You need to search the building for anything the shooters left 
behind. The weapon they used was a Heckler and Koch, standard police issue, so 
the assumption is, they must have worn uniforms to get in.

‘Tell your people to find those, and then find out whether they’re 
authentic. If so, we need to establish whose they were, because we’re looking 
for those owners. Beyond that the work here’s for Dorward and his people. 
Once you’ve got your people moving, I have to do a press conference, and I 
want you with me.’

‘Me?’

‘Absolutely. I think Max was wrong to hide you away. You’re a gem, Lottie; 
the Glasgow press deserve you. Just mind the language, okay?’





Three



‘Can I get you coffee?’ the Lord Provost of Glasgow asked.

Bob Skinner smiled. ‘That’s very kind of you,’ he replied, ‘but given 
that it’s nine o’clock on a Saturday evening, if we accepted you’d either 
have to make it yourself or nip out to Starbucks. No, the use of your office 
for this short meeting is generosity enough. Now, if you’ll…’

Dominic Hanlon took the hint. ‘Come on, Willie,’ he murmured. ‘This is 
operational; it’s not for us.’

‘Oh. Oh, aye.’ The two councillors withdrew.

The Lord Provost was still wearing his heavy gold chain of office. Skinner 
wondered if he slept in it.

‘Right,’ he said, as the door closed. ‘We’ll keep this brief, but I 
wanted a round-up before we all left.’ He looked to his right, at Lottie 
Mann, and to his left, at Lowell Payne, who had joined them as the press 
briefing had closed.

The conference had been a frenzied affair. It had been chaired by the 
Strathclyde force’s PR manager, but most of the questions had been directed 
at Skinner, once his presence had been explained.

‘Can you confirm the identity of the victims, sir?’ the BBC national news 
correspondent had asked. She was new in the country, and new to him, sent up 
from London to make her name, he suspected.

‘Sorry, no,’ he had replied, ‘for the usual next-of-kin reasons, not 
operational. However,’ he had added, halting the renewed clamour, ‘I can 
tell you that the First Minister is unharmed, as is the Scottish Labour leader, 
Aileen de Marco, who was also present.’

‘Joey Morocco says the victim inside the hall was female, and that she was 
sitting next to the First Minister.’

‘Joey Morocco was there. I wasn’t. I’m not going to argue with him.’

‘Why isn’t the First Minister here?’

‘Because he was advised not to be.’

‘By you, sir?’

‘By his own protection staff.’

‘Does that mean there’s a continuing threat?’

‘It means they’re being suitably cautious.’

‘There are two men lying in Killermont Street, apparently dead. It’s been 
suggested that they were the killers. Can you comment?’

‘Yes they were, and they are both as dead as they appear to be.’ Skinner 
had winced inwardly at the brutality of that reply, but nobody had picked up on 
it. ‘As is the police officer they murdered as they left the hall,’ he had 
continued. ‘His colleague is in surgery as we speak.’

‘Are you looking for anybody else?’

‘You’re asking the wrong person. I’m here by accident, remember. That’s 
a question for Detective Inspector Mann of Strathclyde. She’s the officer in 
charge of the investigation.’

Lottie Mann had handled herself well. She had given nothing away, but she had 
made it clear that the multiple killings at the concert hall would be 
investigated from origins to aftermath, like any other homicide.

The one awkward question had been put by a Sun reporter, with whom Mann had 
history, after arresting him for infiltrating a crime scene.

‘Aren’t you rather junior to be running an investigation as important as 
this one?’

She had nailed him with a cold stare. ‘That’s for others to decide. I was 
senior officer on duty tonight and took command at the scene, as I would have 
in any circumstances.’

‘By the way, you did fine in there, Lottie,’ Skinner told her, in the Lord 
Provost’s small room. ‘You did fine at the scene as well; took command, 
took no shit from anybody, and that’s how it’s supposed to be.’

‘To tell you the truth, sir,’ she confessed, as subdued as he had seen her 
in their brief acquaintance, ‘I was in a bit of a panic when I heard that ACC 
Allan had been taken away. I hope he’s all right.’

‘He is,’ Payne reassured her, ‘reasonably so. I called the Royal on my 
way down here. They gave him an ECG in the ambulance, and there’s no sign of 
a heart attack. They’re going to keep him in, though; apparently his blood 
pressure’s through the roof and he’s in shock.’

‘How about the wounded man?’ the chief asked. ‘What’s his name, by the 
way?’

‘PC Auger. Still in surgery, but the word is that he’ll survive. He was 
shot in the chest, but the bullet missed his heart and major arteries. It did 
nick a lung, though, and lodge in his spine.’

‘And his colleague?’

‘Sergeant Sproule. His body’s been taken to the mortuary.’

‘Who’s seeing next of kin?’

‘Chief Superintendent Mayfield,’ Payne told him. ‘She’s divisional 
commander.’

‘Okay. And Toni’s next of kin? Was she married? I don’t know,’ Skinner 
confessed. ‘She and I never got round to discussing our private lives.’

‘I don’t know either, sir. Sorry.’

‘No reason why you should, but raise the head of Human Resources, wherever he 
is, and find out. Whoever her nearest and dearest is needs to be told, and 
fast.’

‘Yes, they do,’ Lottie Mann said, ‘because the whole bloody world will 
soon know she was there if it doesn’t already. Chief Constable Field was a 
big Twitter fan. She posted every professional thing she did on it. No way she 
won’t have tweeted that she was chumming the First Minister to a charity 
gig.’ She scowled. ‘I’d ban that fucking thing if I could.’

Skinner whistled. ‘Thank God you didn’t say that to the press.’ He 
smiled. ‘Max Allan would never let either of us forget it. Lowell,’ he 
continued, ‘do you know where the other ACCs are?’

‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘I thought you’d need to know that. Bridie 
Gorman’s on holiday, in Argyll, I’m told, but ACC Thomas turned up at the 
concert hall just after you’d left. He was for taking command, but I told him 
that he’d better speak to Councillor Hanlon down at the City Chambers. He 
did, and when he’d done that, he went off in what I can best describe as the 
huff.’

‘Oh shit,’ the chief constable sighed. ‘That I did not need. I know 
Michael Thomas through the chiefs’ association. He was very much in the Toni 
Field camp on unification of the forces. In fact, at our last meeting, when 
things got a bit heated, I told him to shut the fuck up unless he had something 
original to say.’ He smiled. ‘Don’t worry, though, Lowell. I’ll make 
sure he doesn’t hold it against you when I’m gone in three months.’ He 
paused. ‘Till then, don’t worry about him. You might still be only a DCI in 
rank, but working directly for me as acting chief, you’ll be taking orders 
from nobody else. Now, have you located the CCTV footage?’

‘Yes, sir. There was only one camera, and I’m getting the footage. CCTV 
monitoring in the city is run by a joint body that’s responsible for 
community safety. Councillor Hanlon and ACC Gorman are on the board, and in a 
situation like this one, we get what we want. In fact, they were expecting a 
call from us. Their manager said the monitor person crapped himself when he saw 
what happened.’

‘I’m not surprised.’

‘What do you want me to do with it?’

‘I want you to keep it close to you. I want to see it on Monday, and 
obviously Lottie has to have access as senior investigating officer, but, 
Inspector, you and you alone are to view the footage.’

She frowned. ‘What am I going to see there?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know for sure, but if I’m right, I’ll be in shot… Christ,’ 
he chuckled, ‘what have I just said? . . . and so will someone else, with me. 
If that’s so, he is absolutely off limits.’ He paused. ‘Lottie, I hope 
you didn’t have a big date tonight…’

‘Only with my husband and son,’ she said. ‘We were going for a Chinese.’

‘Well, I’m sorry about that, but I need you to go back up to the concert 
hall, resume command, and make sure that everything in this operation is done 
exactly by the book. By now they’ll have found shell casings, probably in one 
of the lighting booths overlooking the stage, and those two discarded police 
uniforms. Let’s just pray they don’t have bullet holes in them.’ He gave 
her a card. ‘That’s my mobile number. Keep me in touch.’

She smiled. Until then Skinner had not been certain that she knew how. ‘Yes, 
boss. But… I’m only a lowly DI. There’s a whole raft of ambitious guys 
above me on the CID food chain, including my two line managers. What do I do 
when one of them turns up and says he’s taking over?’

‘One, you ask him why it’s taken him so long to get there. Two, you tell 
him he’d better have a bloody good answer to that question for the acting 
chief constable, first thing on Monday morning. Thing is, Lottie, Max Allan was 
the ACC responsible for criminal investigation. He won’t be around for a 
while, and in his absence CID will go straight to me. To be frank, even if he 
was, that’s how it would be. It’s the way I work. Questions?’

Payne and Mann shook their heads.

‘Good. You know where to get me if you have to. Get on with what you have to 
do. I’m off to stick my head in the lioness’s mouth.’





Four



‘You really are a fucking fascist at heart, Bob, aren’t you?’ she hissed.

‘If that’s how you want to see me,’ he retorted, ‘then honestly, I 
don’t give a damn. I got you out of there because there was a belief that 
you, not Toni Field, was the target of those people. And you know what? If they 
had shot Paula instead, who was sat between the two of you, Toni would have 
done exactly the same as I did. She’d have got you out of there, and fast.’

‘I should have stayed in the building,’ she insisted.

‘Why? You’re not First Minister any more, Clive Graham is. You were a 
fucking liability in there, Aileen, somebody else to worry about. I couldn’t 
have that. Plus,’ he hesitated for a second, ‘you happen to be my wife. I 
didn’t bend any rules to protect you, but believe me, if I’d had to, I 
would have.’

‘That’s irrelevant,’ Aileen de Marco shouted. ‘I should have stayed 
there. It was my duty; I’m the constituency MSP. I should have been there but 
instead I’m hiding in this bloody fortress like some kid who’s afraid of 
the dark.’

‘No, you were hidden, if you want to put it that way, because there was a 
chance you might still have been at risk.’

‘Does that chance still exist?’

‘I don’t believe so,’ he replied, ‘although I can’t be certain.’

‘But I’m free to leave here?’

‘To be honest, you always were. Don’t tell me that hadn’t occurred to 
you. But you stayed here. Aileen, you’re allowed to be scared! A woman has 
just been shot dead, a few feet away from you. You may not have noticed this, 
but her blood is spattered on your dress. The assistant chief constable is in 
hospital suffering from shock. I am strung out my fucking self! So what’s 
your problem?’

‘I was detained, man, against my will. Can’t you see that? I’m a 
politician, and as such I can’t be seen to be showing weakness in the face of 
these terrorists.’

He threw up his hands. ‘Okay, Joan of Arc, go. There isn’t a locked door 
between you and the street, and I will arrange for a car to take you wherever 
you want to go, even if it’s back to our place in Gullane.’

‘Hah!’ she spat. ‘The only time I’ll be back there is to collect my 
clothes. I’ve got somewhere to go tonight, don’t you worry, and I will not 
have a police guard outside the door either.’

Skinner stood. ‘You bloody will. You may leave here, but you will have 
protection, wherever you are. That’s Clive Graham speaking, not me. He’s 
ordered it, and I’ve had arrangements made. For the next couple of days at 
least, you will have personal security officers looking after you. That is not 
for debate, but don’t worry, discretion is included in their training.’

It had been a casual remark, meaning nothing, but she flushed as he said it and 
he realised that he had touched a nerve.

‘I don’t want to know, Aileen,’ he murmured.

‘As if I care,’ she snorted. ‘Isn’t life bloody ironic? You and I go to 
war because I’m for police unification and you’re against it, yet here you 
are in command of a force that covers half of Scotland.’

‘Temporary command,’ he pointed out.

‘So you say, but I know you better than that. You may not have volunteered 
for this job, but now you’re in it, you won’t want to let it go. Up to now 
you’ve chosen your own pond, and been its biggest fish. Now one’s been 
chosen for you, by fate, but your nature will still be the same. Once you get 
your feet under that desk in Pitt Street, Fettes will never be quite big enough 
for you again. That’s how it will be because that’s how you are, like it or 
not!’





Five



‘You might have told me you were goin’ to be on the telly, Mum,’ Jake 
Mann mumbled, as he disposed of the last of his cereal. ‘I’d have told all 
my pals to watch.’

‘I didn’t have much notice of it, Jakey,’ Lottie replied. ‘Anyway, I 
wouldn’t have wanted you to do that, given the subject.’

‘You should have combed your hair.’

She raised an eyebrow and glared at the nine-year-old. ‘Maybe, but my 
hairdresser wasn’t available at the time. I could have done with a bit of 
lippie as well, but the make-up room was in use.’

‘You were good, though,’ Jake said, reaching for his orange juice.

‘Good?’ she boomed.

‘Brilliant,’ he offered. ‘Pure dead brilliant.’

‘You’re getting there, kid.’

‘Who was that big man alongside you?’

‘That was Mr Skinner. He’s from Edinburgh, but he’s going to be our chief 
constable for a while.’

‘Is that right?’ a voice from the doorway asked.

Lottie turned, and frowned. ‘Hey,’ she exclaimed, ‘the Kraken’s 
awake.’

‘The Kraken of dawn,’ Scott Mann moaned, as he shambled barefoot into the 
kitchen, in T-shirt and shorts.

‘Dawn? It’s half past eight, for Christ’s sake.’

‘Aye, and you didnae get in till midnight.’

‘Sorry, but you saw what happened. Didn’t you?’

‘Not really. The telly didn’t show much. They just said the chief constable 
was deid, that was all, even though you and the guy Skinner wouldnae say so.’ 
He looked at her as he lifted the kettle to check that it was full, then 
switched it on. ‘Izzat right?’

She frowned. ‘It’s right.’

‘How?’

She nodded towards their son. ‘Pas devant l’enfant.’

‘Eh?’

‘It means “Not in front of the child”, Dad,’ Jake volunteered. 
‘Mum’s always saying it so I looked it up on the internet.’

‘That’s your mother all over, Jakey. She got an O grade in French at the 
high school, and she thinks she’s Vanessa Paradis.’

‘Hah, and you’d just love it if I was, sunshine. I’m closer to being her 
than you are tae Johnny Depp, that’s for sure.’ She paused. ‘He’s 
nearer my height and all.’ Her husband was stocky in build but he stood no 
more than five feet eight. ‘Yes, that’s a deal, you can have Vanessa and 
I’ll have Johnny.’

‘Naw!’ Jake protested.

Lottie laughed. ‘Chance would be a fine thing, wee man. On you go if you’re 
finished; see what’s on CBeebies.’

Their son needed no second invitation to watch television. He grabbed a slice 
of buttered toast and sprinted from the room.

‘So?’ Scott asked, as the door closed. ‘What did happen?’

‘Three bullets in the head from a professional. The thing was very well 
planned. They blew the power as soon as they’d fired. They shot two cops on 
the way out… Sandy Sproule and Billy Auger…’

‘Aw, Jesus,’ her husband exclaimed. ‘I ken Sandy. Is he…’

‘Yes, I’m afraid so. He died instantly. Billy Auger will live, but 
they’re not sure he’ll walk again. Spinal damage.’

‘Bastards.’

‘Ye can say that again. They’d have got away too, had not Skinner and 
another bloke arrived just seconds after they’d shot them. I’ve seen the 
video. The other guy did for one of them straight away. His buddy ran for it, 
but Skinner picked up Sandy’s carbine and put two rounds through him. Never 
batted a fucking eyelid either, either on the tape or later, inside the hall. 
The only thing he was sorry about was that if he’d just wounded the guy he 
might have given us a clue tae who sent him. But he said that from that range 
all he could do was aim for the central body mass, as per the training manual. 
That is one fucking hard man. I couldn’t have done that, I’ll tell you.’

Scott squeezed her hand. ‘You know what, love? I’m glad about that.’ The 
kettle boiled. ‘Want another?’ he asked.

She handed him her mug. ‘Quick one. I’ve got to be out again. I’ve had 
crime scene people workin’ all night up at the hall and in Killermont Street. 
I’ve set up a temporary murder room, I have to get up there to pull 
everything together. Killermont Street’s still closed to traffic and 
there’s another event due in the hall tonight. Some golden oldie rocker; 
it’s a sell-out and they’re desperate not to cancel, so time is, as they 
say, of the essence.’

Her husband stared at her. ‘Can they do that? Just open the place the night 
as if nothin’s happened?’

‘As long as they put a patch in the carpet,’ she said. ‘They won’t get 
the blood and the brain tissue out with bloody Vanish, that’s for sure. And 
they’ll have to get joiners in to fix the boards in front of the stage. They 
had to dig a couple of flattened bullets out of there. They’ll maybe keep the 
lights low all the time, that’ll help.’

His eyes widened. ‘Imagine. Somebody’s goin’ to be occupying a seat 
tonight, and last night a woman was… Wow.’

‘Ah know,’ she agreed. ‘It’s a bit ghoulish. Listen, Scott, if I could, 
I would close the hall tonight as a mark of respect. Any polis would. But the 
hall manager says that people will be coming from all over Scotland to hear 
this guy. Some’ll have left already.’

‘Not any polis,’ he said.

She looked at him, surprised. ‘Come again?’

‘Ah still have pals in the job,’ he replied, ‘even though I’ve been out 
for five years. From what they tell me, Antonia Field won’t be missed by too 
many people. A lot of people, me included in my time, liked Angus Theakston, 
the deputy chief, and I know you did too. It’s an open secret that she more 
or less sacked him. A guy Ah know worked in his office. He says they had a 
screamin’ match one day that folk in Pitt Street could have heard, and that 
Mr Theakston put his papers in next morning, and was never seen in the office 
again. She treated old Max Allan like shit too, my pal said. The only one she 
had any time for was Michael Thomas.’

‘He’s a fucking weasel,’ Lottie muttered. She sipped her tea. ‘You 
never told me any of this before.’

‘Ah was told on the QT. You’re a senior officer; Ah didn’t want to get my 
pal intae bother.’

‘Eh?’ she exclaimed. ‘Do you actually think that I would come down on a 
guy because of something you told me?’

‘Come on, hen,’ he protested, ‘you’re a stickler and you know it. We 
used tae work thegither, Ah’ve seen you in action, remember; been on the 
receiving end too.’

‘Aye,’ she retorted, ‘and had your own back too. Let’s not go there, 
Scott. Just don’t keep anything else from me. Okay?’

‘Okay.’

‘Good, now I’ve got to go.’

‘When’ll you be back?’

‘Soon as I can.’

‘You’ve forgotten, haven’t you?’

‘Forgotten what?’

‘We promised Jakey we’d take him to Largs.’

‘Bugger!’ she swore. ‘I’m sorry, Scott.’

‘Don’t say sorry tae me. Save it for the wee man.’

‘Aw, don’t be like that. You know what it’s like. Look, when I say as 
soon as I can, I mean it. But I will have to put a report on Skinner’s desk 
first thing tomorrow, ready to go to the fiscal. And I will have to work out 
where the hell we go from here, given that our new acting chief’s gone and 
killed the only possible bloody witness.’

His expression softened. ‘Ah know, love, Ah know.’

She picked up her purse from the work surface and extracted three ten-pound 
notes. ‘Here,’ she said. ‘Take him wherever he wants to go with that.’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘You’re takin’ a chance, aren’t you?’

She frowned. ‘I’d better not be.’ She headed for the door. ‘Have fun, 
the pair of you. See you.’





Six



The bedroom door creaked as she opened it, jerking him from a dream that he was 
happy to leave. ‘Are the kids awake yet?’ Bob mumbled, into the pillow.

‘Are you joking?’ Sarah laughed. ‘It’s five past nine.’

Their reconciliation, which had come after a burst of truth-talking only a day 
and a half before, had taken them both by surprise, but the next morning 
neither of them had felt any guilt, only pleasure, and possibly even relief.

Their separation and divorce had not been acrimonious. No, it had been down to 
a lack of communication and each one of them had concluded, independently, that 
if they had sat down in the right place at the right time and had talked their 
problems through in the right spirit, it might not have happened at all.

‘You what?’ Bob rolled over and sat up in a single movement. He was about 
to swing a leg out of bed, but she sat on the edge, blocking him off.

‘Easy does it,’ she said. ‘They don’t know you’re here.’

‘They’ll see my car.’

‘No they won’t. You parked it a little way along the road, remember.’

‘Alex and Andy?’

‘They left after you crashed. That was quite an entrance; five minutes to 
midnight. Your first words, “Gimme a drink,” then you polished off six 
beers inside half an hour.’ She paused, then murmured, ‘I can always tell, 
Bob, the more you drink, the worse it’s been.’

‘I know,’ he admitted. ‘And the bugger is, the older I get, the less the 
bevvy helps.’

‘So I gather. You did some shouting through the night. It’s just as well 
this house is stone, with thick walls. How do you feel now?’

‘My love, I do not know.’ He reached out and tugged at the cord of her 
dressing gown. She slipped out of it, and eased herself alongside him.

She held his wrist, with two fingers pressed below the base of his thumb. 
‘Your heart rate is a little fast.’

‘Probably the dream. It was a bastard.’

‘Are you ready to tell me what happened?’

He slipped his right arm around her shoulders. ‘I told you last night. Toni 
Field is dead, and somehow I let Clive Graham talk me into taking her place for 
three months. Three months only, mind, even though Aileen and Andy both say 
once I’m there they’ll never get me out.’

‘Hey,’ Sarah murmured. ‘Maybe the witch knows you better than I 
thought.’

‘You think so too?’ He shook his head, and a slight grin turned up the 
corners of his mouth. ‘And here was me thinking you and I were making a new 
start.’

‘Then let me put it another way. Sometimes you don’t know where your duty 
lies until it’s brought home to you. You’ve been frustrated since you 
became chief in Edinburgh; I can see that. You were never really keen on the 
job, without really knowing why. When you were talked into taking it, you found 
out. It was more or less what you’d been doing before, but it made you more 
remote from your people and more authoritarian.

‘But Strathclyde’s different. You’ve always known why you didn’t want 
that job; you grew up there in a different time and you feel that force is too 
big, and as such too impersonal. Now that you’ve been forced into the hot 
seat by circumstances in which, in all conscience, you couldn’t decline, you 
might find the challenge you’ve been needing is to change that. You get what 
I’m saying?’

‘Yes.’ He paused. ‘But I’m a crime-fighter.’

‘I know,’ she agreed, ‘but even Strathclyde CID’s remote, isn’t it? 
If you can bring that closer to the people in every one of the hundreds of 
communities within the force’s area, then won’t they feel safer as a 
result, and won’t that be an achievement?’

‘Okay,’ he nodded, ‘I can see your argument. Maybe you’re right… and 
maybe if this new unified force does happen it’ll be even more important to 
have someone in charge who thinks like I do. But probably you’re wrong. The 
chances are I’ll be back in Edinburgh by November. The chances are also that 
the unification will happen and I’ll walk away from it.’ He hesitated, and 
his forehead twisted into a frown. ‘That’s the way I feel right now.’

‘So tell me why,’ she whispered. ‘Although I think I can guess, having 
seen this before.’

‘I killed someone,’ he whispered, ‘one of the South Africans. His name 
was Gerry Botha. He probably didn’t murder Toni Field, not personally, but he 
was part of the team that did: not just her, but three other people in the last 
forty-eight hours, and God knows how many more in other places, before that. 
I’ve shot people before in the line of duty…’ He sighed. ‘Christ, 
darlin’, most cops never handle a firearm, but I’m always in the firing 
line. At the time it’s a decision you have to make in a split second. I’ve 
never been wrong, or doubted myself afterwards, but there comes a time when you 
have to think that however evil the life you’ve just snuffed out, someone 
brought it into being.

‘Gerry Botha and his sidekick Francois Smit, they probably have mothers and 
fathers still alive, and maybe wives and maybe kids who see completely 
different men at home and who’re not going to have them to take them to rugby 
and cricket or the movies or to the beach any more, like I did yesterday with 
ours before all this shit happened, and when I start to play with all that in 
my head I start to think, “Oh God, perhaps that man wasn’t all that 
different from me, just another guy doing the best he can for those he 
loves.” And that’s when it gets very difficult.’ He leaned back against 
the headboard, and she could see that his eyes were moist.

She kissed his chest. ‘Yeah, I know, love. That’s why you, of all people, 
understand why I prefer to be a pathologist, rather than to work with people 
with a pulse. But,’ she said, ‘if I was a psychologist, I’d be telling 
you to take that thought and apply it to Botha’s victims and to imagine how 
their nearest and dearest are feeling today, then to ask yourself how they’d 
feel about you if you’d funked your duty? Toni Field, for example; did she 
have a family?’

‘No, she’s never been married,’ he told her. ‘According to the Human 
Resources director, her next of kin was her mother, name of Sofia Deschamps. He 
was able to get the mother’s details from her file; he accessed it from home. 
I’m not too happy about that, but it’s an issue for later.

‘Mother lives in Muswell Hill; a couple of community support officers broke 
the news to her last night. Apparently there was no mention of a father on her 
file. The mother was a single parent, Mauritian. Antonia must have Anglicised 
the name at some point, or maybe the mother did, for she graduated as Field.’

‘I guess now they can confirm that she’s the victim.’

‘Yeah. The press office is going to issue a statement at twelve thirty, after 
the Police Authority’s emergency meeting. That will ratify my… temporary… 
appointment, and I’ll be paraded at another media briefing at one.’

‘What about your own Police Authority?’

‘Good question. The chairperson’s a Nationalist, one of the First 
Minister’s cronies. He was going to talk to her last night, but I’ll have 
to give her a call as well, to ask for her blessing, and to get her to nod 
through Maggie as my stand-in and Mario’s move up to ACC Crime.’ He took a 
breath.

‘And I’ll have to talk to Maggie myself; I can go and see her, since she 
doesn’t live far away. Then I’ll need to call in on Mario… not to tell 
him about his promotion, he knows about that… but to see how Paula is the day 
after. And I suppose I’ll have to go to Fettes and change into my fucking 
uniform…’

Sarah rolled out of bed and grabbed her dressing gown from the floor. ‘Then 
what the hell are you still doing lying there? Get yourself showered… but 
don’t you dare put my Venus leg shaver anywhere near your chin… then dress 
and come downstairs to surprise our children. I’ll make you breakfast and 
then you can get on the road.’

‘Yes, boss.’ He grinned.

‘You’ll see,’ she added, ‘it’ll be good for you, this new 
challenge.’

‘If I’m up to it.’

‘That’s bullshit. You do not do self-doubt, my love.’

Bob frowned. ‘No, you’re right, not when it comes to work. In everything 
else though,’ he sighed, ‘I’m a complete fuck-up. Three marriages; soon 
to be two divorces. Are you sure you want to get close to me again?’

She put her hands on his shoulders, and drew him to her. ‘Even in our darkest 
moments,’ she whispered, ‘even across an ocean, I was never not close to 
you. You see us? We’re each other’s weakness and strength all rolled into 
one. This time, strength comes out on top.’

He nodded, stood, took hold of her robe, and kissed her. ‘Sounds good to 
me.’

He headed towards the bathroom, then stopped. ‘Will you keep the kids here 
tonight?’

‘Yes. Will you come back here?’

‘Mmm. What do you think? Do you want me to, I mean? What will the kids be 
thinking? This has all happened pretty quick; Aileen being gone, you and 
me…’

‘What do I think?’ she replied. ‘To be brutally honest, I think that Mark 
won’t bat an eyelid, that James Andrew will be pleased… he didn’t like 
her and, believe me, I never said a word against her to him… and that Seonaid 
will barely notice she’s gone.’

He nodded. ‘Okay then. I’ll see you later.’

He was stepping into the en-suite when she called after him. ‘Hey, Bob?’

He looked over his shoulder. ‘Yeah?’

‘If you did walk away from the job,’ she asked, ‘do you have the faintest 
idea what you’d do?’

‘Sure. I could collect non-executive directorships, get paid for sitting on 
my arse and play a lot of golf, but that wouldn’t be my scene. No, if I do 
that I’ll become a consulting detective; I’ll become bloody Sherlock.’





Seven



He looks tired and tense, Paula Viareggio thought. But he also looks more alive 
than I’ve seen him in a couple of years.

‘I am perfectly fine, Bob,’ she assured him. ‘Honestly. The police doctor 
checked me out last night and he said exactly that. He checked both of us out 
in fact. The baby’s good too. For a while afterwards I did wonder if he’d 
stick his head out to find out what all the fuss was about, but it seems he’s 
keeping to his timetable.’

‘You’re some woman, Paula,’ Skinner chuckled. They were sitting around a 
table on the deck of the prospective parents’ duplex. The sun was high enough 
to catch the highlights in his steel-grey hair.

‘No, I’m just like all the rest. I had my few moments of sheer terror, and 
I know I’m never going to lose the memory, of the noise more than anything 
else, the sound of the bullets hitting the poor woman.’

‘Hey, enough,’ her husband said quietly.

‘No, Mario, it’s all right; I yelled my head off at the time, because I was 
afraid… I was scared for two, as well. But once something’s happened, 
it’s happened. You can’t go back, you can’t change it, but the danger’s 
over and talking about what happened won’t bring it back. So no worries, big 
fella; I won’t be waking up screaming in the night.’

‘I’m glad you feel that way,’ the chief constable said, ‘because there 
is a formal murder investigation going on in Glasgow and it would be useful if 
you could give my DI a statement, for the record.’

‘I won’t have to go through there, will I? I couldn’t be arsed with 
that.’

‘No, of course not. You don’t need to leave home. Knock it out on your 
computer, print it, sign it with Mario as witness, then scan it and send it to 
DI Charlotte Mann.’ He dug a card from his pocket and handed it to her. 
‘Her email address is on that.’

‘Will do. Is Aileen having to do the same?’ She paused. ‘That is the one 
thing that gets to me, Bob: the idea that she was the real target.’

‘Then don’t dwell on it,’ he told her. ‘Because I don’t believe she 
was, and neither does Lottie Mann.’ He looked at his colleague. ‘How about 
you, Mario?’

The swarthy detective shook his head. ‘Probably not.’

‘But what does Aileen think?’ Paula asked.

‘I’ve never been good at working that out,’ Skinner replied, ‘but 
whatever she believes, she won’t mind having people think she was. There’s 
more votes in it.’

She stared at him, shocked. ‘Bob, that’s not worthy of you. The poor woman 
was terrified last night.’

‘Maybe, but she was spitting tin tacks when I spoke to her last at the 
thought of Clive Graham taking credit from it.’

‘Get away with you, you’re doing her an injustice.’

‘I wish I was, but I’m not.’ His expression changed, became quizzical. 
‘Did she tell you anything last night about the two of us?’

Paula hesitated. ‘No, she didn’t say anything specific; but looking back, 
there was something about her, something different.’

‘We’re bust,’ he said. ‘Sorry to be blunt, but it’s over. The press 
will catch on eventually. When they do, we’ll call it “irreconcilable 
differences”. That’ll be true, as well.’

‘The police unification issue? Mario told me you were at loggerheads about 
it.’

He nodded. ‘That’s part of it, but not all. She was planning to turn me 
into a backroom politician. Aileen has ambitions beyond Scotland that I knew 
nothing about. She had this daft idea that I would help her fulfil them.’ He 
snorted. ‘As if.’

He stood, straightened his back, and smoothed his uniform jacket. ‘Now I must 
go. Wouldn’t do if I was late for my unveiling.’ He turned to Mario once 
again. ‘Okay, ACC McGuire. I have no idea when I’ll see you again, but 
I’m glad the promotion’s come through. It probably won’t make any 
operational difference to you, as you’ll still be head of CID under the new 
structure, but you’ll be doing the job from the command corridor, where 
you’ve belonged for a while now.’

A smile lit up McGuire’s face. ‘Thanks, boss.’

‘You’re out of date. Maggie’s the boss, for the next three months. 
She’ll need support though; be sure to give her all you can. And have your 
people do something for me too.’

‘Of course.’

‘Freddy Welsh. The armourer, the man that young Houseman and I arrested 
yesterday. The man who supplied the weapons for the concert hall hit and God 
knows how many others. Clyde and I didn’t have time to ask him all the 
questions we needed to, but they’re still relevant. Technically, it’s part 
of Lottie Mann’s investigation, but he’s in your hands, so your people 
should handle the interrogation.

‘I want to know who placed the order for the weapons. Was it Cohen, the man 
who put the operation together, or was it someone else? Somebody sent that team 
after Toni Field… yes, Paula, fact is we’re certain she was the target… 
and we must find out who it was and why they did it.’

‘I’ll handle it myself,’ the new ACC said. ‘But it’s a pound to a 
pinch of pig shit, Bob; his lawyer will have advised him by now to keep his 
mouth shut.’

‘Then keep his lawyer out of it. Welsh is going away for years for illegal 
possession of firearms, and conspiracy to supply. We don’t need to charge him 
over his involvement in Field’s assassination, so you can interview him as a 
potential witness, not a suspect.’

‘Okay, but I’ll bet you he still won’t talk. His customers aren’t the 
sort you inform on.’

Skinner smiled. ‘If that’s how it is, you give him a message from me. If he 
holds out on us, I won’t hesitate to hand him over to MI5, and Clyde 
Houseman. My young friend made quite an impression on Freddy at their first 
meeting. I don’t think Mr Welsh will be too keen on another session. Now, I 
really am off.’

McGuire saw him to the door. ‘Well,’ he said as he rejoined his wife in the 
sunshine. ‘Is this our morning for surprises? The big man enticed to 
Strathclyde, not to mention him and Aileen being down the road.’

‘Indeed,’ Paula laughed. ‘And maybe get yourself ready for another. When 
she saw that Joey Morocco last night, before the concert, and it was all going 
off… mmm, that was interesting.’

Mario looked at her, intrigued, reading her meaning. ‘She looked like she 
wanted to eat him, did she?’

‘Oh, I think she has, in the past. In fact I know so, ’cos she told me. And 
I’m pretty certain she fancies another helping.’





Eight



‘God, but you’re hot stuff when you’re angry, Aileen de Marco,’ Joey 
Morocco gasped.

She smiled, looking down on him as she straddled him. ‘Then look forward to 
mediocrity, my boy, because I won’t stay mad for ever… unless you can come 
up with ways of winding me up.’

‘What if I told you I’m a Tory?’

‘Hah! That might have worked once, but now I’d just feel sorry for you, 
’cos you’re an endangered species in Scotland.’ She raised an eyebrow, 
reached behind and underneath her and took his scrotum in her right hand, 
massaging him, gently. ‘You’re not, are you?’ she asked.

‘Absolutely not! Absolutely not!’

‘Just as well,’ she laughed, releasing him.

‘You don’t need to stop that, though.’

‘Yes, I do. I’m knackered.’ She pushed herself to her feet, bounced on 
the mattress as if it was a trampoline, and jumped sideways off the bed. 
‘Besides, have you seen what time it is?’

‘No; a gentleman removes his Tory Rolex, remember.’

‘And this lady keeps on her nice socialist Citizen. For your information 
it’s gone half past twelve.’

‘Missed breakfast, then,’ he observed, with a cheerful grin. ‘Have we 
still got fairies at the bottom of the garden?’

‘My unwanted guardians, you mean?’ She crossed to the window and looked 
outside, taking hold of a curtain and drawing it across her body. ‘Yup. 
They’re parked across your driveway too; that’s a clear sign to anyone that 
there’s something going on here. I thought the protection people were 
supposed to be subtle. Here,’ she added, ‘do you ever have paparazzi 
hanging around?’

‘Yes,’ he exclaimed, sitting upright, suddenly alarmed, ‘so get your face 
away from the window.’

She stayed where she was, looking back over her shoulder, and letting go of the 
curtain. ‘Why? Would I be bad for your image? Would your fans not approve of 
you with an older woman?’

‘I’m not worried about my image, Aileen,’ he protested. ‘I’m 
concerned about yours. You’re married to a bloody chief constable, remember, 
and you’re a top politician. You can’t afford scandal.’

She left the window and winked at him. ‘Not to “a chief constable”, Joey; 
to “The Chief Constable”. Bob’s taking over the Strathclyde job; it’s 
an emergency appointment. There was nobody else there anyway.’

Her reassurance was wasted on him. ‘Jesus Christ,’ he said, ‘so these 
guys outside, they report to him?’

She shrugged. ‘I suppose they do. But can you see them being brave enough to 
go to him and say, “By the way, sir, your wife’s shagging Joey Morocco”? 
Somehow I don’t. But even if they did, frankly I would not give the tiniest 
monkey’s. I wouldn’t lose my party job over this, for I’m divorcing Chief 
Constable Skinner just as fast as I can, or he’s divorcing me, if he gets in 
first.’ She read his concern. ‘Don’t worry, Joey. You won’t be caught 
in the middle. The split between Bob and me, it’s not about sex, it’s about 
ambitions that could not be further apart. You and me? We’re just a bit of 
fun, right?’

He hesitated, then nodded.

‘That’s how it was when you were starting out on that soap on BBC Scotland, 
fun. Now you’re in big-budget movies, moved upmarket, and I’m free and soon 
to be single again, but it’s still just fun, convenient uncomplicated nookie, 
no more than that. You’re a sexy guy and I’m a crackin’ ride, as my 
coarser male constituents would say, so let’s just enjoy it without either of 
us worrying about the other. Deal?’

His second nod was more convincing. ‘Deal.’

‘Good, now what do you do for Sunday lunch these days?’

‘Usually I go out for it. Today, maybe not; I’ll see what’s in the 
fridge.’

‘Do that, and I’ll get showered and dressed. No rush, though. I’d like to 
lie low here for the rest of the day, if I can.’

‘Of course. We might even manage breakfast tomorrow?’

‘Sounds like a plan. Thanks. You’re a sweetheart. It really is good to have 
somewhere to hide out just now. Actually, I’m a chancer,’ she admitted. 
‘I brought enough clothes with me for two nights.’ She shuddered. ‘God, 
was I glad to get out of that dress, with the bloodstains. I felt like Jackie 
Kennedy.’

He winced at the comparison as she went into his bathroom. She had left her 
phone there the night before, after brushing her teeth. She switched it on, 
then checked her voicemail.

There were over a dozen calls. One was from her constituency secretary, one 
from Alf Old, the Scottish Labour Party’s chief executive, another from her 
deputy leader… Probably cursing that the bastard missed me, she thought… 
several from other parliamentary colleagues, not all of her party, and three 
from journalists who were trusted with her number. She had expected nothing 
from her husband.

As soon as she was showered and dressed she called the secretary, an officious 
older woman with a tendency to fuss. ‘Aileen, where are you?’ she demanded, 
as soon as she answered. ‘I’ve tried your flat, I’ve tried your house in 
Gullane. I got no reply from either.’

‘Never you mind where I am,’ she retorted sharply. ‘It would have been 
nice of you to ask how I was, but I’m okay and I’m safe. Anybody calls 
inquiring about me, you can tell them that. I may call into the office 
tomorrow, or I may not. I’ll let you know.’

No reply from Gullane? she mused as she ended the call, but had no time to 
dwell on the information as her phone rang immediately. She checked the screen 
and saw that it was the party CEO, trying again. ‘Alf,’ she said as she 
answered.

‘Aileen,’ he exclaimed, ‘thank God I’ve got through. How are you?’

‘I’m fine, thanks. I’m safe, and I’m with a friend. I’m sorry I 
didn’t call you last night, but things were crazy. The security people got me 
off the scene, by force, more or less. Even now I have protection officers 
parked outside, like it or not. The First Minister insisted.’

‘Good for him. Now…’

‘I know what you’re going to say. Silence breeds rumours.’

‘Exactly. I’ve had several calls asking where you are, and whether you 
might have been wounded.’

‘Then issue a statement. Have they confirmed yet that it’s Toni Field 
who’s dead?’

‘Yes. Strathclyde police announced it a wee while ago.’

‘In that case we should offer condolences… I’ll leave it to you to choose 
the adjectives, but praise her all the way to heaven’s gate… then add that 
I’m unharmed, and that I’ve simply been taking some private time to come to 
terms with what’s happened. I suppose you’d better say something nice about 
Clive Graham as well, but not too nice, mind you, nothing that he can quote in 
his next election manifesto.’

‘Mmm,’ Old remarked. ‘I can tell you’re okay.’

‘I’ll be fine as long as I keep myself busy,’ she told him. ‘I’m 
sorry if I seem a bit brutal, but even without what happened last night 
there’s a lot going on in my life.’

‘Do you want to take some more time out? Everyone would understand.’

‘They might,’ she agreed, ‘but in different ways. There are plenty within 
the party who’d think I was showing weakness. I don’t have to tell you, 
Alf, as soon as a woman politician does that the jackals fall on her. I’ve 
handled stress before; I’m good at it.’ She paused. ‘I’ll be back in 
business tomorrow; I have to be. The First Minister will come out of this 
looking like fucking Braveheart, so we have to keep pace. We need to come out 
with something positive. You know that Clive and I were planning a joint 
announcement on unifying the Scottish police forces?’

‘Yes, you told me.’

‘Well, I want to jump the gun. Have our people develop the proposition that 
what happened in the concert hall illustrates the need for it, that it was a 
result of intelligence delayed by artificial barriers within our police service 
that need to be broken down. Then set up a press conference for midday 
tomorrow. We don’t have to say what it’s about. They’ll be all over me 
anyway about last night. But I want to be ready to roll with that policy 
announcement.’

‘Will do,’ Old said, ‘but Aileen, what about your personal security? I 
know the police don’t believe there’s any continuing threat to you, because 
I spoke to the DI in charge this morning, but they can’t rule it out 
completely.’

‘I told you,’ she snapped, ‘I’ve got bodyguards. But so what? If people 
want to believe there is someone out to get me, let them. Remember Thatcher at 
Brighton? The same day that bomb went off she was on her feet, on global telly, 
making her conference speech and saying “Bring it on”. That’s the 
precedent, Alf. I either follow it or I run away and hide. Now get to work, and 
I’ll see you tomorrow.’

As Old went off to follow orders, Aileen thought about returning some of the 
other calls but decided against it. Instead she trotted downstairs. ‘Joey?’ 
she called as she went.

‘I’m in the kitchen. Telly’s on: you should see this.’

She had had no time to learn the layout of the house when she had arrived late 
the night before, but she traced his voice to its location. The room looked out 
on to a large rear garden surrounded by a high wall, topped with spikes. ‘No 
place for the photographers to hide here,’ she remarked.

‘No. I had the fencing added on when I bought the place. It does the job.’

‘So what’s on the box that I should see?’

He turned from the work surface where he was putting a salad together and 
nodded towards a wall-mounted set. It was on, and a BT commercial was running. 
‘Sky News,’ he replied. ‘They’ve been trailing a Glasgow press 
conference and somebody’s name was mentioned. In fact…’

As he spoke, the programme banner ran, then the programme went straight to what 
appeared to be a live location: a table, and two men, one of them in uniform.

‘Is that who I think it is?’ Joey asked. ‘I spoke to him last night; 
didn’t have a clue who he was. No wonder he got frosty when I asked about 
you.’

She smiled, but without humour or affection. ‘That’s him. I told you 
earlier what this is about. Observe and be amazed, for it’s one of the 
biggest U-turns you will ever see in your life. Here, I’ll do the lunch.’

As she took over the salad preparation, Joey Morocco watched the bulletin as 
Dominic Hanlon introduced himself to a roomful of journalists and camera 
operators. There was a nervous tremor in the councillor’s voice, a sure tell 
that the event was well beyond his comfort zone. He began by paying a fulsome 
tribute to the dead Antonia Field, and then explained the difficult 
circumstances in which the Strathclyde force had found itself.

‘However,’ he concluded, ‘I am pleased to announce that with the approval 
of his Police Authority in Edinburgh, Chief Constable Robert Morgan Skinner has 
agreed to take temporary command of the force for a period of three months, to 
allow the orderly appointment of a successor to the late Chief Constable Field. 
Mr Skinner, would you like to say a few words?’ He looked at his companion, 
happy to hand over.

‘In the circumstances,’ Skinner replied, ‘it’s probably best that we go 
straight to questions.’

A forest of hands went up, and a clamour of voices arose, but he nodded to a 
familiar face in the front row, John Fox, the BBC Scotland Home Affairs editor.

‘Bob,’ the reporter began, ‘you weren’t a candidate for this job last 
time it was vacant. Are you prepared to say why not?’

The chief constable shrugged. ‘I didn’t want it.’

‘Why do you want it now?’

‘I don’t, John. Believe me, I would much rather still be arguing with Toni 
Field in ACPOS over the principles of policing, as she and I did, long and 
loud. But Toni’s been taken from us, at a time when Strathclyde could least 
afford to lose its leader, given the absence of a deputy.

‘When I was asked to take over… temporarily; I will keep hammering that 
word home… by Councillor Hanlon’s authority, on the basis that its members 
believe me to be qualified, as a police officer I felt that I couldn’t 
refuse. It wouldn’t have been right.’

Fox was about to put a supplementary, but another journalist cut in. 
‘Couldn’t ACC Allan have taken over?’

‘Given his seniority, if he was well, yes, but he isn’t. He’s on sick 
leave.’

‘What about ACC Thomas, or ACC Gorman?’

‘Fine officers as they are, neither of them meets the criteria for permanent 
appointment,’ he replied, ‘and so the authority took the view that 
wouldn’t have been appropriate.’

‘Did you consult your wife before accepting the appointment, Mr Skinner?’ 
The questioning voice was female, its accent cultured and very definitely 
English. Aileen was in the act of chopping Chinese leaves; she stopped and if 
she had looked down instead of round at the screen she would have seen that she 
came within a centimetre of slicing a finger open.

She saw Bob’s gaze turn slowly towards the source, who was seated at the side 
of the room. ‘And why should I do that, Miss…’

‘Ms Marguerite Hatton, Daily News political correspondent. She is the 
Scottish Labour leader, as I understand it. Surely you discuss important 
matters with her.’

‘You’re either very smart or very stupid or just plain ignorant, lady,’ 
Aileen murmured. ‘You’ve just lit a fuse.’

A very short one, as was proved a second later. ‘What the hell has her 
position got to do with this?’ her estranged husband barked. ‘I’m a 
senior police officer, as senior as you can get in this country. Are you 
asking, seriously, whether I seek political approval before I take a career 
decision, or even an operational decision?’

‘Oh, really!’ the journalist scoffed. ‘That’s a dinosaur answer. I 
meant did you consult her as your wife, not as a politician.’

On the screen Skinner stared at her, then laughed. ‘You are indeed from the 
deep south, Ms Hatton, so I’ll forgive your lack of local knowledge. I 
suggest that you ask some of your Scottish colleagues, those who really know 
Aileen de Marco. They’ll tell you that there isn’t a waking moment when she 
isn’t a politician. And I can tell you she even talks politics in her 
sleep!’

‘Jesus!’ Aileen shouted. ‘Joey, switch that fucking thing off!’

‘Relax,’ he said, ‘it’s not true.’

The woman from the Daily News was undeterred. ‘In that case,’ she 
persisted, ‘how will she feel about you taking the job?’

‘Why should I have any special knowledge of that?’ He looked around the 
room. ‘No more questions about my wife, people.’

On camera, John Fox raised a hand. ‘Just one more, please, Bob? How is she 
after her ordeal last night?’

‘Last time I saw her she was fine: fine and very angry.’

‘Where was that, Mr Skinner?’ Marguerite Hatton shouted.

‘You’ve had your five minutes,’ he growled. ‘Any more acceptable 
questions?’

The woman beside Fox, Stephanie Marshall of STV, raised a hand. ‘You 
weren’t a candidate for the Strathclyde post last time, Chief Constable, but 
will you put your name forward when it’s re-advertised?’

Watching, Aileen saw him lean forward as if to answer, then hesitate.

‘If you’d asked me that last night,’ he began, ‘just after Dominic 
asked me to take on this role, I would have told you no, definitely not. But 
something was said to me this morning that’s made me change my attitude just 
a wee bit.

‘So the honest answer is, I don’t know. Let me see how the next couple of 
weeks go, and then I’ll decide. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I must go. We have 
a major investigation under way as you all realise, and I must call on the 
officer who’s running it.’

Aileen reached out and grasped the work surface, squeezing it hard.

‘What are you doing?’ Joey chuckled.

‘I’m checking for earth tremors. You might not know it but what he just 
said is the equivalent of a very large mountain starting to move. I can’t 
believe it. I told him last night he’d never leave Pitt Street once he got in 
there, but I didn’t think for one second that he’d actually listen to me. 
It’s a first.’

He reached out and patted her on the shoulder. ‘No, dearie, it’s you that 
wasn’t listening to him. His words,’ he pointed out, ‘were “this 
morning”, not “last night”. So whoever made him think again, it wasn’t 
you.’

‘You’re right,’ she whispered. ‘Which makes me wonder where the hell he 
was this morning.’

‘While I’m wondering about something else,’ Joey said. ‘Why did that 
News cow ask where he’d seen you last night?’





Nine



‘I’m sorry about that News woman, sir,’ Malcolm Nopper said. ‘I’ve 
never seen her before. I can’t keep her out of future press conferences, but 
I’ll do my best to control her.’

Skinner looked at the chief press officer he had inherited from Toni Field, and 
laughed. The media had been escorted out of the conference room in the force 
headquarters building and the two men were alone. Nopper eyed his new boss 
nervously, unsure how to read his reaction.

‘How the hell are you going to do that?’ the chief constable asked. 
‘Sellotape over her gob? So you didn’t know her? I didn’t know her 
either, and it would have been the same if she’d turned up in Edinburgh, on 
my own patch. She’s a seagull; we all get them.’

‘A seagull, sir?’

‘Sure, you know, they fly in, make a noise, shit on you, then fly away again. 
As for controlling her, you don’t have to. If she turns up at one of my media 
briefings in future… not that I plan to have many… I’ll simply ignore 
her. You can do the same at any you chair.’

‘I tend not to do that, Chief,’ Nopper said. ‘When an investigation’s 
in process, I let the senior investigating officer take the lead.’

‘Not any more. Lottie Mann will have to go before the media later on. From 
something that Max Allan told me a while back, I guess she hasn’t had any 
formal media training. Am I right?’

‘None that I can recall,’ the civilian agreed.

‘I know she’ll be fine, but I’m not sure she does, so she must have a 
minder. I’ll be there but if I go on the platform it’ll undermine her. As 
you said, she’s the SIO. So you’ll be there, you’ll introduce her and 
you’ll pick the questioners. Ms Hatton will not be one of them. Your regulars 
won’t mind that. In my experience they don’t like seagulls either.’

‘As you wish, Chief.’

‘Mmm. Where will you hold it? Do you have a favourite venue?’

‘No. Normally it would be where it’s most convenient for the officer in 
charge.’

‘In that case we do it here in Pitt Street, in this room. I spoke to DI Mann 
on the way through here. She’ll be finished at the concert hall by two. She 
and I agreed that given the nature of this investigation it’s best that it be 
centrally based, rather than in a police office that’s open to the general 
public. Nobody else will be using this room this afternoon, will they?’

‘Not as far as I know, but suppose somebody was, you want it, you get it.’

‘Okay, set it up for four. That’ll give Lottie time to brief me, and it 
will give me time to get used to my new surroundings.’

As he spoke, a figure appeared in the double doorway.

‘Lowell,’ Skinner called. ‘You found us. DCI Payne is going to be my 
executive officer during my stay here,’ he explained to the press officer. 
‘When you want to get to me, you do it through him. That’ll be the case for 
everyone below command rank, but be assured, I will be accessible; his job 
won’t be to keep people out, but to help them in.’

He moved towards the exit. ‘Your first task, Lowell. Show me to my office. I 
knew where it was in Jock Govan’s time, but I have no clue now.’

As one of her first signs of her new-broom approach, Antonia Field had rejected 
the office suite used by her predecessors and had commandeered half a floor in 
the newer part of the headquarters complex. ‘Have you decided where you’re 
going to live, sir?’ Payne asked as he led the way up a flight of stairs 
towards the third floor.

Skinner stopped. ‘Lowell,’ he said, ‘I don’t expect to be “sirred” 
all the time by senior officers, least of all by you. You want to call me 
something official, call me “Chief”. When there’s nobody else around and 
you ask me something you’d ask me over the dinner table, call me Bob, like 
always.’

‘Fair enough. Although,’ he added, ‘it was really a professional 
question, since I’ll have to know where to raise you in an emergency.’

‘True. The answer is that as much as possible I plan to live in my own house. 
I will have a driver and I plan to use him.’

‘That’s in Gullane?’

‘Sure. Where…’ He halted in mid-sentence. ‘Ah, you thought I might stay 
in Aileen’s flat.’

‘Well, yes.’

‘That won’t be happening. It will become apparent soon, if only because 
we’re both public figures, that she and I are no longer together.’

Payne was silent for a few seconds, as they resumed their climb. ‘I see,’ 
he murmured. ‘I’m sorry to hear that. So that’s why you weren’t with 
her at the concert.’

‘That was part of the reason. Anyway, it’s not public knowledge yet, 
although I came close to making it so in my press briefing, when that bloody 
News person wound me up. It is something I’ll have to deal with, and soon, 
but not right now. Once we’ve both calmed down, we may issue a joint 
statement, but we’re both too hot to discuss that just now.

‘So,’ he continued, ‘Gullane is where you’ll reach me most of the time. 
When I have to stay here I’ll use a hotel; Hanlon’s already said he’ll 
pick up the tab for that… without me even asking, would you believe.’

They reached the top of the stairway; Payne turned left, and headed along a 
corridor that was blocked by a glass doorway, with a keypad. He opened it with 
four digits and led the way into a complex with more than a dozen rooms around 
a small central open space, with four chairs surrounding a low table, on which 
magazines were piled.

‘This is it, Chief, your new command suite. Your office is facing us.’

Skinner stared ahead. ‘It’s got glass walls,’ he exclaimed.

‘Relax,’ his aide said, noting his indignation. ‘There are internal 
blinds between the panels. I’m told that Chief Constable Field kept them open 
all the time.’

‘That will change; they’ll be closed permanently. I never did like people 
watching me think.’

‘There’s a bathroom and a changing room as well. They have solid walls,’ 
he added.

‘Just as well, or I’d be going back to Jock Govan’s old suite. Do I have 
a secretary?’

‘Of course, but she isn’t here today. I called her and told her what was 
happening, about you, and your appointment. I didn’t want her finding out 
from the telly. She offered to come in, but I told her not to.’

‘What’s her name?’

‘Marina Deschamps.’

‘Mmm,’ Skinner murmured, then he blinked. ‘Deschamps, you said? Wasn’t 
that Toni’s birth name?’

Payne nodded. ‘Yes. It’s her sister; the chief brought her with her. She 
insisted on it, apparently, before she accepted the job.’

‘Eh? The bloody Human Resources director didn’t think to tell me that last 
night.’ He frowned. ‘What about the mother? Are we flying her up here?’

‘The Met took care of that. They got her on to the first Glasgow flight this 
morning.’

‘I wish to hell they’d left her down there.’ He sighed. ‘I know I have 
to pay her a courtesy call, but I’ll leave that until tomorrow. Meantime, the 
sister should be regarded as on compassionate leave. Does she have a contract 
of employment?’

‘I don’t know for sure, Chief, but I’d imagine so.’

‘She’s a civilian, yes?’

‘Yes.’

‘Okay. Tell the Human Resources director that her contract will be honoured. 
If she wants to stay here in another capacity, she can. If she wants to leave, 
then she may do so at once, but she’ll be paid as if she’d worked a full 
notice period, whatever that is. Then tell him to find me a replacement, 
pronto, someone with full security clearance, mainly to manage my mail and 
yours.’

They had been walking as they talked, and reached Skinner’s new office as he 
finished issuing his orders. The door was locked, but Payne took a ring with 
three keys from his trouser pocket and handed it over. ‘I had the lock 
changed,’ he said. ‘Easier than searching through Ms Field’s things and 
getting Marina’s back from her.’

‘Good thinking.’ He detached a key from the ring, used it to unlock the 
door, then handed it to the DCI. ‘Yours,’ he said then stepped inside. As 
he did so he felt a sudden and unexpected shiver run through him. ‘Weird,’ 
he murmured. ‘I have never imagined doing this, not once.’

He looked around. The room was larger than the one he had left in Edinburgh, 
but furnished in much the same way. His desk was on the left, facing a round 
meeting table, with six chairs that slid underneath it. Beyond, there was 
another door; he could see through the unscreened glass wall that it led into 
another office.

He pointed towards it. ‘Secretary’s room?’

‘Yes,’ his aide replied.

‘Where are you going to go?’

‘I hadn’t given that any thought.’

‘Where’s the deputy’s office?’

‘That’s the one beyond the secretary’s.’

‘Then use that. It’s vacant.’

‘Okay, Chief, thanks.’ Payne walked behind the desk and opened a door 
behind it. ‘Your personal rooms are through here,’ he said. ‘There’s a 
safe in the changing room, but apparently nobody knows the combination, unless 
Marina does. I’ll ask her. If she doesn’t I’ll…’ He smiled. 
‘Actually I’m not sure what I’ll do.’

‘Too bad Johnny Ramensky’s dead,’ Skinner chuckled.

‘Yeah: the last of the legendary safecrackers. As for the rest,’ the DCI 
continued, ‘all of Ms Field’s things have been removed, from the changing 
room and the bathroom, and everything from the desk as well, that wasn’t 
office-related. Her business diary is still there, so you can see what she had 
in her schedule. There are also some files. I had a look at them, a very quick 
look, and then closed them up again. They seem to contain her observations on 
her senior colleagues.’

‘Then take them away and shred them,’ Skinner instructed him. ‘I don’t 
want to know about her prejudices and her grudges.’ He grinned. ‘I prefer 
to develop my own. What’s the general view of Michael Thomas?’ he asked. 
‘You can be frank, don’t worry.’

‘Unfavourable,’ Payne replied, without a pause for thought. ‘I knew him 
as a constable, way back, after I’d made sergeant. He was “Three bags 
full” then, before he started to climb. Much later I was stationed in his 
division for a while when he was a chief super. He virtually ignored me. He has 
a reputation for efficiency, but also for being a cold fish. He was a big 
supporter of Toni Field, at least he kissed her arse regularly enough.’

‘I know that from ACPOS. He was her regular seconder in the debate on 
unification. What about Bridie Gorman?’

‘Now she is well liked. She spends a lot of time out of the office, in the 
outlying areas of the force. I think that suited her, and suited Chief 
Constable Field as well, for they were complete opposites, as cops and as 
people.’ Payne scratched his chin. ‘Obviously I don’t know what 
perceptions were outside Strathclyde, but the view in here was that Field 
planned to get rid of every chief officer apart from ACC Thomas. She’d 
already axed the deputy, and it was common knowledge that Mr Allan was next.’

Skinner nodded. ‘Yes, I could tell that at ACPOS too. She didn’t even try 
to be civil to him. Any word on him, by the way?’

‘Yes, I checked. He’s still in hospital, suffering from what they’re now 
describing as shock. They’re going to keep him in for a couple of days. I 
don’t know how he’ll feel about coming back.’

‘Then see if you can find out for me. Go and visit him, this evening if you 
can. Max is only a few months off the usual retirement age. If he’s up to 
talking about it, tell him that if he’d like to come back, I’ll be happy to 
see him, but if he doesn’t, I’ll sign him off for enough sick leave to take 
him up to his due date.’

‘Yes, Chief; I was planning to go and see him anyway. He’s always been good 
to me.’

‘Fine. Now who’s here, in the building now?’

‘ACC Thomas is. He said he’d be in his office, and that he’d like to see 
you as soon as possible. And ACC Gorman’s in as well. She came down from 
Argyll overnight.’

‘Does she want to see me too?’

‘No, she said to tell you she was about if you needed her, that’s all.’

Skinner smiled. ‘Okay then, let’s talk to her; I can spare a few minutes 
before I have to see Lottie. Ask her to drop in, then give Mr Thomas my 
apologies, tell him that I’ll fit him in tomorrow morning, and that he’s 
free to salvage what’s left of his Sunday.’

As Payne left, he walked over to the desk, tried the swivel chair for height, 
and found, as he had expected, that it was set far too low. He stayed in it for 
only a few seconds, then pushed himself out. There was something not right 
about it, something that made his spine tingle. He knew what it was without any 
deep analysis. Less than forty-eight hours before, Toni Field had been sitting 
in it, and at that very moment she was lying in a refrigerated drawer in one of 
the city’s morgues, unless she was being autopsied by Sarah’s opposite 
number in the west.

He knew that he would never feel comfortable in her old seat, and so he wheeled 
it over to the secretary’s office, and left it in there with a note saying, 
‘Replace, please,’ scribbled on a sheet torn from a pad.

He had just stepped back into his own room when he heard a knock on the door. 
‘Come in,’ he called.

‘I can’t,’ a female voice shouted back. ‘This door self-locks. It can 
only be opened with a key or from the inside.’

He stepped across and admitted his visitor. ACC Bridget Gorman was in civvies, 
light tan trousers and a check shirt. ‘Afternoon, Chief,’ she said. Her 
manner was tentative, not that of the Bridie Gorman he knew.

‘Hey, Bridie, last week at ACPOS it was Bob,’ he told her. ‘It still is, 
okay? Come in and have a seat.’ He showed her across to the table and pulled 
out two of the chairs.

She glanced across to the desk, taking in the missing swivel but saying 
nothing. ‘Wouldn’t be right,’ he replied to her unspoken question. ‘I 
feel bad enough being here.’

Gorman frowned, and her forehead all but disappeared behind a mop of black but 
grey-streaked hair. ‘I know,’ she murmured. ‘It’s just awful. And it 
could have been Aileen.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t believe it could, and neither does DI Mann.’ 
He explained why.

She nodded. ‘Yes, I can see that. Somebody like them, they’d know exactly 
who they were shooting, I suppose. But why? Why Toni Field?’

‘They didn’t need to know that.’

‘But they’d know who wanted it done.’

‘Not all the way up the chain, not necessarily.’

‘Do you think it was related to something here?’

‘Come on, Bridie,’ Skinner murmured, ‘you know the rule: speculation 
hinders investigation.’

‘Aye, I suppose I do. Did you say that Lottie Mann’s involved?’

‘She was on duty; she took the shout.’

‘Granted, but… Lottie can be like a runaway train. Max Allan was always 
careful how she was deployed.’

‘I know that,’ he conceded. ‘But last night was chaos. The hall was full 
of headless chickens, but she turned up and took charge, even put me in my 
place. I liked that. It means she’s my kind of cop. What’s her back story? 
She said she has a family, but that’s all I know about her.’

‘That’s right,’ she confirmed, ‘she has. Her husband used to be a cop 
too. His name’s Scott, as I recall. I’ve got no idea what the wee boy’s 
called.’

‘Used to be, you say?’

‘Yes. He left the force a few years back. No, that’s a euphemism; he was 
encouraged to resign. He had a drink problem and eventually it couldn’t be 
tolerated any more. The job probably didn’t help, for he seems to have got 
himself together after he left it. The last I heard he was working in security 
in a big cash and carry warehouse out near Easterhouse.’ She smiled. 
‘There’s a story about Lottie and an interdivisional boxing night…’

‘I’ve heard it. Max Allan told me.’

‘Aye but did he tell you the name of the cop she flattened? It was Scott; 
that was how they met.’

Skinner laughed, softly. ‘There’s a love story for you. Somebody should 
make the movie.’

‘Fine, but who would you get to play Lottie?’

‘That would be a problem, I concede. Gerard Butler in drag, maybe.’ A name 
suggested itself. ‘Joey Morocco?’

‘Mr Glasgow? Our movie flavour of the month? He looks good, granted, but I 
wonder sometimes if there’s any real substance to him. I’m pretty sure 
I’d back Lottie against him over ten rounds.’

‘Maybe I’ll make that match,’ the chief murmured. ‘It would fill Ibrox 
Stadium. Bridie,’ he said, his tone changing, ‘I know you’re as surprised 
to see me here as I am to be here.’

She contradicted him. ‘No, I’m not. What happened, happened. I think 
they’ve done the right thing. This force always needs a strong hand; Max is 
too old, I don’t have the experience in the rank, and neither does Michael, 
whatever he might think.’ She frowned, concern in her eyes. ‘How is Max, by 
the way?’

‘He’s okay, but it remains to be seen whether he’ll be back. But whether 
he is or not… I have to get some hierarchy in place here. That means I need 
to appoint a temporary deputy chief. Even if Max was here, I’d want that to 
be you. Are you up for it?’

She was silent for a few seconds. ‘How can I say no?’ she asked when she 
was ready. ‘But what are you going to tell Thomas?’

‘I don’t plan to explain myself, if that’s what you mean, Bridie. The 
Police Authority gave me the power to designate my deputy, and you are it.’

She smiled, and said, ‘This might sound daft, Bob, but… what will I have to 
do as deputy?’

He returned her awkward grin and replied, ‘To be honest, I don’t know yet, 
not in any detail, because I don’t know yet what the demands of the job will 
be on me. Mind you, they have just cast doubt on my plans to go to my house in 
Spain in a couple of weeks’ time, something I’ll have to break to my 
children. Holidays might prove to be out of the question.’

‘Aw, what a shame,’ she exclaimed, like a kindly aunt. ‘The poor wee 
souls.’

‘It might not be a complete disaster. I’ll ask their mother if she can 
clear some time to take them instead.’ He sighed. ‘As for your question, 
all I can say is that you’ll deputise for me whenever it’s necessary.’

‘I’d better go and practise looking important then,’ the ACC chuckled. 
‘Was there anything else for now?’

‘No. My usual practice is to have a morning session with my senior 
colleagues. I’ll probably carry that on here; Lowell Payne will advise 
everybody. He’s going to be my aide while I’m settling in here, maybe for 
longer.’

‘Good,’ she declared. ‘I like Lowell. He tends to fly below the radar; 
that may be why he hasn’t risen higher.’

‘I don’t think he’s bothered about that. I know him well, from outside 
the force, and I’m glad to have him alongside me.’ He stood. She thought he 
was indicating the end of the meeting and was in the act of rising, but he 
waved to her to stay seated.

‘I’m just about to call Lottie up here, to give me an update on her 
investigation. You stay here and sit in; belt and braces. Christ, after what 
happened to Toni, none of us can be sure we’re going to see tomorrow.’





Ten



‘I could get to like this,’ Aileen said. ‘Bob’s garden in Gullane is 
nice too, but it overlooks the beach. He refuses to plant trees to give it a 
bit of privacy; says he likes the view.’ She picked up her glass from the 
wrought-iron table. ‘Well he’s bloody welcome to it!’

Don’t get to like it too much, Joey Morocco thought. He had been on the 
astonished side of surprised when Aileen had called him the night before, 
almost raving about being imprisoned by her husband and seeking sanctuary for a 
day or two, but they had enjoyed regular liaisons a few years before, and the 
occasional fling since.

Their history together had been enough to overcome his caution about taking 
another man’s wife under his roof, even when the man was as formidable as Bob 
Skinner was said to be.

Nonetheless, when she had defined their renewed relationship, ‘just fun, 
convenient uncomplicated nookie, no more than that’, he had been relieved. He 
was bound for Los Angeles in a few days, for the film project that was going to 
make him, he knew, and the last thing he wanted was a heavy-duty woman in 
Scotland with her claws in him.

‘Are you sure that’s really what you want?’ he asked. ‘To end your 
marriage?’

‘Bloody certain,’ she replied. ‘I don’t actually know what drew me to 
him in the first place.’ She grinned. ‘No, that’s not true, I do. I 
wanted to find out if he matched up to the waves he was giving out. Very few 
do, in my limited experience.’

‘Did he?’

‘At first, yes. Then I made the mistake of marrying him. It all got mediocre 
after that, but I suppose that’s life. I’ll learn from it, though; once is 
enough.’

He smiled.

‘And you’re relieved to hear that, I know,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry, 
Joey. My career is all planned out, and it doesn’t take me within six 
thousand miles of where you’re going.’ She looked around the suntrap garden 
once more. ‘But this is nice. I like it here; it suits me. I’m guessing 
that when you go to the US, you won’t be back here very often, so if you need 
a tenant, let me know.’

‘I will,’ he promised. ‘The way my commitments are, I won’t be back for 
at least a year, so that might work. You’d be a house-sitter, though, not a 
tenant.’

‘No,’ she declared. ‘It would have to be formal. I couldn’t be seen as 
your bidey-in, even though you were never here.’

He shrugged. ‘Whatever,’ he murmured, hoping secretly that it would all be 
forgotten by the next morning. ‘Want another drink?’ he asked.

Aileen pressed her glass to her chest. ‘No, I’m fine,’ she said. ‘I’m 
not a big afternoon drinker… or evening, come to that. You’ve seen me in 
action before. You know I can’t handle it.’

‘True,’ he conceded. ‘If you’re sure… I think I’ll get another 
beer, if you don’t mind.’

‘Not a bit.’

He wandered back into the kitchen, and took another Rolling Rock from the 
fridge. He had just uncapped it when the phone rang. He frowned, irked by the 
interruption, wondering which of the few people with access to his unlisted 
number had a need to call it on a bloody Sunday, when they all knew it was the 
day he liked to keep to himself.

‘Yes,’ he barked, not choosing to hide his impatience.

‘Is that Joey Morocco?’ a female voice asked.

‘Depends who this is.’

‘My name’s Marguerite Hatton. I’m on the political staff of the Daily 
News.’

‘And I’m a bloody actor, so why are you calling me?’ Hatton, Hatton; the 
name was fresh in his mind. Of course, the woman from the press conference, she 
who had tried to give Aileen’s husband a hard time, and had her arse well 
kicked.

‘I’m trying to locate Aileen de Marco,’ she replied. ‘I’d like to 
talk to her about her ordeal last night and how relieved she feels that the 
killer got the wrong woman.’

‘So?’ he challenged. ‘Why are you calling me?’

‘You’re quoted as saying, last night as you left the concert hall, that 
you’re a friend of hers,’ she explained. ‘I’m calling around everyone; 
the Labour Party, Glasgow councillors, anyone who might know her, actually, but 
she seems to have disappeared. Do you have any idea where she might be?’

‘Why should I? And if I did, do you really think that I’d betray her by 
setting you on her? If you want to find her, ask her husband, why don’t 
you?’

‘I rather think not,’ Hatton drawled. ‘Can you tell me about your 
relationship with Ms de Marco, Mr Morocco?’

‘No,’ he snorted. ‘Why the hell should I do that?’

‘But you did say you’re a friend of hers.’

‘Yes. So what? Aileen has many friends. She’s Glasgow’s leading lady. Ask 
a real journalist and they’ll tell you that.’

‘Oh, but I’m a real journalist, Mr Morocco,’ she told him. ‘Be in no 
doubt about that. How long have you known Ms de Marco?’

‘For a few years.’

‘How close are you?’

‘We are friends, okay? Is there any part of that you don’t understand?’

‘What’s the nature of your friendship?’

‘Private. Now please piss off.’

‘I don’t think so.’

He felt himself boil over. ‘Listen, hen,’ he shouted, lapsing into 
Glaswegian in his anger, ‘you want to talk to me, you go through my agent or 
my publicist. By the way, both of those are owed favours by your editor, so 
don’t you be making me have them called in.’

‘He owes me a few as well, Joey,’ she countered. ‘I keep bringing him 
exclusives, you see. When did you last see Ms de Marco?’

‘Fuck off!’ he snapped and slammed the phone back into its cradle.

‘You’ve been a while,’ Aileen said, as he rejoined her.

‘I had a nuisance call,’ he replied.

‘There’s a number you can call that stops you getting those.’

‘It doesn’t always work. But hopefully that one’s gone away to bother 
somebody else.’





Eleven



‘How’s the force reacting to Mr Skinner’s appointment?’ Harry Wright of 
the Herald called out, from the second row of the questioning journalists 
gathered in the Pitt Street conference room.

‘Come on, Harry,’ Malcolm Nopper began to protest, but Lottie Mann cut 
across him.

‘How would I know?’ she replied, her deep booming voice at a level just 
below a shout. ‘I’m just one member of this force, and for the last,’ she 
made a show of checking her watch, ‘twenty hours, minus a few for sleep, 
I’ve been leading a murder investigation. I think I can say for everybody 
that we’re all still shocked by what happened to our former chief constable. 
As for the new chief, he’s keeping in close touch with my investigation, but 
he’s confirmed me as the lead officer.’

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Nopper exclaimed, ‘people, I know these are 
unique circumstances, but I remind you that we’re here to discuss an ongoing 
inquiry into a suspicious death.’

A few explosions of laughter, some suppressed, some not, came from the 
gathering at his blatant use of police-speak. Skinner winced, and reflected on 
his insistence that the chief press officer should take the chair at the 
briefing. He had slipped into the room at the first call for order, and was 
standing at the back, half-hidden behind a Sky News camera operator.

‘Okay,’ Nopper sighed, shifting in his seat before the Strathclyde Police 
logo backdrop as he tried to rescue the situation. ‘At least that got your 
attention. My point was that this is a murder we’re here to talk about and 
that it should be treated just like any other, regardless of who the victim is. 
Now can we stick to the point?’ He looked towards the Herald reporter. 
‘Harry,’ he invited, ‘do you want to ask a proper question?’

The man shrugged. ‘I thought that was, but never mind. Detective Inspector, 
you were able to confirm for us that the police victims are Chief Constable 
Field and Sergeant Sproule. Now can you tell us anything about the other two 
men? Do you know who they are… were, sorry?’

Lottie straightened in her chair, and took a deep breath, in an effort to slow 
down her racing heart. ‘We believe so,’ she replied, speaking steadily. A 
murmur rippled through the media, and she paused to let it subside. 
‘They’ve been identified as Gerard Botha and Francois Smit. They were both 
South African citizens, and they’ve been described to us as military 
contractors.’

‘Mercenaries?’ a female Daily Record hack shouted.

The reporter was so suddenly excited that Lottie suspected she had spent her 
career waiting to write a crime story that didn’t involve domestic violence, 
homophobia or dawn raids on drug dealers. ‘If you want to use that term,’ 
she said, ‘I won’t be arguing with you.’

‘Who gave you that description?’ John Fox asked, from his customary front 
and centre seat.

‘Intelligence sources,’ the DI told him.

‘MI6?’

Lottie looked him in the eye, then gave him the smallest of winks. ‘Be 
content with what I’ve given you.’ She came within a couple of breaths of 
adding, ‘There’s a good boy,’ but stopped herself just in time, realising 
that Pacific Quay’s top crime reporter was someone she did not need as an 
enemy.

Fox grinned. ‘I had to ask, Lottie. These men were the killers, yes?’

She nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘To what degree of certainty?’

‘Absolute.’

‘Do you know as certainly how they came to die?’

‘Yes,’ the DI said. ‘But with the greatest respect, I’m going to tell 
the procurator fiscal before I tell you. Fair enough?’

The BBC reporter shrugged his shoulders slightly as if in agreement, but some 
others tried to press the point. She held her position until eventually Harry 
Wright changed the angle of approach.

‘DI Mann, the concert hall had security cover and the event was policed, yet 
these two men seem to have smuggled a weapon in there regardless. Is your 
investigation focusing on your own security and on the lapses that allowed this 
to happen?’

‘We know how they did that too, but again I’m not able to share it with 
you.’

‘Same reason, I suppose,’ Wright moaned. ‘The fiscal gets to know before 
the public.’

She shook her head, firmly. ‘No. It’s information that we have to keep 
in-house for now. There are aspects of it that we need to follow up.’

‘Continuing lines of inquiry?’

‘Sure, if you want to say that, I’m content.’

‘DI Mann, why isn’t Mr Skinner sitting alongside you?’ Marguerite Hatton 
cried out from the side of the room.

‘Relevant questions only,’ Nopper exclaimed. ‘Anyone else?’

‘I’ll decide what’s relevant,’ the woman protested. ‘I’ll disrupt 
this press conference until you answer. Why isn’t the new chief constable 
present?’

‘He is!’

Every head in the room, apart from the two seated at the table, turned at 
Skinner’s bellow.

‘Satisfied?’ he boomed. ‘DI Mann is leading this investigation and she 
enjoys my full confidence.’

‘How is your wife today, Mr Skinner?’ Hatton shouted back.

Slowly, the chief constable walked towards her. A press office aide stood at 
the side of the room, holding one of the microphones that were available so 
that every reporter’s questions could be heard. He held out his hand for it 
and took it, then stopped.

He knew that the TV cameras were running and that still photographs were being 
shot, but made no attempt to have them stop.

‘Lady,’ he said, into the mike, ‘I don’t know who you think you are, or 
what special privileges you expect from me, but you’re not getting any. 
You’re here at our invitation to discuss a specific matter, and now you’re 
threatening disruption, as everyone here has heard. I’m not having that. One 
more word from you and I’ll have you ejected.’

‘This is a public meeting,’ she protested.

‘Don’t be daft,’ he snapped back at her. ‘It’s a police press 
conference. I mean it. One more word and you are on the pavement.’ He held 
her gaze, his eyes icy cold, boring into hers, unblinking, until she subsided 
and turned away from him.

‘Okay,’ he murmured. ‘As long as we’re clear.’ He looked at the 
platform. ‘Carry on, Malcolm.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ the chief press officer said.

The Daily Record reporter raised her hand. Nopper nodded to her. ‘Can we take 
it that Chief Constable Field’s relatives have been told?’

‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘We released her identity, didn’t we? Her 
mother arrived in Glasgow this morning.’

Shit, Skinner thought, they’re going to love you for that when the media turn 
up on their doorstep.

‘Did they identify the body?’

Malcolm Nopper put a hand to his mouth, to hide a laugh.

‘They knew who she was, Penny,’ John Fox pointed out.





Twelve



‘So you’re the armourer,’ ACC Mario McGuire said to the man who faced him 
across the table in the Livingston police office. There was nobody else in the 
interview room.

Freddy Welsh was a big man, one with ‘Don’t cross me’ in his eyes, but 
someone had. There was a deep blue bruise in the middle of his forehead and his 
right hand was bandaged. For all that, he still looked formidable. ‘I don’t 
recognise that name,’ he murmured.

‘Maybe not, but it seems that other people do. People like Beram Cohen.’

‘Never heard of him.’

McGuire leaned back and sighed. ‘Look, Mr Welsh, can we stop playing this 
game? You’ve never been in police custody before, so I appreciate you’re 
only doing what you’ve seen on the telly, but really it’s not like that. 
There’s no recording going on here.

‘You’ve already been charged with illegal possession of a large quantity of 
weapons. We have the gun that was used in last night’s murder in Glasgow, and 
we are in the process of proving beyond any doubt that it came from the crate 
that was found yesterday afternoon in your store. You can take it that we will 
do that, and as soon as we do, the Crown Office will have a decision to make.’

‘And what would that be?’ Welsh asked.

‘Are you really that naive, man?’ McGuire laughed. ‘Do I have to spell it 
out? The kill team that executed Toni Field are all dead.’

The prisoner’s eyelids flickered rapidly. He licked his lips.

‘You didn’t know that?’ his interrogator exclaimed.

Welsh shook his head. ‘I’ve been locked up since last night, and I wasn’t 
offered my choice of newspaper with breakfast this morning. How would I know 
anything? I don’t even know who this bloke Tony Field is, or how Glasgow 
comes into it.’

‘Antonia Field,’ McGuire corrected. ‘The Chief Constable of Strathclyde. 
She was the victim. Your customer, Mr Smit, put three rounds through her head. 
You told my colleague Mr Skinner it was a woman he and Botha were after, and 
you were right.’

The other man frowned, as he took in the information. McGuire had assumed that 
he knew at least some of it, but it was clear to him that he had been wrong. 
‘And they’re dead?’ he said.

The ACC nodded in confirmation. ‘Yeah. Cohen, the planner, the team leader, 
he died of natural causes, a brain haemorrhage, but you knew that much. As for 
the other two, Mr Skinner and the other man you met,’ as he spoke he saw the 
shadow of a bad memory cross Welsh’s face, ‘arrived on the scene too late 
to save Chief Constable Field, but they did come face to face with Smit and 
Botha as they tried to escape, over the bodies of two other police officers 
they’d just taken down. They were offered resistance and they shot them both 
dead.’

The armourer started to tremble. McGuire liked that. ‘Yes,’ he went on, 
‘dead. It’s one thing being the supplier, Freddy, isn’t it? You’ve been 
doing that for donkey’s years, supplying the weapons to all sorts, but never 
being anywhere near them when the trigger was pulled. Not like that here, 
though. You’re too close this time, and it’s scary. Isn’t it?’

He reached into his pocket and pulled out two photographs and laid them in the 
table. One showed the body of Antonia Field, the other that of Smit.

‘Go on, take a good look,’ he urged. ‘That leaky grey stuff, that’s 
brain matter. Awful, isn’t it?’

Welsh pushed them back towards him.

‘You don’t like reality, do you?’ he said. ‘It’s not good to be that 
close.’ He leaned forward again. ‘Well, you are, and far closer than you 
realise. That woman, her whose photo I’ve just shown you, when that was done 
to her, my wife,’ his voice became quieter, and something came into it that 
had not been there before, ‘my heavily pregnant wife, was in the very next 
seat. When I got her home last night she was in a crime scene tunic that 
Strathclyde Police gave her, because the clothes she’d been wearing before 
had Toni Field’s blood and brains splattered all over them, and she 
couldn’t get out of them fast enough.’

He stopped, then reached a massive hand across the desk, seized Welsh’s chin 
and forced him to meet his gaze.

‘So far I know of four people who I hold responsible for that, Freddy. You 
are the only one left alive, and that puts you right in it, because now only 
you can tell me who commissioned this outrage. And you will tell me.’ He 
laughed, as he released Welsh from his grasp.

‘You know, Bob Skinner suggested that if you didn’t cooperate, I should get 
the MI5 guy here to persuade you. But I don’t actually need him. He’s just 
a spook with a gun, whereas I am a husband who’s going to wake up in cold 
sweats, for longer than I can see ahead, at the thought of what might have 
happened to my Paula and our baby if that sight you supplied with your Heckler 
and fucking Koch carbine had been just a wee bit out of alignment.

‘I’ve been playing it cool up to now, because Paula’s amazingly calm 
about it and I want to keep her that way, but that’s been a front. Inside 
I’ve been raging from the moment it happened. Now I can finally let it out. 
You’re a big guy, but you’re not tough. There’s a hell of a difference. 
I’m probably going to beat the crap out of you anyway, but what you have to 
tell me may determine when I stop.’

He sprang from his seat and started round the table.





Thirteen



‘So what have your people got?’ Skinner’s jacket… while he disliked any 
uniform, his hatred for the new tunic style favoured by some of his brother 
chiefs was absolute… was slung over the back of the new swivel chair that had 
been in place by the time he had returned from the press briefing. He had 
refused all requests for one-on-one interviews, insisting instead that these be 
done with Lottie Mann, as lead investigator.

His visitor was as smartly dressed as he had been the day before, but the 
blazer had given way to a close-fitting leather jerkin. No room for a firearm 
there, the chief thought. Just as well or security would have gone crazy. The 
garment was a light tan in colour almost matching Clyde Houseman’s skin tone, 
but not quite, for his face sported a touch of pink. ‘Have you caught the 
sun?’ he asked.

The younger man smiled. ‘Did you think I’d just get browner?’ he 
responded. ‘I’m only one quarter Trinidadian, on my father’s side. The 
rest of me gets as sunburned as you. And the answer’s yes. I went for a run 
this morning, a long one; not on a treadmill either but around the streets.’

‘Where did you go?’

‘Along Sauchiehall Street, then down Hope Street to the Riverside; over the 
Squinty Bridge, along the other side for a bit then I crossed back further up, 
past Pacific Quay. Up to Gilmorehill from there, round the university, and then 
home.’

‘Is that your normal Sunday routine?’

‘Hell no. Normally I go out for breakfast somewhere. There are a few places 
nearby.’

‘Where is home?’

‘Woodlands Drive.’

Skinner’s eyebrows rose slightly. ‘Woodlands Drive, indeed. I had a 
girlfriend who had a flat share there, in my university days. Louise.’ His 
eyes drifted towards the unfamiliar ceiling, and then back to his visitor. 
‘Are you married, Clyde?’

Houseman shook his head. ‘Half my life in the Marines and special forces, 
seeing action for most of it, then on to MI5. No,’ he chuckled. ‘I 
couldn’t find the time to fit that in. Not that I had any incentive, given 
the happy home I grew up in.’

The two men’s first encounter had been in a squalid housing estate in 
Edinburgh, when Skinner had just made detective superintendent. Houseman had 
been a street gang leader, son of a convicted murderer and a thief, until the 
scare the cop had thrown into him had made him rethink his entire life and join 
the military.

‘Hey,’ the chief constable said, ‘mine wasn’t that great either. It 
didn’t put me off marriage, though, not that I’ve been very fucking good at 
it. I’ve had three goes so far. My first wife died young, car crash, second 
marriage ended in divorce, and now the third’s going the same way.’

‘You and the politician lady?’

‘Yeah. She had this notion that I should help her fulfil her ambitions, which 
are substantial. That would have involved me following behind, in the Duke of 
Edinburgh position. Not my scene, I’m afraid, so we’re calling it a day.’

‘Won’t that be tough on your kids?’

‘No. The three young ones are very close to their mother, and as for my adult 
daughter, she’ll wave Aileen a cheerful goodbye. Having made a similar 
mistake herself she reckons I was daft to split up with Sarah in the first 
place, and I’m coming to agree with her. They say that Alex and I are 
absolutely alike, but that’s hardly surprising, since I pretty much brought 
her up on my own.’

He sighed. ‘I know why you went for the run, incidentally. To clear your head 
after what happened last night. We all have our own way of dealing with the 
shitty end of the job, the things we see, and sometimes the things we have to 
do; I’ve been known to go running myself, but usually I get pissed first, to 
give me something to run off, so it’ll hurt that wee bit more. Sometimes I 
wish I was a Catholic like my friend Andy, so I could go to church and get 
absolution. But no, not me; I have to do it the hard way.’

Without warning he swung his chair around and sat upright, his forearms on his 
desk. ‘But enough of that. I asked you what your people have got, if 
anything, on the origin of this hit. We’ve discounted the notion that Aileen 
was the target, so, who wanted Toni Field dead?’

Houseman looked back at him, his expression serious. ‘I’m not sure I have 
the authority, sir,’ he replied.

Skinner shook his head. ‘No, Clyde, I’m not having that. I know there’s 
recent history between your team and Strathclyde and that your deputy director 
told you to keep your distance from our Counter-terrorism and Intelligence 
Section. But that was then and this is now.

‘Amanda Dennis may have told you she thought it was leaky, but I know damn 
well that she didn’t like or trust Toni Field, and didn’t want any 
involvement with her. I’ve known Amanda for years, and I worked with her on 
an internal investigation I did in Thames House a few years ago. I can lift 
that phone right now and have your order rescinded, but save me the bother, 
eh?’

The spook gazed at him for a few seconds, then shrugged. ‘I’m sure you’re 
right,’ he said, ‘and I don’t fancy breaking into Amanda’s Sunday, so 
okay. The truth is we’ve got nothing yet. But that’s no disgrace, since 
we’ve concentrated our efforts since last night on the source of the 
intelligence that London had, that there was going to be a political hit 
somewhere in Britain.

‘Twenty-four hours ago, that was my colleagues’ firm conviction. Today, 
they’re saying they were conned. The threat was bogus; somebody in Pakistan 
was trying to buy entry into Britain for his family. In short, back to square 
one.’ He smiled. ‘Now, since we’re sharing, how about you?’

‘Fair enough,’ Skinner conceded. ‘We’ve been working on the basics. We 
have one potential witness to interview. You met him yesterday evening: Freddy 
Welsh. He may have dealt only with Beram Cohen, but it’s possible that the 
order for the weapons was placed by somebody else.’

‘Do you want me to talk to him again?’

‘I don’t think that’ll be necessary. Mario McGuire’s going to see 
him.’

‘McGuire? Your colleague? The man whose wife was sitting next to Toni 
Field?’

He nodded. ‘The same. Freddy isn’t going to enjoy that; not at all.’

‘Did you tell him to go hard?’

‘No, but I couldn’t stop him even if I tried. You and I might have scared 
Freddy last night, but that was a gentle chat compared to what the big 
fella’s capable of.’

‘He won’t go too far, will he?’

‘He won’t have to. I expect to hear from him fairly soon. In the meantime, 
there is one thing that I will “share” with you, to use your term. 
Remember, our assumption yesterday was that Smit and Botha were going to get 
into the hall disguised as police officers?’

‘Only too well,’ Houseman said, with a bitter frown. ‘If the police 
communications centre hadn’t been on Saturday mode, we might have got the 
message through in time to stop them.’

‘That’s something I will be addressing now I’m in this chair,’ Skinner 
promised, ‘but don’t dwell on it. My fear was that those uniforms would 
have been taken from two cops and that we’d find them afterwards, probably 
dead.’

‘Yes. You’re not going to tell me you have, are you?’

‘No; the opposite in fact. We’ve found the uniforms, along with the 
discarded police-type carbine that Welsh supplied, in the projection room where 
they took the shot from, but I don’t have any officers missing, and the 
tunics were undamaged… no bullet holes, stab wounds or anything else.

‘They were also brand new, and were a one hundred per cent match for the kit 
my people wear. Trousers, short-sleeved undershirt, stab vest with pockets, and 
caps with the usual Sillitoe Tartan around them. Same for the equipment belt 
and the gear on it, Hiatt speedcuffs, twenty-one-inch autolock baton, and a CS 
spray.

‘Okay, all British police forces wear similar clothing these days, but all 
these things were identical,’ he stressed the word, ‘to ours. The 
Strathclyde insignia is sewn on the armoured vest, and the manufacturer was the 
same… that’s telling, for the force changed its stab vest supplier not so 
long ago. In addition to that, we found two bogus cards on lanyards. Well, they 
were bogus in that the names were made up, they’d been created from blanks 
that my people believe were genuine.’

‘Could Welsh have supplied the stuff?’

‘You saw his store yesterday. There was nothing there other than firearms, 
boxed.’

‘In other words,’ the MI5 operative murmured, ‘what you’re saying is 
that…’

‘We’re doing a thorough stock check now, but it looks as if the clothing 
and body equipment came from our own warehouse. I’ve also asked for checks to 
be done in every other force that uses Hawk body armour. In other words, Clyde, 
the hit team had inside help. Somebody in this force supplied them.’

‘Then you’ve got a problem, sir.’

Skinner leaned back in his chair, making a mental note to adjust it to deal 
with his weight. ‘Actually, Clyde,’ he murmured, ‘I’ve got two.’

Houseman frowned. ‘Oh? What’s the other?’

‘It’s why I asked you to come here,’ the chief replied. ‘It takes us 
back to sharing. I need to know what you took from Smit’s body yesterday, 
when I was busy shooting Gerry Botha, and where it led you. I’ve seen the 
CCTV, remember. You were very slick, and very quick, but it’s there.’ He 
took a deep breath, then let it out in a sigh. ‘Fifteen years ago, son,’ he 
said, ‘I gave you a serious warning; don’t make me have to repeat it, far 
less follow through on it.’





Fourteen



‘You don’t need to see the tape, Danny,’ Lottie Mann said, in a tone that 
would have blocked off all future discussion with anyone but Detective Sergeant 
Provan; he had known her for too long.

He persisted. ‘Are you going to show it to the fiscal?’

‘She’s got it already. The chief had it sent over to her office after 
he’d shown it to me.’

‘So what’s on it?’ The stocky little detective puffed himself up, his 
nicotine-stained white moustache bristling, a familiar sign of irritation that 
she had seen a few hundred times before, mostly when she had been a detective 
constable on the way up the ladder, before she had passed him by. ‘This is a 
police inquiry and I’m second in seniority on the team. I’m entitled to 
bloody know.’

‘News for you, Dan. You’re third in the pecking order. The new chief 
constable might have told the press that I’m SIO on this one, but make no 
mistake, he is. This man Skinner is miles different from Toni Field in most 
ways, but in one they’re very much alike. She was on the way to creating a 
force in her own image, flashy, high-tech.’

‘Don’t I know it,’ Provan grumbled. ‘Fuckin’ hand-held devices in all 
the patrol cars. She’d have had us all wearing GPS ankle bracelets before she 
was done, so she could tell where every one of us was all the time.’

Lottie smiled; she had a soft spot for her sergeant that she never showed to 
anyone else. While it was a little short of the truth to say that he was her 
only mentor… Max Allan had been that also, if anyone ever was… he had 
always been her strongest supporter, even though he had known from their 
earliest days as colleagues that he had plateaued, while she was on the rise.

‘I wouldn’t go quite that far,’ she said, ‘but aye, that’s along the 
lines I meant. Skinner, if he sticks around, he’ll change us too, but it’ll 
be far different from the Field model. And I’ll tell you something else, when 
it comes to CID, it will always go back to him. So, Danny my man, don’t you 
be under any illusions about who’s really heading this investigation, ’cos 
I’m not.’

‘Okay,’ he replied. ‘That’s ma card marked. So if Ah want to know 
what’s on that video Ah go an’ ask Skinner. That’s what ye’re saying, 
is it?’

‘Jesus!’ the DI exploded. ‘You’re as persistent as my wee Jakey. I 
never said I wouldn’t tell you. The recording shows four people being shot. 
Three of them are dead, and Barry Auger could be left in a wheelchair.’ She 
described it in detail, as she had done to her husband a few hours earlier. 
‘Don’t feel left out because you haven’t seen it, Danny. I wish I 
hadn’t. Poor Barry and Sandy, they never had a chance.’

‘So much for body armour,’ the sergeant muttered.

‘It’s no’ going to stop a bullet at close range,’ Mann replied. 
‘Anyway, Sandy was shot in the head, twice. He was a goner before he hit the 
ground. The guy Smit was getting ready to finish Barry when Skinner and the 
other bloke arrived.’

‘Aye, the other bloke. What about him?’

‘Not one of ours. Youngish bloke, maybe mixed race, looked military.’

‘You’re kidding,’ the DS exclaimed. ‘When I was coming in, there was a 
bloke just like that at reception, and I heard him ask for the chief 
constable’s office. Light brown skin, dark hair, creases in his trousers, 
shiny shoes; a fuckin’ soldier for sure. Who is he? What is he?’

‘Skinner hasn’t said outright, but you can bet he’s MI5. I know they’ve 
got a regional presence in Glasgow but I’ve never heard of them being 
involved with us before.’

‘So how come they were this time?’

‘The chief had an investigation going in Edinburgh, and this man got pulled 
in.’

‘Linked to this one?’ Provan asked.

‘Aye. They’ve got a man in custody, the arms supplier.’ She held up a 
hand. ‘Before you get excited, he knows nothing that’s going to help us. I 
just had a call from an ACC in Edinburgh. He told me he just finished 
interrogating him and he’s satisfied he’s not holding anything back.’

‘So the only possible line of investigation we’ve got are the uniforms they 
wore.’

‘Right enough; and the fact that they were ours, not fakes,’ she confirmed. 
‘But that’s not going to be general knowledge either, Danny. If Smit and 
Botha did indeed have an inside contact, we know one thing, he’ll be on his 
guard. We have to be careful.’

‘Agreed, but can Ah ask, how certain are we they’re frae inside?’

‘Every single item that we found was what an officer would wear or carry, yet 
they came from a range of suppliers. If they got them anywhere else they’d 
have had to know who every one of those is, and some of that stuff isn’t 
public knowledge, not even under Freedom of Information rules. But it’s the 
CS spray that’s the clincher; that stuff’s military, and each canister has 
a serial number. We know that the two we found came from our store, because the 
numbers are in sequence and they were missing from the stock.’

‘Right. How do we handle it?’

‘Quietly,’ Mann declared. ‘All police equipment’s held in a secure 
store in Paisley. Operationally, ACC Thomas has oversight of all supplies. He 
checked on the numbers for me personally… he let me know it was a big favour, 
mind… and he’s agreed that we can interview the civilian manager, as long 
as we’re discreet. We’re off to Paisley, first up tomorrow morning.’

‘Just the two of us?’

‘Absolutely,’ the DI replied. ‘Discreet is the word.’

Provan nodded. ‘Fair enough. Now, there’s one other thing that Ah’ve been 
wondering, a question I haven’t heard anyone raise since last night.’

‘What’s that?’

‘How did these two fellas get there, and how were they plannin’ tae get 
away? This was a well-planned operation, so I doubt they were going down tae 
the Central Station to catch the London train.’

Lottie Mann’s eyes widened. ‘You know, Dan, life’s really not fair. You 
should be the DI, not me. Smit and Botha had nothing on them, nothing at all. 
No ID of any sort, no wallets, no car keys, nothing.’

‘In that case, Lottie,’ the DS chuckled, ‘maybe Ah should be chief 
constable, for if the new guy really is runnin’ this investigation like you 
say, then he’s missed it as well.’





Fifteen



Clyde Houseman’s face grew even more pink, but with embarrassment.

‘Come on,’ Skinner snapped. ‘Out with it.’

‘I’m sorry, sir,’ the man replied, ‘but it’s like this. I’m a 
Security Service officer, and what we were involved in yesterday… well, I 
felt at the time it was one of our operations, and not police, and when I was 
sent to see you yesterday, by my boss, it was on the basis of bringing you 
inside, not deferring to you.’

‘And you kept thinking that way even though three of our people had been 
shot?’ the chief constable countered.

‘Even though. I’d just taken someone down myself, and in those 
circumstances it was my duty to protect the interests of my service: standard 
practice. So I did what I did. I meant to report to my deputy director straight 
away, but I was caught up in the situation and couldn’t. I tried to call her 
this morning, but so far I haven’t been able to raise her, and I don’t want 
to go anywhere else. She’s my immediate boss.’

‘Even Amanda Dennis has to turn her phone off some time,’ Skinner said. 
‘Clyde,’ he continued, ‘I understand what you’re saying, but I’m not 
buying it. Like it or not, this was a very public crime and the investigation 
has to be seen to be thorough. I can’t have you withholding evidence. So come 
on, man, and remember this: I’ve already protected the interests of your 
service. Only one police officer has seen that tape of you and me taking care 
of the South Africans, and that’s how it’s going to stay. She’s assuming 
that I’ve given it to the procurator fiscal, the prosecutor’s office, 
because I let her believe that, but in fact it’s still in my desk. The deputy 
fiscal in charge of the investigation knows about it, because I’ve told him; 
he understands the sensitivity and he’s prepared to forget that it ever 
existed.’

‘Where is it now?’

‘Locked in my desk, for now, till somebody comes up with the combination of 
the bloody safe that Toni Field left behind.’

‘Thank you for that,’ Houseman murmured. ‘But do you trust your people? 
Leaks can happen, and the last thing that either of us wants is for that video 
to wind up on YouTube.’

‘At the moment, I trust them more than I trust you,’ Skinner pointed out, 
‘and I will until you cough up what you took from Smit’s body. Look, I 
don’t want to, but I will bypass Amanda and go to your director if I have to, 
even though he is a buffoon.’

‘Sir Hubert would probably back me up.’

‘No he wouldn’t,’ the chief chuckled. ‘Do you have any idea of what 
would happen if I even hinted to the media that MI5 was getting in the way of 
my investigation? You’re forgetting who’s been killed here. Toni Field was 
a big name in the Met, plus the Mayor of London was said to be her biggest fan. 
All of their weight would come down on Thames House if I dropped the word. 
Plus,’ he added, ‘I’ve got the tape. You’re worried about YouTube, son? 
If I chose I could edit it, destroy the footage of me shooting Botha, and leak 
the rest myself. If I chose,’ he repeated. ‘Not that I would, but I won’t 
have to, because you’re going to…’ he smiled, ‘. . . share with me 
again. Aren’t you?’

Houseman sighed, then reached inside his leather jerkin. For an instant Skinner 
tensed, but what he produced was nothing more menacing than an envelope.

‘I had a hunch our meeting might go this way,’ he said, ‘so I brought the 
things along.’

He handed it across to the chief, who took it, ripped it open and shook its 
contents out on to the desk: a car key, with a Drivall rental tag bearing a 
vehicle registration number, and a parking ticket.

Skinner picked up the rectangle of card and peered at it with the intense 
concentration of a man who had reached the age of fifty and yet was still in 
denial of his need for reading spectacles.

‘Have you done anything with this yet?’

His visitor shook his head. ‘I decided to wait for instructions.’

‘On whether to hand it over to me or not?’

‘Yes, more or less.’

‘Now you’ve done it, story’s over as far as I’m concerned. If Amanda 
gives you a hard time, although I don’t believe she will, you can tell her I 
coerced you into it. So,’ he held up the ticket, between two fingers, ‘you 
know where this is for?’

‘It doesn’t say on it.’

‘Maybe not, but given the exit they chose, the likeliest is the multi-storey 
on the other side of Killermont Street, beside the bus station. One way to find 
out.’ Skinner pushed himself to his feet. ‘Gimme a minute.’

He picked up his uniform jacket from the back of his chair, and stepped into 
the private room behind it. When he emerged, three minutes later, he had 
changed into the same slacks and cotton jacket that Houseman had seen the day 
before.

‘We’re going ourselves?’ the younger man asked.

‘Of course. I seize every chance that comes up to get out of my office; there 
may not be too many more, now I’m here.’

He led the way out of his room, but instead of heading straight for the exit, 
he turned left, stopping at the second door. He opened it and called to the 
occupant. ‘Lowell, I have an outside visit; I could use your help.’

Payne had been working on the chief constable’s forward engagement diary. He 
closed it and crossed swiftly to the door. ‘Where are we going?’ he asked, 
then reacted with surprise as he saw Houseman for the first time.

Skinner did the introductions on his way to the lift. ‘Clyde’s come in with 
some new information,’ he added. ‘He’s found the vehicle Smit and Botha 
were using yesterday. Well, that’s to say, we know where it might be.’

‘Should we call Lottie?’ the DCI asked.

‘Yes, we should, but we won’t until we’ve got something to tell her.’

They rode the lift down to the sub-level that accessed the police headquarters 
park, then took Payne’s car, which he had left in the space allocated to the 
deputy chief. The journey along Sauchiehall Street and Renfrew Street to the 
Buchanan Street bus station took only two minutes, five less than it might have 
on a weekday. Skinner smiled as they passed the McLellan Galleries, his mind 
going back thirty years to a visit to an art exhibition, in a foursome with 
Louise Bankier and a couple of their fellow students, when he had spotted, on 
the other side of the big room, Myra, his fiancée, with a spotty guy he had 
never seen before. They were heading for the exit, hand in hand, with eyes only 
for each other. He never had found out who the bloke was, but it had never 
occurred to him to ask. He had been too wrapped up in his own guilt over 
Louise; indeed the close encounter had been the beginning of the end of that 
relationship.

He was still dwelling on the past as they approached their destination. In case 
his daydream had been noticed, he took out the Drivall car key and made a show 
of peering at the number written on the fob, until he gave up and handed it to 
Houseman, and his younger eyes.

‘We’re looking for a Peugeot,’ he announced, after the briefest study, 
‘registration LX12 PMP. Doesn’t say what colour it is.’

Payne ignored the official entry point and drove to the office instead. The way 
was blocked by a barrier. A staff member, in a Day-Glo jacket, came out to meet 
them. The DCI showed his warrant card, and the parking ticket that Skinner had 
handed to him. ‘That one of yours?’ he asked.

The attendant studied it. ‘Aye,’ he confirmed. ‘It’s dated yesterday 
afternoon. Left overnight, eh, and no’ picked up yet. Stolen car? There’s 
nae TV in here so we get them.’

‘Not necessarily, but we need to find it. Is the park busy?’

‘Jam packed, but go on in.’ He pushed a button at the side of the barrier, 
and it rose.

‘Okay. Two ways of doing this,’ the chief declared. ‘We either drive 
through very slowly, and hope we get lucky, or we do the sensible thing and 
split it. Lowell, drop me on level two, Clyde on four and you go to the top and 
park. We work our way down till we find it. You’ve both got my work mobile 
number, and I’ve got yours; either of you find the car, you call me and 
I’ll alert the other.’

Payne did as he was instructed. As each of them reached his starting point, he 
realised that the multi-storey was spilt into sub-levels, making it bigger than 
it had looked from the outside. They searched their separate areas as quickly 
as they could but nonetheless almost fifteen minutes had passed before 
Skinner’s mobile rang. By that time he was at ground level.

His screen told him that it was Houseman who had made the discovery. ‘I’m 
on level five,’ the spook said. ‘At the side, overlooking the street.’

‘Good spot. Be with you in a minute; I’ll tell Lowell.’

‘There’s no need. The way this place is built he can see me from where he 
is.’

Skinner took the stairs, two at a time. As he stepped out on to level five he 
saw Payne, on his left, coming towards him down a ramp.

The Peugeot was a big saloon model, in a dark blue colour. Skinner took the key 
from his pocket and worked out by trial and error which button unlocked it. 
Houseman was in the act of reaching for the driver’s door handle when Payne 
called out to him.

‘No, not without gloves.’ He smiled. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘It’s a CID 
reflex.’

‘Understood,’ the MI5 man conceded. He took a handkerchief from his pocket 
and used it to open the door.

Skinner stepped up behind him and looked inside, then slotted the key in to 
light up the dashboard. ‘Satnav,’ he said.

‘So?’ Houseman murmured.

‘With a bit of luck they’ll have used it. With even more, they won’t have 
deleted previous entries. When did they collect the uniforms and equipment? 
Where? That may give us a clue.’

‘Mmm.’

‘And if they did pick up the gear from an inside source, he may have left us 
a print, or a DNA trace.’

‘That’s if he’s on the database,’ Payne pointed out. ‘If he is 
inside, how likely is that?’

‘Come on, Lowell,’ Skinner chided. ‘Think positive.’ He glanced into 
the back of the car, saw it was empty, then withdrew the key and closed the 
driver’s door, leaning on it with an elbow. Moving round to the back of the 
vehicle, which had been left perilously close to the wall of the building, he 
pushed a third button on the remote. There was a muffled sound and the boot lid 
sprang open.

‘Jesus Christ!’ the DCI yelled, jumping backwards in alarm and astonishment.

His companions stood their ground, gazing into the luggage compartment.

‘Surprisingly capacious, these things,’ the chief constable murmured, 
‘aren’t they, Clyde? You’d get at least two sets of golf clubs in there, 
no problem. Maybe two trolleys as well.’

‘Beyond a doubt.’

Two medium-sized blue suitcases lay on their sides, at the front of the boot, 
but there had still been more than enough room for the rest of the load to be 
jammed in behind them: the body of a man, knees drawn up and his arms wrapped 
around them. The eyes were open, staring, and there was a cluster of three 
holes in the centre of his chest.

‘So, chum,’ Skinner wondered. ‘Who the hell were you, and why did you 
wind up here?’





Sixteen



‘That’s Bazza Brown,’ DS Dan Provan announced.

Lottie Mann frowned. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Trust me. Real name Basil, but nobody ever called him that, unless they 
wanted a sore face. The first time Ah lifted him he was sixteen, sellin’ what 
he claimed were LSD tabs on squares from a school jotter. They wis just melted 
sugar, but nobody ever complained; he wis a hard kid even then, and he had a 
gang.’

‘When was that?’ Skinner asked. He had never met the wizened little 
detective before but he found himself taking an instant liking to him, and to 
his irreverence.

‘Goin’ on twenty-five years ago, sir. He moved on frae there, though. The 
next time I picked him up he’d just turned twenty-one and he was sellin’ 
hash. He got three years for that, in the University of Barlinnie, and that, 
you might say, completed his formal education. He’s never done a day’s time 
since, even though he’s reckoned… sorry, he was reckoned… to be one of 
the big three in drugs in Glasgow.’

‘So how come he wound up in a car boot sale?’

‘Ah can’t tell you that, sir. But Ah know you’re going to want us to find 
out.’

The chief grinned. ‘That is indeed the name of the game, Sergeant.’

He and Payne had called in Mann and her squad at once. They had left the car 
untouched. Indeed the only change in the scenery since they had made their 
discovery lay in the absence of Clyde Houseman. Skinner had decided that it 
would be best if he made himself scarce.

He had expected Lottie Mann to be blunt when she arrived, and had been ready 
for her challenge.

‘Can I ask what the fuck you’re doing here, sir? I’ve got people out 
showing pictures of Smit and Botha to every car park attendant in Glasgow, and 
what do I find? You and DCI Payne, with their bloody car key!’

‘Inspector!’ Lowell Payne had intervened, but his new chief had calmed his 
protest with a wave of his hand.

‘It’s okay. DI Mann is well entitled to sound off. I was given some 
information, Lottie, and I decided to evaluate it myself, and to bring you in 
if I reckoned it was worth it. Get used to me: it’s the way I am.’

‘Oh, I know that already, sir,’ she retorted. ‘Just like I know there’s 
no point me asking who your source was.’

‘That’s right, but now the result is all yours.’

She had given one of her hard-earned smiles, then gone into action.

The photographer and video cameraman were finishing their work as Provan 
announced the identity of the victim and he and Skinner had their exchange. 
They had been hampered slightly by a silver Toyota parked in the bay on the 
right, but the two to the left were clear.

As they packed their equipment, the elevator door opened, beside the stairway 
exit, and a woman stepped out, pushing a child in a collapsible pram with John 
Lewis bags hung on the back. She frowned as she moved towards them. ‘What’s 
going…’ she began.

Payne moved quickly across to intercept her, holding up his warrant card. 
‘Police, ma’am. Is that your Toyota?’

‘Yes, but what… It’s not damaged, is it? I can move it, can’t I?’

‘It’s fine, but please don’t come any closer. If you give me your car key 
I’ll bring it out for you.’

‘It’s not a bomb, is it?’ The young mother was terrified; Payne smiled to 
reassure her.

‘No, no, not at all. If it was I wouldn’t be within a mile of it myself. 
It’s just a suspicious vehicle, that’s all. We’re checking out the 
contents. You just give me your keys and don’t you worry.’

He reversed the Toyota out of its bay and drove it a little way down the exit 
ramp, then helped her load her bags and her child, who had slept through the 
exchange.

‘Did she see anything?’ Mann asked the DCI as he returned.

‘No, or you’d have heard the screams. But we need to get a screen round 
this, now we’ve got the room.’

‘It’s on the way, with the forensic people. We’d better not touch 
anything till they get here. That peppery wee bastard Dorward’s on weekend 
duty and he’ll never let me forget it if I compromise “his” crime 
scene.’

‘It’s well compromised already, Lottie,’ Skinner pointed out. ‘Anyone 
got a pair of gloves?’ he asked. ‘I want a look at these suitcases. I’ll 
handle Arthur’s flak. I’ve been doing it for long enough.’

Provan handed him a pair of latex gloves. He slipped them on and lifted one of 
the blue cases from the boot, laid it on the ground and tried the catches, 
hoping they were unlocked and smiling when they clicked open.

‘Clothing,’ he announced as he studied the contents, and sifted through 
them. ‘It looks like two changes: trousers, shirt, underwear, just the one 
jacket, though, and one pair of shoes. Everything’s brand new, Marks and 
Spencer labels still on them. Summer wear. Mmm,’ he mused. ‘What’s the 
weather like in South Africa in July?’

There was a zipped pocket set in the lid of the case, which also sported a 
Marks and Spencer label on its lining. He unfastened it, felt inside and found 
a padded envelope. It was unsealed; the contents slid into his hand.

‘Wallet,’ he said. ‘Looks like at least three hundred quid. One Visa 
debit card in the name of Bryan Lightbody. A passport, New Zealand, in the same 
name, but with Gerry Botha’s photo inside. Flight tickets and itinerary, 
Singapore Air, Heathrow to Auckland through Singapore, business class, 
departure tomorrow evening.’

He lifted the second case from the car and checked its contents. ‘An 
Australian passport,’ he announced when he was finished. ‘It and the bank 
card are in the name of Richie Mallett, and the flight ticket’s Quantas to 
Sydney, again Heathrow tomorrow night. So that was the game plan. Drive to 
London, fly away home and leave us scratching our arses as we try to find them 
on flights out of Scotland.’

‘Well planned,’ Lottie Mann observed.

‘Yes, but that’s not what these guys did. The man Cohen was the planner. He 
made all the arrangements, bought the air tickets, hired the car.’

‘The car,’ she repeated, then turned to Provan. ‘Get…’

‘Ah’m on it already,’ he retorted, waving the car key with his left hand 
while holding his mobile to his ear. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘that’s right, 
Strathclyde CID. I’m standing over one o’ your cars just now, and Ah need 
to know whose name is on the rental contract.’ He paused, listening.

‘Because there’s something wrong wi’ it, that’s why.’ He waited again.

‘Maybe there wasn’t when it left you, Jimmy, but there is now. There’s a 
fuckin’ body in the boot. Or dae all your vehicles come with that accessory? 
No, Ah won’t hold on. The registration’s LX12 PMP; you get me the 
information Ah want and get back to me through the force main switchboard. 
They’ll transfer your call to my mobile. Pronto, please, this is very 
important.’

As Provan finished, Skinner tapped him on the shoulder. ‘Have you ever done a 
course,’ he asked, ‘on communication with the public?’

The sergeant pursed his lips, wrinkling his two-tone moustache in the process, 
and looked up at him. ‘No, sir, I can’t say that Ah have.’

‘Then I will make it my business, Detective Sergeant,’ the chief told him, 
without the suggestion of a smile, ‘to see that you never do.’

‘Thanks, gaffer,’ the little DS replied, ‘but even if you did send me on 
one, at my age I wake up sometimes wi’ this terrible hacking cough. Knocks me 
right off for the day, it does.’

Skinner laughed out loud. ‘I could get to like it here,’ he exclaimed. Then 
he turned serious. ‘Now prove to me that you’re a detective, not some 
fucking hobbit who’s tolerated because he’s been around for ever. There’s 
a begged question in this scenario. I’m not wondering about the guy in the 
boot. You knew who he was, and I know what he was. No, it’s something else, 
unrelated. What is it?’

As Dan Provan looked up at his new boss, two thoughts entered his mind. The 
first of them was financial. He had over thirty years in the job, and his 
pension was secure as long as he didn’t punch the chief constable in the 
mouth, and since that struck him as being a seriously stupid overreaction, it 
wasn’t going to happen. So the ‘daft laddie’ option was open to him, 
without risk.

But the second was professional, and pride was involved. He had survived as 
long as he had because he was, in fact, a damn good detective, and as such he 
was expert in analysing every scenario and in identifying all the possible 
lines of inquiry that it offered.

A third consideration followed. Skinner hadn’t asked him the question to 
embarrass him, but because he expected him to know the answer.

He frowned and bent his mind to recalling as much as he could of what had been 
said in the previous half hour. He played the mental tape, piece by piece, then 
ran through it again.

‘It’s the flights,’ he said, when he was sure. ‘The two dead guys had 
plane tickets out of Heathrow. Yes?’

‘Yes.’

‘Right. Now if everything had gone to plan, the two hit men, Smit and Botha, 
or Lightbody and Mallett, or Randall and fuckin’ Hopkirk deceased, whoever 
they were, if it had all gone to plan, they’d have driven straight out of 
this car park, almost before the alarm had been raised, headed straight down to 
London, dumping our friend Bazza in some lay-by along the way, and got on a 
fuckin’ plane. Right, boss?’

Skinner nodded. ‘You’re on a roll, Sergeant, carry on.’

‘Thank you, gaffer. In that case, even as we’re stood here, they could have 
been sipping fuckin’ cocktails in business class. Except… their flights 
were booked for Monday, for tomorrow. So what were they supposed to be doin’ 
in those spare twenty-four hours?’

The chief constable smiled. ‘Absolutely. Top question. You got an answer for 
that one?’

Provan shrugged, ‘No idea, sir.’ He nodded towards the boot of the Peugeot. 
‘But if we find out what they were doing with poor old Bazza Brown there, 
maybe that’ll give us a clue.’





Seventeen



‘He’s a marginally insubordinate little joker, but I do like him,’ Bob 
chuckled. ‘He and that DI, Lottie, they’re some team.’

Sarah smiled across the table, on which the last of their dinner plates lay, 
empty save for the skeletons of two lemon sole. She raised her coffee cup. 
‘Could it be that Glasgow isn’t the cultural wasteland you thought it 
was?’

‘Hey, come on,’ he protested. ‘I never said that, or even thought it. 
I’m from Motherwell, remember; I’m not quite a Weegie myself, but close. I 
have a Glasgow degree; I spent a good chunk of my teens in that fair city. West 
of Scotland culture is in my blood. Why do you think I like country music and 
bad stand-up comedians?’

‘So part of you is glad to be back there,’ she suggested.

‘Sure, the nostalgic part.’

‘Then why did you ever leave?’ she asked in her light American drawl. 
‘Myra was from Motherwell as well and yet the two of you upped sticks and 
moved through to Gullane in your early twenties.’

‘You know why; I’ve told you often enough. I liked Edinburgh, and I liked 
the seaside. I wanted to work in one and live by the other. I’ve never 
regretted that decision either, not once.’

‘But what made you choose it over Glasgow? I can see you, man, and your 
pleasure now at being back there. There must have been an underlying reason.’

He leaned back in his chair and gazed at her. ‘Very well,’ he conceded. 
‘There was. I didn’t like being asked what school I went to.’

‘Uh?’ she grunted. ‘Come again? What’s that got to do with anything?’

His laugh was gentle, amused. ‘You’ve lived in Scotland for how long? 
Twelve years on and off, and you don’t know that one? It’s code, and what 
it actually means is, “Are you Protestant or are you Catholic?” Where I 
grew up that was a key question, just as much as in Belfast, and for all Aileen 
and her kind might try to deny it, I’m sure it still is in some places and to 
some people. The answer could determine many things, not least your employment 
prospects.

‘Why the school question? Because through there, education was organised 
along religious lines; there were Roman Catholic schools and 
non-denominational, the latter being in name only. They were where the 
Protestants went. So, your school defined you, and it could mean that some 
doors were just slammed in your face.’

‘Wow,’ Sarah murmured. ‘I know about Rangers and Celtic football clubs, 
of course, but I didn’t think it went that deep.’

‘It did, and for some it still does. Both those clubs condemn sectarianism 
but they still struggle to eradicate it among their supporters. I decided very 
early on that I didn’t want any kids of mine growing up in that environment, 
and Myra agreed. That’s what was behind our move.’

‘But now you’re back you like it?’

‘Hey, love, it’s been one day. My reservations about the size of the 
Strathclyde force are as strong as ever. What I’m saying is that I like the 
people I’ve met so far. Mann and Provan, they’re good cops and pure 
Glaswegian, both of them.’

‘What school did they go to?’

‘As for Lottie, I have no idea.’ He winked. ‘But the Celtic supporter’s 
lapel badge that wee Provan was wearing still offers something of a clue. He 
may miss their next game,’ he added, ‘if they don’t get these killings 
wrapped up soon.’

‘Yeah,’ Sarah said. ‘The body in the boot must have been a bit of a 
shaker.’

‘It was for Lowell, that’s for sure. He jumped out of his skin. Me too, to 
be honest, but I’ve gotten good at hiding it.’

‘Why was he there, the dead guy?’

‘I guess they didn’t want to leave him wherever he was killed. The 
provisional time of death was Friday evening some time; with the hit being 
planned for Saturday, they may not have wanted to muddy the waters by having 
him found.’

‘Meaning the police might have made a connection to them?’

He nodded. ‘It would have been a long shot, but that would have been the 
thinking.’

‘Mmm.’ She frowned. ‘But I didn’t mean why was he in the boot; I mean 
why were they involved with him at all?’

‘We all asked ourselves that one. It seems that the late Mr Brown was a 
reasonably heavy-duty Glasgow criminal, but I doubt very much that Mr Smit and 
Mr Botha met him to do a drug deal on the side.’

‘Are you still sure those are their real names?’

‘Oh yes, we know that. We can trace them all the way back to the South 
African armed forces. Lightbody and Mallett were aliases. It remains to be seen 
whether they actually lived under those names, one in New Zealand, one in 
Australia. We’ll need to wait for the passport offices and the police in 
those countries to open before we can follow them up.’ He checked his watch; 
quarter to nine. ‘New Zealand should be wide awake now, Australia in an hour 
or two. Anyway, whatever their fucking names, what were they doing with a 
Weegie hood?’

‘Yes, any theories?’

‘Only one, the obvious. Mr Brown must have been involved in the supply of the 
police uniforms and equipment, and they must have decided not to leave him 
behind as a witness.’

‘So why did they leave the arms dealer alive?’ Sarah wondered.

‘Because he’s part of that world, I’d guess, and was in as deep as they 
were. A small-timer they’d have seen as a weakness.’

Sarah refilled her cup from a cafetière. Bob, who had given up coffee at her 
suggestion, almost at her insistence, topped up his glass with mineral water.

‘But the tough questions are, why was he in the chain at all, and who 
introduced him? There we do not have a Scooby, as wee Provan would probably 
say.’

‘Good.’ She smiled. ‘Enough for tonight, Chief Constable. No more shop, 
just Bob and Sarah for a while. I’ve been thinking about what happened a 
couple of nights ago, you and me having a nice quiet dinner and ending up in 
bed together.’ She took his hand, studying it as she spoke. ‘I have to ask 
you this, Bob, because it’s been gnawing away at me, knowing from personal 
experience how unpredictable you are when it comes to women. Are you and the 
witch definitely a thing of the past? Is there any chance of a 
reconciliation?’

He sipped some water. ‘Given our history,’ he began, ‘I suppose I 
deserved that “unpredictability” crack. But you can take this to the bank: 
Aileen and I are through. Sit her across from you and she would give you the 
same answer. She’d probably add also that we’re not going to walk away as 
friends either. Each of us married a person without knowing them at all. Before 
too long we found we didn’t even like each other all that much.’

‘Do you think you know me now?’ she asked.

‘None of us can live inside someone else’s head, but if I don’t know what 
makes you tick by now…’ He leaned forward and looked deep into her eyes. 
‘I always did like you; now I know more. I never stopped loving you either.’

‘But let’s not put it to the test by getting married again. Agreed?’

Bob nodded. ‘Agreed. But is that because you don’t trust me? If it is, I 
understand.’

‘Amazing as it may sound, I do trust you. No, it’s because right now, the 
way we are… I don’t think I’ve ever felt happier, and I don’t want to 
risk that.’

‘Fair enough. Now, with the kids upstairs in bed, can we do something 
old-fashioned, like watching television?’

She laughed. ‘How very couple-ish! Yeah, let’s.’

She was flicking through the channel choice when Bob’s work mobile sounded. 
‘Bugger,’ he murmured. ‘I must give this Edinburgh phone back to Maggie 
and get a new one from Strathclyde. Chances are this is for her.’ He looked 
at the caller identification. ‘No, it’s not. Lowell,’ he said as he 
accepted the call, ‘what’s up? News from down under?’

As Sarah watched him, she saw his eyes widen, a frown wrinkle his forehead for 
a second then disappear. ‘You’re fucking kidding,’ he exclaimed. ‘So 
that’s what the bloody woman was leading up to. Don’t apologise, man, I 
know you had to tell me, but worry not; it won’t ruin my night. I just wish I 
could be a fly on a certain wall, that’s all.’

He ended the call as Sarah laid down the TV remote.

‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘What bloody woman? Aileen?’

‘As it happened, no,’ he told her, ‘another bloody woman, but not 
unconnected. What you asked me earlier on, whether there was a cat’s chance 
of the two of us staying together.’ He laughed. ‘If you doubted me at all, 
then, by Christ, you’re going to be a happy woman tomorrow morning.’





Eighteen



‘Are we all set for tomorrow, Alf?’

‘Yes, but I’ve brought it forward to eleven thirty. The phone’s never 
stopped ringing all day, and the place is going to be packed out. If you want 
to do follow-up interviews and get them on the midday news we’ll need to 
start a bit earlier than noon.’

‘Agreed,’ Aileen said. ‘And the announcement: do they have that ready?’

‘Yes,’ the party CEO replied. ‘I’ve just sent you a draft by email. If 
you clear it, I can tell the policy staff to go home for the night.’

‘I’ll do that right now.’

‘Thanks. I must go now, Aileen. For some reason the switchboard’s just lit 
up like a Christmas tree.’

She cradled the phone and turned to Joey Morocco, who was removing silver boxes 
from a brown paper bag. She smiled. ‘You must do this a lot,’ she remarked. 
‘I heard you at the front door; you were on first-name terms with the 
delivery boy. “Thank you, Wen-Chong.” I take it that means we’re having 
Chinese.’

‘I see that being married to a detective’s rubbed off on you,’ he said. 
‘Sure, first-name terms with him, with Jeev from the Asian up in Gibson 
Street, with Kemal from the kebab shop and with Jocky.’

‘Jocky? Who the hell’s he?’

‘Pizza. That’s the Italians for you; much more interbred with the 
indigenous population.’

She looked over his shoulder. ‘What have we got?’

‘Chicken, brack bean sauce,’ he replied, mimicking a Chinese accent, 
‘plawn sweet and sowah, clispy duck and pancakes, and lice; flied of 
course.’

‘Sounds great. I just need five minutes on my laptop and I’ll be ready.’

She wakened her computer from the sleep state in which she had left it earlier 
in the evening, and searched her email inbox. It was full of messages from 
friends, anxious, she guessed, for news of her safety, but Old’s was near the 
top and she found it with ease.

She opened the attachment, which was headed, ‘Draft Statement: Unified Police 
Force’, scanned it quickly, made a few changes to bring it into her delivery 
style, then sent it back with a covering note that read, ‘Final version clear 
for use.’

She had just clicked the ‘send’ button when a tone advised her that another 
message had hit the inbox, once again from Alf Old. Almost simultaneously, her 
mobile rang, and the screen showed that he was calling. She made a choice; the 
phone won.

‘Aileen.’ Even although he had only said her name, the chief executive, 
famed for his calmness, sounded rattled. ‘I’ve just sent you an email.’

‘I know, it just arrived. I haven’t opened it yet.’

‘Then you’d better do so.’

Not only rattled, she realised; he was angry also.

She opened the message. There was no text, only an attachment, headed ‘P1’, 
in PDF form. She clicked on it and an image appeared, as quickly as her ageing 
laptop would allow.

It was a newspaper front page, with the masthead of the Daily News, and beneath 
it a headline. ‘Road to Morocco: married Labour leader goes to ground.’ 
Most of it was taken up by a photograph, taken from a distance with a long 
lens, but the face was all too clearly hers, looking out of Joey Morocco’s 
bedroom window, with a curtain held across her, but not far enough to cover her 
right breast, which the newspaper had chosen to cover with a black rectangle.

‘Fuck!’ she screamed.

‘Exactly!’ Old barked. ‘What the hell were you thinking about, Aileen?’

‘It’s not what you think,’ she protested.

‘Then what the hell else is it? Anyway it doesn’t matter what I think, 
it’s what the readers of the Daily News think, them and the readers of every 
other paper that the photographer sells it on to, once they’ve had their 
exclusive. They’ve already given it to BBC, Sky and ITN, for use after ten, 
to sell even more papers tomorrow morning.’

‘Is it on the streets yet? Can we stop them?’

‘It will be any minute now, and no we can’t. We could go to the Court of 
Session and ask for an interdict preventing further publication. We might get 
it, we might not, probably not. Anyway, the damage is done.’

Her anger had risen up to match his. ‘But how did they get it?’ she asked. 
‘How did they know I was here?’

‘They didn’t. I spoke to the editor of the Scottish version; he’s a mate 
and he was good enough to call me, and to send the page across. He said it was 
taken by a freelance photographer, a paparazzo, who stakes out Joey Morocco’s 
place periodically, just in case.

‘She saw a car parked across his driveway, with two guys in it who had 
Special Branch written all over them… her words… so she found a vantage 
point out of their sight and hung around, just in case. She got lucky; saw a 
face at the window and a bit more, snapped off as many shots as she could, then 
legged it.

‘It was only when she downloaded the photos on to her laptop in her car that 
she realised how lucky she was. She got straight on to the News. That’s her 
best payer, apparently.’

‘Bastards!’ she hissed, then chuckled, taking herself by surprise. 
‘It’s the wee black sticker I really hate. It’s suggesting that my tits 
are too misshapen for a family newspaper: that they might put folk off their 
breakfast.’

‘Then cheer up,’ Old growled. ‘There’s another one inside, on page 
three, appropriately enough, with you looking over your shoulder, as if to make 
it crystal clear that there is somebody else in the room with you. There’s a 
lot more of you on show there, and they haven’t covered that up.’

‘Who wrote the story?’

‘Marguerite Hatton. She’s on their political staff. They flew her up from 
London overnight.’

‘That’s the bitch that gave Bob trouble earlier on at his press conference. 
She’ll rub his nose in it now.’

‘Or he will rub yours.’

‘I couldn’t care less about him. Why do you think I’m at Joey’s?’ As 
she spoke, she became aware of a figure in the doorway, holding a plate in each 
hand. ‘I’ve got some apologising to do to him.’

‘Well, do it on the way to the emergency exit. You have to get out of there, 
for a fucking army’s going to land on his doorstep as soon as the telly news 
breaks. Get your bodyguards to pull right up to his door, jump in their car and 
have them get you the hell out of there.’

‘To where, though?’ Joey had moved in behind her and was studying the image 
on the laptop. ‘It’ll be just as bad at my place.’

‘To Gullane?’ Old suggested. ‘Give yourself time to come up with a cover 
story? Maybe even do a happy families shot tomorrow.’

‘Not a fucking chance. I tell you, we’re history. Anyway, I’m going to be 
in Glasgow tomorrow.’

‘Eh?’ he exclaimed. ‘You’re not going ahead with the press conference, 
are you?’

She gasped. ‘Of course, man. We’ll never have a bigger crowd. I will not 
back down from this. It’s not going to kill me, any more than that guy did 
last night, so it can only make me stronger.’

‘Then go to my place. Nobody will think to look there. I’ll call Justine 
and tell her you’re coming.’





Nineteen



‘She’s done what?’ Sarah looked at him, astonished. ‘Let herself be 
photographed in a lover’s bedroom the morning after she’s come within an 
inch of her life?’

‘That’s what they’re going to say,’ Bob acknowledged.

‘She will argue, of course, that Morocco’s an old family friend and that 
his girlfriend was there too.’

‘I don’t think so,’ he replied. ‘She won’t lie her way out of it; too 
big a downside if she’s caught, as many a politician’s found out to their 
cost. She’ll front it up; I know her.’

‘And blacken your name in the process?’

He shook his head. ‘She’ll have a tough time doing that. She doesn’t 
realise it but I have more friends in the media than she has. Speaking of whom, 
I expect that some of them will be calling me in the next hour or so, on my 
mobile and at Gullane. I think it would be best if I go home, so that I’m 
there to answer them.’

‘Aww!’ she moaned. ‘I was looking forward to you staying.’

‘Me too, but if I do, there’s an outside chance that someone might doorstep 
me here in the morning. I don’t want you and the kids caught up in this, in 
any way.’

She stood with him as he rose to leave, picking up his jacket from the back of 
the sofa. ‘How do you feel about this?’ she asked. ‘Her being all over 
the tabloids.’

‘I’ve had some of that myself in my career,’ he answered, ‘and I 
didn’t like it. Am I embarrassed by it? Not a bit. People may talk about me 
behind my back, but none will to my face, so fuck ’em. Am I angry? No, 
because I don’t have a right to be. It could have been me looking out of your 
bedroom window and all over the papers in the morning.’

‘Are you sorry for her?’ she murmured.

‘Only if he’s a lousy fuck, and not worth it. She will win out of this. I 
don’t know how, but she will.’

She walked him to the door and hugged him there, looking up into his eyes. 
‘So what do we do?’

‘Tomorrow we go to work, each of us, and Trish takes care of the kids as 
usual. I’m going to be as busy as the Devil’s apprentice all this week, so 
we’ll see each other when we can. With a bit of luck we’ll be able to keep 
the weekend free.’

She kissed him. ‘That’s a plan,’ she said. ‘Now be on with your way and 
answer those phone calls.’

The first came, on his work mobile… he had switched his personal phone off as 
he left Sarah’s… as he was turning on to the Edinburgh bypass. He had been 
expecting it.

‘Bob.’ The voice that filled the car through its speaker system was no 
longer aggressive, as it had been the last time he had heard it, but there was 
nothing fearful or tentative about it. ‘I have something to tell you.’

‘No, you don’t,’ he replied, speaking louder than usual, to allow for 
road noise.

‘You’ve heard, then.’

‘Of course I have. The editor of the News called my people. I don’t know 
him but he said that he’d given you advance warning and was offering me the 
same courtesy. Of course, he also asked me for a comment.’

‘And did you give him one?’

Skinner laughed. ‘Shouldn’t I be asking you that question, in a different 
context? Not that I need to; from what I’ve been told the answer’s pretty 
fucking obvious. Oops, sorry, unfortunate choice of word. Bet you’re glad now 
I persuaded you to spend that time in the gym.’

‘Bob!’ she snapped. ‘Did you give the man a quote?’

‘Don’t be daft,’ he retorted. ‘Of course I didn’t. Nor will I to 
anyone else, and I’m bloody sure quite a few people will be asking over the 
next couple of hours. What about you?’

‘Nothing so far; they don’t know where I am now. But I’m seeing the press 
tomorrow morning.’

‘How about Joey? What’s he going to be saying?’

‘That I’m an old friend and that he offered me a place where I could 
recover from my ordeal in private.’

‘Is he going to refer to me?’

‘What would he say about you?’

‘Not about me: to me. Some people might expect him to say “Sorry”. 
That’s the big media word these days, isn’t it? People under the spotlight 
all have to utter the “S” word, whether they are or not.’

‘Do you expect that?’

‘Hell no. I’m sorry for him, if anything. He didn’t bargain for all this 
crap.’

‘Well,’ she said, beginning to sound exasperated, as if she thought he was 
playing with her, as he was to a degree, ‘what are you going to say?’

‘Tonight, nothing. Not a fucking word, about you or against you, or anything 
else. What time’s your press briefing tomorrow?’

‘Eleven thirty.’

‘In that case,’ he declared, ‘at ten o’clock, we’re going to issue a 
joint statement through Mitchell Laidlaw, my lawyer at Curle Anthony Jarvis. It 
will say something along these lines: on Thursday… or whenever, you pick the 
day… you and I agreed to separate permanently because of profound and 
irreconcilable differences that have developed between us. You draft it, let me 
see it and we’ll take it from there. You okay with that?’

‘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.’

He heard a sound, indicating that there was a call waiting. ‘On you go 
now,’ he said. ‘I’m in for a busy hour or so.’

‘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 responsible 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.’

‘I’m sure.’ Bob frowned. ‘Has she brought you up to date with what 
happened on Saturday, in the Glasgow concert hall?’

‘Yes, she has. From what she told me, it rather complicates the Aileen 
situation. She had a narrow escape and went running to Morocco, not you.’

‘She didn’t. Have a narrow escape, that is. She wasn’t the target.’

‘You can say that for certain? I thought there was still some doubt about who 
they were after. A couple of our Spanish titles are running the proposition 
that the First Minister himself was the target, and they missed.’

‘Then you should kick someone’s arse. Clive Graham might not mind the 
publicity, but the truth is that the one thing we did know for sure was that 
the target was female, and we said so at the time. Now we know definitely that 
it was Toni Field. My team in Glasgow haven’t announced it yet, but they will 
this morning. Press conference at ten o’clock, the same time as my lawyer 
will issue our statement, Aileen’s and mine, about our decision, last week, 
to pull the plug on our marriage.’

‘Now there’s a coincidence. Sorry,’ the Spanish Scot murmured, ‘that 
was my cynicism showing through.’

‘Hey, Xavi,’ Skinner laughed, ‘I’ve learned many things from you. One 
of them is how to minimise a story, as well as how to maximise it. Tell June… 
sorry, suggest to her, that she forget about us and concentrate on Glasgow this 
morning. There were developments yesterday, significant developments, and 
they’re going to blow political marriages off the front page.’

‘Any hints?’

‘Just one. I don’t want anyone approached before the press conference, but 
your crime reporter might be well employed doing all the research he can on a 
man named Basil “Bazza” Brown.’

‘Thanks for that. Will you be at the media briefing?’

‘No, I have someone else to see before then. I’ll need to go, in fact; my 
driver’s due to pick me up in under fifteen minutes.’

‘Fine.’ Aislado paused, then added, ‘You and Strathclyde, Bob. I know how 
you’ve always felt about it, so how the hell did that happen?’

‘A chapter of accidents, mate. Aileen says that now I’m there it’ll be my 
Hotel California. You know, I can check in any time I like but I can never 
leave. I’m not so sure about that, though. I have many things to sort out in 
my head over the next few weeks.’

‘Well, if you’d like somewhere to sort them out undisturbed, you’re 
welcome to visit us. I know you have your own place in L’Escala, but we have 
a guest house here now, and it’s yours for as long as you need it, if you 
don’t want anyone to know where you are.’

‘Cheers, appreciated. I may take you up on that.’

‘Okay. Bob, one last thing. If we do go looking for this man Brown after ten 
o’clock, where are we likely to find him?’

‘In the fucking mortuary, mate.’





Twenty-Two



‘I’m too old for this shit, Lottie,’ Dan Provan moaned.

‘Agreed,’ DI Mann retorted. ‘But you’re here and you’re all I’ve 
fucking got as a second in charge, so get on with it, eh? Oh and by the way, 
you’re not too old to collect the overtime.’

‘There is that,’ the sallow sergeant conceded. He smiled. ‘Keeps us both 
out the house as well. How’s your Scottie gettin’ on?’

‘He’s fine. Moans a bit but he’s doing great in the battle against the 
bevvy; that makes me happy. He took the wee guy to the big shows in Strathclyde 
Park yesterday. A year ago, even, I’d never have trusted him to do that.’

‘Theme park,’ Provan corrected her. ‘The shows are what you and me went 
to when we were kids.’

‘Maybe you did. My dad never took me anywhere. All his spare money went on 
that bloody football team. “Follow, Follow”,’ she sang, off-key. ‘I 
remember my mum making me hide from him many a Saturday night… well, maybe 
not that many, for they didn’t lose all that often, but when they did and he 
got in with a couple of bottles of Melroso in him, nobody was safe.’

‘No’ even you?’ He looked her up and down, trying to tease her. In all 
the time they had worked together she had never before mentioned her childhood.

‘Not when I was eight or nine. If my mum gave me and my big brother money for 
the multiplex on a Saturday night, we knew there was going to be trouble.’

Provan frowned. ‘Did he…’

‘Batter my mum? Oh yes. Don’t get me wrong, he was a quiet man all the rest 
of the time.’ She shook her head. ‘Listen to me, defending him.’

‘What happened to him?’

‘Stomach cancer happened to him, when I was twelve. Then I grew up, joined 
the police, got married, and found myself in the same situation as my mother 
had. She warned me, ye know, but I never listened.’

‘Scott was like him? Is that what you’re saying?’

She nodded.

‘Just as well you could handle him,’ the sergeant said, ‘like you proved 
at that daft boxing night.’

‘Not all the time. There were re-matches, Danny, without the gloves and the 
head guard. I didn’t always win. That was around the time when he was 
fuckin’ up his police career through the drink. When that finally happened I 
gave him an ultimatum. I gave him two of them, to be honest. The first was that 
if he ever raised a hand to me again, I would leave him. The second was that if 
he ever raised a hand to Jakey, I’d kill him. He believed both of them; 
he’s been off it, more or less, ever since. He still goes AWOL every now and 
then, but he comes back sober, and that’s the main thing.’

‘Then good for him. He’s gettin’ on fine at work too, is he? In that cash 
and carry place o’ his?’

‘Yes. He’s a supervisor now. The head of security’s due to retire in a 
couple of years, and Scottie’s in with a chance of getting the job.’

‘Mibbes he could find somethin’ for me if he does,’ Provan muttered. 
‘Like Ah said…’

She sighed. ‘I know, I know, I know. You’re too old for this shit: but 
you’re here, and we’re both standing in it, so just you keep on 
shovellin’, Danny. I’ve got another press briefing at ten o’clock. By 
then I’d like an answer from that car rental company.’

The sergeant nodded; a small shower of dandruff settled on the shoulders of his 
crumpled, shiny jacket. ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘They should have been back tae 
us by now. Time tae rattle their cage.’ He checked the number on the key-ring 
fob, then snatched his phone from its cradle and punched it in.

‘Drivall Car Hire,’ a young female voice chirped. It made him feel older 
than ever.

‘DS Provan, Strathclyde CID,’ he announced. ‘Ah spoke to somebody in your 
office last night. The lad said his name was Ajmal; Ah wanted some information 
about one of your cars that we found in Glasgow. He was going to get back to 
me, but I’m still waitin’. I need tae speak to him, now.’

‘I’m sorry, caller,’ the irrepressible youth replied, sounding anything 
but regretful. ‘Ajmal’s off duty today.’

‘Then go and get him,’ Provan barked, ‘or dig up your manager! This is a 
major inquiry Ah’m on.’

The girl sniffed. ‘There’s no need for that tone of voice, sir. If you hold 
on I’ll see if Mr Terry’s available; he’s our manager.’

‘You do that, hen.’ He sat and waited, but not for too long.

‘Sergeant err…’ a querulous male voice began. ‘I’m sorry, Chantelle 
didn’t catch your name.’

‘Provan,’ the Glaswegian growled. ‘Detective Sergeant Provan.’

‘Thank you, sorry about that; I’m John Terry, the general manager. This 
will be about our vehicle LX12 PMP, is that right?’

‘Indeed.’

‘We have been acting on this, I assure you,’ Terry declared. ‘My 
colleague Ajmal left me a note when he went off duty. The vehicle hirer has 
died and you’re trying to find out who he was through us, is that the case?’

‘I suppose it might be possible, sir,’ Provan said, ‘that a guy hired a 
vehicle, shot himself three times in the chest, shut himself in the boot and 
disposed o’ the gun, but we don’t really believe that.’

The manager gulped. ‘Pardon? I didn’t quite catch all of that.’

‘Okay, mate. Let me spell it out for ye’, in words of one syllabub.’

‘My God,’ Terry exclaimed, before he was finished. ‘Mr Provan, I think 
we’ve had a little language difficulty here. Ajmal’s English is not the 
best, and your accent is, let’s say, quite regional.’

No, let’s fuckin’ no’ say! With difficulty, the detective managed to keep 
his thought to himself, as the manager continued. ‘Ajmal left me a note with 
the registration number of the vehicle and the information that a man had been 
found dead in the vehicle and that the Glasgow police wanted the name of the 
hirer. What you’ve just told me is news to me and shocking news at that.’

‘Well, now that we understand each other,’ Provan said, weighing each word 
to avoid further ‘language difficulties’, ‘maybe yis can get me the 
information Ah need.’

‘Oh, I have that already, Sergeant. The office where the vehicle was hired… 
it’s in Finsbury Park… was closed last night. I spoke to the person in 
charge five minutes ago. The vehicle was rented a week ago yesterday, for 
return by five p.m. yesterday evening. The hirer’s name was Byron Millbank, 
address number eight St Baldred’s Road, London. I happen to know where that 
is; it’s very close to what was Highbury Stadium, the old Arsenal football 
ground, before they moved to the Emirates.’

‘Did he have a UK driving licence?’

‘I don’t know, but I assume…’

‘We don’t deal in assumptions, Mr Terry. Will they have a record in your 
other office?’

‘Oh yes. And a photocopy. Not everyone does that but we always do; take a 
photocopy of the plastic licence and the paper counterpart.’

‘In that case,’ Provan told him, ‘I need you tae get back on to your 
other office and get those photocopies faxed up to me. Haud on.’ He found a 
number that he had scrawled on a pad on his desk for another inquiry, a week 
before, and read it out to Terry.

‘I’m afraid we don’t have fax machines in our regional offices any 
more,’ he said. ‘Old technology these days.’

‘Well, find one, please. Go to the Arsenal if ye have tae; they’re bound 
tae have one.’

‘Oh, we won’t have to do that. We can scan the copies and send them.’

‘Eh?’

‘Scan them, Mr Provan. Turn them into JPEGs.’

‘Eh?’

‘Photographic images. Then we can send them to you as email attachments.’ 
Terry giggled. ‘Or don’t you have email in Scotland?’

Nancy! Provan, an old-school homophobe, kept another thought to himself. ‘Oh 
aye, sir, we have. It runs on gas, right enough, but we get by.’ He read his 
force e-address, then spelled it out, letter by letter. ‘Soon as ye can, 
please; Ah need it within the next half hour.’

‘You’ll have it in ten minutes.’ Terry paused. ‘Can I send somebody 
along from our Glasgow Airport depot to collect our car?’

‘Eventually,’ the DS told him. ‘Ah’m afraid your car’s a crime scene, 
sir. Ah’m no’ sure how long we’ll need to hold it for. When we’re done 
with it, we’ll bring it back to you. We’ll even clean aff the bloodstains 
fur ye.’

He hung up and turned to Mann. ‘A name for ye, Lottie. The car was hired by 
somebody called Byron Millbank.’

‘What do we know about him?’ she asked.

‘Eff all at the moment, but we should have a wee picture soon, off his 
driving licence. Meantime, his name’s enough tae go searchin’ for his birth 
certificate.’

‘Maybe,’ the DI cautioned. ‘That’s assuming it’s his real name. Let 
me see the image as soon as you get it, and blow it up as large as you can. I 
want to let the big boss see it.’





Twenty-Three



‘When it arrives, have them forward it to my email,’ Skinner told Lowell 
Payne, raising his voice slightly as his car overtook three lorries that were 
travelling in convoy along the busy motorway that links Scotland’s capital 
with its largest city. ‘I’d like to see it as soon as I get to the office, 
although I’m not sure when that will be. I’m not looking forward to my next 
visit, although it’s one I have to make.’

‘I’ll do that, Chief. I was planning to attend the press briefing. Should I 
do that?’

‘Mmm.’ He considered the question for a few seconds, as he held his phone 
to his ear. His Strathclyde driver was new to him; Bluetooth was not an option. 
‘Maybe not. The media will be aware by now of your role as my exec, and 
I’ve been dodging the buggers since last night. But tell DI Mann she should 
make it clear that we now know for sure that Field was the target. She 
doesn’t need to say how, but she should rule out any other possibility one 
hundred per cent. Do we video these events ourselves?’

‘I don’t know,’ Payne admitted. ‘I’ve never been involved in one as 
formal as this.’

‘Then find out. If they don’t, make sure it happens. I’ve always done it 
in Edinburgh. I like my own record of events.’

‘Understood. I’ll tell Malcolm Nopper.’

‘Thanks. Something else I’d like you to do. The force area is massive, as 
we all know; I don’t plan or expect to set foot in every police station on a 
three-month appointment, but nonetheless I imagine I’m going to be travelling 
quite a bit. I want to be in complete touch at all times, so I’d like you to 
fix me up with a tablet computer.’

‘An iPad?’

‘That or equivalent, as long as it gets me internet access everywhere I go 
and has a big enough screen for me to read. With one of those I’ll be able to 
read emails at once, wherever I am.’

‘You’ll have one before the day’s out.’

‘Thanks.’ As he spoke, his driver signalled then eased to the left, leaving 
the motorway. Skinner knew where they were, well enough; Lanarkshire had been 
his territory until he was into his twenties, even if it had changed since his 
departure.

‘Why the hell do they call this Motherwell Food Park?’ he mused aloud.

‘No idea, sir,’ his driver replied, believing that an answer had been 
required. ‘Why would they not?’

‘Because it’s in bloody Bellshill, Constable; it’s miles away from 
Motherwell.’

‘Is that right, sir?’

‘Trust me on it; I was born in Motherwell, and my grandparents, my father’s 
folks, they lived in Bellshill. Where are you from, Constable Cole? What’s 
your first name, by the way?’

‘David, sir; Davie. I’m from Partick; that’s in Glasgow, sir.’

Skinner laughed. ‘I know that well enough. I did some sinning there or 
thereabouts in my youth. Used to hang out in a pub called the Rubaiyat, in 
Byres Road.’

‘That’s not quite Partick, sir, but I know where you are. It’s still 
there.’

‘But not as it was; it was gutted, or “refurbished” to use the polite 
term for architectural vandalism, back in the eighties. It had a lounge bar… 
where you could take your girlfriend; never to the public bar, mind, men only 
there… called “The Bowl of Night”. Very few of the punters had a clue 
where the name came from, but it was famous nonetheless. There was never any 
trouble there, either.’

Careful, Bob, he told himself. Steer well clear of memory lane, or you could 
get to like this bloody place all over again.

‘Were you Chief Constable Field’s driver, Davie?’ he asked.

In the rear-view mirror, he saw the young man’s eyes tense. ‘Yes, sir. I 
wasn’t on duty on Saturday, though. She told me she was being collected by 
the First Minister’s car. I think she was quite chuffed about that.’

‘So you’ve been to her home before?’

‘Oh yes, sir, often. We’re not far from it now.’

They were moving down a steep incline that led to a complex motorway 
interchange. To his left, he saw a series of fantastic twisted shapes, the 
highest of them a wheel. ‘What the hell’s that?’ he asked.

‘Theme park, sir,’ his driver informed him. ‘They call it M and D’s.’

‘My younger son would love it,’ he chuckled. ‘He’s the family action 
man. The older one would turn his nose right up; he’s our computer whizz 
kid.’

‘That whole area’s called Strathclyde Park, sir,’ Constable Davie went on.

‘Oh, I know that,’ Skinner murmured. ‘It used to be wilderness. In fact, 
the Motherwell burgh rubbish tip was there, right next to a football ground 
that used to be covered in broken glass and all sorts of crap. It was all taken 
away when the park was created and they diverted the River Clyde to make the 
loch. I was a kid when they did it, but I remember it happening.’

Nostalgia, nostalgia, nostalgia. Stop it, Skinner! And yet, he reminded 
himself, none of those he thought of as his second family, Mark, James Andrew 
and Seonaid, had ever set foot in the town that had raised him.

He shook the thoughts from his head as Davie drove through the interchange and 
off by an exit marked ‘Bothwell’. Almost immediately he took a left, then 
made a few more turns, the last taking them into a leafy avenue called Maule 
Road. ‘This is it, sir,’ he said, drawing to a halt outside a big red 
sandstone villa, built, Skinner estimated, in the early twentieth century.

‘Pretty substantial,’ he remarked. ‘When did Chief Constable Field move 
in here?’ he asked his driver. ‘Given that she was only in post for five 
months.’

‘Three months ago, sir. For the first few weeks she and her sister lived in 
an executive flat on the Glasgow Riverside.’

‘Right.’ He stepped out of the car, then leaned over, beside the driver’s 
window; it slid open. ‘I can’t say for sure how long I’ll be,’ he 
murmured. ‘If I’m any longer than half an hour, I want you to toot the 
horn. I’ll pretend it’s a signal that I’ve had an urgent message.’ He 
smiled. ‘I’ll never ask you to lie for me, Davie, but it’s always good to 
have an escape plan.’

‘I understand, sir.’ Constable Cole frowned, as if wanting to say more, but 
hesitant.

The chief read the signal. ‘Out with it,’ he said.

‘Thank you, sir. It’s presumptuous of me, but I wonder if you’d express 
my sympathies to Marina and her mother.’

‘Of course I will. You’ve met them both?’

‘Yes, sir. I saw Marina pretty much every day, with her working so close to 
the chief, and I met Miss Deschamps when she stayed with them a couple of 
months ago. I think she came up to see the new house,’ he added.

‘What are they like?’ Skinner asked. ‘Mark my card, Davie.’

‘They’re both very nice ladies. Marina’s younger than the chief by a few 
years and not all that like her physically, or in personality, come to that. 
Miss Deschamps… she’s very particular about that, by the way, sir. 
Marina’s a Ms but her mother is definitely Miss… Miss Deschamps is quiet, 
doesn’t say much, but she was always very polite to me. She tried to tip me 
when we got here.’ He grinned at the memory. ‘The chief did her nut, but 
she just smiled and shook my hand instead.’

‘Thanks.’ The chief constable stood straight, walked through the villa’s 
open gateway and up to the vestibule. He rang the bell and waited.

He was about to press the button again when the front door opened. A tall, slim 
woman stood there; her hair was honey-coloured, and her skin tone almost 
matched it. The overall effect, Skinner mused, had the potential to cause 
traffic accidents.

She looked up at him, but not by much. ‘Yes?’ she said.

‘Bob Skinner,’ he told her. ‘I believe you’re expecting me. My aide 
called yesterday, yes?’

Her hand flew to her mouth. ‘Of course,’ she exclaimed. ‘I’m so sorry. 
It’s just…’ She broke off, looking at his suit.

‘I’m sorry,’ he murmured. ‘I should have thought this through. It’s 
my habit to leave my uniform in the office and travel in civvies. Please 
don’t feel slighted.’

‘I don’t, honestly,’ the woman assured him. ‘I always thought my sister 
overdid the uniform bit.’ She extended her hand. ‘I’m Marina 
Deschamps,’ she said, as they shook. ‘Come in, my mother is through in the 
garden room.’

She led the way and he followed, through a hallway, then along a corridor. He 
guessed at her age as they walked. A few years younger than her sister, Davie 
had said. Toni had been thirty-eight, so Skinner placed Marina early thirties, 
somewhere in age between her sister and his own daughter.

The corridor led them into a small sitting room that might have been a study at 
some time in the life of the old house, before what most people would have 
called a conservatory was added. As far as the chief could see it was 
unoccupied.

‘Mother,’ Marina called out, ‘our visitor is here.’

Sofia Deschamps had been seated in a high-backed wicker armchair, one of a 
pair, looking out into a garden that was entirely paved and filled with potted 
plants of various sizes, from flowers to small trees. She rose and stepped into 
view. She was almost as tall as her younger daughter; indeed they were very 
much alike, twins with a thirty-year age difference.

‘Mr Skinner,’ she said, as she approached him. ‘Thank you for calling on 
us.’ Her accent had strong French overtones, and she held her hand out in 
front of her, as if she expected him to kiss it, in the Gallic manner. Instead, 
he took it in his.

‘I wish I didn’t have to,’ he replied. ‘I wish that Saturday had never 
happened, that Toni was still in Pitt Street and I was still in Fettes, in my 
office in Edinburgh. My condolences to you both.’

‘Thank you.’

It occurred to him, for the first time, that both women were wearing black; 
inwardly he cursed himself for his pale blue tie. Sofia’s face was drawn, and 
her eyes were a little red, but there was an impressive dignity about her, 
about both of them, for that matter. ‘It’s still fairly early,’ she 
murmured, ‘but please, allow me to fetch us some coffee.’

‘No, no, ma’am,’ he protested, ‘that isn’t necessary.’

‘I insist.’ She stood her ground; refusal would have been impolite.

‘In that case, thank you very much, but if I may I’ll have water, sparkling 
if you have it, rather than coffee. My…’ He paused; he had been about to 
describe Sarah as ‘My wife’. ‘. . . medical adviser says I drink far too 
much of the stuff, and she’s made me promise to give it up.’

‘A pity,’ Miss Deschamps murmured, with a hint of a smile. ‘We should 
allow ourselves the occasional vice.’

‘My medical adviser is my vice.’ He said it without a pause for thought. 
‘That’s to say,’ he added, searching for an escape route, ‘she’s my 
former wife, and I’ve learned that it’s too much trouble to disobey her.’

‘In that case I will not press you further. Excuse me, I will not be long.’

His eyes followed her as she headed for the door. She might have left sixty 
behind her, but she had lost no style or elegance; even at that early hour she 
was dressed in an ankle-length skirt and high heels.

Marina was less formal, in black trousers and a satin blouse. ‘Please,’ she 
said, ‘sit down.’

Skinner listened for French in her accent; there was some but less than in her 
mother.

‘Maman is being discreet,’ she continued. ‘She knows I want to ask you 
about my employment situation, and she doesn’t want it to appear as if 
we’re ganging up on you.’

‘That’s very decent of her,’ the chief said, as he sat, facing her, on a 
couch that matched the armchairs, ‘but there’s no rush to consider that. I 
know that you acted as Toni’s personal assistant. My assumption has been that 
you wouldn’t want to continue in that role with her successor, but that’s a 
decision you can take in your own time.

‘I’ve already given instructions that you can have all the time you feel 
you need. My temporary appointment is for three months; if you want to take all 
that time to decide what you want to do, or at least until a permanent 
successor to your sister is selected, that’ll be fine by me.’

Marina shook her head. ‘There’s no need, sir,’ she replied. ‘I have a 
job, and I’d like to carry on doing it.’

Skinner stared at her, unable to keep his surprise from showing. ‘You want to 
work for me?’ he exclaimed.

She nodded.

‘Look,’ he said. ‘I have to be frank about this. You know your sister and 
I were not exactly the best of friends.’

Marina smiled, then nodded. ‘Oh yes. She was very clear about that. But that 
was more political than anything else. You had different views on certain 
things, but that didn’t affect what she thought of you as a police officer. 
We both know she was a big supporter of a unified Scottish force.’

‘Sure, she made that clear enough in ACPOS, and I made my opposition equally 
plain. We had some robust discussions, to say the least.’

‘Oh she told me. But what you probably do not know is, her big fear was that 
she would talk you round to her view. She rated you very highly as a police 
officer; in fact she said you were the best she’d ever met. She wanted the 
top job, no mistake about that, but she didn’t think she’d have a chance if 
you went for it.’

‘Indeed?’ Skinner murmured.

‘Indeed.’

‘So where does that take us, Ms Deschamps?’

‘I have no personal issues with you, sir,’ she replied. ‘Fate has put you 
in what was my sister’s office. I’m a top-class secretary with personnel 
management qualifications, and I like to work with the best. Therefore…’ 
She held his eyes with hers.

‘Let me think about it,’ he said. ‘I like to have a serving officer as my 
assistant, and I’ve already appointed someone to that position, pro tem. To 
be frank, I’ll need to get to know the job before I can judge whether there 
will be enough work left for you. But first things first; you and your mother 
have a funeral to organise, albeit with all the help that the force can give 
you. Once that’s over, we can talk. Fair enough?’

‘Fair enough,’ she agreed.

Out of nowhere, Skinner remembered a problem. ‘There is one thing, though. Do 
you have the combination of the safe in the chief’s office?’

Marina sighed. ‘I did,’ she replied. ‘It was seven three eight two seven 
six. But Antonia always changed it at the end of the week. It was usually the 
last thing she did on a Friday; sometimes she’d tell me the new number there 
and then, but if she didn’t have a chance it would wait until Monday. Last 
Friday she didn’t tell me. You can try the old number, just in case she 
forgot to make the change, but if it doesn’t work, I fear I can’t help 
you.’

She looked up as her mother returned carrying a tray, loaded with two tiny 
espresso cups, and a bottle of Perrier with a glass.

‘No ice,’ Sofia Deschamps declared as she placed them on a small table at 
the side of the couch. ‘I refuse to dilute the mineral with melted tap water, 
as so many do.’

‘I couldn’t agree more,’ Skinner told her. ‘When my late wife and I 
were very young, we went on a camping holiday to the South of France. Everybody 
told us not to drink the water there, so we didn’t. But we had ice in 
everything, so everything tasted of chlorine.’

‘If that was the only side effect,’ she countered, ‘you were lucky.’

He winced. ‘It wasn’t; I was being delicate, that’s all.’

‘Your late wife,’ she repeated. ‘And earlier you mentioned your former 
wife.’

‘Three,’ he said, anticipating the question. ‘Three and still counting.’

‘Maman!’ Marina exclaimed, her tone sharp.

‘Ah yes.’ Her mother held up a hand. ‘I am sorry. That was indiscreet; we 
have seen this morning’s papers.’

‘No apology necessary,’ he assured her. ‘All it means is that our 
separation is public knowledge. It wasn’t the way I’d have chosen for it to 
be revealed, but these things happen. Have you ever been married, Miss 
Deschamps? Or am I making a false assumption? Have you reverted to your birth 
surname?’

‘No, you are correct. I have always chosen to avoid marriage. Antonia’s 
father, Anil, was a member of the Mauritian government of the day… you see, 
we have politicians in common. Marriage with him was never possible, since he 
had a wealthy wife, to whom he owed his position.

‘Marina’s father was an Australian, with business interests in Port St 
Louis. He spent part of the year there, the winter, usually, and the rest in 
Australia, or travelling in connection with his business. He was something of 
an entrepreneur.’ She pronounced the word with care, balancing each syllable.

‘We had a very nice apartment there, and a very pleasant life. Not that I was 
a kept woman,’ she was quick to add. ‘I had a very good job, in the 
Mauritian civil service, and I maintained my own household. He did not 
contribute, because I would not allow it, even though we were together for 
seventeen years. I had a good income. We are a wealthy country, you know; close 
to Africa and yet a little distant from it too.’

‘I know,’ Skinner replied. ‘Mauritius is one of the many places on my 
“To do” list.’

‘You will like it.’

‘Why did you leave?’ he asked her.

‘To be with my daughters. Marina’s father was very good to both my girls; 
he more or less adopted Antonia, and when she came to university age, he got 
her a place in Birmingham, where she did a degree in criminology.’

‘She first joined the police in Birmingham as well,’ Marina added. ‘She 
had a specialised degree and that got her fast-tracked. Well, you’ll have 
seen her career record, I’m sure. She never looked back.’

‘How about you?’ he put to her. ‘Were you ever tempted to join the 
force?’

‘That never really arose, not in the same way. My father died when I was 
sixteen. I was very upset, and any thought of university went out of my mind… 
not that I had Antonia’s IQ anyway. I stayed in Mauritius and went to 
college; I did a secretarial course and a personnel management qualification. I 
came to Britain eight years ago, when Antonia was senior enough to point me at 
a job with the Met support staff.’

She smiled. ‘That’s not as bad as it sounds; I had a very stringent 
interview, and I must have been vetted, for I was attached to SO15, the 
Counter-Terrorism Command, for a little while. But when Antonia became a chief 
constable… back to Birmingham again… things changed. She insisted that I go 
with her, to run what she always called her Private Office. The rest you must 
know.’

Skinner nodded. ‘I’ve been told. Ladies,’ he continued, ‘you’ll be 
aware that since Saturday evening, a full-scale murder investigation has been 
under way. I’m keeping in close touch with it, and I know that DI Mann, the 
senior investigating officer, will want to visit you fairly soon to interview 
you for the record. Meantime, is there anything you would like to ask me?’

‘Of course,’ Sofia exclaimed, ‘but why would he need to interview us?’

‘Detective Inspector Mann is a lady, Maman,’ her daughter murmured.

‘Then she, if you must. Why would she? What do we know? In any event, can 
this not be an interview? You’re her boss now, after all, as my dear Antonia 
was.’

‘Yes but she is in day-to-day charge.’ He paused. ‘If it makes you happy, 
I can go over some of the ground she’ll want to and report what you say to 
her. If she’s comfortable with that, fine. If not, she can come and visit you 
again. Okay?’

‘Yes,’ Marina Deschamps replied, at once. ‘But Maman is right. Why do you 
need witness statements from us?’

‘Because we’re now certain, beyond any doubt, that Chief Constable Field 
was the target. These men weren’t after my wife, or the First Minister. They 
were pros, hit men; they knew exactly who they were there to kill, and they 
did.’

‘Oui,’ Miss Deschamps whispered. ‘We saw my daughter’s body yesterday. 
They covered half her face with a sheet, but I made them take it off. We know 
what was done to her. So yes, I understand you now. What do you need to know?’

‘Her private life,’ Skinner said. ‘I can tell you that we’ll be going 
back through her entire career, looking at what she’s done, people she’s 
put away, enemies she may have made along the way who have the power and the 
contacts to put together an operation like this.’

‘Such an impersonal word: “operation”. You make it sound like a military 
thing.’

‘It was,’ he told her. ‘Smit and Botha were former soldiers, and Beram 
Cohen, the planner, had an intelligence background. They didn’t work cheap, 
and they weren’t the sort of men you can contract in a pub. The very fact 
that the principal, as we’ll call the person who ordered your daughter’s 
death, was able to contact Cohen, tells me that he is wealthy and 
well-connected.

‘I know about some of the successes that Toni had as a police officer and 
I’m aware that she may have upset some very nasty people in her time. Trust 
me, we will look at these, using outside agencies wherever we need to.’

‘Outside agencies?’

‘He means the British Security Service, Maman,’ Marina volunteered.

‘Not only them. The FBI, the American DEA; we’ll go anywhere we need to. 
But alongside that I need to know about any personal relationships your sister 
may have had. Unlikely as it may seem, did she ever have a romance that ended 
badly?’ He hesitated. ‘Did she have any personal weaknesses?’

‘Of course not!’ Sofia exclaimed.

‘I’m sure she didn’t,’ Skinner said, deflecting her sudden anger, 
although privately he counted naked ambition and ruthlessness towards 
colleagues as ranking fairly high on the weakness scale. ‘But the questions 
must be asked if we are to do our best for you in finding the person who had 
that done to her, what you saw yesterday. Marina, you understand that, don’t 
you?’

‘Yes, I do. I knew my sister well enough. Personal weaknesses? Was she a 
gambler, closet drinker? No, she was tight with her money and she didn’t 
touch a drop. She didn’t mortgage beyond her means either; she was shrewd 
with the property she bought. For example, she picked up this pile at the 
bottom of the market, after making a big profit from her house in Edgbaston.’

She stopped and looked at her mother. ‘Personal relationships?’ she 
repeated. ‘Maman, cover your ears if you like, but this is the truth. I 
don’t think Toni ever had a romance in her life, certainly not in the years 
that I’ve lived with her in Britain.

‘Relationships, yes; she’s had six of them. Make no mistake, she was 
robustly heterosexual. But none of them were about love; all of them were about 
her career. I’m not saying that she bedded her way to the top, but every 
lover that she had was a man of power or influence, one way or another.’

‘Might any of them have been the sort of man to take it badly when she pulled 
the plug on him?’ the chief asked.

‘No, I would not put any of them in that category. Everyone she brought 
home… and she told me she never played away… was as cynical as she was.’

‘Were they cops?’

‘A couple were. There was a DAC… deputy assistant commissioner… in the 
Met, about five years ago, and an assistant chief from Birmingham before him. 
I’m sure that neither of those two were in a position to advance her career 
directly, but they knew people who were.

‘More recently, from what she told me, the men she’s been involved with 
have been… how do I put it? . . . opinion formers, movers and shakers outside 
the police force. There was a broadcast journalist, a civil service mandarin in 
the Justice Ministry, and another man she said was a very successful criminal 
lawyer.’

‘You’re telling me what they were but not who,’ Skinner pointed out. 
‘Can you put names to any of them?’

Marina smiled. ‘No, because Antonia never did, and since we didn’t live 
together until she became the chief in Birmingham, I never saw any of them. 
“No names, no blames”, was what she always said, whenever I asked her. It 
used to annoy me, until I realised that given her background and mine…’ She 
broke off and looked at her mother. ‘I’m sorry, Maman,’ she said, ‘but 
this is the truth. She never had a proper father as such, far less than I did. 
We were secret daughters in a way, both of us, but her most of all.

‘Given that history, that upbringing, it was perfectly natural that Antonia 
should have woven a cloak of secrecy around her own personal life. And me? I am 
exactly the same. Most observers, looking at me, would say that my life is a 
mystery.’

Sofia nodded. Her eyes were sad. ‘I wish I could deny that,’ she sighed, 
‘but it is true. That is my legacy to both of my daughters.’





Twenty-Four



‘Bingo,’ Skinner exclaimed, as he gazed at the photograph on his monitor. 
He turned to his exec. ‘It may say Byron Millbank on his driving licence, and 
that may not be a top-quality image, but I rarely forget a face… and never, 
when I’ve seen it dead. That is Beram Cohen, one-time Israeli paratrooper, 
then a Mossad operative until he was caught using a dodgy German passport while 
killing a Hamas official, most recently for hire as a facilitator of covert 
operations.

‘As you know, Lowell, he’s the guy who recruited Smit and Botha, procured 
their weapons through Freddy Welsh in Edinburgh, then went and died, 
inconveniently for them, of a brain haemorrhage a few days before the hit.’

‘Could we have stopped it if he hadn’t?’ Payne asked.

‘There would have been even less chance. The evidence we had would still have 
led us to Welsh, but no sooner; we probably wouldn’t have got to the hall as 
quickly as we did.

‘Even if we had been lucky and got the two South Africans, my guess is that 
Cohen would have been in the car and would have taken off. He’d have been on 
the motorway inside two minutes. He would have got clear, dumped the guy 
Brown’s body, so it would never have been linked to our investigation, and 
we’d have had no clue at all, nowhere to go.’

He scratched his chin. ‘Cohen dying might have been convenient for us, but as 
it turned out it wasn’t a life-saver. Speaking of Bazza Brown’s body,’ he 
continued, ‘lying a-mouldering in the boot of a Peugeot, and all that, I’d 
like an update on that side of the investigation.’ He checked his watch. 
‘Mann’s press briefing should be over by now; ask her to come up, please.’

The DCI nodded and was about to leave when Skinner called after him. ‘By the 
way, Lowell, are we any nearer being able to open that bloody safe, or do we 
seriously have to explore the Barlinnie option? Toni’s sister gave me a 
number, but as she warned me, it had been changed. She did it weekly, 
apparently; there’s security,’ he grumbled, ‘then there’s fucking 
paranoia.’

Payne laughed. ‘It’s in hand, gaffer, but the Bar-L route may be quicker 
than waiting for the supplier to send a technician.’ He paused. ‘By the 
way, how did your visit go? How are the mother and sister?’

‘As bereft as you would imagine,’ the chief replied, ‘but they’re both 
very calm. I was impressed by Marina,’ he added. ‘She’s not a bit like 
her half-sister. Toni, it seems, was the love child of a Mauritian politico; 
she must have inherited the gene. Marina, on the other hand, struck me as one 
of nature’s civil servants, as her mother was.’

‘And her father? Is he still around?’

‘No, not for some years; he never was, not full-time. Sofia seems to have 
valued a degree of independence.’ Skinner pointed to the anteroom at the far 
end of his office, the place that Marina Field had filled. ‘Have you lined up 
any secretary candidates yet?’

‘Yes. Human Resources say they’ll give me a short list by midday.’

‘Then hold back on that for a while. We can call up a vetted typist when we 
need one. Marina says she wants to carry on in her job, working for me. I’ve 
stalled her on it, until I decide whether I want that.’

‘How long will you take to make up your mind?’

Skinner grinned. ‘Ideally, three months, by which time I’ll be out of 
here.’





Twenty-Five



‘It is for these reasons,’ Aileen de Marco concluded, reading from autocue 
screens in the conference room of the ugly Glasgow office block that housed her 
party’s headquarters, ‘that I am committing Scottish Labour to the 
unification of the country’s eight police forces into a single entity. The 
old system, with its lack of integration and properly shared intelligence and 
with its outdated artificial boundaries, bears heavy responsibility for the 
death of Antonia Field.

‘Not only do I endorse the proposal for unity, I urge the First Minister to 
enact it without further delay to enable the appointment of a police 
commissioner as soon as possible to oversee the merger and the smooth 
introduction of the new structure.’

‘Any questions, ladies and gentlemen?’ Alf Old invited, from his seat at 
the table on the right of the platform, then pointing as he chose from the 
hands that shot up, and from the babble of competing voices. ‘John Fox.’

‘Is this not a panic reaction, Ms de Marco,’ the BBC reporter asked, 
‘after your narrow escape on Saturday?’

‘Absolutely not.’

‘What would you say to those people, and there may be many of them, who think 
that it is?’

‘I’d tell them that they’re wrong. Scottish Labour took a corporate 
decision some time ago to support unification; we’re quite clear that it’s 
the way forward. On the other hand, the party in power seems less committed. 
Yes, I know the First Minister says that it’s the way forward, but there are 
people on his back benches who aren’t quite as keen.

‘We’ve been reading a lot this morning about the First Minister’s 
personal courage… and I have to say that I admire him for the way he 
displayed it on Saturday, when even the senior Strathclyde police officer on 
the scene collapsed under the strain.

‘What I’m saying today is that it’s time for him to bring that courage 
into the parliament chamber and join with us in getting important legislation 
on to the Scottish statute book.’

She paused, for only a second, but Marguerite Hatton seized on her silence.

‘Do you have anyone in mind for the position of police commissioner, Ms de 
Marco?’ she asked.

Aileen glared down at her from behind her lectern. ‘There will be a selection 
process,’ she replied, ‘but I won’t have anything to do with it.’

‘Would you endorse your husband’s candidacy?’

‘I repeat,’ she snapped, ‘I will not have anything to do with the 
selection process. I’m not First Minister, and even if I was, the appointment 
will be made by a body independent of government. The legislation will merge 
the existing police authorities into one and that will select the 
commissioner.’

‘Then my question still stands,’ the journalist countered. ‘Will you 
endorse your husband’s candidacy?’

‘I’m sorry, Ms Hatton,’ she maintained, ‘I’m not going there. I’m 
the leader of the Scottish Labour Party, and I’m sure that I’ll have 
political colleagues on the new authority, but it won’t be my place to 
influence them in favour of any candidate.’

‘Or against one,’ she challenged, ‘if you believed he was entirely wrong 
for the job?’

Aileen paused. ‘If I believed that strongly enough about someone,’ she 
replied, ‘I’d say so in parliament.’

‘So do you believe your husband would be the right man for the post, even 
though he’s an authoritarian bully?’

‘Now hold on a minute!’ Alf Old barked, from the platform. ‘This press 
conference isn’t about individuals. It’s about important Labour Party 
policy. However, I have to tell you that I’ve met the gentleman in question 
and I don’t recognise your description. Now that’s enough out of you, 
madam. Another questioner, please?’

Hatton ignored him. ‘But isn’t that why you and he have just announced your 
separation, Aileen?’ she shouted. ‘Isn’t that why you ran into the arms 
of another man after your terrifying ordeal on Saturday, because Bob wasn’t 
there for you?’

Aileen de Marco had known more than a few intense situations in her life, and 
she was proud of her ability to stay calm and controlled, whatever the 
pressure. And so, it was agreed later, her outburst was entirely atypical, 
which made it all the more shocking.

‘Bob’s never been there for me,’ she yelled. ‘Why the hell do you think 
I’m divorcing him, you stupid bloody woman?’





Twenty-Six



‘John, go easy on her, will you?’

‘Bob, I’m BBC. We don’t run big lurid headlines on our reports and we 
don’t editorialise on politicians. We just run what we’ve got on the 
record, and in this case that’s Aileen screaming at the Hatton bitch then 
storming out of the room. We can’t ignore that, because it’s there. STV 
have got it, and that means it’ll be on ITN national at lunchtime. Sky have 
got it and they won’t hold back. Plus I saw a couple of freelance cameras 
there, so it could even go international.’

‘Bugger,’ Skinner sighed. ‘And you’re the nice guys, aren’t you?’

‘Exactly,’ John Fox said. ‘You know what Hatton will do with it, and the 
rest of the tabloids. Thing is, Bob, it’s not just Aileen that’s been 
caught up in it.’

‘Don’t I know it. I was never there for her, she said.’

‘Do you want to react to that?’

‘To the media in general, no, because anything I say will be used in evidence 
against either Aileen or me. To you, because I trust you or we wouldn’t be 
speaking right now, I’ll say I’m sorry she feels that way, and I’ll add 
that lack of communication is one of the factors behind our separation.’ He 
paused, then added, ‘Hell, you can use this as well, on the record. I find it 
contemptible that she was goaded into her outburst after what she went through 
on Saturday night.’

‘I will use it too. How about Hatton calling you an authoritarian bully?’

Skinner laughed. ‘Jesus, John, I’m the acting chief constable of the UK’s 
second biggest police force. If that doesn’t make me an authority figure, I 
don’t know what would. As for me being a bully, I appreciate Alf Old putting 
her straight, and I hope that others will as well.’

‘I wouldn’t worry about that,’ Fox told him. ‘It’s a wee bit close to 
defamation, so most sensible editors… including Hatton’s… won’t repeat 
it. I was only covering my back by asking you about it. Besides, no tabloid 
editor in his right mind’s going to want to fall out with you.’ He laughed. 
‘Not that that implies you’re a bully, mind.’ He was silent for a second 
or two. ‘Can I ask you something else?’ he murmured.

‘Sure.’

‘I told you what she said about Max Allan. Do you want to counter it?’

‘I’d like to, but I can’t, because it’s true. Max was first into the 
hall when the emergency lighting came on. He could see very little, and at 
first he thought it was Paula Viareggio who’d been shot, not Toni. Max has 
known Paula since she was a kid; he and his wife live closer to Edinburgh than 
Glasgow and so they do nearly all their shopping there. They’ve been 
customers of the Viareggio delicatessen chain for twenty years, since the days 
when Paula worked behind the counter.

‘He thought that was her on the floor, and he just buckled. The poor guy’s 
career’s probably at an end, and an ignominious one at that, thanks to 
Aileen. The next time I speak to her she and I are going to have very serious 
words about it. You can be sure of that.’

‘I agree,’ the journalist murmured. ‘True or not, it was well out of 
order. But Bob, off the record this time, why did she put herself up there to 
be shot at? Sorry, that was an unfortunate choice of words in the 
circumstances.’

‘Maybe but I know what you mean. My informed guess would be that her reasons 
were purely political.’

‘Did you know about Labour supporting unification?’

‘Of course I did. This is very much between us, chum, but it was the last 
straw as far as our marriage was concerned.’

‘I guessed as much. There’s a piece on the Saltire website that nobody’s 
noticed yet. It was blown out of the printed edition by the Field shooting, but 
it’s got your stamp all over it. Everybody knows that paper’s your house 
journal, with June Crampsey being a retired cop’s daughter.’

‘Mmm,’ Skinner murmured, ‘do they indeed? I’ll need to watch that, but 
I won’t lie to you about my input to that article; you’re right. I was a 
bit steamed up at the time. But if you’re going to have a girn about me 
playing favourites, don’t, because I’m doing it just now. Nobody else is 
getting past the switchboard here and I’m taking no other media calls 
anywhere else.’

‘I appreciate that,’ Fox chuckled. ‘In the spirit of our special 
relationship, is there anything else you’d like not to tell me? About the 
Field investigation, for example.’

‘Not a fucking word, mate; you’re not that special. However, you might like 
to call another chum of yours, the First Minister. I reckon Aileen will have 
put his nose mightily out of joint.’

‘Thanks for that, and the rest. Cheers.’

The chief was unfamiliar with the telephone console on his desk, but he had 
noticed a red light flashing during the last couple of minutes of his 
conversation with Fox. As he hung up he discovered what it was for as the bell 
sounded, almost instantly. He picked up the receiver, expecting to hear the 
switchboard operator, or Lowell Payne, but it was neither.

‘Yes,’ he began.

‘Bob,’ a male voice snapped back at him, ‘can’t you keep that bloody 
wife of yours under control?’

‘Hello, Clive,’ he replied. ‘Funny you should call. Your name just came 
up in conversation.’

‘I’m not surprised. Your ears must have been burning too. Do you know what 
Aileen’s done?’

‘Yes.’

‘When did you know?’

‘I first became aware of it about ten minutes ago. Clive,’ Skinner asked, 
‘what the fuck are you on about? Haven’t you read any newspapers today?’

‘No I haven’t. I’m not in the office. I’ve spent the last thirty-six 
hours incommunicado, comforting my distraught wife. She’s under sedation, 
Bob. I’m still trying, but failing, to make her believe that I wasn’t the 
target… although the truth is, I’m not a hundred per cent sure of that 
myself.

‘But more than that, it’s not just the thought of me with my brains on the 
floor that’s got to her, it’s the notion that if she had come with me, and 
not Toni, she’d have copped it. So you’ll see, Bob, reading the press 
hasn’t been at the top of my agenda. My political office has only just 
emailed me the unification press release Labour have put out.’

‘And that’s all they’ve sent you?’

‘That’s all.’

‘Then you should shake up all your press people, in the party and in 
government. Somebody should have told you that two hours ago my dear wife and I 
announced that we’ve split. They should also have told you to check out 
today’s Daily News. You’re going to have fun with that come next First 
Minister’s Questions at Holyrood, I promise you.’

He heard the First Minster draw a deep breath, then let it out slowly. ‘Then 
I apologise, Bob,’ he said, quietly. ‘The government people are supposed to 
brief me constantly on what’s happening in the media, partly to ensure that I 
don’t make any embarrassing phone calls like this one. I told them, firmly, 
to leave me alone, but when the troops are afraid to override your orders when 
necessary, that makes you a bad general.’

‘Or an authoritarian bully,’ Skinner murmured.

‘What?’

‘Nothing. You can tell Mrs Graham to calm down. We have absolute proof that 
Toni was the target. They were set up and waiting for her.’

‘Are you certain?’

Skinner snorted. ‘I appreciate that you’re a politician, but even you must 
know what “absolute” means.’

‘But how did they know she’d be there?’ the First Minister asked, 
sounding more than a little puzzled.

‘When did you invite her to accompany you?’

‘Two weeks ago.’

‘Yeah, well, one day later Toni posted the engagement on bloody Twitter, and 
on the Strathclyde force website. She set herself up.’

‘But who’d want to kill her? I know she was abrasive, but…’

‘I’ve got a team of talented people trying to find that out,’ the chief 
replied, ‘and I imagine that right now they’re waiting in my assistant’s 
office.’

‘Then I won’t delay you further. Again, I’m sorry I went off at half 
cock.’

‘No worries. For what it’s worth, I reckon I know why Aileen broke ranks on 
unification. You might not realise it, if you’ve been cloistered since 
Saturday, but you’ve become something of a media hero, thanks to Joey 
Morocco’s eyewitness account. He’s seen a few things up close in the last 
couple of days, has our Joey. With the election coming up, Aileen couldn’t 
let that go uncountered. It’s the way she thinks.’

‘I suppose it is, and I might even understand it. It won’t do her any good 
though. I’ve seen our private polls: Labour will be crushed, and her career 
will be over.’

Bob laughed. ‘Don’t you believe it, Clive. She has a plan for every 
contingency. She’s like Gloria Gaynor: she will survive. Get on with you now. 
Go and give your wife the good news.’





Twenty-Seven



‘Will I survive this, Alf?’ Aileen asked, leaning forward across the table, 
with a goblet of red wine warming in her cupped hands.

‘I’ll treat that as rhetorical,’ the chief officer replied. ‘You’ve 
just locked up the female vote within the party; as for the men, they were 
eating out of your hand anyway.’

‘But tomorrow’s coverage will be all about me dropping the bomb on that 
twat Hatton, and not about the policy initiative I announced.’

‘Aileen, you and I both know that is bollocks; the announcement doesn’t 
matter. We don’t make policy any more, the SNP do.’

‘But they need us to get unification through fast,’ she countered.

‘No, they don’t. You and Clive Graham agreed to rush it through before the 
election so that it doesn’t become an issue that the Tories could score with, 
but the Lib Dems are for it as well, and even in a minority situation their 
votes would see the bill through. That’s if he tables it at all. The poll’s 
in a few weeks, and you’ve just removed police structure as an issue anyway 
by announcing that we’re for it.’

‘You’re saying that if I’ve pissed him off with my challenge he might 
walk away from our agreement.’

‘Indeed I am.’ He glanced around the basement restaurant to which they had 
retreated, checking that they were still alone and that no journalists had 
followed them there. ‘But so what? It’s irrelevant alongside the campaign 
that’s ahead of us. With everything that’s happened, are you sure you’re 
ready for it?’

She looked him in the eye. ‘How long have you known me, Alf?’

He scratched his chin. ‘Twenty years?’ he ventured.

‘Exactly, since our young socialist days. And in all that time have you ever 
known me not to be up for a battle?’

‘No,’ he admitted. ‘But you’ve never been in circumstances like these 
before. You’ve had a horrendous forty-eight hours.’

‘Horrendous in what way? My marriage has broken up. That happens to more than 
ten thousand of my fellow Scots every year, and probably as many again who end 
cohabiting relationships. And although the statement Bob made me agree to was 
bland and consensual, the idiot woman Hatton just succeeded in portraying me as 
the partner who’s been wronged. Don’t you imagine that was in my mind when 
I staged my walk-out?’

‘Are you saying that wasn’t spontaneous?’

She hesitated. ‘No, I’m not, but even before I reached the door I could see 
the positives in it. Can’t you?’

‘I suppose so,’ he admitted.

‘Exactly. So, my other personal disaster: what of that? My body was all over 
today’s Daily News, and by now it’ll have gone viral on the internet. But 
I’ve read the story, there and in all the other papers. Not one has said that 
Joey was actually in the room, because no way can they prove it, so their 
lawyers wouldn’t let them. Neither of us will ever admit that he was, so what 
am I, Alf? A victim of the paparazzi, that’s what, and that’s how the party 
has to spin it. Understood?’

‘Understood,’ he agreed, ‘but you didn’t have to spell it out. Our 
communications people have been doing that since the story broke, both here and 
in London. You probably don’t know this, but the shadow Culture Secretary in 
Westminster is going to demand that the government legislates to make invasion 
of privacy a go-to-jail offence. They won’t do that, of course, because it 
can’t afford to piss off the News, but they’ll make sympathetic noises.’

‘I’ll bet they will. The last thing they want is Clive Graham with an 
absolute majority.’ She smiled. ‘Do you still think I’m not up for a 
fight?’

Old grinned back at her. ‘No, and I never did. So, why did you ask me if 
you’d survive?’

‘I only meant within the party, man. What’s the feeling in our shadow 
cabinet and on the back benches? Are they scared by what’s happened? Is my 
sleekit deputy Mr Felix Brahms likely to seize the day and challenge me for the 
leadership?’

‘As far as I can tell, there won’t be a revolt. You certainly needn’t 
worry about Felix. I spoke to him last night. Yes, he was making opportunistic 
noises, but I put a stop to that.’

She frowned. ‘How?’

‘You don’t want to know.’

‘Yes, I bloody do. Out with it.’

He looked around again; a waiter was approaching with an order pad, but he 
waved him away. ‘A friend of mine in Special Branch up in Aberdeen, the 
Brahms fiefdom, dropped me a word about him. They were worried about him being 
a security risk as shadow Justice Secretary.

‘He’s been having it off with a woman, a well-known local slapper called 
Mandy Madigan, whose brother Stuart is currently remanded in custody charged 
with the murder of a business rival, that business being prostitution and 
money-lending.’

‘What a creepy bastard!’ Aileen exclaimed. ‘I like his wife, too. What 
are we going to do about it?’

‘Nothing,’ he replied, firmly. ‘You’ve put a hint of sex into the 
campaign; that’s just about okay, given the way that you and Bob have dealt 
with it. We do not need any more sleaze, though. When Brahms called me about 
your situation, I had a sharp word with him, told him what I knew. He swears he 
didn’t know about her family background, and he’s going to put an end to 
it. The Grampian cops will keep the affair to themselves, but he’d better be 
a choirboy from now on.’

‘My God,’ she chuckled. ‘You’re making me feel like the singing nun by 
comparison. Well, maybe not quite, shagging a movie star and all, but still.’ 
She paused. ‘Poor Joey; he called me this morning, on his way to the airport. 
He’s quite upset, worried that he might have done for my career. I must call 
him once he gets to Los Angeles, and tell him he’s probably put my approval 
rating up a few points.’

‘Any chance of him supporting you in the campaign?’

‘Hell no, he’s a Tory. I know, before you say it, I seem to be making a 
habit of sleeping with the enemy. At least I’m not going to marry this one!’

‘Is Bob going to make trouble down the line?’

‘For me, no. I’ve got a funny feeling that I’ve done him a favour by 
cutting him loose. Not politically, either. He’s got nothing to gain from 
it.’ She frowned, suddenly. ‘That said, I must ring him and apologise for 
what I said at the press conference. He’ll have heard by now, for sure, from 
one of his inner media circle, Foxie, or June Crampsey. I don’t want to fall 
out with him any more than I have done.’

‘Why should that bother you?’ the chief executive asked. ‘You don’t 
think you can win him over on unification, do you? He made his views pretty 
clear in the Saltire at the weekend.’

‘Did he? That passed me by, not that I care. It’ll go through regardless. 
And once it’s there, who knows what he’ll do. I’m quite convinced that if 
Toni Field was still alive he’d go for it. He’s a cop first, second and 
third; it’s all he knows, and most of what he cares about, apart from his 
kids.

‘He’s also a pragmatist. If that’s right, that he said his piece in the 
press, all he was doing was getting at me. He knows he won’t win. Deep down 
he also knows that if Field had been there to go for the police commissioner 
job, he’d have done whatever was needed to stop her, and that would have 
meant putting himself forward.’

‘Christ, you’re making it sound as if he was behind the shooting.’

Aileen smiled, but her eyes stayed serious. ‘He’s shown himself capable of 
pulling the trigger, on Saturday and more than once before that in his career. 
But no, I wouldn’t go that far.’

‘Now she’s dead, what will he do?’

‘My guess is that he will go for it, and I’ve told him as much. He spent 
years telling himself he didn’t want to be chief in Edinburgh. Since he was 
talked into it, he’s been saying the same about Strathclyde, but I sensed a 
change in him when his refusal to put his name forward last time left the field 
clear for Toni Field, and he saw what a political operator she was. He said 
something to me once about power only being dangerous if it was in the wrong 
hands. He could have been talking about her.’

‘And his are the right hands, are they?’

‘He’d never say so. He’d leave it to the politicians he dislikes so much, 
and the media he uses so skilfully, to do that. But he believes it all right. 
He hides it well, but Robert Morgan Skinner has a massive ego, tied to an 
absolute belief in his own rectitude. And when it comes to power, he’s the 
equivalent of an alcoholic; one taste and he’s hooked. Mind you, he’d tell 
you the same thing about me, and he’d be right too.’

She sipped her wine. ‘I want to stay on good terms with him,’ she 
continued, ‘because I will need to be. Whatever the polls say, and however 
badly our colleagues in London have fucked things up for all of us, I intend to 
be First Minister after the election and, as such, we will have to co-exist.’

Old nodded. ‘I can see that.’

‘But,’ she added, ‘there’s something else. I want to stay as close to 
his investigation as I can, because I want to know who killed Toni Field just 
as much as everyone else does. Who’d want her dead?’ she asked. ‘She 
hadn’t been in Scotland long enough to have upset the criminal fraternity 
that badly. Yes, she may have hacked off someone dangerous in her earlier 
career. But can you recall another case of a senior British cop being 
assassinated by organised crime? I can’t. However, like I said earlier, the 
late Toni was an intensely political animal. Who knows who she’s crossed in 
that area. Make no mistake, politics can get you killed, and if there is any 
whiff of that, I want to know about it.’





Twenty-Eight



‘I’m fine, Bob, honestly. I lost it for a second or two in there, but 
that’s enough when the red lights are on the cameras. I’m simply calling to 
apologise for what I said about you. It was unforgivable; if you want, I’ll 
put out a statement through my press office retracting it and saying that I was 
provoked.’

‘Let it be, Aileen. I’m not worried about it. What you said is bloody true, 
anyway, so I won’t ask you to lie for me.’

‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I appreciate that. You couldn’t do something about 
that Hatton woman, could you?’

‘No need. She’s done it to herself. I’ve just taken yet another call from 
her editor, made no doubt on the advice of his lawyer. This time he was 
grovelling over what she called me. He’s ordered her back to London this 
afternoon, even offered to sack her if I insisted on it. I said I didn’t want 
that, but that he should tell her, so she can see that I have a magnanimous 
side after all.’

‘But if she ever comes back to Glasgow, she’d better not have any drugs in 
her handbag?’

He laughed. ‘You said that, I didn’t. Now, I must go; I’ve got people 
outside waiting to brief me on the Toni Field investigation, and I cannot get 
off the fucking phone.’

‘Then I won’t keep you. How’s it going, by the way? I gather from Alf… 
I’m with him just now; we’re hiding out in the Postman’s Knock, the 
bistro down the road… that they’ve determined that she was the target.’

‘That’s right. My turn to apologise; you should have heard that from us, 
not him. I’ll know more when I’ve seen the team, but we have several lines 
of inquiry. Not least, we want to know what the hell a dead Glasgow gangster 
was doing in the boot of the shooters’ getaway car.’

‘My God!’ she exclaimed.

‘Indeed, and you should be pleased to hear it. Lottie Mann was going to break 
that news at her press briefing. It should deflect some of the coverage of 
yours. By the way, you’d better call Clive Graham. He practically blew the 
wax out of my ears a few minutes ago, in the ludicrously mistaken belief that 
I’ve got any influence over you.’

‘Oh, sorry again,’ Aileen said. ‘I was planning to do that anyway. Bob, 
will you keep me up to date on the inquiry?’

‘Eh?’ he exclaimed. ‘Why should I do that?’

‘Well,’ she murmured, ‘I do have a personal interest in knowing why 
I’ve had to throw away a very expensive evening dress.’

‘There is that,’ he admitted. ‘Yes, I suppose we could. I’ll be 
briefing the First Minister, so I could persuade myself that I should do the 
same for the leader of the Opposition, given that the election’s coming up.’

‘Thanks, you’re a love.’

‘No, I’m not. I’m chief constable and you’re a constituency MSP on my 
patch. When are you seeing Joey again?’ he asked.

‘Maybe next time we’re in the same city, maybe not, maybe never.’ His 
question took her by surprise; she returned the challenge. ‘When are you 
seeing Sarah?’

His reply took one second longer than it should have. ‘Next time I pick up 
the kids.’

‘Sure,’ she sniggered, ‘sure. Bob, I didn’t get where I am by being 
stupid.’ She let her words sink in, realising that her shot in the dark had 
found a target. ‘But don’t worry about it, I don’t care. Whatever works 
for you, that’s fine by me. As for her, just you be certain that getting even 
with me isn’t her main aim.’

‘It isn’t,’ he said, ‘but let’s not discuss it further. Now please, 
let me speak to my team. I promise I’ll keep you informed, as far as I can.’

‘Thanks, I appreciate that.’ He thought the conversation was at an end, 
but, ‘Bob, one more thing. I don’t want to have to go back to Gullane 
again, ever. I’d like you to pack up everything I have there, clothes, 
jewellery, books, music, personal papers, everything that’s mine, and have it 
couriered through to my flat. Would you do that for me?’ She laughed, without 
humour. ‘What am I talking about? Would you do it for us? I imagine you 
don’t want me there again either.’

‘Of course I’ll do that. I’ll deliver them myself.’

‘Thanks for the offer, but no, let’s keep it impersonal.’

‘If that’s what you want, fine; I’ll do it as soon as I can.’

He hung up, then dialled Lowell Payne’s extension number, ignoring the 
‘call waiting’ light that continued to flash on his console. ‘I’m 
clear,’ he told his exec as he answered. ‘Ask Mann and Provan to join me. 
Have the sandwiches I ordered arrived yet?’

‘Yes, they’re on a trolley outside your door; and tea in a Thermos.’

‘Good. Listen, I want you to get on to the switchboard and tell them that 
from now on nobody gets through to me without being filtered through you; not 
the First Minister, not the Prime Minister, not even the monarch. Most of them 
won’t get through; whenever you can, please refer them to Bridie Gorman or, 
where it’s his area, to Thomson. Also I’ve changed my mind about having an 
office mobile through here; I don’t want one. You’ve got my personal phone 
number. If anything’s urgent and I’m not in the office, you can use that.’

‘Yes, Chief.’

Skinner headed for the side door to retrieve the sandwich trolley; Lottie Mann 
and Dan Provan were entering through his anteroom as he returned. 
‘Welcome,’ he greeted them. ‘Sit at the table.’

He pulled the trolley alongside them, then poured three mugs of tea. ‘Help 
yourself to sandwiches,’ he said. ‘Sincere apologies for keeping you 
waiting so long, when you have other more important things to do. Bloody phone! 
Bloody journalists! Bloody politicians! The least I can do is feed you.’

Provan grunted something that might have been thanks followed by a grudging 
‘Sir’. The chief looked at him, pondering the notion that if he judged a 
book by its cover, the scruffy little DS would be heading for the remainder 
store.

‘How long have you been in the force, Sergeant?’ he asked.

‘Thirty-two long years, sir.’

‘It’s a bind, is it?’

‘Absolutely, sir. Ah have to drag ma sorry arse out o’ bed every morning.’

‘So why are you doing it, for what… fourteen or fifteen grand a year, less 
tax and national insurance? That’s all you’re getting for it in real terms. 
With your service, you must be in the old pension scheme, the better one, and 
you’ll have maxed out. It’ll never get any bigger than it is now as a 
percentage of final salary. You could retire tomorrow on two-thirds of your 
current pay level. Tell me,’ he continued, ‘where do you live?’

‘Cambuslang, sir.’

‘How do you get to work?’

Provan reached out and took a handful of sandwiches. ‘Train usually, but 
sometimes Ah bring the car.’

‘But no free parking in your station, eh?’

‘No, sir.’

‘No. So retire and that travel cost is no more. Are you married?’

‘Technically, but no’ so’s you’d notice. She’s long gone.’

‘Kids?’

‘Jamie and Lulu. He’s twenty-six, she’s twenty-four. He’s a fireman, 
she’s a teacher.’

‘That means they’re off your hands financially. So why do you do it, why do 
you drag your shabby arse out of bed every morning for those extra few quid?’ 
He laughed. ‘Jesus, Sergeant, if you stayed at home and gave up smoking 
you’d probably be better off financially. You’re more or less a charity 
worker, man. You’re streetwise, so you’ll have worked this out for 
yourself. So tell me, straight up, why do you do it?’

‘Because I’m fuckin’ stupid… sir. Will that do as an answer?’

‘It will if you want to go back into uniform, as a station sergeant. 
Somewhere nice. How about Shotts?’

‘Okay,’ Provan snapped. ‘I do it because it’s what I am. Ma wife left 
me eight years ago because of it, before Ah’d filled up the pension pot, when 
Lulu was still a student and needin’ helped through uni. Sure, Ah could chuck 
it. Like you say, I’d have more than enough to live on. Except I’d give 
myself six months and ma head would be in the oven, even though it’s 
electric, no’ gas. The picture you’re paintin’s ma worst nightmare, 
Chief.’

He paused and for the briefest instant Skinner thought he saw a smile. 
‘Besides,’ he added, ‘the big yin here would be lost without me. Ah’m 
actually pretty fuckin’ good at what Ah do. But why should Ah go and 
advertise the fact?’

‘The suit’s a disguise, is it?’

‘No,’ Lottie Mann intervened. ‘Dan wears clothes, any clothes, worse than 
any human being I have ever met. Even when he was in uniform they used to call 
him Fungus the Bogeyman.’ She dug him in the ribs with a large elbow. 
‘Isn’t that right?’

The DS gave in to a full-on grin. ‘It got me intae CID though.’ Then it 
faded as he looked the chief constable in the eye. ‘What you see is what you 
get, Mr Skinner. No’ everybody’s like you or even Lottie here, cut out to 
play the Lone Ranger… although too many think they are. Ah don’t. Every 
masked man on a white horse needs a faithful Indian companion, and that’s me, 
fuckin’ Tonto.’

The chief picked up a sandwich, looked at it, decided that the egg looked a 
little past its best, and put it back on the plate.

‘Nice analogy, Dan,’ he murmured, ‘but it doesn’t quite work for me. I 
speak a wee bit of Spanish, just restaurant Spanish, you understand, but enough 
to know that “Tonto” means “Stupid”, and that, Detective Sergeant, you 
are not. I’m not a uniform guy myself, as the entire police community must 
know by now, so the wrapping doesn’t bother me too much as long as it 
doesn’t frighten kids and old ladies, but what’s inside does.

‘I took a shine to you yesterday, but to be sure you weren’t just the 
office comedian, I pulled your personnel file and the first thing I did when I 
got here today was to read it. As far as I can see the only reason you’re 
still a DS is because that’s what you want to be. You’ve never applied for 
promotion to inspector, correct?’

‘Correct, and you’re right, sir. Ah’m happy where I am. It’s no’ that 
I’m scared of responsibility, I just believe Ah’ve found my level,’ he 
paused, ‘Kemo Sabe.’

Skinner chuckled. ‘In which case, Dan, I’ll value you for as long as I’m 
here. So, how much of the trail have you two sniffed out?’

‘Thanks to you, Chief,’ Mann replied, as soon as she had finished the last 
sandwich, the one that he had rejected, ‘we now know that the man who rented 
the Peugeot was the planner of the operation, Beram Cohen, the guy you’ve got 
in the mortuary through in Edinburgh.

‘We’ve established through HMRC that under the name Byron Millbank he’s 
lived and worked in London for the last six years, for a mail order company 
called Rondar. It operates one of those teleshopping channels on satellite 
telly. Three years ago he married a woman called Golda Radnor, the boss’s 
daughter, we’re guessing, going by the fact that her name’s the company’s 
reversed, and eighteen months later they had a wee boy, named Leon Jesse. 
According to the General Register Office, Byron was born in Eastbourne 
thirty-two years ago, father unknown, mother named Caroline Anne Millbank, died 
on the last day of the last century.’

‘Pity,’ Provan muttered. ‘She missed the fireworks.’

‘I doubt if she was ever alive to see them,’ Skinner countered.

‘Do you think those records are faked, sir?’ Mann asked.

He nodded. ‘And clumsily, by somebody with a knowledge of poetic history. I 
studied it as an option in my degree. Look at the names: Byron Millbank, out of 
Caroline Anne. Lord Byron the poet, and two of his most famous women, Lady 
Caroline Lamb and her cousin Annabella, the one he wound up marrying.’

‘Where does Millbank come from?’

‘That was Annabella’s family name, only it was spelled differently, as I 
recall.’ He laughed. ‘I don’t know where all that came from. I must be 
turning into Andy Martin; he’s got a photographic memory for everything. 
However,’ he continued, ‘there’s a second context, and one that’s more 
likely to be connected. It used to be a secret, but now one of the most famous 
buildings in London is Thames House, on Millbank: it’s the MI5 headquarters. 
Whoever set up Cohen’s identity practically signed their name.’

‘Aye, sir, but,’ Provan interposed, ‘how do you know that Cohen’s no’ 
the alias?’

‘I know because I’d never heard of him until Five told me who he was, and 
told me about his career in the Israeli military and then its secret service. I 
guess,’ he continued, ‘that Mr Millbank had a driving licence.’

Mann nodded.

‘And a passport?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Neither of them more than six years old?’

The DI opened the folder she had brought with her, searched through her notes, 
then looked up. ‘That’s right. Both issued a couple of months before he 
shows up on the payroll of Rondar, and on the same day.’

‘To make absolutely sure,’ Skinner instructed, ‘I want you to go to the 
DSS and see if his records go any further back with them. My dollar says they 
don’t. Before then Cohen was in Mossad, until he was caught up in an illegal 
operation and got thrown out.’

‘But what does it mean, sir?’ Dan Provan asked.

‘Probably nothing at all, as far as our investigation’s concerned. My 
reading is that British intelligence did the Israelis a favour by looking after 
one of theirs. They gave him a legitimate front and if he continued to take on 
black ops under his old identity, that was all right with them. They told me 
about one where he had used Smit and Botha; that was American-sponsored, in 
Somalia. I suppose he was what the spooks call an asset, but now it looks as if 
he wasn’t fussy who he worked for.’

The sergeant blew out his cheeks. ‘This is a’ new stuff for us, gaffer. How 
do we go about investigatin’ MI5, for Christ’s sake?’

‘You don’t,’ the chief told him. ‘Yes, Byron Millbank, he’ll need to 
be followed up, but I’ll take care of that. I want you two and your team to 
focus on Bazza Brown. Am I right in believing that the media haven’t made any 
connection between his murder and the Field assassination?’

‘So far they haven’t. As far as they know, Ronnie Edgar from Townhead’s 
the SIO on that case, and they’ve only just found out it’s Bazza that’s 
dead. They’ve been told we’re still tryin’ to identify the victim.’

‘Good. From what I’ve heard of Brown’s history, now that we have released 
his name, the first thing the press will do will speculate that it’s gang 
wars. That’ll be fine by me. Let them chase that hare as long as they can. 
Meantime, you need to look at his family and his associates. Do you know 
them?’

‘I know the main one; that would be Cecil, his brother,’ Lottie Mann 
replied. ‘Younger by two years, but they were as inseparable as twins.’

‘Cecil?’ Skinner repeated. ‘Basil and Cecil? Not exactly Weegie names.’

Provan’s eyes twinkled. ‘Remember that old Johnny Cash song, about a boy 
called Sue? Their old man, Hammy, he had the same idea. He gave them soppy 
names, and the pair of them grew up as the hardest kids in Govan. The muscle 
was equally divided, but Bazza got a’ the brains. Ah’ve lifted Cec in my 
time. He’s no’ likely tae help us.’

‘Lift him again; tell him it’s on suspicion of conspiracy to murder Toni 
Field. If the brothers were that close, we have to go on the assumption that 
whatever the connection was to Smit and Botha, Cecil was part of it. See how he 
reacts under questioning. Whether he was involved or not, he’ll be thinking 
revenge. If you tell him there’s nobody left for him to kill, he might just 
cooperate.’

‘He might, sir. Just don’t build your hopes up, that’s all Ah’m 
sayin’.’

‘Understood. Now, what else do you have to tell me?’

‘The satnav in the rental car, sir,’ the DI said. ‘We’ve looked at it 
and it was used. Since they’ve had it, they’ve been to several locations. 
One was in Edinburgh, and another in Livingston.’

‘The first would be when they first met up with Freddy Welsh, their armourer, 
when Cohen upped and died on them. The second was when they collected the 
weapons from Welsh’s store. We know that already. Anything we don’t know?’

She nodded. ‘We’ve found out where they were living. Their journeys were to 
and from a hotel out on the south side; it’s called the Forest Grove. It’s 
a quiet place, family run, with about a dozen bedrooms. They were booked in for 
a week, Sunday to Saturday, full board, signed in as Millbank, Lightbody and 
Mallett. Millbank said they were there for a jewellery convention, and that the 
other two worked for the South African branch of his firm. The owner knew him; 
he’d stayed there before, a couple of times.’

‘Do we have dates?’

‘Yes, boss. And yes, we’ve checked for unsolved crimes to match them. There 
were none, neither in Glasgow, nor anywhere else in Scotland. But there was a 
watch fair in the SECC each time, so it looks like he was there on legitimate 
business.’

‘Fair enough; good on you, for being thorough. Who paid the bill?’ he asked.

‘The man the hotel people knew as Lightbody. He settled up on Saturday 
lunchtime, then they left. The owner, his name’s MacDonald, remarked to him 
that he hadn’t seen Mr Millbank for a couple of days, and that his bed 
hadn’t needed making. Lightbody said that he’d been called away to a 
meeting in Newcastle and that he’d flown back to London from there. Mr 
MacDonald thought that was odd, for his daughter had serviced the room the 
first morning he was gone and his stuff was still in it. Thing about the bill, 
though, sir, it was settled in cash, old-fashioned folding money.’

‘New Bank of England fifties?’

Mann’s looked at him, surprised. ‘How did you know that?’

‘Our investigation in Edinburgh last week, after we found Cohen’s body, led 
us to a kosher restaurant in Glasgow. The three guys ate there, and that’s 
how they paid. Does MacDonald still have the notes?’

‘I’m afraid not, sir. They went straight into his bank’s night safe. 
I’ve got somebody contacting his branch though; they’re probably still 
there.’

‘Good. The notes from the restaurant are in Edinburgh. If we can match them 
up with these and they are straight from the printer, we might be able to trace 
them to the issuing bank and branch.’

‘Wouldn’t that have been Millbank’s?’ the DI pointed out.

Provan shook his head, causing another micro snowstorm. ‘Ah don’t see that. 
If he’s had two identities, he’s going tae have kept them completely 
separate.’

‘For sure,’ Skinner agreed. ‘It may be that he had a separate Beram Cohen 
account, or a safe deposit box, but there’s also a chance the cash came from 
the person who bought the operation. If we can trace its movement in the 
banking system, you never know.’

‘If we can recover them,’ Mann said. ‘I’ll chase it up.’

‘Do that, pronto. Anything else from the satnav?’

‘Yes, one other journey, but I’m not getting excited about it. On Friday, 
they went from the hotel to the Easthaven Retail Park, not far from the M8 
motorway.’

‘Indeed?’ the chief said. ‘Why are you writing that off?’

‘Because it seems they went there to shop and to eat, that’s all. We found 
receipts in the car for two shirts, and a pack of underwear from a clothes 
shop, and for two pizzas, ice cream and coffee from Frankie and Benny. The next 
journey programmed was the second last, the one to Livingston; the last being 
from their hotel to the car park next to the concert hall, where we found the 
car.’

‘Yes, you’re probably right; sounds like a refuelling stop, no more.’ He 
frowned. ‘Forensics. What have they given us?’

‘They say that Bazza was shot in the car. They dug a bullet out of the 
upholstery, and found blood spatters. Other than that, they’ve given us 
nothing we didn’t have before.’

‘Post-mortem report? What about that? Has Brown been formally identified? I 
don’t want as much as a scratch in him until that’s done. If we ever do put 
anyone in the dock for this, he can’t be allowed to walk out on a 
technicality.’

‘That’s done,’ she said. ‘His wife did it first thing this mornin’. 
Pathology’s not holding us up but still I’m not pleased about it. Either 
Dan or I will have to be there as a witness. That’s going to use up the rest 
of the day for whoever it is, with there being two of them.’

‘Two?’

‘Yes, there’s Bazza, and there’s the one on Chief Constable Field.’

‘Of course.’

‘Yes, I’d hoped that could be done yesterday, but it turns out it 
wasn’t.’

‘Bugger that,’ the chief grumbled. ‘What was the problem?’

‘The chief pathologist was away on what he said was “family business”, 
then this morning the so-and-so went and called in sick. I don’t fancy his 
deputy, not since his evidence cost me a nailed-on conviction in the High Court 
last year. I said I wasn’t having him do them, so they’ve called somebody 
through from the Edinburgh University pathology department.’

‘Professor Hutchinson?’

She shook her head. ‘No, sir. I asked for him but he wasn’t available 
either. Instead they’ve sent us his number two. A woman, they said. I hope 
she’s up to the job.’

Skinner’s eyebrows rose. ‘Oh, she is, Inspector, she is. I can vouch for 
her. As for you being there,’ he continued, ‘your priority has to be 
keeping the investigation up to speed.’

‘Fair enough, sir. I never mind not going to post-mortems. Do you want me to 
send a couple of detective cons along instead?’

‘No, Lottie, you leave that to me to sort out. The autopsies may be only 
formalities, but given that my predecessor’s going to be on the table, our 
representative has to be appropriate in rank. Luckily, I know the very man for 
the job.’





Twenty-Nine



Every so often, in the office where he spent most of his time, Detective Chief 
Superintendent Neil McIlhenney would find himself daydreaming. When he awakened 
it was always with a start as he looked out of his window. He was still well 
away from being used to life in the Metropolitan Police Service, and he 
wondered if he ever would.

When a move south, on promotion, had been offered to him he had taken no time 
at all to accept. There had been more involved than his own future. Louise, his 
wife, had taken time out of her acting career to have a family, but he had 
known there would come a time when she would want to go back to work, and 
London was where she was known and where the opportunities arose.

As she had put it, she was beyond the ‘age of romance’, in that lead roles 
in major movies were no longer being offered, but it had always been her 
intention to go back to the stage when she passed forty, as she had a few years 
earlier. They had been in London for only a few weeks, yet she was in rehearsal 
for a major role in a West End play and the arts sections of the broadsheets 
were trumpeting her return.

The sound of his mobile put an end to his contemplation; he looked at the 
screen and smiled when he saw who was calling.

‘Good morning, Chief Constable,’ he said. ‘I’m guessing this isn’t a 
social call.’

‘Why shouldn’t it be?’ his former boss challenged. ‘We have lunch 
breaks in Strathclyde too. I take it you’ve heard what’s happened.’

‘How could I not, even if I hadn’t had my best mate call me on Saturday 
night, as soon as he got Paula back to Edinburgh? He was crying, Bob; Mario. 
Can you believe that? He started to tell me what had happened and then he broke 
down, sobbing like a baby. Was Paula really that close to the victim?’

‘Their heads couldn’t have been any more than three feet apart when Toni 
Field’s was blown open,’ Skinner told him.

He shivered. ‘God, it doesn’t bear thinking about. How is she?’

‘Most people, put in her situation, would be under sedation right now. Clive 
Graham’s wife still is, and she wasn’t even there. Maybe at another time 
Paula would be too, but at the moment she’s completely focused on the baby, 
so, once she was sure he was okay in there, she was fine. I was with them 
yesterday morning and saw no sign of a delayed reaction. She’s still on 
course to deliver in a couple of weeks.’

‘Yes,’ McIlhenney said. ‘That’s something else I won’t be around for, 
but I’ll get up to meet wee Eamon as soon as I can. You know Mario’s 
calling him after his father, don’t you?’ He paused. ‘It’s not plain 
sailing for me, you know, being down here. To move or not to move, it was my 
choice; Lou didn’t put any pressure on me. If I’d said no, we’d have got 
by, but I want what’s best for all of us, Lauren, Spence and wee Louis, and 
this is it. That said, I miss you lot and not being around for Mario when he 
really needed me, that was tough.’

‘I can imagine. But I admire you nonetheless, for making the move. I have to 
admit, you’re so Edinburgh that I didn’t think you’d have the balls.’

‘Thanks, pal.’ The DCS chuckled. ‘By the way, does Joey Morocco still 
have his? He had a small part in one of Lou’s movies a few years back. She 
says he had a reputation for nose candy and shagging anything female and alive, 
the latter probably being optional.’

‘Fu—’ Skinner snorted. ‘You are one of the few guys in the world who 
could say that and get away with it. Yes he has, maybe more by luck than 
judgement. Aileen and I are history, but what you saw in the papers probably 
happened because of that, rather than the other way round. I’ve got no beef 
with Morocco, but there’s a freelance photographer here in Glasgow who should 
leave town sharpish.’

‘That sounds as if you’re planning to be there for longer than the three 
months Mario told me about. I called him back yesterday,’ he explained, 
‘just to make sure he was all right.’

‘Ach, Neil, I’m not planning anything. This whole thing… it’s so 
bizarre, so bloody terrible, and with the Aileen situation too, I haven’t had 
time to gather my thoughts. I just don’t know any more. What I do know is 
that I’m at the head of the highest profile investigation of my career, and 
I’m going to consider nothing else until it’s done. Speaking of which… 
you were right. This isn’t a social call.’

‘Some things never change. Go on, Chief, let me hear it.’

‘Okay, but you’re not due anywhere soon, are you? It’s best that I fill 
you in from the start, and it’ll take a while.’

‘No, I’m clear for an hour. I was just about to go for lunch, but I can do 
without that.’

‘Thanks. Knowing how you like your chuck, I appreciate that.’

He ran through the events of the previous few days, from the discovery of a 
body in a shallow grave in Edinburgh, through the chain of events that led to 
the assassination of Chief Constable Antonia Field, then gave McIlhenney the 
story of the investigation as it stood.

The chief superintendent stayed silent throughout, but when Skinner was 
finished, he asked, ‘Am I right in thinking that you’ve run all these 
checks on your planner, this man Cohen, alias Byron Millbank, without any 
reference to my outfit?’

‘You’re spot on, chum. I chose not to involve the Met until I absolutely 
had to, and that time is now. Make no mistake, this is a Strathclyde operation, 
but I am going to need to interview people in London, and I will need 
assistance. I propose to phone your commissioner and ask for it, but what I do 
not want is for the job to be handed to anyone who might have been personally 
acquainted with Toni Field. I know she had an affair with a DAC, but I don’t 
have a name.’

‘Couldn’t you ask the Security Service for help? I know you’re well in 
with them.’

‘I could but I don’t want to. Their paws are all over Beram Cohen’s false 
identity.’

‘Forgive me for asking the obvious, but couldn’t Beram Cohen be the false 
name? They told you about him, after all.’

‘No, because there’s no trace of Millbank any further back than half a 
dozen years.’

‘Right, box ticked. So, boss… listen to me; old habits and all that… cut 
to the chase. Why are you calling me? As if I can’t guess.’

‘I’ll spell it out anyway,’ Skinner told him. ‘When I call my esteemed 
colleague, I want to ask him to lend me someone I know and who knows the way I 
work. But I don’t want you press-ganged. Do you want to take this on, and can 
you?’

‘Of course I want to,’ McIlhenney replied. ‘Can I, though? I’m heading 
up a covert policing team down here. I have officers operating under cover, 
deep and dangerous in some cases. I don’t run them all directly, but I have 
to be available for them, and their handlers, at all times.’

‘Not a problem. All I’m talking about here is partnering one of my guys in 
knocking on a few doors. Millbank was a family man, so there’s a wife to be 
told. He had a legitimate job, so that will have to be looked at. I need to 
know whether there was any overlap between his life and that of Beram Cohen, 
and if there was, to see where it takes us.’

‘Who will you give me? You can’t know anyone through there yet, apart from 
the assistant chiefs.’

‘Wrong, I do. I’m going to send my exec down. He’s a DCI and his name is 
Lowell Payne.’

‘That’s familiar. Isn’t he…’

‘Alex’s uncle, but our family link is irrelevant. He’s been involved in 
this operation almost from the start. He’s the obvious choice.’

‘In which case,’ McIlhenney exclaimed, ‘I’ll look forward to meeting 
him.’





Thirty



Anger writhed within Assistant Chief Constable Michael Thomas like a snake 
trapped in a jar. He had seen enough of Bob Skinner, and the way he dominated 
ACPOS meetings, to know that he did not like the man.

He was ruthless, he was inflexible, he was politically connected and in 
Thomas’s mind he had an agenda: Skinner was out to mould the Scottish police 
service in his own image, planting his clones and protégés in key roles until 
they came to dominate it.

He had done it with the stolid Willie Haggerty in Dumfries and Galloway, with 
quick-witted Andy Martin in the Serious Crimes and Drug Enforcement Agency, and 
most recently in Tayside, with Brian Mackie, ‘The Automaton’, as some of 
his colleagues had nicknamed him.

When Antonia Field had been appointed chief constable of Strathclyde and he had 
taken her measure, he had been immensely pleased. Finally there was someone on 
the scene with the rank, the gravitas and the balls to tackle his enemy head 
on. The truth, that he was afraid to do so himself, had never crossed his mind.

She had identified him from the beginning as her one true supporter among the 
command ranks in Pitt Street, and he had demonstrated that at every 
opportunity. She had been in post for less than a month when she took him to 
dinner, and laid out her vision of the future.

‘Unification is coming, Michael,’ she began. ‘My sources among the movers 
and shakers tell me that the Scottish government is going to create a single 
police force, as soon as it deems the moment to be right. I will make no bones 
about it; I want to be its first chief.

‘As head of Strathclyde I should be the obvious choice, but we both know 
there’s a big obstacle in my way. I need allies if I’m going to overcome 
him, and in particular I need you. You’re the only forward-thinking policeman 
in the place. Theakston, Allan, Gorman, they’re all old-school thinkers; 
they’re not going to be around long. Back me and you’ll be my deputy inside 
a year, and again when the new service comes into play. Are you up for that?’

‘Of course, Toni, of course.’

After dinner she had taken him to bed, to seal their alliance, she said, 
although there were times later, after he felt the rough edge of her tongue, as 
everyone did, when he wondered whether it had been to give her an even greater 
hold over him, insurance against his ambition growing as great as hers. It had 
been a one-off and when it was over she had more or less patted him on the bum 
and sent him home to his wife. There had been no hint of intimacy from then on; 
he wondered whether there was a new guy in the background, but that was one 
secret she did not share with him.

For all that, she had been as good as her word and he had been almost there: 
DCC Theakston gone to enforced early retirement, and Max Allan with his 
sixty-fifth birthday and compulsory departure only four months in the future. 
Within a few weeks he would have been deputy. And beyond that?

She had been right about the new force. It had come up in ACPOS, and while 
Skinner had won the first battle, by a hair’s breadth, the next round would 
be theirs, and the First Minister would be able to claim chief officer support 
as he moved the legislation. The enemy would be marginalised and unable to go 
forward as a candidate for commissioner, having fought so hard and publicly 
against the creation of the job.

Toni had promised him that she had no ambition to grow old, or even 
middle-aged, in Scotland. She was bound for London, back to the Met when its 
commissioner fell out with the Mayor, as all of them seemed to do. ‘I have 
levers, Michael, and I will use them, when the time comes. When I go, the floor 
will be yours.’

Three shots, inside two seconds, that was all it had taken to put the skids 
under his entire career. He had been doing a spot of evening fishing with his 
son near Hazelbank when the call had come through. ‘An incident reported at 
the concert hall, sir,’ the divisional commander had told him. ‘A shooting, 
with one reported casualty.’

He had known that Toni would be at the hall that night… for the previous 
fortnight she had been full of her ‘date’ with the First Minister… and so 
he had almost stayed on the river, but a moment’s reflection had convinced 
him that the smart thing would be to tear himself away and rush to the scene. 
He had arrived to discover that Toni was the reported casualty, and that Max 
Allan was another, having suffered some sort of collapse, suspected heart 
attack, they were saying. Her body was still there, with crime scene 
technicians working all around it in their paper suits and bootees. He had 
tried to take charge of the shambles, and that was when DCI Lowell bloody Payne 
had told him about Skinner being there.

He hadn’t believed the man, until Dom Hanlon had told him Skinner had taken 
command, and that he would have to live with it, even though the guy had no 
semblance of authority. Outrageous, bloody outrageous. Then next day, to cap it 
all, they’d gone and appointed him acting chief.

That was when the grief had set in, for his own foiled prospects as much as for 
his fallen leader. He knew where he stood with Skinner, a fact confirmed when 
he had chosen Bridie Gorman, whom Toni had sidelined almost completely, as 
acting deputy. He had been considering resignation, quite seriously, when he 
had been called to the chief constable’s office, urgently. Twenty-four bloody 
hours and suddenly it was urgent.

There he had been, Toni Field’s arch-enemy behind Toni Field’s desk. God, 
it had been hard to take.

He hadn’t expected subtlety and there had been none. ‘Michael,’ Skinner 
had begun, ‘you don’t like me, and I don’t like you much either. But 
that’s irrelevant; if everyone in an organisation this size were bosom 
buddies it would get sloppy very quickly. Far better that some of us are 
watching out for each other, and that there are some rivalries in play.

‘I had two CID guys in Edinburgh who could have been twins, they were so 
close; indeed, twins they were called, by their mates. Eventually they rose 
until they were at the head of operations. It didn’t work out; things started 
to slip through the net, because each one overlooked the other’s weaknesses 
and mistakes. At least that’s not going to happen with you and me, in the 
time I’m here.’

‘In that case,’ Thomas had ventured, ‘wouldn’t that make me an 
excellent deputy?’

The response, a frown. ‘Nice try, but no. In my ideal world, people like you 
and me would be elected to our post by the people we seek to command, not 
appointed by those who command us, or by boards of councillors. I’ve been 
here a day and I’ve worked out already that if we did that, you wouldn’t 
get too many votes.

‘I don’t doubt your ability as an officer, not for a second, but what 
I’ve seen in ACPOS and heard since I’ve been here make some believe that 
you’re not a leader. Forgive me for being frank; it’s the way I’m built.

‘However,’ Skinner had continued, ‘even though I chose ACC Gorman as my 
deputy when necessary, you are still my assistant and that I respect. So 
let’s work together, not against each other, for as long as I’m here. I’d 
like to meet with you and Bridie tomorrow morning, so that you can both brief 
me on your areas of responsibility. Meantime… there’s something quite 
important that I’d be grateful if you could handle. It’s not going to be 
pleasant, but it needs a senior officer.’

And that was how Michael Thomas had come to be standing, seething with anger, 
in an autopsy theatre, gowned and masked, looking, not for the first time, at 
the naked body of Antonia Field. The pathologist had followed him into the 
room. She was a woman also, a complete contrast to Toni, and not only in the 
fact that she was alive. She was tall, fair-skinned, and the strands of hair 
that escaped her sterile headgear were blonde.

‘You’re the duty cop with the short straw in his hand, I take it,’ she 
said. ‘I’m Dr Grace.’ She turned and nodded towards a young man. From 
what Thomas could see of his face, his skin tone looked similar to that of 
Toni. ‘And this is Roshan, who’ll be assisting me.’

He realised, to his surprise, that she was North American, possibly Canadian, 
possibly US; he had never been able to distinguish the respective accents.

‘ACC Thomas,’ he replied. ‘Given the circumstances, I felt it was 
appropriate that I come myself.’

‘And I don’t imagine Bob tried to talk you out of it,’ she murmured, 
through her mask.

He looked at her, puzzled. ‘I’m sorry?’

‘Chief Skinner. He’s my ex, my former husband. The older he gets, the more 
squeamish he gets.’

‘I see.’ The bastard had set him up!

‘That said, he’s been to more than his fair share. How about you?’

‘I’ve spent most of my career in uniform,’ he told her, avoiding a 
straight answer.

‘Ah, so you’ll have seen mostly suicides and road fatalities. They have a 
pretty high squeamishness quotient.’

‘Mmm.’

She looked at the man. His eyes told her what the rest of his face was saying. 
‘You’ve never been to an autopsy in your life, have you?’

‘No,’ the ACC confessed.

‘So here you are, looking at somebody you knew and worked with, who’s now 
dead and you’re going to have to watch me cut her open and take her insides 
out, all in the line of duty?’

Thomas felt his stomach heave, but he mastered it. ‘That sums it up pretty 
well,’ he conceded. ‘I suppose your ex would say “Welcome to the real 
world”, or something like that.’

‘That sounds like a Bob quote, I admit. Since he didn’t, I assume you 
didn’t tell him you’ve never done this duty before.’

‘Of course I didn’t.’

‘Ah,’ she exclaimed, ‘the macho thing. The traditional pissing contest, 
in yet another form. As a result I’ve got somebody in my workplace who’s 
liable to faint on me or, worse, choke himself to death by barfing inside a 
face mask. You should have told him, and he’d have sent someone else, because 
he knows that’s the last thing I need. And by the way, he isn’t an ogre, 
either.’

‘Well, I’m here now, Doctor,’ he replied stiffly, ‘so we might as well 
take the chance. I’ll make sure I don’t land on anything important when I 
fall over.’

‘Not necessary.’ She peeled off her mask. ‘You’re a legal necessity but 
in practice don’t have to watch every incision or every organ being removed. 
This is not going to be a complicated job. Cause of death is massive brain 
trauma caused by gunshot wounds; we know that before I touch her. But the law 
needs a full report and that’s what it will get.

‘You can go sit in the corner and read a book, or listen to your iPod. If I 
find something I believe you need to look at up close, I will tell you and you 
can look at it. But that’s not going to happen. And from what I’ve seen of 
our next customer, that’s going to be the case with him as well. He was shot 
from so close up that some of his chest hairs are melted. So go on, get out of 
my space.’

He looked at her, gratefully. ‘Thank you,’ he said. He started to move 
away, then paused. ‘Doctor Grace,’ he ventured, ‘this is a silly thing to 
ask, I know, but Toni and I, well, we were friends as well as colleagues. Be 
gentle with her, yes?’

‘As if she were an angel,’ Sarah replied, feeling pity for the man, then 
adding, in case he thought she was being sarcastic, ‘Who knows, by now she 
may be one.’





Thirty-One



‘Ye cannae do this,’ the prisoner protested, ‘ma lawyer’s no’ here. 
I’m saying nothin’ till he gets here. And this charge! What the fuck yis on 
about? Conspiracy tae fuckin’ murder? That’s pure shite. Ah never murdered 
onybody.’

‘Technically that’s true, Cec,’ Dan Provan admitted. ‘The jury was 
stupid enough tae convict you of culpable homicide, and the judge was even 
dafter when he gave you five years. But the boy ye killed was just as fuckin’ 
deid, so let’s no’ split hairs about it.’

‘We can do it,’ Lottie Mann assured him. ‘We can do pretty much what we 
like.’

‘Oh aye?’ Cecil Brown stuck out his jaw, with menace, then took a closer 
look at the expression on her face and realised that aggression was not his 
best option.

‘Oh aye.’ She pointed at the recorder on the desk. ‘That thing is not 
switched on. When your brief gets here it will be and we’ll get formal, but 
until then, tell me what business you and your brother had with the South 
Africans.’

He stared back at her. When they had arrested him, the DI’s impression had 
been that he was genuinely surprised. As she studied his big, dumb eyes, that 
feeling moved towards certainty. ‘What fuckin’ South Africans?’ he asked.

Provan leaned forward. ‘Son,’ he murmured, ‘off the record, who’s your 
biggest rival in Glasgow?’

‘Ah don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.’

He laughed. ‘Of course you do. Don’t fanny about, Cec. I’m askin’ you 
who you’ve got in mind, what mind ye have, that is, for toppin’ your 
brother. Paddy Reilly? Specky Green? Which of those have you crossed lately? 
Which of those are we liable tae find in the Clyde any day now?’

When the sergeant floated the second name he saw Brown’s eyes narrow; very 
slightly but it was enough. ‘It’s Specky, right? Let me guess; you and 
Bazza ripped him off on some sort of a deal, or moved gear intae one of his 
pubs. So you’re thinkin’ it was him that bumped off the boy. Well, if ye 
are, ye’re wrong.’

‘Aye, sure.’ The tone was a mix of scepticism and contempt. ‘Ah might be 
thick, but no’ so thick Ah’d believe youse bastards.’

‘He’s not kidding, Cecil,’ Lottie Mann assured him. ‘This is how it 
was. We found your brother’s body yesterday afternoon crammed into the boot 
of a car in the multi-storey park next to the Buchanan Street bus station. It 
had been there for a day, and it was starting to hum.

‘It was a hire vehicle from London, and it was meant to be the getaway car 
for the two men, those South Africans I mentioned, who shot and killed our 
chief constable in the Royal Concert Hall on Saturday evening. Unfortunately 
for them, they didn’t get away, and they’re no longer,’ her eyes narrowed 
and she smiled, ‘in a position to assist us with our inquiries.’ She 
paused, letting the slow-moving cogs of his mind process what she had said.

‘Now we don’t actually believe,’ she went on, ‘that you and your 
brother were the masterminds behind a plot to kill Ms Field, but the fact that 
we found him where we did, and also that our forensic team will prove that he 
was killed by the same gun that was used to shoot two police officers outside 
the hall, that puts you right in the middle of it.’

Cecil Brown’s mouth was hanging open.

‘Yes,’ she continued. ‘I can see you get my point. So we need you to tell 
us what your role was, and how Bazza came to meet up with those guys. You help 
us, before your brief gets here to shut you up, and your life will be a hell of 
a lot better. For openers, you will have a life.

‘We are going to put somebody in the dock for this, make no mistake, and at 
the moment you’re all we’ve got. I’m not talking about five soft years 
for manslaughter here, Cecil. If you’re convicted of having a part in Chief 
Constable Field’s murder you’ll be drawing your old age pension before you 
get out.’

‘Personally, laddie,’ Dan Provan yawned, ‘Ah’d love tae see that 
happen. You sit there and say nothing and we’ll build a case against ye, no 
bother.’

‘Ah don’t know anything!’ the prisoner shouted. ‘Honest tae Christ, Ah 
don’t. Bazza said nothin’ tae me about any South Africans.’

‘What did he tell you?’

‘Nothin’.’

‘Come on,’ the DS laughed, ‘when did your big brother keep secrets from 
you? The pair of you wis like Siamese twins. You lived next door tae each 
other, drove the same gangster motors… what are they, big black Chrysler 
saloons… ye both married girls ye’d been at the school with, ye shared a 
box at Ibrox. Come on, Cec. You cannae expect us to believe that Bazza was 
involved in the shooting of the chief bloody constable and he kept you in the 
dark about it.’

‘Man,’ the surviving Brown brother protested, ‘ye’re off yir heid. 
Bazza would never have got involved in anything as crazy as killin’ the chief 
constable, or any fuckin’ constable. The amount of shite that would have 
brought down on our heids! It’s the last thing he’d have wanted. He had 
nothin’ to do with it.’

‘But he had, Cecil,’ Lottie Mann boomed. ‘Like it or not, he was with 
Smit and Botha, the two men who shot Ms Field. He was involved with them, and 
he could have identified them, so they killed him when they had done whatever 
business they had with him.’

‘If you say so,’ the prisoner muttered, his lip jutting out like that of a 
rebellious child. ‘But he never telt me about it, okay?’

She sighed. ‘Yes, right. Let’s say I accept that, for the moment. Did Bazza 
keep a diary?’

‘Eh?’

‘Did he keep any sort of written record of his life; his meetings, deals, and 
so on?’

‘In a book, like?’

‘Book, computer, tablet.’

‘Ah don’t know. Maybe on his phone.’

‘We don’t have that,’ Mann said. ‘Would he have had it on him?’

‘Oh aye, a’ the time.’

‘Did he have a contract or did he use a throwaway?’

‘He had a top-up. He took it everywhere, even tae the bog.’

‘Then Smit and Botha must have dumped it after they killed him.’ She leaned 
closer to him. ‘Cec, we want whoever was behind them. So do you, for your 
brother’s sake. Help us.’

He met her gaze. ‘How can Ah, if Ah don’t know anything?’

‘Where’s Bazza’s car?’

Brown turned, at Provan’s question. ‘Parked outside his hoose,’ he 
replied.

The DS looked at the DI, eyebrows raised, as if inviting a response.

It came. ‘Did Smit and Botha pick him up from home?’ she asked.

‘Naw. Ah’d have seen them,’ Cec volunteered, with certainty. ‘We’ve 
got CCTV. It covers both houses. Ah checked it this mornin’, as soon as Senga 
told me he was deid. Ah was looking for Specky, or his boys. There was 
nothin’, other than us, the paper boy and the postie.’

‘So that makes us wonder. How did he get to wherever he met them?’

‘Ah suppose Ah must have took him.’

‘Where? When?’

‘Friday evenin’. Ye know that big park with a’ the shops, beside the 
motorway? Bazza asked me if Ah’d take him there for seven o’clock. He said 
he was meetin’ a burd. He always had bits on the side,’ he added, in 
explanation. ‘Our cars are a wee bit obvious, so if he is… when he wis… 
playin’ away he liked tae use taxis. Ah took him there and Ah dropped him 
off, in the car park, must hae been about seven, mibbes a wee bit after.’

‘And that was the last time you saw him?’

‘Aye.’

‘But you didn’t see the woman?’

‘Naw.’ His eyes were fixed on the table. ‘There couldnae have been one, 
could there? Ah must have delivered him tae the guys that killed him.’

‘Then it’s too bad for him he didn’t tell you what was going on. You 
could have hung around and watched his back.’

‘Fuckin’ right,’ Cec muttered.

‘Is there anything else?’ Mann asked him. ‘Anything that could help us?’

‘I wish there wis. If Ah could, Ah would, honest.’

‘You know what,’ she said, ‘I think I believe you. Cec, you’re free to 
go, but I warn you, we’ve got search warrants for Bazza’s house, and for 
yours, and for the office of that so-called minicab company that you run. 
We’re enforcing them right now, going through the records, and looking for 
anything that’ll tie your brother to those guys. If we find something, and 
you’re involved after all, you’ll be back in here before you’ve even had 
time to take a piss.

‘In the meantime, my advice is to watch your back. If the man we’re after 
gets it into his head that Bazza might have confided in you, he might decide 
that it’s too big a risk to leave you running around loose.’

Brown’s eyes seemed to light up with a strange intensity, that of a man with 
two bells showing on a one-armed bandit and the third reel still spinning. 
‘Ah hope he does, Miss. Ah’d like tae talk tae him.’





Thirty-Two



‘So there you have it. Sir Bryan Storey, the Met commissioner himself, has 
approved your trip. Funny,’ Skinner mused, ‘I met that man for the first 
time at a policing conference a few weeks ago. D’you know what he said, 
“Ah, you’re Edinburgh, are you?” as if he was a Premier League manager 
and I was mid-table Division Three. Just now when I spoke to him, he was almost 
deferential. It seems that this office does have clout nationally, more than 
I’d realised.’

‘I don’t have to report to him when I get there, do I?’ Lowell Payne 
asked.

‘No, not even a courtesy call. I doubt if he’s spoken to a DCI since he got 
the final piece of silver braid on his cap. You just catch the first London 
flight you can tomorrow, go to New Scotland Yard and ask for Chief 
Superintendent McIlhenney. He’ll be waiting for you.’

‘What’s he like, this man?’

The chief smiled. ‘Try to imagine a quieter, more thoughtful version of Mario 
McGuire; but when he has to, Neil can be almost as formidable. The division he 
works in, covert policing, has some tough people in it. He’d never be any 
good in the field himself because he’s too conspicuous, but he will always 
have the respect of the people who are.’

‘How do we play it with Millbank’s family?’

‘You should take the lead in the questions. You’re the investigator, in 
practice; Neil’s just your escort. He knows that and he’s okay with it. 
I’d suggest you begin by being circumspect. Remember, we’ve only just 
identified Cohen under the name Byron Millbank. Now we have done, Storey’s 
going to send two female family support officers to break the news to his 
widow, but you’ll be going in soon after.’

‘How much will they have told her?’

‘Only the basic truth, that he died suddenly, of a brain haemorrhage, and 
that he had no identification on him at the time, hence the delay in getting to 
her. It’s your job to fill in the rest, and find out as best you can whether 
she has a clue that her old man had another identity. The book’s open on 
that. My bet is that she doesn’t, but you reach your own conclusions, 
gently.’

‘Once we get past gentle, what then?’

‘You don’t,’ Skinner told him, with emphasis. ‘You ask to see her 
husband’s computer, to check his calendar, recent contacts, all that stuff. 
Kid-glove stuff, Lowell. It’s only if she doesn’t play ball that you have 
to make the request formal, and take it all away.

‘It should be the same with his workplace, this teleshopping outfit. It’s 
pretty obvious that it’s a family business, given the similarity with the 
wife’s maiden name, so unless you find a box of Uzis in his desk, you 
maintain the front that it’s a formal sudden-death inquiry, required by 
Scottish law, and that all we’re doing is confirming his appointments, 
movements, etc.’

‘Understood.’ Payne stood up. ‘When do you want me back?’ he asked.

‘When you’re done; that’s all I can say. I have no idea how this thing 
will go, but I do know this. An outside agency has an interest in it, and I 
want to head it off. So, any leads that are thrown up have to be followed up, 
fast. If you need to stay tomorrow night, or even beyond that, so be it.’

‘Okay, I’ll take enough clothes and stuff for a couple of days.’ He 
smiled. ‘There’s just one thing, though, Bob. It’s our wedding 
anniversary on Thursday, and I’ve got a table booked at Rogano. If it comes 
to it and I have to cancel, I’d appreciate it if you call Jean and tell her, 
and say that it was your fault.’

Skinner whistled. ‘There ought to be no absolutes in the field of human 
courage,’ he said, ‘but it would take an absolute fucking hero to do that. 
If necessary, her niece and I will take her to Rogano ourselves, and I’ll 
pick up the tab.’

‘That’s a deal. Hopefully it won’t come to that. Here,’ he added, 
‘what will you do for an assistant while I’m away? You’re still on a 
learning curve here.’

‘Yes, and I’m going to rely on my ACCs to instruct me. Mr Thomas and I had 
a getting to know you session earlier on. I asked him to attend the post-mortem 
on Toni Field and to sit in on Bazza Brown’s while he was there.’

‘Oh shit,’ Payne murmured.

The chief frowned. ‘What?’

‘Maybe I should have told you, but I never thought to, because it was no more 
than office gossip. Not long after Field arrived, when she lived on the 
Riverside, a couple of PCs in a Panda car saw Michael Thomas leaving her 
apartment block at three in the morning. The story was all round the force 
inside a day. ACC Allan heard about it and put the word out that anybody who 
even thought of posting it on Twitter or Facebook would wind up nailed to a 
cross.’

‘Indeed?’ Skinner murmured, with a thin smile. ‘Typical Max; he’s too 
nice a guy for his own good. Yes, it sounds like I really have put Thomas on 
the spot. Was this a continuing relationship?’

‘I’m pretty sure it wasn’t.’

‘How sure?’

‘Not a hundred per cent, I admit. Why?’

‘Oh nothing. Between you and me, Marina Deschamps gave me a rundown on her 
sister’s sex life. It hadn’t occurred to me till now, but the numbers 
didn’t quite add up.’ He nodded, as if he had reached a conclusion, then 
spelled it out. ‘That’s made my mind up,’ he said. ‘I’m going to tell 
Marina she can come back to work. If any more Toni skeletons pop out during 
this investigation, it’ll be useful to have her around.’

‘Do you want me to…’

‘No, I’ll call her myself, after I’ve told the fiscal that I want the 
body released tomorrow morning.’

‘The fiscal here doesn’t like to be told, Chief,’ Payne warned.

‘Then I’ll make it seem as if it was his idea all along.’

‘He’s a she.’

‘Aren’t they all these days? When my dad was in practice just after the 
war, there wasn’t a single female solicitor in the burgh. Now the majority of 
law graduates are women, like our Alex. It’s magic; it hasn’t half shaken 
up the establishment. What’s her name?’

‘Reba Paisley. Mrs.’

‘Get her on the phone for me, please. Then you’d better get off home, once 
you’ve booked your flight.’

‘Will do. By the way,’ he volunteered, ‘that bloody safe; you were right. 
It was installed at Chief Constable Field’s request and we do not have the 
technical capability in-house to open it. I’ve asked our plant and machinery 
people to source the supplier and get someone to deal with it.’

As Payne headed back to his own office to make the call to the procurator 
fiscal, the regional chief prosecutor, Skinner moved from the table to his 
desk. As he eased himself into his seat… not a patch on my Edinburgh chair, 
he grumbled, mentally… his mobile buzzed and vibrated in his pocket, 
signalling an incoming text. He dug it out and read it.

‘In Glasgow. Can I blag a lift? We came in Roshan’s car. Be about 6. 
Sarahx.’

He keyed in a reply, awkwardly because of the thickness of his index finger; he 
had never mastered using his thumbs on the mini-keyboard.

‘I know, & what ur doing. Sure. Take a taxi to Pitt St when ur done. L Bob.’

He had no sooner sent the message than the phone rang. ‘Chief Constable,’ 
he said as he picked up.

‘Procurator fiscal,’ an assertive female voice replied. ‘What can I do 
for you, Mr Skinner?’

‘Nothing, Mrs Paisley. I don’t ask for favours. Let’s get that clear from 
the start.’

‘So this is a social call?’

‘Yes, partly.’

‘Even “partly” makes a change. In the time she was here I never once 
heard from your late predecessor.’

‘You won’t be wanting to hang on to her then,’ Skinner chuckled.

‘To tell you the truth,’ the fiscal replied, ‘I hadn’t given that any 
thought.’

‘What’s your normal procedure with homicide victims?’

‘I don’t have one. I make my judgement on a case by case basis, but it’s 
my judgement, I stress. It’s not a call that I delegate to a deputy. In this 
case… is the PM done?’

‘As we speak.’

‘Who are the immediate family?’

‘Mother and sister.’

‘Are there any prospects of further arrests?’

‘Further?’ Skinner repeated. ‘We never actually got round to arresting 
Smit and Botha.’

He heard a sound that might have been a chuckle. ‘You know what I mean. 
Because if there are, defence counsel might want access to the body.’

‘I know that, but it isn’t an automatic right. I can’t say for sure we 
will ever trace the people in this chain of conspiracy, let alone guessing 
when. We’re interviewing the brother of the man found dead in the getaway 
car, but I don’t believe he will be able to help us.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because he’s still alive. If Cec knew anything, he’d probably be in the 
cooler next to his brother.’

‘How about if I authorise release for burial only?’

‘Toni Field was born in Mauritius. What if her mother wants to take her home 
there?’

‘It would be a lot easier in an urn than a coffin. Is that what you’re 
saying?’

‘I’m not saying anything, only asking questions.’

‘But good ones,’ Paisley said. ‘Tell you what. If the post-mortem report 
satisfies me that there are no unresolved questions about the death, the family 
can have her, and do whatever they like with her.’

‘That’s fair enough,’ Skinner agreed. ‘I’ll tell them. The only 
unresolved questions about the death aren’t related to the autopsy. There are 
only two: who wanted her dead and why.’

‘Do your people have any ideas about either of those issues?’

‘I don’t encourage my people to deal in ideas, only evidence. As I speak 
they’re looking for any that’s to be found. When they have more to report, 
they will, to both of us. Good to talk to you; you must come here for lunch 
some time.’

‘That will also be a first,’ the fiscal remarked. ‘I’ll look forward to 
it.’

As he hung up, Skinner scribbled, ‘Lunch Pitt St with fiscal: arrange,’ 
then called the switchboard and asked to be connected with Marina Deschamps. It 
was her mother who came on the line. ‘I regret that Marina is unavailable,’ 
she said. ‘Will I do?’

‘Of course, Miss Deschamps. I want to talk to you about Antonia’s 
funeral.’

‘Good, for we were going to call you about that. We contacted an undertaker, 
but he said that he had no access to her body.’

‘Not yet,’ he agreed. ‘There are issues in any homicide, but once the 
fiscal has some paperwork in place, everything should be all right. What I want 
to talk to you about is the form of the funeral. Antonia was a chief constable, 
and she died in office. If you want a private family funeral, so be it, but 
it’s only right that her force should pay its tribute. I’m happy to 
organise everything for you, if that’s what you would like. Did she have a 
religion?’

‘She was raised in the Roman Catholic Church,’ she fell silent for a few 
seconds, ‘although she was not a regular visitor, I must admit.’

‘Nonetheless. Cardinal Gainer, in Edinburgh, is a friend of mine. I’m sure 
he would officiate, or approach his opposite number in Glasgow.’

‘That is very generous of you, Mr Skinner. I would like to talk to Marina 
about it when she returns.’

He heard a sound, in the background, as if someone was calling out. ‘Is that 
her now?’ he asked.

‘No, it’s just street noise. We will call you, Mr Skinner. Thank you very 
much.’





Thirty-Three



‘Anything on Bazza’s computer, Banjo?’ Lottie Mann called out to a 
detective constable who was seated at a table on the other side of the inquiry 
office, working on the confiscated PC. He rose and crossed towards her.

‘No email account that I can find, and that’s disappointing. He was very 
big on porn sites, though,’ he advised her. ‘Nothing illegal, nothing that 
Operation Amethyst would have hit on; all grown-ups, all doing fairly 
monotonous and repetitive stuff. Strange; from what I saw of Mrs Brown when we 
raided the house, he shouldn’t have needed any diversions like that. There 
are some pictures of her on the computer that bear that out, and a couple of 
videos.’

‘Chacun à son goût.’

The DC nicknamed Banjo… his surname was Paterson, but none of his colleagues 
made the connection to the man who wrote the words of ‘Waltzing Matilda’ . 
. . stared at her. ‘Eh?’ he exclaimed.

‘It’s the only French I know,’ she said. ‘It means there’s no telling 
what you’ll find under a guy’s bed when you take a look. Or something like 
that.’

‘I’ll take your word for it, boss. I only speak Spanish and a wee bit of 
Mandarin Chinese.’

‘Smart bastard,’ she snarled. ‘What else?’

‘Video games; the thing was wired up to a big high-def screen. And casinos, 
he was quite a gambler, was our Bazza. He played roulette and blackjack mostly, 
but poker as well, from time to time. He also had an account with an online 
bookie, and bet heavily on the horses and on boxing.’

‘Was he any good at it?’

‘He seems to have been. He paid through a credit card; I’ve looked at the 
records and most months there was more going in than coming out. He had a 
system for roulette and he only ever backed favourites.’

‘That’s not a complete surprise; Bazza’s old man had a bookie’s licence 
and a couple of betting shops. As I recall, Bazza ran them for a while after he 
died, then sold them on to a chain. So yes, he’d a gambling background. He 
backed the wrong horse, though, when he took up with the South Africans. How 
about Cec?’ she asked. ‘Did he have a PC?’

‘Cec couldnae spell PC,’ Dan Provan muttered.

‘Possibly not,’ the detective constable agreed. ‘He’s got a PlayStation 
and that was it. He likes war games; anything where people get blown to bits. 
He also likes porn, but DVDs in his case. We could nick him for a few of those 
if you want.’

‘Can’t be arsed,’ Mann said. ‘What about their office?’

‘Definitely non-ecological. They don’t give a shit about how many trees 
they kill. All their records are on paper. However, they did fail to hide a 
list of addresses. They didn’t connect to anything so we’re having a look. 
Our search warrant was broad enough to let us go straight in.’ Paterson 
smiled. ‘Now for the good bit. Uniform have visited just one so far, a 
four-bedroom villa in a modern estate near Clydebank; it’s a cannabis farm, 
and you can bet the others are too.’

She laughed. ‘Poor old Cec; it’s not his week. He’s probably home by now; 
have him rearrested and brought in, then hand him and that address list over to 
Operation League. He’s their business now.’ She turned to Provan. 
‘Bilbo,’ she began.

He glared at her. ‘The chief wis bad enough,’ he growled. ‘No’ you as 
well.’

‘What do we have on Bazza as a force? Is there an intelligence report on 
him?’

‘Now there’s a hell of a question to be askin’ a garden fuckin’ 
ornament like me.’

‘Okay, Dan,’ she laughed, ‘I’m sorry.’

‘No more funnies?’

‘No more funnies.’

‘Good, because that really was a hell of a question. Ah’ve got a mate, a 
good mate, in what we’re no’ supposed to call Special Branch any more, in 
Counter-Terrorism Intelligence Section. He’s jist told me that the chief… 
the old chief, no’ the new one… asked for updated files on all organised 
crime figures as soon as she came in. When SCT went to work on Bazza, they 
asked the National Criminal Intelligence Service for input, and a big red sign 
came up, warnin’ them off.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means he wis a fuckin’ grass, Lottie; he was protected. And if it 
wasnae for us, and it wasn’t, it must have been for MI5. They’ve got a 
serious crime section.’

‘Jesus!’

‘You’ll get brownie points wi’ the new chief when ye tell him that, eh?’

‘Maybe. But have you thought through the implications?’

‘Sure,’ Provan admitted, ‘but Ah’m no’ paid enough to spell them out. 
Ye’d better go and see the gaffer.’

‘I will do. While I’m up there, you concentrate on the only other line of 
inquiry we have with Bazza. Have we got the CCTV tapes from the Easthaven 
Retail Park yet?’

‘Aye, and I’ve cleared up something; nothin’ major, just a point for the 
record. We know that Smit and Botha were at Easthaven and that Bazza went there 
too, to meet them. We know from the gaffer that the South Africans were in 
Livingston on Friday, collecting their weapons. Ah’ve checked with the team 
in Edinburgh, spoke to a DC called Haddock, bright-soundin’ kid…’

‘Nothing fishy about him?’ Mann murmured.

‘Whit… ach, be serious, Lottie. He said that there was no mention of a 
third man bein’ with them. So, Bazza must have been in the boot o’ the 
motor by then.’

‘Fair enough, fills in the timeline. Take a look at that video and see if it 
shows them meeting, then we’ll join all the dots. What does the recording 
cover?’

‘Two cameras, all day Friday, midnight to midnight. But there’s a clock on 
it so Ah’ll speed run it back to just before seven and go from there.’

‘Fine, you do that. I’ll go and see the boss.’





Thirty-Four



‘You do realise, Lottie,’ a frowning Skinner said, ‘that I should be 
water-boarding the wee man until he tells me who his contact in CTIS is. That 
section is supposed to be completely confidential. Information like that 
shouldn’t be passed on outside the reporting chain.’

‘That’s why I didn’t bring him up here with me,’ the DI replied. ‘But 
you’d be wasting your time, boss. He’d drown before he told you. Dan’s 
old school.’

‘Don’t I know it. That’s why the tap’s not running. I won’t press the 
point, for now, but I won’t forget it either. Make sure he knows that, so 
that his mate, whoever he is, will get to hear about it.’

‘Understood, boss. I’ll drop a word in his ear.’

‘Don’t be too friendly about it. I know he was your mentor, but you’re 
his line manager, not the other way around. Now, since he has given us this 
information… you know what it suggests?’

‘I think so,’ she said, ‘if it was the Security Service that flagged 
Bazza Brown as off limits… and who else would it be?’

‘Drugs enforcement,’ the chief suggested, ‘but that’s unlikely. I can 
and will check it, though. If that was the cause of the red notice, it would 
have come from Scotland. The head of the SCDEA and I are close. He’ll tell me 
if it was his mob that were running Brown. Indeed, I’ve got a feeling that if 
it was them, he’d have been in touch with me by now to let me know.

‘So, let’s say that Bazza was on the books of MI5’s serious crime 
section. If our speculation that they fixed Beram Cohen up with a new identity 
is well founded, then he would have as well, and that’s our link.’

‘What do you want me to do about it, boss?’

‘Absolutely nothing,’ Skinner replied, almost before she had finished her 
question. ‘As far as you’re concerned, you never had the information you 
just brought me and neither did Dan. He shouldn’t have been given it in the 
first place, and if he made any written note of his conversation, it must be 
destroyed.’

‘Yes, sir.’ She rose from the chair that faced the chief constable’s 
desk. It was low set, so that whoever sat behind the desk was always looking 
down on his visitors, an intimidating tactic that Skinner disliked, and vowed 
that he would change. ‘Since I was never here,’ she said, ‘I’d better 
make myself scarce.’

He laughed. ‘You do that, Lottie. Concentrate on the video you told me about. 
If you can show Bazza Brown meeting Smit and Botha, you can wrap up the inquiry 
into his murder, and pass that on to Reba Paisley’s office. Why he met them, 
if we’re right about that, she doesn’t need to know. How they came to know 
him, that’s completely off limits.’

‘Fine, I’ll report back on the first part as soon as we’ve nailed it 
down.’

He watched her as she left then reached across his desk for the phone, only to 
be interrupted by his mobile signalling another incoming text. ‘Done here. 
Scrubbing up, then on my way. Sarahx.’

No reply needed; he smiled as he put it back in his pocket, then picked up the 
other instrument, selected ‘direct dial’ and made the call he had been 
intending.

‘Mario? How are you settling into my old office? Do you like the view? You 
can see every bugger who comes in and goes out. Useful at times.’

‘Sure,’ the newly appointed ACC conceded, ‘but they can see me.’

‘Not if you angle the blinds right.’

‘I’ll try that. Have you got any other advice for me?’

‘Yeah, keep your eye on David Mackenzie; he’s after your job.’

‘I worked that one out for myself, Bob, quite some time ago. Anything else? 
Anything serious?’

‘No, but a question. How’s Paula?’

‘Blooming. No sign of delayed shock, post-traumatic stress or any of that 
crap, I’m relieved to say. Maybe because she’s got too much on her mind. 
She saw her consultant again this morning, at his request. When he checked her 
over yesterday, he thought he might have got her dates wrong. Now he’s sure, 
he’s given her to the end of the week to get the job done herself, or he’s 
going to induce labour.’

‘They did that with Myra, when she had Alex. As I recall, it started with 
castor oil. Tell her that; the threat alone might be a trigger.’

‘I will. Now let me ask you one. How’s Aileen? First off, I’m sorry about 
you two, and about all the other shit. She’s had a very tough forty-eight 
hours, man.’

Skinner felt his forehead tighten. ‘Are you saying I made it worse?’ he 
asked.

‘No, absolutely not,’ McGuire insisted. ‘I wasn’t implying that. I 
understand how things are between you. It was a straight question.’

‘In that case, she’s fine. She and I spoke not that long ago and 
everything’s okay. We’ve put our situation on the record, so the press will 
have to be very careful with what they say about her. I know she had that 
bother at her press conference this morning, but given the trouble the Hatton 
woman’s been making, it’ll work for her rather than agin her.’

‘Good. Now would you like to come to the point?’

‘What makes you think there is one?’ Skinner asked.

‘How long have we known each other? About fifteen years? I’m not saying you 
never call me just to pass the time of day, but I don’t recall you ever doing 
it from the office, not once.’

‘Christ, is that true? You know, McIlhenney said much the same earlier. What 
does that say about me?’ He sighed. ‘The sad thing is, you’re right. 
I’ve got a situation here, I need it resolved, but I can’t be bothered 
going through channels. It would take too long. Instead, I’m looking for a 
simpler solution. Do you remember a wee guy called Johan Ramsey?’

‘Wee Jo? Of course. A master of his craft, if ever there was one.’

‘It didn’t stop him getting lifted a few times though. Do you know where he 
is now?’

‘As a matter of fact I do. He’s here in Edinburgh, on parole after his last 
sentence. We were advised when he was released.’

‘Good,’ Skinner declared. ‘That’s what I wanted to hear.’

‘How come?’ McGuire laughed. ‘What do you want with him?’

‘I want to employ him.’

‘You what?’

‘I mean it. I’ve got a job for him. There’s a safe in my office here. 
Toni Field had it installed, and only she knew the combination. I don’t have 
the time to wait for some bloody company in the south of England to free up one 
of their specialists, so I want to hire one of my own. I’d like you to pick 
him up, and invite him to join me here tomorrow morning, to see what he can do. 
Tell him there’s a hundred in it for him, regardless, cash, and that his 
probation officer will never know. Can you do that for me, ACC McGuire? Make it 
work and I’ll buy you lunch after your first ACPOS meeting.’

‘Hell, Bob, you don’t need to bribe me to get me to do that. That’s a 
first, and it’s going in my memoirs.’

‘That’s fine,’ Skinner grunted, ‘but you’d better make it clear to 
wee Jo that if it winds up in his, then next time he gets sent down, I will 
make certain, personally, that parole is off the table.’





Thirty-Five



‘In my office, please, Dan,’ Lottie Mann said as she returned to the 
investigation suite.

‘Absolutely,’ Provan muttered, but too quietly for her to hear, and he rose 
from his seat and followed her into a small room at the end of the open area.

‘See that friend of yours in CTIS?’ she began, without preamble. ‘Whoever 
he is, you’d better warn him that where he works careless talk costs lives, 
and in this case it’s his that’s on the line. On Toni Field’s watch there 
would probably have been a leak inquiry over what he told you. There won’t be 
this time, but probably only because Skinner likes you too much to use a 
nutcracker to get the name out of you.

‘We are not to follow up what you were told. Instead we’re to wrap up 
Bazza’s murder, pass the file to the fiscal and mark it case closed, then get 
on with the main investigation, which is still, unlike Field, very much alive. 
That’s the way it is, Dan. You are from Barcelona. You know nussing.’

‘Ye’ve got the accent wrong,’ the DS said. ‘Ah’m old enough to have 
seen Fawlty Towers when it wis new. Unfortunately, Lottie, Ah don’t know 
nothin’. In fact, Ah know too fuckin’ much.’

‘Oh, I know that,’ she laughed. ‘Too much for your own good.’

‘No, love,’ he sighed, ‘for yours.’

She stared at him. ‘What are you on about, Detective Sergeant? Can we just 
keep up the pretence that I’m your senior officer?’

‘No, we can’t.’

Her eyes narrowed. A spasm of something strange ran through her, and she 
realised that it was fear. ‘Dan,’ she murmured, ‘what is this?’

‘This, Lottie, is me doin’ something Ah shouldn’t. By rights Ah 
shouldn’t be talking to you alone. There should be a senior officer in this 
room right now, probably the chief constable himself. There isn’t, because Ah 
care about you, lassie, and I want you to know about this from me, first. This 
might have to be another of those conversations that never happened, like mine 
with Alec in CTIS, but this is a hell of a lot more serious.’

He reached across her desk and switched on her computer; it was an 
old-fashioned tower type, probably on its last legs, and took an inordinate 
length of time to boot up.

‘Dan,’ she said once more, as they waited, but he hushed her, with a finger 
to his lips.

‘They store the CCTV recordings on DVDs,’ he told her, as he loaded a disk 
on to the computer’s player tray, and slid it into position, then settled 
into the DI’s chair so that he could control playback.

‘I started at the end, like Ah said,’ he began. She looked at the screen 
and saw a still image of an empty car park, and with numerals in the bottom 
right corner. ‘These things can hold eight hours at a time,’ he explained. 
‘They have a bank of recorders tae cover the whole park. When one disk gets 
full, another starts, so it’s constant. Ah thought I’d have to go a’ the 
way back tae seven, but…’

He clicked a rewind icon, three times; the image began to move, as did the time 
read-out, fast, backwards. Provan’s finger hovered above the mouse until the 
clock showed seven twenty-eight, when he clicked again, freezing the recording 
once more.

‘Ah nearly missed this first time. Watch.’ He clicked on the ‘Play’ 
arrow and the images started to move.

Mann peered at the screen. The park was almost as empty as it had been before; 
only a few cars remained. Then she saw a silver saloon roll into view, moving 
jerkily, for the camera was set to shoot only a few frames per second. It came 
to a stop and as it did so, a figure walked towards it, his speed enhanced. He 
was carrying a large parcel. She could just make out a face in the front 
passenger seat, and a hand, beckoning.

‘Bazza,’ Provan murmured. ‘Now see what happens.’

The man she took to be Brown opened the rear door, slid into the back seat, and 
closed it behind him. Everything was still for a few seconds. Then she saw what 
seemed to be three flashes, inside the Peugeot, as if someone was sending a 
Morse message with a torch. Immediately afterwards, the car zoomed off, at high 
speed.

‘That was the execution of Bazza Brown,’ the DS said.

‘No doubt about it,’ his DI agreed. ‘So?’

‘So, what was wrong with that picture?’

‘Enlighten me,’ she growled. ‘Stop playin’ games, Dan.’

‘This is no game, kid. The parcel.’ He emphasised the word. ‘Where did 
Brown get the fuckin’ parcel? Cec never mentioned that. As far as he was 
concerned he was takin’ his brother to meet a bit on the side. And what was 
in it? Did he take her chocolates? If he did, it’s the biggest box of Black 
Magic Ah’ve ever seen.’

‘True,’ she murmured. That cold feeling revisited the pit of her stomach. 
Her old crony was taking her somewhere, and she had a bad feeling about their 
destination.

‘Then there was the time,’ the DS continued. ‘Bazza wanted to be there 
for seven, yet the South Africans never turned up for another half hour. So Ah 
ran the recording back to the time Cec told us, like this.’ He rewound once 
more, stopping at six fifty-eight, with a large black car in shot, near to 
where the Peugeot had pulled up.

Provan let the recording go forward, and Mann saw Bazza Brown step out of his 
brother’s Chrysler, and into the last half hour of his life. He went nowhere, 
but stood his ground, pacing up and down, waiting, as Cec drove away.

And then a door opened; it was set in the side of a large warehouse building at 
the top of the frame. A figure stepped out. He was carrying a large parcel, and 
he walked towards Brown. There was no handshake between the two, barely a 
glance exchanged, it seemed, as the bundle was handed over. The second man 
seemed about to turn on his heel, when Provan froze the screen.

‘I need you to confirm, ma’am,’ he said, ‘that the man with Brown is 
who I think he is.’

Standing behind him, Lottie leaned over and grasped his shoulder, and the 
corner of the desk, for support.

‘Oh no,’ she moaned. ‘Oh my God, no. You know it is, Danny. You know 
it’s my Scott.’

The sergeant let out a sigh that seemed bigger than he was. ‘Ah’ve never 
wished in ma life before,’ he murmured, ‘that Ah wasnae a cop. But I do 
now, so that somebody else could be doin’ this.’

He stood, and gave her back her own chair. Then he went to the door, opened it 
and beckoned to Banjo Paterson, who crossed the office and joined them.

‘Detective Inspector,’ Provan announced, his accent vanishing in the 
formality of his voice, ‘in view of what we’ve just seen, and what you’ve 
confirmed, in spite of my subordinate rank I have got no choice but to ask you 
to remain here with DC Paterson while I take this matter to senior officers.’





Thirty-Six



‘So this is where it all happens,’ Sarah Grace said, with a smile in her 
tone as she looked round the room that had become his. ‘This is the nerve 
centre of Scottish policing.’

‘A week ago,’ Bob told her, ‘I would have denied that suggestion, with 
all the vehemence at my disposal. Today, I’m forced to agree with you.’

‘I prefer the command suite in Edinburgh,’ she confessed. ‘It has a more, 
I dunno, a more lived-in feel about it. This is all very antiseptic, very 
impersonal.’

‘Honey child,’ he laughed, ‘don’t you think that might be because I 
haven’t had time to stamp my personality on it?’

‘Maybe. I’m sure you will… as long as that doesn’t involve importing 
that coffee machine you inherited from your old mentor Alf Stein.’

‘It won’t, I promise you. You told me I should give myself a caffeine 
holiday and that’s what I’m doing. I haven’t had a coffee this week. Are 
you pleased with me?’

She grinned. ‘Yes and no. If you really are sticking to it, that might mean I 
have to give up too. When you’re around, at least. Speaking of which,’ she 
added, ‘do you want to stop off tonight? The Gullane house will be empty, 
since the kids are with me.’

‘I think I would like that very much, although I do have something to do 
there, before the place can be truly empty.’

‘Can I help?’

‘Mmm,’ he mused. ‘No, I don’t think so. I don’t reckon either of us 
would feel right if you did.’

‘Ah,’ Sarah whispered. ‘I think I can guess what you mean. Clearing out 
all the evidence, yes?’

‘Yes, at the other party’s request.’

‘Then you’re right. That is something you should do on your own… unless 
it involves a bonfire, in which case I’ll be happy to help.’

‘Hey, hey!’

‘I’m joking,’ she said. ‘The strangest thing happened to me this 
morning. I saw the newspapers and all of a sudden I found that I don’t bear 
that woman any ill-will, not any more, however she might feel about me.’

‘To be honest with you, Sarah,’ Bob confessed, ‘I don’t believe she 
feels any way about you, and I doubt that she ever did. She thought I was 
somebody I’m not. Now she’s found out the truth, she’s happy to make me, 
and everything to do with me, part of her past.’

‘Does that include not trying to take you for plenty in the divorce?’

‘That hasn’t been mentioned,’ he grinned, ‘and I’m not going to raise 
the subject.’

He loaded a handful of documents and files into his attaché case, an aluminium 
Zero Halliburton that Sarah had given him as a birthday present a few years 
before, clicked it shut and picked it up. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Constable 
Davie, my driver, will be waiting for us in the car park.’

He turned, and was in the act of heading for the door that led directly into 
the corridor when he saw a small, crumpled, moustachioed figure in his 
anteroom, his hand raised as if he was about to knock on the door.

‘What the hell?’ he murmured. ‘Hold on a minute, love,’ he told his 
ex-wife. ‘There’s something up here. Detective sergeants don’t turn up 
uninvited in the chief’s office without a bloody good reason.’

He signalled to Dan Provan to enter, but the little man stood his ground. 
‘What the fu—’ Skinner muttered. ‘Sit down for a minute, Sarah,’ he 
said. ‘Maybe the wee bugger’s scared of strange women.’

He walked towards the glass doorway, then stepped through it into the outer 
office. ‘Yes, Dan?’ he murmured. ‘Where’s your DI and what can I do for 
you?’

‘She’s detained, sir, downstairs in the office.’

Skinner had a low annoyance threshold. ‘What the fuck’s detaining her? Has 
it paralysed her phone hand?’

‘No, sir, you don’t understand. Ah’ve detained her. Out of bloody nowhere 
she’s become involved in the investigation. The rule book requires that Ah do 
that and report the matter to senior officers, plural. In this case, Ah don’t 
think that means a couple of DIs.’

The chief’s face darkened; looking up at him, Provan, experienced though he 
was, felt a chill run through him.

‘Where is she?’ Skinner murmured.

‘She’s in her private office, boss. DC Paterson’s with her; Ah’ve 
ordered him not to allow her to make any phone calls or send any texts.’

‘You’ve done that to Lottie?’ Skinner said, and as he did he realised how 
upset the sergeant was. ‘Right, let’s hear about it, but not here.’

He opened the door behind him and called out to Sarah, ‘Urgent, I’m afraid. 
Hang on please, love; I’ll be as quick as I can.’ Then he led the way into 
the corridor and along to ACC Gorman’s office, relieved to see through the 
unshaded glass wall that she was behind her desk. He rapped on the door, and 
walked straight in.

‘Bridie, sorry to interrupt, but something’s arisen that DS Provan feels he 
has to bring to the top of the reporting chain. He’s been around long enough 
to know the rule book off by heart, so we’d better hear him out.’

‘Of course.’ Skinner’s deputy rose. ‘Hi, Dan,’ she said. ‘You look 
as though the cat’s just ett your budgie.’

The little sergeant sighed. ‘Ma’am, if it would make this go away Ah’d 
feed it the bloody thing maself.’

‘So what do you have to tell us?’ she asked.

‘To show you,’ he corrected her. ‘Is your computer on?’

‘Give me a minute,’ she said, then pressed a button behind a console that 
sat on a side table.

The command suite computers were of more recent vintage than those in the 
floors below, and so it was ready in less than the time she had requested.

Provan inserted the DVD he had brought with him into a slot at the side of the 
screen. ‘This is CCTV footage,’ he explained to the two chief officers, 
‘from the Easthaven Retail Park. It was taken on Friday evening. Our 
investigation established that the two men who killed Chief Constable Field 
went there at that time, and later Bazza Brown’s brother, Cec, told us that 
he took Bazza there as well. Now, please watch.’

He played the recording in the same way that he had shown it to his DI twenty 
minutes earlier, stopping as the Peugeot roared away from the park.

‘That’s your homicide wrapped up,’ Skinner remarked. ‘But where did the 
parcel come from?’

‘Watch again,’ Provan replied, rewinding the recording by half an hour, 
showing Brown’s drop-off by his brother, the unexpected encounter, and the 
handing over of the package. Once again, he froze the action to show the 
newcomer’s face.

‘I see,’ the chief constable murmured. ‘Are you going to tell me who that 
is, now?’

It was Bridie Gorman who answered. ‘I can tell you that,’ she hissed. He 
looked at her and saw that her eyes, normally warm and kind, were cold and 
seemed as hard as blue marble. ‘That is Scottie Mann, one-time police officer 
until the bevvy got the better of him, and still the husband of Detective 
Inspector Charlotte Mann. What’s the stupid fucking bastard gone and done? 
Dan, what was in the parcel? Do you know?’

‘I would bet my maxed-out pension, ma’am,’ the veteran detective 
declared, ‘that it was two police uniforms and two equipment belts.’





Thirty-Seven



‘I’m sorry that took so long,’ Bob told Sarah as he stepped back into his 
office, ‘but it had to be done straight away, and by nobody other than my 
deputy and me.’

‘What’s happened?’ she asked. ‘Can you tell me?’

‘In theory no, I can’t, but bugger that. If I don’t I’ll be brooding 
over it for the rest of the night. Bridie Gorman and I have just found 
ourselves in the horrible position of having to interview, under caution, the 
senior investigating officer in the Toni Field murder. Her husband turned up 
not just as a witness, but as a suspect in the conspiracy. That’s what wee 
Provan came to tell me, and it must have been bloody tough on him, because the 
two of them are bloody near father and daughter.’

‘Oh my. How did it go?’

‘We put the question directly to her and she swore that she had no knowledge 
of her husband’s involvement, and that if she had she would have declared 
it.’

‘Do you believe her?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, we do. The poor woman’s in a hell of a state. She 
alternates between being tearful and wanting to rip her old man’s heart 
out… and she’s big enough to do that too.’

‘What happens now?’

‘Scott, the husband… the ex-cop husband,’ he growled, his face twisting 
suddenly in anger, ‘will be arrested. In fact it’s under way now. 
Provan’s taking a DC and some uniforms to their house to pick him up. Their 
son will see that happen, I’m afraid, but there’s no way round that. DC 
Paterson and the uniforms will take him away and Dan… he’s the boy’s 
godfather… will stay with him till Lottie gets back.’ He chuckled, 
savagely. ‘She wanted to make the arrest herself! I almost wish that was 
possible. It’d serve the guy right. No chance, though; she’s out.’

‘You mean she’s suspended?’ Sarah looked as angry as he did.

‘No, of course not.’ He smiled to lighten the moment. ‘Calm down. No need 
to get the sisterhood wound up. She’s on an unanticipated holiday, that’s 
all. She can’t continue on the inquiry, because she’s been hopelessly 
compromised.’

‘Who’ll take over from her?’

‘Dan will,’ Skinner replied, ‘reporting to me, just as she’s been 
doing. I could parachute in another DI, indeed maybe I should, given his 
closeness to the family, but Scott was a cop himself and it would be difficult 
to find someone who had never crossed his path.

‘Anyway, Provan’s forgotten more about detective work than most of the 
potential candidates will ever learn, and he’s still got enough left in his 
tank to see him through. He won’t interview Scott, though. Bridie and I will 
do that, tomorrow morning. Not too early, though, I want him to stew in 
isolation for a while. Now,’ he declared, ‘let’s you and I get out of 
here. Change of plan; we’ll take the train, then a taxi to yours. I can’t 
have PC Davie drive me through to Edinburgh at this time of night.’

They took the lift down to the headquarters car park, where PC Cole was 
waiting. The chief constable introduced the extra passenger, ‘Doctor Grace, 
the pathologist, from Edinburgh University,’ then apologised for the delay, a 
gesture that seemed to take his driver by surprise. His reaction rose to 
astonishment when Skinner told him that the destination was Queen Street 
Station.

‘Are you sure, sir?’ he exclaimed.

‘Certain. You can pick me up from there tomorrow as well. I’ll let you know 
what train I’m on.’

The train was on the platform five minutes from departure as they settled into 
its only first-class compartment. Sarah grinned. ‘I’m on expenses, or I 
would be if you hadn’t bought my ticket. What’s your excuse?’

‘I’m not quite sure,’ he confessed, ‘since everything happened very 
quickly at the weekend, but I think I am too. But the truth is that I prefer 
first, on the rare occasions that I take the train, simply because there’s 
less chance of me meeting an old customer, so to speak.’

‘And that would worry you?’ she asked, eyebrow raised. ‘Are you feeling 
your age?’

‘No to both of those, and not that it’s likely to happen, but I’d rather 
avoid those situations. I’m not just talking about people I’ve locked up; 
there’s councillors, journalists, defence lawyers. I don’t like to be 
cornered by any of them, because I don’t care to be in any situation where I 
have to watch every word I say.’

‘I can see that,’ she conceded.

No other passengers had joined them by the time the train left the station.

‘This preference of yours for privacy,’ Sarah ventured, as it entered the 
tunnel that ran north out of Queen Street, ‘would it have anything to do with 
you not wanting to be seen with me?’

‘What?’ He laughed. ‘Don’t be daft.’ He reached out and took her 
hand. ‘There is no woman in the world I would rather be seen with.’

‘Apart from Alex.’

‘Alexis is my daughter, and so is Seonaid, our daughter, yours and mine. We 
made her and I am very proud of that, even though I was fucking awful at 
showing it for a while. You are different, you are you, and I love you.’

‘This hasn’t happened too soon, has it?’ she wondered. ‘A week ago, if 
you’d asked me, I’d never have imagined you and me, here like this, now.’

‘Me neither,’ Bob admitted, ‘but I am mightily pleased that we are. It 
should never have been any other way. I was stupid, and not for the first time 
in my life. Feeling my age, you asked. Well, maybe I am, in a way. It’s led 
me to a point where I’m honest with myself about my weaknesses, and the 
things I’ve done wrong in the past, and strong enough to be able to promise 
you that I will never let you down again.’

‘You realise that if you do,’ she whispered, as the train passed out into 
the open with leafy embankments on either side, ‘I will do your autopsy 
myself, before they take me away?’

He gave her a big wide-open smile, a rarity from him. ‘Yes, but I don’t 
need that incentive.’

When the door slid open, they were both taken by surprise. ‘Tickets please.’

The guard’s intervention ended the moment. They were passing through the 
first station on the route before Sarah broke the silence. ‘When did you eat 
last?’ she asked.

‘Good question; probably sometime between one and half past; sandwiches with 
Mann and Provan, my office. They were crap. The bread was turning up at the 
edges by the time we got round to them.’

‘That sort of a day, uh?’

He nodded. ‘That sort. How about yours?’

She scrunched up her face for a second or two. ‘Usual blood and guts, but 
pretty run-of-the-mill, as my job goes.’

‘No surprises? No complications?’

‘None, in either case. The two cadavers I’ll be looking at tomorrow… 
remind me of their names again? Not that it matters.’

‘Smit and Botha, also known as Mallett and Lightbody.’

‘Well, one thing I can tell you about them right now is that they were very 
good at their job, and humane too. Neither of their victims had any time to 
think about it. Mr Brown died on Friday evening. He may have seen the man who 
was killing him, but he died instantly. He still had a surprised expression on 
his face.’

‘I know,’ Bob reminded her. ‘I saw him in his second-to-last resting 
place. And,’ he added, ‘I’ve just seen a recording of him being shot.’

‘Why didn’t they kill the detective inspector’s husband?’

‘Because he never saw them, otherwise, you’re right, poor Lottie would be a 
widow.’

‘Then too bad for Mr Brown that he did, otherwise his life expectancy would 
have been pretty good. He was a fit guy.’

‘And how about Toni?’

‘Same with her, as you might expect, given her job. She was killed even more 
humanely than Brown, if I can use the term. She would not have had the faintest 
idea of what had happened to her. Well,’ she corrected herself, ‘maybe a 
few milliseconds, but no more than that. She’d have been brain-dead even 
before the force of the impact threw her out of her seat. If that’s some 
small comfort to her family, you might like to tell them.’

‘I have done already. I saw her mother and sister this morning.’

‘How were they?’

‘Very dignified, both of them. I’ve let the fiscal talk herself into 
releasing the body as soon as she gets your report.’

‘Then I’ll complete it and send it to her before I move on to Smit and 
Botha.’ She paused. ‘But how about her husband? How about the child?’ she 
asked. ‘Or is it too young to understand?’

He stared at her, a slight, bewildered smile on his face. ‘Husband?’ he 
repeated. ‘Child? What child?’

‘Hers of course, Antonia Field’s. I assumed she was married or in a 
familial relationship.’

‘No, never,’ Bob said. ‘She was never married, and she lived with her 
sister. What makes you think she had a child?’

‘Hell,’ she exclaimed, ‘I might not be a professor of forensic pathology 
yet, but I do know a caesarean scar when I see one.’

He sat up straight in his high-backed seat. ‘Well, honey, that is news to me, 
and neither her mother nor her sister… who wants to come back to work for 
me… gave me the slightest hint of its existence.’

‘Then tread carefully if you decide to tackle them about it. Yes, she has a 
scar, and there were other physical signs of child-bearing. However, there is 
no way I could guarantee that her baby was delivered alive.’

‘I accept that, but the odds are heavily in favour of that. If a kid goes 
full-term or almost there…’

‘That’s true, but Bob, where are you going with this? Suppose she did have 
a baby and kept quiet about it in case it harmed her career; that’s not a 
crime.’

‘In certain circumstances it might be. An application for the post of chief 
constable requires full disclosure.’

‘But honey, she’s dead. Does it really matter?’

‘Probably not at all.’ He grinned. ‘But it’s a mystery and you know how 
I feel about them. How old was this scar? Can you tell?’

‘I can take a guess. I’d say not less than one year old, and not more than 
three.’

‘Okay. One year ago she was chief constable of the West Midlands; if she had 
it then it would have been a bit noticeable. But hold on.’

He raised himself from his seat and took his attaché case down from the 
luggage rack. He spun the combination wheels and opened it.

‘I’ve got Toni’s HR file in here. Let’s take a look and see what that 
tells us.’ He removed the thick green folder, then closed the case again, 
putting it on his knee to use as an impromptu table.

‘Let’s go back three years. Then she was a Met commander, on secondment to 
the Serious and Organised Crime Agency; she built her legend there knocking 
over foreign drugs cartels. If she’d taken time out to have a kid, that would 
have been noticed and recorded. It isn’t, so we can rule it out. So where 
does that take us?’

As he read, a smile split his face. ‘It takes us to her becoming the chief 
constable of West Midlands, just over two years ago.’

‘She couldn’t have been there long,’ Sarah remarked.

‘She wasn’t. She barely had time to crease her uniform before the 
Strathclyde job came up. But, it says here that before she was appointed to 
Birmingham she took a six-month sabbatical, which ended a week before she was 
interviewed. That fits like a glove,’ he exclaimed.

‘It does,’ Sarah agreed. ‘But what do you do about it?’

‘I could simply ask her family, but you’re right; there could be 
sensitivities there. It’s even possible they don’t know about it. Marina 
gave me a pretty full rundown of her sister’s sex life and didn’t mention 
her being pregnant. She may have assumed that I knew from her record, but on 
the other hand, is there any reason why she should? If the child was safely 
delivered, it could have been put up for adoption. Toni was the sort of woman 
who wouldn’t have fancied any impediment to her career ambitions.

‘So no,’ he decided, ‘I won’t take it to Sofia or Marina. Instead 
I’ll do some digging of my own. I have a timeframe, her full name, Antonia 
Maureen Field, and her date of birth; they’ll be enough for the General 
Register Office to get me a hit. But I’m not counting on it.’

‘No?’

‘No. I have a feeling that there’s another possibility, one that might even 
be more likely.’

‘You love this, don’t you?’ Sarah chuckled. ‘The thrill of the chase, 
and all.’

‘It’s what I do, honey,’ he replied. ‘It’s the part of the job that 
I’ve always loved. These days, I don’t have too many chances to be hands 
on, so I take every one that’s going.’

‘Including interviewing the guy tomorrow morning? Surely you don’t really 
have to do that. An ACC alone’s pretty heavy duty, isn’t she?’

‘Oh, I have to do it, make no mistake. Not only was he a police officer until 
a few years ago, his wife still is. I’ve come to rate her in the last couple 
of days, and to like her a lot too. This bastard’s gone and compromised her 
career and even put her in a situation where she had to be formally detained 
for a short while.

‘Tomorrow morning, he’s going to have me across the table, and if he thinks 
that his obligatory lawyer will prevent me from coming down on him like an 
avalanche, he’s kidding himself.’

‘It’s a new thing in Scotland, isn’t it, the prisoner’s right to a 
lawyer?’

Bob nodded. ‘Indeed, but to be frank, I don’t know how we got away with the 
old system for so long. It doesn’t bother me anyway; I’m at my best when I 
don’t say a word.’

Sarah grinned, as a gleam came into her eye. ‘You can say that again, 
buddy,’ she murmured.





Thirty-Eight



‘Where is ma daddy, Uncle Dan?’ Jake Mann asked, not for the first time. 
His godfather realised that there was no ducking the question.

‘I told ye before, Jakey, it’s all hush-hush, but maybe this’ll explain 
it. Ye know your daddy used to be a policeman.’

The child nodded, with vigour. ‘M-hm.’

‘Well, it’s like this. They’ve asked him to go back and help them again. 
Yer mum and I, we’ve been asked no’ tae talk about it, not even tae you.’

‘Wow! Secret squirrels?’

‘That’s right, secret squirrels; undercover.’ He ruffled Jake’s hair. 
‘Now away ye go to your bed, like yer mum asked ye to a while back.’

‘Okay.’ He hugged his honorary uncle and ran into the hall, heading for the 
stairs, as if he was fuelled by excitement.

‘You’re a lovely wee man, Danny Provan,’ Lottie said, from the kitchen 
doorway. ‘I’d never have thought of that.’ She was carrying two plates, 
each loaded with fish and chips still in the wrapper. She handed him one and 
settled into her armchair. ‘It won’t hold up for long, though,’ she 
sighed. ‘Eventually, this is going to hit the press.’

‘Eventually,’ he conceded, ‘but these are special circumstances. The 
husband of the SIO bein’ lifted? Okay, it’s bound to leak within a day or 
two, but Ah’d expect the fiscal tae go to the High Court and get an interdict 
against publishing Scott’s name, at least until the trial begins, maybe even 
till he’s convicted.’

‘There’s no doubt he will be, is there?’

‘Ah’d love tae say he’s got a chance, but Ah can’t. We found the 
wrapping from the parcel in the car. You know as well as I do that the forensic 
people will find fibres on it and match them to a police uniform.’

‘It’s as well for him he is done,’ she barked. ‘I could bloody kill 
him, for what he’s done to Jakey; it’ll be hellish for him at school. Ye 
know what kids are like. I tell you this, even if by some miracle he does get 
out of this, he and I are done. He’s never coming back here. Never!’

‘Come on, Lottie, Scott wouldnae harm his laddie for a’ the tea in China.’

‘And what about me? Do you think he hasn’t harmed me?’

‘No, Ah don’t,’ the sergeant admitted. ‘I concede that. Ah want you to 
know, hen,’ he added, ‘that this has been the worst day of my police 
career. What I had to do this afternoon…’ His voice trailed away, as if he 
had run out of words.

‘But you had to do it, Dan,’ she countered. ‘As you say, you had to do 
it. If you hadn’t, I’d have thought the worse of you, and so would you and 
all, for the rest of your life. You’ve always been a hero to me, since I was 
the rawest DC in the team, but never more so than this afternoon.’





Thirty-Nine



‘You’ll be DCS McIlhenney, then,’ Lowell Payne said as he approached the 
hulking, dark-suited stranger who stood at the entrance to the platform at 
Victoria Station where the Gatwick Express arrived.

‘How do you work that out?’ the other countered.

‘The boss’s description was enough. That and the fact that you’ve got his 
warrant card hung around your neck.’

‘Ah. I deduce that you are a detective. DCI Payne?’

They shook hands. ‘That’s me. It’s a pleasure to meet the other half of 
the Glimmer Twins.’

‘You know my Latino compatriot?’ he asked, surprised. ‘Bob never 
mentioned that.’

‘Yes, I do. I was involved in the investigation in Edinburgh that led up to 
the shit that happened at the weekend. That’s how I met Mario. He and I got 
to the Glasgow concert hall not long after the shooting. Now I find myself 
right in the middle of the follow-up.’

‘You were there?’ McIlhenney’s eyes flashed. ‘How’s Paula? McGuire 
says she’s all right, but I couldn’t be quite sure that he wasn’t 
spinning the truth to keep me off the first plane.’

‘Trust me, he wasn’t,’ Payne assured him. ‘She’s a tough lady. 
Everything happened so fast that I don’t think she had time to be scared. She 
was fine when we got there, shaken, but well in control of herself. From what 
the boss said when he called me last night she still is. Mind you, you can 
think about booking a flight this weekend, from what I hear. The baby’s 
expected by the end of the week.’

‘Is that right? That’s terrific.’ He laughed. ‘Mario has no idea how 
much his life is going to change. He reckoned nothing could ever slow him down, 
but this will. Who knows? I might even get to overtake him.’

He read the question written on Payne’s face. ‘He’s always been first to 
every promotion,’ he explained. ‘Then when I get one, he lands another. 
It’s the same again this time. I come all the way to London to make chief 
super, he stays in bloody Edinburgh, and gets the ACC post.’ He beamed. 
‘There’s a longer ladder here, though; he’ll be struggling from now on. 
He’s got one more rung left in him, max, while I could have two in the Met.’

‘Good for you guys,’ Payne said. ‘I’m not on a ladder any more. I 
won’t see fifty again, I’ve reached my level, and I’m happy with it.’

‘Don’t write yourself off,’ McIlhenney murmured, ‘not if you’re 
working for Bob Skinner.’ He frowned, rubbing his hands together. ‘Now,’ 
he continued, ‘enough career planning. You and I have got a grieving widow to 
interview.’

‘Does she know she’s a widow yet?’

The chief superintendent checked his watch, as they walked towards the station 
exit. ‘She should by now. We ran some checks on her and found that she’s 
not in employment, so we guess that she’s a full-time mum. The family support 
people were going to call on her at nine thirty, and I’ve had no message to 
say that she wasn’t in. It’s going on ten now, so hopefully by the time we 
get there, she’ll have had time to absorb what’s happened.’

‘Or not, as the case may be,’ the visitor countered. ‘It’s the worst 
possible news they’ll have given her. She might not be capable of talking to 
anyone.’

‘In that case, we get a doctor, we sedate her and while she’s in the land 
of nod we search the place, quietly but carefully.’

‘Can we do that?’ Payne wondered. ‘Legally, I mean?’

McIlhenney opened his jacket, displaying an envelope in an inside pocket. 
‘I’ve got warrants,’ he said. ‘Everything the Met does these days has 
to be watertight. We are all book operators now. I hate to think how Bob 
Skinner would get on down here. He’d do his own thing, because that’s all 
he knows, and wind up on page one… just like his bloody wife! That was a 
shocker; it blew me right out of my seat when I saw those pictures. Some of my 
brother officers think it’s funny, fools that they are, to see the big man 
embarrassed like that. How’s it going down in Pitt Street?’

‘Very quietly. The new chief’s reputation travels before him. One of our 
ACCs might be found chortling in a stall in the gents, but he’s got his own 
secret to protect, so he’s poker-faced in public.’

‘Sensible man.’ McIlhenney slowed his pace as they approached a waiting 
police car. ‘I can’t get over Aileen getting herself compromised like that. 
She always struck me as super-cautious, given her political position. What 
doesn’t surprise me, though, is that the marriage was up shit creek even 
without the Morocco complication.’

‘No?’

‘No. Those are two of the most powerful people, personality-wise, that I’ve 
ever met. I never thought it would last. Just as I never thought he and Sarah 
would actually split, even though she can be volatile and though Bob doesn’t 
have quite the same control over his dick that he has over everything else. 
McGuire tells me that Sarah’s back in Edinburgh. Is that right?’

‘So I believe. I have met her, you know. For example, a few years back, at my 
niece’s twenty-first… well, she’s my wife’s niece, really. Sarah and 
Bob weren’t long married at the time. She was well pregnant at the time.’ 
McIlhenney was staring at him, puzzled. ‘Alex,’ he explained. ‘Alexis, 
Bob’s daughter. I’m married to her mother’s sister, although Myra had 
died well before I came on the scene.’

The chief superintendent beamed, then laughed. ‘Jeez,’ he exclaimed, ‘the 
man’s like a fucking octopus; his tentacles are everywhere. He’s had a 
family insider in Strathclyde CID all this time and he’s never let on.’

‘Oh, come on,’ Payne protested, ‘you’re making it sound like I was his 
snitch. I rarely saw him, other than a few times when he came with Alex to 
visit our wee lass, or family events, like weddings and such, and before now 
our paths only ever crossed the once professionally, way back when I was a 
uniform sergeant and he’d just made detective super.’

‘Maybe so, but I’ll bet when you did see him, you spent a hell of a lot 
more time talking about policing than about Auntie Effie’s bunions.’

‘Mmm,’ the DCI murmured. ‘We don’t have an Auntie Effie, but yes, I 
suppose you’re right. It was mostly shop talk. Mind you, I’m not a golfer, 
and I don’t follow football, so there wasn’t much else on the agenda.’

‘Wouldn’t have made any difference,’ McIlhenney assured him. ‘Come on, 
let’s get on our way.’ They slid into the back of the waiting police car. 
‘You know where we’re going?’ he asked the constable at the wheel.

‘Yes, sir,’ the driver replied. ‘There was a message for you while you 
were away,’ he added. ‘The family support gels say it’s okay for you to 
go in. The lady’s been advised, and she’s okay to speak to you.’

‘I hope she’s still okay after we’ve finished,’ the chief 
superintendent grunted.

The car pulled out of the station concourse and into the traffic. ‘Tourist 
route, sir?’ the constable asked.

‘Not this trip. We can show DCI Payne the sights later.’

The visiting detective had no more than a tourist’s knowledge of London, and 
so he sat bewildered as they cut past New Scotland Yard and along a series of 
thoroughfares that might have been in any developed city in the world, had it 
not been for the omnipresence of the Union flag and the Olympic rings, and for 
the Queen’s image beaming from shop windows displayed on a range of souvenir 
products from clothing to crockery. The sun told him that they were heading 
roughly north, and occasionally a sign would advise him that Madame Tussaud’s 
lay a mile from where they were at that moment, or that they were passing an 
underground station called Angel, or that the Mayor of London wished him an 
enjoyable stay in his city.

They had been on the road for twenty minutes when McIlhenney pointed out of the 
window to his left, indicating a modern steel edifice, its clean lines sharp 
against the sky. ‘The Emirates Stadium,’ he announced. ‘Home of Arsenal 
Football Club.’

‘Are you a fan?’

‘No,’ he chuckled. ‘Spence, my older laddie, won’t allow it. He plays 
rugby, pretty well, they say, and I usually follow him on winter Saturdays. Not 
that we’ve had too many of them down here, not yet. Next season, though; 
he’s been accepted by London Scottish. Dads on the touchlines can be bad news 
at junior rugby, but they like me, being a cop.’

And a brick shithouse into the bargain, Payne thought. ‘The stadium. Is that 
where we’re heading?’

‘Not quite. We’re going to the Gunners’ old home, Highbury. In fact,’ 
he paused as they made a turn, ‘there it is.’

Ahead the DCI saw a tall building with ‘Arsenal Stadium’ emblazoned in red 
along its high wall, with a wheeled gun underneath.

‘Who plays there now?’ he asked. As he spoke he glanced forward and caught 
in the rear-view the constable driver giving him a look that might have been 
scornful, or simply one of pity.

‘Nobody, sir,’ he volunteered. ‘It’s been turned into flats and stuff. 
They weren’t allowed to knock down the front of the main stand… more’s 
the pity. Should have bulldozed the lot, if you ask me.’

‘I take it you’re not a follower.’

‘God forbid! No, I’m Totten’am, till I die.’

‘You don’t want to get into that, Lowell,’ McIlhenney advised. ‘Serious 
London tribalism.’

‘When you’ve been on uniform duty at an Old Firm match,’ the visitor 
countered, ‘nothing else can seem all that serious.’

‘Before I came down here, I might have agreed with that.’

The driver indicated a right turn, then waited for oncoming traffic to pass. 
Reading the street sign, St Baldred’s Road, McIlhenney tapped him on the 
shoulder. ‘Don’t turn in there. Pull over here and we’ll walk the rest; 
this vehicle would tell the whole neighbourhood that something’s up.’

‘Sir.’ The PC changed his signal, then parked twenty yards further on. The 
two detectives climbed out, and crossed the street.

St Baldred’s Road told a story of comfortable middle-class prosperity. The 
Millbank family home was four doors along, on the left, a brick terraced villa, 
smart and well-maintained like all of its neighbours.

A blue Fiesta was parked outside, out of place between a Mercedes E-class, and 
a Lexus four-wheel drive with a child seat in the back. Payne glanced inside 
the little Ford and saw two female uniform caps on the front seats. Discretion 
seems to be the watchword in the Met these days, he thought.

The door opened before they reached it; one of the pair, a forty-something, 
salt-and-pepper-haired sergeant, stood waiting for them. ‘How is she?’ 
McIlhenney asked, quietly, as they stepped inside.

‘Shocked, but self-controlled,’ the woman replied. ‘She’s got a kid, 
little Leon. In my experience that usually helps to keep them together.’

‘The child’s here? Not in a nursery?’

‘He’s here, outside in his playground. Molly, PC Bates, my colleague, is 
looking after him. I’m Rita,’ she added ‘Sergeant Caan.’

‘Has she called anyone? Friends, family?’

‘No, not yet. She said something about having to phone her mother, to let her 
know. I said we could do that for her. She felt she had to do that herself, but 
she hasn’t got round to it yet.’

‘Do you know,’ Payne began, ‘if we’re right in our assumption that the 
husband worked for her family business?’

Rita Caan nodded. ‘Yes, spot on. The mother runs it; Golda’s father’s 
dead.’

‘Thanks, that’s helpful; one less question for us. Have you picked up 
anything else?’

She frowned at him. ‘Other than the fact that she’s four and a half months 
pregnant, no.’

‘Doctor on the way?’ McIlhenney asked.

She sighed. ‘Of course he is. It’s standard in a situation like this. She 
didn’t want to bother him, but we persuaded her that he’d want to be 
bothered. He’s coming after his morning surgery.’

‘Good. Sorry, Sergeant. I wasn’t doubting you; I just had to know for sure. 
Let’s see her, then, before the doc gets here.’

‘Okay. She’s in the living room. This way.’ She led them to a solid wood 
door, as old as the house, tapped on it gently, then opened it. ‘Golda,’ 
she called out. ‘My colleagues have arrived. Chief Superintendent McIlhenney 
and Mr Payne, from Scotland. Mr McIlhenney is too, as you’ll realise very 
quickly, but he’s one of ours.’

The widow was in the act of rising as they stepped into the room, which 
extended for the full length of the house, with double doors opening into the 
garden. As Payne looked along he saw a ball bounce into view, and heard a 
toddler’s shout, as Caan’s colleague retrieved it.

‘Don’t get up, Mrs Millbank, please,’ McIlhenney insisted. ‘I’m the 
local,’ he added, ‘he’s the visitor. First and foremost, we are both very 
sorry for your loss.’

‘Thank you,’ Golda Millbank, née Radnor, said. Her voice was quiet, but 
strong, with no hint of a quaver. ‘Please, can you tell me what happened to 
Byron? All that Rita could say is that it was a brain thing.’

‘That’s correct,’ Payne confirmed. ‘An autopsy was performed; it showed 
that your husband suffered a massive, spontaneous subarachnoid cerebral 
haemorrhage. Death would have been almost instantaneous, the pathologist 
said.’

‘When did this happen?’

‘Last week.’

‘Last week?’ she repeated. ‘Then why has it taken so long for you to tell 
me?’

‘When your husband’s body was found,’ the DCI explained, ‘he had no 
identification on him. It took the police in Edinburgh some time to find out 
who he was.’

‘What does Edinburgh have to do with it?’

‘That’s where he was found.’

‘But he was supposed to be in Manchester, then in Glasgow, at a jewellery 
fair, and then in Inverness, visiting one of our suppliers. I don’t 
understand why he would be in Edinburgh.’

‘When was he due home, Mrs Millbank?’ McIlhenney asked.

‘Not until today; I expected him back this evening.’

‘When was the last time you spoke to him?’

‘On the day he left for Scotland. Byron doesn’t like mobile phones; he 
won’t have one. When he’s away on business, I don’t expect to hear from 
him, unless he sends me an email. He tends to do everything through his 
computer. He has a laptop, a MacBook Air. It goes everywhere with him; he says 
that all his life is on it.’

‘When did you meet him?’ The DCS kept his tone casual.

‘When he came to work for my parents’ business; I called in there one day, 
a few months after he started. Neither my father nor mother were there but he 
was. He introduced himself and,’ she smiled, ‘that was that.’ She shook 
her head. ‘He was such a fit, strong man. I can’t believe this has 
happened.’ She stared at McIlhenney, and then at Payne. ‘Are you telling me 
the truth?’ she asked. Her voice was laden with suspicion. ‘Has somebody 
killed my husband?’

It was Payne who replied. ‘No, absolutely not. I assure you, his death was 
completely natural. I can get you a copy of the post-mortem report, if it’ll 
help you. I can even arrange for you to speak to the pathologist, Dr Grace. 
She’s one of the best in the business, I promise you. If there had been any 
sign of violence, or anything other than natural causes, she’d have found 
it.’

‘Then why are you here?’ she demanded. ‘You two, you’re detectives, 
you’re not wearing uniforms like Rita and Molly. And you, Mr Payne, you’ve 
come all the way from Scotland. Would you do that if there was not something 
more to this?’

‘When he died, Mrs Millbank, he was unattended, not seen by a doctor,’ the 
DCI explained. ‘That makes it a police matter; nothing sinister, a formality 
really, but we have to complete a report.’

‘Very good, but such things must happen every day. For a senior officer to 
come down to London… please, Mr Payne, don’t take me for a fool.’

He glanced at the DCS, who nodded. ‘Very well, there is more to it,’ he 
admitted. ‘Can I ask you, Mrs Millbank, how much do you know of your 
husband’s background, of his life before you two met?’

‘I know that he was born in Eastbourne, that he never knew his father and 
that his mother is dead. He spent some time in Israel, was a lieutenant in the 
army, but left because of his opposition to the Iraq war, worked in mail order 
and finally for an investment bank, before he joined Rondar… that’s our 
family business.’

‘How about friends, family? Did you ever meet any of them?’

‘He has no family, and as for friends, when he left the army, he left them 
behind too. We have friends, as a couple, but that’s it.’

‘Has he ever mentioned a man called Brian Lightbody, from New Zealand, or 
Richie Mallett, an Australian? Or have you ever heard of either of them 
indirectly?’

She shook her head. ‘No. Those names mean nothing to me. Why do you ask?’

‘Because we know that your husband ate with them in a kosher restaurant in 
Glasgow, on the day he died, and that they were all registered in the same 
hotel, and that the other two told staff they were there for the jewellery 
fair.’

‘So?’ she retorted. ‘That’s your explanation surely. I don’t know 
everybody in the business, and if they were jewellery buyers also, they do tend 
to be in the same place at the same time.’

‘Sure, but… Mrs Millbank, Lightbody and Mallett weren’t jewellery buyers, 
and those weren’t their real names. I’m not free to tell you at this stage 
who they were, but we do know, and we do know their real business.’

‘Are you saying they killed Byron?’

‘No,’ Payne insisted, ‘I am not, but they were with him when he died. 
There is physical evidence that one or both of them tried to revive him after 
he collapsed. When they failed, they removed all the identification from his 
body, including his clothing, and concealed him. Then, after a day or so, they 
called the police and told them where he could be found.’

Golda Millbank opened her mouth but found that she could not speak. She looked 
towards Rita Caan, as if for help. ‘Is this…’ she whispered.

‘I don’t know any of it,’ the sergeant told her. ‘It’s not what I do. 
Molly and me, we’re only family support, honest.’

‘It’s true, Mrs Millbank,’ McIlhenney said. ‘We’re here to find out 
everything you knew about your husband and about what he did.’

‘I know all about him,’ she insisted. ‘He was a good husband and a 
faithful family man. Or are you trying to tell me that he had a piece on the 
side?’

‘Not for a second, but suppose he did, that wouldn’t be our business. Let 
me chuck another name at you. Beram Cohen; Israeli national. Mean anything?’

Both he and Payne gazed at her, concentrating on her expression, looking for 
any twitch, any hint of recognition, but neither saw any, only utter 
bewilderment.

‘No,’ she declared. ‘I’ve never heard of him.’ She rose from her 
chair. ‘I have to phone my mother. She needs to know what’s happening 
here.’

‘Where will she be at this moment?’ the DCS asked.

‘She’ll be at work.’

‘In that case, I’m sorry, but we’d rather you didn’t contact her.’ He 
paused. ‘Look, Mrs Millbank, I’m as satisfied as I can be that you know no 
more about your husband than you’re telling us. But let me ask you, how 
successful is the family business? I could find out through Companies House, 
but if you know, it would save time.’

She took a deep breath, frowning. ‘I can tell you that. I’m a director, so 
I know. Frankly, it’s been on its last legs since my father died three years 
ago. We’re being out-marketed by other companies and we don’t have the 
expertise in the company to reverse the trend. Mummy’s trying to sell it, but 
there are no takers.’

‘Byron wasn’t a director?’

‘No, Mummy wouldn’t allow that. She didn’t want a situation where she 
could be outvoted. There’s just the two of us on the board; I’m unpaid of 
course.’

‘How about Byron? Was he on a good salary?’

‘Thirty-five thousand. He had to take a pay cut at the beginning of last 
year, down from fifty.’

‘In that case, living in his house must be a stretch,’ McIlhenney 
suggested. ‘This isn’t the cheapest part of London, from what I’m told. 
How long have you lived here?’

‘We bought it when Leon was on the way, and moved in just after he was born. 
But it’s okay, we get by easily, because we don’t have a mortgage.’

‘Lucky you. Did your father leave you money?’

‘No. It was Byron. He made a pile in bonuses working with the bank, and never 
spent it. He wasn’t the type to buy a flashy sports car or anything like 
that. No, one way or another we’ve always been comfortably off.’ Her eyes 
narrowed. ‘Are you saying…’

‘I’m not saying anything,’ the DCS replied. ‘I’m asking. We’re 
trying to build up a complete picture of Byron. To do that we need to search, 
where he lived, where he worked, everywhere we can. Was he a member of a sports 
club, for example?’

‘He played squash, but otherwise he wasn’t the clubbable sort. He ran, on 
the streets, he cycled and he did things like chins and press-ups… he could 
do hundreds of those things… but always on his own.’

‘So all his private life was here in this house?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did he have a computer here?’ Payne asked.

‘We have one, yes, but it’s mine and he never used it. I’ve told you, he 
had his laptop, his MacBook, and he took that with him when he left.’

‘Can we look in your machine nonetheless? Just in case he was able to access 
it without you knowing about it.’

She let out a sigh, of sheer exasperation. ‘Yes, if you must, but honestly, 
Byron wouldn’t do that, any more than I would look in his. That’s assuming 
I could get into it. He used to laugh about it and say that breaking his 
password was as likely as winning the Lottery.’

‘If that’s so,’ McIlhenney said, ‘I wouldn’t like to try to access 
it, just in case it spoiled my luck for the jackpot.’

‘No worries of that happening,’ Payne pointed out.

‘You mean you didn’t find it,’ the widow asked, ‘among his effects?’

‘I told you, we didn’t find anything, Mrs Millbank. Not even his clothes.’

She shuddered and for a second her eyes moistened, her first sign of weakness. 
‘How awful,’ she whispered. ‘Robbing a dead man. How could they have done 
that? Of course I’ll help you in any way I can. What do you need to see?’

‘That computer for a start,’ the DCS replied. ‘If you could take us 
through it, looking for any files you don’t recognise, and at its history, 
its usage pattern. Then if we could look though his belongings, and examine any 
area where he might have worked at home.’

‘There wasn’t one. He never did. But you can look. If it’ll help, you can 
look; anything that’ll help you find those so-called friends of his.’

‘Oh, we know where they are,’ Payne said.

‘Then what are you looking for?’

‘I’m afraid it’s one of those situations where we won’t know until we 
find it. And if we do,’ he added, ‘we might not be able to tell you, for 
your own protection.’

Her forehead wrinkled. ‘That sounds a little scary. You can’t tell me 
anything?’

‘No more than we have already.’

‘Nothing? What about that name you mentioned, the Israeli man, Beram Cohen. 
Where does he fit? Who is he?’

The DCI looked at his escort colleague, raising his eyebrows, asking a silent 
question. McIlhenney hesitated, then nodded.

‘I’m sorry, Mrs Millbank,’ Payne replied, ‘but he was your husband.’





Forty



‘Thanks, Bridie,’ Skinner said, as the ACC rose from her chair at his 
meeting table, their morning briefing session having come to an end. ‘I’ll 
give you a shout when I’m ready to start interviewing Scott Mann. He can stew 
for a bit longer.’

‘His lawyer’s not going to like that,’ she pointed out.

‘Then tough shit on him. The Supreme Court says he has a right to be there, 
but we still set the timetable, up to a point, and we haven’t reached that 
yet. He can wait with his client.’

Gorman liked what she heard; her smile confirmed it.

‘Do something for me,’ he continued. ‘Ask Dan Provan to come up here, 
straight away. With Lottie being stood down, he’s carrying the ball, and I 
need to speak to him.’

The third person in the room was on his feet also, but the chief waved him back 
down. ‘Stay for a bit, Michael, please. I’d like a word.’

ACC Thomas frowned, but did as he was asked.

‘I want to apologise to you,’ Skinner began as soon as the door had closed 
behind Gorman.

‘For what, Chief?’ For which of the many ways I’ve been offended? he 
thought.

‘For asking you to attend Toni Field’s post-mortem. It’s been suggested 
to me since then that your relationship might have been more than professional. 
If I’d been aware of that at the time, no way would I have asked you to go.’

‘Even if the suggestion was untrue?’

‘Even then, because I wouldn’t have been quizzing you about it. If you and 
she had a fling away from the office, so what? When I was on my way up the 
ladder, and widowed, I had a long-standing relationship with a female 
colleague. Nobody ever questioned it and if anyone had they’d have been told 
very quickly to fuck off.’

‘Then I accept your apology, and I appreciate it, sir… although it wasn’t 
really necessary, since it was my duty as a senior officer to attend the 
autopsy.’

Skinner grinned. ‘Which means, by implication, that if it was yours, then it 
was mine even more, and I shirked it.’

‘I didn’t say that.’

‘No, but if you had I couldn’t have argued, ’cos you’d have been right. 
The truth is, I’ve seen more hacked-about bodies than you or I have had years 
in the force, combined, and I tend not to volunteer to see any more. I should 
have stood up for that one, though.’

Thomas shook his head. ‘No, you shouldn’t,’ he said.

‘How do you work that out?’ the chief asked.

‘Because the examination was performed by your ex-wife, who still speaks of 
you with a smile and a twinkle in her eye; in my book that disqualifies you as 
a witness. Suppose that she’d made a mistake, and her findings had been 
challenged by the defence in a future trial and you’d wound up in the witness 
box. You’d have been hopelessly compromised.’

Skinner stared at him. ‘Do you know, Michael,’ he murmured, ‘you are 
absolutely right. It’s years since I attended one of Sarah’s autopsies, but 
I have done, when we were married. I shouldn’t have, unarguably. I should 
have known that, so why didn’t it dawn on me?’

‘I’d guess because the possibility of her slipping up didn’t enter your 
head,’ Thomas suggested. ‘She does seem very efficient.’

‘She’s all that. She gave up pathology for a while, when we went our 
separate ways, but I’m glad she’s back. I confess that the very thought of 
what she does turns my stomach from time to time, but I can say the same about 
my own career.’

‘Is it public knowledge?’

The chief blinked. ‘What?’

‘Toni and me. Does everybody know?’

‘From what I gather, most of the force does.’

‘Jesus!’ The ACC stared at the ceiling. ‘It’s never got back to me, 
then. I’ve never heard a whisper, not once. And once is the number of times 
it happened so how the…’

‘You were unlucky. You were seen by the wrong people, the kind whose 
discretion gene was removed at birth. Max Allan did what damage limitation he 
could, but for what it’s worth, when Lowell Payne gets back from a wee job 
I’ve given him, I’m going to ask him to root out the people who started the 
story. Then I’m going to draw them a very clear picture of their futures in 
the force. What’s the shittiest part of our vast patch, Michael? Where does 
no PC want to be posted?’

‘I’ll give it some thought,’ Thomas growled.

Skinner nodded and pushed his chair back. ‘You do that,’ he declared. 
‘Let’s you and I start again, with a clean sheet,’ he added, extending 
his hand.

As the two men shook, Skinner’s phone rang. ‘Need to take this,’ he said. 
‘It might be Payne.’

It was.

‘We’ve just left Mrs Millbank, Chief,’ his exec told him. ‘We got 
nothing from it. Neither of us believe that she had a clue about her 
husband’s previous, or any idea about his sideline. It helped their 
lifestyle, though; the family business is pretty well fucked, but they live 
debt-free and drive a nice Lexus.’

‘But no clue to where he kept his Cohen money?’

‘Yes and no. The wife, widow now, told us that he had a computer, an Apple 
MacBook Air laptop that he was never parted from. His life was in it, was how 
she put it. Am I right in thinking that hasn’t shown up anywhere?’

‘You are,’ Skinner agreed. ‘Nothing of his has turned up. He was buried 
naked, wrapped in a sheet. Leave that with me, Lowell. I’ll check it out and 
get people moving if I have to. Where are you off to now?’

‘To check out his workplace, in the Elephant and Castle, wherever that is. 
It’ll be a shock for his mother-in-law, or maybe not, depending on how she 
felt about him. From what I gather, Byron, or Beram, wasn’t much bloody good 
as a buyer. That’s what the father did, and the business has been suffering 
since his death.’

‘Let me know how you get on. Then we can decide whether there’s anything 
else to be done in London.’

‘Will do, boss.’

The chief constable flicked a button on his console to end the call, another 
for an outside line, then dialled a number that was ingrained in his memory, 
yet which he had never called before.

A female voice answered. ‘Yes?’

‘Bet you got a shock when that rang,’ he said. ‘Theory being that it’s 
for your private calls, and not routed through the comms centre.’

‘Are you kidding?’ Maggie Steele replied. ‘This is the fourth call I’ve 
had on it. One was from Chief Constable Haggerty in Dumfries, another was from 
Archbishop Gainer, and the third was from old John Hunter, the freelance 
journalist, who’s got onset dementia and asked me for a prawn biryani with 
naan bread. He got me mixed up with the Asian takeaway. Are there any of your 
friends who don’t have this number, Bob?’

‘One or two. How are you getting on?’

‘Okay, but I still feel a wee bit overawed. It feels strange, sitting in this 
chair, and you on the other side of the country. Only for three months though, 
yes?’

‘That’s the duration of my appointment,’ he agreed, ‘or my loan if 
you’d rather put it that way.’

‘Can I have a straight answer to that question? You will be back, won’t 
you?’

‘That’s my intention.’

‘Bob! Don’t prevaricate. Have you been seduced by the bright lights and the 
glitter balls of Glasgow already?’

‘No, but…’

‘I knew it!’ she declared.

‘No, really. I still have three months in my head, for reasons that are more 
than just professional.’

‘The kids, I imagine.’

‘And Sarah,’ he added, ‘but keep that very much to yourself. I know that 
you and she didn’t always see eye to eye, but much of that was my fault. 
It’s best for us as a family that she’s here, and that we get along.’

‘But? I can still hear it, hanging there.’

‘But, there are good people through here, Mags, and they need leadership. 
There is no successor here, from within, and frankly, nobody else in Scotland 
either, except possibly for Andy, and he wouldn’t want it.

‘The force has already been disrupted and demoralised by Toni Field, God rest 
her, by her blind ambition and her half-arsed ideas. I’ll hear about the 
likely runners when the job is advertised. If I don’t fancy any of them, I 
won’t rule out applying for the post myself.

‘As I say that, I’m thinking that it sounds incredibly conceited, but I am 
a good cop and I do believe that I’m capable of doing the job, in spite of 
the misgivings I’ve always held about the size of this effing force.’

‘That’s not conceited,’ she retorted, ‘it’s the plain truth. And 
beyond that,’ she asked, ‘will you go for the police commissioner post, if 
unification happens?’

‘I haven’t thought that far, but if I can overcome my doubts about policing 
half of Scotland, I suspect I’ll be able to do the same about the rest.’

Maggie laughed. ‘Now there’s a sea change, after what you were saying in 
the press last weekend. If it’s what you want, Bob, or what you feel you have 
to do, good luck, although I’ll worry about who we might get here as your 
permanent successor.’

‘I’m listening to her,’ he said.

‘Nice of you to say so, but I don’t have the seniority. The councillors on 
the Police Authority won’t have it.’

‘The councillors will have it, because I’ll bloody tell them. Their 
political parties all owe me favours and I will call them in, make no 
mistake.’

‘But maybe I don’t want it,’ she suggested.

‘Bollocks,’ he laughed. ‘You do, because your late husband would have 
insisted on it.’

He heard her sigh. ‘You’ve got me there. Stevie would. Hell, though, my 
in-tray’s stacked high here, and yours must be even bigger.’

‘True, but I didn’t just call you to shoot the breeze. I need your help in 
our top-priority investigation, Toni Field’s assassination. You weren’t 
really involved when it began, but are you up to speed now?’

‘Yes,’ she confirmed, ‘fully.’

‘In that case, you’ll know it all began when we found the body of a man in 
Edinburgh, having been directed by the people who left him there, his 
ex-soldier buddies. They’re now dead, having been killed on the scene after 
the Field hit. We’ve found their car, and what was in it, including the body 
of a well-known Glasgow hoodlum. Although we haven’t linked his death to 
them, but there was nothing there that referred back to Cohen. Everything that 
he had is missing. That includes a MacBook Air laptop… you know, the 
super-light kind… and that’s what we would most like to find.

‘It may no longer exist. Freddy Welsh told me he burned his clothes but he 
didn’t mention the computer. Maybe that went into the fire as well, but maybe 
not. Either way, Freddy needs to be asked; use Special Branch. Have George 
Regan go to see him. He’s been well softened up, so he’ll talk with no 
persuasion.

‘If he can’t help us, I would like you to institute a search, city-wide, 
but looking initially at the area near Welsh’s yard, where Cohen died, and 
around Mortonhall, where he was found. Will you do that for me?’

‘Of course. What’s on the computer?’

‘I don’t know; his wife in London said his whole life was on it, but maybe 
that means nothing more than his iTunes collection and photographs of her and 
their kid. On the other hand, there may be the key that unlocks all the fucking 
boxes.

‘We know already all there is to know about Byron Millbank; that’s the 
alias he was given by somebody’s friends at MI5. If what the widow told 
Lowell Payne and Neil McIlhenney is literally true, the MacBook, if it still 
exists and we can find it, may tell us everything we need to know about Beram 
Cohen, including the name of the person who paid him to kill the chief 
constable of Strathclyde, and why.’

‘We’ll get on it right away,’ Steele promised.

‘Thanks,’ Skinner said. ‘It’s a long shot, I know, but if you don’t 
buy a ticket, you won’t win the raffle.’





Forty-One



‘Where have you been, Sarge?’ Banjo Paterson asked, as Provan came into the 
room. ‘The DI was on the phone looking for you.’

‘Did ye tell her I’ll call her back?’

‘No. I thought you might not want to. It’s awkward with her being 
suspended.’

‘She’s not fuckin’ suspended!’ Provan yelled, flaring up in sudden 
fury. ‘She’s on family leave. If I hear that word used once more Ah’ll 
have your nuts in a vice, son.’

The DC backed off, holding up his hands as if to keep the little man at bay. 
‘Sorry, sorry, sorry.’

‘Aye, well… just mind your tongue from now on.’

‘Understood. So,’ he continued, ‘where have you been? You went out that 
door like a greyhound. I’ve never seen you move so fast.’

‘Doesnae do tae keep the chief constable waiting,’ the DS said, a smirk of 
bashful pride turning up one corner of his mouth.

Paterson whistled. ‘A summons from on high, eh? What did he want?’

‘He wants us to do a wee job for him. Ah need you to get intae your computer 
and find me a phone number for the equivalent of the General Register Office in 
the Republic of Mauritius… wherever the fuck that is.’

‘It’s in the Indian Ocean. Give me a minute.’

Provan looked on as he bent over his keyboard, typed a few words, clicked once, 
twice, a third time, then scribbled on a notepad. ‘There you are,’ he 
announced, as he ripped off the top sheet and handed it over. ‘That’s the 
number of the head office of the Civil Status Division, in the Emmanuel 
Anquetil Building, Port Louis, Mauritius.’ He glanced at the wall clock. ‘I 
make that fifteen seconds short of the minute.’

‘Since you’re that fuckin’ clever, can you access birth records through 
that thing?’

‘I doubt it, but I’ll have a look.’ He turned back to the screen and to 
his search engine, but soon shook his head. ‘No, sorry; not that I can see. 
You’ll have to call them.’

‘Will Ah be able to speak the language?’

‘Possibly not; it’s English.’

‘Cheeky bastard,’ the DS growled, but with a grin. He dialled the number 
Paterson had given him. The voice that answered was female, with a musical 
quality.

He introduced himself, speaking slowly, as if to a child. ‘I am trying to 
find the record of a birth that may have taken place in your country two years 
ago.’

‘Hold on please, sir. I will direct you to the correct department.’

He waited for two minutes and more, becoming more and more annoyed by the sound 
of a woman crooning in a tongue he did not understand, but which he recognised 
as having Bollywood overtones. Finally, she stopped in mid-chorus and was 
replaced by a man.

‘Yes, sir,’ he began. ‘I understand you are a police officer and are 
seeking information. Is this an official inquiry?’ His voice was clipped and 
his accent offered a hint that he might have understood the lyrics of the 
compulsory music.

‘Of course it is,’ Provan replied, his limited patience close to being 
exhausted, ‘as official as ye can get. It’s a murder investigation.’

‘In that case, sir, how can I be of help?’

‘Ah’m lookin’ for a birth record. Ah don’t know for certain that 
it’ll be there, but ma boss has asked me to check it out. All we have is the 
name of the mother, Antonia Field.’

‘What is the date?’

‘We don’t know that either, just that it was two years ago, in the period 
between January and June. The lady took six months off work tae have the child, 
so our guess is that it was probably born round about May or early June.’

‘Field, you said?’

‘Aye, but when she lived in Mauritius she was known as Day Champs.’

‘Pardon?’

‘Day Champs.’

‘Are you trying to say Deschamps, officer?’ He spelled it out, letter by 
letter.

‘Aye, that’s it.’

‘Very good. I will search for you. If you tell me your number, I will call 
you back. That way I will know that you really are a policeman.’

‘Fair enough.’ Provan gave the official the switchboard number, and his own 
extension, then hung up.

With time to kill, he wandered into Lottie Mann’s empty office, sat at her 
desk, picked up the phone and dialled her number.

She answered on the first ring. ‘Dan?’

‘Aye. How’re ye doin’, kid?’

‘Terrible. Wee Jakey isn’t buying the story about his dad any more. I’ve 
had to tell him the truth, and it’s breaking his wee heart.’

‘Maybe he’ll be home soon,’ the sergeant suggested, knowing as he spoke 
how unlikely that was.

‘Get real, Dan,’ she sighed. ‘There’s more. On Sunday I gave Scott 
thirty quid to take the wee man out for the day. They went to that theme park 
out near Hamilton. It occurred to me, that’s a hell of a lot more than thirty 
quid’s worth, so I had a rummage in his half of the wardrobe. I found an 
envelope in a jacket pocket, with four hundred and twenty quid in it. The 
envelope had a crest on the back: Brown Brothers Private Hire.’

Provan felt his stomach flip. ‘Lottie,’ he murmured. ‘What are ye telling 
me this for? Ah’ll have tae report it now.’

‘No you won’t. I’ve done that already, I called ACC Gorman and told 
her.’ She paused. ‘Here, did you think I was going to cover it up? For 
fuck’s sake, Danny!’ she protested. ‘Don’t you know me better than 
that?’

‘Aye, right,’ he sighed. ‘Ah shouldae known better. Sorry, lass.’

‘Have they interviewed him yet?’ she asked. ‘The big bosses?’

‘They’ll just be startin’ about now. Ah’m no long back frae seein’ 
the chief. He was just gettin’ ready to go down there, him and Bridie.’

‘Then God help my idiot husband. There’s no prizes for guessing who’ll 
play “bad cop” out of that pair, and I would not like that bugger sitting 
across the table from me. Why were you seein’ him anyway?’ she asked. 
‘Are you telling me there’s been a development?’

‘No, just something he asked me to handle for him.’ As he spoke he heard a 
phone ring outside, then saw Paterson pick up his own line. The DC spoke a few 
words, then beckoned to him. ‘I think that’s ma contact now,’ he said. 
‘Ah’ll need tae go. Ah’ll call ye if I hear anything from the 
interview.’





Forty-Two



The chief constable paused outside the door of the interview room. ‘Who’s 
his solicitor?’ he asked his deputy.

‘Her name’s Viola Murphy,’ Bridie Gorman told him. ‘She’s a hotshot 
in Glasgow, a solicitor advocate… that means…’

‘I know what it means. She takes the case the whole way through, from first 
interview to appearing in the High Court. I know about her too. She was one of 
my daughter’s tutors when she did her law degree. Alex couldn’t stand 
her.’

‘Will she know you?’

‘Not personally. She might from the media, though.’

‘Of course, she’s bound to. How do you want to play this?’

‘Very simply. We’re going to walk in there and inside five minutes Mr Mann 
is going to be singing like a linty. He’ll tell us everything we want to 
know. And you know what? It might even be true.’

Gorman was sceptical. ‘Mmm. I know Scott. He used to be a cop, remember, a 
DC. He’s interviewed people in his time, so he’ll know what’s going on in 
here. He’ll know that he has a perfect right not to say a single word, and 
you can bet that’s how Viola bloody Murphy will have advised him to play 
it.’

‘We’ll see. You keep her in her box and let me have a go at him. Remember, 
the right to silence goes both ways.’ He opened the door and stepped into the 
interview room.

Scott Mann was seated at a rectangular table. His solicitor was by his side, 
but she shot to her feet. ‘I don’t appreciate being kept waiting like 
this,’ she protested.

Skinner ignored her. He and Gorman took their places and she reached across and 
switched on the twin-headed recorder, then glanced up and over her shoulder to 
check that the video camera was showing a red light.

‘I mean it,’ Viola Murphy insisted. ‘I am a busy woman, and you’ve kept 
me sitting here for an hour and a half. I promise you, as soon as this 
interview is over I’ll be complaining to your chief constable.’

Now there’s a real kick in the ego, Skinner thought. She doesn’t know who I 
am after all.

‘For the purposes of the tape,’ the deputy began, ‘I am ACC Bridget 
Gorman, accompanied by acting Chief Constable Bob Skinner, here to interview Mr 
Scott Mann, whose legal representative is also present.’

Murphy glared at Skinner, but could not hide her surprise at his presence. He 
could read her mind. If the top man is doing this interview himself, my client 
is in much deeper shit than I thought.

‘Well? Get on with it,’ she snapped.

‘Ms Murphy,’ Gorman said, ‘you’re here to advise Mr Mann of his legal 
rights and to ensure that these aren’t infringed. But you don’t speak for 
him, and you don’t direct us.’

As they spoke, Skinner fixed his gaze on Scott Mann, drawing his eyes to him 
and locking them to his as if by a beam. He held him captive, not blinking, not 
saying a word, keeping his head rock steady. The silent exchange went on for 
almost a minute, until the prisoner could stand the invisible pressure no 
longer and broke free, staring down at the desk.

‘Look at me,’ the chief murmured, just loud enough for the recorders to 
pick up. ‘I want to see what we’re dealing with here. I want to see what 
sort of person you are. So far I’ve seen nothing; a nonentity in the literal 
sense of the word. They say you were a cop once. They say you’re a loving 
husband and father. I don’t see any of those people; they’re all hiding 
from me. Look at me, Scott.’

‘Mr Skinner!’ Viola Murphy yelled, her voice shrill. ‘I won’t bloody 
have this! I protest!’

His head moved, very slightly, and his eyes engaged hers. She stared back, and 
shivered, in spite of herself.

‘No you don’t,’ he told her, in a matter-of-fact voice. ‘You sit there, 
you stay silent and you do not interfere with my interview. If you raise your 
voice to me again and use any more abusive language, I will suspend these 
proceedings and charge you with breach of the peace, and possibly also with 
obstruction. Then we will wait for another lawyer to arrive to represent both 
Mr Mann and you.’

‘You’re joking,’ she gasped.

‘I have a long and distinguished record of never joking, Ms Murphy. I advise 
you not to test me.’ He turned back to Mann who was looking at him once more, 
astonished. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I have your attention again.’

He fell silent once more, then reached inside his jacket, and produced what 
appeared to be three rectangles of white card. He turned the top one over, to 
reveal a photograph, of Detective Inspector Charlotte Mann, then laid it in 
front of her husband.

‘For the tape,’ he said, ‘I am showing the prisoner a photo of his wife, 
a senior CID officer.’

He turned the second image over and placed it beside the first.

‘For the tape,’ he said, ‘I am showing the prisoner a photo of his son, 
Jake Mann.’

He turned the third over and put it beside the other, watching Mann recoil in 
horror as he did so.

‘For the tape,’ he said, ‘I am showing the prisoner a close-up photo of 
the body of Chief Constable Antonia Field, taken after she was shot three times 
in the head in the Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, on Saturday evening.’

He paused, as the shock on the prisoner’s face turned into something else: 
fear.

‘What I’m asking you now, Mr Mann,’ he continued, ‘is this. How could 
you betray your wife and compromise her career, how could you condemn your wee 
boy to the whispers and finger-pointing of his school pals, by being part of 
the conspiracy that led to Toni Field lying there on the floor with her brains 
beside her?’ His gaze hardened again; in an instant his eyes became as cold 
as dry ice. He reached inside his jacket again and produced a fourth image. It 
was grainy but clear enough.

‘For the tape,’ he said, ‘I am showing the prisoner a photograph of 
himself in the act of handing a parcel to a second man, identified as Mr Basil 
Brown, also known as Bazza.’

He glanced at the solicitor. ‘To anticipate what should be Ms Murphy’s next 
question, we know that Mr Mann was not receiving the package because that image 
was taken from a CCTV recording that shows the exchange. However, Ms Murphy, 
your client did receive something from Mr Brown and that is also shown on the 
video.’

His hand went to his jacket once more, but this time to the right side pocket. 
He produced a clear evidence bag and slammed it on to the table. ‘For the 
tape,’ he announced, ‘I am showing Mr Mann an envelope which his wife 
discovered today in their home and sent to us. It bears the crest of Mr 
Brown’s taxi firm and contains four hundred and twenty pounds.

‘It hasn’t yet been tested for fingerprints and DNA but when it is we’re 
confident it will link the two men. We can’t ask Mr Brown about this as he 
was found dead in Glasgow on Sunday. However, Mr Mann, we don’t need him, or 
even that evidence. We’ve recovered the paper from the package you handed 
over and we’ve got your DNA and prints, and his, from that. We can also prove 
that the package contained two police uniforms, worn as disguises by the men 
who assassinated Chief Constable Field.’

He stopped, and locked eyes with Mann yet again. His subject, the former 
detective, and veteran of many interviews, was white as a sheet and trembling.

‘All that means,’ Skinner continued, ‘that we can prove you were an 
integral part of the plot to murder my predecessor, and it is our duty to 
charge you with that crime.

‘You’ll be lonely in the dock, Scott; it’ll just be you and Freddy Welsh, 
the man who supplied the guns. Everybody else in the chain is dead, bar one, 
the man who gave the order for the hit, recruited the planner and funded the 
operation.’ He paused. ‘I think we’ve reached the point,’ he went on, 
‘where you bury your face in your hands and burst into tears.’

And Mann did exactly that.

Skinner waited, allowing the storm to break, to run its course and then to 
abate. When the prisoner had regained a semblance of self-control, he asked 
him, ‘What’s your story, Scott? For I’m sure you have one.’

‘My client,’ Viola Murphy interposed, ‘isn’t obliged to say anything.’

The chief sighed, then smiled. ‘I know that as well as you do,’ he replied. 
‘And you know as well as I do that given the evidence we have against him, if 
your client takes that option and sticks to it, then the best he can hope for 
is a cell with a sea view.

‘Silence will be no defence, Ms Murphy. The best you will be able to offer 
will be a plea in mitigation, and by that time it will be too late, because 
once he’s convicted, the sentence will be mandatory. I’m offering the pair 
of you the chance to make that plea to me now, and through me to the fiscal, 
before he’s charged with anything.’

‘He said he was only borrowin’ them,’ Scott Mann blurted out. ‘He said 
he would give me them back.’

‘Okay,’ the chief responded. ‘Now for the big question. Did he tell you 
why he was borrowing them?’

‘He said it was for a fancy dress dance, for charity. He told me that he and 
Cec wanted tae go as polis, and that they wanted it to be authentic.’

Skinner leaned forward. ‘And you seriously believed that?’ he exclaimed.

‘I chose to. The fact is, sir, Ah didn’t want to know what they were really 
for, because I didn’t have any choice.’

‘What do you mean by that? You had a very simple choice. You could have told 
your wife that Bazza Brown had asked you to acquire two police uniforms for 
him, and let her handle his request. Jesus, man, even if your half-arsed story 
is true, by not telling Lottie and co-operating with Brown, you condemned a 
woman to death.’

‘I ken that now,’ Mann wailed. ‘But like I said, I didnae have any 
choice. Bazza’s had a hold on me from way back, since I was a cop. It’s 
no’ just the drink that’s a problem for me. Ah’m an addictive 
personality. Anything I do, I do it to the limit and beyond.’

‘Drugs?’

‘Not that: gambling. Horses, mostly, but there was the cards too. Bazza’s 
old man was ma bookie, and then he died and the brothers took over. Bazza gave 
me a tab, extended credit, he called it, but what he was really doin’ was 
lettin’ me pile up debt. One night he introduced me to a poker school. Ah did 
all right early on, but I think that was rigged, to suck me in. Then I lost it 
all back, but Ah was beyond stoppin’ by then. Bazza kept on stakin’ me, 
letting my tab get bigger and bigger. It got completely out of control, until 
before I knew it I was about seventy-five grand down, on top of twelve and a 
half that I’d owed him before.’

He paused, and his eyes found Skinner, reversing their earlier roles. ‘That 
was when I was truly fucked. He pressed me for the money, even though he knew I 
didnae have it. He got heavy. He threatened me, he threatened Lottie and he 
even threatened wee Jakey, even though he was only a baby then.

‘I threatened him back, or Ah tried to, told him he was messing wi’ a cop 
and that I could have him done. He laughed at me; then he put a blade to my 
throat and told me that it would be the easiest thing in the world for me to be 
found up a close in an abandoned tenement with a needle hangin’ out my arm 
and an overdose of heroin in ma bloodstream. And Bazza did not kid about those 
things. So I agreed tae pay him off in kind.’

‘How?’ the chief murmured.

‘I became his grass, within the force. I told him everything we knew about 
him. Every time he was under surveillance he knew about it. If one of his boys 
was ever done for anything, Ah’d fix the evidence, or I’d give Bazza a list 
of the witnesses against him and he’d sort them.’

‘You mean he killed them?’

‘No, he never needed to go that far. That would have been stupid, and he 
wasn’t.’

‘So you were his safety net within the force?’

‘Aye. And I got uniforms for him, once before.’

‘You did? When?’

‘About six months before I was kicked out. He gave me the same story: a fancy 
dress party. That time he did give me them back, after they’d been used in a 
robbery at an MoD arms depot. All the guys that were in on it were caught 
eventually, apart from Bazza.’ He frowned. ‘That was a funny one, a Special 
Branch job rather than our CID.’

And I know why, Skinner thought. Bazza was off limits on the NCIS database 
because he’d grassed on his accomplices in the robbery . . . or possibly set 
the whole thing up for MI5.

‘How did you get the uniforms, then and this time?’ he asked.

‘I’ve got a friend who works in the warehouse. I asked for a favour.’

‘I don’t imagine it was done out of the goodness of your friend’s 
heart.’

Mann shot him a tiny smile. ‘It was, as it happened.’

‘Eh?’ The chief constable was taken aback. ‘So why did you have that cash 
from Bazza Brown?’

‘Ah told him that Ah had to pay the supplier.’

‘What’s your friend’s name?’

‘Aw, sir. Do ye really need it?’

Skinner stared at him, then he laughed. ‘Are you kidding me? Of course we do. 
The guy’s as guilty as you are, almost. Name, now.’

‘Chris McGlashan,’ the prisoner sighed. ‘Sergeant Chris McGlashan. And 
it’s no a guy; it’s Chris, as in Christine. Please, sir,’ he begged. 
‘Can ye no’ leave her out of it? Can you not say I broke intae the 
warehouse and stole them?’

‘Why the bloody hell should I do that?’

‘She’ll deny it.’

‘I’m sure she will, but we’ll lift her DNA as well, from the package and 
the equipment.’

‘Aw Jesus, no! Lottie…’

The obvious dawned. ‘Aw Jesus, indeed!’ Skinner exclaimed. ‘You stupid, 
selfish, irresponsible son-of-a…’ he snapped. ‘This Chris, she’s your 
bit on the side, isn’t she? You’re an addictive personality right enough, 
Scott. The booze, the horses, the women… Is she the only one you’ve been 
two-timing Lottie with, or have there been others?’

Mann seemed to slump into himself. ‘One or two,’ he sobbed.

‘Mr Skinner,’ Viola Murphy ventured, ‘is this relevant to your 
investigation?’

‘Probably not, but it does demonstrate what a weak, untrustworthy apology for 
a husband and father your client is… let alone what a disgrace he was as a 
serving police officer.’

He turned back to his subject. ‘How did Bazza react when you were chucked out 
of the force, Scott? I don’t imagine you could have worked off all that 
ninety-odd grand, just in doing him favours.’

‘He was okay about it, more or less. He told me he’d still come to me for 
info, and that he’d expect me to get it through Lottie, but he never really 
did, no’ until this business. To tell you the truth, I half expected tae wind 
up in the Clyde, but nothin’ happened.’

‘No, you idiot,’ Skinner’s laugh was scornful, ‘because the debt was 
never real! The poker school, where you supposedly lost all that dough. Did it 
never occur to you that it wasn’t just the first few hands that were rigged 
in your favour, but that the whole bloody thing was rigged against you, to set 
you up? Who were the other guys in the school? Did you know them?’

‘A couple of them; they were Bazza’s drivers in the taxi business.’

‘Then they must have been on bloody good tips, to be able to sit in on such a 
high-roller card game. You got taken, chum, to the cleaners and back again, 
just like everyone else who was involved with your friend Mr Brown. Did you 
really never work any of this out?’

‘No. Now you say it, I can see how he done it, but honest, sir, he had me 
scared shitless most of the time and on a string. He was even the reason I got 
chucked off the force.’

‘What? Are you saying he fed you the booze?’

‘It had nothin’ tae do wi’ the booze. The station commander caught me 
liftin’ evidence against Cec, one time he got arrested for carvin’ up a 
dope dealer that had crossed the pair of them. I photocopied the witness list. 
He walked in on me while Ah was doing it, and saw right away what it was about. 
He gave me a straight choice: either Ah resigned on health grounds and blamed 
alcoholism, or I’d go down for pervertin’ the course of justice.’

‘Why did he do that?’

‘For Lottie’s sake, he said.’

‘And who was this station commander, this saviour of yours?’

‘Michael Thomas,’ Mann replied. ‘ACC Thomas, he is now. He was a 
superintendent back then.’

‘Indeed?’ Skinner murmured. ‘And what happened to Cec? I don’t recall 
any serious assault convictions on his record.’

‘The charges were dropped anyway. The two key witnesses withdrew their 
evidence. They must have got to them some other way.’

‘Not through you?’

‘No. I never knew who they were. Ah never got that far. They must have had 
another source in the force.’





Forty-Three



‘Do you ever feel like you’re in a movie, or a TV series?’ Lowell Payne 
asked.

Neil McIlhenney laughed. ‘All the bloody time. My wife’s an actress, 
remember. As a matter of fact, she’s just been offered the lead in a new TV 
series, about a single mother who’s a detective, but it would have meant 
spending months at a time out in Spain, so she turned it down. Why d’you ask? 
Are you a frustrated thesp?’

‘Hell, no. No, it’s being down here, in this place, where all the names 
come straight off the telly. Highbury earlier on; now it’s the Elephant and 
bloody Castle, for God’s sake. Makes me feel like Phil Mitchell.’

‘Nah, you’ve got too much hair, mate.’

‘Where does the name come from anyway?’

‘I’m told by my cockney colleagues that it goes back to one of the 
worshipful companies that had an elephant with a castle on its back on its coat 
of arms. Somehow that became the name of a coaching inn on this site, about two 
hundred and fifty years ago.’

‘So it’s got fuck all to do with real elephants, or castles.’

‘Absolutely fuck all.’

The two detectives were standing on the busy thoroughfare they had been 
discussing, having been dropped off by their driver in the bus lane that ran 
past the Metropolitan Tabernacle Baptist Church, a great grey pillared building.

‘Where’s the office?’ the visitor asked.

‘On the other side of the road, on top of that shopping complex; that’s 
what I’m told.’

Payne looked at the dual carriageway, and at the density of the fast-moving 
traffic. ‘Crossing that’s going to be fun,’ he complained.

‘No. It’s going to be dead easy,’ his companion replied, heading towards 
a circular junction. At the end of the road was a subway, running under the 
highway and surfacing through the Elephant and Castle tube station. ‘The 
office should be just around the corner here,’ he said, as they stepped out 
into the sunlight once more.

They walked up a ramp that led into a shopping centre, and found the block 
without difficulty, and the board in the foyer that listed the tenants, floor 
by floor.

‘There we are,’ McIlhenney declared. ‘Rondar Mail Order Limited, level 
three, north. Just two floors up.’

They took the elevator, at Payne’s insistence. ‘I’d an early start, and I 
am knackered. Buggered if I’m walking when there’s an option.’

As they stepped out, they saw, to their left, the Rondar logo, emblazoned 
across double doors of obscured glass. There was no bell, no entrance 
videophone, so the two officers walked straight through them, into an open 
space furnished with half a dozen desks and a few tables. At the far end, there 
were two partitioned areas, affording privacy. They counted five members of 
staff, all female, all white, all dark-haired, all in their twenties.

‘Fuck me,’ Payne whispered, ‘it’s like a room full of Amy Winehouses. 
I’m sure you don’t have to be Jewish to work here, for that would be 
illegal, wouldn’t it, but I’m even surer it helps.’

The woman seated at the desk nearest to the entrance looked up at them. They 
judged that she was probably the oldest of the five. ‘Yes?’ she said.

‘Mrs Radnor, please,’ the DCS replied, showing her his warrant card. 
‘Police. I’m Chief Superintendent McIlhenney, from the Met, and this is 
Chief Inspector Payne, from Strathclyde.’

‘Aunt Jocelyn’s busy, I’m afraid. She’s making a new product video, and 
can’t be disturbed.’

McIlhenney smiled. ‘I think you’ll find that she can. But we’d all prefer 
it if you did it, rather than us.’

For a moment or two, the niece looked as if she might put up an argument, but 
there was something in the big cop’s kind eyes that told her she would lose. 
And so, instead, she sighed and stood. ‘If you’ll follow me.’ They did. 
‘Can you tell me what this is about?’ she asked as they reached the private 
room on the right.

‘Family matter,’ Payne told her.

‘But I’m…’ she began, swallowing the rest of her protest when he shook 
his head. ‘Wait here, please.’ She rapped on the door and stepped inside.

They waited. For a minute, then a second, and then a third. McIlhenney’s fist 
was clenched ready to knock, when it reopened and Jocelyn Radnor, glamorous, 
late fifties and unmistakably Golda’s mother, stepped out. She did not look 
best pleased, even under the heavy theatrical make-up that she wore.

‘Gentlemen,’ she exclaimed, ‘I haven’t a clue what this is about, but 
it had better be worth it. I’ve been trying to get that bloody promo right 
for an hour now, and I had finally cracked it when Bathsheba came in and ruined 
it.’

‘We’re sorry about that,’ McIlhenney said, lying, ‘but it is important, 
and better dealt with in your office.’

‘If you say so,’ she sighed. ‘Come on.’ She led them into the other 
room; they found themselves looking down the Elephant and Castle, back towards 
the tabernacle. The furniture had seen better days, but it was quality. She 
offered them each a well-worn leather chair and sat in her own. ‘What’s it 
all about, then? “A family matter,” my niece said.’

‘We want to talk to you about your son-in-law,’ Payne replied.

She tilted her head and looked at him. ‘You’re one too?’ She chuckled. 
‘Scotland Yard is finally living up to its name. What about my son-in-law?’ 
she asked, serious in the next instant. ‘Why are you asking about Byron?’

‘We’ll get to that. Can you tell us, how did he come to work for you?’

‘We needed a buyer, simple as that. Jesse, my late husband, always handled 
that side of the business, from the time when he founded it. That was the way 
it worked; he bought, I sold. Eventually, there came a time when he decided to 
plan for what he called “our retirement”. What he really meant was his own 
death, for he was twenty years older than me and had heart trouble, more 
serious than I knew. So he recruited Byron.’

‘How?’

She frowned at the DCI. ‘I don’t know; he recruited him, that’s all. I 
can’t remember.’

‘Think back, please. Did he place an ad in the newspapers, or specialist 
magazines? Did he use headhunters?’

Her eyebrows rose, cracking the make-up on her forehead along the lines of the 
wrinkles that lay underneath. ‘That was it. I asked where he found him and he 
said he had used specialists.’

‘Do you know anything about his career before he joined you?’

‘Jesse said he had worked for other mail order firms, in his time, and for a 
bank, but he never specified any of them.’

‘Doesn’t he have a personnel file, Mrs Radnor?’ McIlhenney asked.

‘Please, officer,’ she sighed, with a show of exasperation. ‘This is a 
family business. We don’t need such things. I know he was born somewhere on 
the south coast, although I can’t remember where, I know that he never had a 
father and that his mother is dead, I know that he’s nowhere near as good a 
buyer as my husband was, I know that he’s a very good husband to my daughter, 
and I know that he spent some time in Israel, a lot of time.’

‘How do you know that last bit?’

‘The accent would have told me, if he hadn’t. He didn’t get all of that 
in Sussex. I asked him about it, not long after he joined us; he said that 
after his mother died he went to work in a kibbutz.’

‘Do they have mail order in kibbutzes?’ Payne murmured.

‘Of course not, but after that he stayed in Tel Aviv for another few years, 
or so he said.’

‘You didn’t believe him?’

‘Let’s say he was never very specific.’ She paused. ‘Look, to be 
absolutely frank, my guess has always been that when Jesse took him on he was 
doing a favour for a friend from the old days.’

‘The old days where?’ the DCI asked.

‘My late husband was a soldier in his earlier life, a major in the Israeli 
army. He fought in the Six Day War, back in sixty-seven. He didn’t come to 
Britain until nineteen seventy-two.’

‘But he kept his links with Israel? Is that what you’re saying?’

‘Yes, through work with Jewish charities. He had a couple of friends at the 
embassy as well.’

‘So, Mrs Radnor,’ McIlhenney murmured, ‘if we told you that the man 
you’ve known all these years as Byron Millbank was known before that as Beram 
Cohen, am I right in thinking you wouldn’t be all that surprised?’

‘Not a little bit.’ She gazed at the DCS. ‘So what’s he done, that 
you’re here asking about him?’

‘He’s died, I’m afraid.’

Jocelyn’s hands flew to her mouth, but she regained her composure after a few 
seconds. ‘Oh my. That I did not expect. Golda, my daughter, does she know?’

‘Yes, we’ve just left her. You’ll probably want to go to her when we’re 
finished here.’

‘Of course. When did this happen? Where? And how?’

‘Last week, in Edinburgh, of natural causes.’ He carried on, explaining how 
it had happened and what his companions had done with his body.

She listened to his story without a single interruption. ‘What was he doing 
with these men?’ she asked, when he was finished.

‘Planning a murder,’ he replied. ‘You’ve probably heard of the shooting 
of a senior police officer in Glasgow on Saturday evening. Your son-in-law 
organised the whole thing. The two guys who buried him were his comrades, 
soldiers like he was in Israel, working these days for money, not for flags.’

‘Yes,’ she acknowledged, ‘I read of it. His buddies, they’re dead too, 
yes?’

‘Killed at the scene.’

‘So Byron was a soldier. That’s what you’re saying?’ McIlhenney nodded. 
‘Israeli army, I guess.’

‘That and more. Latterly he was Mossad, the Israeli secret service.’

‘So was my husband,’ she told them, ‘in the old days, and for a while 
after he came to Britain. It all fits. So why did they send him over here?’

‘From what I’m told, he’d become an embarrassment, so he was relocated. 
He kept in touch with his old community though. The concert hall killing 
wasn’t the only job he did, not by a long way. I guess it all helped pay for 
your daughter’s lifestyle.’

‘I have wondered about that,’ she admitted. ‘And Golda, does she know any 
of this?’

‘Only that her husband had another identity.’

‘Am I allowed to tell her the rest?’

‘If you want to, but do you? Isn’t being widowed enough for her to be going 
on with?’

‘True,’ she agreed. ‘So why did you tell me?’

‘Because you don’t strike me as the sort of person who’d fall for a 
phoney cover story when we say we need to take Byron’s computer and all the 
other records he kept in this office.’

‘I’ll take that as a compliment,’ Jocelyn said.

‘So, can we have it?’

‘I imagine that’s a rhetorical question, and that you have a warrant.’

‘Call it a courteous request, but yes, we do.’

‘Warrant or not,’ she retorted, ‘I’d be happy to cooperate, and let you 
take everything you need. Unfortunately, someone’s beaten you to it.’

‘Eh?’ Payne exclaimed. ‘What do you mean? Nobody else knows about this 
branch of the investigation.’

‘That’s irrelevant. This is London, Chief Inspector, and there’s a 
depression. Two nights ago we had a burglary. The thieves took a few pieces of 
not very valuable jewellery, and they took Byron’s computer. Of course, I 
reported it to your people, as we have to for the insurance claim, but frankly, 
they didn’t seem too interested. That’s how it is these days.’





Forty-Four



‘What do you think, Bridie?’ Skinner asked. They were in her office; she 
held a mug of coffee in a meaty hand, he held a can of diet Irn Bru.

‘I think,’ she began, ‘that I accept his story about the fancy dress. 
Okay, he knew he was being spun a line, and that he chose not to ask questions, 
but I don’t believe that Scott Mann would knowingly be a part of any 
conspiracy to murder, or that if we charged him with that, we’d get a 
conviction.

‘However, we can tie him to those uniforms beyond reasonable doubt, so he’s 
not walking away. I would propose that we charge him with theft, and his 
girlfriend, assuming we do get her DNA from the packaging. We’ll get guilty 
pleas for sure, I could read it in Viola Murphy’s dark Satanic eyes.’

The chief gave a small nod. ‘I agree with that. What about McGlashan? Do we 
let her resign quietly or do the full disciplinary thing?’

‘Formal,’ Gorman replied, without hesitation. ‘If I could I’d put her 
in the public stocks in George Square.’

Skinner laughed. ‘I once suggested to my soon to be ex-wife that her party 
should propose that as a way of dealing with Glasgow’s Ned hooligan problem. 
She took me seriously, started arguing that the rival gangs would turn out in 
force to throw rocks at them. So I started arguing back to wind her up. She got 
angrier and angrier, wound up calling me a fucking fascist. Looking back, it 
was maybe the beginning of the end. We won’t go that far with this lady, but 
yes, I agree, she has to be made an example of.’ The humour left his 
expression. ‘The consequences might be worse than an hour being pelted with 
rotten fruit. Imagine how Lottie’s going to react when she finds out.’

His deputy sighed. ‘Need she?’

‘She’s bound to. Her husband’s going to court and so’s his girlfriend. 
We’ll make sure there’s no mention of a relationship during the hearing, 
but she’ll figure it out, for sure. It might be best for the pair of them if 
the sheriff puts them out of her reach for a few months.’

‘Do you think he will?’

‘I’m bloody sure of it. They’ve got to go down.’

‘And what about the elephant?’ she asked.

‘Which one would that be?’ he murmured.

‘The great big one in this bloody room: Michael Thomas.’

‘I’ve been trying to pretend it isn’t there,’ the chief admitted.

‘But it is,’ Gorman insisted. ‘Scott Mann claims that Thomas caught him 
photocopying a witness list for the Brown brothers, and hushed it up. For 
Lottie’s sake, indeed. Do you buy that?’

‘No. Not for a second. If what Mann says is true, then he had an obligation 
to call in another officer to corroborate what had happened and then to charge 
him.’

‘So why didn’t he?’

‘I’ll let you speculate on that, Bridie,’ Skinner said. ‘I’m too new 
here.’

‘If you insist. The witnesses against Cec Brown were nobbled anyway, and as 
Scott said, that suggests Bazza had another source. According to his story, 
Michael Thomas saw the list, and we know that he kept quiet about Mann nicking 
it. That has to raise the possibility that he was that source. If he’d done 
what he should have, the investigation would have gone all the way to Brown, 
the witnesses would have been protected and both brothers would have been 
finished.’

‘I can’t argue against that. So what do you suggest we do about it? Get the 
brush out again and sweep it under the carpet? After all, Brown’s dead and it 
will only be Scott’s word against his.’

‘We couldn’t do that, not even if we wanted to, and I don’t believe that 
either of us do. Viola Murphy heard the accusation, and she has the copy of the 
recording that we were bound by law to give her. She’s riding the bloody 
elephant in the bloody room!’

‘Colourful but true. What’s your recommendation?’

‘We take a further statement from Mann, not as an accused person, but as a 
witness, and we give it to the fiscal. What do you say? New or not, you are 
where the buck stops.’

‘Yes and no,’ the chief said. ‘Action has to be taken, but not by us. I 
suggest that you call in Andy Martin, and the Serious Crimes Agency. I don’t 
want to do it myself, or to be involved, because Andy’s in a relationship 
with my daughter. That might not have mattered in the past, but we have to be 
spotless here. His people have to take the statement, and have to decide what 
happens after that. Almost certainly that will not involve the local fiscal. 
For all we know she could be a member of the Michael Thomas fan club. See to 
it.’

‘Will do, Bob. After the statement’s taken, what will we do with Scott?’

‘We charge him, and his girlfriend as soon as we have a DNA match. Murphy 
will probably apply for bail. Likely she’ll get it, since we have no strong 
grounds for opposing it, so we might as well let them go, until their first 
court appearance.’

‘What about Lottie?’ Gorman asked. ‘Are you going to tell her about 
this… new development?’

‘Hell no! Dan Provan can do that. I’m nowhere near brave enough.’





Forty-Five



Detective Sergeant Dan Provan sat at his absent boss’s desk staring at the 
notes he had made. He was unsure of the significance of what he had discovered. 
Instinctively he doubted that it had any relevance to the investigation on 
which he was engaged. But one thing he did know: it was well outside his 
comfort zone as a police officer.

He had spent most of his thirty-something year career catching petty thieves 
and putting them out of business, sorting out those who thought that violence 
was an acceptable means of self-expression, or in one short but horrible 
chapter, pursuing and prosecuting those he would always refer to only as 
‘beasts’, sicko bastards who preyed upon children, their own on one or two 
occasions, leaving them with physical and emotional scars they would carry 
through life.

Always, those issues had been clear, and he had known exactly what he was doing 
and why. But this stuff, Glasgow hoodlums coming up with big red ‘hands 
off’ notices on the national intelligence database, and the latest, Mauritian 
mysteries, it was all unfocused, and way outside the rules of the game that he 
was used to playing. Yet it excited him, gave him the kind of thrill he had 
experienced as a young man, before it had been washed away by a river of 
sadness and cynicism.

When the door opened he did not look up. Instead he growled, ‘Banjo, will you 
fuck off! Did Ah no’ say Ah want to be alone in here?’

‘Indeed?’ a strong baritone voice replied. ‘Anyone less like Greta Garbo 
I cannot imagine.’

Provan gulped and shot to his feet. ‘Sorry, sir,’ he said to the chief 
constable. ‘Ah thought it was DC Paterson. Around here we’re no’ used to 
the brass comin’ tae see us. Always it’s the other way around, and usually 
for the wrong reasons. As a matter of fact,’ he continued, ‘I was just 
about tae ask for an appointment wi’ you.’

Skinner laughed. ‘You make me sound like the fucking dentist. Sit down, man, 
and relax. Before we get to your business, I’ve got another task for you. Not 
a very pleasant one, but I reckon you’d rather do it that anyone else.’

‘Sounds ominous, gaffer.’ He took a guess. ‘Scott Mann?’

‘Got it in one. ACC Gorman and I have not long finished interviewing him. 
He’s going to be charged.’

‘Conspiracy to murder?’ the DS murmured.

‘No, he’ll only be charged with theft. We’re satisfied that he had no 
specific knowledge of why Bazza Brown wanted the uniforms. He’s heading for 
Barlinnie though, or Low Moss.’

‘Still,’ Provan countered, ‘all things considered, that’s a result for 
him. It’ll no’ be nice for Lottie and the wee fella, but a hell of a lot 
better than if he got life.’

‘True, but it’s not as simple as that. There will be a co-accused, Sergeant 
Christine McGlashan, who works in the store warehouse.’

Provan stiffened in his chair. ‘Christine McGlashan?’ he repeated. ‘She 
used to be a DC, until she got promoted back intae uniform. She worked 
alongside Scott in CID and it was an open secret that he was porkin’ her. But 
that was before he met Lottie. Are you gin’ tae tell me he still is?’

The chief constable nodded. ‘I’m afraid so. You’ll see that’s why 
you’re the best man to explain the situation to Lottie. That said, if you 
think it’s Mission Impossible, you don’t have to accept it. This tape will 
self-destruct in five seconds and I’ll handle it myself.’

‘No, sir, Ah’ll do it. You’re right; it’s best she hears that sort of 
news from someone who knows the both o’ them.’

‘Thanks, Dan. None of this is going to go unnoticed or unrewarded, you 
realise that?’

‘Appreciated, boss, but that “Thanks”, that was enough. There’s no way 
you could reward me, other than promotion to DI, and I wouldn’t accept that. 
I am where Ah want to be. If you can make sure that for as long as Ah’m here 
Ah’ll be alongside the Big Yin, tae look after her, that’ll be fine.’

‘For as long as I’m here myself, I’ll make sure that happens. That’s a 
promise, Dan.’

‘In which case, Ah hope you stick around.’ He frowned. ‘What’s 
happenin’ tae McGlashan?’

‘She’ll have been arrested by now, and on her way here. You and Paterson 
can interview her, but make sure you listen to the recording of Mann’s 
interview first. Once you’ve done that, you can charge them both, then 
release them on police bail, pending a Sheriff Court appearance.’ He took a 
breath, then went on. ‘Now, what were you coming to tell me?’

‘The thing you asked me tae do, sir,’ Provan responded. ‘Ah’ve got a 
result, sort of. There’s a hospital in Port Louis… that’s the capital of 
Mauritius,’ he offered, with a degree of pride. ‘It’s called the Doctor 
Jeetoo. Its maternity department has a record of a patient called Antonia Day 
Champs. She had a baby there, a wee girl, on May the twenty-third, two years 
ago. It was born by caesarean section, and she was discharged a week after. The 
address they had for her was in a place called Peach Street. I checked the 
local property register; it said it’s owned by a woman called Sofia Day 
Champs.’

‘Toni’s mother,’ Skinner volunteered. ‘She got knocked up and went home 
to Mum.’

The sergeant sniggered. ‘Makes a change from goin’ tae yer auntie’s for a 
few months, like lassies used tae do in the days before legal abortions. Ah 
wonder why she didnae have one herself, given that she was such a career woman. 
Her clock must have been tickin’ Ah suppose.’

‘Who knows?’

‘I spoke to the ward sister. She said she remembered her. She said that a 
woman came to visit her when she was in, but no husband. There was one man came 
to visit her, though; much older, about seventy. The sister heard Sofia call 
him “Grandpa”. She said his face was familiar, like somebody she’d seen 
in the papers, but that whoever he was he was pretty high-powered, because the 
consultant was on his best behaviour when he was there, and Antonia had a room 
tae herself.’

‘Then I guess that could have been her father. Marina told me he was a bigwig 
in government, and Sofia was his mistress. So what about the birth 
registration, Dan?’ the chief asked. ‘That’s what I’m really interested 
in.’

‘Then you’re no’ goin’ tae like this. Mauritius is more modern than 
ye’d think. All the latest records are stored on computer. The doctor who 
attends the birth gives the parents a form tae say that it’s happened, but 
that’s the only written record, apart from the official birth certificate 
that the parents are given when they register it. And you have tae do that; 
it’s the law. The government guy Ah spoke to checked the whole period that 
she was out there after the twenty-third of May, and there is no record of a 
birth bein’ registered. He’s in no doubt about that.’

‘Bugger!’

The DS held up a hand: it occurred to Skinner that one day he would make an 
excellent lollipop man. ‘However,’ he declared, ‘he did say that he’d 
found an anomaly. On the thirtieth of May, a week later, there were forty-six 
births notified, but when he looked at the computer, he noticed that number 
seven two six four is followed by seven two six six. There’s a number 
missing; he had his computer folk look at it. They said it had been hacked. How 
about that then, boss? D’ye think Grandpa was powerful enough to have the 
record removed?’

‘I doubt it, Dan,’ Skinner replied. ‘But I know someone who is.’





Forty-Six



‘So much for the tour of the capital,’ Lowell Payne grumbled.

‘We drove past the Tower of London, didn’t we?’ Neil McIlhenney pointed 
out. ‘And if you went up on the roof here and found the right spot, you’d 
be able to see the top of Big Ben. Not only that, you’ve seen the home of the 
mighty Arsenal Football Club. All for free too, in the most expensive city I 
know.’ He grinned. ‘Tell you what. You check in with the King in the North 
and I’ll take you for a pint and a sandwich. It’s getting on past lunchtime 
and I’m a bit peckish myself.’

‘I’ve been trying but he’s not in his office, and his mobile’s switched 
off.’

‘Maybe he’s still doing that interview you told me about.’

‘If he is and the bloke hasn’t been charged yet, he’ll be entitled to get 
up and walk out.’

‘He’s probably still hiding under the table. Big Bob doesn’t like bent 
cops, even ex ones. Try him again, go on.’

The DCI took out his phone and pressed the contact entry for Skinner’s direct 
line. He let it ring six times, and was about to hang up when it was answered.

‘Lowell?’

‘Yes, Chief.’

‘How’s it going down there? Got anything useful?’

‘Some, but don’t get excited. We’ve worked out how an Israeli 
ex-paratrooper and disgraced spook hit man came to get a job as a jewellery 
buyer with a London mail order company. His late father-in-law was Mossad, once 
upon a time.’

‘Surprise me,’ Skinner drawled, with heavy sarcasm. ‘How did you find 
that out?’

‘We decided to be forthcoming with his mother-in-law. She was equally frank 
in return; she told us.’

He chuckled. ‘Giving the guy a job, that’s one thing; marrying your 
daughter off to him might be taking it a bit too far.’

‘You’d think so, but the impression we’re getting is of a popular, 
charming bloke. The wife’s devastated. It was just starting to hit home when 
we left.’

‘How about the mother-in-law? How did she take it?’

‘Calmly. She was upset, of course, but it didn’t come as a bombshell to 
find out that poor Byron had a second line of business. Before we left, she 
told us she hoped he was better at that than he was at the jewellery buying.’

‘Did you get anything else from your visit, apart from a compendium of Jewish 
mother-in-law jokes? Did you take his computer?’

‘No, and that’s the real news I have for you. Somebody beat us to it; 
Rondar Mail Order had a break-in last Friday night. A few small items were 
taken, but the main haul was Byron Millbank’s computer. I’m sorry about 
that, boss, but this trip’s been pretty much a waste of time.’

‘Like hell it has,’ the chief retorted. ‘There are three possibilities 
here, Lowell. One, the break-in was exactly that, a routine office burglary. 
Two, it was an inside job, staged to hide something incriminating from the 
sharp eyes of the VAT inspectors. Three, someone who knew about Byron’s 
background, and the fact that he was no longer in the land of the living, 
decided to make sure that nothing embarrassing had been left behind him. I know 
which of those my money’s on. You’ve had a result, of sorts, Lowell. What 
was only a suspicion until now, it’s confirmed in my book. The cleaners have 
been in, and not just in London.’

‘But what have they been covering up?’

‘Work it out for yourself. It’s too hot for any phone line, especially a 
mobile that can be easily monitored. The thing that’s getting to me is that 
they’ve been too damn good at it. If I’m right, I know what the big secret 
is, but I can’t even come close to proving it, and the bugger is that I 
don’t believe I ever will. Our investigation into Toni Field’s murder is 
dead in the water, as dead as she is.’

‘Are you sure?’ Payne asked.

‘I don’t believe in miracles, brother.’

‘What do you want me to do, then?’

‘You might as well come home. Get yourself on to an evening flight. I’ll 
see you tomorrow.’

As the DCI ended the call, he realised that McIlhenney was gazing at him. 
‘How did he take it?’ he asked.

‘He reckons that’s it. We’re stuffed. He’s going to close the inquiry. 
He sounded pretty pissed off. I know he hates to lose.’

The chief superintendent shook his heard. ‘No,’ he said. ‘You don’t 
know. He refuses to lose. You wait and see. He’s not finished yet.’

‘He says he doesn’t believe in miracles.’

‘Then he’s lying. When he’s around they happen all the time.’





Forty-Seven



‘Bastards!’ Skinner exclaimed. The room was empty but there was real 
vehemence in his voice. ‘It’s like someone’s farted in a busy pub. 
You’re pretty sure who it was but you’ve got no chance of proving it and 
the more time passes, the more the evidence dissipates.’

Frustrated, he reached for his in-tray and began to examine the pile of 
correspondence, submissions and reports that his support team had deemed worthy 
of his attention. He had planned that it would go to Lowell for further 
filtering but his absence had landed it all on his desk.

‘Commonwealth Games, policing priorities,’ he read, from the top sheet on 
the pile. ‘One, counter-terrorism,’ he murmured. ‘Two, counter-terrorism, 
three counter-terrorism, four, stop the Neds from mugging the punters.’ He 
laid the paper to one side for consideration later, probably at Sarah’s, and 
picked up the next item, a letter.

It was addressed to Chief Constable Antonia Field, from the Australian Federal 
Police Association, inviting her to address its annual conference, to be held 
in Sydney, the following December.

He scribbled a note, ‘Call the sender, tell them about Toni’s death. If he 
asks me to do it, decline with regret on the ground that I have no idea where 
I’ll be in December,’ clipped it to the letter and dropped it into his 
out-tray.

He worked on for ten minutes, finding it more and more difficult to maintain 
his concentration. He felt his eyes grow heavy and realised for the first time 
that he had missed lunch. A week before he would have poured himself a mug of 
high-octane coffee, but Sarah had made him promise to give up, and he had 
promised himself that he would never cheat on her again, in any way. Instead, 
he took a king-size Mars Bar from his desk drawer and consumed it in four bites.

As he waited for the energy boost to hit his system, he picked up his direct 
telephone, found a number and dialled it.

He hoped that it would be Marina who answered rather than Sofia; and so it was.

‘Bob Skinner,’ he announced.

‘Good afternoon. This is a pleasant surprise… do you have something to tell 
us about Antonia’s death?’

‘No, sorry. In fact I have something to ask you. When were you going to get 
round to telling me about Toni’s child?’

He counted the silence; one second, two seconds, three…

‘Ah, so you know about that.’

‘Of course. You must have realised that the post-mortem was bound to reveal 
it.’

‘Yes, I suppose I did. Maman and I hoped you wouldn’t regard it as 
relevant. It isn’t really, is it?’

‘Probably not,’ he agreed, ‘but when we set out to create a picture of 
someone’s life, it has to be complete. We can’t leave things out, 
arbitrarily, for personal, or even for diplomatic, reasons.’

‘No, I accept that now. We should have volunteered it.’

‘What happened to the child?’

‘She’s here, with us. When you visited us the other day, she was upstairs, 
playing in the nursery that Antonia made for her there. She was born in 
Mauritius, two years ago. Her name is Lucille; she’s such a pretty little 
thing. Normally she lives in London, with Maman, in a house that Antonia’s 
father bought for them. He is widowed now, and when he heard of the child he 
was overwhelmed. He had never recognised my sister as his daughter, not 
formally, not until then.’

‘Does he know she’s dead?’

‘Oh yes. Maman called him, straight away. She said he was very upset. So he 
should have been. I don’t care for the man, even though I’ve never met 
him.’

‘Who’s Lucille’s father?’ Skinner asked.

‘I don’t know,’ Marina confessed. ‘Antonia never told me, and she never 
told Maman. But she registered the birth herself, in Mauritius. You should be 
able to find out there.’

‘That’s right,’ he agreed, ‘we should.’ We should, he thought, but 
some bugger doesn’t want us to.

‘When you do, will you let me know, please. Maman and I have been looking for 
Lucille’s birth certificate among Antonia’s papers, but we can’t find 
it.’

‘Sure, will do. But until then we’re guessing. Those men friends you told 
me about, her lovers: she never gave you any clue to their names?’

‘No, not really. She gave one or two of them nicknames. The DAC in the Met, 
for example, she called him “Bullshit”, for whatever unimaginable reason. 
The mandarin she called “Chairman Mao”, and the QC was always “Howling 
Mad”. Other than that, she never let anything slip.’

‘You mentioned five men in her life,’ the chief said, ‘but when we met 
you said she’d had six relationships in the time you lived with her. Was the 
sixth Michael Thomas?’

She laughed. ‘Him?’ she exclaimed. ‘You know about that?’

‘The whole bloody force seems to know about that. He was seen leaving the 
flat she was renting, far too late for it to have been a work visit.’

‘Then that was careless of her, and not typical. It was very definitely a 
one-night stand. It was also the only time that she ever had a man when she and 
I were under the same roof. Actually, I found it quite embarrassing,’ she 
confessed. ‘The walls were thin.’ He heard what might have been a giggle. 
‘It’s very off-putting to hear your sister faking it. Next morning I 
complained. She laughed and said not to worry, that it had been what she 
described as “tactical sex” and wouldn’t happen again.

‘No,’ she continued, ‘her most recent relationship was still going on, 
and had been for at least three months. I’m more than a little surprised that 
I haven’t heard from the poor man; he must be distraught, for they were 
close. For the first time I sensed that there was no motive behind the 
relationship, nothing “tactical” about it.’

‘I don’t suppose she told you his name, either.’

‘Ah, but this time she did,’ Marina exclaimed. ‘That’s why I believe it 
was serious. She told me he is called Don Sturgeon, and that he works as an IT 
consultant. She never brought him home and she never introduced us, but I saw 
him once when he came to pick her up. He is very attractive: clean-cut, 
well-dressed, almost military looking.’

Skinner felt his right eyebrow twitch. ‘Indeed?’ he murmured. ‘Anything 
else that you can recall about him?’

‘Yes,’ she replied at once. ‘His skin tone; it’s almost the same as 
mine. It made me wonder if he was Mauritian too, and that’s what she saw in 
him.’

‘In this life,’ the chief observed, ‘anything is possible. Marina,’ he 
exclaimed as a picture formed in his mind, ‘are you doing anything, right 
now?’

‘No. Maman is with Lucille, so I’m free.’

‘Then I’d like you to come into the office, quick as you can.’





Forty-Eight



Lowell Payne had seen the interior of Westminster Abbey several times, but only 
on television, when it had been bedecked for royal weddings or draped in black 
for funerals, and packed with celebrants or mourners. As he stepped inside the 
great church for the first time, he found himself humming ‘Candle in the 
Wind’ without quite recalling why.

It was the sheer age of the place that took hold of him, the realisation when 
he read the guide that its origins were as old as England itself, and that the 
building in which he stood went back eight centuries.

He knew as little of architecture as he did of history, but he appreciated at 
once that the abbey was not simply a place of worship, but also of celebration, 
a great theatre created for the crowning of kings and, occasionally, of queens.

In common with most first-time visitors, he paused at the tomb of the Unknown 
Soldier, wondering for a moment whether the occupant’s nearest and dearest 
had been told secretly of the honour that had been done him. ‘Somebody must 
have known,’ he whispered as he looked down, drawing an uncomprehending smile 
and a nod from a Japanese lady tourist by his side.

He moved on and found a memorial stone, commemorating sixteen poets of the 
First World War, recognising not a single name. Charles Dickens he knew, 
though, and the Brontë sisters, and Rabbie Burns, and Clement Attlee. Stanley 
Baldwin was lost on him, but somewhere the name Geoffrey Chaucer rang a bell.

His mobile did not ring, but it vibrated in his pocket. He took it out, feeling 
as if he was committing a form of sacrilege, until he realised that half of the 
tourists in the place were using smart-phones as cameras.

He read the screen and took the call. ‘Chief,’ he said, keeping his voice 
as low as he could, and moving away from the throng of which he had become a 
part.

‘Where the hell are you?’ Skinner asked. ‘You at the station already?’

‘No, I’ve got time to kill, so I’m doing the tourist thing. Does the name 
Stanley Baldwin mean anything to you?’

‘Of course. He was a Tory prime minister between the wars, and even less use 
than most of them. He took a hard line on Mrs Simpson and made the King 
abdicate, but he didn’t mind Hitler nearly as much. Bloody hell, Lowell, what 
did you do at school? You’ll be asking me who Attlee was next.’

‘No, I know about him. What can I do for you?’

‘Cancel your return flight. I’d like you to stay down there overnight. Can 
you do that?’

‘Sure. Has there been a development?’

‘Maybe. I’m not sure. But if something plays out…’ His voice drifted 
off with his thoughts for a few seconds. ‘I’ll know in a couple of hours, 
but meantime you just hang on down there. I’ll be back in touch.’

The conversation ended with as little ceremony as it had begun, leaving Payne 
staring at his phone. ‘If you say so, Bob,’ he murmured. ‘I wonder if I 
can put a West End show on expenses.’





Forty-Nine



Skinner smiled as he gazed at the ceiling. Stanley Baldwin, he thought. He 
guessed where Payne had been when he had reached him. The abbey was one of his 
favourite stopping-off places when he was in London.

London. For all that the prospect of an independently governed Scotland was 
looming, the great monolith in the south remained the centre of power. He had 
decided that he would vote ‘Yes!’ with his heart in the referendum, but he 
had no illusions over the difficulty his country faced in extricating itself 
from the British state, if that was what the majority chose.

Scotland might become a nation, fully self-governing, a member of both the 
European Union and the UN, but it would still share a head of state and an 
island with its English neighbours and their common problems of security would 
remain. He knew better than most what that would mean. MI5 would continue to 
operate north of what would have become a national border.

Even if a future first minister had access to its work and to those of its 
secrets that affected his interests, he would have a very small voice in 
decisions that affected its remit and its funding, and no control at all over 
its activities. Strings would continue to be pulled in secret, by secret 
people, like his friend Amanda Dennis and her immediate boss, Sir Hubert 
Lowery, the director of the service.

It would be up to the new Scotland to come to terms with the need to have its 
own counter-espionage service, to protect itself against potential threats from 
wherever they came, even if that was Westminster. He had discussed this with 
Clive Graham, at a meeting so private that he had kept it from Aileen. Whatever 
their differences on the unification of the police forces, the two men were 
agreed that if the time came, their country would need its own secret service. 
There was also an understanding over the man who would head it.

His smile was long gone when the phone sounded; he flicked the switch that put 
it on speaker. ‘Yes?’

‘Sir,’ a woman replied, ‘it’s PC May in reception. I’m very sorry to 
bother you, and I wouldn’t normally, but there’s a man here, an odd-looking 
wee chap, and he’s asking to see you. He won’t give me his name but he says 
to tell you that he’s been sent by Mr McGuire in Edinburgh. What should I 
do?’

‘He’s okay,’ Skinner told her. ‘He’s a tradesman I need to solve a 
practical problem. Take him to the lift, then come up with him to this floor, 
straight away. I’ll meet you there and take charge of him.’

He hung up and walked from his office. He was waiting by the elevator door when 
it opened less than two minutes later. A small wiry man with a pinched face and 
a jailhouse complexion stepped out.

The chief looked towards his escort. ‘Thanks, Constable. I’ll call you to 
come and collect him when we’re done. By the way,’ he added. ‘I’m 
expecting another visitor quite soon. Let me know directly he arrives.’

She was nodding as the lift door closed, leaving Skinner alone with his 
visitor. ‘Well, Johan,’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s good to see you, under 
different circumstances from the usual.’

Johan Ramsey was dressed in baggy jeans and brown jerkin, over a Rangers 
football top that his host judged, from its design, to be at least three 
seasons old. He was one of those people whose only expression was furtive. 
‘Is this legit?’ he asked.

Skinner laughed. ‘Johan, I’m the chief fucking constable; of course it’s 
legit. A wee bit unorthodox, that’s all. Come on.’

He led the way to his office, and into his private room, where he pulled aside 
the door that concealed the safe. ‘That’s the problem,’ he said. ‘My 
predecessor took the combination to her grave, and I can’t open it. Six 
digits, I’m told.’

Ramsey took a pair of spectacles with one leg from a pocket in his jerkin, and 
perched them on the narrow bridge of his nose. He appraised the task for a few 
seconds, then nodded, and declared, ‘A piece of piss,’ with a degree of 
pride. ‘If you’ll just step into the other room, sir, Ah’ll have it open 
in a couple of minutes.’

The chief’s jaw dropped, then he laughed. ‘Jo, if you think I’m leaving 
you alone in here, you’re daft.’

The little man pouted. ‘Professional secrets, Mr Skinner,’ he protested.

‘My arse! Jo, you’re a professional fucking thief! I don’t know what’s 
in the bloody thing. Tell you what, I’ll stand behind you, so I can’t see 
your hands.’ He took five twenty-pound notes from his wallet and waved them 
before the safe-cracker’s eyes. ‘And there’s these,’ he added.

‘What about ma train fare?’

Skinner snorted, but produced another twenty. ‘There you are: and a couple of 
pints when you get home. Now get on with it.’

‘Aye, okay.’

He turned and hunched over the safe. The chief saw him reach inside his jacket 
again then insert a device that could have been a hearing aid in his ear. 
Everything else was hidden to him; all he could see were small movements of 
Ramsey’s shoulders.

‘A couple of minutes’ he had said, and it took no longer, until there was a 
click, and the safe swung open.

‘Piece of piss, Ah told ye. Three four eight five’s the combination. Four 
digits, no’ six.’

Skinner smiled as he handed over the notes. ‘Do you know what 
“recidivist” means, Johan?’ he asked.

‘No, sir,’ Ramsey replied as he pocketed them.

‘No, I didn’t think so. Do me one favour, even though it’ll be a big one 
for you. Try not to get nicked again on my patch, whether it’s here or in 
Edinburgh. This can’t get you any favours, and I really don’t want to have 
to lock you up again. Come on, let’s get you back home. Remember, you were 
never here.’

His desk phone rang again as they stepped back into his office. He picked it up.

‘PC May again, sir. Your next visitor’s arrived.’

‘Good timing,’ he said. ‘Bring him up, and you can take this one back.’





Fifty



‘When will they be in court?’ Viola Murphy asked, as soon as Dan Provan had 
finished reading the formal charges, and the two accused had been taken away to 
complete the bail formalities.

‘Ah can’t say,’ he replied, ‘but we’ll let you know. Will you be 
defending them both?’

‘Probably, unless either one of them changes their mind and decides to plead 
not guilty; in that event, there could be a conflict. Does Skinner mean it? 
Will he press for custodial sentences?’

‘From what Ah hear you got on the wrong side of him. Did you think he’s the 
kind that bluffs?’

‘No,’ the lawyer conceded.

‘It’s no’ just him. ACC Gorman’s of the same mind.’

‘And you?’

‘Listen, Viola, we all are. It’s tough for me, personally, you must know 
that, but we cannae let this go by wi’ a slap on the wrist, especially for 
McGlashan. If she goes down, he has tae and all. That would be the case suppose 
he wasn’t an ex-cop and married to somebody who still is. The fact that he is 
just underlines it. The fiscal will demand jail. The best you can hope for is a 
soft-hearted sheriff that gives them less than six months.’

‘I’ll ask for a suspended sentence.’

‘Ye better no’. He might hang them.’ He winced. ‘Bad joke, Ah know, but 
you know the bench. Sometimes, the more that lawyers chance their arm, the 
harder they go. Would ye like some advice?’

‘I’ll listen to it,’ she said. ‘Whether I’ll act on it…’

‘Okay. If I was in the dock, I’d want the youngest, freshest kid in your 
firm tae do the plea in mitigation. Ah’d even be hopin’ that they made an 
arse of it, and the judge took pity on them. Because that’s the only way 
those two will get anything like sympathy from any sheriff in this city.’

‘Mmm,’ she murmured. ‘You may well be right. I suppose you should be; 
you’ve been around long enough to have seen it all. I’ll have a word with 
my partners, and see what they think. Thanks, Sergeant.’

The door had barely closed behind her when it opened again. Provan looked up, 
to see Scott Mann framed there.

‘Dan,’ he began. ‘Sarge.’

The older man bristled. ‘Don’t you fuckin’ call me Sarge.’ He jerked a 
thumb in the direction of DC Paterson who stood beside him, gathering notes and 
papers and putting them in order. ‘That’s reserved for colleagues, like 
Banjo here; for police officers, and that you’re no’. And don’t “Dan” 
me either. Mr Provan, it can be, but frankly Ah’d prefer nothing at all. 
Ah’d rather no’ see you again.’

‘Will ye put a word in for me?’ Mann begged.

‘What? Wi’ the high heid yins? You must be joking.’

‘No, I meant wi’ Lottie.’

The DS started round the table towards him, only to be restrained by 
Paterson’s strong hand, grabbing him by the elbow. He stopped, gathering 
himself.

‘There is even less chance of that,’ he said when he was ready. ‘From now 
on, I will do all I can to protect Lottie from you. Now you fuck off out of 
here, boy, get off wi’ your tart. And be glad you’re leavin’ in one 
piece. In the old days ye wouldn’t have.’





Fifty-One



‘Who was that little guy?’ Clyde Houseman asked, as he settled into the 
chair that Skinner offered him. ‘He wasn’t the sort you expect to see on 
the command floor of the second largest police force in Britain.’

‘Just a technician,’ the chief replied. ‘I had a wee problem, but he 
sorted it out for me.’

‘Computer?’

He shrugged. ‘You know IT consultants, they live in a different world from 
the rest of us. Some of them turn up and they’re dressed like you, others, 
they’re like him. I know which ones I trust more. I’m not a big fan of 
dressing to impress.’

The younger man winced and his eyes seemed to flicker for a moment. ‘I 
do…’

Skinner laughed. ‘Don’t take it personally. I wasn’t getting at you. 
You’re ex-military, an ex-officer; you’ve had years of training in taking a 
pride in your appearance. Plus, you’re not a computer consultant; you’re a 
spook. Whatever, you look a hell of a lot better than you did as a gang-banger 
in Edinburgh half a lifetime ago.’

‘Thank God for that.’

‘Me, now? I’ve never changed. I joined the police force because I felt a 
vocational calling, and I followed it even though I knew that my old man had 
always hoped I would take over the family law firm eventually. I think he died 
hoping that. I never let myself be swayed, though. I applied to join the 
Edinburgh force, they saw my shiny new degree and they accepted me. And you 
know what? The first time I put on the uniform, I realised that I hated it. The 
thing was ugly and uncomfortable and when I looked in the mirror I didn’t 
recognise the bloke inside it.

‘It didn’t kill my pride in the job, but it did make me want to get into 
CID as fast as I could. Look at me now; I’m a chief constable, but my uniform 
is hanging in my wardrobe next door. I’m only wearing a suit because I feel a 
wee bit obliged to do that, at least until I get settled in here.

‘The real me might dress a wee bit sharper than the guy you passed at the 
lift, but it would still be pretty casual. So what you see here, to an extent 
it’s a phoney. Old George Michael got it right; sometimes clothes do not make 
the man.

‘But yours, though, they do. They mark you out, they define you. The military 
defined you. It made you; you became it. Before that you were no more than 
eighty kilos of clay waiting to be given proper form.

‘I could see that when I came across you in that shithole of a scheme in 
Edinburgh. That’s why I gave you my card that day: I thought you might see 
the light and get in touch. You didn’t, but you still went in the right 
direction. If you had… you’d still be the man you are, but you’d just 
look a bit different, that’s all.’

Houseman laughed. ‘Scruffy at weekends, you mean? How do you know I’m 
not?’

‘I know, because I’ve met plenty of soldiers in my time and quite a few 
were officers who rose through the ranks, like you. I’ll bet you don’t have 
a pair of jeans in your wardrobe. Am I right?’

‘You are, as a matter of fact. Is that a bad thing?’

‘In a soldier, no. In a lawyer, no. In an actuary, for sure no. When I hang 
out in Spain I see these fat blokes on the beach in gaudy shirts and ridiculous 
shorts, with gold Rolexes on their wrists and all of them looking miserable 
because their wives have dragged them there and they’re starting to panic 
because they don’t know who anyone else is and, worse, nobody knows what they 
are. My golf club’s full of people who’ve never worn denim in their fucking 
lives, and that’s okay, because if they did they’d be pretending to be 
something they’re not.’

‘Exactly. So what are you saying?’

‘I’m trying to tell you,’ Skinner said, ‘that conformity is fine for 
normal people. But you, Clyde, you’re not a normal person, you’re a spook. 
You’re a good-looking bloke, of mixed race, so you have an inbuilt tendency 
to be memorable. The way you dress, the way you present yourself, makes you 
unforgettable, and in your line of work, my friend, that is the very last thing 
you want to be. If they didn’t teach you that when you joined up at Millbank, 
then they failed you.’

Houseman’s eyebrows formed a single line. ‘Point taken, sir. Any 
suggestions?’

‘Nothing radical; the obvious mostly. Vary your dress, and when you go 
casual, don’t wear stuff with big logos or pop stars on the front. Shop in 
Marks and Spencer rather than Austin Reed. Let your hair grow a bit shaggy. 
Don’t shave every day. Wear sunglasses when it’s appropriate, the kind that 
people will remember rather than the person behind them. Choose what you drive 
carefully.’

He smiled. ‘That day you and I met, back in the last century, I was driving 
my BMW. That was an accident; normally I’d have been in my battered old Land 
Rover. If I had, you and your gang wouldn’t have given it a second glance, 
and I wouldn’t have had to warn you off.’

‘Then whatever caused that accident, I’m grateful for it. You gave me the 
impetus to get out of there. Otherwise I might not have. I might have stayed a 
stereotype and wound up in jail.’

‘Nah, I think you’d have made it. You were a smart kid. You’d have worked 
it out for yourself, eventually.’

‘Maybe.’ He pulled himself a little more upright. ‘However, I’m sure 
you didn’t call me here to give me fashion advice.’

‘No,’ Skinner agreed, ‘that’s true. I felt I should give you an update 
on the investigation, since you were in at the death, so to speak.’

‘Thanks, sir. I appreciate that. How’s it going?’

‘It’s not,’ the chief sighed. ‘It’s stalled. All our lines of inquiry 
have dried up. There is no link between Beram Cohen and the person or 
organisation who sponsored the hit. We know how it was done, and even if it 
points in a certain direction, the witnesses are all dead. That’s probably my 
fault,’ he added. ‘You had no choice but to take down Smit, but if I was a 
better shot I’d have been able to stop Botha without killing him.’

‘There will be no further inquiries about our part in that?’ Houseman asked.

‘None. Everything is closed.’

Skinner rose to his feet, and his visitor followed suit. He moved towards the 
door, then stopped. ‘I’m aware,’ he said, ‘that in Toni Field’s time 
MI5 policy was to keep our counter-terrorism unit at a distance. It’s okay, 
I’m not asking you to comment. Toni may not even have been aware of it, but I 
know it was the case. I just want you to know that while I’m here, I won’t 
tolerate that. You can keep secrets from anyone else, but if they affect my 
operational area, not from me. Understood?’

Houseman nodded. ‘Understood, sir.’

They walked together to the lift. The chief constable watched the doors close 
then went back the way he had come, but walked past his own room, stopping 
instead at the one he had commandeered for Lowell Payne. He knocked on the door 
then opened it halfway and looked in.

‘Come on along,’ he said.

Marina Deschamps put down her magazine, stood and followed him. ‘This is all 
very surprising,’ she murmured, with a smile. ‘Even a little mysterious. By 
the way, did you solve the mystery of the safe?’

He nodded. ‘This very afternoon. I’ve still to check its contents, but if 
there’s anything personal in there I’ll let you have it. As for the rest, 
you’re right, but now I can show you what this visit’s all about.’

He sat behind his desk and touched the space bar on his computer keyboard to 
waken it from sleep.

‘This room has a couple of little bonuses,’ he began. ‘Having worked next 
door, you’re probably aware that there’s a security system. There’s a wee 
camera in the corner of the ceiling and when the system is set, anyone who 
comes in here is automatically filmed, without ever knowing it.’

‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘Some evenings I would be last out of here, and so I 
had to be shown how to set it.’

‘Yes, I imagine so. But did Toni tell you that it’s more than an alarm?’

‘No, she never did. It is? In what way?’

‘It can also be used to record meetings. Clearly, if that happens, all the 
participants should be made aware of it, but if they weren’t they’d never 
know.’ He used his mouse to open a program then select a file. He beckoned to 
her. ‘Come here and take a look at this.’

As she walked round behind him he clicked an icon, to start a video. There was 
no sound, but the image that she could see was clear and in colour. The chief 
constable with his back to the camera and facing him a sharply dressed, 
immaculately groomed man, whose skin tone was almost identical to her own.

‘Ever seen him before?’ Skinner asked, hearing an intake of breath from 
over his shoulder.

‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘That’s Don Sturgeon. What’s he doing here?’





Fifty-Two



‘What d’you think of the beer?’ Neil McIlhenney asked.

‘It’s okay,’ Lowell Payne conceded. ‘What’s it called?’

‘Chiswick Bitter. I don’t drink much, not any more, but when I do it’s 
the one I go for.’

‘That’s because it doesn’t take the top of your head off,’ one of their 
companions remarked, ‘unlike that ESB stuff. Bloody ferocious that is. I’ve 
seen tourists staggering out of here after a couple of pints of that stuff. Not 
like you Jocks, though. You’d drink aviation fuel and never feel it.’

‘I used to,’ the DCS chuckled. ‘Me and my mate. In those days we used to 
say that English beer was half the strength of a Scotsman’s piss, but since I 
came down here I’ve developed an occasional taste for it. Travelling to work 
on the tube has its compensations.’

The other Londoner glanced at him. ‘Where do you live?’

McIlhenney raised an eyebrow. ‘Was that a professional inquiry? I’ve heard 
about you guys; you’re never off duty.’

‘No, not at all.’

‘Richmond, actually.’

The man had his glass to his lips, he spluttered. ‘You what? On a copper’s 
pay? Maybe it should have been a professional question.’

‘My wife’s owned the place for years. When we lived in Edinburgh it was 
rented out. We used her flat in St John’s Wood if we ever came down.’

‘You’re shitting us.’

‘Oh no he’s not,’ Payne laughed. ‘Ask him who his wife is.’

As he spoke, the phone in the pocket of his shirt vibrated against his chest. 
He knew who the caller would be without looking at it. He excused himself as he 
took it out, and stepped out into the street.

‘Where are you now?’ Skinner asked.

‘I’m in a pub called the Red Lion, in Whitehall, with Neil McIlhenney and 
two guys he says are part of the Prime Minister’s protection team. This might 
be a good night to have a go at him.’

‘Given what happened on Saturday,’ the chief pointed out, ‘that’s not 
very funny. Have you got a hotel?’

‘Yes, the Met fixed me up with one near Victoria Station.’

‘Good. I want you to meet me tomorrow morning. Victoria will do fine. I’ll 
be coming up from Gatwick, same flight as you caught today.’

‘I’ll see you there. Where are we going?’

‘I have a meeting, and given where it is and what’s on the agenda, I’m 
not going in there unaccompanied.’

‘Sounds heavy. Where?’

‘Security Service, Millbank. I’m just off the phone with my friend Amanda 
Dennis, the deputy director. She’s expecting us.’

Payne gasped. ‘Jesus Christ, boss. Why are we going there? What’s 
happened?’

‘Nothing that I can slam on the table, point at and say “He did it”, but 
enough for me to fly some kites and see how they react. I can see a chain of 
events and facts that lead to a certain hypothesis, but I can’t see anything 
that resembles a motive. Still, what we’ve got is enough for some 
cage-rattling. I’m good at that.’

‘I think I know that.’

‘Then you can sit back and learn.’

‘At my age I don’t want to.’

‘You’re a year older than me, Lowell,’ Skinner chuckled, ‘that’s all. 
One thing I want you to do in preparation for the meeting. When you call Jean, 
as I’m sure you will, tell her where you’re going. I’ll be doing the same 
with Sarah. I know, I said that Amanda’s a friend, and she is, but in that 
place, friendship only goes so far.’





Fifty-Three



‘Are you going to work in Glasgow for good, Dad?’ Skinner’s elder son 
asked, ranging over three octaves in that single sentence.

Mark McGrath, the boy Skinner and Sarah had adopted as an orphan, was at the 
outset of adolescence, and the breaking of his voice was not passing over 
easily or quickly. James Andrew, his younger brother, laughed at his lack of 
control, until he was silenced by a frown from his mother.

‘I dunno, mate,’ Bob confessed. ‘Last week I’d never have imagined 
being there. On Sunday, when I agreed to take over, the answer would still have 
been no. But with every day that passes, I’m just a little less certain. But 
remember, even if I did apply for the job, so would other people. There’s no 
saying I’d be chosen.’

Both of his sons looked at him as if he had told them Motherwell would win the 
Champions League.

‘No kidding,’ he insisted. ‘There are many very good cops out there, and 
most of them are younger than me. I won’t see fifty again, lads.’

‘You’ll get it, Dad.’ James Andrew spoke with certainty, his father’s 
certainty, Sarah realised, as she heard him. ‘Will we have to move to 
Glasgow?’

‘Never!’ The reply was instant, and vehement.

‘Come on, guys,’ Sarah interrupted. ‘It’s past nine, time you headed 
upstairs. And don’t disturb your sister if she’s asleep.’

‘She won’t be,’ Mark squeaked. ‘She’ll be practising her reading.’

‘That’s a bit of an exaggeration surely,’ Bob chuckled. ‘She might be 
looking at the pictures.’

‘No, Dad. She’s learning words as well; I’ve been teaching her. There’s 
a computer program and I’ve been using it.’

Skinner watched them as they left, and was still gazing at the door long after 
it was closed. Sarah settled down beside him on the sofa, tugging his arm to 
claim his attention. ‘Hey,’ she murmured, ‘come back from wherever you 
are. Whassup, anyway?’

‘Ach, I was just thinking what a crap dad I’ve been. I should be teaching 
my daughter to read, not subcontracting the job to Mark. Last week I was all 
motivated, pumped up to do that and more. We had a great morning on the beach 
on Saturday, the kids and I, then I had a phone call, the shit hit the fan and 
I had to go rushing off, didn’t I, and get it splattered all over me. Now 
I’m thinking seriously about taking on the biggest job in Scotland, when 
I’ve already got a job that’s far more important than that.’

She turned his face to her, and kissed him. ‘Bob,’ she said, ‘I love you, 
and it’s good to see you taking your kids so seriously. But you always have 
done. You’ve been great with the boys all along, and you’ve never neglected 
Seonaid. It’s taken you a while to realise that she isn’t a baby any more, 
that’s all. Me living in America didn’t help, since that meant you missed a 
big chunk of her infancy, but I’m back now, and we can help her grow 
together.’ She put a hand on his chest. ‘That does not mean I expect you to 
become a house husband, because you couldn’t. There’s too much happening, 
too much at stake just now, and if you don’t get involved in it, you’ll 
regret it for the rest of your life.

‘You can’t walk away anyway, it’s not in your nature. This thing 
tomorrow, this high-stakes meeting at MI5 that you’re so worked up about, 
even if you’re not saying so, you don’t have to go there, do you? But you 
want to, you feel you have to. Isn’t that right?’

‘I set it up,’ he admitted. ‘Yes, it is a bit of a fishing trip, and 
there are other ways I could have played it. For example, I could just write a 
report, a straight factual account of the things that we know, and suggest 
certain possibilities. Then I could give that report to the Lord Advocate, 
who’s my ultimate boss as a criminal investigator in Scotland, with a copy to 
the First Minister.’

‘Why don’t you?’

‘Because they’d burn it. If I told them what I know to be fact and what I 
see as a possibility, they’d be scared stiff. If they acted on it, it could 
provoke a major conflict between them and the Westminster government. All in 
all, it’s best that I keep it from them, and that I go and have a full and 
frank discussion with Amanda.’

‘Bob,’ Sarah ventured, ‘are you suggesting that MI5 had something to do 
with Toni Field’s murder?’

‘No, I’m not, because the evidence doesn’t take me there. Even if I 
thought they were capable of doing that, I can’t see why they would. But I do 
know that they created the conditions for it to happen, and that they’ve been 
doing what they can to cover up. There’s a piece of that I still don’t 
understand, but I never will because they’ve been too good at it.’

‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Here’s what I think you should do. See this thing 
through to its conclusion, and let it go, however unsatisfactory the conclusion 
may be. Then apply for the Strathclyde job. You’ll get it; even the boys know 
that. And once you’re there, be everything you can be. Build your support 
staff so that you can delegate and not have to change every light bulb. Work 
the hours a normal man does, and be the father that a normal man is expected to 
be.’

He grinned. ‘And the husband?’

‘Nah,’ she laughed in return. ‘You were always lousy at that; we’re 
fine as we are.’

‘Yeah,’ he agreed. ‘I’ll go with that.’

‘Would you like a drink? I put some Corona in the fridge for you. I take it 
it’s still your favourite beer.’

‘Absolutely, but I’ll give it a miss tonight. Early start tomorrow. Hey,’ 
he added, ‘you realise that from now on I’ll be able to tell whether 
you’ve got another bloke just by checking the fridge?’

‘Yes, but how will you know I don’t have another fridge somewhere, one with 
a combination lock just in case you do find it?’

Her joke triggered a memory. ‘Bugger,’ he exclaimed. ‘I finally got into 
my own safe this afternoon, in the office. I haven’t had a chance to check 
the papers that were in it. They’re in my briefcase; mind if I go through 
them now?’

‘No,’ she replied, jumping to her feet, ‘you do that, and I’ll check 
that Madam Seonaid isn’t halfway through War and Peace by torchlight under 
the duvet.’

As she left the room, he reached for his attaché case and opened it. He had 
brought the remnants of his in-tray with him, to be worked on during his flight 
to London, but the contents of Toni Field’s safe were in a separate folder. 
He took it out and set the rest aside.

His dead predecessor’s papers were contained in a series of large envelopes. 
He picked up the first; the word ‘Receipts’ was scrawled on the outside. He 
shook out the contents and saw a pile of payment slips, two from restaurants, 
three from petrol stations, five for train tickets, two for books on 
criminology bought from Amazon, another from a hotel in Guildford, double room, 
breakfast for two, he noted, recalling a policing conference in the Surrey town 
two months earlier that he had declined to attend. Maybe she took Marina, he 
thought.

Or possibly not. Might Toni have been capable of taking the so-called Don 
Sturgeon along for the ride, and slipping him on to her expenses?

He stuffed the slips back into the envelope and picked up the next. His 
eyebrows rose when he saw his own name written on the front. He was about to 
open it when he found a second envelope attached, stuck to it by the gum on its 
unsealed flap. He prised them apart and read another name, ‘P. Friedman’. 
He looked inside, but it was empty, and so he laid it aside and slid out the 
contents of his own.

He found himself looking at two photographs of himself. From the background he 
saw that they had been taken surreptitiously at ACPOS, probably by Toni, with a 
mobile phone while his attention had been elsewhere. They were clipped on to a 
series of handwritten notes.

As he read them he saw that they were summaries of every meeting they had ever 
attended together, and one that had been just the two of them, when he had paid 
a courtesy call on her in Pitt Street in the week she had taken up office. That 
note was the most interesting.

Robert M. Skinner (Wonder what M stands for?)



The top dog in Scotland he thinks, come to let me know no doubt that he could 
have had my job for the asking . . . if he only knew. Tough on him; this is the 
season of the bitch. Sensitive about his politician wife. Eyes went all cold 
when I asked about her. Wonder if he knows what I do, about her screwing the 
actor guy every time he’s in Glasgow. Or if he’d like me to show him the 
evidence. If he knew about the other one! But that definitely stays my secret, 
till the time is right.





Skinner’s eyes widened as he read.

The man has testosterone coming out of his pores, which makes it all the more 
ironic that his wife plays away, as did the one before, from what I hear. As a 
cop, old school. He will not be an ally over unification. Question is, will he 
be an opponent for the job? Think he will, whatever he says; he’s a 
pragmatist, used to power, and not being questioned. Also, will he stand for 
Scotland’s top police officer being a woman, and a black one at that? Sexist? 
Racist? His sort usually are, if old Bullshit is anything to go by. Must work 
out a way to take him out of the game. Main weakness is his wife; use what I 
know and work on getting more on her. Other weakness his daughter, but she’s 
protected by the dangerous Mr Martin so too much trouble. Summary: an enemy, 
but can be handled.





‘No wonder this fucking woman got herself killed,’ he murmured to himself. 
‘I might have been tempted to do it myself.’

He replaced the notes and the photographs, then turned to the next envelope. It 
was inscribed ‘Bullshit’. It contained nothing but photographs, of Toni 
Field and a man. In one they were both in police uniform, but in the others 
they were highly informal. It was all too apparent that at least one of the 
participants had been completely unaware that they were being taken, most of 
all in one in which he was clad only in his socks.

Skinner stared. He gaped. And then he laughed. ‘Bullshit,’ he said. ‘B. 
S. for short. B. S. for Brian Storey, Sir Brian bloody Storey, deputy assistant 
commissioner then, going by his uniform, but now Commissioner of the 
Metropolitan Police. And weren’t he and Lady Storey guests in the royal box 
at Ascot a few weeks ago?’

His smile vanished. Was Brian Storey a man to be blackmailed and take it 
quietly? Maybe, maybe not.

He moved on to the next envelope. It was labelled ‘Brum’, another 
collection of candid camera shots of the star of the show with a West Midlands 
ACC, in line with Marina’s account. Skinner knew the guy by sight but could 
not remember his name, a sign that the days when he might have been of use to 
Toni lay in the past.

The same was true of the men featured in the next two. The broadcast journalist 
had been a name a couple of years before but had passed into obscurity when he 
had signed up with Sky News. As for Chairman Mao, the only thing for which he 
was remarkable was the size of his penis, since Toni had been able, easily, to 
swallow it whole.

The fifth envelope in the sequence was ‘Howling Mad’. There was something 
vaguely recognisable about the man, but if he was a QC as Marina had said, he 
would normally be seen publicly in wig and gown, as good a disguise as the 
chief constable had ever encountered. In addition, he was the only one of the 
five who was not seen completely naked, or in full face, only profile. However, 
there were a series of images possibly taken from a video, in which the pair 
were seen under a duvet, in what looked to be, even in the stills, vigorous 
congress.

‘Howling Mad,’ Skinner repeated. ‘Who the hell are you, and why is that 
name vaguely familiar?’

His question went unanswered as he refilled the envelope and turned to the 
last. It was anonymous; there was no description of its contents on the 
outside. He upended it and more photographs fell out. They showed Toni Field as 
he had never seen her, out of uniform, without make-up, without her hair 
carefully arranged. In each image she was holding or watching over a child, at 
various ages, from infancy to early toddler.

He felt a pang of sadness. Little Lucille, who’d never see her mother again. 
One photograph was larger than the rest. It showed Toni, sitting up in a 
hospital bed, holding her child and flanked by Sofia and a man, Mauritian. He 
had given his daughter his high forehead and straight, slightly delicate nose. 
And how much of his character? Skinner wondered.

He was replacing the photographs and making a mental note to hand them over to 
Marina, after burning four of the others… the ‘Bullshit’ file was one to 
keep… when he realised that something had not fallen out when they did. He 
reached inside with two fingers and drew out a document.

He whistled as he saw it, knowing at once what it was even if its style was 
unfamiliar to him. A birth certificate, serial number ending seven two six 
five, recording the safe arrival of Mauritian citizen Lucille Sofia Deschamps, 
mother’s name, Antonia Maureen Deschamps, nationality Mauritian, father’s 
name Murdoch Lawton, nationality British.

In the days when Trivial Pursuit was the only game in town, Bob Skinner had 
been the man to avoid, or the man to have on your team. There was never a fact, 
a name or a link so inconsequential that he would not retain it.

‘Murdoch,’ he exclaimed. ‘The A Team, original TV series not the iffy 
movie, crazy team member, “Howling Mad” Murdock, spelled the American way 
but near enough and that’s how Toni would have pronounced it anyway, played 
by Dwight Schultz. Hence the nickname, but who the hell is he?’

Sarah’s iPad was lying on the coffee table. He picked it up, clicked on the 
Wikipedia app, and keyed in the name of the father of little Lucille Deschamps.

When Sarah came back into the room he was staring at the tablet’s small 
screen, his face frozen, his expression so wild that it scared her.

‘Bob,’ she called out, ‘are you all right?’

He shook himself back to life. ‘Never better, love,’ he replied, and his 
eyes were exultant. ‘Can you print from this thing?’ he asked.

‘Of course. Why?’

‘Because the whole game is changed, my love, the whole devious game.’





Fifty-Four



‘Are ye sure you’re all right, kid?’ Since his visit earlier in the 
evening he had called her three times and on each occasion he had put the same 
question. Lottie understood; she knew that he was hurting almost as much as she 
was, but was incapable of saying so.

‘I promise you, Dan, I’m okay. That’s to say I’m not a danger to 
myself, or to wee Jakey. Nobody’s going to break in here tomorrow and find me 
hanging from the banisters. Ask me how I feel instead and I’ll tell you that 
I’m hurt, embarrassed, disappointed and blazing mad, but I’ll get over all 
that… apart, maybe, from the blazing mad bit. I’ve made a decision since 
you called me earlier. Jakey’s going to his granny’s tomorrow and I’m 
coming back to work.’

‘But Lottie,’ Provan began.

She cut him off. ‘Don’t say it, ’cos I know that I can have nothing to do 
with the Field investigation, but there’s other crime in Glasgow; there 
always is.’

‘The chief constable said ye should stay at home until everything’s 
sorted.’

‘As far as I’m concerned it is sorted. Scott’s been charged, right?’

‘Right.’

‘He’s no longer in custody, right?’

‘Right.’

‘And I’m not suspected of being involved in what he did, right?’

‘Right.’

‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘In that case, there is no reason for me to be 
stuck in the house twiddling my thumbs. The longer I do that the more it will 
look like I’m mixed up in my husband’s stupidity. So, Detective Sergeant, I 
will see you tomorrow. If the chief doesn’t like it, the only way he’ll get 
me out of there is by formally suspending me, and as you’ve just agreed, he 
doesn’t have any grounds to do that. I won’t come into the investigation 
room in Pitt Street. I’ll go to our own office in Anderston instead.’

‘Then ye’ll see me there. The chief’s told me to shut down the Pitt 
Street room. He says the investigation’s went as far as it can, and there’s 
no point in our bein’ there any longer.’

‘Why?’ she asked, surprised. ‘Have we run out of leads?’

‘Worse than that. Everywhere we’ve gone, some bugger’s been there before 
us. See ye the morra.’

As Lottie hung the wall phone back on its cradle in the hallway, her eye was 
caught by a movement. She looked at the front door and saw a figure; it was 
unrecognisable, its shape distorted by the obscure glass, but she knew who it 
was. She felt a strange fluttering in her stomach, and realised that she was a 
little afraid. She thought of calling Dan back. She thought of going back into 
the living room and listening to loud music through her headphones.

But she did neither of those things. Instead her anger overcame her 
nervousness, and she marched to the door and threw it open.

Her husband stood on the step, with a key in his hand, wavering towards the 
Yale lock that was no longer within reach. She snatched it from him.

‘Gimme,’ he protested.

‘No danger. You’ll not be needing it any longer.’ She grabbed him by one 
of the lapels of his sports jacket and pulled him indoors.

‘Aw thanks, love,’ he sighed, misunderstanding her.

‘Thanks for nothing,’ she replied. ‘You won’t be staying. You’re as 
drunk as a monkey and I’m not putting on a show for the neighbours, that’s 
all.’

‘Ach Lottie, gie’s a break. I’m goin’ tae the fucking jail, is that not 
enough for you?’

‘That’s the last thing I want, you pathetic twat,’ she hissed. ‘What do 
you think that’s going to do for your son at the school? Every kid in the 
place will be pointing fingers at him and calling him names. The only thing 
that’ll save him from being bullied is that all of them know me. As for your 
slapper, though, that McGlashan, they can stick her in Cornton Vale for as long 
as they like.’

‘Leave Christine out of this,’ Scott snarled, lurching towards her.

‘I’d leave her out of the human race,’ she retorted, her voice filled 
with scorn. ‘And you take one more step towards me,’ she added, ‘and it 
won’t be a police car that’ll come for you, it’ll be an ambulance. It was 
you that brought her into it. I hope you’re happy that you’ve ruined her 
life as well as your own. If I didn’t feel the contempt for her that any 
woman would feel, and that any good police officer would feel five times over, 
I could actually find it in my heart to be sorry for the poor cow. Do you have 
the faintest idea how cruel you’ve been in even asking her to do what she 
did, far less in talking her into it?

‘I know you and she were at it before we met, and I suspect that you always 
have been, behind my big stupid plodding back. That can only mean that the daft 
bitch actually feels something for you. And that you’ve let her down just as 
badly as you’ve betrayed and shamed Jakey and me.’

She took him by the arm, as if she was arresting him and began to push him 
towards the door. ‘Now go,’ she ordered, ‘and don’t you ever come back 
here.’

‘Lottie,’ he pleaded, ‘gie’s a break.’

‘Certainly. Which arm would you prefer?’

‘Ah’ve got nowhere else tae go!’

‘No? Why don’t you just go to her place?’

‘Aye, that’ll be right. Her husband’s lookin’ for me as it is.’

‘Her what? Well, I’ll tell you what, you go down to the riverside and find 
yourself a nice bench to sleep on, so that if he comes here, I can tell him 
where to find you.’ She opened the front door and thrust him outside. ‘As 
soon as I get inside,’ she warned him, ‘I’m going to phone the station. 
If you’re seen within a mile of this house for the rest of the night, 
you’ll be lifted. But I won’t tell them to arrest you. Oh no, I’ll have 
them drive you to Christine McGlashan’s house, drop you there and ring the 
doorbell. You think I wouldn’t do that, you snivelling bastard?’ she 
challenged.

He shook his head.

‘Aye, damn right I would. You know, Scott, what I feel right now, looking at 
you? I feel ashamed that I let you father my son. Well, I tell you this. There 
is no way that I will let you pass your weakness on to him. It might hurt him 
for a bit, but you’re never going to see him again.’

With that, Charlotte Mann slammed the door on her husband, walked quietly into 
her living room, slumped into an armchair, and wept as she had never wept 
before.





Fifty-Five



‘It’s bloody warm in this city,’ Lowell Payne remarked, as they stood on 
the pavement outside Thames House.

‘It can be in the summer,’ Skinner conceded. ‘I have this theory that all 
big cities generate their own heat. Mind you, it can be cold here too. I 
remember, oh, must be twenty years ago now, standing here on Millbank one 
evening in February, with a wind whistling up the Thames that felt as if it had 
come all the way from Siberia. That’s still the coldest I’ve ever been in 
my life.’

‘Are we going to get a chilly reception in here, d’ you think?’

‘No, I don’t, but things may cool down quite a bit once we get going.’

‘Who are we meeting?’

‘I’m not absolutely certain. As things stand, our appointment is with 
Amanda Dennis, the deputy director of the service. Whether she has anyone with 
her, that may depend on whether she guesses why we’re here.’

‘What’s my role?’

‘You’re a witness,’ Skinner told him. ‘Did you do what I suggested?’

‘Tell Jean, you mean?’ Payne frowned. ‘No, I didn’t, I’m sorry. 
You’ve known her for longer than I have, so I shouldn’t have to tell you 
that if I just happened to mention casually that you and I were off to a 
top-level meeting with MI5 but I couldn’t tell her what it was about, she’d 
have gone into full worry mode, and not slept a wink. Did you tell Sarah?’

‘Of course. Sarah gave up worrying about me years ago.’

‘Did you tell her what the meeting’s about?’

‘No, and she didn’t ask. She’s used to me moving in mysterious ways. She 
calls me God, sometimes.’

The DCI grinned and shook his head. ‘What is it with you two?’

‘What do you think?’

‘Honestly?’

‘Always. I’d expect nothing else.’

‘I think that Aileen getting caught out with Joey Morocco came in very handy 
for both of you.’

‘What does Jean think?’ Bob asked.

‘There’s nothing for her to think about,’ Lowell told him, ‘as far as 
you and Sarah are concerned, not yet, but she’ll be fine. They didn’t know 
it at the time, but I heard her and Alex compare notes one day. Neither of them 
were too keen on Aileen.’

‘I know that now.’

‘I’ve got nothing against her, mind, but on the two occasions that I’ve 
met Sarah, I thought that she was a sensational woman and that the two of you 
together just filled the whole room.’

‘Maybe we did at that, Lowell. We lost our way for a while, that was all. I 
hope we’ve found it again.’

‘What’s made the difference?’

‘I’ve stopped living in the past. Recently, somebody very close to me told 
me that for the last twenty and a bit years, since Myra was killed in that 
bloody car, I’ve been in denial, that I’ve never accepted it, never moved 
on. I’ve come to accept that’s true. It drove Sarah and me apart, and with 
Aileen… I made myself see Myra in her, when in fact they couldn’t be more 
different. Myra was wild, self-indulgent and she lived her life on the spur of 
the moment. She was also promiscuous, as Jean may have told you, more than I 
ever was, even when I was single.

‘Aileen, on the other hand, is one of the most calculating people I have ever 
known. I don’t mean that unkindly, not any more, but everything she does is 
to a plan, and everyone around her must conform to it, even me.

‘She supports police unification for two reasons. One, she does believe in 
it, but two, she thought that it would make me leave the force and help her 
achieve her real ambitions, which don’t lie in Scotland, but down here, in 
Westminster.

‘I’m sure she’ll get there, but not with my help. As for me, as was said 
to me, my soul’s been broken, but Sarah’s helping me fix it, and I feel 
more at peace with myself than I have in years.’ He checked his watch. ‘And 
I’ll be even more so when we’ve done our business here. Are you all set?’

‘Yes, I’m ready.’

‘Good. Come on then, I like to be bang on time when I visit this place.’

They entered the headquarters of the Security Service through a modest door to 
the right of the building’s great archway, and stepped up to a reception desk 
that might have belonged to any civil service department. Skinner announced 
them to one of the uniformed staff. When he told the man that he had an 
appointment with Mrs Dennis, there was a subtle change in his attitude. He 
checked a screen that the police officers could not see, then nodded.

‘Yes, gentlemen,’ he announced. ‘I’ll let the DD know you’re here and 
she’ll send someone down to collect you.’ He made a quick phone call, then 
filled in two slips, which he inserted in plastic cases and handed them over, 
one to each. ‘These must be surrendered on leaving. Now, if you’ll follow 
me, I’ll check you in through our electronic security. It’s just like an 
airport, really.’

‘I know,’ Skinner said. ‘But I have a pacemaker so you’ll have to pat 
me down.’

‘That won’t be necessary, Rashid,’ a woman called out.

The chief constable looked over towards a line of lift doors and saw Amanda 
Dennis approach. ‘Oh, but it will,’ he insisted. ‘I’m not having your 
lot plant a gun on me when we get upstairs then say I carried it in.’

She laughed. ‘Damn it! There goes Plan A.’

The deputy director of MI5 was not what Lowell Payne had been expecting. In his 
mind he had pictured Dame Judi Dench, or someone like her. Instead he saw 
someone who was around fifty, with dark, well-cut hair and sparkling eyes that 
had none of the chilly aloofness that were a feature of her film and television 
equivalents.

‘Hi, Mandy,’ Skinner greeted her when the security search was over and he 
and Payne had retrieved their bags from x-ray. ‘Good to see you; this is DCI 
Payne, Lowell, my sidekick, but you’ll know that by now.’ He kissed her on 
the cheek. ‘You’re looking better than ever. Still finding time for the toy 
boy?’

She winked. ‘Shows, does it?’

‘Does he still think you work in a flower shop?’

‘No, it closed down. Now he thinks I’m a proof-reader in a law firm.’ She 
grinned. ‘Actually he knows exactly what I do. He’s a bright enough chap to 
read the parliamentary reports where my name crops up occasionally. You know 
how it is, Bob. It’s the junior ranks who have to be anonymous. Thanks to 
John bloody Major, the rest of us can’t.’

‘I know,’ he sympathised, as they stepped into a lift. ‘The Don Sturgeons 
of this world have to be protected, but you and Hubert can walk around with 
targets on your backs.’

‘Who on earth is Don Sturgeon?’ she remarked, but did not wait for an 
answer. ‘As for Hubert, why do you want to see me? He’s the director, not 
me.’

‘He’s also a prat, a Home Office toady dropped in here because the Prime 
Minister of the day decided the place needed some new blood, after that wee 
scandal you and I uncovered a couple of years back. He may have been the 
transfusion, but you’re still the heartbeat.’

The elevator stopped and they stepped out, then along a corridor. Mrs Dennis 
unlocked her office door and followed them into the room. It was oak-panelled 
and grandly furnished, in contrast to the utilitarian style of the reception 
area.

‘Welcome,’ she said. ‘We’ll use the conference table, but before we 
start, Bob, I assume you’d like coffee.’

He held up a hand. ‘No thanks, Amanda, I’ve signed the coffee pledge, and 
Lowell here had a Starbucks on the way up from Victoria. By the way,’ he 
added, ‘he was propositioned by a whore, sorry, that’s non-PC, by a sex 
worker in his hotel last night. Very English, could even have been public 
school. Three hundred quid. Isn’t that right, Lowell?’

‘Yes indeed, Chief. She said it was her way of paying off her mortgage.’

‘Unluckily for her, he’s a Jock, and a tight-fisted bastard like all of us. 
She wasn’t one of yours, was she?’

‘She could have been,’ the deputy director replied. ‘About a third of the 
women in this place fit that description. But if she was, she wasn’t on duty. 
We tend to use Russian girls, or Polish. That’s what our targets expect, and 
let’s face it, chaps,’ she winked, ‘have you ever met a posh English girl 
who really knew how to fuck?’

Skinner laughed out loud. ‘As a matter if fact I have, but you probably know 
about her. Likely she’s on my file.’

‘Come on, Bob,’ she chided him. ‘We don’t keep files on senior police 
officers.’

‘Of course you bloody do, Amanda. You keep files on everyone, apart from the 
odd militant Islamist who slips through the net and blows up a London bus. For 
example, you kept a file on Beram Cohen. I know that, because you sent my young 
friend Clyde Houseman through to see me last Saturday, to tell me who he was. 
What I didn’t understand at the time was why MI5 should know about Cohen. He 
wasn’t Islamic, he was Jewish. He wasn’t an internal security threat to us. 
No, he was an Israeli secret service operative who got compromised and had to 
vanish.’

‘Yes,’ she agreed, ‘and we helped, as you know by now. We did a favour 
via our friends in MI6, for their friends in Mossad, and took him on board.’

‘You turned him into Byron Millbank?’

She frowned and the change seemed to add a couple of years to her age in the 
time it took. ‘What a bloody stupid name! I was livid when I heard about it, 
but when it was done I wasn’t involved. I was running our serious crime 
division then.’

‘I imagine it flagged up with you as soon as my people ran a DVLA check on 
him.’

‘Yes, that’s how it happened.’

‘And as soon as it did, you broke into the Rondar offices and removed his 
computer.’

‘We did, as a precaution, although it turned out to be unnecessary. He seems 
to have kept his two identities absolutely separate.’

‘But you knew he still functioned as Beram?’

‘I did, and a very few others. Six advised us of a couple of operations he 
had undertaken for them and for the Americans. There was the one in Somalia, 
for example; that’s how we knew of the connection between him, Smit and 
Botha. As soon as you came looking for him, trying to identify his body, I knew 
that something was up.’

‘And you knew who the target was, but you didn’t tell me,’ Skinner said. 
‘Because MI5 wanted her dead.’

She stared back at him. ‘Of course not,’ she protested. ‘Why the hell are 
you saying that?’

Lowell Payne had been following the exchange, fascinated; he had sat in on, or 
led, hundreds of interviews during his career, and he realised what Skinner was 
doing. As Dennis spoke, he detected a very subtle shift in her posture, as if 
she had slipped, very slightly, on to the defensive.

‘Because I believe it’s true,’ the chief replied. ‘Twenty-four hours 
ago, I was simply curious about the chain of events, mostly because of Basil 
“Bazza” Brown. As you said earlier, Mandy, you used to run the serious 
crimes operation in this place. Inevitably that would involve you in suborning 
criminals up and down the country and turning them into informants, either 
through blackmail or bribery.

‘When we found Bazza’s body in the boot of Smit and Botha’s supposed 
getaway car… rented by Byron Millbank… and we checked him out through NCIS, 
they’d never heard of him. Now, Bazza might not quite have been one half of 
the Kray Twins, but he was a person of significant interest to Strathclyde CID 
and the Scottish Serious Crimes and Drugs Agency. So it just wasn’t feasible 
that he wouldn’t be on the national criminal database, unless he had been 
taken off it, and the only organisation I can think of with the clout to do 
that, is yours. Come on, he was an MI5 asset, wasn’t he? Give me that much.’

She sighed, then smiled. ‘I should have known,’ she murmured. ‘Yes, he 
was. I turned him myself.’

‘Thought so. By the way, was Michael Thomas involved in any way, my ACC?’

‘Yes, I had to involve him at one point, on pain of disgrace if he breathed a 
word. Why?’

‘It answers a question, that’s all. And gets him off a nasty hook.’ He 
paused, straightening in his seat. ‘Okay,’ he went on, ‘so you must see 
where I’m coming from. I’ve uncovered an operation in Scotland, planned by 
a man who is known to MI5. Then right in the middle, I find a key equipment 
supplier, eliminated to keep him quiet, and I discover that he was also known 
to you. At the very least that was going to start me wondering. You’ve got to 
concede that, chum.’

‘Yes, okay, I do. But answer me this. If we were behind it, why did I send 
Clyde Houseman through to see you, to tell you who Cohen was? Surely I’d have 
kept quiet about it all.’

‘No,’ Skinner murmured. ‘You wouldn’t have taken that chance. If you 
had you’d have been betting that I wouldn’t have found out about the 
operation on my own, without your help, and you know me too well for that. So 
you sent Clyde with his order, and with his personal connection to me to cloud 
my judgement.

‘I bought into him, but now I’ve come to believe that his job was to make 
sure that the hit went ahead; not to help me, but to get in my way, and to keep 
me from getting to the concert hall on time, by any means necessary.’

‘And I gave him orders to shoot you if he had to? Come on, old love,’ she 
protested.

‘No,’ he conceded, ‘just to fuck me about, to make sure we were chasing 
the wrong hare. It worked too. We didn’t find out that the target was female 
until it was too late. Even then, when we did, I still assumed that it was 
political, as Clyde had said, and that meant that it had to be Aileen, my 
wife.’

‘Bob,’ Dennis murmured. ‘This is all very flight of fancy. What on earth 
has brought it about?’

‘Two things. First, you told me that official MI5 policy has been to steer 
clear of cooperation with the Strathclyde Counter-Terrorism Intelligence 
Section because you didn’t trust Toni Field. But in fact I find out that 
you’ve had her under very close supervision, through Clyde Houseman, or Don 
Sturgeon, the identity he used to… how to say it… penetrate her.’

Amanda smiled and raised an eyebrow.

‘Second,’ Skinner continued, ‘I’ve solved a mystery.’

‘It seems to me that you’ve created one, but go on.’

‘Toni Field’s secret child, Lucille.’

‘Her what?’ Dennis exclaimed.

‘Come on, Mandy, Clyde must have told you she had a kid. The scar was a clear 
giveaway, as we found at her autopsy. As soon as I heard about it, I found 
myself wondering why. Why did she have to hide the fact, take a sabbatical and 
fuck off to Mauritius to have the baby under her old name?

‘A child wouldn’t have been a roadblock in her career, not these days, and 
not even as a single parent, for Toni’s mother’s hale and hearty and still 
young enough to help raise her, as she is doing.

‘So I started wondering who Daddy was, and I started to consider five people 
that Marina, her sister, told me about, five men in her life before they came 
to Scotland. The only problem was, Marina didn’t know them by name, only 
nickname.’

‘How inconvenient.’ Her tone was teasing, but Payne, the shrewd observer, 
detected tension beneath it.

‘Yeah. But somebody must have known one of them, somebody with the resources 
to hack into the Mauritian general registry and remove all records of the 
birth. If it hadn’t been for the hospital patient log, we’d never have been 
able to prove it happened at all. Nice one, my dear. Tell me, did you have to 
send someone to Mauritius or were you able to do it without leaving this 
building?’ He looked at her, inquiring, but she was silent.

‘Yup,’ he chuckled. ‘This week, it’s been a whole series of dead ends, 
until I found out about Mr Sturgeon and until a specialist thief of my 
acquaintance finally managed to get into Toni’s safe, in what’s now my 
office.’ He picked up his attaché case and opened it. ‘When I did, I found 
these.’ He removed two envelopes and placed them on the table.

Amanda Dennis frowned and pulled her chair in a little. She reached out for the 
envelopes, but Skinner drew them back. ‘All in good time,’ he said. 
‘There were three others, but their subjects were of no relevance to this, so 
I’ve destroyed them. These two, though, they tell a story.’

He removed the contents of the envelope marked ‘Bullshit’ and passed them 
across.

As the deputy director studied them, her eyebrows rose and her eyes widened. 
‘Bloody hell!’ she murmured.

‘I wondered if you knew about him,’ Skinner remarked. ‘Now, I gather that 
you didn’t. I expect you’ll find that when Toni was appointed to both West 
Midlands and Strathclyde, Sir Brian Storey gave her glowing testimonials, both 
times. I don’t like the man, so if you use these to bring him down, it 
won’t bother me.’

He picked up ‘Howling Mad’ and reached inside. ‘These, on the other hand, 
are a whole different matter.’ He withdrew several photographs. ‘I didn’t 
know who this bloke was at first,’ he said, as he handed them across, ‘the 
one she’s fucking, but I do now. Once he was Murdoch Lawton, QC, a real star 
of the English Bar. In fact he was such a big name that the Prime Minister gave 
him a title, Lord Forgrave, and brought him into the Cabinet as Justice 
Secretary.

‘There he sits at the table alongside his wife, Emily Repton, MP, the Home 
Secretary, the woman who controls this organisation, and to whom you and Hubert 
Lowery answer.’

She stared at the images. Even to Payne, that most skilled reader of 
expressions, she was inscrutable.

‘Those are bad enough,’ the chief constable told her, ‘even without 
this.’ He took Lucille Deschamps’ birth certificate from the envelope and 
laid it down. ‘You knew about it of course, since MI5 removed the original 
registration. Lawton knocked her up, fathered her child.’ He sighed, with 
real regret.

‘So now you see, my friend, how I’m drawn to the possibility that Toni 
Field was murdered by this organisation, to prevent her from advancing herself 
even further than she had already by blackmailing the woman at its head, and 
her husband.

‘Amanda, I don’t actually believe that you’d be party to that, which is 
why I’ve brought this to you and not to Lowery, who’d probably have the 
Queen shot if he was ordered to.’

Amanda Dennis leaned back, linked her fingers behind her head and looked up at 
the ceiling. ‘Oh dear, Bob,’ she sighed. ‘If only you hadn’t.’

As she spoke, a door at the far end of the room swung open and two people came 
into the room, one large, the other small, almost petite. Skinner had met the 
man before, at a secret security conference the previous autumn, not long after 
his appointment as Director of MI5, but not the woman. Nonetheless, he knew who 
she was, from television and the press.

Dennis stood; Payne followed her lead instinctively, but Skinner stayed in his 
seat. ‘Home Secretary,’ he exclaimed, ‘Hubert. Been eavesdropping, have 
we?’

‘No!’ the director snapped. ‘We’ve been monitoring a conversation that 
borders on seditious. To accuse us of organising a murder…’

‘Go back and listen to the recording that you’ve undoubtedly made,’ the 
chief constable said. ‘You’ll find no such accusation. I’m investigating 
a crime, and my line of inquiry has led me here. You people may think you’re 
off limits, but not to me.’

As Sir Hubert Lowery’s massive frame leaned over him, the chief recalled a 
day when, as a very new uniformed constable, he had policed a Calcutta Cup 
rugby international at Murrayfield Stadium, in which the man had played in the 
second row of the scrum, for England.

‘Skinner,’ the former lock hissed, ‘you’re notorious as a 
close-to-the-wind sailor, but this time you’ve hit the rocks.’

He pushed himself to his feet. ‘Get your bad analogies and your bad breath 
out of my face, you fat bastard,’ he murmured, ‘or you will need some 
serious dental work.’

Lowery leaned away, but only a little. Skinner put a hand on his chest and 
pushed, hard enough to send him staggering back a pace or two. ‘You were 
never any use on your own,’ he said. ‘You always needed the rest of the 
pack to back you up.’

‘Bob!’ Dennis exclaimed.

He grinned. ‘No worries, Amanda. He doesn’t have the balls.’

‘Probably not,’ the Home Secretary said, ‘but I do. Let me see these.’ 
She snatched up the photographs. ‘The idiot!’ she snapped as she examined 
them. ‘Bad enough to get involved with that scheming little bitch, but to let 
himself be photographed on the job, it’s beyond belief, it really is. Are 
these the only copies?’

‘I’d say so,’ Skinner replied, sitting once again. ‘Toni was too smart 
to leave unnecessary prints lying around. Plus, she thought she was 
untouchable.’ He took a memory card from the breast pocket of his jacket and 
tossed it on to the table. ‘I found that among the envelopes. The originals 
are on it.’

Emily Repton picked it up, and the birth certificate. She walked across to the 
deputy director’s desk and fed the photographs into the shredder that stood 
beside it. The memory card followed it. She was about to insert the birth 
certificate when Payne called out, ‘Hey, don’t do that! The child’s going 
to need it.’

The Home Secretary gave him a long look. ‘What child?’ she murmured. The 
shredder hummed once again. ‘Why did you give those up so easily?’ she 
asked the chief constable.

‘Because I’m a realist. I’ve been in this building before. I know what 
it’s about, and I know that there are certain things that are best kept below 
decks, as Barnacle Hubert the Sailor here might say. But they’re kept in my 
head too, and in DCI Payne’s.’

‘Sometimes it can be a lot harder to get out of here than to get in,’ 
Repton pointed out.

‘Not in this case,’ Skinner told her. ‘We’re being collected in about 
half an hour from the front of Thames House by Chief Superintendent McIlhenney, 
of the Met. If we’re any more than five minutes late, he will leave, and will 
come back, with friends.’

She smiled. ‘See, Sir Hubert. I said you were underestimating this man. 
What’s your price, our friend from the north?’

He pointed at Lowery. ‘He goes. Amanda becomes Director General, as she 
should have been all along. Then you go.’

‘What about my husband? Do you want his head too?’

‘Nah. I imagine you’ll cut his balls off as soon as you get him home for 
landing you in all this. I wouldn’t wish any more on the guy.’

‘I see.’ She frowned and pursed her lips, calling up an image from the past 
as she stood in her pale blue suit, with every blonde hair in place. ‘The 
first of those is doable, because you’re right: Sir Hubert isn’t up to the 
job, and Mrs Dennis is. The second, no, not a chance.’

‘No? You don’t think I’d bring you down?’

‘I don’t think you can. Okay, my husband had an affair with someone he met 
in the course of his work at the Bar and, unknown to him, fathered her child. 
I’ll survive that… and it’s all you have on me.’

Her mirthless smile was that of an approaching shark, and all of a sudden 
Skinner felt that the ground beneath his feet was a little less solid.

‘Explain, Amanda,’ she said.

‘We didn’t do it, Bob.’ His friend looked at him with sympathy in her 
eyes, and he found himself hating it. ‘When you asked to see me, I was afraid 
this was how it would develop. The thing is, we knew about the child, and we 
knew of Toni Field’s ambitions, which were, granted, without limits, but we 
felt they were pretty much contained.

‘We knew what the sabbatical had been about, even before she went on it. 
After we deleted the Mauritian birth record, we felt she had nothing to use 
against us, or against the Home Secretary, so we simply parked her in Scotland, 
with Brian Storey’s assistance. I can see now why he was so keen to help.’ 
She grinned, but only for a second.

‘We made her your problem, Bob, not ours. No, we didn’t know about the 
photos, but if we had, I’d have been relying on you or someone like you to 
find them, as you did. As for the birth certificate, well, we thought that had 
been dealt with.

‘Oh sure, she still had her career planned in her head, Scotland, and then 
the Met as Storey’s successor, but in reality, she’d never have got another 
job in England. Toni Field was a boil, that was all, and we thought we had 
lanced her, so there was no need to bump her off.’

‘So why did you plant Clyde with her?’ he asked. ‘To check whether she 
had any more damaging secrets?’

‘Bob, we never did! There was no liaison, there was no Don Sturgeon. Clyde 
never met the woman, I promise you.’

Skinner gaped at her as he experienced something for the first time in his 
life: the feeling of being a complete fool, dupe, idiot.

‘This is bluff,’ he exclaimed. ‘Repton’s laid down the party line for 
you.’ But as he did, he thought of his own ruse with Houseman, and knew that 
she was right.

‘I’m afraid not.’ She rose, walked across to her desk, and produced a 
paper, from a drawer. ‘This is a printout of the data we removed from the 
Mauritian files. It shows, along with everything else, the name and nationality 
of the person who registered the birth, and it even carries her signature.’

She handed it to him.

‘Marina Deschamps,’ he read, his voice sounding dry and strange.

‘Exactly. She’s how we came to know about the child, and who her father 
was. The same Marina who told you she didn’t know any of her sister’s 
lovers by name. Marina, who invented Toni’s relationship with Clyde Houseman. 
Marina, who it is now clear to me had her half-sister killed.’ She smiled at 
him once more, but with sadness in her eyes. ‘My dear, I’m sorry, but 
you’ve been played. The scenario you have in your head, about the Home 
Secretary having Toni assassinated, to keep her husband’s dark secret and to 
spare the government from possible collapse in the ensuing scandal, it’s 
plausible, I’ll admit, but it seems that Marina put it there. But don’t 
feel too bad about it,’ she added. ‘She was an expert. She used to be one 
of us.’

‘She what?’ he spluttered.

‘She worked here for five years, in MI5, with a pretty high security 
clearance. When she applied, she was with the Met, and Brian Storey recommended 
her for the job.’

‘Doesn’t that tell you something?’ he challenged her. ‘Given that Toni 
had Storey by the balls?’

‘With hindsight it does. But he may have done it to get himself a little 
protection from her. Marina left here when Toni took the job in Birmingham. 
That was our idea originally; we wanted to keep a continuing eye on her and she 
agreed to do it. She sold it to her sister, so well that she thought it was her 
own wheeze. Marina’s been keeping an eye on her all along.’

‘Did Toni ever know she was a spook?’ Payne asked, as his boss sat silent, 
contemplating what he had been told.

‘No, never.’ Dennis gave a soft chuckle. ‘Believe it or not, she also 
thought Marina worked in a flower shop, of sorts, after she left the Met. I can 
and will check, but I’m certain that while she was here she would have been 
in a position to know about Beram Cohen, and his second identity, and that 
she’d have known about poor old Bazza too.’

She looked at Skinner. ‘You do believe me, Bob, don’t you? If you don’t, 
there’s an easy way to test me. Call her, at home. Send a car to pick her up, 
under some pretext or other. She won’t be there, I promise you.’

He glared back at her. ‘Then tell me why,’ he demanded. ‘Tell me why she 
did it.’

‘If I knew,’ Amanda replied, ‘I would tell you, without hesitation. But I 
don’t. I don’t have a clue. All I can suggest is that you find her and ask 
her. However, if you do, and knowing you I imagine that you might, you must 
hand her over to us. None of the stuff that we’ve talked about here could 
ever come out in open court.’

‘Don’t you worry about that,’ he growled. ‘It won’t.’ He started to 
rise, Payne following.

‘Hold on just a moment,’ the Home Secretary said. ‘We’re not done yet, 
not quite. There is still the matter of your continuing silence on this 
business. I’m not letting you leave without that being secured.’

‘How are you going to do that? I’ve got nothing to gain, personally, by 
going public, but if you knew anything about Scots law and procedures, you’d 
realise that having begun the investigation I’m bound to report its findings 
to the procurator fiscal.’

‘Then it will have to be edited, otherwise…’

He looked at her, and realised that she was a rarity, a politician who should 
not, rather than could not, be underestimated. He had read a description of 
Emily Repton as ‘a prime minister in waiting, but not for much longer’. 
Feeling the force of the certainty that radiated from her, he understood that 
assessment.

‘Otherwise?’ he repeated.

‘Show him, Sir Hubert,’ she murmured.

‘No,’ Skinner countered, ‘I don’t listen to him. You tell me.’

‘Very well.’ She reached out a hand; Lowery took a plastic folder from his 
pocket and passed it to her.

She selected a photograph and held it up. ‘You seem to have recovered well 
from the public break-up of your marriage, Chief Constable. This was taken 
early this morning, as you left the home of your former wife.’

‘So what?’ he laughed. ‘Our children are with her just now, and I wanted 
to see them.’

‘But you have joint custody; you’ll see them at the weekend.’

He snatched the image from her, crumpled it, and threw it on the floor. ‘Go 
on, then,’ he challenged her. ‘Leak it and see what follows. I’ll tell 
the Scottish media that it’s a Tory plot to discredit me. See those two words 
“Tory plot”? In Scotland they’re a flame to the touch paper. They’ll be 
on you like piranha. You’ve got to do better than that.’

‘I can. Your ex-wife is an American citizen. Now that you and she are no 
longer married, she’s here because she’s been given right to remain. That 
can be revoked.’

‘We’d see you in court if you tried that.’

‘It would have to be an American court; we’d have her removed inside 
twenty-four hours.’

‘And twenty-four hours after that I’m on a plane to New York and we 
remarry. Come on, Home Secretary, up your game. You still need to do better.’ 
And yet, as he spoke, he sensed that she could, and that her first two shots 
had been mere range-finders.

‘If you insist,’ she replied, and her voice told him that he had been 
right. ‘It might come as a surprise to you to learn that your present 
wife’s liaison with Mr Joey Morocco has been going on for years. It began 
before you met and it continued during your marriage.’

She took a series of photographs from the folder and handed them to him. He 
glanced through them; they showed Aileen and the actor at various locations: in 
a garden with Loch Lomond stretched out below them, on the balcony of her 
Glasgow flat, leaving a hotel in a street he did not recognise. None of them 
were explicit, but they displayed intimacy clearly enough.

He handed them back, and shrugged. ‘Sorry, no surprise,’ he said. ‘Nor is 
it my business any more either. By the way, after the Daily News photos you 
might be able to sell those to Hello! or OK! but nobody else is going to buy 
them.’

‘Probably not,’ Repton conceded, ‘but every newspaper in the country 
would run this, front page. The trouble with our modern celebrity culture is 
that it’s so damn predictable. Where there are actors, there are the 
inevitable parties, with the same inevitable temptations. Most politicians have 
the sense to steer clear of them, but not, it seems, Ms de Marco.’

She took the last two items from the folder and gave them to him. The 
photographs had been taken in a ladies’ toilet. There were three washbasins 
set into a flat surface, with a mirrored wall above.

The first picture showed two women, expensively clad, watching while a third, 
her face part-hidden by her hair, bent over a line of white powder, with a tube 
held to her nose. In the second, all three women were standing, their laughter, 
and their faces, reflected in the mirror.

He stared at it, then at Emily Repton with pure hatred in his eyes.

‘The original is in a place of safety,’ Sir Hubert Lowery barked. ‘Not 
here, though, just in case Mrs Dennis feels obliged to do a favour for an old 
friend. I don’t have to tell you…’

Skinner moved with remarkable speed for a man in his early fifties. He moved 
half a pace forward and hit the Director General with a thunderous, hooking, 
left-handed punch that caught him on the right temple. The man’s legs turned 
to spaghetti and he was unconscious before he hit the floor.

‘I’ve wanted to do that,’ he murmured, ‘ever since I saw him blindside 
our outside half at Murrayfield.’

‘I did warn him,’ Amanda Dennis remarked. ‘I told him you’d want to hit 
somebody, and since he’d be the only man in the room…’

‘He’ll be all right,’ the chief growled. ‘His skull’s too thick and 
his brain’s too small for there to be any lasting damage.’

He turned to Emily Repton. Her eyes told him she had enjoyed the show. ‘Spell 
it out,’ he told her.

She nodded. ‘Hard man, soft centre,’ she said. ‘Your marriage may be 
over, but I don’t believe you would wish to cause Ms de Marco the damage, the 
distress and the disgrace that would follow publication of those images. The 
fact that it was a one-off doesn’t matter. Her career would be gone, way 
beyond the U-bend, and so would her employable life. As indeed it will, if one 
single line in one single newspaper, or blog, should ever link my husband to 
Antonia Field and her child.

‘You can write your report to the procurer physical or whatever he’s 
called. It will say that your investigation has reached the conclusion that the 
balance of probability is that Chief Constable Field’s killing was ordered 
and funded by Mexican or Colombian drug cartels that she compromised during her 
time with the Serious and Organised Crime Agency. There will be not the 
slightest hint of impropriety by the Security Service.’

She frowned. ‘I’m not going to ask if you agree. There is no alternative on 
the table; you will do what you’re told. Go back to Scotland, Mr Skinner, and 
be the big provincial copper in your little provincial pond. This is London; 
the power will always lie here. If you can’t live with that truth, you could 
always resign.’

Skinner stared down at her, unblinking, until the coldness in his eyes made her 
shiver and look away.

‘You really don’t know me, Home Secretary,’ he told her. ‘My report’s 
already dictated and that is more or less what it says. Even if my suspicions 
had been one hundred per cent right, there would have been no mileage for me in 
pulling this building down.’

He nodded towards Lowery, who was beginning to stir on the floor. ‘Getting 
rid of him will do nicely thanks, and I’ve shown you why that has to 
happen.’

‘Agreed,’ Repton said.

‘But you are right,’ he continued, ‘that I won’t see Aileen broken by 
you. Hell, woman, I know you and Lowery set her up. Any idiot, even me, could 
see that. She can’t hold her booze at the best of times, and I can tell from 
the photo she was rat-arsed when that all went off. I’m sure that if I could 
identify the two other women, I’d find that at least one was on Five’s 
payroll.

‘But that’s by the by; I’ll go along with your deal. Your husband’s 
safe. If you’re prepared to tolerate his adultery, that’s your business. 
I’ve never met the man, so he really means nothing to me. Plus, I have no 
practical need to remove him, since he isn’t in my sphere of influence.’

‘That’s pragmatic of you,’ she mocked, her tone heavy with sarcasm.

‘But you are,’ he snapped, as he picked up his case. ‘And you disgust me. 
You’re the embodiment of everything I loathe about politics and politicians. 
Frankly, I don’t want to be any part of any world in which someone like you 
operates, and there are only two things I can do about that. So I’ll go back 
to my provincial, sub-national pond, and I will work out which one it’s going 
to be.’





Fifty-Six



‘No thanks, Amanda, I’ll pass on that one personally. Maybe I’ll send 
Lowell Payne instead. I was impressed by the way he handled himself the other 
day, and it’s persuaded me that he’s the man to take over what was a 
vacancy as head of CTIS.

‘He’s in post already. It wouldn’t be right of me to come, when I might 
not be a police officer for much longer. You take care now, and watch your back 
as long as that woman’s standing behind you.’

He ended the call and slipped his mobile into the big canvas bag that lay by 
his side.

‘What was that about?’ Sarah asked. They were sitting on a travelling rug 
on the beach at Gullane, watching their two sons trying to persuade Seonaid 
that the seawater was as warm as they said.

‘Amanda Dennis,’ he said. ‘She’s having a two-day review of the Field 
fiasco in London, on Monday and Tuesday. It’s a natural response: what went 
wrong and how to prevent any recurrence. She said she’s ordered Houseman and 
his entire Glasgow team down there, and asked if I wanted to attend.’

‘Were you serious in what you said to her?’

‘About Lowell? Sure. He never wavered in there and he turned out to be very 
good at reading people. He’s a natural for the job, and it gives me grounds 
to give him an acting promotion, without anyone calling it nepotism. Mind 
you,’ he chuckled, ‘Jean wouldn’t be too pleased if I send him off to 
London again so soon, so I don’t think I’ll pass on the invite.’

She shook her head. ‘I didn’t mean were you sure about Lowell. I was 
talking about the last part. Do you really mean that?’

‘I think I do,’ he said. ‘I am edging myself towards walking away from 
the Strathclyde job and leaving the police service altogether, as soon as I 
can. All the way back from London I argued the toss with myself, and I still am 
arguing. It’s doing my head in. I never wanted to destroy the Security 
Service itself, only to sort any people that might have crossed the line. I’m 
a realist, I understand how the world has to work at times. But given what I 
knew, or thought I knew, I had some questions that needed answers.

‘As it was, I got it wrong, although not all of it: the Home Secretary did 
misuse her position by having Lowery delete the Mauritian birth record. Now 
I’m being blackmailed by Emily Repton herself, to save her husband’s 
reputation and both their careers. You should have heard her, and seen her. 
That woman is fucking evil.’

‘She threatened me? Really?’

‘Yes, but we both knew that was crap; that was just her way of telling me how 
far she could reach into my life. I’ve taken legal advice since. Your 
passport may be American, but your children are British. There isn’t a judge 
in Scotland who’d allow your deportation.’

‘But her threat against Aileen? Is that for real?’

Bob nodded. ‘Oh yes. She went with Morocco to a party in Glasgow, after the 
premiere of a movie he was in. They’d been watching the pair of them for long 
enough to be fairly sure she would go, especially since I was at a security 
conference that MI5 had set up.

‘While Joey was away schmoozing the press, Hubert Lowery’s two women got 
her shit-faced, possibly with a little chemical assistance, then set up the 
cocaine scene in the toilets. I know all this because Amanda made Lowery tell 
her as he was clearing his desk.’

‘How did she make him cough that up?’

He gave a bitter laugh. ‘She threatened to tell me where he lives. That was 
enough.’

‘Can Amanda do anything about it, now she’s in the top job?’

‘Not with Emily Reptile as Home Secretary.’

‘If you had been right, and Toni Field had been killed on Repton’s orders, 
what would you have done?’

‘As much as I could, although that might not have been a lot, since so many 
of the players are dead and so much of it is deniable.’

‘Are you really satisfied that isn’t what happened?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, I’m sure. I got taken. As Mandy suggested, I did send a 
car to pick up Marina, as soon as I got out of there. She’d gone, right 
enough. Sofia thought she was just shopping… or so she said… but she 
hasn’t been seen since. Amanda was right. The woman made me look like an 
idiot. Hell, I am an idiot! She fed me little hints to steer me in the 
direction she wanted, towards them and away from her.

‘That last scene, her identifying Clyde Houseman as Toni’s mystery lover, 
that was the final piece of the con. I bought it, like an absolute sucker, and 
went charging off down to London, to commit professional suicide.’

‘It wasn’t suicide,’ Sarah insisted. ‘You don’t need to do anything 
so drastic as quit.’ She paused. ‘Don’t go off on me for asking this, but 
could this depression from which speaking as a doctor, you are clearly 
suffering, be related to the fact that you feel humiliated, embarrassed, and 
maybe even a little unmanned by what this Marina woman did to you?’

‘Why should I take the hump?’ he asked. ‘It’s a fair question. But the 
answer’s no. At the time, sure, I had a red face. Now, I see it the same as a 
golf game. Marina was good, and so was I. But where I shot a birdie, she had an 
eagle. When that happens out there on Gullane Number One, you don’t give up 
the game. You say to the other guy, “Good shot,” and then you stuff him at 
the next hole. If I leave the force, it’ll be because I can’t go after 
Repton from within it. But whatever happens, I’m going to find Marina 
Deschamps.’

She looked at him, a little afraid of the answer to the question she was about 
to pose. ‘When you find her, what will you do?’

‘I could eliminate her,’ he told her. ‘As long as I don’t do it in the 
middle of Piccadilly Circus at rush hour, I really don’t believe anyone would 
want to know. Too many guilty secrets.’ He stopped, then laughed at the alarm 
on her face. ‘I could,’ he repeated, ‘but don’t worry, I won’t. There 
is an alternative.’

He jumped up from the rug. ‘Come on, let’s go and paddle with the kids. The 
water can’t be that cold.’

‘Okay.’ She took his hand and let him pull her to her feet, then laughed, 
as his phone sounded. ‘I thought you were going to leave that at home,’ she 
said.

‘Force of habit. I’ll ignore it.’

‘Hell no,’ she retorted, fishing it out of their beach bag. ‘You’ll 
fret if you do that.’ She handed it to him. ‘It’s Mario.’

‘Ah, that’s different.’ He took it from her and accepted the call. 
‘What is it?’ he asked. ‘Has Paula had the baby?’

‘She has indeed,’ the new father replied. ‘Wee Eamon put in an appearance 
about half an hour ago. Like shelling peas, the midwife said, although not 
within Paula’s hearing.’

‘Big fella, that is absolutely great, I am so pleased for you both.’

‘In that case, you’re going to be even more pleased. About two hours ago a 
bloke walked into the St Leonards office with a bag that he found when he was 
sorting old clothes from one of those public recycling points. It was mixed up 
among them all, and there was a laptop inside it, wrapped in a shirt with a 
Selfridges label on it. The battery was flat, but the desk staff found a 
charger and plugged it in. When they switched it on, it said “Byron’s 
MacBook”. I reckon we’ve found your man Cohen’s missing computer.’

Looking at Bob, Sarah saw his face light up, saw all his gloom and pessimism 
evaporate, and she knew that whatever he had been told, it had been a tipping 
point in his life.

‘Mario,’ she heard him exclaim, ‘that’s brilliant. It means the 
show’s back on the road. I’d like it in Glasgow in my office, by Monday 
morning.’ She thought he was about to end the call, but he went on, as if an 
afterthought had come to him just in time.

‘One other thing,’ he added. ‘I want to see wee Ramsey again, but not in 
my office. Find him and tell him I’ll be shopping in Fort Kinnaird at noon 
tomorrow and that I’ll fancy a hot dog from the stall by the crossing. 
There’ll be one in it for him as well if he turns up.’





Fifty-Seven



‘Welcome back, Detective Inspector,’ Skinner said, with feeling. He jerked 
his thumb in Provan’s direction. ‘This little bugger’s been intolerable 
since you’ve been away.’

‘Tell me about it,’ Lottie chuckled. ‘He’s never been off the bloody 
phone. He’ll be wanting to adopt me next.’

‘Everything’s all right at home, is it?’ Her eyes went somewhere else for 
a second. ‘Sorry,’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s none of my business and if you 
don’t want to talk about it, that’s fine by me.’

‘Not at all, Chief, not at all,’ she replied. ‘I had a tough couple of 
days, but I’m okay now. Scott’s living with his brother out in Airdrie… 
at least that was the address they gave when he made his court appearance this 
morning. He turned up at the house again on Saturday, but he was sober, and it 
was only to collect his clothes.’

‘Did you know that Sergeant…’

Her nod stopped him in mid-sentence. ‘Yes, I was told. Her husband got 
himself arrested for thumping her. I’d have put in a word for him if he’d 
battered Scott, but he must have decided that hitting her was less risky. Maybe 
she’s with him now. I don’t know and I don’t want to. Jakey’s come to 
terms with the fact that his dad won’t be back, and that’s all I’m 
worried about.’

‘Of course,’ Skinner agreed. ‘He’s the most important person involved. 
Right,’ he exclaimed, ‘if we’re all ready, let me explain to you what 
this is about.’ He smiled. ‘They thought it was all over…’ he chuckled. 
‘But no, thanks to a large slice of luck, the game may still be on…’ He 
rose, stepped over to his desk, and returned holding a laptop, which he laid on 
the table. ‘. . . and those who don’t believe in miracles may like to have 
a rethink. That, lady and gentleman, is Byron Millbank’s missing MacBook, the 
place where his wife told Detective Superintendent Payne that he kept his whole 
life. Normally,’ he continued, ‘there would have been a team of experts 
huddled over it for a week, trying to work out the password. In this case Byron 
gave us an unwitting clue, when he said to Mrs Millbank that the chances of 
getting into it were the same as winning the Lottery.

‘So we had her rummage about among his personal things, and guess what she 
found? Yup, a payslip for a lottery season ticket.’ He opened the computer to 
reveal a slip of paper, with six twin-digit numbers noted on it. ‘There you 
are,’ he said, and slid the slim computer across to Mann.

‘Has anyone looked at it?’ she asked.

‘No, it’s all yours. I want you and that bright young lad Paterson to get 
into it, and see if you can find anything that doesn’t relate to the dull and 
fairly uneventful life of Mr Byron Millbank but to the rather more colourful 
world of Beram Cohen.’

‘What about me, Chief?’ Provan asked, with a hint of a rumble. ‘Am Ah too 
old for that shite?’

Skinner threw him a sharp look. ‘Almost certainly,’ he said. ‘But as it 
happens I’ve got something else in mind for you. I want you to get back on to 
your friends in Mauritius, and find the birth registration of Marina Deschamps. 
She’s thirty-two years old, so the probability is that it will be a paper 
record. Birth date, April the ninth, so you’ll know exactly where to look.’

‘Marina Day Champs? The last chief’s sister?’

‘Not quite,’ Skinner corrected him. ‘The last chief’s missing 
half-sister. There are things I don’t know about that lady, and I want to.’

‘Can Ah no’ just ask her mother?’

‘No chance. You do not go near her mother. Leave that to CTIS, Superintendent 
Payne’s new team. She says she doesn’t know where her daughter’s gone, 
but we’re tapping her phone, just in case. Like mother like daughters? You 
never know.’





Fifty-Eight



‘The chief seems in better form today,’ Dan Provan remarked, as they 
stepped back into the suite in Pitt Street that he had left the week before. 
‘When Ah saw him on Thursday, when Ah wis closing this place up, he wis like 
a panda that discovered he’d slept in and missed his big date wi’ Mrs 
Panda.’

‘Why’s he interested in Marina Deschamps all of a sudden?’ Lottie Mann 
pondered.

‘How come you can say that and Ah cannae? Day Champs.’

‘Possibly because I have a wider outlook on life than you, and expose myself 
to other cultures,’ she suggested. ‘You’ve got no interest in anything 
that doesn’t involve crime, real or imaginary.’

‘Maybe no’, but Ah’m shit hot at that. Ah’ve thought about puttin’ ma 
name up for Mastermind.’

Beside him Banjo Paterson spluttered.

‘You can laugh, son, but tell me, how many murders was Peter Manuel convicted 
of?’

‘Eight.’

‘No, seven. One charge wis dropped for lack of evidence. What was Baby Face 
Nelson’s real name?’

‘Who was Baby Face Nelson?’

‘Eedjit. Lester Gillis. What was Taggart’s first sergeant called?’

‘Mike?’

‘Naw, he wis the second. It was Peter, Peter Livingstone.’

‘Enough!’ Lottie Mann laughed. ‘If they ever have a “Brain of 
Cambuslang” contest you might be in with a shout, but until then stop 
showboating for the lad. All these things happened before he was born.’

‘So did Christmas,’ Provan retorted, ‘but he knows all about that.’

He shuffled off to the desk he had adopted, and dug out the old-fashioned 
notebook that was still his chosen style of database. He opened it at the most 
recent entries and found the number of the Mauritian government. He keyed it in 
and waited.

‘Mr Bachoo, please, Registry Department,’ he asked. ‘Tell him it’s DS 
Provan again, Strathclyde Police in Glasgow, Scotland.’

Paterson grinned across at him. ‘You didn’t have any problem with that 
name,’ he said.

‘It sounds like a sneeze. Yes, Mr Bachoo,’ he carried on, without a pause, 
‘it’s me again. Ah’ve got another request for ye, another registration 
Ah’m trying to trace. This one goes back thirty-two years, but Ah’ve got a 
birth date this time: April the ninth. The name of the wean… Ah mean the 
child, is Marina Day Champs. Could ye do that for me?’

‘Without difficulty,’ the official replied. ‘That period has not been 
computerised yet, and the records are kept on this floor. This time, could you 
hold on, please. Last week I was reprimanded for making a foreign call without 
permission.’

‘Aye sure. Sorry about that; your bean counters must be worse than ours.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Nothin’, nothin’. Ah’ll hold on.’

He leaned back in his chair, the phone pressed loosely to his ear, expecting 
more Bollywood music but hearing instead only the background chatter of an 
open-plan office. He glanced across at Paterson’s desk but saw that it was 
empty, and guessed that the DC and DI were pressing on with their task.

He passed the time by listing, mentally and chronologically, the fictional 
officers who had been Jim Taggart’s colleagues and successors, and the names 
of the actors who had played them. He was wondering, not for the first time, 
about the real relationship between Mike and Jackie, when he heard the phone in 
Mauritius being picked up.

‘I have it,’ Mr Bachoo announced, sounding pleased with himself. ‘The 
child Marina Shelby Deschamps, Mauritian citizen, was born in Port Louis on the 
day you mentioned and registered on the following day. The mother was Sofia 
Deschamps, Mauritian citizen, and the father, who registered the birth, is 
named as Hillary, with two ls, Shelby, Australian citizen. I could fax this 
document to you; my superior has given me permission.’

‘If ye would, Ah’d appreciate that.’ He scrambled through the papers on 
the desk, and found the Pitt Street fax number, which he read out, digit by 
digit. ‘Thanks, Mr Bachoo. Ah’m pretty sure that’ll be all.’

‘It was a pleasure, Detective Sergeant. As I believe you say, no worries.’

Provan smiled as he hung up, then added the name he had been given to his 
notebook. ‘Hillary Shelby,’ he murmured. ‘Hillary Shelby.’ And then he 
frowned, as another potential Mastermind answer popped out of his mental 
treasure chest.

‘Hillary Shelby,’ he repeated as he booted up his computer. ‘Now that 
name definitely rings a bell.’





Fifty-Nine



‘So what have we got here?’ Banjo Paterson asked himself, with his DI 
looking over his shoulder. ‘Standard MacBook screen layout. Let’s see where 
he keeps his email. Mmm, he’s got Google Chrome loaded up as well as Safari. 
Probably means he used that as his search engine. Let’s see.’

He clicked on a multicoloured icon at the foot of the screen. ‘Yes,’ he 
murmured with satisfaction as a window opened. ‘Big surprise, I don’t 
think; the Rondar mail order site is his home page. Let’s see what else 
he’s bookmarked. Okay, he’s got a Google account for his email.’

He clicked on a red envelope, with a two-word description alongside. ‘Byron 
mail.’

‘Auto sign-in,’ he murmured. ‘Lucky us, otherwise we’d have had to go 
back to the IT technicians to crack his password. His email address is Byron at 
Rondar dot co dot UK. Here we go.’

He inspected the second window. ‘That’s his inbox. He’s got three 
unopened messages… What the hell?’ He opened one headed ‘National 
Lottery’. ‘Oh dear.’ It was half sigh, half laugh. ‘The poor 
bastard’s lottery ticket came up last Wednesday; he matched four balls and 
won ninety-nine quid.’

He hovered the cursor over an arrow and the next message opened. It was from 
someone called Mike, confirming a squash court booking on the following 
Thursday for a semi-final tie in the club knock-out competition.

‘Lucky boy, Mike,’ Mann muttered. A wicked grin crossed her face. ‘Let me 
in,’ she told Paterson, leaned across him and keyed in a reply. ‘Can’t 
make it, have to scratch; good luck in the final.’ She hit the send button.

‘Should you have done that, boss?’ the DC asked, as she backed off.

‘Maybe not, but the guy deserved to know. Go on.’

He moved on to the last unopened message. The sender was identified as 
‘Jocelyn’ also using the Rondar mail system. ‘The mother-in-law, as I 
understand it,’ the DI told him.

‘Mother-in-law from hell, in that case,’ Paterson replied. ‘Look at 
this.’

Mann peered at the screen, and read:

I have just received the latest quarterly management accounts. These show an 
operating loss of just under seventy-seven thousand pounds and make this the 
seventh successive quarter in which this company has lost money. Our auditors 
estimate that at this rate we will be insolvent by the end of the next 
financial year.



I have analysed the situation and have reached the inescapable conclusion that 
we have been on the slide since your father-in-law passed away. He and I always 
knew that the key to this business is not only what we sell but, as 
importantly, what we buy. We have to offer our customers attractive products at 
attractive prices while maintaining our profit margins. When Jesse was our 
buyer, we were able to do so very successfully. He was sure that when you took 
over from him, this would be maintained, but it is now clear to me that this 
confidence was misplaced.





I cannot allow this situation to continue, simply to sit on my hands and watch 
my company go out of existence. Son-in-law or not, I am going to have to 
relieve you of your duties and to declare you redundant. You and I both know 
that you are not suited to this line of work and never have been. So does Golda 
but she is too loyal to admit it. I intend to handle the buying function 
myself, with the assistance of my niece Bathsheba. When we are back in profit, 
Golda can expect to receive dividend income, but until then you are on your own.





‘Lovely,’ the DI said. ‘Byron Millbank doesn’t seem to have had a hell 
of a lot of luck.’

‘Neither did Beram Cohen,’ Paterson pointed out, ‘culminating in them 
both being in a cool box in the mortuary.’

‘Aye, but we’re not so lucky ourselves. This doesn’t tell us anything 
about Cohen, and that’s what we’re after. How about old emails? Could there 
be anything there?’

‘I’m checking that, but I don’t see anything. There’s nothing filed or 
archived, not that I can see. I’ve checked the bin and even that’s empty. 
He must have done that manually, the sign of a careful man.’

‘What about the rest of it, other than his correspondence?’

‘Gimme a few minutes. Please, gaffer.’ He looked up at her. ‘I don’t 
really work best with somebody looking over my shoulder.’ He smiled. ‘A mug 
of tea wouldn’t go amiss, though.’

‘You cheeky bastard,’ she exclaimed. ‘I’m the DI, you’re the DC; 
you’re the bloody tea boy around here. However, in this situation… how many 
sugars do you take?’

‘Me? None, thanks. Just milk.’

She left him in her room and crossed the main office. She glanced across at 
Provan, but he had his back to her and a phone to his ear. She shook the kettle 
to check that it was full, then switched it on. And watched. And waited.

As she did, her mind wandered to her shattered family. Scott had been remanded 
on bail to a future court hearing, and to its inevitable conclusion. He had 
shown some contrition when he had come for his clothes, but she had smelled 
stale alcohol on his breath, and that had been enough to maintain her resolve. 
There would be no way back for him, no way, Jose.

And for her? There would be nothing other than her career, and bringing up her 
son. I will not be making that mistake again, she told herself. There are no 
happy endings; sooner or later fate will always kick you in the teeth . . . and 
very much sooner if your husband is an alcoholic gambler who was shagging 
another woman within the first year of your marriage.

The forgotten kettle broke into her thoughts by boiling. She made the tea, 
three mugs, one for Provan, stewed, as he liked it, distributed them and sat at 
her desk, waiting patiently for Banjo to finish his exploration of the dead 
man’s double life.

Eventually he did, and turned towards her. ‘Byron Millbank,’ he announced, 
‘liked Celine Dion, Dusty Springfield, Black Sabbath, Alan Jackson, and 
Counting Crows, at least that’s what his iTunes library indicates. He loved 
his wife and child, respected his late father-in-law but had no time for his 
mother-in-law. That’s obvious from a study of his iPhoto albums. There’s 
only one photograph of her on it, it’s as unflattering as you can get and 
it’s captioned “Parah”, which I’ve just discovered is Hebrew for 
“Cow”.

‘He was a fan of Arsenal Football Club, not unnaturally, given where he 
lived. He had an American Express Platinum card, personal, not through the 
company. He had an Amazon Kindle account and his library included the complete 
works of Dickens and Shakespeare, the biography of Ronald Reagan and a dozen 
crime novels by Mark Billingham, Michael Jecks and Val McDermid.

‘He had an Xbox and liked war games, big time. His most visited websites were 
Wikipedia, Sky News, the BBC and ITV players, the CIA World Factbook, and a 
charity called Problem Solvers.’

‘Wow!’ Mann exclaimed, with irony. ‘How much more typical could this man 
have been? You’re just described Mr Average Thirty-something.’

The DC nodded. ‘Agreed. There is nothing out of the ordinary about him at 
all… apart from one thing. The charity: it doesn’t exist. And that’s 
where he does get interesting.’





Sixty



‘It’s not a charity at all, sir,’ Paterson ventured. ‘If you ask me, 
it’s more of a doorway.’

‘Explain,’ Skinner said.

‘It’s the website, sir. It’s called www dot problemsolvers dot org. Dot 
org domains used to be just for charities, but these days that’s not 
necessarily so. To be sure I checked with the Charities Commission; they’ve 
never heard of it.

‘On top of that,’ the DC continued, ‘it’s weird in another way. It’s 
password protected. I only got in because Millbank was careless in one respect: 
he saved his passwords on his computer, thinking, I suppose, that nobody else 
would ever use it.’

‘When you did get in there, what did you find?’ the chief constable asked.

‘Nothing much; it’s very simple. I’m sure he set it up himself. There’s 
just the two pages. The home page has only six words: “Personnel problems? 
Discreet and permanent solutions.” Then there’s a message board. But 
there’s no history on the site at all. He’s wiped it all. However, there is 
one message still up on the board. It’s possible that he left it there 
because the reply will go automatically to the sender, without Millbank ever 
needing to know who he was.’

‘Not Millbank, Cohen,’ Skinner countered. ‘This is definitely Beram 
Cohen. You’ve found him. What did the message say?’

‘Confirm payment made as agreed, to sort code eighty-one forty twenty-two, 
account number zero six nine five two one five one.’

‘Have you followed it up?’

‘Not yet, sir.’

‘Then do so, tomorrow morning. Wherever the bank is it’ll have knocked off 
for the day by now. When you find it, trace the source of the payment and find 
out if any withdrawals have been made from it lately. Lottie, Banjo, that’s 
good work.’ He turned to Provan. ‘Now, Sergeant, you’re clearly bursting 
your braces to tell me something. It’s your turn, so out with it.’





Sixty-One



‘Is this not a real bore for you, Davie?’ Skinner asked his driver, as they 
passed the clubhouse that welcomed golfing visitors to Gullane, and picked up 
speed. ‘Same round trip every day, sometimes twice a day.’

‘Absolutely not, Chief,’ Constable Cole replied. ‘I love driving, 
especially nice big motors like this one. I’ve done all the advanced courses 
there are, too. When I get moved out of this job, as I will, ’cos nothing’s 
for ever, I’m going to try to get a spot as an instructor.’

‘Good for you. But don’t you ever miss the company? Most cops work in 
pairs. Most cops meet people through their work… even if some of those are 
rank bad yins.’ He laughed at his own words. ‘Listen to me,’ he 
exclaimed. ‘Second week in post and I’m lapsing into Weegie-speak already. 
I’m spending too much time with that wee bugger Provan, that’s what it is. 
Maybe being a lone wolf isn’t such a bad thing.’

‘Maybe not,’ Cole agreed.

‘No, but seriously, does this never get to you? Don’t you ever get the urge 
to see some action?’

The constable tilted his head back slightly, to help his voice carry into the 
back seat. ‘The last action I saw, Chief, was over two years ago. We got a 
call to a cesspit of a housing scheme they’d used as accommodation for asylum 
seekers. Some of the neighbourhood Neds had given one of their kids a 
going-over and the dads went after them, mob-handed. It went into a 
full-blooded riot. My crew was sent in there with shields, batons and helmets, 
to re-establish order, we were told.’ He chuckled. ‘There hadn’t been any 
proper order in that place for about five years, so they were asking quite a 
lot of us.

‘Anyway, we waded in, and got the two sides separated. Just as well, because 
the local hooligans had turned out in force. They were winning the battle and 
there would have been fatalities if we hadn’t stopped it. What we done, in 
effect, was protect the immigrants, but they never seen it that way. We had 
tearaways coming at us with swords and machetes, and behind us the foreigners 
were chucking bottles, rocks, all sorts of shit at us.’

Skinner glanced at the rear-view mirror as he paused, and saw him frown.

‘Those riot helmets, sir,’ he continued, ‘they’re pretty good, but if 
somebody drops a television set on you from the balcony of a third-floor flat, 
there’s only so much protection they can give. It probably saved my life, but 
I still had a skull fracture, three displaced vertebrae in my neck and a broken 
shoulder. I was off work for nearly a year. When I came back they sent me on an 
advanced driving course. I did well at it. When Chief Constable Field arrived 
she wanted a full-time driver, and I got picked.’

‘I see,’ Skinner said. ‘In that case, as long as I’m here, you’ll be 
in the driving seat. Besides,’ he continued, ‘this is good for me too. 
Having you lets me get through shedloads of paperwork that I couldn’t do if I 
drove myself, or if I took the train, for that would be too public. And the 
more of that I do while I’m travelling, the more time I have to put myself 
about, to see people, and, as important, to let them see me. So,’ he said, 
pulling his case across the seat towards him, ‘time to shift some of it.’

He worked steadily for fifteen minutes until the car was half a mile from the 
slip road that joined the Edinburgh bypass.

‘Davie,’ he called, ‘I want to make a detour, if you would. Go straight 
on, then take the next exit and head left, until you come to the second 
roundabout. You’ll see a hot food and coffee stall. I’d like you to wait in 
the shopping centre car park, while I pick up a couple of bacon rolls. It’s a 
lot less fuss to buy my breakfast than to make it myself.’

‘I’m lucky, sir. I get mine made for me.’

‘I’m lucky too. Looking out for yourself can be a price worth paying.’ He 
grinned as he saw the driver’s expression in the mirror. ‘Don’t mind 
me,’ he said. ‘I’m not always that cynical. The fact is, when we are 
together as a family, I enjoy making it for everybody.’

His directions were clear and accurate. PC Cole spotted the stall as he passed 
the first exit from the second roundabout, did a complete circuit and parked in 
the road facing the way he had come.

‘Want anything?’ the chief asked him.

‘No thanks, sir, I’m fine.’

He relaxed in his seat as his passenger stepped out. He watched him in the 
nearside wing mirror as he sprinted towards the pedestrian crossing to catch 
the green light. Davie had never seen a senior cop who would go to work in a 
light tan cotton jacket; even the CID people usually wore suits, or expensive 
leather jackets in the case of some of the young, newly blooded DCs.

The stallholder must have known Skinner, he reckoned, for the boss smiled at 
him as he gave him his order. Or maybe he was only in a chatty mood, for he 
seemed to strike up a conversation with the scruffy wee man who was the only 
other punter there.

Whatever they were talking about, it must have been serious, for the other guy 
never cracked a smile, not even when the chief, his back half turned towards 
the car, slipped him something.

Christ, Cole thought, the wee sod’s on the scrounge. Not a bad guy, my boss. 
He likes getting the breakfast for everybody, even for a wee panhandler like 
that.





Sixty-Two



It took almost no time at all to track down the bank account of Problem 
Solvers, once Banjo Paterson had opened the resource site that would take him 
there. He keyed in the sort code and number and clicked ‘Validate’, then 
leaned back with a smile on his face that broke all previous office records for 
smugness.

‘There you are,’ he announced. ‘The account’s held in the Bank of 
Lincoln, in an office in Grantham. There’s no street address, only a PO box 
number, but there’s a phone number.’ He scribbled it in a pad and passed it 
to his DI.

‘Thanks,’ she said.

‘Son,’ Provan grunted, ‘you better get a safe deposit box for a’ these 
gold stars ye’ve been gettin’, otherwise you might find yersel’ bein’ 
mugged on the way home.’

Mann took the note into her small office and dialled the number. ‘Bank of 
Lincoln,’ a cheery female voice answered. ‘How can I be of service?’

‘You can phone me back.’

‘Pardon?’

‘This is Detective Inspector Charlotte Mann, Strathclyde CID, Glasgow. I need 
to speak to your manager, urgently. If you call me back through my main 
switchboard number which I’ll give you now,’ she read it out, ‘he’ll 
know I am who I say I am. When you ring back, ask for extension one 
forty-eight.’

‘Yes, madam. I won’t be a minute.’

She was over-optimistic, by just under ten minutes, but did have the grace to 
apologise. ‘I’m sorry to have kept you waiting, madam, but Mr Harrison, the 
branch manager, has only just become available. I’ll put you through to him 
now.’

Mann had time to growl a curt ‘Thank you’ before the line clicked and a man 
spoke.

‘Inspector, is it?’

‘Detective Inspector.’

‘I see. My name is Nigel Harrison, how can I help you?’ There was a 
wariness in his voice. She had heard its like often enough in her career to 
know that assistance was not at the top of his agenda.

‘I want to talk to you about an account that’s held at your branch.’ She 
recited the number. ‘We believe that it’s in the name of an entity calling 
itself Problem Solvers.’

‘Let me check that,’ the manager murmured. She waited, anticipating another 
long interlude, but he came back on the line after less than a minute. ‘Yes, 
I have it on screen now. Problem Solvers; it’s a charity.’

‘So it says,’ Mann retorted. ‘I’d like to know about money moving in 
and out recently, within the last few weeks.’

‘Ahh. I was afraid this conversation might take such a turn. I don’t think 
I can help you there. I took the precaution of consulting my general manager 
before I returned your call, and was reminded that it’s our head office 
policy to afford our clients confidentiality.’

‘It’s my policy,’ she retorted, ‘to get tough with people when I 
believe they’re obstructing my investigation.’

She was sure she heard him sniff before he replied. ‘If your questions are 
well founded,’ he said, ‘I’m sure the court will furnish you with the 
appropriate warrant.’

‘I’m in no doubt about that,’ she agreed, ‘but I was hoping you’d be 
more cooperative. You’re not, and that’s too bad, because my questions are 
now going to move up a notch. You say this client of yours is a charity, yes?’

‘Yes. We have a special account category for charities.’

‘So it will be registered with the Charities Commission, yes?’

‘Of course.’

‘Sorry, Mr Harrison; it isn’t.’

‘But Mr Cohen assured me…’

‘This would be Mr Beram Cohen, yes? The late Mr Beram Cohen?’

‘The late…’ the banker spluttered. ‘Oh my! What happened?’

‘He died. People do. So you see, he’s got no confidentiality left to 
protect.’

‘But Problem Solvers has.’

‘A bogus charity? Tell me, sir, do the words “proceeds of crime” and 
possibly also “money laundering”, which I’ll throw into the mix just for 
fun, have any meaning for you?’

‘What are you saying?’

‘I’m saying that unless you cooperate with me, my next conversation will be 
with my colleagues in Lincolnshire Police. No more than an hour after that, 
they’ll descend on you with that warrant you’re insisting on, and they 
won’t do it quietly. In fact, I’ll ask them to make as much noise as they 
can. How will that go down with head office and your general manager?’

‘Well…’

She had been bluffing, but his hesitancy told her that she was winning. ‘I 
don’t want to bully you, Mr Harrison, but this is urgent, and you’ll be 
doing us a great service if you talk to me.’

She heard an intake of breath as he weighed up his options and made his 
decision. ‘All right,’ he sighed. ‘Recent traffic through the account, 
you said?’

‘Yes. Go back three months for starters.’

‘Can do. I have it on screen, in fact. Two months ago, the charity received a 
donation of three hundred thousand pounds. One month later, two money transfers 
of fifty thousand pounds each were made, one to a bank in New Zealand, the 
other to Australia. Both of these were private accounts; that means I can’t 
see the owner’s name. That was followed by a third, for thirty thousand 
pounds, to a company in Andorra called Holyhead.

‘The most recent transaction took place just under three weeks ago. Ahh,’ 
he exclaimed, ‘I remember that one. Mr Cohen called into the branch and made 
a withdrawal of fifteen thousand pounds in cash. It was potentially 
embarrassing, as my chief teller had let us get rather low on cash, and there 
had been a bit of a run that morning. We were forced to pay Mr Cohen his money 
in new fifties. Some customers would have been unhappy about that, but he said 
it was no problem.’

‘I don’t suppose you have a record of the serial numbers, do you?’ she 
asked.

Harrison surprised her. ‘As a matter of fact I do. Those notes were brand 
new; we were the first recipients. I can send that information to you.’

‘Thanks. It would let us tick some boxes.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Oh yes,’ Mann replied, ‘the most important of all. Who made the payment 
of three hundred thousand?’

‘That came from a bank in Jersey, from an account in the name of an 
investment company registered in Jersey. It’s called Pam Limited.’

Mann felt her eyebrows rise halfway up her forehead, but she said nothing.

‘Is that all?’ Harrison asked her.

‘Yes. Thank you… eventually.’

‘Come on, Inspector. You must understand my caution.’

‘I suppose.’

‘What about the Problem Solvers account? Mr Cohen was the only contact we 
have with the organisation, whatever it is.’

‘I’d suggest that you freeze it,’ the DI told him. ‘I have no idea what 
its legal status is, although Cohen’s widow might fancy laying claim to it. 
Whatever, it’s not my problem. I’ll be reporting this; I’m sure someone 
will be in touch.’

‘Your investigation,’ Harrison ventured. ‘You didn’t say what it’s 
about, but am I right in guessing that it’s into Mr Cohen’s death rather 
than this Problem Solver business?’

‘No, you’re not; it’s into someone else’s murder. You see, Mr Harrison, 
Mr Cohen’s business was making people dead. Those were the sort of problems 
that he solved.’





Sixty-Three



‘Pam Limited,’ Skinner repeated.

‘Yes,’ Mann confirmed. ‘I checked with the company registration office in 
Jersey. According to the articles, it stands for Personal Asset Management. Its 
most recent accounts show that it’s worth over two hundred and fifty 
million.’

‘Who owns it?’

‘According to the public record, its only shareholder is a man called Peter 
Friedman.’

‘And who the hell’s he?’ the chief asked, frowning, then muttering, 
‘Although there’s something familiar about that name.’

‘Banjo ran a search on people called Friedman,’ she told him. ‘He came up 
with two singers, a journalist and an economist, although he’s dead. The only 
references he got to anyone called Peter Friedman were a few press stories. He 
showed them to me; they all related to donations to good causes, charities and 
the like.’

‘What, like Problem Solvers?’ Skinner retorted.

‘No, sir. Real ones, like Chest Heart and Stroke, Cancer UK, Children First, 
and Shelter. Only one of them gave any detail on him beyond his name and that 
was the Saltire, in a report on a charity fund-raiser dinner in the Royal 
Scottish Museum, in Edinburgh, six months ago. It described him as “a 
reclusive philanthropist”; nothing beyond that. If a wealthy man has that low 
a profile on the internet, then he really is reclusive.’

‘Sounds like it. Friedman, Friedman, Friedman,’ he repeated. ‘Where the 
fu—’ He slammed the palm of his hand on the table. ‘Got it!’ he 
shouted. ‘It was…’ He stopped in mid-sentence as he remembered who were 
in which loop, and who were not.

‘I’ll take the mystery man from here, thanks,’ he told the DI. ‘I’ve 
got another task for you, Lottie, for you and you alone. Thanks to Dan, we have 
Sofia Deschamps’ address in Mauritius, but we don’t know exactly where she 
lives in London, beyond that it’s in Muswell Hill. She moved there very soon 
after Toni came back from her so-called sabbatical, to look after the child. 
Marina told me that Lucille’s grandfather, Toni’s dad, bought it for her. I 
took her word for that, like I swallowed everything else she fed me. She lied 
to me about other stuff, so maybe she lied about that too.

‘I want you to dig deep, get the address and look into the purchase 
transaction. When it was bought, and if it was indeed an outright purchase, no 
mortgage, then I want to know exactly where the cash came from. And while 
you’re at it, just for the hell of it, look into Toni’s house in Bothwell, 
asking the same questions. Remember, don’t involve the guys in this and 
report to me alone, as soon as you get a result. Use my mobile if you have 
to.’ He gave her a card, with the number.

‘I understand, sir,’ Mann said. ‘What do you expect to find?’

He smiled. ‘Who knows? Maybe it’s something to do with living at the 
seaside but I like flying kites.’

‘Maybe you can show me how,’ she replied. ‘I’m going to have to find 
new ways to amuse my Jakey, with his dad out the picture.’

As soon as she had gone, he picked up the phone and made a direct call.

‘Sal-tire,’ a male telephonist announced, the confident public voice of a 
confident newspaper.

‘June Crampsey, please. Tell her it’s Bob. She’ll know which one.’

‘There may be other men called Bob in my life,’ the editor said as she came 
on line.

‘But you still knew which one this is.’

‘It’s my phone; it goes all moist when you call. Why didn’t you use my 
direct line, or my mobile?’

‘Because my head’s full of stuff and I couldn’t remember either number.’

‘I thought you had slaves to get those for you.’

‘That’s Edinburgh. In Glasgow they’re all lashed to the oars and rowing 
like shit to keep the great ship off the rocks.’

‘Do I detect a continuing ambivalence towards Strathclyde?’ she teased.

‘It’s a lousy job, kid, but somebody’s got to do it. For now that’s me. 
June, I need your help.’

‘Shoot. You still have a credit balance in the favour ledger.’

‘Six months or so back, you ran a story about some charity dinner in the RSM. 
It mentioned a man named Peter Friedman, a recluse, your story called him.’

‘I remember that one.’

‘How much do you know about him?’

‘No more than was in the paper. He’s a very rich bloke who keeps himself to 
himself. We ran that dinner to honour people who gave decent sized bucks to 
good causes last year. The guests were all nominated by the charities and we 
sent the formal invitations. His address was a PO box in Tobermory.’

‘Tobermory?’ he repeated.

‘That’s what I said. He lives on the Isle of Mull. That qualifies as 
reclusive, doesn’t it?’

‘Hey, I’m from Motherwell. Everything north and west of Perth’s reclusive 
in my book. Your story: was there a photo with it?’

‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘That’s why I remember it so well. I had a 
photographer in the hall, snapping groups; real dull stuff, but I felt we had 
to do it since it was our gig. Your man Friedman was in one of them and he made 
a fuss about it. First he tried to bribe the photographer, then he threatened 
him. When neither of those worked he sought me out and asked me, more politely, 
not to use it. I said I’d see what I could do, then I made bloody sure that 
it went in.’

‘Did you hear from him afterwards?’

‘No. Fact is, I doubt if he even saw it. The next day was the Saturday 
edition; most people just read that for the sport and the weekend section.’

‘Do you still have the photo in your library?’

‘Of course, everything’s in the bloody library. I’ll have somebody dig it 
out, crop him out of the group and email it to you. What’s your Strathclyde 
address?’

‘Thanks, but use my private address. I don’t want it on this network.’

‘Okay, but what’s this about, Bob? Why are you interested in him?’

‘His name came up in connection with another charity donation,’ Skinner 
replied, content that he was telling the truth. ‘I like to know about people 
with deep pockets; maybe our dependants’ support group can put the bite on 
him in the future. Thanks, June, you’re a pal. You and that other Bob must 
come to dinner some night.’

‘I’ll take you up on that, only his name’s Adrian. Now I’m wondering 
who the hostess will be. Cheers.’

He hung up, leaned back in his chair, his fingers steepled in front of his 
face, gathering his thoughts and seeing images flow past his mind’s eye. He 
sat there until a trumpet sound on his phone told him that he had a personal 
email, and a glance confirmed that it was from June. He opened it, then viewed 
the attachment. As he did, possibilities became certainties.

The chief constable rose from his desk, left his office and his command floor, 
taking the stair down one level and walking round to a suite that overlooked 
Holland Street, and the group of buildings that once had housed one of 
Scotland’s oldest and most famous schools.

He keyed a number into a pad, then pushed open a door bearing a plaque that 
read ‘Counter-Terrorism Intelligence Section’. As he entered the long open 
room, a female officer looked up at him, first with a frown, then in surprise. 
She started to rise, but he waved her back down, and headed to the far end of 
the room.

A red light above Lowell Payne’s door said that he was in a meeting. Skinner 
knocked on it nonetheless, then waited, until it was opened by a glaring man 
with a moustache.

‘Aye?’ he snapped.

‘Intelligence section?’ he murmured, as Payne appeared behind the officer.

‘Chief.’

‘Sorry to interrupt, Detective Superintendent, but you know me. Everything I 
do has “urgent” stamped on it.’

‘Indeed. That’ll be all for now, DS Mavor,’ he said, almost pushing the 
other officer out of the room.

‘Sorry about that,’ he murmured once he and Skinner were alone. ‘He was 
somebody’s mistake, from the days when a guy might get dumped into Special 
Branch and forgotten about, because he was too rough-edged for the mainstream, 
or because he’d done somebody higher up a big favour in the witness box, and 
an SB job was his reward.’

‘Where do you want him sent?’

‘Anywhere that being rough-edged will be an advantage.’

‘I’ll ask Bridie. She’ll have an idea. Now, I have a question, best put 
to somebody who was here six months ago and who’d know pretty much everything 
that went on then.’

‘That would be DI Bulloch,’ Payne replied at once. ‘Sandra. You probably 
passed her on your way along here.’

‘I did. At least she knows who I am, which is a good start.’

‘I’ll get her in.’

‘Fine, but before you do, let me set the scene. When I got into Toni 
Field’s safe finally, and found those envelopes, there was another. It was 
marked “P. Friedman” and it was empty. It was stuck on to the back of 
another, and I reckon that was a mistake on Marina’s part.’

‘Marina’s?’

‘Oh yes. Marina knew that stuff would be there for me to find, in time, once 
I’d got past her stalling me by giving me the wrong code for the safe. But 
she didn’t intend me to find the Friedman envelope. She destroyed what was in 
it, but failed to notice that she’d left it in there. Now, let’s talk to 
the DI.’

Sandra Bulloch was a cool one, neither too pretty nor too plain to be 
memorable, but with legs that few men would fail to notice, and that she 
probably covered up, Skinner guessed, when she went operational.

‘Peter Friedman,’ she repeated. ‘Yes, sir, I remember him. It was Chief 
Constable Field’s second week here; she called Superintendent Johnson and me 
up to her office, and told us that there was a man she wanted put under full 
surveillance. His name, she said, was Peter Friedman and he lived on Mull.

‘I handled the job myself, with DS Mavor.’ A small flicker of distaste 
crossed her face, then vanished. ‘We found that he owned a big estate house 
up behind Tobermory, set in about forty acres of land. We photographed him from 
as close as we could get, we hacked his emails and we tapped his phones.

‘He lived alone, but he had a driver, a personal assistant type, who also 
flew the helicopter that appeared to be his means of getting off the island. He 
left the estate once a day, that was all, to go down to Tobermory, in his white 
Range Rover Evoque, to collect his mail from the post office, and to have a 
coffee and a scone in the old church building next door that somebody’s made 
into a shop and a café.

‘He had no visitors and he never took or made a phone call that wasn’t 
about his investments. Nor did he file any emails; they were all deleted after 
study. I assume that if he wanted to keep something he’d print it.

‘The only thing we intercepted that was of any interest,’ Bulloch said, 
‘was an email from a consultant oncologist, with a report attached. It 
didn’t make good reading. It confirmed that Friedman had a squamous cell lung 
carcinoma, in other words lung cancer, that it was inoperable, and that no form 
of therapy was going to do him any good. It gave him somewhere between nine 
months and two years to live.’

‘Ouch,’ Skinner whispered. ‘Did you report all of this back to Toni, to 
Chief Constable Field?’

‘Of course, sir. We gave her a file with everything in it. She kept it and 
she ordered us to destroy any copies.’

‘Which you did?’

Bulloch stared at him, as if outraged. ‘Absolutely,’ she insisted.

‘Did she ever tell you why she wanted this man targeted?’

‘No, and we didn’t ask. Sometimes the chief constable knows things that we 
don’t need to. For example, why you’re here now, asking questions about the 
same man.’

He laughed. ‘Nice one, Sandra. You’re right; I’m not going to tell you 
either.’

His mobile sounded as she was leaving the room. The caller was Lottie Mann, 
with not one result, but two. He listened carefully to her, said, ‘Thanks. 
I’ll be in touch,’ then ended the call.

‘Lowell,’ he asked, ‘has our tap on Sofia Deschamps produced anything?’

‘Nothing, Chief. Only a call from Mauritius, a bloke we think was Chief 
Constable Field’s dad, going by his distress if nothing else. Nothing from 
Marina, though. In fact, when she was talking to the man, she said, “Now 
I’ve lost both my daughters, and I won’t get either one back.” I suppose 
that doesn’t rule out her knowing where the other one is, but from the tone 
of her voice on the recording, I don’t believe she does.’

‘That’s all right, I do. Pretty soon, I expect that everything will become 
clear. I’m tired of this business, Lowell,’ Skinner sighed, ‘tired of the 
entire Deschamps family and their devious lives. Tomorrow, the two of us will 
go on a trip. I’d like to meet this guy Friedman. Can you put me up at your 
place tonight? Otherwise it’ll be an even earlier start for Davie.’





Sixty-Four



‘Sailing is not something I do very often,’ Bob remarked. ‘In fact, the 
last time I was on a boat on this side of the country was when Ali Higgins took 
Alex and me for a weekend on her rich brother’s schooner. It was a cathartic 
experience in an emotional sense.’

He was leaning on the rail of the Oban car ferry as it made a slow turn towards 
the jetty at Craignure, landing point for visitors to the island of Mull. Their 
driver, PC Davie Cole, was in the car, asleep.

‘Funnily enough,’ Lowell Payne said, ‘I remember that; on your way there, 
the three of you were at Jean’s dad’s funeral. It was the first time you 
and I met.’

‘You’re right, it was. I think about that trip often, whenever I’m 
feeling low. I loved it. By the end of the voyage, I was talking seriously 
about jacking it all in and buying a boat of my own, doing the odd charter, 
that sort of stuff. Then the fucking phone rang, didn’t it, and it all went 
up in smoke.’

‘What if you had?’ Lowell asked. ‘Maybe you and Alison would be off in 
the Caribbean or the Med right now. Jean had hopes for the pair of you.’

‘I know she had, but they were misplaced. We didn’t last, remember; Ali was 
more career driven than me.’ He sighed, and his eyes went somewhere else. 
‘But if we had bought our tall ship and made it work, she would still be 
alive. If I’d taken her away from the fucking police force,’ he muttered, 
with sudden savagery, ‘she wouldn’t have been turned into crispy bits by a 
fucking car bomb.’

‘You both made the same choice,’ Lowell pointed out. ‘And it could as 
easily have been you that got killed. A couple of times, from what I hear.’

‘Yes I know that, but still. This fucking job, man, what it does to people, 
on the inside. Ali and I, we spent a couple of years banging each other’s 
brains out, yet by the time she died, it was all gone and she was calling me 
“sir” with the rest of them.’

He was silent for a while, until he had worked off his anger and his guilt, and 
his mood changed. ‘By the way,’ he said quietly, ‘I enjoyed last night. 
You and Jean, you’re such a normal down-to-earth couple.’ He gave a soft, 
sad laugh. ‘As a matter of fact, you’re just about the only normal 
down-to-earth couple that I know. And that lass of yours, young Myra, she’s 
blooming. What is she now, thirteen? She reminds me a lot of Alex when she was 
that age. Prepare to be wound round her little finger, my friend.’

‘There is a difference, though. You had to bring Alexis up on your own. Yes, 
I might be a soft touch, I’ll admit, but Jean’s there as a buffer; she 
takes no nonsense… not that Myra gets up to much, mind. She’s a good kid. 
That is, she has been up to now. I suppose it all changes the further into 
their teens they get.’

‘It does, and the trick is to accept that. There comes a time in every young 
person’s growing up when they’re entitled to a private life, in every 
respect. When it’s a daughter, that can be difficult for dads, because we all 
inevitably remember the hormonal volcanoes we were at that age. I was no 
exception, and I’ll always be grateful to Jean for being a really good aunt 
to Alex during that couple of years.’

‘From what she said, and indeed from what I saw for myself, you were a great 
dad.’

‘Ach, we all are to our girls, or should be. I’m beginning to learn that 
boys take much more managing.’

‘Do you think that’s what went wrong with Toni and Marina? The absence of a 
father’s influence?’

He pursed his lips. ‘In Toni’s case, nah; I reckon she was just a bad 
bitch. As for Marina, maybe it was the opposite. The jury’s still out on 
that.’

‘What do you mean?’ Payne paused. ‘You realise I’m completely in the 
dark about this trip. You’ve hardly told me anything. Now it turns out 
we’re going to see some recluse in Tobermory, and I still don’t know why.’

‘You will.’ He pushed himself off the rail. ‘Come on, let’s go and see 
if Davie’s awake yet. We’ll be ready to offload soon.’

Twenty minutes later they were seated in the back of the chief constable’s 
car, as PC Cole eased it carefully down the ramp then on to the roadway.

‘I thought the terminal was in Tobermory itself,’ Payne observed as he read 
a road sign outside the Caledonian MacBrayne building. ‘Twenty-one miles 
away: I never realised Mull was so big.’

‘I’d forgotten myself,’ Skinner confessed, ‘until I looked it up on 
Google Earth. I didn’t think it would have street view for a place this size, 
but it does. Now I know exactly where we’re going.’

‘The post office?’

‘No, the café place next door that DI Bulloch mentioned. The Gallery, it’s 
called. We’ll have a cup of something there and wait for Mr Friedman to 
arrive. It’s a nice morning, and they’ve got tables outside.’

‘What if he’s already been for his mail?’

‘There’s no chance of that. This is the first ferry of the day, and the 
Royal Mail van was six behind us in the queue to get off. We’ll be there 
before it.’

The Gallery was exactly as DI Bulloch had described it. A classic old Scottish 
church building, with a paved area in front with half a dozen tables, four of 
them unoccupied. It offered a clear view across Tobermory Bay and, more 
important, of anyone arriving at the post office, next door.

Cole dropped them off outside, then, on Skinner’s instruction, reversed into 
a parking bay, thirty yards further along on the seaward side of the road, half 
hidden by a tree and a telephone box.

They took the table nearest the street, and the chief produced a ten-pound 
note. ‘I’m not pulling rank,’ he said, ‘but since I actually know who 
we’re waiting for, it’s better you get the teas in. I’ll have a scone 
too, if they look okay. They should be; you’d expect home baking in a place 
like this.’

As he took the banknote, Payne sensed the excitement of anticipation underlying 
Skinner’s good humour. There was no queue in the café. He bought two mugs of 
tea and two scones, which looked better than okay, and was carrying them 
outside on a tray when he saw the Royal Mail van drive past, slowing to park.

There was no conversation as they sat, sipping and eating. The chief was 
relaxed in his chair, but his colleague noticed that it was drawn clear of the 
table, so that if necessary he had a clear route to the street.

And then, after ten minutes, a large white vehicle came into view, approaching 
from their left. It was halfway in shape between a coupé and an estate car. 
‘How many white Range Rover Evoques would you expect in Mull?’ the chief 
murmured.

The car swung into an empty bay on the other side of the road. Its day lights 
dimmed as the driver switched off, then stepped out: not a man, Payne saw, but 
a woman, tall, in shorts and a light cotton top, with a blue and yellow motif.

Her hair was jet black, cut short and spiky. Although a third of her face was 
hidden behind wrap-round sunglasses, Oakley, he guessed, by the shape of them, 
the lovely honey-coloured tone of her skin was still apparent, and striking.

She was halfway across the road, heading for the post office, when Skinner put 
his right thumb and index finger in his mouth and gave a loud, shrill whistle. 
The woman, and everyone else in earshot, looked in his direction. But she alone 
froze in mid-stride.

She made a small move, as if to abort her errand and go back to the Range 
Rover, but the chief shook his head, then beckoned her towards them. She seemed 
to sag a little, then she obeyed, as if she was on an invisible lead and he was 
winding it in.

He stood as she drew near, reaching out with his right foot, gathering in a 
spare chair and pulling it to the table. ‘Have a seat,’ he said. He 
inclined his head towards Payne, never taking his eyes from hers. ‘Lowell, 
you didn’t get up to the command floor in the last chief’s time, so you 
probably don’t know her sister, Marina Deschamps, or Day Champs, as wee Dan 
Provan would say. Mind you,’ he added, ‘even if you did, you’d have had 
bother recognising her with the radical new hair and the designer shades. I 
probably wouldn’t have been sure myself if she hadn’t been driving her 
dad’s car.’

‘Her what?’ Payne exclaimed.

‘Her dad,’ he repeated. ‘Peter Friedman’s her father. There’s been a 
consistent feature in this investigation. Most of the players in it have had 
two names, making them hard to pin down. Byron Millbank was Beram Cohen, and 
vice versa when he had to be, Antonia Deschamps became Toni Field, in the cause 
of advancing her career like everything else she ever did, and even Basil 
Brown, gangster and MI5 grass, had to be called Bazza.’

‘So what about Peter Friedman?’ Marina asked, as she sat. ‘What was he?’

‘He used to be Harry Shelby.’

She removed the sunglasses, as if she was peeling them off her face, and stared 
at him, with eyes that were colder than he had ever imagined they could be. 
‘How did you find out?’

‘MI5 erased the records of wee Lucille’s birth,’ he replied, ‘but they 
had no reason to wipe out yours. It wouldn’t have been that easy anyway, you 
being born before the computer era. When you steered me towards your conspiracy 
scenario, and I was stupid enough to embarrass myself, even endanger myself, by 
falling for it, you may have thought that I wouldn’t survive professionally, 
maybe even personally. You certainly didn’t envisage me coming after you, nor 
Five either, not after I’d handed them all Toni’s blackmail leverage. For 
that’s what your sister was, wasn’t she? Inside Supercop, there was a nasty 
little blackmailer… as you well knew, for you were put alongside her to spy 
on her, and you found the evidence.’

‘I…’ she began, protesting, but he raised a hand, to stop her.

‘I know you were, because Amanda Dennis told me so, and I know you did, 
because you left it for me, after you’d doctored it a wee bit. So come on, 
just nod your head, and admit it.’

She did.

‘God knows what Toni got out of the civil servant,’ Skinner continued, 
‘or the TV guy, or the other cop, but she got advancement from Storey, and I 
know now that she got a house out of the Home Secretary and her husband, the 
one your mother lives in in London. Her father didn’t buy it, they did; they 
paid her off, and if that was known, the scandal would be compounded. That 
house was bought and paid for by Repton Industries, Emily Repton’s family 
business. You knew that, Marina, and you didn’t care a toss about it.

‘But when she pulled the same stroke on your father, that was different. 
Lottie Mann traced both transactions right to the source of the money. She 
found out that the house in Bothwell was paid for by Pam Limited, Peter 
Friedman’s investment company. Thanks to one single, unfortunate newspaper 
photo, Toni found out who Friedman really was. She contacted him and she sold 
him her silence, for five hundred and seventy-five thousand pounds, the cost of 
a nice big villa.’ Skinner frowned. ‘Or her silence for a while: and that 
was something you couldn’t tolerate, the idea that she could unmask him any 
time she chose, so… you had your sister killed!’

‘Half-sister,’ she murmured. ‘So prove it.’

He shrugged. ‘I can’t, not to court standards. Anyway, not only did your 
fiction add up, that Repton had her removed, it still does, for you could claim 
that everything you did was on their orders.’

‘Do you really know it wasn’t?’ she challenged.

‘Oh yes, I do. And I can prove that.’

‘How?’

‘It was your old man that paid Cohen to do the job, not them.’

‘My God,’ she said, ‘you have been busy. You know that much?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, I do.’

‘In that case, tell me, Mr Skinner… I can see you’re desperate to, 
you’re so pleased with yourself… how did you find out who my father was?’

‘I’m not pleased with myself,’ he contradicted her. ‘But I’m dead 
chuffed for Dan Provan, the guy I mentioned earlier. He’s a walking 
anachronism of a detective sergeant, who’s been hiding in Strathclyde CID for 
years. You probably never saw him when you were there, just as your path and 
Lowell’s never crossed, but even if you had you wouldn’t have noticed him. 
That’s one of his strengths. The other is that he never forgets a criminal, 
if the crime is big enough to get his attention.’

He picked up his ever-present attaché case and spun the combination wheels to 
open it.

‘I was never just going to forget about you, Marina,’ he told her as he 
flicked the catches. ‘I don’t like being made to feel like an idiot. I take 
it personally. The first thing I did when I got back to Glasgow was send Provan 
to dig out your birth records from Mauritius. I wanted to build a complete 
picture of you and obviously I couldn’t rely on the things you had told me, 
or the hints you had dropped, since you’re as consummate a deceiver as your 
sister was.’

A flicker of a smile suggested she took that as a compliment.

‘Provan discovered that your father was listed as Hillary Shelby,’ he 
continued, taking a document from the Zero Halliburton and handing it to her. 
‘See? Hillary not Harry, and there’s an Australian passport number. 
However, that surname niggled him, and the itch wouldn’t go away. And 
that’s where his special skills came into play. “Shelby,” he told 
himself. “I know that name from somewhere.” Dan isn’t of the IT 
generation,’ Skinner said, ‘but he went to the computer and ran a Google 
search.’ He grinned. ‘He called it “that Bugle thing” when he told me 
about it. He did try the full name first off, but got zilch, so then he entered 
simply Shelby, on its own. He came up with a car designer, an actor, and three 
different towns in America, then at the foot of the page, he got Harry Shelby, 
and it all came back to him, and that pub quiz mind of his.

‘Harry Shelby was an Australian financier, a real tycoon… or typhoon, as 
Dan called him. He built a business empire of considerable size in Australia, 
South Africa and in Hong Kong from the early seventies on. He started in 
minerals, then moved into currency trading, and pretty soon he had become a 
national business icon, stand-out even in an era in Australian history when 
there were quite a few of those around.

‘In nineteen ninety-six, he was awarded a knighthood, in the Birthday Honours 
list. He was scheduled to be invested in Canberra, by the High Commissioner. 
Everything was set up, but the day before, Harry Shelby vanished, off the face 
of the earth. He was never seen again, and he never left a penny behind him, or 
rather a cent.’

‘I remember that,’ Payne exclaimed. ‘It was big news for a week or so, 
internationally.’

‘I confess that it passed me by,’ the chief said. ‘But nineteen 
ninety-six was a busy year for me; my mind was full of other stuff, on my own 
doorstep. Anyway,’ he carried on, ‘you can imagine that after Shelby 
disappeared, his whole life was dug up. It didn’t take the investigators long 
to find out that in fact he ran out of business steam in the mid-eighties, 
after a series of bad currency deals that he managed to cover up. Everything 
he’d done after that had been a huge Ponzi scheme, paying investors with 
their own money, as he drew more and more in with the promise of attractive 
profits that were evidently being delivered. If Harry Shelby hadn’t had such 
a big reputation, chances are he’d have been caught, but because he was such 
a hero he got away with it.’

He stopped to sip his tea, only to find that it had gone cold.

‘Why did he run?’ he asked, then answered. ‘It may have been because he 
knew that all Ponzi fraudsters are caught eventually, unless they shut up shop 
before it’s too late.’ He paused. ‘However, Provan happened upon another 
theory, one that the Australian authorities… Dan checked this with the 
Australian Embassy… believe to this day, possibly because it suits them so to 
do. They think, indeed they’re pretty well sure, that a couple of his biggest 
investors were Americans, Mafia figures, using his investment scheme to launder 
money. The scenario is, they caught on to the swindle, so they dealt with it 
the old-fashioned way. They made Shelby and his money disappear at the same 
time. On the day that he did, Australian air traffic control traced an 
unregistered flight out of Canberra heading for Tasmania. The investigators had 
a tip that Shelby was on it, until they dropped him out halfway there over the 
ocean.’ He gazed at Marina. ‘But we know that’s not true, don’t we?’

She stared back at him, silent. He took a photograph from the case, held it up 
for Payne to see, then passed it to her.

‘That’s Harry Shelby, aged about forty.’

He produced a second. ‘That’s Peter Friedman, photographed, to his 
annoyance, at a charity dinner last winter. He’s over thirty years older, but 
I’ve had the images run through a recognition program, and it confirms 
they’re one and the same man.’

He went back into the attaché and took out a third image. ‘And that’s 
you,’ he said, ‘from your HR file in Pitt Street. You can’t hide from it, 
Marina. You are your father’s double.’

She picked up his mug, and drank his cold tea in a single gulp. ‘And proud of 
it,’ she whispered.

‘It was the newspaper photograph that did it, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘Antonia was in her first month in Glasgow when it 
appeared. She read every newspaper, every day, to familiarise herself with the 
place, and she saw that. She used CTIS to trace him, then one day, just as you 
have, she turned up here, alone. When he got over the shock, he assumed that 
she had come to arrest him, but no. I mean, why would she have done that? There 
would have been nothing in it for her.

‘Your assumption was correct; she did to him what she had done to Lawton and 
his wife. She showed him the brochure for the house and told him that she 
wanted it. She told him to forget about trying to vanish again, as she would 
know about it the moment his helicopter took off, or he boarded the ferry. But 
in truth she knew that there was no point in him running. He was dying, and 
even then the house was being turned into a hospice, a place for him to be as 
peaceful as he could be in his last days. So he bought the Bothwell place for 
her.’ Her eyes flashed. ‘He told me she should have chosen a bigger one.’

‘Why did he go to the damn dinner? That doesn’t sound like typical 
behaviour.’

‘He was in Edinburgh, seeing an oncologist for tests,’ she explained. ‘It 
was that day, and he had a feeling the news wasn’t going to be the best, so 
he went, in the hope it might cheer him up. As it turned out it did the 
opposite.’

‘Does your mother know any of this?’ Skinner asked.

‘None,’ Marina insisted. ‘Maman is not a stupid woman. She had a good job 
in the civil service, but she was looked after by men for much of her life, 
first Anil, and then Papa. She’s naive in some ways, so when Antonia told her 
that she had done well in property in Britain, she believed her.’

‘How did Sofia meet your father?’

‘He was part of an Australian business delegation to the island, in nineteen 
eighty, after her thing with Anil was over. Maman was in charge of official 
government hospitality. That’s when it began.

‘I was born two years later, and for all my childhood he spent as much time 
as he could with us. He was as good to Antonia as he was to me. That’s what 
made her behaviour all the more despicable. You were right. She was just a 
nasty little blackmailer.’

‘When did you get back in touch with him?’

‘I was never out of touch. Gifts would arrive, and letters, never traceable, 
only ever signed “Papa”. The theory is wrong, incidentally, about the 
Mafia. They were his partners in the Ponzi business, not his victims. They all 
made lots of money and when the time came to close it down, they helped him get 
away, and they planted the idea that they had killed him. In fact he lived in 
the West Indies for six years, as Peter Friedman. He moved to Mull ten years 
ago, around the same time as I came to Britain. It was then he told me his new 
name.’

‘Whose idea was it for you to join MI5?’ Skinner asked.

‘A shrewd question, because I think you know the answer. Papa suggested it. 
The idea was that if the Australians started looking for him again, in Millbank 
I would be well placed to hear about it. By that time I was in a security 
department within the Met, so when I applied, it seemed a natural step, and I 
was accepted. Brian Storey was my boss then, and he endorsed me. Antonia never 
knew, though, not ever. The service, as it does, gave me a front as an importer 
for a chain of florists.’

‘That sounds like an Amanda Dennis touch.’

‘It was. She’s a good teacher.’

‘You were a good student, Marina. You could have been Amanda yourself, if 
you’d stayed the course, instead of letting them move you out to spy on your 
sister.’

‘But if I had stayed, I wouldn’t have been able to deal with her when the 
need arose.’

‘By telling your father how to get rid of her? No, I don’t suppose you 
would.’

‘Papa never knew,’ she said.

Both police officers stared at her.

‘It’s true, I swear,’ she exclaimed. ‘If I had told him he would have 
forbidden it, absolutely. All he ever did was make a donation of three hundred 
thousand pounds to a charity I told him about. He was a sucker for charities, 
especially those involved with cancer research; I told him it helped patients 
with difficult personal circumstances. I approached Cohen, using a contact 
email address I’d picked up in the service. I gave him the commission and he 
named his price. No conscience, that man, only a cash register. I also gave him 
Brown as a resource on the ground in Glasgow. I’m sorry they had to kill him, 
but not too sorry, as he was a traitor to his own kind. No, the decision was 
mine, and the orders were mine. Knowing what Antonia was, and what she might 
have become, I don’t regret them. I’m sorry for Maman, and for Anil, and 
for Lucille, of course, but they will bring her up as if she was their own. 
Maman is still young and fit enough to see it through.’

‘But what about Papa?’ Skinner murmured. ‘He isn’t, is he?’

‘Yes, Papa,’ she sighed. ‘I suppose you have come to take him away, as 
Antonia did not.’

‘We haven’t come to ask for a raffle prize for the policeman’s ball, 
that’s for sure. As for taking him away, we’ll see about that. But I would 
like to meet him.’

‘Then come with me, Chief Constable, and you shall.’ She stood; Skinner and 
Payne followed suit. ‘In your car? You have a car, I take it.’

‘Yes, but Superintendent Payne can take that. I’ll come with you, just in 
case the minder panics at the sight of strange vehicles. By the way, no 
nonsense up there, Marina. There are firearms in my car; that’s a practice 
your sister introduced.’

‘He isn’t that sort of minder, I promise. Rudolf is a driver and a pilot, 
that’s all.’ As she spoke, they heard the heavy engine sound of an 
aircraft. She looked up and pointed, towards a helicopter above them, gaining 
height. ‘In fact, that’s him.’

‘Hey!’ Skinner exclaimed. ‘Are you…’

‘No. Papa is not with him. He’s still at the house. Come and meet him.’

The chief frowned, still cautious, weighing her up, not anxious to be taken 
twice. ‘Okay,’ he said at last. ‘Don’t you want to collect your mail?’

‘It can wait. Come on.’ She led him across the road to the waiting Range 
Rover.

With the police car following close behind, they drove out of Tobermory, taking 
a narrower road from the one they had used earlier, passing a campsite on the 
edge of the small town, then climbing for two or possibly three miles, although 
its twists and turns made it difficult to judge distance travelled.

She slowed as they approached a gate on the right, with an unequivocal sign 
beside it: ‘Private’. It was shut, but Marina pressed a button on a remote 
control and the barrier slid aside.

The surface of the estate road was gravel, but better than the one they had 
left. Their tyres crunched beneath them, early warning, Skinner thought, for 
anyone waiting.

The house itself was a grey mansion, large but not ostentatious. It reminded 
him of some of his neighbours on Gullane Hill, although the stone was 
different. She drew up at the front door, then waited until the second car 
stopped alongside and Payne climbed out to join them.

He was holding a pistol, in the manner of a man for whom it was a new 
experience. Skinner frowned and shook his head; he handed it back to Davie Cole.

‘This way,’ she said, leading them inside, walking briskly through a 
chandelier-lit hallway, and, ignoring a wide mahogany stairway, into a room on 
the far side of the house.

It was large, decorated with old-fashioned flock wallpaper. A bay window faced 
south over a sunlit garden, laid out in shrubs and fruit trees, with stone 
statuary among them. Soft music was playing, a female singer with a gentle 
voice; the chief guessed at Stacey Kent.

There was a smell about the room, a smell of disinfectant, a hospital smell, 
one that seemed fitting given the metal-framed bed that was positioned facing 
the window. Skinner saw an oxygen cylinder on the far side as they approached, 
and beside it, in a stand, a vital signs monitor.

All the lines on it were flat.

The man on the bed was old, but his face was unlined. He looked peaceful, with 
his eyes closed.

‘Papa died just over two hours ago,’ Marina murmured. ‘Rudolf has gone to 
Oban to fetch an undertaker, and to take Sister Evans to the station. She’s 
been with us for the last month. She did a great job; he was pain-free all the 
way to the end. The doctor from Oban was with him at the end. He was kind 
enough to stay overnight. He caught the first ferry back this morning.’

‘I suppose I should say I’m sorry for your loss,’ Skinner told her. 
‘And I am, honestly, even if he was a billion-dollar fraudster, and you’re 
a sororicide… if that’s a word. You are a first, Marina. I’ve come across 
plenty of conmen in my career… although not on your dad’s scale, I admit… 
but I’ve never met someone who’s killed her own sister.’

‘What are you going to do with me?’ she asked. Payne, standing on the other 
side of the bed, saw a hint of trepidation in her eyes, for the first time 
since their encounter in the café.

‘What do you think?’ the chief retorted. ‘I’m duty bound to arrest you 
and charge you with murder. You’ve admitted it, and even if you recant that, 
I know enough now to put a case together.’ And then he sighed. ‘That’s my 
duty, but the judge would be bound to knock out so much of my evidence on 
national security grounds that you would walk. Your problem would then be that 
you wouldn’t walk very far, before you were hit by a runaway lorry, or killed 
in a random mugging, or died of a peanut allergy that nobody knew you had, or 
just plain disappeared.’

Her trepidation turned to undisguised fear as she acknowledged the truth in 
what he said.

‘Who are you now?’

His question took her by surprise. ‘My new identity, you mean?’

‘Yes.’

‘I have a Jamaican passport, in the name of Marina Friedman. My father 
obtained it for me, in case we both needed to move on in a hurry.’

‘What was your next move? Your plan for life after Papa?’

‘His will is with his lawyer in Jersey. It names me as his sole heir. He told 
me to go there, with the death certificate and my passport, to claim my 
inheritance.’

‘That won’t be happening now,’ Skinner said.

‘No, I realise that. So, what will you do with me? Will you save the expense 
of your abortive prosecution by handing me straight over to Amanda Dennis?’

He took a breath and blew out his cheeks. ‘Like she would thank me for 
that,’ he exclaimed. ‘It would be better all round if I just shot you 
myself and buried you somewhere on this big island.’

She backed away, staring at him in sudden naked terror.

‘Hey!’ he exclaimed. ‘Calm down. Better all round, but I’m not one of 
them, Marina. Besides,’ he added, with a half smile and a nod in Payne’s 
direction, ‘there are witnesses, and your man Rudolf will be back from Oban 
soon. So,’ he told her, ‘here’s what you do. You take whatever you can 
pack quickly, and as much as you can in the way of cash and valuables, you get 
in that car and you drive it straight on to the ferry. When you get to Oban, 
keep on driving, in any direction you can and in any direction as long as it is 
out of the jurisdiction of any Scottish police force.’

‘But not Jersey, I take it.’

‘No; there’ll be nothing there by the time you get there. Whatever fortune 
your father’s left isn’t for you, it’s for the people he swindled, even 
if some of them will be dead themselves by now.’ He gazed at her. ‘This is 
what’s happened,’ he said. ‘Lowell and I arrived to arrest him, following 
my discovery of some papers in Toni’s safe. Sadly, we were too late. You were 
never here. When Rudolf gets back and asks, “Where’s Marina?” I will say, 
“Marina who?” That’s the outcome. We get Papa, you get lost. We will be 
fucking heroes, Lowell and me, in Australia most of all. As for you, you will 
be alive.’

She looked at him, still doubting, until he nodded, to reassure her.

‘You’re a resourceful lady. You’ll get by for a couple of years, and 
after that you can probably go back to Mauritius and become yourself again, 
because nobody will be looking for you. But don’t ever show up here again, 
for I will know about it. You’re getting away with murder, because that’s 
what suits everybody best. But don’t you ever forget it.’





PostScript



‘Why did you decide to quit as leader? Were there knives out for you because 
of the Joey incident?’

Aileen snorted across the lunch table in a restaurant next to Edinburgh Castle. 
They had gone there after finalising their divorce, in the Court of Session, 
further down the Royal Mile.

‘They wouldn’t have been nearly sharp enough. No, to be frank I resigned 
because we are going to get absolutely slaughtered at the next Holyrood 
election and I don’t want that on my CV. That twerp Felix Brahms will inherit 
it, now that I’ve endorsed him.’

‘Foresighted as ever,’ Bob chuckled.

‘Of course, and there’s this. I won’t be a candidate in Scotland next 
time. One of our guys in a safe seat on Tyneside is about to retire early on 
health grounds. I’ve called in some favours; it’s mine.’

‘The divorce won’t be a problem for you, will it?’

‘I don’t see it. We’ve settled on unreasonable behaviour as the grounds, 
not adultery. As for the Daily News pictures, they’re old, cold news by now. 
Besides, it’s a safe seat, like I said. The Lib Dems don’t count there and 
as for the Tories, they’re really too nice to use those sort of tactics.’

‘Will Joey put in an appearance for you?’

‘As if I’d ask him. Look, Joey and me, it’s a thing from way back. I 
suppose I can confess now, there were other times while we were married, not 
just that one. Sorry if it dents your male ego, but there were.’

‘I know,’ he admitted. ‘Toni Field had a file on you. It’s long since 
gone into the shredder. Mind you, she did hint that there was somebody else, 
apart from Joey.’

Aileen’s eyes widened. ‘She did what? Any name mentioned?’

‘No, and I’m sure I don’t want to know.’

‘Oh but you do. Who knows? It might come in useful to you one day. The US 
government ran a big hospitality shindig a couple of years back in the 
Turnberry Hotel. All the party leaders were there, and the champagne was fairly 
flowing. As usual, I had a wee bit too much, and God knows how it happened, but 
I woke up next morning with Clive Graham. So there you are. My deep dark 
secret, and Clive’s, except… somewhere there may be CCTV footage of the two 
of us going into his room, and probably of me leaving. Find it and it could buy 
you a lot of influence.’

He sighed. ‘My predecessor did that sort of thing, and it got her fucking 
killed.’

‘What? She tried to blackmail Colombian drug lords?’

‘Not quite. That was the official version. The true story’s a lot 
different, but I’m not sharing, as the spooks say.’

She shrugged. ‘Be like that. Here,’ she went on, ‘the way you said “My 
predecessor” there, it sounded as if you’ve made a decision.’

‘I have. I’ve decided that I can’t go back to Edinburgh. Mario and Maggie 
are getting on fine without me. They don’t need me any more; if I went back 
I’d be a spare wheel. So my application for Strathclyde, permanently, is in 
the hat with the rest.’

‘And you will get it, especially after all those headlines you got when you 
found that Australian fraudster.’

Bob laughed. ‘You ain’t kidding. The day I moved into Pitt Street, I 
inherited an invitation to address an Australian Police Federation conference. 
Since then I’ve had twenty-two more, from other organisations down under. 
Yes, I know I’ll probably be confirmed in post. If not, I’ll do something 
else. I might even retire and buy a boat.’

‘And sail away, with Sarah and the kids?’

‘They’re all too young, and she’s not ready.’

‘It’s cool, though? You and her?’

‘Honestly? It is, for the first time really. We’ve discovered that being 
nice to each other, all the time, is all it takes.’

‘Maybe I’ll try that, next time.’

‘Some chance of that,’ he scoffed. ‘You’re a politician. By the way,’ 
he added, ‘the Turnberry tape did exist, kept carelessly by Toni in a plain 
envelope that I found deep in the desk that is currently mine. It does not 
exist any longer.’

‘Thank you,’ she whispered. ‘To be honest, I was really worried about 
that, and not for Mrs Graham’s sake.’

‘It’s nothing to be concerned about any more,’ he replied, ‘but this 
is.’ He took an envelope from a slim document case that he had brought with 
him.

She took it from him and her face paled, as she studied its contents: two 
photographs of her, with two other women, in a ladies’ toilet.

‘What are… Bob, I think I know when those were taken, but…’

‘You have to give up the booze, Aileen,’ he said. ‘You must. I didn’t 
realise you had a problem, maybe because whenever we had a drink at home, you 
went straight to sleep, or else you got amorous and I put it down to my fatal 
attraction. But that’s twice you’ve courted potential disaster, not 
counting the Morocco fiasco.’

‘How did you get these?’

He smiled. ‘The strangest thing happened a few weeks back. Amanda Dennis 
called all her Scottish team down to London for a two-day performance review. 
While they were gone, somebody broke into their office, and opened the safe. I 
don’t think they even know it happened, not yet. All that was taken were 
those photos, and the master tape. It’s in there too. Somehow they found 
their way into my possession.’

She gazed at him. ‘You know, I could fall in love with you.’

‘Nah, you didn’t before, so how could you now?’

She laughed. ‘Okay. Then how about a farewell shag? We could get a room.’

He shook his head. ‘I’m sworn to be faithful. You should try it too. 
Besides, someone would be bound to photograph us. For example…’

He took another, larger envelope from the document case. ‘These are my 
parting gifts to you, Aileen, and my greatest. Where you’re going to be after 
your by-election, these will represent your ticket straight to the front bench, 
and a fast track to the shadow Cabinet. In this package you will see Toni Field 
doing what she did best. You’ll also recognise the bloke she’s doing it to, 
and I think you will find that you know his wife too. The stupid bloody woman 
actually believed I wouldn’t make copies! That same lady had you set up by 
those two scrubbers, who are, incidentally, no longer Security Service staff, 
and tried to use your moment of weakness to club me into submission and 
silence.’

He lifted his glass and drank a toast, to her, to them, to their past, and to 
their separate futures.

‘Use them wisely, choose your moment, and when you do, make certain sure that 
the damage to Emily Repton is terminal. “Provincial copper” indeed. 
Doesn’t she bloody know that we’re a nation?’





Copyright © 2013 Portador Ltd



The right of Quintin Jardine to be identified as the Author of the Work has 
been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 
1988.



First published as an Ebook by Headline Publishing Group 2013



Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only 
be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior 
permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic 
production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright 
Licensing Agency.



All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real 
persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.



Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library



E-pub conversion by Avon DataSet Ltd, Bidford-on-Avon, Warwickshire



eISBN: 978 0 7553 5706 2



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About the Author



Twenty years ago Quintin Jardine abandoned the life of a media relations 
consultant for the more morally acceptable world of murder and mayhem. Over 
thirty published novels later, it’s a decision that neither he nor his global 
network of fans have ever regretted. Happily married, he splits his time 
between Scotland and Spain, but he can be tracked down through his website 
www.quintinjardine.com.





By Quintin Jardine and available from Headline

Bob Skinner series:

Skinner’s Rules

Skinner’s Festival

Skinner’s Trail

Skinner’s Round

Skinner’s Ordeal

Skinner’s Mission

Skinner’s Ghosts

Murmuring the Judges

Gallery Whispers

Thursday Legends

Autographs in the Rain

Head Shot

Fallen Gods

Stay of Execution

Lethal Intent

Dead and Buried

Death’s Door

Aftershock

Fatal Last Words

A Rush of Blood

Grievous Angel

Funeral Note

Pray for the Dying

Oz Blackstone series:

Blackstone’s Pursuits

A Coffin for Two

Wearing Purple

Screen Savers

On Honeymoon with Death

Poisoned Cherries

Unnatural Justice

Alarm Call

For the Death of Me

Primavera Blackstone series:

Inhuman Remains

Blood Red

As Easy As Murder

Deadly Business



The Loner





About the Book



‘After what happened, none of us can be sure we’re going to see tomorrow’

The killing was an expert hit. Three shots through the head as the lights 
dimmed at a celebrity concert in Glasgow. A most public crime and Edinburgh 
Chief Constable Bob Skinner is right in the centre of the storm as it breaks 
over the Strathclyde force. The shooters are dead too, killed at the scene. But 
who sent them?

The crisis finds Skinner, his private life shattered by the abrupt end of his 
marriage, taking a step that he had sworn he never would. Tasked by 
Scotland’s First Minister with the investigation of the outrage, he finds 
himself quickly uncovering some very murky deeds… and a fourth body, whose 
identity only adds to the confusion.

The trail leads to London, where national issues compromise the hunt. Skinner 
has to rattle the bars of the most formidable cage in the country, and go head 
to head with its leading power brokers… a confrontation that seems too much, 
even for him.

Can the Chief solve the most challenging mystery of his career… or will 
failure end it?





For Eileen, for ever, or as close to that as we can manage.





PreScript



From the Saltire newspaper, Sunday edition:

Strathclyde Chief Constable believed dead in Glasgow Concert Hall Shooting

By June Crampsey



Mystery still surrounds a shooting last night in Glasgow’s Royal Concert Hall 
in which a woman was killed in a VIP seat at a charity concert, inches away 
from Scotland’s First Minister, Clive Graham MSP. The identity of the victim 
has still to be confirmed officially, but it is believed that she was Antonia 
Field, the recently appointed Chief Constable of the Strathclyde Force, the 
second largest in the UK after London’s Met.



The killing was carried out by two men, who were themselves shot dead as they 
tried to escape, after murdering a police officer and critically wounding 
another.



A security cordon was thrown round the hall immediately after the incident, but 
reporters could see what appeared to be three bodies outside in Killermont 
Street, one of them in police uniform. A fourth man, said to be a police 
officer, was taken away by ambulance, and a spokesman for Glasgow Royal 
Infirmary confirmed later that he was undergoing emergency surgery for gunshot 
wounds.



Edinburgh Chief Constable Bob Skinner, husband of Scottish Labour leader Aileen 
de Marco who was a guest of the First Minister at the fund-raiser, took command 
at the scene. Briefing media in Glasgow City Chambers, he refused to name the 
victim, but did say that it was not his wife, nor was it the woman who had 
accompanied her to the concert, believed to be Edinburgh businesswoman Paula 
Viareggio, the partner of another senior police officer in the capital, 
Detective Chief Superintendent Mario McGuire.



Most of the eyewitnesses refused to speak to journalists as they were ushered 
away from the concert hall. Many seemed to be in shock. However, world-famous 
Scottish actor Joey Morocco, Master of Ceremonies for the evening, told the 
Saltire as he left, ‘There was complete confusion in there.



‘The conductor, Sir Leslie Fender, had just raised his baton and the house 
lights had dimmed when I heard three sounds that I know now were shots, one 
after the other. Then everything went completely dark, pitch black, and someone 
started screaming.



‘Before that, though,’ Mr Morocco continued, ‘I was standing in the wings 
and I was facing the audience. In the second or two before the lights went out, 
as the shots were fired, I saw movement in the front row. There were three 
women on the First Minister’s left.



‘Aileen, she’s a friend, by the way, she was sat furthest away from him, 
then her companion, Paula, and then the lady who’d arrived with Mr Graham. I 
don’t know her name, but somebody said she’s the chief constable. I saw her 
jerk in her seat then start to fall forward. That’s when the lights went out.



‘The emergency lighting came on automatically, after a few seconds. It 
wasn’t much good, but I could make out that the seat next to the First 
Minister was empty and that there was a shape on the floor.



‘There was panic after that. I heard Mr Graham shouting for help, then I 
could just make out a policeman rushing forward. I think it was Mr Allan, the 
assistant chief constable. I tried to use the mike but it was useless with the 
power being out, so I jumped up on to the conductor’s podium and yelled to 
everyone to stay in their seats and stay calm until the lighting was restored. 
But the people in the rows nearest the front, some of them realised what had 
happened and they started to panic.



‘Mr Graham was brilliant. He stood up, called out to everyone to stay where 
they were, for their own safety. It was an incredibly brave thing to do,’ Mr 
Morocco added. ‘He might have been the target himself and the gunman might 
still have been there, but he put himself right in the line of fire, then he 
took off his jacket and put it over the woman on the floor. That’s when I 
knew for sure that she was dead.



‘Thing is,’ he explained, ‘she was wearing a red dress. Normally at a big 
public event Aileen wears red, her party colours, but last night, for some 
reason, she didn’t. So I’m wondering if she was the intended target and 
whether the gunman just made a mistake.’



Addressing journalists in a hastily convened briefing in the Glasgow City 
Council Chambers, after being asked by the First Minister to take charge of the 
situation, Mr Skinner refused to comment on Mr Morocco’s speculation.



‘It’s way too early to be making any assumptions,’ he said firmly. ‘We 
believe we know who the shooters were, but we’re a long way from 
understanding their motives.’



Asked whether Al Qaeda might be involved, he replied, ‘I’m not ruling that 
out, but the gunmen were not Muslim and the nationality of a third person 
involved in the plot makes that highly unlikely. However, I can tell you that 
this was a well-planned operation carried out by people with special skills.



‘We’ve been able to establish already that the hall was blacked out by an 
explosion that took out the electricity substation serving the building. It was 
remotely detonated as soon as the shots had been fired. We’re also sure that 
the two men gained entrance to the building dressed as police officers, and 
ditched their disguises before trying to escape.’



He refused to go into detail on how they had been killed, or by whom.



When I spoke to him later, by telephone, he explained that neither of the 
victims could be identified before their next of kin had been told. He added 
that the First Minister was under close protection at his home, and that his 
wife was also being guarded at a secret location.





One



‘I put Paula in harm’s way, Mario,’ Bob Skinner murmured, as he gazed at 
his colleague, their faces pale in the glare of the freestanding spotlights 
that had been set up to illuminate the scene. ‘I am desperately sorry.’

Never before had Detective Chief Superintendent McGuire seen his boss looking 
apprehensive, and yet he was, there could be no mistaking it.

‘How exactly did you do that, sir?’ he replied, stiffly. ‘Your wife 
invited my wife to chum her to a charity concert. Given that Aileen is a former 
and possibly future First Minister of our country, most people would regard 
that as something of an honour.’

‘Someone tried to kill her,’ Skinner hissed. ‘There was intelligence that 
a hit was being planned. You know that; I knew it. I was asleep at the fucking 
wheel, or I’d have considered that as a possibility.’

‘Then it was Paula that saved her life, Bob,’ McGuire pointed out, more 
gently. ‘If she hadn’t told Aileen that she was wearing a red outfit, on 
account of her being so pregnant it was the only thing that would fit, then 
Aileen would have worn her usual colour.’

The chief constable frowned. ‘But Paula isn’t wearing red.’

‘No, she found something else. Thank your lucky stars again that she didn’t 
think to tell Aileen about it. Stop beating yourself up, man. Nobody’s going 
to blame you for anything, least of all me. Paula’s all right, she’s off 
the scene, and that’s an end of it.’

Skinner nodded towards the splayed body, a few yards away from where they 
stood, in front of the auditorium stage of Glasgow’s splendid concert arena. 
‘She would blame me, if she could.’ He put a hand to an ear. ‘If I listen 
hard enough I reckon I’ll hear her. Five minutes, that’s all it would have 
taken. If we’d got to our informant five minutes earlier…’

‘You’d probably have been caught in traffic,’ his colleague countered, 
‘and got here no quicker. Okay, if the Strathclyde communications centre 
hadn’t been on weekend mode, you might have got the word to ACC Allan and 
prevented the hit… but they were and you didn’t.’

‘Speaking of old Max,’ Skinner murmured, ‘how is he? I didn’t have time 
to talk to him when he met us at the entrance. “She’s dead,” he said. 
That was all. I assumed it was Aileen. I didn’t wait to hear any more. I just 
charged inside and left him there.’

‘He’s wasted; complete collapse. When I got there he was sitting on the 
steps in the foyer with his face in his hands. He had blood on them; it was all 
over his face, in his hair. He was a mess.’ He paused. ‘The guy you were 
with, the fellow who took Paula and Aileen away. I only caught a glimpse of 
him. Who is he?’

‘His name’s Clyde Houseman. Security Service; Glasgow regional office.’

‘He’s sound?’

‘Oh yes.’ Skinner’s eyes flashed. ‘Do you think for a minute I’d 
entrust our wives’ safety to him if I wasn’t sure of that? I told him to 
take them to the high security police station in Govan and to keep them there 
till he heard from me. And before you ask, there’s a doctor on the way there 
to check Paula out, given that she’s over eight months gone.’

‘But she was fine, as far as you could see?’ McGuire asked, anxiously.

‘Yes, like I said. Obviously, she got a fright at the time… not even 
Paula’s going to have the woman in the seat next to her shot through the head 
without batting an eyelid… but when I got to her she was calm and in control. 
Far more concerned about Toni Field than about herself.’

‘Did she see…’

‘Not much. Even when the emergency lighting came on, it wasn’t far short of 
pitch dark, and Clive Graham got between her and the body, and made his 
protection officers rush her and Aileen out of there, into the anteroom where I 
found them. Aileen screamed bloody murder, of course.’

‘Was she in shock?’

‘Hell no. It wasn’t from fright. She just didn’t want to leave. I’m a 
cynic where politicians are concerned, and my wife’s no different from any of 
them, maybe worse than most. She wanted to be seen here alongside Clive Graham, 
who appears to have been a complete fucking hero. He’ll get the headlines and 
Aileen was livid that she’ll be seen as a weak wee woman, hiding behind her 
husband. I wasn’t fucking wearing that, mate. I told Houseman to get them out 
of there, regardless of what she wanted, and I sent Graham’s people back to 
do their job.’ He grunted. ‘You know that actor guy, Joey Morocco? Didn’t 
he turn up on the bloody scene while all this was going on, demanding to know 
that Aileen was all right!’

‘Morocco? The movie star? What’s his interest in Aileen?’

‘The very question I put to him, but she said they were old friends. News to 
me, but they were all over each other. I might as well not have been here. He 
offered to take the girls to his place, but I told him that unless it was 
bomb-proof like the Govan nick, that wouldn’t be a starter. Then I told him 
to clear out, with the rest of the civilians.’

‘How long are you going to keep them there?’

The chief constable’s eyebrows rose. ‘Christ, Mario, I haven’t thought 
that far ahead. I’ve been here for twenty-five minutes, that’s all, trying 
to keep this crime scene secure till the forensic team arrive. Anyway, this 
isn’t our patch. That’s an operational decision for…’

‘Indeed.’

Both police officers turned towards the newcomer. McGuire, irked by the 
interruption, frowned, but Skinner knew the voice well enough. ‘Clive,’ he 
murmured in greeting, as the First Minister stepped into the silver light, with 
his two personal protection officers no more than a yard behind him. He was 
tartan-clad, waistcoat and trousers, but no jacket. The chief constable guessed 
that garment was draped over the body of Toni Field.

The woman had been his arch-enemy. She had been a surprise choice as head of 
the Strathclyde force, a job for which he had declined to apply, in spite of 
the entreaties of his wife and of the retiring chief. Most Scots assumed, 
therefore, that she had been appointed by default, but Skinner recognised the 
quality of her CV, and even more important its breadth, with success in the Met 
and England’s Serious Crimes Agency added to relevant experience as chief 
constable of the West Midlands.

She and Skinner had been on a collision course from their first meeting, when 
it had become clear that Field was in support of the unified Scottish police 
force advocated by Clive Graham’s government, and that she expected to be 
appointed to lead it, regardless of his own ambitions.

As it happened, those no more included heading Graham’s proposed force than 
they had inclined him towards Strathclyde. Skinner was firmly against the idea, 
on principle. He had shunned the Glasgow job because he felt that a force that 
covered half of Scotland’s land mass and most of its population was itself 
too large.

He had always believed that policing had to be as locally responsible as 
possible, and when he had discovered a few days earlier that his wife, the 
First Minister’s chief political rival as leader of the Scottish Labour 
Party, intended to back unification and help rush it through the Holyrood 
parliament, their marriage had exploded. Aileen had moved back to her flat, 
ostensibly for a few days, but they knew, both of them, that it was for good.

‘How are you?’ he asked the First Minister. He had no personal issues with 
him. His position and that of his party had been clear from the start; his 
wife’s, he was convinced, was based on political expediency, pure and simple.

‘In need of another very stiff drink,’ Graham replied. ‘Yes, I’ve 
already had one, but I suspect I’m going to get the shakes pretty soon. What 
happened… it hasn’t quite sunk in yet. Please brief me, on everything. I 
can’t get any sense out of the locals, and my protection boys don’t know 
any more than I do.’

Both Skinner and McGuire realised that he was making a determined effort not to 
look at the thing on the floor.

‘Are the ladies safe?’ he continued.

‘Yes,’ Skinner replied.

‘The pregnant one? She’s…’

‘My wife,’ McGuire whispered.

The First Minister stared at him.

‘This is DCS McGuire,’ Skinner explained. ‘My head of CID. I had promised 
my kids some attention today, so Aileen invited Paula to use the other 
ticket.’ Not a lie, not the whole truth. ‘And yes, thank you. She’s okay. 
Obviously Mario here will be keeping her in cotton wool from now on, but 
she’ll be fine, I’m sure.’

‘That’s good to hear. Now, do you believe there’s a continuing threat?’

‘No, I don’t, but we shouldn’t take any chances.’

‘What happened? None of us really knows, Bob. Who was it? Did they get 
away?’

‘It was a professional hit team. Originally there were three, but one of 
them, the planner, died a few days ago, unexpectedly, of natural causes. The 
body was dumped in Edinburgh. The other two didn’t think for a minute we’d 
identify him, but we did, and as soon as we knew who he was, we knew as well 
that something was up. We guessed the venue, but we got the target wrong. We 
thought they were after the pianist, the guy who was supposed to be playing at 
this thing.’

‘Theo Fabrizzi?’

‘Yes. For all his name, he’s Lebanese, and he’s a hate figure for the 
Israelis. We didn’t find out any of this until the last minute. When we did, 
we got him out of here. You were probably told he’d been taken ill, but that 
was bollocks. The guy’s a fanatic, a martyr with a piano; he wouldn’t back 
off, so we arrested him and took him away, spitting feathers, but safe.’

‘My God,’ the First Minister exclaimed. ‘Why wasn’t I told this at the 
time?’

‘We were too busy sorting the situation out,’ Skinner shot back, irritably. 
‘Or so we thought. And there was another reason,’ he added. ‘I 
shouldn’t have to tell you that your devolved powers do not include 
counter-terrorism. That’s reserved for Westminster.

‘As soon as we identified Cohen, the planner, MI5 got involved, with the Home 
Secretary pulling the strings. There had been intelligence that a hit was 
planned in the UK, but no details. With Cohen and his team in Scotland, 
assumptions were made, and we all bought into the piano player as the target. 
Then the Home Secretary got brave… God save us all from courageous 
politicians in fucking bunkers in Whitehall, Clive… and decided that she 
wanted her people to catch the rest of the team. She declared that it was a 
Five operation, and that the police shouldn’t be alerted, in case of crossed 
wires.’

‘So how did you get involved?’

‘I was in play by that time, having asked them for help in identifying 
Cohen.’

Graham’s face was creased into a frown that made him unrecognisable as the 
beaming man on the election posters. ‘But if…’ he growled.

Skinner nodded. ‘There was someone else involved, the man who supplied the 
weapons. My MI5 colleague and I got to him,’ he paused and checked his watch, 
‘less than ninety minutes ago. We interrogated him and he told us that from a 
remark by one of the shooters, when they collected the guns last night, the 
target was definitely female.

‘Obviously that changed everything. At that point…’ he paused, ‘. . . 
well, frankly, it was fuck the Home Secretary’s orders. We headed straight 
through here. I tried to stop the event, but in all this mighty police force, 
Clive, I could not find anyone willing to take responsibility, until it was too 
late. You know what happened then.’

‘What about the terrorists? Did they escape in all the confusion? Nobody can 
tell me, or will.’

‘They’re dead. They were making their escape when we arrived. They’d just 
shot the two cops manning the door.’ He sighed, shuddered for a second, and 
shook his head. ‘Fortunately my Five sidekick was armed or we’d have been 
in trouble. We didn’t negotiate. Captain Houseman killed one. I took down the 
other one as he tried to run off. But don’t be calling these guys terrorists, 
Clive. They weren’t. No, they were…’

He broke off as his personal mobile phone… he carried two… sounded in his 
pocket. He took it out and peered at the screen, ready to reject the call if it 
was Aileen spoiling for a renewed fight, but it was someone else. ‘Excuse 
me,’ he told the First Minister. ‘I have to take this.’

Graham nodded. ‘Of course.’

He slid the arrow to accept, and put the phone to his ear, moving a few paces 
away from the group, skirting Toni Field’s body as he did so.

‘Hi, Sarah,’ he murmured.

‘Bob!’ she exclaimed. Skinner’s ex-wife was cool and not given to panic, 
but the anxiety in her voice was undeniable.

‘Where are you? Are you okay? What’s happened? I’ve just had a call from 
Mark. He told me he heard a news flash on radio about a shooting in Glasgow, at 
an event with the First Minister and Aileen. That’s the event that she and 
Paula were going to this evening, isn’t it? He says someone’s dead and that 
your name was mentioned. Honey, what is it? Is it Aileen?’

‘Shit,’ he hissed. ‘So soon. They’re not saying that, are they, that 
it’s Aileen?’

‘I’m not sure what they said but Mark was left wondering if it might be. 
He’s scared, Bob, and most of all he’s scared for you.’

‘In that case, love, please call him back and calm him down. Yes, I am at the 
scene, yes, there is a casualty here, and others outside, but none of them are 
Aileen or anyone else he knows. And it’s certainly not Paula. They’re both 
safe.’

‘But how about you?’ Her voice was strident.

‘You can hear me, can’t you? I’m okay too. I might not be in the morning, 
when it all sinks in, but I am fine now, and in control of myself.’ As if to 
demonstrate, he paused then lowered his voice as he continued. ‘Are you 
alone?’ he asked. ‘Are you at home?’

‘Yes, of course, to both.’

‘Good. In that case, I need you to do a couple of things. Call Trish,’ 
their children had a full-time carer; their sons had reached an age at which 
they refused to allow her to be called a nanny, ‘and have her take the kids 
to your place. As soon as you’ve done that, get hold of my grown-up daughter. 
I’m guessing she hasn’t heard about this yet, or she’d have called me, 
but Alex being Alex, she’s bound to find out soon. She may be at home; if 
not, try her mobile… do you have the number?’

‘Yes.’

‘Fine, if you can’t raise her on either of those, try Andy’s place. Tell 
her what I’ve told you. I don’t have time to do it myself; the fan’s 
pretty much clogged up with shit here.’

‘Where will you be?’

‘That remains to be seen, but I’ll keep you in touch.’

‘When will you be out of there?’

‘Same answer.’

‘When you are,’ she told him, ‘come here first. It’s important that the 
kids see you as soon as they can.’

‘Yes, sure.’

‘What about Aileen?’

‘What do you mean?’ Bob asked.

‘Will she be coming back with you?’

‘No,’ he replied, with a sound that might have been a chuckle or a grunt, 
‘not even in protective custody. I told you last night, she and I are done.’

He glanced to his right. The First Minister and McGuire had been joined by a 
youngish man, in a dark suit. Strained though it was, his face was familiar to 
Skinner, but he found himself unable to put a name to it. Graham caught his 
eye, and he realised that they were waiting for him to finish his call. ‘Now, 
I must go,’ he said.

‘Take care,’ Sarah murmured.

‘Don’t I always?’

‘No.’

A brief smile flickered on his lips, but it was gone before he returned his 
phone to his pocket. He rejoined the group, and as he did so he remembered who 
the newcomer was. They had met at a reception hosted by his wife, during her 
time as Clive Graham’s predecessor in office.

‘Bob,’ the First Minister began, ‘this is…’

‘I know: Councillor Dominic Hanlon, chair of Strathclyde Police Authority.’ 
He extended his hand and they shook. ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’

Hanlon whistled, softly. ‘I could say something very inappropriate right now. 
It’s an open secret that you and Toni didn’t get on.’

‘You’ve just said it, Mr Hanlon,’ Skinner snapped. ‘You’re right; 
it’s as far from appropriate as you can get. Are you implying I’m glad to 
see her dead?’

‘No, no!’ The man held his hands up, in a defensive gesture, but the chief 
constable seemed to ignore him.

‘Colleagues don’t always agree,’ he went on, ‘any more than 
politicians. Like you two for example; anywhere else you’d be at each 
other’s ideological throats.’ He felt his anger grow, make him take the 
councillor by the elbow. ‘Come here,’ he growled. He pulled him towards the 
body on the floor, knelt beside it and removed the covering jacket, carefully.

‘This is what we’re dealing with here, chum. Look, remember it.’ The back 
of the head was caked red, and mangled where three bullets had torn into it. 
The right eye and a section of forehead above it were missing and there was 
brain tissue on the carpet.

Hanlon recoiled, with a howl that reminded the chief constable of a small 
animal in pain, as he replaced the makeshift cover.

‘Poor Toni Field and I might have had different policing agendas,’ he said, 
‘but we each of us devoted our careers to hunting down the sort of people who 
would do that sort of thing to another human being. You remember that next time 
you chair your fucking committee.’

‘I’m sorry,’ the younger man murmured.

‘You want to know how I feel?’ Skinner, not ready to let up, challenged. 
‘I feel angry, so walk carefully around me, chum.’

‘Yes, of course,’ Hanlon said, patting him on the sleeve as if to mollify 
him. ‘Surely, the chances are it wasn’t Toni they were after. Everybody 
outside is saying it’s Aileen that’s been shot… our Aileen, we call her 
in Glasgow. There’s folk in tears out there.

‘I thought it was her myself until the First Minister told me otherwise. Only 
the people in the front row could possibly know what’s really happened and I 
doubt if any of them do. They all think it’s Aileen because that’s the 
natural assumption. I think these people made a mistake, and shot the wrong 
woman.’

‘For God’s sake, man!’ Graham barked, beside him. ‘This is Aileen’s 
husband, don’t you realise that?’

‘Yes, of course! Sorry.’ The councillor seemed to collapse into his own 
confusion.

Skinner held up a hand. ‘Stop!’ he boomed. ‘Enough. We’ll get to that, 
and to Dominic’s theory. First things first.’ He turned to McGuire. 
‘Mario, did you come through here alone?’

‘No, boss,’ the massive DCS answered. ‘Lowell Payne, DCI Payne, our 
Strathclyde secondee, he’s with me. He’s outside in the foyer; it was sheer 
chaos when we arrived, with no sign of anybody in command, so I told him to 
take control out there, calm people down as best he could, and move them out 
the other exit, so they wouldn’t go past bodies outside.’

The chief nodded. ‘Well done, mate. My priority was in here when I arrived. 
With Max Allan not making any sense, all I could do was get hold of a uniformed 
inspector and tell him to contain the audience within the hall, until we could 
be sure that there was no further threat outside. Where is everyone?’

‘Payne said he would gather them in the foyer and in the smaller theatre. 
There’s enough back-up lighting for that to be managed safely.’

‘Okay, that sounds fine. Now, you shouldn’t really be here at all, but you 
charged through here like a red-taunted bull as soon as you heard your wife 
might be in danger. Whatever, your priority will always be her. Get yourself 
off to the Govan police station, pick her up from there and take her home.’

‘What about Aileen?’ McGuire asked.

‘She stays there, till someone in authority says otherwise. Find Clyde 
Houseman and tell him from me that he takes no instructions from anyone below 
chief officer rank. On your way, now.’

He turned back to the politicians. ‘Now. You two were working up to say 
something before Dominic here put his foot in it. What was it?’

‘We’ve got a crisis, Bob,’ Graham replied. ‘Strathclyde is in trouble, 
and that’s putting it mildly. The chief constable is dead, the deputy chief 
took early retirement a fortnight ago, Max Allan, the senior ACC, has just been 
taken away in an ambulance with severe chest pains, and the two other ACCs are 
far too new and inexperienced in post to move into the top job, even on a 
temporary basis… and even without the force facing one of the highest-profile 
murder investigations it’s ever known, as this will become.’

Hanlon nodded, vigorously. ‘As you’ve just pointed out to me, Mr Skinner, 
graphically, this is a major crime, and even if Toni’s killers… and the 
killers of one, maybe two police officers… are lying dead in the street 
outside, the matter isn’t closed.’

‘Maybe three, maybe four,’ Skinner murmured.

The Police Authority chairman blinked. ‘Eh?’

‘How did they get the uniforms? We don’t know that. Did they bring them, or 
did they take them from two other cops we haven’t found yet?’

‘My God,’ Hanlon gasped. ‘I hadn’t thought about that.’

‘Bob,’ the First Minister intervened. ‘This investigation needs a leader. 
This whole force needs a leader and it needs him now. We don’t have time for 
niceties here. I want to appoint you acting chief constable of Strathclyde, 
pending confirmation by an emergency meeting of Dominic’s authority. That 
will take place tomorrow morning.’

‘Me?’ Skinner gasped. ‘Strathclyde? The force whose very existence I’ve 
opposed for years? Is there nobody else? What about Andy Martin? He’s head of 
the Serious Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency. He could do the job.’

Graham shook his head. ‘He could, I agree, but everybody knows he’s your 
protégé, not to mention him being your daughter’s partner. He’d be seen 
as second choice, and I can’t have that. I need the best man available, and 
that is you. Please, help me. Your deputy in Edinburgh is more than capable; 
she can stand in there. Please take the job; in the public interest, Bob, even 
if it does go against your own beliefs.’

Skinner stared at him. ‘You’ve really boxed me in, man, haven’t you?’

‘It’s not something I’d have chosen to do.’

‘No, I believe you. That’s the way it is, nonetheless.’ He sighed. 
‘Fuck it!’ he shouted, into the darkness of the empty hall.

‘Can I take that as a yes?’ the First Minister whispered.





Two



‘And you’ve agreed?’

‘What else could I do, Andy? The Police Authority meets tomorrow to confirm 
it formally, and it’ll be announced on Monday. But it’s for three months, 
that’s all. I’ve made that clear.’

There was a silence on Andy Martin’s end of the line, until he broke it with 
a soft chuckle. ‘Would that be as clear as you’ve made it to anyone who 
would listen that you would never take the job under any circumstances?’

‘Yes, okay, I have said that,’ Skinner conceded. ‘But,’ he protested, 
‘who could have predicted these particular circumstances?’

‘Nobody,’ his best friend conceded. ‘That’s why the “any” part of 
it was a mistake. Now let me make a prediction. However hard it was for you to 
get into the job, it will be harder for you to get out.’

‘Nonsense! I said three months and I meant it. They’ll be glad to see me 
go, Andy. The politicians will hate me here; remember, most of them are 
followers of my soon to be ex-wife.’

‘Your what?’ Martin exclaimed. ‘Come on, Bob. Alex told me you’d had a 
row over police unification, but I’d no idea it was that serious. You’ll 
get over it, surely.’

‘No, we won’t. Too much was said, too much truth told. This isn’t like 
when Sarah and I broke up, or you and Karen. We haven’t drifted away from 
each other like then, we’ve torn the thing apart. Besides…’ He stopped in 
mid-sentence. ‘No, that’s for another time. I have things to do here. First 
and foremost, I’ve got a very messy crime scene to manage. Second, I’ve got 
to face the press.’

‘Where are you going to do that?’

‘I’ve told the press office to use the City Chambers. Hanlon, the Police 
Authority chair, is going to fix it. I could have done it on the front steps of 
the concert hall, but I want to move the media, or as many as I can, away from 
there, so the people who were in the auditorium can leave as easily as we can 
manage. They’re having to go that way, into Buchanan Street, since there are 
still three bodies lying in Killermont Street.’

‘I know Hanlon; he’ll want to sit alongside you.’

‘You’re right. He’s asked if he could, and not only him. Clive Graham 
tried it before him. I’ve told them both that they’re not on. This is the 
assassination of a high-profile public figure we’re dealing with and I’m 
damned if I’m having anything that sniffs of political posturing alongside 
it.’

‘Hah!’ Martin exclaimed. ‘That’s already happened. I’ve just seen 
that Joey Morocco guy vox-popped on telly, outside in Buchanan Street. The way 
he tells the story, the First Minister’s something of a hero, standing up in 
the line of fire when the emergency lights came back on. Graham’s going to 
have to give himself a gallantry medal.’

‘Stupidity medal more like.’ Skinner paused. ‘Did Morocco say who the 
victim is?’

‘No, but he did say it isn’t Aileen, or Paula. They are both unhurt, yes?’

‘Yes, fine, I’ve spoken to them both, before I had them rushed out of here. 
Aileen wanted to stay and wave the red flag, of course.’

‘Ouch! Bob, can I do anything? Personally, or through the agency?’

‘Yes, you can. I’d like you to take Alex to Sarah’s, and stay there with 
her. I don’t believe for a second there’s any sort of threat to them, but 
I’m feeling a bit prickly, and I want all my family under one roof and looked 
after till I can get to them.’

‘I understand. I’ll do that. Now, Alex wants to speak.’

Skinner could picture his elder daughter snatching the phone from her 
partner’s hand. ‘Dad!’ Her voice had the same breathless tone as 
Sarah’s, a little earlier.

‘Be cool, kid,’ he told her. ‘The panic’s over; there’s no hostage 
situation or anything like that. Andy will tell you as much as he can. I have 
things to do and then I have to go to the Royal Infirmary. We have a cop there 
fighting for his life and I have to see how he’s doing. Go now. I’ll see 
you when I can.’

He ended the call and walked back towards the pool of light in front of the 
stage. The First Minister had been escorted away by his protection officers, 
and Councillor Hanlon had gone to the Glasgow council headquarters, to have 
them made ready for the media briefing to come. But Skinner was not standing 
guard alone.

‘I’ve just spoken to your niece,’ he said to Detective Chief Inspector 
Lowell Payne. ‘I didn’t tell her you were involved, though, in case she 
phoned Jean. There’s enough anxiety in my family without spreading it to 
yours.’

There was a personal link between the two men, one that had nothing to do with 
the job. Ten years after the death of Skinner’s first wife, Myra, Alex’s 
mother, Payne had married her sister.

‘Thanks, Bob. I appreciate that.’

‘Don’t mention it. Listen, Lowell, this job I’ve taken on, temporary or 
not, I have to be on top of it from the start. That means I need to get up to 
speed very quickly on the basics of the force, areas where my knowledge may be 
lacking: its structure, its strengths and its weaknesses, as perceived within 
the force.

‘I’m going to need somebody close to me, to advise me and instruct me where 
necessary, a sound, experienced guy. You’ve got twenty-five years plus in the 
job, all of it in Strathclyde. Will you be my aide, for as long as I need one? 
Officially, mind; you’ll come off CID for the duration and operate as my 
liaison across the force. You up for it?’

The DCI seemed to hesitate. ‘Are you not worried there might be talk, about 
you and me being sort of related?’

‘No, and anyway, we’re not. My daughter being your niece does not make you 
part of my family, or me part of yours.’

‘In that case the answer’s yes.’

‘Good. Now, what’s happening outside?’

‘Everybody’s calm, and they’re leaving. They’re all potential 
witnesses, I know, but there’s no need to ask them all for contact details, 
since they’re all on a central database. They all booked through the 
internet, so they all had to leave their details.’

‘Good man. Not that we’ll need to go back to any of them. None of them can 
answer any of the questions we need to ask.’

‘Those being?’

‘Who sent the hit team, and why?’

Payne frowned. ‘Why? Does there have to be a why these days, when terrorism 
is involved, and politicians are the target?’

‘Doesn’t matter. It’s our job to look for it.’

‘And mine to help you.’

Skinner turned. He had recognised the voice, from many similar scenes over many 
years. The man who faced him was clad in a crime-scene tunic, complete with a 
paper hat that failed to contain the red hair that escaped from it. Looking at 
him the chief wondered if he would have recognised him in ordinary clothes, or, 
God forbid, in uniform.

‘Arthur,’ he exclaimed. ‘You’re looking as out of water as I feel. What 
the hell are you doing in Glasgow?’

‘You should know, boss,’ Detective Inspector Dorward replied. ‘You 
approved the set-up. Ever since forensic services were pulled together into a 
central unit, we’ve gone anywhere we’re needed and more than that, we’ve 
had a national duty rota at weekends. I drew this straw. And bloody busy I’ve 
been. I’d not long left a very messy scene in Leith when I got the call to 
come through here.’ He paused. ‘But I could ask you the same question. Why 
are you here?’

‘I was following a line of inquiry. It led me here.’

Dorward raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh aye,’ he drawled. ‘I know what that means. 
So far I’ve counted four bodies on the ground. Any of them down to you?’

‘Just the one.’

Dorward nodded towards the figure under the jacket. ‘Not her, though?’

‘Definitely not. Now don’t push your luck any further, Arthur.’

‘Fair enough, Chief; in return, you get your big feet off my crime scene.’ 
He looked at Payne. ‘And you.’ He paused. ‘Here, weren’t you at 
Leith?’

The Strathclyde DCI nodded.

‘Then what the fuck’s going on here? What’s the connection?’

‘Never mind that,’ Skinner told him. ‘This is what matters. For openers, 
we need you to recover the bullets that killed our victim here, for comparison 
with the ones that were recovered from the two bodies in Leith.’

‘Are you saying they’ll be the same?’

Skinner nodded.

‘And if they’re not?’

‘Then we’re all going to find out how deep shit can get. Go to work, 
Arthur.’

‘Errr…’ a deep contralto voice exclaimed from the relative darkness 
beyond the floodlights, ‘can we just hold on a minute here?’

Its owner stepped into the bright light. She was tall, around six feet, and 
wore, over an open-necked white shirt, a dark suit that did nothing to disguise 
the width of her shoulders. Her hair was dark, swept back from a high forehead, 
her eyes were a deep shade of blue, but her nose was her dominant feature. A 
warrant card was clipped to the right lapel of her jacket.

She eyed Skinner, up and down, no flicker of recognition on her face. ‘So who 
the hell are you, to be giving orders at my crime scene?’ she asked, slowly.

The chief constable took his own ID from a pocket and displayed it. She looked 
at it, then shrugged.

‘That doesn’t answer my question,’ the woman retorted. ‘That says 
Edinburgh. Okay, the earth might have moved for me last night, but not that 
much. As far as I know, this is still Strathclyde.’

Payne took half a pace forward. ‘Cool it, Lottie. This is Chief Constable Bob 
Skinner, and you know who I am.’

She frowned at him. ‘Sure, I know who you are. You’re a DCI and you’re in 
strategy. I’m serious crimes, which this as sure as hell is, from what I was 
told and what I saw outside. That puts me in command of this crime scene.’ 
She nodded sideways, in Skinner’s general direction. ‘As for our friend 
here…’

‘Sir,’ Payne sighed, ‘I must apologise to you, on behalf of the 
Strathclyde force. My colleague here, DI Charlotte Mann, she’s got a 
reputation for being blunt, and sometimes she takes it to the point of 
rudeness. Lottie, get off your high horse. We know what’s happened here…’

‘I don’t,’ she snapped back. ‘I know there’s a dead cop outside in 
Killermont Street, and two other gunshot victims, but I don’t know how they 
got there. I don’t know who’s under that jacket…’

‘You’d better take a look, then,’ Skinner told her.

‘You speak when you’re spoken to… sir. And don’t be trying to tell me 
my job.’ She stepped across to the body.

‘Be careful over there,’ the blue-suited Dorward warned, but she ignored 
him as she lifted the jacket from the prone form.

‘Bloody hell!’ she exclaimed as she observed the shattered head. She peered 
a little closer, then looked over her shoulder, at Payne. ‘Lowell,’ she 
murmured ‘is this… ?’

He nodded.

‘And the two men outside?’

He nodded again. ‘The shooters.’

‘So you see, Inspector,’ Skinner said. ‘We do know what’s happened 
here.’

The DI glared at him. ‘You might, chum, but the procurator fiscal doesn’t, 
and it’s my job to investigate these incidents and report to her. So you can 
shove your Edinburgh warrant card as far as it’ll go. It means nothing to me. 
As far as I’m concerned, you’re just another witness, and for all I know 
you might even be a suspect. My team should all be here within the next few 
minutes. Do not go anywhere; they will be wanting to interview you.’

‘Aw, Jesus!’ Payne laughed, out loud. ‘I’ve had enough of this.’ He 
glanced at Skinner. ‘May I, sir?’

‘You’d better,’ the chief conceded. He moved aside, letting the DCI step 
up to his CID colleague and whisper, urgently and fiercely in her ear, then 
catching her eye as she looked towards him, nodding gently, in answer to her 
surprise.

She walked towards him. ‘They didn’t waste any time filling the chair,’ 
she said.

‘They… they being the First Minister and the Police Authority chair… felt 
that they didn’t have a choice. I was asked and I accepted: end of story. 
It’ll be formalised on Monday, but as of now you take orders from me and 
anyone else I tell you to.’ He paused. ‘Now, Inspector, tell me. How are 
your traffic management skills?’

Lottie Mann held his gaze, unflinching. ‘The traffic will do what I fucking 
tell it, sir,’ she replied, ‘if it knows what’s good for it. But 
wouldn’t that be a bit of a waste?’

Skinner’s eyes softened, then he smiled. ‘Yes, it would,’ he agreed, 
‘and one I don’t plan to have happen. I know about you, Lottie. ACC Allan 
told us all about you, at a chief officers’ dinner a while back.’

For the first time, her expression grew a little less fierce. ‘What did he 
say?’ she asked.

‘He said you were barking mad, a complete loose cannon, and that you were 
under orders never to speak to the press or let yourself be filmed for TV. He 
told us a story about you, ten years ago, when you had just made DC, demanding 
to box in an interdivisional smoker that some of your male CID colleagues had 
organised, and knocking out your male opponent inside a minute. But he also 
said you were the best detective on the force and that he put up with you in 
spite of it all. I like Max, and I rate him, so I’ll take all of that as a 
recommendation.’

Mann nodded. ‘Thank you, sir. Actually it was inside thirty seconds. Can I 
take your statement now… yours and the guy I was told you arrived with?’

The chief grinned again. ‘Mine, sure, in good time. My colleague, no. His 
name won’t appear in your report and he won’t be a witness at any 
inquiry.’

‘Spook?’

‘Spook. That reminds me.’ He turned to Payne. ‘Lowell, there is bound to 
be at least one CCTV camera covering the Killermont Street entrance. I want you 
to locate it, them if there are others, and confiscate all the footage from 
this afternoon. When we have it, it goes nowhere without my say-so.’

‘Yes, sir.’

As the DCI left, Skinner led Mann away from the floodlight beam and signalled 
to Dorward that he and his people could begin their work. He stopped at an 
auditorium doorway, beneath a green exit sign and an emergency lamp.

‘Lottie, this is the scenario,’ he said. ‘On the face of it, a contract 
hit has taken place here. I can tell you there have been rumours in the 
intelligence community of a terrorist attempt on a British political figure. 
So, it’s being suggested there’s a possibility Chief Constable Field was 
mistaken for the real target: my wife, Aileen de Marco, the Scottish Labour 
leader. Aileen usually wears red to public functions. This evening she 
didn’t, but Toni Field did.’

‘That suggestion’s bollocks,’ she blurted out. ‘Sir.’

His eyebrows rose. ‘Why?’

‘A couple of reasons. First, and with respect…’

The chief grinned. ‘I didn’t think you had any of that.’

‘I do where it’s deserved. I know about you too. And I know about your 
wife. She’s my constituency MSP, and she’s a big name in Glasgow, even in 
Scotland. But not beyond. So, killing her, it’s hardly going to strike a 
major blow for Islam, is it?’

‘Go on.’

‘Okay. You say this is a contract hit. So, let’s assume that the two guys 
outside weren’t amateurs, however dead they might be now.’

‘Far from it. They were South African mercenaries, both of them.’

‘Right. That being the case, they’re going to have seen photographs of 
their target. Your wife is about five eight and blonde. Toni Field was five 
feet five with her shoes on and she had brown hair. But even more important, 
Aileen de Marco is white, and Chief Constable Field was dark-skinned. These 
people knew exactly who they were here to kill, and they didn’t make a 
mistake. That’s my professional opinion. Sir.’

Skinner gazed at the floor, then up, engaging her once again. ‘And mine too, 
Detective Inspector,’ he murmured. ‘But let’s keep it to ourselves for 
now. The media can run with whatever theories they like. We won’t confirm or 
knock down any of them. Tell me,’ he added, ‘what did you think of Toni 
Field?’

‘Honestly?’

‘I don’t believe you could tell it any other way.’

‘On the face of it, she was a role model for all female police officers. In 
reality, she was a careerist, an opportunist and another few words ending in 
“ist”, none of them very complimentary.

‘I liked DCC Theakston, but she had him out the door as fast as she could. I 
more than like ACC Allan, he’s the man I’ve always looked up to in the 
force, and she had her knife out for him as well. She might have been a good 
police officer herself, but she didn’t know one when she saw one. I have a 
feeling that you might.’

‘I believe I’m looking at one.’ He pushed the door open. ‘Come on. 
You’re with me.’

‘Where? I’m supposed to be in command here.’

‘Mmm. True,’ he conceded. ‘Okay, get your team together, and give them 
dispositions. You need to search the building for anything the shooters left 
behind. The weapon they used was a Heckler and Koch, standard police issue, so 
the assumption is, they must have worn uniforms to get in.

‘Tell your people to find those, and then find out whether they’re 
authentic. If so, we need to establish whose they were, because we’re looking 
for those owners. Beyond that the work here’s for Dorward and his people. 
Once you’ve got your people moving, I have to do a press conference, and I 
want you with me.’

‘Me?’

‘Absolutely. I think Max was wrong to hide you away. You’re a gem, Lottie; 
the Glasgow press deserve you. Just mind the language, okay?’





Three



‘Can I get you coffee?’ the Lord Provost of Glasgow asked.

Bob Skinner smiled. ‘That’s very kind of you,’ he replied, ‘but given 
that it’s nine o’clock on a Saturday evening, if we accepted you’d either 
have to make it yourself or nip out to Starbucks. No, the use of your office 
for this short meeting is generosity enough. Now, if you’ll…’

Dominic Hanlon took the hint. ‘Come on, Willie,’ he murmured. ‘This is 
operational; it’s not for us.’

‘Oh. Oh, aye.’ The two councillors withdrew.

The Lord Provost was still wearing his heavy gold chain of office. Skinner 
wondered if he slept in it.

‘Right,’ he said, as the door closed. ‘We’ll keep this brief, but I 
wanted a round-up before we all left.’ He looked to his right, at Lottie 
Mann, and to his left, at Lowell Payne, who had joined them as the press 
briefing had closed.

The conference had been a frenzied affair. It had been chaired by the 
Strathclyde force’s PR manager, but most of the questions had been directed 
at Skinner, once his presence had been explained.

‘Can you confirm the identity of the victims, sir?’ the BBC national news 
correspondent had asked. She was new in the country, and new to him, sent up 
from London to make her name, he suspected.

‘Sorry, no,’ he had replied, ‘for the usual next-of-kin reasons, not 
operational. However,’ he had added, halting the renewed clamour, ‘I can 
tell you that the First Minister is unharmed, as is the Scottish Labour leader, 
Aileen de Marco, who was also present.’

‘Joey Morocco says the victim inside the hall was female, and that she was 
sitting next to the First Minister.’

‘Joey Morocco was there. I wasn’t. I’m not going to argue with him.’

‘Why isn’t the First Minister here?’

‘Because he was advised not to be.’

‘By you, sir?’

‘By his own protection staff.’

‘Does that mean there’s a continuing threat?’

‘It means they’re being suitably cautious.’

‘There are two men lying in Killermont Street, apparently dead. It’s been 
suggested that they were the killers. Can you comment?’

‘Yes they were, and they are both as dead as they appear to be.’ Skinner 
had winced inwardly at the brutality of that reply, but nobody had picked up on 
it. ‘As is the police officer they murdered as they left the hall,’ he had 
continued. ‘His colleague is in surgery as we speak.’

‘Are you looking for anybody else?’

‘You’re asking the wrong person. I’m here by accident, remember. That’s 
a question for Detective Inspector Mann of Strathclyde. She’s the officer in 
charge of the investigation.’

Lottie Mann had handled herself well. She had given nothing away, but she had 
made it clear that the multiple killings at the concert hall would be 
investigated from origins to aftermath, like any other homicide.

The one awkward question had been put by a Sun reporter, with whom Mann had 
history, after arresting him for infiltrating a crime scene.

‘Aren’t you rather junior to be running an investigation as important as 
this one?’

She had nailed him with a cold stare. ‘That’s for others to decide. I was 
senior officer on duty tonight and took command at the scene, as I would have 
in any circumstances.’

‘By the way, you did fine in there, Lottie,’ Skinner told her, in the Lord 
Provost’s small room. ‘You did fine at the scene as well; took command, 
took no shit from anybody, and that’s how it’s supposed to be.’

‘To tell you the truth, sir,’ she confessed, as subdued as he had seen her 
in their brief acquaintance, ‘I was in a bit of a panic when I heard that ACC 
Allan had been taken away. I hope he’s all right.’

‘He is,’ Payne reassured her, ‘reasonably so. I called the Royal on my 
way down here. They gave him an ECG in the ambulance, and there’s no sign of 
a heart attack. They’re going to keep him in, though; apparently his blood 
pressure’s through the roof and he’s in shock.’

‘How about the wounded man?’ the chief asked. ‘What’s his name, by the 
way?’

‘PC Auger. Still in surgery, but the word is that he’ll survive. He was 
shot in the chest, but the bullet missed his heart and major arteries. It did 
nick a lung, though, and lodge in his spine.’

‘And his colleague?’

‘Sergeant Sproule. His body’s been taken to the mortuary.’

‘Who’s seeing next of kin?’

‘Chief Superintendent Mayfield,’ Payne told him. ‘She’s divisional 
commander.’

‘Okay. And Toni’s next of kin? Was she married? I don’t know,’ Skinner 
confessed. ‘She and I never got round to discussing our private lives.’

‘I don’t know either, sir. Sorry.’

‘No reason why you should, but raise the head of Human Resources, wherever he 
is, and find out. Whoever her nearest and dearest is needs to be told, and 
fast.’

‘Yes, they do,’ Lottie Mann said, ‘because the whole bloody world will 
soon know she was there if it doesn’t already. Chief Constable Field was a 
big Twitter fan. She posted every professional thing she did on it. No way she 
won’t have tweeted that she was chumming the First Minister to a charity 
gig.’ She scowled. ‘I’d ban that fucking thing if I could.’

Skinner whistled. ‘Thank God you didn’t say that to the press.’ He 
smiled. ‘Max Allan would never let either of us forget it. Lowell,’ he 
continued, ‘do you know where the other ACCs are?’

‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘I thought you’d need to know that. Bridie 
Gorman’s on holiday, in Argyll, I’m told, but ACC Thomas turned up at the 
concert hall just after you’d left. He was for taking command, but I told him 
that he’d better speak to Councillor Hanlon down at the City Chambers. He 
did, and when he’d done that, he went off in what I can best describe as the 
huff.’

‘Oh shit,’ the chief constable sighed. ‘That I did not need. I know 
Michael Thomas through the chiefs’ association. He was very much in the Toni 
Field camp on unification of the forces. In fact, at our last meeting, when 
things got a bit heated, I told him to shut the fuck up unless he had something 
original to say.’ He smiled. ‘Don’t worry, though, Lowell. I’ll make 
sure he doesn’t hold it against you when I’m gone in three months.’ He 
paused. ‘Till then, don’t worry about him. You might still be only a DCI in 
rank, but working directly for me as acting chief, you’ll be taking orders 
from nobody else. Now, have you located the CCTV footage?’

‘Yes, sir. There was only one camera, and I’m getting the footage. CCTV 
monitoring in the city is run by a joint body that’s responsible for 
community safety. Councillor Hanlon and ACC Gorman are on the board, and in a 
situation like this one, we get what we want. In fact, they were expecting a 
call from us. Their manager said the monitor person crapped himself when he saw 
what happened.’

‘I’m not surprised.’

‘What do you want me to do with it?’

‘I want you to keep it close to you. I want to see it on Monday, and 
obviously Lottie has to have access as senior investigating officer, but, 
Inspector, you and you alone are to view the footage.’

She frowned. ‘What am I going to see there?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know for sure, but if I’m right, I’ll be in shot… Christ,’ 
he chuckled, ‘what have I just said? . . . and so will someone else, with me. 
If that’s so, he is absolutely off limits.’ He paused. ‘Lottie, I hope 
you didn’t have a big date tonight…’

‘Only with my husband and son,’ she said. ‘We were going for a Chinese.’

‘Well, I’m sorry about that, but I need you to go back up to the concert 
hall, resume command, and make sure that everything in this operation is done 
exactly by the book. By now they’ll have found shell casings, probably in one 
of the lighting booths overlooking the stage, and those two discarded police 
uniforms. Let’s just pray they don’t have bullet holes in them.’ He gave 
her a card. ‘That’s my mobile number. Keep me in touch.’

She smiled. Until then Skinner had not been certain that she knew how. ‘Yes, 
boss. But… I’m only a lowly DI. There’s a whole raft of ambitious guys 
above me on the CID food chain, including my two line managers. What do I do 
when one of them turns up and says he’s taking over?’

‘One, you ask him why it’s taken him so long to get there. Two, you tell 
him he’d better have a bloody good answer to that question for the acting 
chief constable, first thing on Monday morning. Thing is, Lottie, Max Allan was 
the ACC responsible for criminal investigation. He won’t be around for a 
while, and in his absence CID will go straight to me. To be frank, even if he 
was, that’s how it would be. It’s the way I work. Questions?’

Payne and Mann shook their heads.

‘Good. You know where to get me if you have to. Get on with what you have to 
do. I’m off to stick my head in the lioness’s mouth.’





Four



‘You really are a fucking fascist at heart, Bob, aren’t you?’ she hissed.

‘If that’s how you want to see me,’ he retorted, ‘then honestly, I 
don’t give a damn. I got you out of there because there was a belief that 
you, not Toni Field, was the target of those people. And you know what? If they 
had shot Paula instead, who was sat between the two of you, Toni would have 
done exactly the same as I did. She’d have got you out of there, and fast.’

‘I should have stayed in the building,’ she insisted.

‘Why? You’re not First Minister any more, Clive Graham is. You were a 
fucking liability in there, Aileen, somebody else to worry about. I couldn’t 
have that. Plus,’ he hesitated for a second, ‘you happen to be my wife. I 
didn’t bend any rules to protect you, but believe me, if I’d had to, I 
would have.’

‘That’s irrelevant,’ Aileen de Marco shouted. ‘I should have stayed 
there. It was my duty; I’m the constituency MSP. I should have been there but 
instead I’m hiding in this bloody fortress like some kid who’s afraid of 
the dark.’

‘No, you were hidden, if you want to put it that way, because there was a 
chance you might still have been at risk.’

‘Does that chance still exist?’

‘I don’t believe so,’ he replied, ‘although I can’t be certain.’

‘But I’m free to leave here?’

‘To be honest, you always were. Don’t tell me that hadn’t occurred to 
you. But you stayed here. Aileen, you’re allowed to be scared! A woman has 
just been shot dead, a few feet away from you. You may not have noticed this, 
but her blood is spattered on your dress. The assistant chief constable is in 
hospital suffering from shock. I am strung out my fucking self! So what’s 
your problem?’

‘I was detained, man, against my will. Can’t you see that? I’m a 
politician, and as such I can’t be seen to be showing weakness in the face of 
these terrorists.’

He threw up his hands. ‘Okay, Joan of Arc, go. There isn’t a locked door 
between you and the street, and I will arrange for a car to take you wherever 
you want to go, even if it’s back to our place in Gullane.’

‘Hah!’ she spat. ‘The only time I’ll be back there is to collect my 
clothes. I’ve got somewhere to go tonight, don’t you worry, and I will not 
have a police guard outside the door either.’

Skinner stood. ‘You bloody will. You may leave here, but you will have 
protection, wherever you are. That’s Clive Graham speaking, not me. He’s 
ordered it, and I’ve had arrangements made. For the next couple of days at 
least, you will have personal security officers looking after you. That is not 
for debate, but don’t worry, discretion is included in their training.’

It had been a casual remark, meaning nothing, but she flushed as he said it and 
he realised that he had touched a nerve.

‘I don’t want to know, Aileen,’ he murmured.

‘As if I care,’ she snorted. ‘Isn’t life bloody ironic? You and I go to 
war because I’m for police unification and you’re against it, yet here you 
are in command of a force that covers half of Scotland.’

‘Temporary command,’ he pointed out.

‘So you say, but I know you better than that. You may not have volunteered 
for this job, but now you’re in it, you won’t want to let it go. Up to now 
you’ve chosen your own pond, and been its biggest fish. Now one’s been 
chosen for you, by fate, but your nature will still be the same. Once you get 
your feet under that desk in Pitt Street, Fettes will never be quite big enough 
for you again. That’s how it will be because that’s how you are, like it or 
not!’





Five



‘You might have told me you were goin’ to be on the telly, Mum,’ Jake 
Mann mumbled, as he disposed of the last of his cereal. ‘I’d have told all 
my pals to watch.’

‘I didn’t have much notice of it, Jakey,’ Lottie replied. ‘Anyway, I 
wouldn’t have wanted you to do that, given the subject.’

‘You should have combed your hair.’

She raised an eyebrow and glared at the nine-year-old. ‘Maybe, but my 
hairdresser wasn’t available at the time. I could have done with a bit of 
lippie as well, but the make-up room was in use.’

‘You were good, though,’ Jake said, reaching for his orange juice.

‘Good?’ she boomed.

‘Brilliant,’ he offered. ‘Pure dead brilliant.’

‘You’re getting there, kid.’

‘Who was that big man alongside you?’

‘That was Mr Skinner. He’s from Edinburgh, but he’s going to be our chief 
constable for a while.’

‘Is that right?’ a voice from the doorway asked.

Lottie turned, and frowned. ‘Hey,’ she exclaimed, ‘the Kraken’s 
awake.’

‘The Kraken of dawn,’ Scott Mann moaned, as he shambled barefoot into the 
kitchen, in T-shirt and shorts.

‘Dawn? It’s half past eight, for Christ’s sake.’

‘Aye, and you didnae get in till midnight.’

‘Sorry, but you saw what happened. Didn’t you?’

‘Not really. The telly didn’t show much. They just said the chief constable 
was deid, that was all, even though you and the guy Skinner wouldnae say so.’ 
He looked at her as he lifted the kettle to check that it was full, then 
switched it on. ‘Izzat right?’

She frowned. ‘It’s right.’

‘How?’

She nodded towards their son. ‘Pas devant l’enfant.’

‘Eh?’

‘It means “Not in front of the child”, Dad,’ Jake volunteered. 
‘Mum’s always saying it so I looked it up on the internet.’

‘That’s your mother all over, Jakey. She got an O grade in French at the 
high school, and she thinks she’s Vanessa Paradis.’

‘Hah, and you’d just love it if I was, sunshine. I’m closer to being her 
than you are tae Johnny Depp, that’s for sure.’ She paused. ‘He’s 
nearer my height and all.’ Her husband was stocky in build but he stood no 
more than five feet eight. ‘Yes, that’s a deal, you can have Vanessa and 
I’ll have Johnny.’

‘Naw!’ Jake protested.

Lottie laughed. ‘Chance would be a fine thing, wee man. On you go if you’re 
finished; see what’s on CBeebies.’

Their son needed no second invitation to watch television. He grabbed a slice 
of buttered toast and sprinted from the room.

‘So?’ Scott asked, as the door closed. ‘What did happen?’

‘Three bullets in the head from a professional. The thing was very well 
planned. They blew the power as soon as they’d fired. They shot two cops on 
the way out… Sandy Sproule and Billy Auger…’

‘Aw, Jesus,’ her husband exclaimed. ‘I ken Sandy. Is he…’

‘Yes, I’m afraid so. He died instantly. Billy Auger will live, but 
they’re not sure he’ll walk again. Spinal damage.’

‘Bastards.’

‘Ye can say that again. They’d have got away too, had not Skinner and 
another bloke arrived just seconds after they’d shot them. I’ve seen the 
video. The other guy did for one of them straight away. His buddy ran for it, 
but Skinner picked up Sandy’s carbine and put two rounds through him. Never 
batted a fucking eyelid either, either on the tape or later, inside the hall. 
The only thing he was sorry about was that if he’d just wounded the guy he 
might have given us a clue tae who sent him. But he said that from that range 
all he could do was aim for the central body mass, as per the training manual. 
That is one fucking hard man. I couldn’t have done that, I’ll tell you.’

Scott squeezed her hand. ‘You know what, love? I’m glad about that.’ The 
kettle boiled. ‘Want another?’ he asked.

She handed him her mug. ‘Quick one. I’ve got to be out again. I’ve had 
crime scene people workin’ all night up at the hall and in Killermont Street. 
I’ve set up a temporary murder room, I have to get up there to pull 
everything together. Killermont Street’s still closed to traffic and 
there’s another event due in the hall tonight. Some golden oldie rocker; 
it’s a sell-out and they’re desperate not to cancel, so time is, as they 
say, of the essence.’

Her husband stared at her. ‘Can they do that? Just open the place the night 
as if nothin’s happened?’

‘As long as they put a patch in the carpet,’ she said. ‘They won’t get 
the blood and the brain tissue out with bloody Vanish, that’s for sure. And 
they’ll have to get joiners in to fix the boards in front of the stage. They 
had to dig a couple of flattened bullets out of there. They’ll maybe keep the 
lights low all the time, that’ll help.’

His eyes widened. ‘Imagine. Somebody’s goin’ to be occupying a seat 
tonight, and last night a woman was… Wow.’

‘Ah know,’ she agreed. ‘It’s a bit ghoulish. Listen, Scott, if I could, 
I would close the hall tonight as a mark of respect. Any polis would. But the 
hall manager says that people will be coming from all over Scotland to hear 
this guy. Some’ll have left already.’

‘Not any polis,’ he said.

She looked at him, surprised. ‘Come again?’

‘Ah still have pals in the job,’ he replied, ‘even though I’ve been out 
for five years. From what they tell me, Antonia Field won’t be missed by too 
many people. A lot of people, me included in my time, liked Angus Theakston, 
the deputy chief, and I know you did too. It’s an open secret that she more 
or less sacked him. A guy Ah know worked in his office. He says they had a 
screamin’ match one day that folk in Pitt Street could have heard, and that 
Mr Theakston put his papers in next morning, and was never seen in the office 
again. She treated old Max Allan like shit too, my pal said. The only one she 
had any time for was Michael Thomas.’

‘He’s a fucking weasel,’ Lottie muttered. She sipped her tea. ‘You 
never told me any of this before.’

‘Ah was told on the QT. You’re a senior officer; Ah didn’t want to get my 
pal intae bother.’

‘Eh?’ she exclaimed. ‘Do you actually think that I would come down on a 
guy because of something you told me?’

‘Come on, hen,’ he protested, ‘you’re a stickler and you know it. We 
used tae work thegither, Ah’ve seen you in action, remember; been on the 
receiving end too.’

‘Aye,’ she retorted, ‘and had your own back too. Let’s not go there, 
Scott. Just don’t keep anything else from me. Okay?’

‘Okay.’

‘Good, now I’ve got to go.’

‘When’ll you be back?’

‘Soon as I can.’

‘You’ve forgotten, haven’t you?’

‘Forgotten what?’

‘We promised Jakey we’d take him to Largs.’

‘Bugger!’ she swore. ‘I’m sorry, Scott.’

‘Don’t say sorry tae me. Save it for the wee man.’

‘Aw, don’t be like that. You know what it’s like. Look, when I say as 
soon as I can, I mean it. But I will have to put a report on Skinner’s desk 
first thing tomorrow, ready to go to the fiscal. And I will have to work out 
where the hell we go from here, given that our new acting chief’s gone and 
killed the only possible bloody witness.’

His expression softened. ‘Ah know, love, Ah know.’

She picked up her purse from the work surface and extracted three ten-pound 
notes. ‘Here,’ she said. ‘Take him wherever he wants to go with that.’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘You’re takin’ a chance, aren’t you?’

She frowned. ‘I’d better not be.’ She headed for the door. ‘Have fun, 
the pair of you. See you.’





Six



The bedroom door creaked as she opened it, jerking him from a dream that he was 
happy to leave. ‘Are the kids awake yet?’ Bob mumbled, into the pillow.

‘Are you joking?’ Sarah laughed. ‘It’s five past nine.’

Their reconciliation, which had come after a burst of truth-talking only a day 
and a half before, had taken them both by surprise, but the next morning 
neither of them had felt any guilt, only pleasure, and possibly even relief.

Their separation and divorce had not been acrimonious. No, it had been down to 
a lack of communication and each one of them had concluded, independently, that 
if they had sat down in the right place at the right time and had talked their 
problems through in the right spirit, it might not have happened at all.

‘You what?’ Bob rolled over and sat up in a single movement. He was about 
to swing a leg out of bed, but she sat on the edge, blocking him off.

‘Easy does it,’ she said. ‘They don’t know you’re here.’

‘They’ll see my car.’

‘No they won’t. You parked it a little way along the road, remember.’

‘Alex and Andy?’

‘They left after you crashed. That was quite an entrance; five minutes to 
midnight. Your first words, “Gimme a drink,” then you polished off six 
beers inside half an hour.’ She paused, then murmured, ‘I can always tell, 
Bob, the more you drink, the worse it’s been.’

‘I know,’ he admitted. ‘And the bugger is, the older I get, the less the 
bevvy helps.’

‘So I gather. You did some shouting through the night. It’s just as well 
this house is stone, with thick walls. How do you feel now?’

‘My love, I do not know.’ He reached out and tugged at the cord of her 
dressing gown. She slipped out of it, and eased herself alongside him.

She held his wrist, with two fingers pressed below the base of his thumb. 
‘Your heart rate is a little fast.’

‘Probably the dream. It was a bastard.’

‘Are you ready to tell me what happened?’

He slipped his right arm around her shoulders. ‘I told you last night. Toni 
Field is dead, and somehow I let Clive Graham talk me into taking her place for 
three months. Three months only, mind, even though Aileen and Andy both say 
once I’m there they’ll never get me out.’

‘Hey,’ Sarah murmured. ‘Maybe the witch knows you better than I 
thought.’

‘You think so too?’ He shook his head, and a slight grin turned up the 
corners of his mouth. ‘And here was me thinking you and I were making a new 
start.’

‘Then let me put it another way. Sometimes you don’t know where your duty 
lies until it’s brought home to you. You’ve been frustrated since you 
became chief in Edinburgh; I can see that. You were never really keen on the 
job, without really knowing why. When you were talked into taking it, you found 
out. It was more or less what you’d been doing before, but it made you more 
remote from your people and more authoritarian.

‘But Strathclyde’s different. You’ve always known why you didn’t want 
that job; you grew up there in a different time and you feel that force is too 
big, and as such too impersonal. Now that you’ve been forced into the hot 
seat by circumstances in which, in all conscience, you couldn’t decline, you 
might find the challenge you’ve been needing is to change that. You get what 
I’m saying?’

‘Yes.’ He paused. ‘But I’m a crime-fighter.’

‘I know,’ she agreed, ‘but even Strathclyde CID’s remote, isn’t it? 
If you can bring that closer to the people in every one of the hundreds of 
communities within the force’s area, then won’t they feel safer as a 
result, and won’t that be an achievement?’

‘Okay,’ he nodded, ‘I can see your argument. Maybe you’re right… and 
maybe if this new unified force does happen it’ll be even more important to 
have someone in charge who thinks like I do. But probably you’re wrong. The 
chances are I’ll be back in Edinburgh by November. The chances are also that 
the unification will happen and I’ll walk away from it.’ He hesitated, and 
his forehead twisted into a frown. ‘That’s the way I feel right now.’

‘So tell me why,’ she whispered. ‘Although I think I can guess, having 
seen this before.’

‘I killed someone,’ he whispered, ‘one of the South Africans. His name 
was Gerry Botha. He probably didn’t murder Toni Field, not personally, but he 
was part of the team that did: not just her, but three other people in the last 
forty-eight hours, and God knows how many more in other places, before that. 
I’ve shot people before in the line of duty…’ He sighed. ‘Christ, 
darlin’, most cops never handle a firearm, but I’m always in the firing 
line. At the time it’s a decision you have to make in a split second. I’ve 
never been wrong, or doubted myself afterwards, but there comes a time when you 
have to think that however evil the life you’ve just snuffed out, someone 
brought it into being.

‘Gerry Botha and his sidekick Francois Smit, they probably have mothers and 
fathers still alive, and maybe wives and maybe kids who see completely 
different men at home and who’re not going to have them to take them to rugby 
and cricket or the movies or to the beach any more, like I did yesterday with 
ours before all this shit happened, and when I start to play with all that in 
my head I start to think, “Oh God, perhaps that man wasn’t all that 
different from me, just another guy doing the best he can for those he 
loves.” And that’s when it gets very difficult.’ He leaned back against 
the headboard, and she could see that his eyes were moist.

She kissed his chest. ‘Yeah, I know, love. That’s why you, of all people, 
understand why I prefer to be a pathologist, rather than to work with people 
with a pulse. But,’ she said, ‘if I was a psychologist, I’d be telling 
you to take that thought and apply it to Botha’s victims and to imagine how 
their nearest and dearest are feeling today, then to ask yourself how they’d 
feel about you if you’d funked your duty? Toni Field, for example; did she 
have a family?’

‘No, she’s never been married,’ he told her. ‘According to the Human 
Resources director, her next of kin was her mother, name of Sofia Deschamps. He 
was able to get the mother’s details from her file; he accessed it from home. 
I’m not too happy about that, but it’s an issue for later.

‘Mother lives in Muswell Hill; a couple of community support officers broke 
the news to her last night. Apparently there was no mention of a father on her 
file. The mother was a single parent, Mauritian. Antonia must have Anglicised 
the name at some point, or maybe the mother did, for she graduated as Field.’

‘I guess now they can confirm that she’s the victim.’

‘Yeah. The press office is going to issue a statement at twelve thirty, after 
the Police Authority’s emergency meeting. That will ratify my… temporary… 
appointment, and I’ll be paraded at another media briefing at one.’

‘What about your own Police Authority?’

‘Good question. The chairperson’s a Nationalist, one of the First 
Minister’s cronies. He was going to talk to her last night, but I’ll have 
to give her a call as well, to ask for her blessing, and to get her to nod 
through Maggie as my stand-in and Mario’s move up to ACC Crime.’ He took a 
breath.

‘And I’ll have to talk to Maggie myself; I can go and see her, since she 
doesn’t live far away. Then I’ll need to call in on Mario… not to tell 
him about his promotion, he knows about that… but to see how Paula is the day 
after. And I suppose I’ll have to go to Fettes and change into my fucking 
uniform…’

Sarah rolled out of bed and grabbed her dressing gown from the floor. ‘Then 
what the hell are you still doing lying there? Get yourself showered… but 
don’t you dare put my Venus leg shaver anywhere near your chin… then dress 
and come downstairs to surprise our children. I’ll make you breakfast and 
then you can get on the road.’

‘Yes, boss.’ He grinned.

‘You’ll see,’ she added, ‘it’ll be good for you, this new 
challenge.’

‘If I’m up to it.’

‘That’s bullshit. You do not do self-doubt, my love.’

Bob frowned. ‘No, you’re right, not when it comes to work. In everything 
else though,’ he sighed, ‘I’m a complete fuck-up. Three marriages; soon 
to be two divorces. Are you sure you want to get close to me again?’

She put her hands on his shoulders, and drew him to her. ‘Even in our darkest 
moments,’ she whispered, ‘even across an ocean, I was never not close to 
you. You see us? We’re each other’s weakness and strength all rolled into 
one. This time, strength comes out on top.’

He nodded, stood, took hold of her robe, and kissed her. ‘Sounds good to 
me.’

He headed towards the bathroom, then stopped. ‘Will you keep the kids here 
tonight?’

‘Yes. Will you come back here?’

‘Mmm. What do you think? Do you want me to, I mean? What will the kids be 
thinking? This has all happened pretty quick; Aileen being gone, you and 
me…’

‘What do I think?’ she replied. ‘To be brutally honest, I think that Mark 
won’t bat an eyelid, that James Andrew will be pleased… he didn’t like 
her and, believe me, I never said a word against her to him… and that Seonaid 
will barely notice she’s gone.’

He nodded. ‘Okay then. I’ll see you later.’

He was stepping into the en-suite when she called after him. ‘Hey, Bob?’

He looked over his shoulder. ‘Yeah?’

‘If you did walk away from the job,’ she asked, ‘do you have the faintest 
idea what you’d do?’

‘Sure. I could collect non-executive directorships, get paid for sitting on 
my arse and play a lot of golf, but that wouldn’t be my scene. No, if I do 
that I’ll become a consulting detective; I’ll become bloody Sherlock.’





Seven



He looks tired and tense, Paula Viareggio thought. But he also looks more alive 
than I’ve seen him in a couple of years.

‘I am perfectly fine, Bob,’ she assured him. ‘Honestly. The police doctor 
checked me out last night and he said exactly that. He checked both of us out 
in fact. The baby’s good too. For a while afterwards I did wonder if he’d 
stick his head out to find out what all the fuss was about, but it seems he’s 
keeping to his timetable.’

‘You’re some woman, Paula,’ Skinner chuckled. They were sitting around a 
table on the deck of the prospective parents’ duplex. The sun was high enough 
to catch the highlights in his steel-grey hair.

‘No, I’m just like all the rest. I had my few moments of sheer terror, and 
I know I’m never going to lose the memory, of the noise more than anything 
else, the sound of the bullets hitting the poor woman.’

‘Hey, enough,’ her husband said quietly.

‘No, Mario, it’s all right; I yelled my head off at the time, because I was 
afraid… I was scared for two, as well. But once something’s happened, 
it’s happened. You can’t go back, you can’t change it, but the danger’s 
over and talking about what happened won’t bring it back. So no worries, big 
fella; I won’t be waking up screaming in the night.’

‘I’m glad you feel that way,’ the chief constable said, ‘because there 
is a formal murder investigation going on in Glasgow and it would be useful if 
you could give my DI a statement, for the record.’

‘I won’t have to go through there, will I? I couldn’t be arsed with 
that.’

‘No, of course not. You don’t need to leave home. Knock it out on your 
computer, print it, sign it with Mario as witness, then scan it and send it to 
DI Charlotte Mann.’ He dug a card from his pocket and handed it to her. 
‘Her email address is on that.’

‘Will do. Is Aileen having to do the same?’ She paused. ‘That is the one 
thing that gets to me, Bob: the idea that she was the real target.’

‘Then don’t dwell on it,’ he told her. ‘Because I don’t believe she 
was, and neither does Lottie Mann.’ He looked at his colleague. ‘How about 
you, Mario?’

The swarthy detective shook his head. ‘Probably not.’

‘But what does Aileen think?’ Paula asked.

‘I’ve never been good at working that out,’ Skinner replied, ‘but 
whatever she believes, she won’t mind having people think she was. There’s 
more votes in it.’

She stared at him, shocked. ‘Bob, that’s not worthy of you. The poor woman 
was terrified last night.’

‘Maybe, but she was spitting tin tacks when I spoke to her last at the 
thought of Clive Graham taking credit from it.’

‘Get away with you, you’re doing her an injustice.’

‘I wish I was, but I’m not.’ His expression changed, became quizzical. 
‘Did she tell you anything last night about the two of us?’

Paula hesitated. ‘No, she didn’t say anything specific; but looking back, 
there was something about her, something different.’

‘We’re bust,’ he said. ‘Sorry to be blunt, but it’s over. The press 
will catch on eventually. When they do, we’ll call it “irreconcilable 
differences”. That’ll be true, as well.’

‘The police unification issue? Mario told me you were at loggerheads about 
it.’

He nodded. ‘That’s part of it, but not all. She was planning to turn me 
into a backroom politician. Aileen has ambitions beyond Scotland that I knew 
nothing about. She had this daft idea that I would help her fulfil them.’ He 
snorted. ‘As if.’

He stood, straightened his back, and smoothed his uniform jacket. ‘Now I must 
go. Wouldn’t do if I was late for my unveiling.’ He turned to Mario once 
again. ‘Okay, ACC McGuire. I have no idea when I’ll see you again, but 
I’m glad the promotion’s come through. It probably won’t make any 
operational difference to you, as you’ll still be head of CID under the new 
structure, but you’ll be doing the job from the command corridor, where 
you’ve belonged for a while now.’

A smile lit up McGuire’s face. ‘Thanks, boss.’

‘You’re out of date. Maggie’s the boss, for the next three months. 
She’ll need support though; be sure to give her all you can. And have your 
people do something for me too.’

‘Of course.’

‘Freddy Welsh. The armourer, the man that young Houseman and I arrested 
yesterday. The man who supplied the weapons for the concert hall hit and God 
knows how many others. Clyde and I didn’t have time to ask him all the 
questions we needed to, but they’re still relevant. Technically, it’s part 
of Lottie Mann’s investigation, but he’s in your hands, so your people 
should handle the interrogation.

‘I want to know who placed the order for the weapons. Was it Cohen, the man 
who put the operation together, or was it someone else? Somebody sent that team 
after Toni Field… yes, Paula, fact is we’re certain she was the target… 
and we must find out who it was and why they did it.’

‘I’ll handle it myself,’ the new ACC said. ‘But it’s a pound to a 
pinch of pig shit, Bob; his lawyer will have advised him by now to keep his 
mouth shut.’

‘Then keep his lawyer out of it. Welsh is going away for years for illegal 
possession of firearms, and conspiracy to supply. We don’t need to charge him 
over his involvement in Field’s assassination, so you can interview him as a 
potential witness, not a suspect.’

‘Okay, but I’ll bet you he still won’t talk. His customers aren’t the 
sort you inform on.’

Skinner smiled. ‘If that’s how it is, you give him a message from me. If he 
holds out on us, I won’t hesitate to hand him over to MI5, and Clyde 
Houseman. My young friend made quite an impression on Freddy at their first 
meeting. I don’t think Mr Welsh will be too keen on another session. Now, I 
really am off.’

McGuire saw him to the door. ‘Well,’ he said as he rejoined his wife in the 
sunshine. ‘Is this our morning for surprises? The big man enticed to 
Strathclyde, not to mention him and Aileen being down the road.’

‘Indeed,’ Paula laughed. ‘And maybe get yourself ready for another. When 
she saw that Joey Morocco last night, before the concert, and it was all going 
off… mmm, that was interesting.’

Mario looked at her, intrigued, reading her meaning. ‘She looked like she 
wanted to eat him, did she?’

‘Oh, I think she has, in the past. In fact I know so, ’cos she told me. And 
I’m pretty certain she fancies another helping.’





Eight



‘God, but you’re hot stuff when you’re angry, Aileen de Marco,’ Joey 
Morocco gasped.

She smiled, looking down on him as she straddled him. ‘Then look forward to 
mediocrity, my boy, because I won’t stay mad for ever… unless you can come 
up with ways of winding me up.’

‘What if I told you I’m a Tory?’

‘Hah! That might have worked once, but now I’d just feel sorry for you, 
’cos you’re an endangered species in Scotland.’ She raised an eyebrow, 
reached behind and underneath her and took his scrotum in her right hand, 
massaging him, gently. ‘You’re not, are you?’ she asked.

‘Absolutely not! Absolutely not!’

‘Just as well,’ she laughed, releasing him.

‘You don’t need to stop that, though.’

‘Yes, I do. I’m knackered.’ She pushed herself to her feet, bounced on 
the mattress as if it was a trampoline, and jumped sideways off the bed. 
‘Besides, have you seen what time it is?’

‘No; a gentleman removes his Tory Rolex, remember.’

‘And this lady keeps on her nice socialist Citizen. For your information 
it’s gone half past twelve.’

‘Missed breakfast, then,’ he observed, with a cheerful grin. ‘Have we 
still got fairies at the bottom of the garden?’

‘My unwanted guardians, you mean?’ She crossed to the window and looked 
outside, taking hold of a curtain and drawing it across her body. ‘Yup. 
They’re parked across your driveway too; that’s a clear sign to anyone that 
there’s something going on here. I thought the protection people were 
supposed to be subtle. Here,’ she added, ‘do you ever have paparazzi 
hanging around?’

‘Yes,’ he exclaimed, sitting upright, suddenly alarmed, ‘so get your face 
away from the window.’

She stayed where she was, looking back over her shoulder, and letting go of the 
curtain. ‘Why? Would I be bad for your image? Would your fans not approve of 
you with an older woman?’

‘I’m not worried about my image, Aileen,’ he protested. ‘I’m 
concerned about yours. You’re married to a bloody chief constable, remember, 
and you’re a top politician. You can’t afford scandal.’

She left the window and winked at him. ‘Not to “a chief constable”, Joey; 
to “The Chief Constable”. Bob’s taking over the Strathclyde job; it’s 
an emergency appointment. There was nobody else there anyway.’

Her reassurance was wasted on him. ‘Jesus Christ,’ he said, ‘so these 
guys outside, they report to him?’

She shrugged. ‘I suppose they do. But can you see them being brave enough to 
go to him and say, “By the way, sir, your wife’s shagging Joey Morocco”? 
Somehow I don’t. But even if they did, frankly I would not give the tiniest 
monkey’s. I wouldn’t lose my party job over this, for I’m divorcing Chief 
Constable Skinner just as fast as I can, or he’s divorcing me, if he gets in 
first.’ She read his concern. ‘Don’t worry, Joey. You won’t be caught 
in the middle. The split between Bob and me, it’s not about sex, it’s about 
ambitions that could not be further apart. You and me? We’re just a bit of 
fun, right?’

He hesitated, then nodded.

‘That’s how it was when you were starting out on that soap on BBC Scotland, 
fun. Now you’re in big-budget movies, moved upmarket, and I’m free and soon 
to be single again, but it’s still just fun, convenient uncomplicated nookie, 
no more than that. You’re a sexy guy and I’m a crackin’ ride, as my 
coarser male constituents would say, so let’s just enjoy it without either of 
us worrying about the other. Deal?’

His second nod was more convincing. ‘Deal.’

‘Good, now what do you do for Sunday lunch these days?’

‘Usually I go out for it. Today, maybe not; I’ll see what’s in the 
fridge.’

‘Do that, and I’ll get showered and dressed. No rush, though. I’d like to 
lie low here for the rest of the day, if I can.’

‘Of course. We might even manage breakfast tomorrow?’

‘Sounds like a plan. Thanks. You’re a sweetheart. It really is good to have 
somewhere to hide out just now. Actually, I’m a chancer,’ she admitted. 
‘I brought enough clothes with me for two nights.’ She shuddered. ‘God, 
was I glad to get out of that dress, with the bloodstains. I felt like Jackie 
Kennedy.’

He winced at the comparison as she went into his bathroom. She had left her 
phone there the night before, after brushing her teeth. She switched it on, 
then checked her voicemail.

There were over a dozen calls. One was from her constituency secretary, one 
from Alf Old, the Scottish Labour Party’s chief executive, another from her 
deputy leader… Probably cursing that the bastard missed me, she thought… 
several from other parliamentary colleagues, not all of her party, and three 
from journalists who were trusted with her number. She had expected nothing 
from her husband.

As soon as she was showered and dressed she called the secretary, an officious 
older woman with a tendency to fuss. ‘Aileen, where are you?’ she demanded, 
as soon as she answered. ‘I’ve tried your flat, I’ve tried your house in 
Gullane. I got no reply from either.’

‘Never you mind where I am,’ she retorted sharply. ‘It would have been 
nice of you to ask how I was, but I’m okay and I’m safe. Anybody calls 
inquiring about me, you can tell them that. I may call into the office 
tomorrow, or I may not. I’ll let you know.’

No reply from Gullane? she mused as she ended the call, but had no time to 
dwell on the information as her phone rang immediately. She checked the screen 
and saw that it was the party CEO, trying again. ‘Alf,’ she said as she 
answered.

‘Aileen,’ he exclaimed, ‘thank God I’ve got through. How are you?’

‘I’m fine, thanks. I’m safe, and I’m with a friend. I’m sorry I 
didn’t call you last night, but things were crazy. The security people got me 
off the scene, by force, more or less. Even now I have protection officers 
parked outside, like it or not. The First Minister insisted.’

‘Good for him. Now…’

‘I know what you’re going to say. Silence breeds rumours.’

‘Exactly. I’ve had several calls asking where you are, and whether you 
might have been wounded.’

‘Then issue a statement. Have they confirmed yet that it’s Toni Field 
who’s dead?’

‘Yes. Strathclyde police announced it a wee while ago.’

‘In that case we should offer condolences… I’ll leave it to you to choose 
the adjectives, but praise her all the way to heaven’s gate… then add that 
I’m unharmed, and that I’ve simply been taking some private time to come to 
terms with what’s happened. I suppose you’d better say something nice about 
Clive Graham as well, but not too nice, mind you, nothing that he can quote in 
his next election manifesto.’

‘Mmm,’ Old remarked. ‘I can tell you’re okay.’

‘I’ll be fine as long as I keep myself busy,’ she told him. ‘I’m 
sorry if I seem a bit brutal, but even without what happened last night 
there’s a lot going on in my life.’

‘Do you want to take some more time out? Everyone would understand.’

‘They might,’ she agreed, ‘but in different ways. There are plenty within 
the party who’d think I was showing weakness. I don’t have to tell you, 
Alf, as soon as a woman politician does that the jackals fall on her. I’ve 
handled stress before; I’m good at it.’ She paused. ‘I’ll be back in 
business tomorrow; I have to be. The First Minister will come out of this 
looking like fucking Braveheart, so we have to keep pace. We need to come out 
with something positive. You know that Clive and I were planning a joint 
announcement on unifying the Scottish police forces?’

‘Yes, you told me.’

‘Well, I want to jump the gun. Have our people develop the proposition that 
what happened in the concert hall illustrates the need for it, that it was a 
result of intelligence delayed by artificial barriers within our police service 
that need to be broken down. Then set up a press conference for midday 
tomorrow. We don’t have to say what it’s about. They’ll be all over me 
anyway about last night. But I want to be ready to roll with that policy 
announcement.’

‘Will do,’ Old said, ‘but Aileen, what about your personal security? I 
know the police don’t believe there’s any continuing threat to you, because 
I spoke to the DI in charge this morning, but they can’t rule it out 
completely.’

‘I told you,’ she snapped, ‘I’ve got bodyguards. But so what? If people 
want to believe there is someone out to get me, let them. Remember Thatcher at 
Brighton? The same day that bomb went off she was on her feet, on global telly, 
making her conference speech and saying “Bring it on”. That’s the 
precedent, Alf. I either follow it or I run away and hide. Now get to work, and 
I’ll see you tomorrow.’

As Old went off to follow orders, Aileen thought about returning some of the 
other calls but decided against it. Instead she trotted downstairs. ‘Joey?’ 
she called as she went.

‘I’m in the kitchen. Telly’s on: you should see this.’

She had had no time to learn the layout of the house when she had arrived late 
the night before, but she traced his voice to its location. The room looked out 
on to a large rear garden surrounded by a high wall, topped with spikes. ‘No 
place for the photographers to hide here,’ she remarked.

‘No. I had the fencing added on when I bought the place. It does the job.’

‘So what’s on the box that I should see?’

He turned from the work surface where he was putting a salad together and 
nodded towards a wall-mounted set. It was on, and a BT commercial was running. 
‘Sky News,’ he replied. ‘They’ve been trailing a Glasgow press 
conference and somebody’s name was mentioned. In fact…’

As he spoke, the programme banner ran, then the programme went straight to what 
appeared to be a live location: a table, and two men, one of them in uniform.

‘Is that who I think it is?’ Joey asked. ‘I spoke to him last night; 
didn’t have a clue who he was. No wonder he got frosty when I asked about 
you.’

She smiled, but without humour or affection. ‘That’s him. I told you 
earlier what this is about. Observe and be amazed, for it’s one of the 
biggest U-turns you will ever see in your life. Here, I’ll do the lunch.’

As she took over the salad preparation, Joey Morocco watched the bulletin as 
Dominic Hanlon introduced himself to a roomful of journalists and camera 
operators. There was a nervous tremor in the councillor’s voice, a sure tell 
that the event was well beyond his comfort zone. He began by paying a fulsome 
tribute to the dead Antonia Field, and then explained the difficult 
circumstances in which the Strathclyde force had found itself.

‘However,’ he concluded, ‘I am pleased to announce that with the approval 
of his Police Authority in Edinburgh, Chief Constable Robert Morgan Skinner has 
agreed to take temporary command of the force for a period of three months, to 
allow the orderly appointment of a successor to the late Chief Constable Field. 
Mr Skinner, would you like to say a few words?’ He looked at his companion, 
happy to hand over.

‘In the circumstances,’ Skinner replied, ‘it’s probably best that we go 
straight to questions.’

A forest of hands went up, and a clamour of voices arose, but he nodded to a 
familiar face in the front row, John Fox, the BBC Scotland Home Affairs editor.

‘Bob,’ the reporter began, ‘you weren’t a candidate for this job last 
time it was vacant. Are you prepared to say why not?’

The chief constable shrugged. ‘I didn’t want it.’

‘Why do you want it now?’

‘I don’t, John. Believe me, I would much rather still be arguing with Toni 
Field in ACPOS over the principles of policing, as she and I did, long and 
loud. But Toni’s been taken from us, at a time when Strathclyde could least 
afford to lose its leader, given the absence of a deputy.

‘When I was asked to take over… temporarily; I will keep hammering that 
word home… by Councillor Hanlon’s authority, on the basis that its members 
believe me to be qualified, as a police officer I felt that I couldn’t 
refuse. It wouldn’t have been right.’

Fox was about to put a supplementary, but another journalist cut in. 
‘Couldn’t ACC Allan have taken over?’

‘Given his seniority, if he was well, yes, but he isn’t. He’s on sick 
leave.’

‘What about ACC Thomas, or ACC Gorman?’

‘Fine officers as they are, neither of them meets the criteria for permanent 
appointment,’ he replied, ‘and so the authority took the view that 
wouldn’t have been appropriate.’

‘Did you consult your wife before accepting the appointment, Mr Skinner?’ 
The questioning voice was female, its accent cultured and very definitely 
English. Aileen was in the act of chopping Chinese leaves; she stopped and if 
she had looked down instead of round at the screen she would have seen that she 
came within a centimetre of slicing a finger open.

She saw Bob’s gaze turn slowly towards the source, who was seated at the side 
of the room. ‘And why should I do that, Miss…’

‘Ms Marguerite Hatton, Daily News political correspondent. She is the 
Scottish Labour leader, as I understand it. Surely you discuss important 
matters with her.’

‘You’re either very smart or very stupid or just plain ignorant, lady,’ 
Aileen murmured. ‘You’ve just lit a fuse.’

A very short one, as was proved a second later. ‘What the hell has her 
position got to do with this?’ her estranged husband barked. ‘I’m a 
senior police officer, as senior as you can get in this country. Are you 
asking, seriously, whether I seek political approval before I take a career 
decision, or even an operational decision?’

‘Oh, really!’ the journalist scoffed. ‘That’s a dinosaur answer. I 
meant did you consult her as your wife, not as a politician.’

On the screen Skinner stared at her, then laughed. ‘You are indeed from the 
deep south, Ms Hatton, so I’ll forgive your lack of local knowledge. I 
suggest that you ask some of your Scottish colleagues, those who really know 
Aileen de Marco. They’ll tell you that there isn’t a waking moment when she 
isn’t a politician. And I can tell you she even talks politics in her 
sleep!’

‘Jesus!’ Aileen shouted. ‘Joey, switch that fucking thing off!’

‘Relax,’ he said, ‘it’s not true.’

The woman from the Daily News was undeterred. ‘In that case,’ she 
persisted, ‘how will she feel about you taking the job?’

‘Why should I have any special knowledge of that?’ He looked around the 
room. ‘No more questions about my wife, people.’

On camera, John Fox raised a hand. ‘Just one more, please, Bob? How is she 
after her ordeal last night?’

‘Last time I saw her she was fine: fine and very angry.’

‘Where was that, Mr Skinner?’ Marguerite Hatton shouted.

‘You’ve had your five minutes,’ he growled. ‘Any more acceptable 
questions?’

The woman beside Fox, Stephanie Marshall of STV, raised a hand. ‘You 
weren’t a candidate for the Strathclyde post last time, Chief Constable, but 
will you put your name forward when it’s re-advertised?’

Watching, Aileen saw him lean forward as if to answer, then hesitate.

‘If you’d asked me that last night,’ he began, ‘just after Dominic 
asked me to take on this role, I would have told you no, definitely not. But 
something was said to me this morning that’s made me change my attitude just 
a wee bit.

‘So the honest answer is, I don’t know. Let me see how the next couple of 
weeks go, and then I’ll decide. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I must go. We have 
a major investigation under way as you all realise, and I must call on the 
officer who’s running it.’

Aileen reached out and grasped the work surface, squeezing it hard.

‘What are you doing?’ Joey chuckled.

‘I’m checking for earth tremors. You might not know it but what he just 
said is the equivalent of a very large mountain starting to move. I can’t 
believe it. I told him last night he’d never leave Pitt Street once he got in 
there, but I didn’t think for one second that he’d actually listen to me. 
It’s a first.’

He reached out and patted her on the shoulder. ‘No, dearie, it’s you that 
wasn’t listening to him. His words,’ he pointed out, ‘were “this 
morning”, not “last night”. So whoever made him think again, it wasn’t 
you.’

‘You’re right,’ she whispered. ‘Which makes me wonder where the hell he 
was this morning.’

‘While I’m wondering about something else,’ Joey said. ‘Why did that 
News cow ask where he’d seen you last night?’





Nine



‘I’m sorry about that News woman, sir,’ Malcolm Nopper said. ‘I’ve 
never seen her before. I can’t keep her out of future press conferences, but 
I’ll do my best to control her.’

Skinner looked at the chief press officer he had inherited from Toni Field, and 
laughed. The media had been escorted out of the conference room in the force 
headquarters building and the two men were alone. Nopper eyed his new boss 
nervously, unsure how to read his reaction.

‘How the hell are you going to do that?’ the chief constable asked. 
‘Sellotape over her gob? So you didn’t know her? I didn’t know her 
either, and it would have been the same if she’d turned up in Edinburgh, on 
my own patch. She’s a seagull; we all get them.’

‘A seagull, sir?’

‘Sure, you know, they fly in, make a noise, shit on you, then fly away again. 
As for controlling her, you don’t have to. If she turns up at one of my media 
briefings in future… not that I plan to have many… I’ll simply ignore 
her. You can do the same at any you chair.’

‘I tend not to do that, Chief,’ Nopper said. ‘When an investigation’s 
in process, I let the senior investigating officer take the lead.’

‘Not any more. Lottie Mann will have to go before the media later on. From 
something that Max Allan told me a while back, I guess she hasn’t had any 
formal media training. Am I right?’

‘None that I can recall,’ the civilian agreed.

‘I know she’ll be fine, but I’m not sure she does, so she must have a 
minder. I’ll be there but if I go on the platform it’ll undermine her. As 
you said, she’s the SIO. So you’ll be there, you’ll introduce her and 
you’ll pick the questioners. Ms Hatton will not be one of them. Your regulars 
won’t mind that. In my experience they don’t like seagulls either.’

‘As you wish, Chief.’

‘Mmm. Where will you hold it? Do you have a favourite venue?’

‘No. Normally it would be where it’s most convenient for the officer in 
charge.’

‘In that case we do it here in Pitt Street, in this room. I spoke to DI Mann 
on the way through here. She’ll be finished at the concert hall by two. She 
and I agreed that given the nature of this investigation it’s best that it be 
centrally based, rather than in a police office that’s open to the general 
public. Nobody else will be using this room this afternoon, will they?’

‘Not as far as I know, but suppose somebody was, you want it, you get it.’

‘Okay, set it up for four. That’ll give Lottie time to brief me, and it 
will give me time to get used to my new surroundings.’

As he spoke, a figure appeared in the double doorway.

‘Lowell,’ Skinner called. ‘You found us. DCI Payne is going to be my 
executive officer during my stay here,’ he explained to the press officer. 
‘When you want to get to me, you do it through him. That’ll be the case for 
everyone below command rank, but be assured, I will be accessible; his job 
won’t be to keep people out, but to help them in.’

He moved towards the exit. ‘Your first task, Lowell. Show me to my office. I 
knew where it was in Jock Govan’s time, but I have no clue now.’

As one of her first signs of her new-broom approach, Antonia Field had rejected 
the office suite used by her predecessors and had commandeered half a floor in 
the newer part of the headquarters complex. ‘Have you decided where you’re 
going to live, sir?’ Payne asked as he led the way up a flight of stairs 
towards the third floor.

Skinner stopped. ‘Lowell,’ he said, ‘I don’t expect to be “sirred” 
all the time by senior officers, least of all by you. You want to call me 
something official, call me “Chief”. When there’s nobody else around and 
you ask me something you’d ask me over the dinner table, call me Bob, like 
always.’

‘Fair enough. Although,’ he added, ‘it was really a professional 
question, since I’ll have to know where to raise you in an emergency.’

‘True. The answer is that as much as possible I plan to live in my own house. 
I will have a driver and I plan to use him.’

‘That’s in Gullane?’

‘Sure. Where…’ He halted in mid-sentence. ‘Ah, you thought I might stay 
in Aileen’s flat.’

‘Well, yes.’

‘That won’t be happening. It will become apparent soon, if only because 
we’re both public figures, that she and I are no longer together.’

Payne was silent for a few seconds, as they resumed their climb. ‘I see,’ 
he murmured. ‘I’m sorry to hear that. So that’s why you weren’t with 
her at the concert.’

‘That was part of the reason. Anyway, it’s not public knowledge yet, 
although I came close to making it so in my press briefing, when that bloody 
News person wound me up. It is something I’ll have to deal with, and soon, 
but not right now. Once we’ve both calmed down, we may issue a joint 
statement, but we’re both too hot to discuss that just now.

‘So,’ he continued, ‘Gullane is where you’ll reach me most of the time. 
When I have to stay here I’ll use a hotel; Hanlon’s already said he’ll 
pick up the tab for that… without me even asking, would you believe.’

They reached the top of the stairway; Payne turned left, and headed along a 
corridor that was blocked by a glass doorway, with a keypad. He opened it with 
four digits and led the way into a complex with more than a dozen rooms around 
a small central open space, with four chairs surrounding a low table, on which 
magazines were piled.

‘This is it, Chief, your new command suite. Your office is facing us.’

Skinner stared ahead. ‘It’s got glass walls,’ he exclaimed.

‘Relax,’ his aide said, noting his indignation. ‘There are internal 
blinds between the panels. I’m told that Chief Constable Field kept them open 
all the time.’

‘That will change; they’ll be closed permanently. I never did like people 
watching me think.’

‘There’s a bathroom and a changing room as well. They have solid walls,’ 
he added.

‘Just as well, or I’d be going back to Jock Govan’s old suite. Do I have 
a secretary?’

‘Of course, but she isn’t here today. I called her and told her what was 
happening, about you, and your appointment. I didn’t want her finding out 
from the telly. She offered to come in, but I told her not to.’

‘What’s her name?’

‘Marina Deschamps.’

‘Mmm,’ Skinner murmured, then he blinked. ‘Deschamps, you said? Wasn’t 
that Toni’s birth name?’

Payne nodded. ‘Yes. It’s her sister; the chief brought her with her. She 
insisted on it, apparently, before she accepted the job.’

‘Eh? The bloody Human Resources director didn’t think to tell me that last 
night.’ He frowned. ‘What about the mother? Are we flying her up here?’

‘The Met took care of that. They got her on to the first Glasgow flight this 
morning.’

‘I wish to hell they’d left her down there.’ He sighed. ‘I know I have 
to pay her a courtesy call, but I’ll leave that until tomorrow. Meantime, the 
sister should be regarded as on compassionate leave. Does she have a contract 
of employment?’

‘I don’t know for sure, Chief, but I’d imagine so.’

‘She’s a civilian, yes?’

‘Yes.’

‘Okay. Tell the Human Resources director that her contract will be honoured. 
If she wants to stay here in another capacity, she can. If she wants to leave, 
then she may do so at once, but she’ll be paid as if she’d worked a full 
notice period, whatever that is. Then tell him to find me a replacement, 
pronto, someone with full security clearance, mainly to manage my mail and 
yours.’

They had been walking as they talked, and reached Skinner’s new office as he 
finished issuing his orders. The door was locked, but Payne took a ring with 
three keys from his trouser pocket and handed it over. ‘I had the lock 
changed,’ he said. ‘Easier than searching through Ms Field’s things and 
getting Marina’s back from her.’

‘Good thinking.’ He detached a key from the ring, used it to unlock the 
door, then handed it to the DCI. ‘Yours,’ he said then stepped inside. As 
he did so he felt a sudden and unexpected shiver run through him. ‘Weird,’ 
he murmured. ‘I have never imagined doing this, not once.’

He looked around. The room was larger than the one he had left in Edinburgh, 
but furnished in much the same way. His desk was on the left, facing a round 
meeting table, with six chairs that slid underneath it. Beyond, there was 
another door; he could see through the unscreened glass wall that it led into 
another office.

He pointed towards it. ‘Secretary’s room?’

‘Yes,’ his aide replied.

‘Where are you going to go?’

‘I hadn’t given that any thought.’

‘Where’s the deputy’s office?’

‘That’s the one beyond the secretary’s.’

‘Then use that. It’s vacant.’

‘Okay, Chief, thanks.’ Payne walked behind the desk and opened a door 
behind it. ‘Your personal rooms are through here,’ he said. ‘There’s a 
safe in the changing room, but apparently nobody knows the combination, unless 
Marina does. I’ll ask her. If she doesn’t I’ll…’ He smiled. 
‘Actually I’m not sure what I’ll do.’

‘Too bad Johnny Ramensky’s dead,’ Skinner chuckled.

‘Yeah: the last of the legendary safecrackers. As for the rest,’ the DCI 
continued, ‘all of Ms Field’s things have been removed, from the changing 
room and the bathroom, and everything from the desk as well, that wasn’t 
office-related. Her business diary is still there, so you can see what she had 
in her schedule. There are also some files. I had a look at them, a very quick 
look, and then closed them up again. They seem to contain her observations on 
her senior colleagues.’

‘Then take them away and shred them,’ Skinner instructed him. ‘I don’t 
want to know about her prejudices and her grudges.’ He grinned. ‘I prefer 
to develop my own. What’s the general view of Michael Thomas?’ he asked. 
‘You can be frank, don’t worry.’

‘Unfavourable,’ Payne replied, without a pause for thought. ‘I knew him 
as a constable, way back, after I’d made sergeant. He was “Three bags 
full” then, before he started to climb. Much later I was stationed in his 
division for a while when he was a chief super. He virtually ignored me. He has 
a reputation for efficiency, but also for being a cold fish. He was a big 
supporter of Toni Field, at least he kissed her arse regularly enough.’

‘I know that from ACPOS. He was her regular seconder in the debate on 
unification. What about Bridie Gorman?’

‘Now she is well liked. She spends a lot of time out of the office, in the 
outlying areas of the force. I think that suited her, and suited Chief 
Constable Field as well, for they were complete opposites, as cops and as 
people.’ Payne scratched his chin. ‘Obviously I don’t know what 
perceptions were outside Strathclyde, but the view in here was that Field 
planned to get rid of every chief officer apart from ACC Thomas. She’d 
already axed the deputy, and it was common knowledge that Mr Allan was next.’

Skinner nodded. ‘Yes, I could tell that at ACPOS too. She didn’t even try 
to be civil to him. Any word on him, by the way?’

‘Yes, I checked. He’s still in hospital, suffering from what they’re now 
describing as shock. They’re going to keep him in for a couple of days. I 
don’t know how he’ll feel about coming back.’

‘Then see if you can find out for me. Go and visit him, this evening if you 
can. Max is only a few months off the usual retirement age. If he’s up to 
talking about it, tell him that if he’d like to come back, I’ll be happy to 
see him, but if he doesn’t, I’ll sign him off for enough sick leave to take 
him up to his due date.’

‘Yes, Chief; I was planning to go and see him anyway. He’s always been good 
to me.’

‘Fine. Now who’s here, in the building now?’

‘ACC Thomas is. He said he’d be in his office, and that he’d like to see 
you as soon as possible. And ACC Gorman’s in as well. She came down from 
Argyll overnight.’

‘Does she want to see me too?’

‘No, she said to tell you she was about if you needed her, that’s all.’

Skinner smiled. ‘Okay then, let’s talk to her; I can spare a few minutes 
before I have to see Lottie. Ask her to drop in, then give Mr Thomas my 
apologies, tell him that I’ll fit him in tomorrow morning, and that he’s 
free to salvage what’s left of his Sunday.’

As Payne left, he walked over to the desk, tried the swivel chair for height, 
and found, as he had expected, that it was set far too low. He stayed in it for 
only a few seconds, then pushed himself out. There was something not right 
about it, something that made his spine tingle. He knew what it was without any 
deep analysis. Less than forty-eight hours before, Toni Field had been sitting 
in it, and at that very moment she was lying in a refrigerated drawer in one of 
the city’s morgues, unless she was being autopsied by Sarah’s opposite 
number in the west.

He knew that he would never feel comfortable in her old seat, and so he wheeled 
it over to the secretary’s office, and left it in there with a note saying, 
‘Replace, please,’ scribbled on a sheet torn from a pad.

He had just stepped back into his own room when he heard a knock on the door. 
‘Come in,’ he called.

‘I can’t,’ a female voice shouted back. ‘This door self-locks. It can 
only be opened with a key or from the inside.’

He stepped across and admitted his visitor. ACC Bridget Gorman was in civvies, 
light tan trousers and a check shirt. ‘Afternoon, Chief,’ she said. Her 
manner was tentative, not that of the Bridie Gorman he knew.

‘Hey, Bridie, last week at ACPOS it was Bob,’ he told her. ‘It still is, 
okay? Come in and have a seat.’ He showed her across to the table and pulled 
out two of the chairs.

She glanced across to the desk, taking in the missing swivel but saying 
nothing. ‘Wouldn’t be right,’ he replied to her unspoken question. ‘I 
feel bad enough being here.’

Gorman frowned, and her forehead all but disappeared behind a mop of black but 
grey-streaked hair. ‘I know,’ she murmured. ‘It’s just awful. And it 
could have been Aileen.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t believe it could, and neither does DI Mann.’ 
He explained why.

She nodded. ‘Yes, I can see that. Somebody like them, they’d know exactly 
who they were shooting, I suppose. But why? Why Toni Field?’

‘They didn’t need to know that.’

‘But they’d know who wanted it done.’

‘Not all the way up the chain, not necessarily.’

‘Do you think it was related to something here?’

‘Come on, Bridie,’ Skinner murmured, ‘you know the rule: speculation 
hinders investigation.’

‘Aye, I suppose I do. Did you say that Lottie Mann’s involved?’

‘She was on duty; she took the shout.’

‘Granted, but… Lottie can be like a runaway train. Max Allan was always 
careful how she was deployed.’

‘I know that,’ he conceded. ‘But last night was chaos. The hall was full 
of headless chickens, but she turned up and took charge, even put me in my 
place. I liked that. It means she’s my kind of cop. What’s her back story? 
She said she has a family, but that’s all I know about her.’

‘That’s right,’ she confirmed, ‘she has. Her husband used to be a cop 
too. His name’s Scott, as I recall. I’ve got no idea what the wee boy’s 
called.’

‘Used to be, you say?’

‘Yes. He left the force a few years back. No, that’s a euphemism; he was 
encouraged to resign. He had a drink problem and eventually it couldn’t be 
tolerated any more. The job probably didn’t help, for he seems to have got 
himself together after he left it. The last I heard he was working in security 
in a big cash and carry warehouse out near Easterhouse.’ She smiled. 
‘There’s a story about Lottie and an interdivisional boxing night…’

‘I’ve heard it. Max Allan told me.’

‘Aye but did he tell you the name of the cop she flattened? It was Scott; 
that was how they met.’

Skinner laughed, softly. ‘There’s a love story for you. Somebody should 
make the movie.’

‘Fine, but who would you get to play Lottie?’

‘That would be a problem, I concede. Gerard Butler in drag, maybe.’ A name 
suggested itself. ‘Joey Morocco?’

‘Mr Glasgow? Our movie flavour of the month? He looks good, granted, but I 
wonder sometimes if there’s any real substance to him. I’m pretty sure 
I’d back Lottie against him over ten rounds.’

‘Maybe I’ll make that match,’ the chief murmured. ‘It would fill Ibrox 
Stadium. Bridie,’ he said, his tone changing, ‘I know you’re as surprised 
to see me here as I am to be here.’

She contradicted him. ‘No, I’m not. What happened, happened. I think 
they’ve done the right thing. This force always needs a strong hand; Max is 
too old, I don’t have the experience in the rank, and neither does Michael, 
whatever he might think.’ She frowned, concern in her eyes. ‘How is Max, by 
the way?’

‘He’s okay, but it remains to be seen whether he’ll be back. But whether 
he is or not… I have to get some hierarchy in place here. That means I need 
to appoint a temporary deputy chief. Even if Max was here, I’d want that to 
be you. Are you up for it?’

She was silent for a few seconds. ‘How can I say no?’ she asked when she 
was ready. ‘But what are you going to tell Thomas?’

‘I don’t plan to explain myself, if that’s what you mean, Bridie. The 
Police Authority gave me the power to designate my deputy, and you are it.’

She smiled, and said, ‘This might sound daft, Bob, but… what will I have to 
do as deputy?’

He returned her awkward grin and replied, ‘To be honest, I don’t know yet, 
not in any detail, because I don’t know yet what the demands of the job will 
be on me. Mind you, they have just cast doubt on my plans to go to my house in 
Spain in a couple of weeks’ time, something I’ll have to break to my 
children. Holidays might prove to be out of the question.’

‘Aw, what a shame,’ she exclaimed, like a kindly aunt. ‘The poor wee 
souls.’

‘It might not be a complete disaster. I’ll ask their mother if she can 
clear some time to take them instead.’ He sighed. ‘As for your question, 
all I can say is that you’ll deputise for me whenever it’s necessary.’

‘I’d better go and practise looking important then,’ the ACC chuckled. 
‘Was there anything else for now?’

‘No. My usual practice is to have a morning session with my senior 
colleagues. I’ll probably carry that on here; Lowell Payne will advise 
everybody. He’s going to be my aide while I’m settling in here, maybe for 
longer.’

‘Good,’ she declared. ‘I like Lowell. He tends to fly below the radar; 
that may be why he hasn’t risen higher.’

‘I don’t think he’s bothered about that. I know him well, from outside 
the force, and I’m glad to have him alongside me.’ He stood. She thought he 
was indicating the end of the meeting and was in the act of rising, but he 
waved to her to stay seated.

‘I’m just about to call Lottie up here, to give me an update on her 
investigation. You stay here and sit in; belt and braces. Christ, after what 
happened to Toni, none of us can be sure we’re going to see tomorrow.’





Ten



‘I could get to like this,’ Aileen said. ‘Bob’s garden in Gullane is 
nice too, but it overlooks the beach. He refuses to plant trees to give it a 
bit of privacy; says he likes the view.’ She picked up her glass from the 
wrought-iron table. ‘Well he’s bloody welcome to it!’

Don’t get to like it too much, Joey Morocco thought. He had been on the 
astonished side of surprised when Aileen had called him the night before, 
almost raving about being imprisoned by her husband and seeking sanctuary for a 
day or two, but they had enjoyed regular liaisons a few years before, and the 
occasional fling since.

Their history together had been enough to overcome his caution about taking 
another man’s wife under his roof, even when the man was as formidable as Bob 
Skinner was said to be.

Nonetheless, when she had defined their renewed relationship, ‘just fun, 
convenient uncomplicated nookie, no more than that’, he had been relieved. He 
was bound for Los Angeles in a few days, for the film project that was going to 
make him, he knew, and the last thing he wanted was a heavy-duty woman in 
Scotland with her claws in him.

‘Are you sure that’s really what you want?’ he asked. ‘To end your 
marriage?’

‘Bloody certain,’ she replied. ‘I don’t actually know what drew me to 
him in the first place.’ She grinned. ‘No, that’s not true, I do. I 
wanted to find out if he matched up to the waves he was giving out. Very few 
do, in my limited experience.’

‘Did he?’

‘At first, yes. Then I made the mistake of marrying him. It all got mediocre 
after that, but I suppose that’s life. I’ll learn from it, though; once is 
enough.’

He smiled.

‘And you’re relieved to hear that, I know,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry, 
Joey. My career is all planned out, and it doesn’t take me within six 
thousand miles of where you’re going.’ She looked around the suntrap garden 
once more. ‘But this is nice. I like it here; it suits me. I’m guessing 
that when you go to the US, you won’t be back here very often, so if you need 
a tenant, let me know.’

‘I will,’ he promised. ‘The way my commitments are, I won’t be back for 
at least a year, so that might work. You’d be a house-sitter, though, not a 
tenant.’

‘No,’ she declared. ‘It would have to be formal. I couldn’t be seen as 
your bidey-in, even though you were never here.’

He shrugged. ‘Whatever,’ he murmured, hoping secretly that it would all be 
forgotten by the next morning. ‘Want another drink?’ he asked.

Aileen pressed her glass to her chest. ‘No, I’m fine,’ she said. ‘I’m 
not a big afternoon drinker… or evening, come to that. You’ve seen me in 
action before. You know I can’t handle it.’

‘True,’ he conceded. ‘If you’re sure… I think I’ll get another 
beer, if you don’t mind.’

‘Not a bit.’

He wandered back into the kitchen, and took another Rolling Rock from the 
fridge. He had just uncapped it when the phone rang. He frowned, irked by the 
interruption, wondering which of the few people with access to his unlisted 
number had a need to call it on a bloody Sunday, when they all knew it was the 
day he liked to keep to himself.

‘Yes,’ he barked, not choosing to hide his impatience.

‘Is that Joey Morocco?’ a female voice asked.

‘Depends who this is.’

‘My name’s Marguerite Hatton. I’m on the political staff of the Daily 
News.’

‘And I’m a bloody actor, so why are you calling me?’ Hatton, Hatton; the 
name was fresh in his mind. Of course, the woman from the press conference, she 
who had tried to give Aileen’s husband a hard time, and had her arse well 
kicked.

‘I’m trying to locate Aileen de Marco,’ she replied. ‘I’d like to 
talk to her about her ordeal last night and how relieved she feels that the 
killer got the wrong woman.’

‘So?’ he challenged. ‘Why are you calling me?’

‘You’re quoted as saying, last night as you left the concert hall, that 
you’re a friend of hers,’ she explained. ‘I’m calling around everyone; 
the Labour Party, Glasgow councillors, anyone who might know her, actually, but 
she seems to have disappeared. Do you have any idea where she might be?’

‘Why should I? And if I did, do you really think that I’d betray her by 
setting you on her? If you want to find her, ask her husband, why don’t 
you?’

‘I rather think not,’ Hatton drawled. ‘Can you tell me about your 
relationship with Ms de Marco, Mr Morocco?’

‘No,’ he snorted. ‘Why the hell should I do that?’

‘But you did say you’re a friend of hers.’

‘Yes. So what? Aileen has many friends. She’s Glasgow’s leading lady. Ask 
a real journalist and they’ll tell you that.’

‘Oh, but I’m a real journalist, Mr Morocco,’ she told him. ‘Be in no 
doubt about that. How long have you known Ms de Marco?’

‘For a few years.’

‘How close are you?’

‘We are friends, okay? Is there any part of that you don’t understand?’

‘What’s the nature of your friendship?’

‘Private. Now please piss off.’

‘I don’t think so.’

He felt himself boil over. ‘Listen, hen,’ he shouted, lapsing into 
Glaswegian in his anger, ‘you want to talk to me, you go through my agent or 
my publicist. By the way, both of those are owed favours by your editor, so 
don’t you be making me have them called in.’

‘He owes me a few as well, Joey,’ she countered. ‘I keep bringing him 
exclusives, you see. When did you last see Ms de Marco?’

‘Fuck off!’ he snapped and slammed the phone back into its cradle.

‘You’ve been a while,’ Aileen said, as he rejoined her.

‘I had a nuisance call,’ he replied.

‘There’s a number you can call that stops you getting those.’

‘It doesn’t always work. But hopefully that one’s gone away to bother 
somebody else.’





Eleven



‘How’s the force reacting to Mr Skinner’s appointment?’ Harry Wright of 
the Herald called out, from the second row of the questioning journalists 
gathered in the Pitt Street conference room.

‘Come on, Harry,’ Malcolm Nopper began to protest, but Lottie Mann cut 
across him.

‘How would I know?’ she replied, her deep booming voice at a level just 
below a shout. ‘I’m just one member of this force, and for the last,’ she 
made a show of checking her watch, ‘twenty hours, minus a few for sleep, 
I’ve been leading a murder investigation. I think I can say for everybody 
that we’re all still shocked by what happened to our former chief constable. 
As for the new chief, he’s keeping in close touch with my investigation, but 
he’s confirmed me as the lead officer.’

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Nopper exclaimed, ‘people, I know these are 
unique circumstances, but I remind you that we’re here to discuss an ongoing 
inquiry into a suspicious death.’

A few explosions of laughter, some suppressed, some not, came from the 
gathering at his blatant use of police-speak. Skinner winced, and reflected on 
his insistence that the chief press officer should take the chair at the 
briefing. He had slipped into the room at the first call for order, and was 
standing at the back, half-hidden behind a Sky News camera operator.

‘Okay,’ Nopper sighed, shifting in his seat before the Strathclyde Police 
logo backdrop as he tried to rescue the situation. ‘At least that got your 
attention. My point was that this is a murder we’re here to talk about and 
that it should be treated just like any other, regardless of who the victim is. 
Now can we stick to the point?’ He looked towards the Herald reporter. 
‘Harry,’ he invited, ‘do you want to ask a proper question?’

The man shrugged. ‘I thought that was, but never mind. Detective Inspector, 
you were able to confirm for us that the police victims are Chief Constable 
Field and Sergeant Sproule. Now can you tell us anything about the other two 
men? Do you know who they are… were, sorry?’

Lottie straightened in her chair, and took a deep breath, in an effort to slow 
down her racing heart. ‘We believe so,’ she replied, speaking steadily. A 
murmur rippled through the media, and she paused to let it subside. 
‘They’ve been identified as Gerard Botha and Francois Smit. They were both 
South African citizens, and they’ve been described to us as military 
contractors.’

‘Mercenaries?’ a female Daily Record hack shouted.

The reporter was so suddenly excited that Lottie suspected she had spent her 
career waiting to write a crime story that didn’t involve domestic violence, 
homophobia or dawn raids on drug dealers. ‘If you want to use that term,’ 
she said, ‘I won’t be arguing with you.’

‘Who gave you that description?’ John Fox asked, from his customary front 
and centre seat.

‘Intelligence sources,’ the DI told him.

‘MI6?’

Lottie looked him in the eye, then gave him the smallest of winks. ‘Be 
content with what I’ve given you.’ She came within a couple of breaths of 
adding, ‘There’s a good boy,’ but stopped herself just in time, realising 
that Pacific Quay’s top crime reporter was someone she did not need as an 
enemy.

Fox grinned. ‘I had to ask, Lottie. These men were the killers, yes?’

She nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘To what degree of certainty?’

‘Absolute.’

‘Do you know as certainly how they came to die?’

‘Yes,’ the DI said. ‘But with the greatest respect, I’m going to tell 
the procurator fiscal before I tell you. Fair enough?’

The BBC reporter shrugged his shoulders slightly as if in agreement, but some 
others tried to press the point. She held her position until eventually Harry 
Wright changed the angle of approach.

‘DI Mann, the concert hall had security cover and the event was policed, yet 
these two men seem to have smuggled a weapon in there regardless. Is your 
investigation focusing on your own security and on the lapses that allowed this 
to happen?’

‘We know how they did that too, but again I’m not able to share it with 
you.’

‘Same reason, I suppose,’ Wright moaned. ‘The fiscal gets to know before 
the public.’

She shook her head, firmly. ‘No. It’s information that we have to keep 
in-house for now. There are aspects of it that we need to follow up.’

‘Continuing lines of inquiry?’

‘Sure, if you want to say that, I’m content.’

‘DI Mann, why isn’t Mr Skinner sitting alongside you?’ Marguerite Hatton 
cried out from the side of the room.

‘Relevant questions only,’ Nopper exclaimed. ‘Anyone else?’

‘I’ll decide what’s relevant,’ the woman protested. ‘I’ll disrupt 
this press conference until you answer. Why isn’t the new chief constable 
present?’

‘He is!’

Every head in the room, apart from the two seated at the table, turned at 
Skinner’s bellow.

‘Satisfied?’ he boomed. ‘DI Mann is leading this investigation and she 
enjoys my full confidence.’

‘How is your wife today, Mr Skinner?’ Hatton shouted back.

Slowly, the chief constable walked towards her. A press office aide stood at 
the side of the room, holding one of the microphones that were available so 
that every reporter’s questions could be heard. He held out his hand for it 
and took it, then stopped.

He knew that the TV cameras were running and that still photographs were being 
shot, but made no attempt to have them stop.

‘Lady,’ he said, into the mike, ‘I don’t know who you think you are, or 
what special privileges you expect from me, but you’re not getting any. 
You’re here at our invitation to discuss a specific matter, and now you’re 
threatening disruption, as everyone here has heard. I’m not having that. One 
more word from you and I’ll have you ejected.’

‘This is a public meeting,’ she protested.

‘Don’t be daft,’ he snapped back at her. ‘It’s a police press 
conference. I mean it. One more word and you are on the pavement.’ He held 
her gaze, his eyes icy cold, boring into hers, unblinking, until she subsided 
and turned away from him.

‘Okay,’ he murmured. ‘As long as we’re clear.’ He looked at the 
platform. ‘Carry on, Malcolm.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ the chief press officer said.

The Daily Record reporter raised her hand. Nopper nodded to her. ‘Can we take 
it that Chief Constable Field’s relatives have been told?’

‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘We released her identity, didn’t we? Her 
mother arrived in Glasgow this morning.’

Shit, Skinner thought, they’re going to love you for that when the media turn 
up on their doorstep.

‘Did they identify the body?’

Malcolm Nopper put a hand to his mouth, to hide a laugh.

‘They knew who she was, Penny,’ John Fox pointed out.





Twelve



‘So you’re the armourer,’ ACC Mario McGuire said to the man who faced him 
across the table in the Livingston police office. There was nobody else in the 
interview room.

Freddy Welsh was a big man, one with ‘Don’t cross me’ in his eyes, but 
someone had. There was a deep blue bruise in the middle of his forehead and his 
right hand was bandaged. For all that, he still looked formidable. ‘I don’t 
recognise that name,’ he murmured.

‘Maybe not, but it seems that other people do. People like Beram Cohen.’

‘Never heard of him.’

McGuire leaned back and sighed. ‘Look, Mr Welsh, can we stop playing this 
game? You’ve never been in police custody before, so I appreciate you’re 
only doing what you’ve seen on the telly, but really it’s not like that. 
There’s no recording going on here.

‘You’ve already been charged with illegal possession of a large quantity of 
weapons. We have the gun that was used in last night’s murder in Glasgow, and 
we are in the process of proving beyond any doubt that it came from the crate 
that was found yesterday afternoon in your store. You can take it that we will 
do that, and as soon as we do, the Crown Office will have a decision to make.’

‘And what would that be?’ Welsh asked.

‘Are you really that naive, man?’ McGuire laughed. ‘Do I have to spell it 
out? The kill team that executed Toni Field are all dead.’

The prisoner’s eyelids flickered rapidly. He licked his lips.

‘You didn’t know that?’ his interrogator exclaimed.

Welsh shook his head. ‘I’ve been locked up since last night, and I wasn’t 
offered my choice of newspaper with breakfast this morning. How would I know 
anything? I don’t even know who this bloke Tony Field is, or how Glasgow 
comes into it.’

‘Antonia Field,’ McGuire corrected. ‘The Chief Constable of Strathclyde. 
She was the victim. Your customer, Mr Smit, put three rounds through her head. 
You told my colleague Mr Skinner it was a woman he and Botha were after, and 
you were right.’

The other man frowned, as he took in the information. McGuire had assumed that 
he knew at least some of it, but it was clear to him that he had been wrong. 
‘And they’re dead?’ he said.

The ACC nodded in confirmation. ‘Yeah. Cohen, the planner, the team leader, 
he died of natural causes, a brain haemorrhage, but you knew that much. As for 
the other two, Mr Skinner and the other man you met,’ as he spoke he saw the 
shadow of a bad memory cross Welsh’s face, ‘arrived on the scene too late 
to save Chief Constable Field, but they did come face to face with Smit and 
Botha as they tried to escape, over the bodies of two other police officers 
they’d just taken down. They were offered resistance and they shot them both 
dead.’

The armourer started to tremble. McGuire liked that. ‘Yes,’ he went on, 
‘dead. It’s one thing being the supplier, Freddy, isn’t it? You’ve been 
doing that for donkey’s years, supplying the weapons to all sorts, but never 
being anywhere near them when the trigger was pulled. Not like that here, 
though. You’re too close this time, and it’s scary. Isn’t it?’

He reached into his pocket and pulled out two photographs and laid them in the 
table. One showed the body of Antonia Field, the other that of Smit.

‘Go on, take a good look,’ he urged. ‘That leaky grey stuff, that’s 
brain matter. Awful, isn’t it?’

Welsh pushed them back towards him.

‘You don’t like reality, do you?’ he said. ‘It’s not good to be that 
close.’ He leaned forward again. ‘Well, you are, and far closer than you 
realise. That woman, her whose photo I’ve just shown you, when that was done 
to her, my wife,’ his voice became quieter, and something came into it that 
had not been there before, ‘my heavily pregnant wife, was in the very next 
seat. When I got her home last night she was in a crime scene tunic that 
Strathclyde Police gave her, because the clothes she’d been wearing before 
had Toni Field’s blood and brains splattered all over them, and she 
couldn’t get out of them fast enough.’

He stopped, then reached a massive hand across the desk, seized Welsh’s chin 
and forced him to meet his gaze.

‘So far I know of four people who I hold responsible for that, Freddy. You 
are the only one left alive, and that puts you right in it, because now only 
you can tell me who commissioned this outrage. And you will tell me.’ He 
laughed, as he released Welsh from his grasp.

‘You know, Bob Skinner suggested that if you didn’t cooperate, I should get 
the MI5 guy here to persuade you. But I don’t actually need him. He’s just 
a spook with a gun, whereas I am a husband who’s going to wake up in cold 
sweats, for longer than I can see ahead, at the thought of what might have 
happened to my Paula and our baby if that sight you supplied with your Heckler 
and fucking Koch carbine had been just a wee bit out of alignment.

‘I’ve been playing it cool up to now, because Paula’s amazingly calm 
about it and I want to keep her that way, but that’s been a front. Inside 
I’ve been raging from the moment it happened. Now I can finally let it out. 
You’re a big guy, but you’re not tough. There’s a hell of a difference. 
I’m probably going to beat the crap out of you anyway, but what you have to 
tell me may determine when I stop.’

He sprang from his seat and started round the table.





Thirteen



‘So what have your people got?’ Skinner’s jacket… while he disliked any 
uniform, his hatred for the new tunic style favoured by some of his brother 
chiefs was absolute… was slung over the back of the new swivel chair that had 
been in place by the time he had returned from the press briefing. He had 
refused all requests for one-on-one interviews, insisting instead that these be 
done with Lottie Mann, as lead investigator.

His visitor was as smartly dressed as he had been the day before, but the 
blazer had given way to a close-fitting leather jerkin. No room for a firearm 
there, the chief thought. Just as well or security would have gone crazy. The 
garment was a light tan in colour almost matching Clyde Houseman’s skin tone, 
but not quite, for his face sported a touch of pink. ‘Have you caught the 
sun?’ he asked.

The younger man smiled. ‘Did you think I’d just get browner?’ he 
responded. ‘I’m only one quarter Trinidadian, on my father’s side. The 
rest of me gets as sunburned as you. And the answer’s yes. I went for a run 
this morning, a long one; not on a treadmill either but around the streets.’

‘Where did you go?’

‘Along Sauchiehall Street, then down Hope Street to the Riverside; over the 
Squinty Bridge, along the other side for a bit then I crossed back further up, 
past Pacific Quay. Up to Gilmorehill from there, round the university, and then 
home.’

‘Is that your normal Sunday routine?’

‘Hell no. Normally I go out for breakfast somewhere. There are a few places 
nearby.’

‘Where is home?’

‘Woodlands Drive.’

Skinner’s eyebrows rose slightly. ‘Woodlands Drive, indeed. I had a 
girlfriend who had a flat share there, in my university days. Louise.’ His 
eyes drifted towards the unfamiliar ceiling, and then back to his visitor. 
‘Are you married, Clyde?’

Houseman shook his head. ‘Half my life in the Marines and special forces, 
seeing action for most of it, then on to MI5. No,’ he chuckled. ‘I 
couldn’t find the time to fit that in. Not that I had any incentive, given 
the happy home I grew up in.’

The two men’s first encounter had been in a squalid housing estate in 
Edinburgh, when Skinner had just made detective superintendent. Houseman had 
been a street gang leader, son of a convicted murderer and a thief, until the 
scare the cop had thrown into him had made him rethink his entire life and join 
the military.

‘Hey,’ the chief constable said, ‘mine wasn’t that great either. It 
didn’t put me off marriage, though, not that I’ve been very fucking good at 
it. I’ve had three goes so far. My first wife died young, car crash, second 
marriage ended in divorce, and now the third’s going the same way.’

‘You and the politician lady?’

‘Yeah. She had this notion that I should help her fulfil her ambitions, which 
are substantial. That would have involved me following behind, in the Duke of 
Edinburgh position. Not my scene, I’m afraid, so we’re calling it a day.’

‘Won’t that be tough on your kids?’

‘No. The three young ones are very close to their mother, and as for my adult 
daughter, she’ll wave Aileen a cheerful goodbye. Having made a similar 
mistake herself she reckons I was daft to split up with Sarah in the first 
place, and I’m coming to agree with her. They say that Alex and I are 
absolutely alike, but that’s hardly surprising, since I pretty much brought 
her up on my own.’

He sighed. ‘I know why you went for the run, incidentally. To clear your head 
after what happened last night. We all have our own way of dealing with the 
shitty end of the job, the things we see, and sometimes the things we have to 
do; I’ve been known to go running myself, but usually I get pissed first, to 
give me something to run off, so it’ll hurt that wee bit more. Sometimes I 
wish I was a Catholic like my friend Andy, so I could go to church and get 
absolution. But no, not me; I have to do it the hard way.’

Without warning he swung his chair around and sat upright, his forearms on his 
desk. ‘But enough of that. I asked you what your people have got, if 
anything, on the origin of this hit. We’ve discounted the notion that Aileen 
was the target, so, who wanted Toni Field dead?’

Houseman looked back at him, his expression serious. ‘I’m not sure I have 
the authority, sir,’ he replied.

Skinner shook his head. ‘No, Clyde, I’m not having that. I know there’s 
recent history between your team and Strathclyde and that your deputy director 
told you to keep your distance from our Counter-terrorism and Intelligence 
Section. But that was then and this is now.

‘Amanda Dennis may have told you she thought it was leaky, but I know damn 
well that she didn’t like or trust Toni Field, and didn’t want any 
involvement with her. I’ve known Amanda for years, and I worked with her on 
an internal investigation I did in Thames House a few years ago. I can lift 
that phone right now and have your order rescinded, but save me the bother, 
eh?’

The spook gazed at him for a few seconds, then shrugged. ‘I’m sure you’re 
right,’ he said, ‘and I don’t fancy breaking into Amanda’s Sunday, so 
okay. The truth is we’ve got nothing yet. But that’s no disgrace, since 
we’ve concentrated our efforts since last night on the source of the 
intelligence that London had, that there was going to be a political hit 
somewhere in Britain.

‘Twenty-four hours ago, that was my colleagues’ firm conviction. Today, 
they’re saying they were conned. The threat was bogus; somebody in Pakistan 
was trying to buy entry into Britain for his family. In short, back to square 
one.’ He smiled. ‘Now, since we’re sharing, how about you?’

‘Fair enough,’ Skinner conceded. ‘We’ve been working on the basics. We 
have one potential witness to interview. You met him yesterday evening: Freddy 
Welsh. He may have dealt only with Beram Cohen, but it’s possible that the 
order for the weapons was placed by somebody else.’

‘Do you want me to talk to him again?’

‘I don’t think that’ll be necessary. Mario McGuire’s going to see 
him.’

‘McGuire? Your colleague? The man whose wife was sitting next to Toni 
Field?’

He nodded. ‘The same. Freddy isn’t going to enjoy that; not at all.’

‘Did you tell him to go hard?’

‘No, but I couldn’t stop him even if I tried. You and I might have scared 
Freddy last night, but that was a gentle chat compared to what the big 
fella’s capable of.’

‘He won’t go too far, will he?’

‘He won’t have to. I expect to hear from him fairly soon. In the meantime, 
there is one thing that I will “share” with you, to use your term. 
Remember, our assumption yesterday was that Smit and Botha were going to get 
into the hall disguised as police officers?’

‘Only too well,’ Houseman said, with a bitter frown. ‘If the police 
communications centre hadn’t been on Saturday mode, we might have got the 
message through in time to stop them.’

‘That’s something I will be addressing now I’m in this chair,’ Skinner 
promised, ‘but don’t dwell on it. My fear was that those uniforms would 
have been taken from two cops and that we’d find them afterwards, probably 
dead.’

‘Yes. You’re not going to tell me you have, are you?’

‘No; the opposite in fact. We’ve found the uniforms, along with the 
discarded police-type carbine that Welsh supplied, in the projection room where 
they took the shot from, but I don’t have any officers missing, and the 
tunics were undamaged… no bullet holes, stab wounds or anything else.

‘They were also brand new, and were a one hundred per cent match for the kit 
my people wear. Trousers, short-sleeved undershirt, stab vest with pockets, and 
caps with the usual Sillitoe Tartan around them. Same for the equipment belt 
and the gear on it, Hiatt speedcuffs, twenty-one-inch autolock baton, and a CS 
spray.

‘Okay, all British police forces wear similar clothing these days, but all 
these things were identical,’ he stressed the word, ‘to ours. The 
Strathclyde insignia is sewn on the armoured vest, and the manufacturer was the 
same… that’s telling, for the force changed its stab vest supplier not so 
long ago. In addition to that, we found two bogus cards on lanyards. Well, they 
were bogus in that the names were made up, they’d been created from blanks 
that my people believe were genuine.’

‘Could Welsh have supplied the stuff?’

‘You saw his store yesterday. There was nothing there other than firearms, 
boxed.’

‘In other words,’ the MI5 operative murmured, ‘what you’re saying is 
that…’

‘We’re doing a thorough stock check now, but it looks as if the clothing 
and body equipment came from our own warehouse. I’ve also asked for checks to 
be done in every other force that uses Hawk body armour. In other words, Clyde, 
the hit team had inside help. Somebody in this force supplied them.’

‘Then you’ve got a problem, sir.’

Skinner leaned back in his chair, making a mental note to adjust it to deal 
with his weight. ‘Actually, Clyde,’ he murmured, ‘I’ve got two.’

Houseman frowned. ‘Oh? What’s the other?’

‘It’s why I asked you to come here,’ the chief replied. ‘It takes us 
back to sharing. I need to know what you took from Smit’s body yesterday, 
when I was busy shooting Gerry Botha, and where it led you. I’ve seen the 
CCTV, remember. You were very slick, and very quick, but it’s there.’ He 
took a deep breath, then let it out in a sigh. ‘Fifteen years ago, son,’ he 
said, ‘I gave you a serious warning; don’t make me have to repeat it, far 
less follow through on it.’





Fourteen



‘You don’t need to see the tape, Danny,’ Lottie Mann said, in a tone that 
would have blocked off all future discussion with anyone but Detective Sergeant 
Provan; he had known her for too long.

He persisted. ‘Are you going to show it to the fiscal?’

‘She’s got it already. The chief had it sent over to her office after 
he’d shown it to me.’

‘So what’s on it?’ The stocky little detective puffed himself up, his 
nicotine-stained white moustache bristling, a familiar sign of irritation that 
she had seen a few hundred times before, mostly when she had been a detective 
constable on the way up the ladder, before she had passed him by. ‘This is a 
police inquiry and I’m second in seniority on the team. I’m entitled to 
bloody know.’

‘News for you, Dan. You’re third in the pecking order. The new chief 
constable might have told the press that I’m SIO on this one, but make no 
mistake, he is. This man Skinner is miles different from Toni Field in most 
ways, but in one they’re very much alike. She was on the way to creating a 
force in her own image, flashy, high-tech.’

‘Don’t I know it,’ Provan grumbled. ‘Fuckin’ hand-held devices in all 
the patrol cars. She’d have had us all wearing GPS ankle bracelets before she 
was done, so she could tell where every one of us was all the time.’

Lottie smiled; she had a soft spot for her sergeant that she never showed to 
anyone else. While it was a little short of the truth to say that he was her 
only mentor… Max Allan had been that also, if anyone ever was… he had 
always been her strongest supporter, even though he had known from their 
earliest days as colleagues that he had plateaued, while she was on the rise.

‘I wouldn’t go quite that far,’ she said, ‘but aye, that’s along the 
lines I meant. Skinner, if he sticks around, he’ll change us too, but it’ll 
be far different from the Field model. And I’ll tell you something else, when 
it comes to CID, it will always go back to him. So, Danny my man, don’t you 
be under any illusions about who’s really heading this investigation, ’cos 
I’m not.’

‘Okay,’ he replied. ‘That’s ma card marked. So if Ah want to know 
what’s on that video Ah go an’ ask Skinner. That’s what ye’re saying, 
is it?’

‘Jesus!’ the DI exploded. ‘You’re as persistent as my wee Jakey. I 
never said I wouldn’t tell you. The recording shows four people being shot. 
Three of them are dead, and Barry Auger could be left in a wheelchair.’ She 
described it in detail, as she had done to her husband a few hours earlier. 
‘Don’t feel left out because you haven’t seen it, Danny. I wish I 
hadn’t. Poor Barry and Sandy, they never had a chance.’

‘So much for body armour,’ the sergeant muttered.

‘It’s no’ going to stop a bullet at close range,’ Mann replied. 
‘Anyway, Sandy was shot in the head, twice. He was a goner before he hit the 
ground. The guy Smit was getting ready to finish Barry when Skinner and the 
other bloke arrived.’

‘Aye, the other bloke. What about him?’

‘Not one of ours. Youngish bloke, maybe mixed race, looked military.’

‘You’re kidding,’ the DS exclaimed. ‘When I was coming in, there was a 
bloke just like that at reception, and I heard him ask for the chief 
constable’s office. Light brown skin, dark hair, creases in his trousers, 
shiny shoes; a fuckin’ soldier for sure. Who is he? What is he?’

‘Skinner hasn’t said outright, but you can bet he’s MI5. I know they’ve 
got a regional presence in Glasgow but I’ve never heard of them being 
involved with us before.’

‘So how come they were this time?’

‘The chief had an investigation going in Edinburgh, and this man got pulled 
in.’

‘Linked to this one?’ Provan asked.

‘Aye. They’ve got a man in custody, the arms supplier.’ She held up a 
hand. ‘Before you get excited, he knows nothing that’s going to help us. I 
just had a call from an ACC in Edinburgh. He told me he just finished 
interrogating him and he’s satisfied he’s not holding anything back.’

‘So the only possible line of investigation we’ve got are the uniforms they 
wore.’

‘Right enough; and the fact that they were ours, not fakes,’ she confirmed. 
‘But that’s not going to be general knowledge either, Danny. If Smit and 
Botha did indeed have an inside contact, we know one thing, he’ll be on his 
guard. We have to be careful.’

‘Agreed, but can Ah ask, how certain are we they’re frae inside?’

‘Every single item that we found was what an officer would wear or carry, yet 
they came from a range of suppliers. If they got them anywhere else they’d 
have had to know who every one of those is, and some of that stuff isn’t 
public knowledge, not even under Freedom of Information rules. But it’s the 
CS spray that’s the clincher; that stuff’s military, and each canister has 
a serial number. We know that the two we found came from our store, because the 
numbers are in sequence and they were missing from the stock.’

‘Right. How do we handle it?’

‘Quietly,’ Mann declared. ‘All police equipment’s held in a secure 
store in Paisley. Operationally, ACC Thomas has oversight of all supplies. He 
checked on the numbers for me personally… he let me know it was a big favour, 
mind… and he’s agreed that we can interview the civilian manager, as long 
as we’re discreet. We’re off to Paisley, first up tomorrow morning.’

‘Just the two of us?’

‘Absolutely,’ the DI replied. ‘Discreet is the word.’

Provan nodded. ‘Fair enough. Now, there’s one other thing that Ah’ve been 
wondering, a question I haven’t heard anyone raise since last night.’

‘What’s that?’

‘How did these two fellas get there, and how were they plannin’ tae get 
away? This was a well-planned operation, so I doubt they were going down tae 
the Central Station to catch the London train.’

Lottie Mann’s eyes widened. ‘You know, Dan, life’s really not fair. You 
should be the DI, not me. Smit and Botha had nothing on them, nothing at all. 
No ID of any sort, no wallets, no car keys, nothing.’

‘In that case, Lottie,’ the DS chuckled, ‘maybe Ah should be chief 
constable, for if the new guy really is runnin’ this investigation like you 
say, then he’s missed it as well.’





Fifteen



Clyde Houseman’s face grew even more pink, but with embarrassment.

‘Come on,’ Skinner snapped. ‘Out with it.’

‘I’m sorry, sir,’ the man replied, ‘but it’s like this. I’m a 
Security Service officer, and what we were involved in yesterday… well, I 
felt at the time it was one of our operations, and not police, and when I was 
sent to see you yesterday, by my boss, it was on the basis of bringing you 
inside, not deferring to you.’

‘And you kept thinking that way even though three of our people had been 
shot?’ the chief constable countered.

‘Even though. I’d just taken someone down myself, and in those 
circumstances it was my duty to protect the interests of my service: standard 
practice. So I did what I did. I meant to report to my deputy director straight 
away, but I was caught up in the situation and couldn’t. I tried to call her 
this morning, but so far I haven’t been able to raise her, and I don’t want 
to go anywhere else. She’s my immediate boss.’

‘Even Amanda Dennis has to turn her phone off some time,’ Skinner said. 
‘Clyde,’ he continued, ‘I understand what you’re saying, but I’m not 
buying it. Like it or not, this was a very public crime and the investigation 
has to be seen to be thorough. I can’t have you withholding evidence. So come 
on, man, and remember this: I’ve already protected the interests of your 
service. Only one police officer has seen that tape of you and me taking care 
of the South Africans, and that’s how it’s going to stay. She’s assuming 
that I’ve given it to the procurator fiscal, the prosecutor’s office, 
because I let her believe that, but in fact it’s still in my desk. The deputy 
fiscal in charge of the investigation knows about it, because I’ve told him; 
he understands the sensitivity and he’s prepared to forget that it ever 
existed.’

‘Where is it now?’

‘Locked in my desk, for now, till somebody comes up with the combination of 
the bloody safe that Toni Field left behind.’

‘Thank you for that,’ Houseman murmured. ‘But do you trust your people? 
Leaks can happen, and the last thing that either of us wants is for that video 
to wind up on YouTube.’

‘At the moment, I trust them more than I trust you,’ Skinner pointed out, 
‘and I will until you cough up what you took from Smit’s body. Look, I 
don’t want to, but I will bypass Amanda and go to your director if I have to, 
even though he is a buffoon.’

‘Sir Hubert would probably back me up.’

‘No he wouldn’t,’ the chief chuckled. ‘Do you have any idea of what 
would happen if I even hinted to the media that MI5 was getting in the way of 
my investigation? You’re forgetting who’s been killed here. Toni Field was 
a big name in the Met, plus the Mayor of London was said to be her biggest fan. 
All of their weight would come down on Thames House if I dropped the word. 
Plus,’ he added, ‘I’ve got the tape. You’re worried about YouTube, son? 
If I chose I could edit it, destroy the footage of me shooting Botha, and leak 
the rest myself. If I chose,’ he repeated. ‘Not that I would, but I won’t 
have to, because you’re going to…’ he smiled, ‘. . . share with me 
again. Aren’t you?’

Houseman sighed, then reached inside his leather jerkin. For an instant Skinner 
tensed, but what he produced was nothing more menacing than an envelope.

‘I had a hunch our meeting might go this way,’ he said, ‘so I brought the 
things along.’

He handed it across to the chief, who took it, ripped it open and shook its 
contents out on to the desk: a car key, with a Drivall rental tag bearing a 
vehicle registration number, and a parking ticket.

Skinner picked up the rectangle of card and peered at it with the intense 
concentration of a man who had reached the age of fifty and yet was still in 
denial of his need for reading spectacles.

‘Have you done anything with this yet?’

His visitor shook his head. ‘I decided to wait for instructions.’

‘On whether to hand it over to me or not?’

‘Yes, more or less.’

‘Now you’ve done it, story’s over as far as I’m concerned. If Amanda 
gives you a hard time, although I don’t believe she will, you can tell her I 
coerced you into it. So,’ he held up the ticket, between two fingers, ‘you 
know where this is for?’

‘It doesn’t say on it.’

‘Maybe not, but given the exit they chose, the likeliest is the multi-storey 
on the other side of Killermont Street, beside the bus station. One way to find 
out.’ Skinner pushed himself to his feet. ‘Gimme a minute.’

He picked up his uniform jacket from the back of his chair, and stepped into 
the private room behind it. When he emerged, three minutes later, he had 
changed into the same slacks and cotton jacket that Houseman had seen the day 
before.

‘We’re going ourselves?’ the younger man asked.

‘Of course. I seize every chance that comes up to get out of my office; there 
may not be too many more, now I’m here.’

He led the way out of his room, but instead of heading straight for the exit, 
he turned left, stopping at the second door. He opened it and called to the 
occupant. ‘Lowell, I have an outside visit; I could use your help.’

Payne had been working on the chief constable’s forward engagement diary. He 
closed it and crossed swiftly to the door. ‘Where are we going?’ he asked, 
then reacted with surprise as he saw Houseman for the first time.

Skinner did the introductions on his way to the lift. ‘Clyde’s come in with 
some new information,’ he added. ‘He’s found the vehicle Smit and Botha 
were using yesterday. Well, that’s to say, we know where it might be.’

‘Should we call Lottie?’ the DCI asked.

‘Yes, we should, but we won’t until we’ve got something to tell her.’

They rode the lift down to the sub-level that accessed the police headquarters 
park, then took Payne’s car, which he had left in the space allocated to the 
deputy chief. The journey along Sauchiehall Street and Renfrew Street to the 
Buchanan Street bus station took only two minutes, five less than it might have 
on a weekday. Skinner smiled as they passed the McLellan Galleries, his mind 
going back thirty years to a visit to an art exhibition, in a foursome with 
Louise Bankier and a couple of their fellow students, when he had spotted, on 
the other side of the big room, Myra, his fiancée, with a spotty guy he had 
never seen before. They were heading for the exit, hand in hand, with eyes only 
for each other. He never had found out who the bloke was, but it had never 
occurred to him to ask. He had been too wrapped up in his own guilt over 
Louise; indeed the close encounter had been the beginning of the end of that 
relationship.

He was still dwelling on the past as they approached their destination. In case 
his daydream had been noticed, he took out the Drivall car key and made a show 
of peering at the number written on the fob, until he gave up and handed it to 
Houseman, and his younger eyes.

‘We’re looking for a Peugeot,’ he announced, after the briefest study, 
‘registration LX12 PMP. Doesn’t say what colour it is.’

Payne ignored the official entry point and drove to the office instead. The way 
was blocked by a barrier. A staff member, in a Day-Glo jacket, came out to meet 
them. The DCI showed his warrant card, and the parking ticket that Skinner had 
handed to him. ‘That one of yours?’ he asked.

The attendant studied it. ‘Aye,’ he confirmed. ‘It’s dated yesterday 
afternoon. Left overnight, eh, and no’ picked up yet. Stolen car? There’s 
nae TV in here so we get them.’

‘Not necessarily, but we need to find it. Is the park busy?’

‘Jam packed, but go on in.’ He pushed a button at the side of the barrier, 
and it rose.

‘Okay. Two ways of doing this,’ the chief declared. ‘We either drive 
through very slowly, and hope we get lucky, or we do the sensible thing and 
split it. Lowell, drop me on level two, Clyde on four and you go to the top and 
park. We work our way down till we find it. You’ve both got my work mobile 
number, and I’ve got yours; either of you find the car, you call me and 
I’ll alert the other.’

Payne did as he was instructed. As each of them reached his starting point, he 
realised that the multi-storey was spilt into sub-levels, making it bigger than 
it had looked from the outside. They searched their separate areas as quickly 
as they could but nonetheless almost fifteen minutes had passed before 
Skinner’s mobile rang. By that time he was at ground level.

His screen told him that it was Houseman who had made the discovery. ‘I’m 
on level five,’ the spook said. ‘At the side, overlooking the street.’

‘Good spot. Be with you in a minute; I’ll tell Lowell.’

‘There’s no need. The way this place is built he can see me from where he 
is.’

Skinner took the stairs, two at a time. As he stepped out on to level five he 
saw Payne, on his left, coming towards him down a ramp.

The Peugeot was a big saloon model, in a dark blue colour. Skinner took the key 
from his pocket and worked out by trial and error which button unlocked it. 
Houseman was in the act of reaching for the driver’s door handle when Payne 
called out to him.

‘No, not without gloves.’ He smiled. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘It’s a CID 
reflex.’

‘Understood,’ the MI5 man conceded. He took a handkerchief from his pocket 
and used it to open the door.

Skinner stepped up behind him and looked inside, then slotted the key in to 
light up the dashboard. ‘Satnav,’ he said.

‘So?’ Houseman murmured.

‘With a bit of luck they’ll have used it. With even more, they won’t have 
deleted previous entries. When did they collect the uniforms and equipment? 
Where? That may give us a clue.’

‘Mmm.’

‘And if they did pick up the gear from an inside source, he may have left us 
a print, or a DNA trace.’

‘That’s if he’s on the database,’ Payne pointed out. ‘If he is 
inside, how likely is that?’

‘Come on, Lowell,’ Skinner chided. ‘Think positive.’ He glanced into 
the back of the car, saw it was empty, then withdrew the key and closed the 
driver’s door, leaning on it with an elbow. Moving round to the back of the 
vehicle, which had been left perilously close to the wall of the building, he 
pushed a third button on the remote. There was a muffled sound and the boot lid 
sprang open.

‘Jesus Christ!’ the DCI yelled, jumping backwards in alarm and astonishment.

His companions stood their ground, gazing into the luggage compartment.

‘Surprisingly capacious, these things,’ the chief constable murmured, 
‘aren’t they, Clyde? You’d get at least two sets of golf clubs in there, 
no problem. Maybe two trolleys as well.’

‘Beyond a doubt.’

Two medium-sized blue suitcases lay on their sides, at the front of the boot, 
but there had still been more than enough room for the rest of the load to be 
jammed in behind them: the body of a man, knees drawn up and his arms wrapped 
around them. The eyes were open, staring, and there was a cluster of three 
holes in the centre of his chest.

‘So, chum,’ Skinner wondered. ‘Who the hell were you, and why did you 
wind up here?’





Sixteen



‘That’s Bazza Brown,’ DS Dan Provan announced.

Lottie Mann frowned. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Trust me. Real name Basil, but nobody ever called him that, unless they 
wanted a sore face. The first time Ah lifted him he was sixteen, sellin’ what 
he claimed were LSD tabs on squares from a school jotter. They wis just melted 
sugar, but nobody ever complained; he wis a hard kid even then, and he had a 
gang.’

‘When was that?’ Skinner asked. He had never met the wizened little 
detective before but he found himself taking an instant liking to him, and to 
his irreverence.

‘Goin’ on twenty-five years ago, sir. He moved on frae there, though. The 
next time I picked him up he’d just turned twenty-one and he was sellin’ 
hash. He got three years for that, in the University of Barlinnie, and that, 
you might say, completed his formal education. He’s never done a day’s time 
since, even though he’s reckoned… sorry, he was reckoned… to be one of 
the big three in drugs in Glasgow.’

‘So how come he wound up in a car boot sale?’

‘Ah can’t tell you that, sir. But Ah know you’re going to want us to find 
out.’

The chief grinned. ‘That is indeed the name of the game, Sergeant.’

He and Payne had called in Mann and her squad at once. They had left the car 
untouched. Indeed the only change in the scenery since they had made their 
discovery lay in the absence of Clyde Houseman. Skinner had decided that it 
would be best if he made himself scarce.

He had expected Lottie Mann to be blunt when she arrived, and had been ready 
for her challenge.

‘Can I ask what the fuck you’re doing here, sir? I’ve got people out 
showing pictures of Smit and Botha to every car park attendant in Glasgow, and 
what do I find? You and DCI Payne, with their bloody car key!’

‘Inspector!’ Lowell Payne had intervened, but his new chief had calmed his 
protest with a wave of his hand.

‘It’s okay. DI Mann is well entitled to sound off. I was given some 
information, Lottie, and I decided to evaluate it myself, and to bring you in 
if I reckoned it was worth it. Get used to me: it’s the way I am.’

‘Oh, I know that already, sir,’ she retorted. ‘Just like I know there’s 
no point me asking who your source was.’

‘That’s right, but now the result is all yours.’

She had given one of her hard-earned smiles, then gone into action.

The photographer and video cameraman were finishing their work as Provan 
announced the identity of the victim and he and Skinner had their exchange. 
They had been hampered slightly by a silver Toyota parked in the bay on the 
right, but the two to the left were clear.

As they packed their equipment, the elevator door opened, beside the stairway 
exit, and a woman stepped out, pushing a child in a collapsible pram with John 
Lewis bags hung on the back. She frowned as she moved towards them. ‘What’s 
going…’ she began.

Payne moved quickly across to intercept her, holding up his warrant card. 
‘Police, ma’am. Is that your Toyota?’

‘Yes, but what… It’s not damaged, is it? I can move it, can’t I?’

‘It’s fine, but please don’t come any closer. If you give me your car key 
I’ll bring it out for you.’

‘It’s not a bomb, is it?’ The young mother was terrified; Payne smiled to 
reassure her.

‘No, no, not at all. If it was I wouldn’t be within a mile of it myself. 
It’s just a suspicious vehicle, that’s all. We’re checking out the 
contents. You just give me your keys and don’t you worry.’

He reversed the Toyota out of its bay and drove it a little way down the exit 
ramp, then helped her load her bags and her child, who had slept through the 
exchange.

‘Did she see anything?’ Mann asked the DCI as he returned.

‘No, or you’d have heard the screams. But we need to get a screen round 
this, now we’ve got the room.’

‘It’s on the way, with the forensic people. We’d better not touch 
anything till they get here. That peppery wee bastard Dorward’s on weekend 
duty and he’ll never let me forget it if I compromise “his” crime 
scene.’

‘It’s well compromised already, Lottie,’ Skinner pointed out. ‘Anyone 
got a pair of gloves?’ he asked. ‘I want a look at these suitcases. I’ll 
handle Arthur’s flak. I’ve been doing it for long enough.’

Provan handed him a pair of latex gloves. He slipped them on and lifted one of 
the blue cases from the boot, laid it on the ground and tried the catches, 
hoping they were unlocked and smiling when they clicked open.

‘Clothing,’ he announced as he studied the contents, and sifted through 
them. ‘It looks like two changes: trousers, shirt, underwear, just the one 
jacket, though, and one pair of shoes. Everything’s brand new, Marks and 
Spencer labels still on them. Summer wear. Mmm,’ he mused. ‘What’s the 
weather like in South Africa in July?’

There was a zipped pocket set in the lid of the case, which also sported a 
Marks and Spencer label on its lining. He unfastened it, felt inside and found 
a padded envelope. It was unsealed; the contents slid into his hand.

‘Wallet,’ he said. ‘Looks like at least three hundred quid. One Visa 
debit card in the name of Bryan Lightbody. A passport, New Zealand, in the same 
name, but with Gerry Botha’s photo inside. Flight tickets and itinerary, 
Singapore Air, Heathrow to Auckland through Singapore, business class, 
departure tomorrow evening.’

He lifted the second case from the car and checked its contents. ‘An 
Australian passport,’ he announced when he was finished. ‘It and the bank 
card are in the name of Richie Mallett, and the flight ticket’s Quantas to 
Sydney, again Heathrow tomorrow night. So that was the game plan. Drive to 
London, fly away home and leave us scratching our arses as we try to find them 
on flights out of Scotland.’

‘Well planned,’ Lottie Mann observed.

‘Yes, but that’s not what these guys did. The man Cohen was the planner. He 
made all the arrangements, bought the air tickets, hired the car.’

‘The car,’ she repeated, then turned to Provan. ‘Get…’

‘Ah’m on it already,’ he retorted, waving the car key with his left hand 
while holding his mobile to his ear. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘that’s right, 
Strathclyde CID. I’m standing over one o’ your cars just now, and Ah need 
to know whose name is on the rental contract.’ He paused, listening.

‘Because there’s something wrong wi’ it, that’s why.’ He waited again.

‘Maybe there wasn’t when it left you, Jimmy, but there is now. There’s a 
fuckin’ body in the boot. Or dae all your vehicles come with that accessory? 
No, Ah won’t hold on. The registration’s LX12 PMP; you get me the 
information Ah want and get back to me through the force main switchboard. 
They’ll transfer your call to my mobile. Pronto, please, this is very 
important.’

As Provan finished, Skinner tapped him on the shoulder. ‘Have you ever done a 
course,’ he asked, ‘on communication with the public?’

The sergeant pursed his lips, wrinkling his two-tone moustache in the process, 
and looked up at him. ‘No, sir, I can’t say that Ah have.’

‘Then I will make it my business, Detective Sergeant,’ the chief told him, 
without the suggestion of a smile, ‘to see that you never do.’

‘Thanks, gaffer,’ the little DS replied, ‘but even if you did send me on 
one, at my age I wake up sometimes wi’ this terrible hacking cough. Knocks me 
right off for the day, it does.’

Skinner laughed out loud. ‘I could get to like it here,’ he exclaimed. Then 
he turned serious. ‘Now prove to me that you’re a detective, not some 
fucking hobbit who’s tolerated because he’s been around for ever. There’s 
a begged question in this scenario. I’m not wondering about the guy in the 
boot. You knew who he was, and I know what he was. No, it’s something else, 
unrelated. What is it?’

As Dan Provan looked up at his new boss, two thoughts entered his mind. The 
first of them was financial. He had over thirty years in the job, and his 
pension was secure as long as he didn’t punch the chief constable in the 
mouth, and since that struck him as being a seriously stupid overreaction, it 
wasn’t going to happen. So the ‘daft laddie’ option was open to him, 
without risk.

But the second was professional, and pride was involved. He had survived as 
long as he had because he was, in fact, a damn good detective, and as such he 
was expert in analysing every scenario and in identifying all the possible 
lines of inquiry that it offered.

A third consideration followed. Skinner hadn’t asked him the question to 
embarrass him, but because he expected him to know the answer.

He frowned and bent his mind to recalling as much as he could of what had been 
said in the previous half hour. He played the mental tape, piece by piece, then 
ran through it again.

‘It’s the flights,’ he said, when he was sure. ‘The two dead guys had 
plane tickets out of Heathrow. Yes?’

‘Yes.’

‘Right. Now if everything had gone to plan, the two hit men, Smit and Botha, 
or Lightbody and Mallett, or Randall and fuckin’ Hopkirk deceased, whoever 
they were, if it had all gone to plan, they’d have driven straight out of 
this car park, almost before the alarm had been raised, headed straight down to 
London, dumping our friend Bazza in some lay-by along the way, and got on a 
fuckin’ plane. Right, boss?’

Skinner nodded. ‘You’re on a roll, Sergeant, carry on.’

‘Thank you, gaffer. In that case, even as we’re stood here, they could have 
been sipping fuckin’ cocktails in business class. Except… their flights 
were booked for Monday, for tomorrow. So what were they supposed to be doin’ 
in those spare twenty-four hours?’

The chief constable smiled. ‘Absolutely. Top question. You got an answer for 
that one?’

Provan shrugged, ‘No idea, sir.’ He nodded towards the boot of the Peugeot. 
‘But if we find out what they were doing with poor old Bazza Brown there, 
maybe that’ll give us a clue.’





Seventeen



‘He’s a marginally insubordinate little joker, but I do like him,’ Bob 
chuckled. ‘He and that DI, Lottie, they’re some team.’

Sarah smiled across the table, on which the last of their dinner plates lay, 
empty save for the skeletons of two lemon sole. She raised her coffee cup. 
‘Could it be that Glasgow isn’t the cultural wasteland you thought it 
was?’

‘Hey, come on,’ he protested. ‘I never said that, or even thought it. 
I’m from Motherwell, remember; I’m not quite a Weegie myself, but close. I 
have a Glasgow degree; I spent a good chunk of my teens in that fair city. West 
of Scotland culture is in my blood. Why do you think I like country music and 
bad stand-up comedians?’

‘So part of you is glad to be back there,’ she suggested.

‘Sure, the nostalgic part.’

‘Then why did you ever leave?’ she asked in her light American drawl. 
‘Myra was from Motherwell as well and yet the two of you upped sticks and 
moved through to Gullane in your early twenties.’

‘You know why; I’ve told you often enough. I liked Edinburgh, and I liked 
the seaside. I wanted to work in one and live by the other. I’ve never 
regretted that decision either, not once.’

‘But what made you choose it over Glasgow? I can see you, man, and your 
pleasure now at being back there. There must have been an underlying reason.’

He leaned back in his chair and gazed at her. ‘Very well,’ he conceded. 
‘There was. I didn’t like being asked what school I went to.’

‘Uh?’ she grunted. ‘Come again? What’s that got to do with anything?’

His laugh was gentle, amused. ‘You’ve lived in Scotland for how long? 
Twelve years on and off, and you don’t know that one? It’s code, and what 
it actually means is, “Are you Protestant or are you Catholic?” Where I 
grew up that was a key question, just as much as in Belfast, and for all Aileen 
and her kind might try to deny it, I’m sure it still is in some places and to 
some people. The answer could determine many things, not least your employment 
prospects.

‘Why the school question? Because through there, education was organised 
along religious lines; there were Roman Catholic schools and 
non-denominational, the latter being in name only. They were where the 
Protestants went. So, your school defined you, and it could mean that some 
doors were just slammed in your face.’

‘Wow,’ Sarah murmured. ‘I know about Rangers and Celtic football clubs, 
of course, but I didn’t think it went that deep.’

‘It did, and for some it still does. Both those clubs condemn sectarianism 
but they still struggle to eradicate it among their supporters. I decided very 
early on that I didn’t want any kids of mine growing up in that environment, 
and Myra agreed. That’s what was behind our move.’

‘But now you’re back you like it?’

‘Hey, love, it’s been one day. My reservations about the size of the 
Strathclyde force are as strong as ever. What I’m saying is that I like the 
people I’ve met so far. Mann and Provan, they’re good cops and pure 
Glaswegian, both of them.’

‘What school did they go to?’

‘As for Lottie, I have no idea.’ He winked. ‘But the Celtic supporter’s 
lapel badge that wee Provan was wearing still offers something of a clue. He 
may miss their next game,’ he added, ‘if they don’t get these killings 
wrapped up soon.’

‘Yeah,’ Sarah said. ‘The body in the boot must have been a bit of a 
shaker.’

‘It was for Lowell, that’s for sure. He jumped out of his skin. Me too, to 
be honest, but I’ve gotten good at hiding it.’

‘Why was he there, the dead guy?’

‘I guess they didn’t want to leave him wherever he was killed. The 
provisional time of death was Friday evening some time; with the hit being 
planned for Saturday, they may not have wanted to muddy the waters by having 
him found.’

‘Meaning the police might have made a connection to them?’

He nodded. ‘It would have been a long shot, but that would have been the 
thinking.’

‘Mmm.’ She frowned. ‘But I didn’t mean why was he in the boot; I mean 
why were they involved with him at all?’

‘We all asked ourselves that one. It seems that the late Mr Brown was a 
reasonably heavy-duty Glasgow criminal, but I doubt very much that Mr Smit and 
Mr Botha met him to do a drug deal on the side.’

‘Are you still sure those are their real names?’

‘Oh yes, we know that. We can trace them all the way back to the South 
African armed forces. Lightbody and Mallett were aliases. It remains to be seen 
whether they actually lived under those names, one in New Zealand, one in 
Australia. We’ll need to wait for the passport offices and the police in 
those countries to open before we can follow them up.’ He checked his watch; 
quarter to nine. ‘New Zealand should be wide awake now, Australia in an hour 
or two. Anyway, whatever their fucking names, what were they doing with a 
Weegie hood?’

‘Yes, any theories?’

‘Only one, the obvious. Mr Brown must have been involved in the supply of the 
police uniforms and equipment, and they must have decided not to leave him 
behind as a witness.’

‘So why did they leave the arms dealer alive?’ Sarah wondered.

‘Because he’s part of that world, I’d guess, and was in as deep as they 
were. A small-timer they’d have seen as a weakness.’

Sarah refilled her cup from a cafetière. Bob, who had given up coffee at her 
suggestion, almost at her insistence, topped up his glass with mineral water.

‘But the tough questions are, why was he in the chain at all, and who 
introduced him? There we do not have a Scooby, as wee Provan would probably 
say.’

‘Good.’ She smiled. ‘Enough for tonight, Chief Constable. No more shop, 
just Bob and Sarah for a while. I’ve been thinking about what happened a 
couple of nights ago, you and me having a nice quiet dinner and ending up in 
bed together.’ She took his hand, studying it as she spoke. ‘I have to ask 
you this, Bob, because it’s been gnawing away at me, knowing from personal 
experience how unpredictable you are when it comes to women. Are you and the 
witch definitely a thing of the past? Is there any chance of a 
reconciliation?’

He sipped some water. ‘Given our history,’ he began, ‘I suppose I 
deserved that “unpredictability” crack. But you can take this to the bank: 
Aileen and I are through. Sit her across from you and she would give you the 
same answer. She’d probably add also that we’re not going to walk away as 
friends either. Each of us married a person without knowing them at all. Before 
too long we found we didn’t even like each other all that much.’

‘Do you think you know me now?’ she asked.

‘None of us can live inside someone else’s head, but if I don’t know what 
makes you tick by now…’ He leaned forward and looked deep into her eyes. 
‘I always did like you; now I know more. I never stopped loving you either.’

‘But let’s not put it to the test by getting married again. Agreed?’

Bob nodded. ‘Agreed. But is that because you don’t trust me? If it is, I 
understand.’

‘Amazing as it may sound, I do trust you. No, it’s because right now, the 
way we are… I don’t think I’ve ever felt happier, and I don’t want to 
risk that.’

‘Fair enough. Now, with the kids upstairs in bed, can we do something 
old-fashioned, like watching television?’

She laughed. ‘How very couple-ish! Yeah, let’s.’

She was flicking through the channel choice when Bob’s work mobile sounded. 
‘Bugger,’ he murmured. ‘I must give this Edinburgh phone back to Maggie 
and get a new one from Strathclyde. Chances are this is for her.’ He looked 
at the caller identification. ‘No, it’s not. Lowell,’ he said as he 
accepted the call, ‘what’s up? News from down under?’

As Sarah watched him, she saw his eyes widen, a frown wrinkle his forehead for 
a second then disappear. ‘You’re fucking kidding,’ he exclaimed. ‘So 
that’s what the bloody woman was leading up to. Don’t apologise, man, I 
know you had to tell me, but worry not; it won’t ruin my night. I just wish I 
could be a fly on a certain wall, that’s all.’

He ended the call as Sarah laid down the TV remote.

‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘What bloody woman? Aileen?’

‘As it happened, no,’ he told her, ‘another bloody woman, but not 
unconnected. What you asked me earlier on, whether there was a cat’s chance 
of the two of us staying together.’ He laughed. ‘If you doubted me at all, 
then, by Christ, you’re going to be a happy woman tomorrow morning.’





Eighteen



‘Are we all set for tomorrow, Alf?’

‘Yes, but I’ve brought it forward to eleven thirty. The phone’s never 
stopped ringing all day, and the place is going to be packed out. If you want 
to do follow-up interviews and get them on the midday news we’ll need to 
start a bit earlier than noon.’

‘Agreed,’ Aileen said. ‘And the announcement: do they have that ready?’

‘Yes,’ the party CEO replied. ‘I’ve just sent you a draft by email. If 
you clear it, I can tell the policy staff to go home for the night.’

‘I’ll do that right now.’

‘Thanks. I must go now, Aileen. For some reason the switchboard’s just lit 
up like a Christmas tree.’

She cradled the phone and turned to Joey Morocco, who was removing silver boxes 
from a brown paper bag. She smiled. ‘You must do this a lot,’ she remarked. 
‘I heard you at the front door; you were on first-name terms with the 
delivery boy. “Thank you, Wen-Chong.” I take it that means we’re having 
Chinese.’

‘I see that being married to a detective’s rubbed off on you,’ he said. 
‘Sure, first-name terms with him, with Jeev from the Asian up in Gibson 
Street, with Kemal from the kebab shop and with Jocky.’

‘Jocky? Who the hell’s he?’

‘Pizza. That’s the Italians for you; much more interbred with the 
indigenous population.’

She looked over his shoulder. ‘What have we got?’

‘Chicken, brack bean sauce,’ he replied, mimicking a Chinese accent, 
‘plawn sweet and sowah, clispy duck and pancakes, and lice; flied of 
course.’

‘Sounds great. I just need five minutes on my laptop and I’ll be ready.’

She wakened her computer from the sleep state in which she had left it earlier 
in the evening, and searched her email inbox. It was full of messages from 
friends, anxious, she guessed, for news of her safety, but Old’s was near the 
top and she found it with ease.

She opened the attachment, which was headed, ‘Draft Statement: Unified Police 
Force’, scanned it quickly, made a few changes to bring it into her delivery 
style, then sent it back with a covering note that read, ‘Final version clear 
for use.’

She had just clicked the ‘send’ button when a tone advised her that another 
message had hit the inbox, once again from Alf Old. Almost simultaneously, her 
mobile rang, and the screen showed that he was calling. She made a choice; the 
phone won.

‘Aileen.’ Even although he had only said her name, the chief executive, 
famed for his calmness, sounded rattled. ‘I’ve just sent you an email.’

‘I know, it just arrived. I haven’t opened it yet.’

‘Then you’d better do so.’

Not only rattled, she realised; he was angry also.

She opened the message. There was no text, only an attachment, headed ‘P1’, 
in PDF form. She clicked on it and an image appeared, as quickly as her ageing 
laptop would allow.

It was a newspaper front page, with the masthead of the Daily News, and beneath 
it a headline. ‘Road to Morocco: married Labour leader goes to ground.’ 
Most of it was taken up by a photograph, taken from a distance with a long 
lens, but the face was all too clearly hers, looking out of Joey Morocco’s 
bedroom window, with a curtain held across her, but not far enough to cover her 
right breast, which the newspaper had chosen to cover with a black rectangle.

‘Fuck!’ she screamed.

‘Exactly!’ Old barked. ‘What the hell were you thinking about, Aileen?’

‘It’s not what you think,’ she protested.

‘Then what the hell else is it? Anyway it doesn’t matter what I think, 
it’s what the readers of the Daily News think, them and the readers of every 
other paper that the photographer sells it on to, once they’ve had their 
exclusive. They’ve already given it to BBC, Sky and ITN, for use after ten, 
to sell even more papers tomorrow morning.’

‘Is it on the streets yet? Can we stop them?’

‘It will be any minute now, and no we can’t. We could go to the Court of 
Session and ask for an interdict preventing further publication. We might get 
it, we might not, probably not. Anyway, the damage is done.’

Her anger had risen up to match his. ‘But how did they get it?’ she asked. 
‘How did they know I was here?’

‘They didn’t. I spoke to the editor of the Scottish version; he’s a mate 
and he was good enough to call me, and to send the page across. He said it was 
taken by a freelance photographer, a paparazzo, who stakes out Joey Morocco’s 
place periodically, just in case.

‘She saw a car parked across his driveway, with two guys in it who had 
Special Branch written all over them… her words… so she found a vantage 
point out of their sight and hung around, just in case. She got lucky; saw a 
face at the window and a bit more, snapped off as many shots as she could, then 
legged it.

‘It was only when she downloaded the photos on to her laptop in her car that 
she realised how lucky she was. She got straight on to the News. That’s her 
best payer, apparently.’

‘Bastards!’ she hissed, then chuckled, taking herself by surprise. 
‘It’s the wee black sticker I really hate. It’s suggesting that my tits 
are too misshapen for a family newspaper: that they might put folk off their 
breakfast.’

‘Then cheer up,’ Old growled. ‘There’s another one inside, on page 
three, appropriately enough, with you looking over your shoulder, as if to make 
it crystal clear that there is somebody else in the room with you. There’s a 
lot more of you on show there, and they haven’t covered that up.’

‘Who wrote the story?’

‘Marguerite Hatton. She’s on their political staff. They flew her up from 
London overnight.’

‘That’s the bitch that gave Bob trouble earlier on at his press conference. 
She’ll rub his nose in it now.’

‘Or he will rub yours.’

‘I couldn’t care less about him. Why do you think I’m at Joey’s?’ As 
she spoke, she became aware of a figure in the doorway, holding a plate in each 
hand. ‘I’ve got some apologising to do to him.’

‘Well, do it on the way to the emergency exit. You have to get out of there, 
for a fucking army’s going to land on his doorstep as soon as the telly news 
breaks. Get your bodyguards to pull right up to his door, jump in their car and 
have them get you the hell out of there.’

‘To where, though?’ Joey had moved in behind her and was studying the image 
on the laptop. ‘It’ll be just as bad at my place.’

‘To Gullane?’ Old suggested. ‘Give yourself time to come up with a cover 
story? Maybe even do a happy families shot tomorrow.’

‘Not a fucking chance. I tell you, we’re history. Anyway, I’m going to be 
in Glasgow tomorrow.’

‘Eh?’ he exclaimed. ‘You’re not going ahead with the press conference, 
are you?’

She gasped. ‘Of course, man. We’ll never have a bigger crowd. I will not 
back down from this. It’s not going to kill me, any more than that guy did 
last night, so it can only make me stronger.’

‘Then go to my place. Nobody will think to look there. I’ll call Justine 
and tell her you’re coming.’





Nineteen



‘She’s done what?’ Sarah looked at him, astonished. ‘Let herself be 
photographed in a lover’s bedroom the morning after she’s come within an 
inch of her life?’

‘That’s what they’re going to say,’ Bob acknowledged.

‘She will argue, of course, that Morocco’s an old family friend and that 
his girlfriend was there too.’

‘I don’t think so,’ he replied. ‘She won’t lie her way out of it; too 
big a downside if she’s caught, as many a politician’s found out to their 
cost. She’ll front it up; I know her.’

‘And blacken your name in the process?’

He shook his head. ‘She’ll have a tough time doing that. She doesn’t 
realise it but I have more friends in the media than she has. Speaking of whom, 
I expect that some of them will be calling me in the next hour or so, on my 
mobile and at Gullane. I think it would be best if I go home, so that I’m 
there to answer them.’

‘Aww!’ she moaned. ‘I was looking forward to you staying.’

‘Me too, but if I do, there’s an outside chance that someone might doorstep 
me here in the morning. I don’t want you and the kids caught up in this, in 
any way.’

She stood with him as he rose to leave, picking up his jacket from the back of 
the sofa. ‘How do you feel about this?’ she asked. ‘Her being all over 
the tabloids.’

‘I’ve had some of that myself in my career,’ he answered, ‘and I 
didn’t like it. Am I embarrassed by it? Not a bit. People may talk about me 
behind my back, but none will to my face, so fuck ’em. Am I angry? No, 
because I don’t have a right to be. It could have been me looking out of your 
bedroom window and all over the papers in the morning.’

‘Are you sorry for her?’ she murmured.

‘Only if he’s a lousy fuck, and not worth it. She will win out of this. I 
don’t know how, but she will.’

She walked him to the door and hugged him there, looking up into his eyes. 
‘So what do we do?’

‘Tomorrow we go to work, each of us, and Trish takes care of the kids as 
usual. I’m going to be as busy as the Devil’s apprentice all this week, so 
we’ll see each other when we can. With a bit of luck we’ll be able to keep 
the weekend free.’

She kissed him. ‘That’s a plan,’ she said. ‘Now be on with your way and 
answer those phone calls.’

The first came, on his work mobile… he had switched his personal phone off as 
he left Sarah’s… as he was turning on to the Edinburgh bypass. He had been 
expecting it.

‘Bob.’ The voice that filled the car through its speaker system was no 
longer aggressive, as it had been the last time he had heard it, but there was 
nothing fearful or tentative about it. ‘I have something to tell you.’

‘No, you don’t,’ he replied, speaking louder than usual, to allow for 
road noise.

‘You’ve heard, then.’

‘Of course I have. The editor of the News called my people. I don’t know 
him but he said that he’d given you advance warning and was offering me the 
same courtesy. Of course, he also asked me for a comment.’

‘And did you give him one?’

Skinner laughed. ‘Shouldn’t I be asking you that question, in a different 
context? Not that I need to; from what I’ve been told the answer’s pretty 
fucking obvious. Oops, sorry, unfortunate choice of word. Bet you’re glad now 
I persuaded you to spend that time in the gym.’

‘Bob!’ she snapped. ‘Did you give the man a quote?’

‘Don’t be daft,’ he retorted. ‘Of course I didn’t. Nor will I to 
anyone else, and I’m bloody sure quite a few people will be asking over the 
next couple of hours. What about you?’

‘Nothing so far; they don’t know where I am now. But I’m seeing the press 
tomorrow morning.’

‘How about Joey? What’s he going to be saying?’

‘That I’m an old friend and that he offered me a place where I could 
recover from my ordeal in private.’

‘Is he going to refer to me?’

‘What would he say about you?’

‘Not about me: to me. Some people might expect him to say “Sorry”. 
That’s the big media word these days, isn’t it? People under the spotlight 
all have to utter the “S” word, whether they are or not.’

‘Do you expect that?’

‘Hell no. I’m sorry for him, if anything. He didn’t bargain for all this 
crap.’

‘Well,’ she said, beginning to sound exasperated, as if she thought he was 
playing with her, as he was to a degree, ‘what are you going to say?’

‘Tonight, nothing. Not a fucking word, about you or against you, or anything 
else. What time’s your press briefing tomorrow?’

‘Eleven thirty.’

‘In that case,’ he declared, ‘at ten o’clock, we’re going to issue a 
joint statement through Mitchell Laidlaw, my lawyer at Curle Anthony Jarvis. It 
will say something along these lines: on Thursday… or whenever, you pick the 
day… you and I agreed to separate permanently because of profound and 
irreconcilable differences that have developed between us. You draft it, let me 
see it and we’ll take it from there. You okay with that?’

‘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.’

He heard a sound, indicating that there was a call waiting. ‘On you go 
now,’ he said. ‘I’m in for a busy hour or so.’

‘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 responsible 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.’

‘I’m sure.’ Bob frowned. ‘Has she brought you up to date with what 
happened on Saturday, in the Glasgow concert hall?’

‘Yes, she has. From what she told me, it rather complicates the Aileen 
situation. She had a narrow escape and went running to Morocco, not you.’

‘She didn’t. Have a narrow escape, that is. She wasn’t the target.’

‘You can say that for certain? I thought there was still some doubt about who 
they were after. A couple of our Spanish titles are running the proposition 
that the First Minister himself was the target, and they missed.’

‘Then you should kick someone’s arse. Clive Graham might not mind the 
publicity, but the truth is that the one thing we did know for sure was that 
the target was female, and we said so at the time. Now we know definitely that 
it was Toni Field. My team in Glasgow haven’t announced it yet, but they will 
this morning. Press conference at ten o’clock, the same time as my lawyer 
will issue our statement, Aileen’s and mine, about our decision, last week, 
to pull the plug on our marriage.’

‘Now there’s a coincidence. Sorry,’ the Spanish Scot murmured, ‘that 
was my cynicism showing through.’

‘Hey, Xavi,’ Skinner laughed, ‘I’ve learned many things from you. One 
of them is how to minimise a story, as well as how to maximise it. Tell June… 
sorry, suggest to her, that she forget about us and concentrate on Glasgow this 
morning. There were developments yesterday, significant developments, and 
they’re going to blow political marriages off the front page.’

‘Any hints?’

‘Just one. I don’t want anyone approached before the press conference, but 
your crime reporter might be well employed doing all the research he can on a 
man named Basil “Bazza” Brown.’

‘Thanks for that. Will you be at the media briefing?’

‘No, I have someone else to see before then. I’ll need to go, in fact; my 
driver’s due to pick me up in under fifteen minutes.’

‘Fine.’ Aislado paused, then added, ‘You and Strathclyde, Bob. I know how 
you’ve always felt about it, so how the hell did that happen?’

‘A chapter of accidents, mate. Aileen says that now I’m there it’ll be my 
Hotel California. You know, I can check in any time I like but I can never 
leave. I’m not so sure about that, though. I have many things to sort out in 
my head over the next few weeks.’

‘Well, if you’d like somewhere to sort them out undisturbed, you’re 
welcome to visit us. I know you have your own place in L’Escala, but we have 
a guest house here now, and it’s yours for as long as you need it, if you 
don’t want anyone to know where you are.’

‘Cheers, appreciated. I may take you up on that.’

‘Okay. Bob, one last thing. If we do go looking for this man Brown after ten 
o’clock, where are we likely to find him?’

‘In the fucking mortuary, mate.’





Twenty-Two



‘I’m too old for this shit, Lottie,’ Dan Provan moaned.

‘Agreed,’ DI Mann retorted. ‘But you’re here and you’re all I’ve 
fucking got as a second in charge, so get on with it, eh? Oh and by the way, 
you’re not too old to collect the overtime.’

‘There is that,’ the sallow sergeant conceded. He smiled. ‘Keeps us both 
out the house as well. How’s your Scottie gettin’ on?’

‘He’s fine. Moans a bit but he’s doing great in the battle against the 
bevvy; that makes me happy. He took the wee guy to the big shows in Strathclyde 
Park yesterday. A year ago, even, I’d never have trusted him to do that.’

‘Theme park,’ Provan corrected her. ‘The shows are what you and me went 
to when we were kids.’

‘Maybe you did. My dad never took me anywhere. All his spare money went on 
that bloody football team. “Follow, Follow”,’ she sang, off-key. ‘I 
remember my mum making me hide from him many a Saturday night… well, maybe 
not that many, for they didn’t lose all that often, but when they did and he 
got in with a couple of bottles of Melroso in him, nobody was safe.’

‘No’ even you?’ He looked her up and down, trying to tease her. In all 
the time they had worked together she had never before mentioned her childhood.

‘Not when I was eight or nine. If my mum gave me and my big brother money for 
the multiplex on a Saturday night, we knew there was going to be trouble.’

Provan frowned. ‘Did he…’

‘Batter my mum? Oh yes. Don’t get me wrong, he was a quiet man all the rest 
of the time.’ She shook her head. ‘Listen to me, defending him.’

‘What happened to him?’

‘Stomach cancer happened to him, when I was twelve. Then I grew up, joined 
the police, got married, and found myself in the same situation as my mother 
had. She warned me, ye know, but I never listened.’

‘Scott was like him? Is that what you’re saying?’

She nodded.

‘Just as well you could handle him,’ the sergeant said, ‘like you proved 
at that daft boxing night.’

‘Not all the time. There were re-matches, Danny, without the gloves and the 
head guard. I didn’t always win. That was around the time when he was 
fuckin’ up his police career through the drink. When that finally happened I 
gave him an ultimatum. I gave him two of them, to be honest. The first was that 
if he ever raised a hand to me again, I would leave him. The second was that if 
he ever raised a hand to Jakey, I’d kill him. He believed both of them; 
he’s been off it, more or less, ever since. He still goes AWOL every now and 
then, but he comes back sober, and that’s the main thing.’

‘Then good for him. He’s gettin’ on fine at work too, is he? In that cash 
and carry place o’ his?’

‘Yes. He’s a supervisor now. The head of security’s due to retire in a 
couple of years, and Scottie’s in with a chance of getting the job.’

‘Mibbes he could find somethin’ for me if he does,’ Provan muttered. 
‘Like Ah said…’

She sighed. ‘I know, I know, I know. You’re too old for this shit: but 
you’re here, and we’re both standing in it, so just you keep on 
shovellin’, Danny. I’ve got another press briefing at ten o’clock. By 
then I’d like an answer from that car rental company.’

The sergeant nodded; a small shower of dandruff settled on the shoulders of his 
crumpled, shiny jacket. ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘They should have been back tae 
us by now. Time tae rattle their cage.’ He checked the number on the key-ring 
fob, then snatched his phone from its cradle and punched it in.

‘Drivall Car Hire,’ a young female voice chirped. It made him feel older 
than ever.

‘DS Provan, Strathclyde CID,’ he announced. ‘Ah spoke to somebody in your 
office last night. The lad said his name was Ajmal; Ah wanted some information 
about one of your cars that we found in Glasgow. He was going to get back to 
me, but I’m still waitin’. I need tae speak to him, now.’

‘I’m sorry, caller,’ the irrepressible youth replied, sounding anything 
but regretful. ‘Ajmal’s off duty today.’

‘Then go and get him,’ Provan barked, ‘or dig up your manager! This is a 
major inquiry Ah’m on.’

The girl sniffed. ‘There’s no need for that tone of voice, sir. If you hold 
on I’ll see if Mr Terry’s available; he’s our manager.’

‘You do that, hen.’ He sat and waited, but not for too long.

‘Sergeant err…’ a querulous male voice began. ‘I’m sorry, Chantelle 
didn’t catch your name.’

‘Provan,’ the Glaswegian growled. ‘Detective Sergeant Provan.’

‘Thank you, sorry about that; I’m John Terry, the general manager. This 
will be about our vehicle LX12 PMP, is that right?’

‘Indeed.’

‘We have been acting on this, I assure you,’ Terry declared. ‘My 
colleague Ajmal left me a note when he went off duty. The vehicle hirer has 
died and you’re trying to find out who he was through us, is that the case?’

‘I suppose it might be possible, sir,’ Provan said, ‘that a guy hired a 
vehicle, shot himself three times in the chest, shut himself in the boot and 
disposed o’ the gun, but we don’t really believe that.’

The manager gulped. ‘Pardon? I didn’t quite catch all of that.’

‘Okay, mate. Let me spell it out for ye’, in words of one syllabub.’

‘My God,’ Terry exclaimed, before he was finished. ‘Mr Provan, I think 
we’ve had a little language difficulty here. Ajmal’s English is not the 
best, and your accent is, let’s say, quite regional.’

No, let’s fuckin’ no’ say! With difficulty, the detective managed to keep 
his thought to himself, as the manager continued. ‘Ajmal left me a note with 
the registration number of the vehicle and the information that a man had been 
found dead in the vehicle and that the Glasgow police wanted the name of the 
hirer. What you’ve just told me is news to me and shocking news at that.’

‘Well, now that we understand each other,’ Provan said, weighing each word 
to avoid further ‘language difficulties’, ‘maybe yis can get me the 
information Ah need.’

‘Oh, I have that already, Sergeant. The office where the vehicle was hired… 
it’s in Finsbury Park… was closed last night. I spoke to the person in 
charge five minutes ago. The vehicle was rented a week ago yesterday, for 
return by five p.m. yesterday evening. The hirer’s name was Byron Millbank, 
address number eight St Baldred’s Road, London. I happen to know where that 
is; it’s very close to what was Highbury Stadium, the old Arsenal football 
ground, before they moved to the Emirates.’

‘Did he have a UK driving licence?’

‘I don’t know, but I assume…’

‘We don’t deal in assumptions, Mr Terry. Will they have a record in your 
other office?’

‘Oh yes. And a photocopy. Not everyone does that but we always do; take a 
photocopy of the plastic licence and the paper counterpart.’

‘In that case,’ Provan told him, ‘I need you tae get back on to your 
other office and get those photocopies faxed up to me. Haud on.’ He found a 
number that he had scrawled on a pad on his desk for another inquiry, a week 
before, and read it out to Terry.

‘I’m afraid we don’t have fax machines in our regional offices any 
more,’ he said. ‘Old technology these days.’

‘Well, find one, please. Go to the Arsenal if ye have tae; they’re bound 
tae have one.’

‘Oh, we won’t have to do that. We can scan the copies and send them.’

‘Eh?’

‘Scan them, Mr Provan. Turn them into JPEGs.’

‘Eh?’

‘Photographic images. Then we can send them to you as email attachments.’ 
Terry giggled. ‘Or don’t you have email in Scotland?’

Nancy! Provan, an old-school homophobe, kept another thought to himself. ‘Oh 
aye, sir, we have. It runs on gas, right enough, but we get by.’ He read his 
force e-address, then spelled it out, letter by letter. ‘Soon as ye can, 
please; Ah need it within the next half hour.’

‘You’ll have it in ten minutes.’ Terry paused. ‘Can I send somebody 
along from our Glasgow Airport depot to collect our car?’

‘Eventually,’ the DS told him. ‘Ah’m afraid your car’s a crime scene, 
sir. Ah’m no’ sure how long we’ll need to hold it for. When we’re done 
with it, we’ll bring it back to you. We’ll even clean aff the bloodstains 
fur ye.’

He hung up and turned to Mann. ‘A name for ye, Lottie. The car was hired by 
somebody called Byron Millbank.’

‘What do we know about him?’ she asked.

‘Eff all at the moment, but we should have a wee picture soon, off his 
driving licence. Meantime, his name’s enough tae go searchin’ for his birth 
certificate.’

‘Maybe,’ the DI cautioned. ‘That’s assuming it’s his real name. Let 
me see the image as soon as you get it, and blow it up as large as you can. I 
want to let the big boss see it.’





Twenty-Three



‘When it arrives, have them forward it to my email,’ Skinner told Lowell 
Payne, raising his voice slightly as his car overtook three lorries that were 
travelling in convoy along the busy motorway that links Scotland’s capital 
with its largest city. ‘I’d like to see it as soon as I get to the office, 
although I’m not sure when that will be. I’m not looking forward to my next 
visit, although it’s one I have to make.’

‘I’ll do that, Chief. I was planning to attend the press briefing. Should I 
do that?’

‘Mmm.’ He considered the question for a few seconds, as he held his phone 
to his ear. His Strathclyde driver was new to him; Bluetooth was not an option. 
‘Maybe not. The media will be aware by now of your role as my exec, and 
I’ve been dodging the buggers since last night. But tell DI Mann she should 
make it clear that we now know for sure that Field was the target. She 
doesn’t need to say how, but she should rule out any other possibility one 
hundred per cent. Do we video these events ourselves?’

‘I don’t know,’ Payne admitted. ‘I’ve never been involved in one as 
formal as this.’

‘Then find out. If they don’t, make sure it happens. I’ve always done it 
in Edinburgh. I like my own record of events.’

‘Understood. I’ll tell Malcolm Nopper.’

‘Thanks. Something else I’d like you to do. The force area is massive, as 
we all know; I don’t plan or expect to set foot in every police station on a 
three-month appointment, but nonetheless I imagine I’m going to be travelling 
quite a bit. I want to be in complete touch at all times, so I’d like you to 
fix me up with a tablet computer.’

‘An iPad?’

‘That or equivalent, as long as it gets me internet access everywhere I go 
and has a big enough screen for me to read. With one of those I’ll be able to 
read emails at once, wherever I am.’

‘You’ll have one before the day’s out.’

‘Thanks.’ As he spoke, his driver signalled then eased to the left, leaving 
the motorway. Skinner knew where they were, well enough; Lanarkshire had been 
his territory until he was into his twenties, even if it had changed since his 
departure.

‘Why the hell do they call this Motherwell Food Park?’ he mused aloud.

‘No idea, sir,’ his driver replied, believing that an answer had been 
required. ‘Why would they not?’

‘Because it’s in bloody Bellshill, Constable; it’s miles away from 
Motherwell.’

‘Is that right, sir?’

‘Trust me on it; I was born in Motherwell, and my grandparents, my father’s 
folks, they lived in Bellshill. Where are you from, Constable Cole? What’s 
your first name, by the way?’

‘David, sir; Davie. I’m from Partick; that’s in Glasgow, sir.’

Skinner laughed. ‘I know that well enough. I did some sinning there or 
thereabouts in my youth. Used to hang out in a pub called the Rubaiyat, in 
Byres Road.’

‘That’s not quite Partick, sir, but I know where you are. It’s still 
there.’

‘But not as it was; it was gutted, or “refurbished” to use the polite 
term for architectural vandalism, back in the eighties. It had a lounge bar… 
where you could take your girlfriend; never to the public bar, mind, men only 
there… called “The Bowl of Night”. Very few of the punters had a clue 
where the name came from, but it was famous nonetheless. There was never any 
trouble there, either.’

Careful, Bob, he told himself. Steer well clear of memory lane, or you could 
get to like this bloody place all over again.

‘Were you Chief Constable Field’s driver, Davie?’ he asked.

In the rear-view mirror, he saw the young man’s eyes tense. ‘Yes, sir. I 
wasn’t on duty on Saturday, though. She told me she was being collected by 
the First Minister’s car. I think she was quite chuffed about that.’

‘So you’ve been to her home before?’

‘Oh yes, sir, often. We’re not far from it now.’

They were moving down a steep incline that led to a complex motorway 
interchange. To his left, he saw a series of fantastic twisted shapes, the 
highest of them a wheel. ‘What the hell’s that?’ he asked.

‘Theme park, sir,’ his driver informed him. ‘They call it M and D’s.’

‘My younger son would love it,’ he chuckled. ‘He’s the family action 
man. The older one would turn his nose right up; he’s our computer whizz 
kid.’

‘That whole area’s called Strathclyde Park, sir,’ Constable Davie went on.

‘Oh, I know that,’ Skinner murmured. ‘It used to be wilderness. In fact, 
the Motherwell burgh rubbish tip was there, right next to a football ground 
that used to be covered in broken glass and all sorts of crap. It was all taken 
away when the park was created and they diverted the River Clyde to make the 
loch. I was a kid when they did it, but I remember it happening.’

Nostalgia, nostalgia, nostalgia. Stop it, Skinner! And yet, he reminded 
himself, none of those he thought of as his second family, Mark, James Andrew 
and Seonaid, had ever set foot in the town that had raised him.

He shook the thoughts from his head as Davie drove through the interchange and 
off by an exit marked ‘Bothwell’. Almost immediately he took a left, then 
made a few more turns, the last taking them into a leafy avenue called Maule 
Road. ‘This is it, sir,’ he said, drawing to a halt outside a big red 
sandstone villa, built, Skinner estimated, in the early twentieth century.

‘Pretty substantial,’ he remarked. ‘When did Chief Constable Field move 
in here?’ he asked his driver. ‘Given that she was only in post for five 
months.’

‘Three months ago, sir. For the first few weeks she and her sister lived in 
an executive flat on the Glasgow Riverside.’

‘Right.’ He stepped out of the car, then leaned over, beside the driver’s 
window; it slid open. ‘I can’t say for sure how long I’ll be,’ he 
murmured. ‘If I’m any longer than half an hour, I want you to toot the 
horn. I’ll pretend it’s a signal that I’ve had an urgent message.’ He 
smiled. ‘I’ll never ask you to lie for me, Davie, but it’s always good to 
have an escape plan.’

‘I understand, sir.’ Constable Cole frowned, as if wanting to say more, but 
hesitant.

The chief read the signal. ‘Out with it,’ he said.

‘Thank you, sir. It’s presumptuous of me, but I wonder if you’d express 
my sympathies to Marina and her mother.’

‘Of course I will. You’ve met them both?’

‘Yes, sir. I saw Marina pretty much every day, with her working so close to 
the chief, and I met Miss Deschamps when she stayed with them a couple of 
months ago. I think she came up to see the new house,’ he added.

‘What are they like?’ Skinner asked. ‘Mark my card, Davie.’

‘They’re both very nice ladies. Marina’s younger than the chief by a few 
years and not all that like her physically, or in personality, come to that. 
Miss Deschamps… she’s very particular about that, by the way, sir. 
Marina’s a Ms but her mother is definitely Miss… Miss Deschamps is quiet, 
doesn’t say much, but she was always very polite to me. She tried to tip me 
when we got here.’ He grinned at the memory. ‘The chief did her nut, but 
she just smiled and shook my hand instead.’

‘Thanks.’ The chief constable stood straight, walked through the villa’s 
open gateway and up to the vestibule. He rang the bell and waited.

He was about to press the button again when the front door opened. A tall, slim 
woman stood there; her hair was honey-coloured, and her skin tone almost 
matched it. The overall effect, Skinner mused, had the potential to cause 
traffic accidents.

She looked up at him, but not by much. ‘Yes?’ she said.

‘Bob Skinner,’ he told her. ‘I believe you’re expecting me. My aide 
called yesterday, yes?’

Her hand flew to her mouth. ‘Of course,’ she exclaimed. ‘I’m so sorry. 
It’s just…’ She broke off, looking at his suit.

‘I’m sorry,’ he murmured. ‘I should have thought this through. It’s 
my habit to leave my uniform in the office and travel in civvies. Please 
don’t feel slighted.’

‘I don’t, honestly,’ the woman assured him. ‘I always thought my sister 
overdid the uniform bit.’ She extended her hand. ‘I’m Marina 
Deschamps,’ she said, as they shook. ‘Come in, my mother is through in the 
garden room.’

She led the way and he followed, through a hallway, then along a corridor. He 
guessed at her age as they walked. A few years younger than her sister, Davie 
had said. Toni had been thirty-eight, so Skinner placed Marina early thirties, 
somewhere in age between her sister and his own daughter.

The corridor led them into a small sitting room that might have been a study at 
some time in the life of the old house, before what most people would have 
called a conservatory was added. As far as the chief could see it was 
unoccupied.

‘Mother,’ Marina called out, ‘our visitor is here.’

Sofia Deschamps had been seated in a high-backed wicker armchair, one of a 
pair, looking out into a garden that was entirely paved and filled with potted 
plants of various sizes, from flowers to small trees. She rose and stepped into 
view. She was almost as tall as her younger daughter; indeed they were very 
much alike, twins with a thirty-year age difference.

‘Mr Skinner,’ she said, as she approached him. ‘Thank you for calling on 
us.’ Her accent had strong French overtones, and she held her hand out in 
front of her, as if she expected him to kiss it, in the Gallic manner. Instead, 
he took it in his.

‘I wish I didn’t have to,’ he replied. ‘I wish that Saturday had never 
happened, that Toni was still in Pitt Street and I was still in Fettes, in my 
office in Edinburgh. My condolences to you both.’

‘Thank you.’

It occurred to him, for the first time, that both women were wearing black; 
inwardly he cursed himself for his pale blue tie. Sofia’s face was drawn, and 
her eyes were a little red, but there was an impressive dignity about her, 
about both of them, for that matter. ‘It’s still fairly early,’ she 
murmured, ‘but please, allow me to fetch us some coffee.’

‘No, no, ma’am,’ he protested, ‘that isn’t necessary.’

‘I insist.’ She stood her ground; refusal would have been impolite.

‘In that case, thank you very much, but if I may I’ll have water, sparkling 
if you have it, rather than coffee. My…’ He paused; he had been about to 
describe Sarah as ‘My wife’. ‘. . . medical adviser says I drink far too 
much of the stuff, and she’s made me promise to give it up.’

‘A pity,’ Miss Deschamps murmured, with a hint of a smile. ‘We should 
allow ourselves the occasional vice.’

‘My medical adviser is my vice.’ He said it without a pause for thought. 
‘That’s to say,’ he added, searching for an escape route, ‘she’s my 
former wife, and I’ve learned that it’s too much trouble to disobey her.’

‘In that case I will not press you further. Excuse me, I will not be long.’

His eyes followed her as she headed for the door. She might have left sixty 
behind her, but she had lost no style or elegance; even at that early hour she 
was dressed in an ankle-length skirt and high heels.

Marina was less formal, in black trousers and a satin blouse. ‘Please,’ she 
said, ‘sit down.’

Skinner listened for French in her accent; there was some but less than in her 
mother.

‘Maman is being discreet,’ she continued. ‘She knows I want to ask you 
about my employment situation, and she doesn’t want it to appear as if 
we’re ganging up on you.’

‘That’s very decent of her,’ the chief said, as he sat, facing her, on a 
couch that matched the armchairs, ‘but there’s no rush to consider that. I 
know that you acted as Toni’s personal assistant. My assumption has been that 
you wouldn’t want to continue in that role with her successor, but that’s a 
decision you can take in your own time.

‘I’ve already given instructions that you can have all the time you feel 
you need. My temporary appointment is for three months; if you want to take all 
that time to decide what you want to do, or at least until a permanent 
successor to your sister is selected, that’ll be fine by me.’

Marina shook her head. ‘There’s no need, sir,’ she replied. ‘I have a 
job, and I’d like to carry on doing it.’

Skinner stared at her, unable to keep his surprise from showing. ‘You want to 
work for me?’ he exclaimed.

She nodded.

‘Look,’ he said. ‘I have to be frank about this. You know your sister and 
I were not exactly the best of friends.’

Marina smiled, then nodded. ‘Oh yes. She was very clear about that. But that 
was more political than anything else. You had different views on certain 
things, but that didn’t affect what she thought of you as a police officer. 
We both know she was a big supporter of a unified Scottish force.’

‘Sure, she made that clear enough in ACPOS, and I made my opposition equally 
plain. We had some robust discussions, to say the least.’

‘Oh she told me. But what you probably do not know is, her big fear was that 
she would talk you round to her view. She rated you very highly as a police 
officer; in fact she said you were the best she’d ever met. She wanted the 
top job, no mistake about that, but she didn’t think she’d have a chance if 
you went for it.’

‘Indeed?’ Skinner murmured.

‘Indeed.’

‘So where does that take us, Ms Deschamps?’

‘I have no personal issues with you, sir,’ she replied. ‘Fate has put you 
in what was my sister’s office. I’m a top-class secretary with personnel 
management qualifications, and I like to work with the best. Therefore…’ 
She held his eyes with hers.

‘Let me think about it,’ he said. ‘I like to have a serving officer as my 
assistant, and I’ve already appointed someone to that position, pro tem. To 
be frank, I’ll need to get to know the job before I can judge whether there 
will be enough work left for you. But first things first; you and your mother 
have a funeral to organise, albeit with all the help that the force can give 
you. Once that’s over, we can talk. Fair enough?’

‘Fair enough,’ she agreed.

Out of nowhere, Skinner remembered a problem. ‘There is one thing, though. Do 
you have the combination of the safe in the chief’s office?’

Marina sighed. ‘I did,’ she replied. ‘It was seven three eight two seven 
six. But Antonia always changed it at the end of the week. It was usually the 
last thing she did on a Friday; sometimes she’d tell me the new number there 
and then, but if she didn’t have a chance it would wait until Monday. Last 
Friday she didn’t tell me. You can try the old number, just in case she 
forgot to make the change, but if it doesn’t work, I fear I can’t help 
you.’

She looked up as her mother returned carrying a tray, loaded with two tiny 
espresso cups, and a bottle of Perrier with a glass.

‘No ice,’ Sofia Deschamps declared as she placed them on a small table at 
the side of the couch. ‘I refuse to dilute the mineral with melted tap water, 
as so many do.’

‘I couldn’t agree more,’ Skinner told her. ‘When my late wife and I 
were very young, we went on a camping holiday to the South of France. Everybody 
told us not to drink the water there, so we didn’t. But we had ice in 
everything, so everything tasted of chlorine.’

‘If that was the only side effect,’ she countered, ‘you were lucky.’

He winced. ‘It wasn’t; I was being delicate, that’s all.’

‘Your late wife,’ she repeated. ‘And earlier you mentioned your former 
wife.’

‘Three,’ he said, anticipating the question. ‘Three and still counting.’

‘Maman!’ Marina exclaimed, her tone sharp.

‘Ah yes.’ Her mother held up a hand. ‘I am sorry. That was indiscreet; we 
have seen this morning’s papers.’

‘No apology necessary,’ he assured her. ‘All it means is that our 
separation is public knowledge. It wasn’t the way I’d have chosen for it to 
be revealed, but these things happen. Have you ever been married, Miss 
Deschamps? Or am I making a false assumption? Have you reverted to your birth 
surname?’

‘No, you are correct. I have always chosen to avoid marriage. Antonia’s 
father, Anil, was a member of the Mauritian government of the day… you see, 
we have politicians in common. Marriage with him was never possible, since he 
had a wealthy wife, to whom he owed his position.

‘Marina’s father was an Australian, with business interests in Port St 
Louis. He spent part of the year there, the winter, usually, and the rest in 
Australia, or travelling in connection with his business. He was something of 
an entrepreneur.’ She pronounced the word with care, balancing each syllable.

‘We had a very nice apartment there, and a very pleasant life. Not that I was 
a kept woman,’ she was quick to add. ‘I had a very good job, in the 
Mauritian civil service, and I maintained my own household. He did not 
contribute, because I would not allow it, even though we were together for 
seventeen years. I had a good income. We are a wealthy country, you know; close 
to Africa and yet a little distant from it too.’

‘I know,’ Skinner replied. ‘Mauritius is one of the many places on my 
“To do” list.’

‘You will like it.’

‘Why did you leave?’ he asked her.

‘To be with my daughters. Marina’s father was very good to both my girls; 
he more or less adopted Antonia, and when she came to university age, he got 
her a place in Birmingham, where she did a degree in criminology.’

‘She first joined the police in Birmingham as well,’ Marina added. ‘She 
had a specialised degree and that got her fast-tracked. Well, you’ll have 
seen her career record, I’m sure. She never looked back.’

‘How about you?’ he put to her. ‘Were you ever tempted to join the 
force?’

‘That never really arose, not in the same way. My father died when I was 
sixteen. I was very upset, and any thought of university went out of my mind… 
not that I had Antonia’s IQ anyway. I stayed in Mauritius and went to 
college; I did a secretarial course and a personnel management qualification. I 
came to Britain eight years ago, when Antonia was senior enough to point me at 
a job with the Met support staff.’

She smiled. ‘That’s not as bad as it sounds; I had a very stringent 
interview, and I must have been vetted, for I was attached to SO15, the 
Counter-Terrorism Command, for a little while. But when Antonia became a chief 
constable… back to Birmingham again… things changed. She insisted that I go 
with her, to run what she always called her Private Office. The rest you must 
know.’

Skinner nodded. ‘I’ve been told. Ladies,’ he continued, ‘you’ll be 
aware that since Saturday evening, a full-scale murder investigation has been 
under way. I’m keeping in close touch with it, and I know that DI Mann, the 
senior investigating officer, will want to visit you fairly soon to interview 
you for the record. Meantime, is there anything you would like to ask me?’

‘Of course,’ Sofia exclaimed, ‘but why would he need to interview us?’

‘Detective Inspector Mann is a lady, Maman,’ her daughter murmured.

‘Then she, if you must. Why would she? What do we know? In any event, can 
this not be an interview? You’re her boss now, after all, as my dear Antonia 
was.’

‘Yes but she is in day-to-day charge.’ He paused. ‘If it makes you happy, 
I can go over some of the ground she’ll want to and report what you say to 
her. If she’s comfortable with that, fine. If not, she can come and visit you 
again. Okay?’

‘Yes,’ Marina Deschamps replied, at once. ‘But Maman is right. Why do you 
need witness statements from us?’

‘Because we’re now certain, beyond any doubt, that Chief Constable Field 
was the target. These men weren’t after my wife, or the First Minister. They 
were pros, hit men; they knew exactly who they were there to kill, and they 
did.’

‘Oui,’ Miss Deschamps whispered. ‘We saw my daughter’s body yesterday. 
They covered half her face with a sheet, but I made them take it off. We know 
what was done to her. So yes, I understand you now. What do you need to know?’

‘Her private life,’ Skinner said. ‘I can tell you that we’ll be going 
back through her entire career, looking at what she’s done, people she’s 
put away, enemies she may have made along the way who have the power and the 
contacts to put together an operation like this.’

‘Such an impersonal word: “operation”. You make it sound like a military 
thing.’

‘It was,’ he told her. ‘Smit and Botha were former soldiers, and Beram 
Cohen, the planner, had an intelligence background. They didn’t work cheap, 
and they weren’t the sort of men you can contract in a pub. The very fact 
that the principal, as we’ll call the person who ordered your daughter’s 
death, was able to contact Cohen, tells me that he is wealthy and 
well-connected.

‘I know about some of the successes that Toni had as a police officer and 
I’m aware that she may have upset some very nasty people in her time. Trust 
me, we will look at these, using outside agencies wherever we need to.’

‘Outside agencies?’

‘He means the British Security Service, Maman,’ Marina volunteered.

‘Not only them. The FBI, the American DEA; we’ll go anywhere we need to. 
But alongside that I need to know about any personal relationships your sister 
may have had. Unlikely as it may seem, did she ever have a romance that ended 
badly?’ He hesitated. ‘Did she have any personal weaknesses?’

‘Of course not!’ Sofia exclaimed.

‘I’m sure she didn’t,’ Skinner said, deflecting her sudden anger, 
although privately he counted naked ambition and ruthlessness towards 
colleagues as ranking fairly high on the weakness scale. ‘But the questions 
must be asked if we are to do our best for you in finding the person who had 
that done to her, what you saw yesterday. Marina, you understand that, don’t 
you?’

‘Yes, I do. I knew my sister well enough. Personal weaknesses? Was she a 
gambler, closet drinker? No, she was tight with her money and she didn’t 
touch a drop. She didn’t mortgage beyond her means either; she was shrewd 
with the property she bought. For example, she picked up this pile at the 
bottom of the market, after making a big profit from her house in Edgbaston.’

She stopped and looked at her mother. ‘Personal relationships?’ she 
repeated. ‘Maman, cover your ears if you like, but this is the truth. I 
don’t think Toni ever had a romance in her life, certainly not in the years 
that I’ve lived with her in Britain.

‘Relationships, yes; she’s had six of them. Make no mistake, she was 
robustly heterosexual. But none of them were about love; all of them were about 
her career. I’m not saying that she bedded her way to the top, but every 
lover that she had was a man of power or influence, one way or another.’

‘Might any of them have been the sort of man to take it badly when she pulled 
the plug on him?’ the chief asked.

‘No, I would not put any of them in that category. Everyone she brought 
home… and she told me she never played away… was as cynical as she was.’

‘Were they cops?’

‘A couple were. There was a DAC… deputy assistant commissioner… in the 
Met, about five years ago, and an assistant chief from Birmingham before him. 
I’m sure that neither of those two were in a position to advance her career 
directly, but they knew people who were.

‘More recently, from what she told me, the men she’s been involved with 
have been… how do I put it? . . . opinion formers, movers and shakers outside 
the police force. There was a broadcast journalist, a civil service mandarin in 
the Justice Ministry, and another man she said was a very successful criminal 
lawyer.’

‘You’re telling me what they were but not who,’ Skinner pointed out. 
‘Can you put names to any of them?’

Marina smiled. ‘No, because Antonia never did, and since we didn’t live 
together until she became the chief in Birmingham, I never saw any of them. 
“No names, no blames”, was what she always said, whenever I asked her. It 
used to annoy me, until I realised that given her background and mine…’ She 
broke off and looked at her mother. ‘I’m sorry, Maman,’ she said, ‘but 
this is the truth. She never had a proper father as such, far less than I did. 
We were secret daughters in a way, both of us, but her most of all.

‘Given that history, that upbringing, it was perfectly natural that Antonia 
should have woven a cloak of secrecy around her own personal life. And me? I am 
exactly the same. Most observers, looking at me, would say that my life is a 
mystery.’

Sofia nodded. Her eyes were sad. ‘I wish I could deny that,’ she sighed, 
‘but it is true. That is my legacy to both of my daughters.’





Twenty-Four



‘Bingo,’ Skinner exclaimed, as he gazed at the photograph on his monitor. 
He turned to his exec. ‘It may say Byron Millbank on his driving licence, and 
that may not be a top-quality image, but I rarely forget a face… and never, 
when I’ve seen it dead. That is Beram Cohen, one-time Israeli paratrooper, 
then a Mossad operative until he was caught using a dodgy German passport while 
killing a Hamas official, most recently for hire as a facilitator of covert 
operations.

‘As you know, Lowell, he’s the guy who recruited Smit and Botha, procured 
their weapons through Freddy Welsh in Edinburgh, then went and died, 
inconveniently for them, of a brain haemorrhage a few days before the hit.’

‘Could we have stopped it if he hadn’t?’ Payne asked.

‘There would have been even less chance. The evidence we had would still have 
led us to Welsh, but no sooner; we probably wouldn’t have got to the hall as 
quickly as we did.

‘Even if we had been lucky and got the two South Africans, my guess is that 
Cohen would have been in the car and would have taken off. He’d have been on 
the motorway inside two minutes. He would have got clear, dumped the guy 
Brown’s body, so it would never have been linked to our investigation, and 
we’d have had no clue at all, nowhere to go.’

He scratched his chin. ‘Cohen dying might have been convenient for us, but as 
it turned out it wasn’t a life-saver. Speaking of Bazza Brown’s body,’ he 
continued, ‘lying a-mouldering in the boot of a Peugeot, and all that, I’d 
like an update on that side of the investigation.’ He checked his watch. 
‘Mann’s press briefing should be over by now; ask her to come up, please.’

The DCI nodded and was about to leave when Skinner called after him. ‘By the 
way, Lowell, are we any nearer being able to open that bloody safe, or do we 
seriously have to explore the Barlinnie option? Toni’s sister gave me a 
number, but as she warned me, it had been changed. She did it weekly, 
apparently; there’s security,’ he grumbled, ‘then there’s fucking 
paranoia.’

Payne laughed. ‘It’s in hand, gaffer, but the Bar-L route may be quicker 
than waiting for the supplier to send a technician.’ He paused. ‘By the 
way, how did your visit go? How are the mother and sister?’

‘As bereft as you would imagine,’ the chief replied, ‘but they’re both 
very calm. I was impressed by Marina,’ he added. ‘She’s not a bit like 
her half-sister. Toni, it seems, was the love child of a Mauritian politico; 
she must have inherited the gene. Marina, on the other hand, struck me as one 
of nature’s civil servants, as her mother was.’

‘And her father? Is he still around?’

‘No, not for some years; he never was, not full-time. Sofia seems to have 
valued a degree of independence.’ Skinner pointed to the anteroom at the far 
end of his office, the place that Marina Field had filled. ‘Have you lined up 
any secretary candidates yet?’

‘Yes. Human Resources say they’ll give me a short list by midday.’

‘Then hold back on that for a while. We can call up a vetted typist when we 
need one. Marina says she wants to carry on in her job, working for me. I’ve 
stalled her on it, until I decide whether I want that.’

‘How long will you take to make up your mind?’

Skinner grinned. ‘Ideally, three months, by which time I’ll be out of 
here.’





Twenty-Five



‘It is for these reasons,’ Aileen de Marco concluded, reading from autocue 
screens in the conference room of the ugly Glasgow office block that housed her 
party’s headquarters, ‘that I am committing Scottish Labour to the 
unification of the country’s eight police forces into a single entity. The 
old system, with its lack of integration and properly shared intelligence and 
with its outdated artificial boundaries, bears heavy responsibility for the 
death of Antonia Field.

‘Not only do I endorse the proposal for unity, I urge the First Minister to 
enact it without further delay to enable the appointment of a police 
commissioner as soon as possible to oversee the merger and the smooth 
introduction of the new structure.’

‘Any questions, ladies and gentlemen?’ Alf Old invited, from his seat at 
the table on the right of the platform, then pointing as he chose from the 
hands that shot up, and from the babble of competing voices. ‘John Fox.’

‘Is this not a panic reaction, Ms de Marco,’ the BBC reporter asked, 
‘after your narrow escape on Saturday?’

‘Absolutely not.’

‘What would you say to those people, and there may be many of them, who think 
that it is?’

‘I’d tell them that they’re wrong. Scottish Labour took a corporate 
decision some time ago to support unification; we’re quite clear that it’s 
the way forward. On the other hand, the party in power seems less committed. 
Yes, I know the First Minister says that it’s the way forward, but there are 
people on his back benches who aren’t quite as keen.

‘We’ve been reading a lot this morning about the First Minister’s 
personal courage… and I have to say that I admire him for the way he 
displayed it on Saturday, when even the senior Strathclyde police officer on 
the scene collapsed under the strain.

‘What I’m saying today is that it’s time for him to bring that courage 
into the parliament chamber and join with us in getting important legislation 
on to the Scottish statute book.’

She paused, for only a second, but Marguerite Hatton seized on her silence.

‘Do you have anyone in mind for the position of police commissioner, Ms de 
Marco?’ she asked.

Aileen glared down at her from behind her lectern. ‘There will be a selection 
process,’ she replied, ‘but I won’t have anything to do with it.’

‘Would you endorse your husband’s candidacy?’

‘I repeat,’ she snapped, ‘I will not have anything to do with the 
selection process. I’m not First Minister, and even if I was, the appointment 
will be made by a body independent of government. The legislation will merge 
the existing police authorities into one and that will select the 
commissioner.’

‘Then my question still stands,’ the journalist countered. ‘Will you 
endorse your husband’s candidacy?’

‘I’m sorry, Ms Hatton,’ she maintained, ‘I’m not going there. I’m 
the leader of the Scottish Labour Party, and I’m sure that I’ll have 
political colleagues on the new authority, but it won’t be my place to 
influence them in favour of any candidate.’

‘Or against one,’ she challenged, ‘if you believed he was entirely wrong 
for the job?’

Aileen paused. ‘If I believed that strongly enough about someone,’ she 
replied, ‘I’d say so in parliament.’

‘So do you believe your husband would be the right man for the post, even 
though he’s an authoritarian bully?’

‘Now hold on a minute!’ Alf Old barked, from the platform. ‘This press 
conference isn’t about individuals. It’s about important Labour Party 
policy. However, I have to tell you that I’ve met the gentleman in question 
and I don’t recognise your description. Now that’s enough out of you, 
madam. Another questioner, please?’

Hatton ignored him. ‘But isn’t that why you and he have just announced your 
separation, Aileen?’ she shouted. ‘Isn’t that why you ran into the arms 
of another man after your terrifying ordeal on Saturday, because Bob wasn’t 
there for you?’

Aileen de Marco had known more than a few intense situations in her life, and 
she was proud of her ability to stay calm and controlled, whatever the 
pressure. And so, it was agreed later, her outburst was entirely atypical, 
which made it all the more shocking.

‘Bob’s never been there for me,’ she yelled. ‘Why the hell do you think 
I’m divorcing him, you stupid bloody woman?’





Twenty-Six



‘John, go easy on her, will you?’

‘Bob, I’m BBC. We don’t run big lurid headlines on our reports and we 
don’t editorialise on politicians. We just run what we’ve got on the 
record, and in this case that’s Aileen screaming at the Hatton bitch then 
storming out of the room. We can’t ignore that, because it’s there. STV 
have got it, and that means it’ll be on ITN national at lunchtime. Sky have 
got it and they won’t hold back. Plus I saw a couple of freelance cameras 
there, so it could even go international.’

‘Bugger,’ Skinner sighed. ‘And you’re the nice guys, aren’t you?’

‘Exactly,’ John Fox said. ‘You know what Hatton will do with it, and the 
rest of the tabloids. Thing is, Bob, it’s not just Aileen that’s been 
caught up in it.’

‘Don’t I know it. I was never there for her, she said.’

‘Do you want to react to that?’

‘To the media in general, no, because anything I say will be used in evidence 
against either Aileen or me. To you, because I trust you or we wouldn’t be 
speaking right now, I’ll say I’m sorry she feels that way, and I’ll add 
that lack of communication is one of the factors behind our separation.’ He 
paused, then added, ‘Hell, you can use this as well, on the record. I find it 
contemptible that she was goaded into her outburst after what she went through 
on Saturday night.’

‘I will use it too. How about Hatton calling you an authoritarian bully?’

Skinner laughed. ‘Jesus, John, I’m the acting chief constable of the UK’s 
second biggest police force. If that doesn’t make me an authority figure, I 
don’t know what would. As for me being a bully, I appreciate Alf Old putting 
her straight, and I hope that others will as well.’

‘I wouldn’t worry about that,’ Fox told him. ‘It’s a wee bit close to 
defamation, so most sensible editors… including Hatton’s… won’t repeat 
it. I was only covering my back by asking you about it. Besides, no tabloid 
editor in his right mind’s going to want to fall out with you.’ He laughed. 
‘Not that that implies you’re a bully, mind.’ He was silent for a second 
or two. ‘Can I ask you something else?’ he murmured.

‘Sure.’

‘I told you what she said about Max Allan. Do you want to counter it?’

‘I’d like to, but I can’t, because it’s true. Max was first into the 
hall when the emergency lighting came on. He could see very little, and at 
first he thought it was Paula Viareggio who’d been shot, not Toni. Max has 
known Paula since she was a kid; he and his wife live closer to Edinburgh than 
Glasgow and so they do nearly all their shopping there. They’ve been 
customers of the Viareggio delicatessen chain for twenty years, since the days 
when Paula worked behind the counter.

‘He thought that was her on the floor, and he just buckled. The poor guy’s 
career’s probably at an end, and an ignominious one at that, thanks to 
Aileen. The next time I speak to her she and I are going to have very serious 
words about it. You can be sure of that.’

‘I agree,’ the journalist murmured. ‘True or not, it was well out of 
order. But Bob, off the record this time, why did she put herself up there to 
be shot at? Sorry, that was an unfortunate choice of words in the 
circumstances.’

‘Maybe but I know what you mean. My informed guess would be that her reasons 
were purely political.’

‘Did you know about Labour supporting unification?’

‘Of course I did. This is very much between us, chum, but it was the last 
straw as far as our marriage was concerned.’

‘I guessed as much. There’s a piece on the Saltire website that nobody’s 
noticed yet. It was blown out of the printed edition by the Field shooting, but 
it’s got your stamp all over it. Everybody knows that paper’s your house 
journal, with June Crampsey being a retired cop’s daughter.’

‘Mmm,’ Skinner murmured, ‘do they indeed? I’ll need to watch that, but 
I won’t lie to you about my input to that article; you’re right. I was a 
bit steamed up at the time. But if you’re going to have a girn about me 
playing favourites, don’t, because I’m doing it just now. Nobody else is 
getting past the switchboard here and I’m taking no other media calls 
anywhere else.’

‘I appreciate that,’ Fox chuckled. ‘In the spirit of our special 
relationship, is there anything else you’d like not to tell me? About the 
Field investigation, for example.’

‘Not a fucking word, mate; you’re not that special. However, you might like 
to call another chum of yours, the First Minister. I reckon Aileen will have 
put his nose mightily out of joint.’

‘Thanks for that, and the rest. Cheers.’

The chief was unfamiliar with the telephone console on his desk, but he had 
noticed a red light flashing during the last couple of minutes of his 
conversation with Fox. As he hung up he discovered what it was for as the bell 
sounded, almost instantly. He picked up the receiver, expecting to hear the 
switchboard operator, or Lowell Payne, but it was neither.

‘Yes,’ he began.

‘Bob,’ a male voice snapped back at him, ‘can’t you keep that bloody 
wife of yours under control?’

‘Hello, Clive,’ he replied. ‘Funny you should call. Your name just came 
up in conversation.’

‘I’m not surprised. Your ears must have been burning too. Do you know what 
Aileen’s done?’

‘Yes.’

‘When did you know?’

‘I first became aware of it about ten minutes ago. Clive,’ Skinner asked, 
‘what the fuck are you on about? Haven’t you read any newspapers today?’

‘No I haven’t. I’m not in the office. I’ve spent the last thirty-six 
hours incommunicado, comforting my distraught wife. She’s under sedation, 
Bob. I’m still trying, but failing, to make her believe that I wasn’t the 
target… although the truth is, I’m not a hundred per cent sure of that 
myself.

‘But more than that, it’s not just the thought of me with my brains on the 
floor that’s got to her, it’s the notion that if she had come with me, and 
not Toni, she’d have copped it. So you’ll see, Bob, reading the press 
hasn’t been at the top of my agenda. My political office has only just 
emailed me the unification press release Labour have put out.’

‘And that’s all they’ve sent you?’

‘That’s all.’

‘Then you should shake up all your press people, in the party and in 
government. Somebody should have told you that two hours ago my dear wife and I 
announced that we’ve split. They should also have told you to check out 
today’s Daily News. You’re going to have fun with that come next First 
Minister’s Questions at Holyrood, I promise you.’

He heard the First Minster draw a deep breath, then let it out slowly. ‘Then 
I apologise, Bob,’ he said, quietly. ‘The government people are supposed to 
brief me constantly on what’s happening in the media, partly to ensure that I 
don’t make any embarrassing phone calls like this one. I told them, firmly, 
to leave me alone, but when the troops are afraid to override your orders when 
necessary, that makes you a bad general.’

‘Or an authoritarian bully,’ Skinner murmured.

‘What?’

‘Nothing. You can tell Mrs Graham to calm down. We have absolute proof that 
Toni was the target. They were set up and waiting for her.’

‘Are you certain?’

Skinner snorted. ‘I appreciate that you’re a politician, but even you must 
know what “absolute” means.’

‘But how did they know she’d be there?’ the First Minister asked, 
sounding more than a little puzzled.

‘When did you invite her to accompany you?’

‘Two weeks ago.’

‘Yeah, well, one day later Toni posted the engagement on bloody Twitter, and 
on the Strathclyde force website. She set herself up.’

‘But who’d want to kill her? I know she was abrasive, but…’

‘I’ve got a team of talented people trying to find that out,’ the chief 
replied, ‘and I imagine that right now they’re waiting in my assistant’s 
office.’

‘Then I won’t delay you further. Again, I’m sorry I went off at half 
cock.’

‘No worries. For what it’s worth, I reckon I know why Aileen broke ranks on 
unification. You might not realise it, if you’ve been cloistered since 
Saturday, but you’ve become something of a media hero, thanks to Joey 
Morocco’s eyewitness account. He’s seen a few things up close in the last 
couple of days, has our Joey. With the election coming up, Aileen couldn’t 
let that go uncountered. It’s the way she thinks.’

‘I suppose it is, and I might even understand it. It won’t do her any good 
though. I’ve seen our private polls: Labour will be crushed, and her career 
will be over.’

Bob laughed. ‘Don’t you believe it, Clive. She has a plan for every 
contingency. She’s like Gloria Gaynor: she will survive. Get on with you now. 
Go and give your wife the good news.’





Twenty-Seven



‘Will I survive this, Alf?’ Aileen asked, leaning forward across the table, 
with a goblet of red wine warming in her cupped hands.

‘I’ll treat that as rhetorical,’ the chief officer replied. ‘You’ve 
just locked up the female vote within the party; as for the men, they were 
eating out of your hand anyway.’

‘But tomorrow’s coverage will be all about me dropping the bomb on that 
twat Hatton, and not about the policy initiative I announced.’

‘Aileen, you and I both know that is bollocks; the announcement doesn’t 
matter. We don’t make policy any more, the SNP do.’

‘But they need us to get unification through fast,’ she countered.

‘No, they don’t. You and Clive Graham agreed to rush it through before the 
election so that it doesn’t become an issue that the Tories could score with, 
but the Lib Dems are for it as well, and even in a minority situation their 
votes would see the bill through. That’s if he tables it at all. The poll’s 
in a few weeks, and you’ve just removed police structure as an issue anyway 
by announcing that we’re for it.’

‘You’re saying that if I’ve pissed him off with my challenge he might 
walk away from our agreement.’

‘Indeed I am.’ He glanced around the basement restaurant to which they had 
retreated, checking that they were still alone and that no journalists had 
followed them there. ‘But so what? It’s irrelevant alongside the campaign 
that’s ahead of us. With everything that’s happened, are you sure you’re 
ready for it?’

She looked him in the eye. ‘How long have you known me, Alf?’

He scratched his chin. ‘Twenty years?’ he ventured.

‘Exactly, since our young socialist days. And in all that time have you ever 
known me not to be up for a battle?’

‘No,’ he admitted. ‘But you’ve never been in circumstances like these 
before. You’ve had a horrendous forty-eight hours.’

‘Horrendous in what way? My marriage has broken up. That happens to more than 
ten thousand of my fellow Scots every year, and probably as many again who end 
cohabiting relationships. And although the statement Bob made me agree to was 
bland and consensual, the idiot woman Hatton just succeeded in portraying me as 
the partner who’s been wronged. Don’t you imagine that was in my mind when 
I staged my walk-out?’

‘Are you saying that wasn’t spontaneous?’

She hesitated. ‘No, I’m not, but even before I reached the door I could see 
the positives in it. Can’t you?’

‘I suppose so,’ he admitted.

‘Exactly. So, my other personal disaster: what of that? My body was all over 
today’s Daily News, and by now it’ll have gone viral on the internet. But 
I’ve read the story, there and in all the other papers. Not one has said that 
Joey was actually in the room, because no way can they prove it, so their 
lawyers wouldn’t let them. Neither of us will ever admit that he was, so what 
am I, Alf? A victim of the paparazzi, that’s what, and that’s how the party 
has to spin it. Understood?’

‘Understood,’ he agreed, ‘but you didn’t have to spell it out. Our 
communications people have been doing that since the story broke, both here and 
in London. You probably don’t know this, but the shadow Culture Secretary in 
Westminster is going to demand that the government legislates to make invasion 
of privacy a go-to-jail offence. They won’t do that, of course, because it 
can’t afford to piss off the News, but they’ll make sympathetic noises.’

‘I’ll bet they will. The last thing they want is Clive Graham with an 
absolute majority.’ She smiled. ‘Do you still think I’m not up for a 
fight?’

Old grinned back at her. ‘No, and I never did. So, why did you ask me if 
you’d survive?’

‘I only meant within the party, man. What’s the feeling in our shadow 
cabinet and on the back benches? Are they scared by what’s happened? Is my 
sleekit deputy Mr Felix Brahms likely to seize the day and challenge me for the 
leadership?’

‘As far as I can tell, there won’t be a revolt. You certainly needn’t 
worry about Felix. I spoke to him last night. Yes, he was making opportunistic 
noises, but I put a stop to that.’

She frowned. ‘How?’

‘You don’t want to know.’

‘Yes, I bloody do. Out with it.’

He looked around again; a waiter was approaching with an order pad, but he 
waved him away. ‘A friend of mine in Special Branch up in Aberdeen, the 
Brahms fiefdom, dropped me a word about him. They were worried about him being 
a security risk as shadow Justice Secretary.

‘He’s been having it off with a woman, a well-known local slapper called 
Mandy Madigan, whose brother Stuart is currently remanded in custody charged 
with the murder of a business rival, that business being prostitution and 
money-lending.’

‘What a creepy bastard!’ Aileen exclaimed. ‘I like his wife, too. What 
are we going to do about it?’

‘Nothing,’ he replied, firmly. ‘You’ve put a hint of sex into the 
campaign; that’s just about okay, given the way that you and Bob have dealt 
with it. We do not need any more sleaze, though. When Brahms called me about 
your situation, I had a sharp word with him, told him what I knew. He swears he 
didn’t know about her family background, and he’s going to put an end to 
it. The Grampian cops will keep the affair to themselves, but he’d better be 
a choirboy from now on.’

‘My God,’ she chuckled. ‘You’re making me feel like the singing nun by 
comparison. Well, maybe not quite, shagging a movie star and all, but still.’ 
She paused. ‘Poor Joey; he called me this morning, on his way to the airport. 
He’s quite upset, worried that he might have done for my career. I must call 
him once he gets to Los Angeles, and tell him he’s probably put my approval 
rating up a few points.’

‘Any chance of him supporting you in the campaign?’

‘Hell no, he’s a Tory. I know, before you say it, I seem to be making a 
habit of sleeping with the enemy. At least I’m not going to marry this one!’

‘Is Bob going to make trouble down the line?’

‘For me, no. I’ve got a funny feeling that I’ve done him a favour by 
cutting him loose. Not politically, either. He’s got nothing to gain from 
it.’ She frowned, suddenly. ‘That said, I must ring him and apologise for 
what I said at the press conference. He’ll have heard by now, for sure, from 
one of his inner media circle, Foxie, or June Crampsey. I don’t want to fall 
out with him any more than I have done.’

‘Why should that bother you?’ the chief executive asked. ‘You don’t 
think you can win him over on unification, do you? He made his views pretty 
clear in the Saltire at the weekend.’

‘Did he? That passed me by, not that I care. It’ll go through regardless. 
And once it’s there, who knows what he’ll do. I’m quite convinced that if 
Toni Field was still alive he’d go for it. He’s a cop first, second and 
third; it’s all he knows, and most of what he cares about, apart from his 
kids.

‘He’s also a pragmatist. If that’s right, that he said his piece in the 
press, all he was doing was getting at me. He knows he won’t win. Deep down 
he also knows that if Field had been there to go for the police commissioner 
job, he’d have done whatever was needed to stop her, and that would have 
meant putting himself forward.’

‘Christ, you’re making it sound as if he was behind the shooting.’

Aileen smiled, but her eyes stayed serious. ‘He’s shown himself capable of 
pulling the trigger, on Saturday and more than once before that in his career. 
But no, I wouldn’t go that far.’

‘Now she’s dead, what will he do?’

‘My guess is that he will go for it, and I’ve told him as much. He spent 
years telling himself he didn’t want to be chief in Edinburgh. Since he was 
talked into it, he’s been saying the same about Strathclyde, but I sensed a 
change in him when his refusal to put his name forward last time left the field 
clear for Toni Field, and he saw what a political operator she was. He said 
something to me once about power only being dangerous if it was in the wrong 
hands. He could have been talking about her.’

‘And his are the right hands, are they?’

‘He’d never say so. He’d leave it to the politicians he dislikes so much, 
and the media he uses so skilfully, to do that. But he believes it all right. 
He hides it well, but Robert Morgan Skinner has a massive ego, tied to an 
absolute belief in his own rectitude. And when it comes to power, he’s the 
equivalent of an alcoholic; one taste and he’s hooked. Mind you, he’d tell 
you the same thing about me, and he’d be right too.’

She sipped her wine. ‘I want to stay on good terms with him,’ she 
continued, ‘because I will need to be. Whatever the polls say, and however 
badly our colleagues in London have fucked things up for all of us, I intend to 
be First Minister after the election and, as such, we will have to co-exist.’

Old nodded. ‘I can see that.’

‘But,’ she added, ‘there’s something else. I want to stay as close to 
his investigation as I can, because I want to know who killed Toni Field just 
as much as everyone else does. Who’d want her dead?’ she asked. ‘She 
hadn’t been in Scotland long enough to have upset the criminal fraternity 
that badly. Yes, she may have hacked off someone dangerous in her earlier 
career. But can you recall another case of a senior British cop being 
assassinated by organised crime? I can’t. However, like I said earlier, the 
late Toni was an intensely political animal. Who knows who she’s crossed in 
that area. Make no mistake, politics can get you killed, and if there is any 
whiff of that, I want to know about it.’





Twenty-Eight



‘I’m fine, Bob, honestly. I lost it for a second or two in there, but 
that’s enough when the red lights are on the cameras. I’m simply calling to 
apologise for what I said about you. It was unforgivable; if you want, I’ll 
put out a statement through my press office retracting it and saying that I was 
provoked.’

‘Let it be, Aileen. I’m not worried about it. What you said is bloody true, 
anyway, so I won’t ask you to lie for me.’

‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I appreciate that. You couldn’t do something about 
that Hatton woman, could you?’

‘No need. She’s done it to herself. I’ve just taken yet another call from 
her editor, made no doubt on the advice of his lawyer. This time he was 
grovelling over what she called me. He’s ordered her back to London this 
afternoon, even offered to sack her if I insisted on it. I said I didn’t want 
that, but that he should tell her, so she can see that I have a magnanimous 
side after all.’

‘But if she ever comes back to Glasgow, she’d better not have any drugs in 
her handbag?’

He laughed. ‘You said that, I didn’t. Now, I must go; I’ve got people 
outside waiting to brief me on the Toni Field investigation, and I cannot get 
off the fucking phone.’

‘Then I won’t keep you. How’s it going, by the way? I gather from Alf… 
I’m with him just now; we’re hiding out in the Postman’s Knock, the 
bistro down the road… that they’ve determined that she was the target.’

‘That’s right. My turn to apologise; you should have heard that from us, 
not him. I’ll know more when I’ve seen the team, but we have several lines 
of inquiry. Not least, we want to know what the hell a dead Glasgow gangster 
was doing in the boot of the shooters’ getaway car.’

‘My God!’ she exclaimed.

‘Indeed, and you should be pleased to hear it. Lottie Mann was going to break 
that news at her press briefing. It should deflect some of the coverage of 
yours. By the way, you’d better call Clive Graham. He practically blew the 
wax out of my ears a few minutes ago, in the ludicrously mistaken belief that 
I’ve got any influence over you.’

‘Oh, sorry again,’ Aileen said. ‘I was planning to do that anyway. Bob, 
will you keep me up to date on the inquiry?’

‘Eh?’ he exclaimed. ‘Why should I do that?’

‘Well,’ she murmured, ‘I do have a personal interest in knowing why 
I’ve had to throw away a very expensive evening dress.’

‘There is that,’ he admitted. ‘Yes, I suppose we could. I’ll be 
briefing the First Minister, so I could persuade myself that I should do the 
same for the leader of the Opposition, given that the election’s coming up.’

‘Thanks, you’re a love.’

‘No, I’m not. I’m chief constable and you’re a constituency MSP on my 
patch. When are you seeing Joey again?’ he asked.

‘Maybe next time we’re in the same city, maybe not, maybe never.’ His 
question took her by surprise; she returned the challenge. ‘When are you 
seeing Sarah?’

His reply took one second longer than it should have. ‘Next time I pick up 
the kids.’

‘Sure,’ she sniggered, ‘sure. Bob, I didn’t get where I am by being 
stupid.’ She let her words sink in, realising that her shot in the dark had 
found a target. ‘But don’t worry about it, I don’t care. Whatever works 
for you, that’s fine by me. As for her, just you be certain that getting even 
with me isn’t her main aim.’

‘It isn’t,’ he said, ‘but let’s not discuss it further. Now please, 
let me speak to my team. I promise I’ll keep you informed, as far as I can.’

‘Thanks, I appreciate that.’ He thought the conversation was at an end, 
but, ‘Bob, one more thing. I don’t want to have to go back to Gullane 
again, ever. I’d like you to pack up everything I have there, clothes, 
jewellery, books, music, personal papers, everything that’s mine, and have it 
couriered through to my flat. Would you do that for me?’ She laughed, without 
humour. ‘What am I talking about? Would you do it for us? I imagine you 
don’t want me there again either.’

‘Of course I’ll do that. I’ll deliver them myself.’

‘Thanks for the offer, but no, let’s keep it impersonal.’

‘If that’s what you want, fine; I’ll do it as soon as I can.’

He hung up, then dialled Lowell Payne’s extension number, ignoring the 
‘call waiting’ light that continued to flash on his console. ‘I’m 
clear,’ he told his exec as he answered. ‘Ask Mann and Provan to join me. 
Have the sandwiches I ordered arrived yet?’

‘Yes, they’re on a trolley outside your door; and tea in a Thermos.’

‘Good. Listen, I want you to get on to the switchboard and tell them that 
from now on nobody gets through to me without being filtered through you; not 
the First Minister, not the Prime Minister, not even the monarch. Most of them 
won’t get through; whenever you can, please refer them to Bridie Gorman or, 
where it’s his area, to Thomson. Also I’ve changed my mind about having an 
office mobile through here; I don’t want one. You’ve got my personal phone 
number. If anything’s urgent and I’m not in the office, you can use that.’

‘Yes, Chief.’

Skinner headed for the side door to retrieve the sandwich trolley; Lottie Mann 
and Dan Provan were entering through his anteroom as he returned. 
‘Welcome,’ he greeted them. ‘Sit at the table.’

He pulled the trolley alongside them, then poured three mugs of tea. ‘Help 
yourself to sandwiches,’ he said. ‘Sincere apologies for keeping you 
waiting so long, when you have other more important things to do. Bloody phone! 
Bloody journalists! Bloody politicians! The least I can do is feed you.’

Provan grunted something that might have been thanks followed by a grudging 
‘Sir’. The chief looked at him, pondering the notion that if he judged a 
book by its cover, the scruffy little DS would be heading for the remainder 
store.

‘How long have you been in the force, Sergeant?’ he asked.

‘Thirty-two long years, sir.’

‘It’s a bind, is it?’

‘Absolutely, sir. Ah have to drag ma sorry arse out o’ bed every morning.’

‘So why are you doing it, for what… fourteen or fifteen grand a year, less 
tax and national insurance? That’s all you’re getting for it in real terms. 
With your service, you must be in the old pension scheme, the better one, and 
you’ll have maxed out. It’ll never get any bigger than it is now as a 
percentage of final salary. You could retire tomorrow on two-thirds of your 
current pay level. Tell me,’ he continued, ‘where do you live?’

‘Cambuslang, sir.’

‘How do you get to work?’

Provan reached out and took a handful of sandwiches. ‘Train usually, but 
sometimes Ah bring the car.’

‘But no free parking in your station, eh?’

‘No, sir.’

‘No. So retire and that travel cost is no more. Are you married?’

‘Technically, but no’ so’s you’d notice. She’s long gone.’

‘Kids?’

‘Jamie and Lulu. He’s twenty-six, she’s twenty-four. He’s a fireman, 
she’s a teacher.’

‘That means they’re off your hands financially. So why do you do it, why do 
you drag your shabby arse out of bed every morning for those extra few quid?’ 
He laughed. ‘Jesus, Sergeant, if you stayed at home and gave up smoking 
you’d probably be better off financially. You’re more or less a charity 
worker, man. You’re streetwise, so you’ll have worked this out for 
yourself. So tell me, straight up, why do you do it?’

‘Because I’m fuckin’ stupid… sir. Will that do as an answer?’

‘It will if you want to go back into uniform, as a station sergeant. 
Somewhere nice. How about Shotts?’

‘Okay,’ Provan snapped. ‘I do it because it’s what I am. Ma wife left 
me eight years ago because of it, before Ah’d filled up the pension pot, when 
Lulu was still a student and needin’ helped through uni. Sure, Ah could chuck 
it. Like you say, I’d have more than enough to live on. Except I’d give 
myself six months and ma head would be in the oven, even though it’s 
electric, no’ gas. The picture you’re paintin’s ma worst nightmare, 
Chief.’

He paused and for the briefest instant Skinner thought he saw a smile. 
‘Besides,’ he added, ‘the big yin here would be lost without me. Ah’m 
actually pretty fuckin’ good at what Ah do. But why should Ah go and 
advertise the fact?’

‘The suit’s a disguise, is it?’

‘No,’ Lottie Mann intervened. ‘Dan wears clothes, any clothes, worse than 
any human being I have ever met. Even when he was in uniform they used to call 
him Fungus the Bogeyman.’ She dug him in the ribs with a large elbow. 
‘Isn’t that right?’

The DS gave in to a full-on grin. ‘It got me intae CID though.’ Then it 
faded as he looked the chief constable in the eye. ‘What you see is what you 
get, Mr Skinner. No’ everybody’s like you or even Lottie here, cut out to 
play the Lone Ranger… although too many think they are. Ah don’t. Every 
masked man on a white horse needs a faithful Indian companion, and that’s me, 
fuckin’ Tonto.’

The chief picked up a sandwich, looked at it, decided that the egg looked a 
little past its best, and put it back on the plate.

‘Nice analogy, Dan,’ he murmured, ‘but it doesn’t quite work for me. I 
speak a wee bit of Spanish, just restaurant Spanish, you understand, but enough 
to know that “Tonto” means “Stupid”, and that, Detective Sergeant, you 
are not. I’m not a uniform guy myself, as the entire police community must 
know by now, so the wrapping doesn’t bother me too much as long as it 
doesn’t frighten kids and old ladies, but what’s inside does.

‘I took a shine to you yesterday, but to be sure you weren’t just the 
office comedian, I pulled your personnel file and the first thing I did when I 
got here today was to read it. As far as I can see the only reason you’re 
still a DS is because that’s what you want to be. You’ve never applied for 
promotion to inspector, correct?’

‘Correct, and you’re right, sir. Ah’m happy where I am. It’s no’ that 
I’m scared of responsibility, I just believe Ah’ve found my level,’ he 
paused, ‘Kemo Sabe.’

Skinner chuckled. ‘In which case, Dan, I’ll value you for as long as I’m 
here. So, how much of the trail have you two sniffed out?’

‘Thanks to you, Chief,’ Mann replied, as soon as she had finished the last 
sandwich, the one that he had rejected, ‘we now know that the man who rented 
the Peugeot was the planner of the operation, Beram Cohen, the guy you’ve got 
in the mortuary through in Edinburgh.

‘We’ve established through HMRC that under the name Byron Millbank he’s 
lived and worked in London for the last six years, for a mail order company 
called Rondar. It operates one of those teleshopping channels on satellite 
telly. Three years ago he married a woman called Golda Radnor, the boss’s 
daughter, we’re guessing, going by the fact that her name’s the company’s 
reversed, and eighteen months later they had a wee boy, named Leon Jesse. 
According to the General Register Office, Byron was born in Eastbourne 
thirty-two years ago, father unknown, mother named Caroline Anne Millbank, died 
on the last day of the last century.’

‘Pity,’ Provan muttered. ‘She missed the fireworks.’

‘I doubt if she was ever alive to see them,’ Skinner countered.

‘Do you think those records are faked, sir?’ Mann asked.

He nodded. ‘And clumsily, by somebody with a knowledge of poetic history. I 
studied it as an option in my degree. Look at the names: Byron Millbank, out of 
Caroline Anne. Lord Byron the poet, and two of his most famous women, Lady 
Caroline Lamb and her cousin Annabella, the one he wound up marrying.’

‘Where does Millbank come from?’

‘That was Annabella’s family name, only it was spelled differently, as I 
recall.’ He laughed. ‘I don’t know where all that came from. I must be 
turning into Andy Martin; he’s got a photographic memory for everything. 
However,’ he continued, ‘there’s a second context, and one that’s more 
likely to be connected. It used to be a secret, but now one of the most famous 
buildings in London is Thames House, on Millbank: it’s the MI5 headquarters. 
Whoever set up Cohen’s identity practically signed their name.’

‘Aye, sir, but,’ Provan interposed, ‘how do you know that Cohen’s no’ 
the alias?’

‘I know because I’d never heard of him until Five told me who he was, and 
told me about his career in the Israeli military and then its secret service. I 
guess,’ he continued, ‘that Mr Millbank had a driving licence.’

Mann nodded.

‘And a passport?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Neither of them more than six years old?’

The DI opened the folder she had brought with her, searched through her notes, 
then looked up. ‘That’s right. Both issued a couple of months before he 
shows up on the payroll of Rondar, and on the same day.’

‘To make absolutely sure,’ Skinner instructed, ‘I want you to go to the 
DSS and see if his records go any further back with them. My dollar says they 
don’t. Before then Cohen was in Mossad, until he was caught up in an illegal 
operation and got thrown out.’

‘But what does it mean, sir?’ Dan Provan asked.

‘Probably nothing at all, as far as our investigation’s concerned. My 
reading is that British intelligence did the Israelis a favour by looking after 
one of theirs. They gave him a legitimate front and if he continued to take on 
black ops under his old identity, that was all right with them. They told me 
about one where he had used Smit and Botha; that was American-sponsored, in 
Somalia. I suppose he was what the spooks call an asset, but now it looks as if 
he wasn’t fussy who he worked for.’

The sergeant blew out his cheeks. ‘This is a’ new stuff for us, gaffer. How 
do we go about investigatin’ MI5, for Christ’s sake?’

‘You don’t,’ the chief told him. ‘Yes, Byron Millbank, he’ll need to 
be followed up, but I’ll take care of that. I want you two and your team to 
focus on Bazza Brown. Am I right in believing that the media haven’t made any 
connection between his murder and the Field assassination?’

‘So far they haven’t. As far as they know, Ronnie Edgar from Townhead’s 
the SIO on that case, and they’ve only just found out it’s Bazza that’s 
dead. They’ve been told we’re still tryin’ to identify the victim.’

‘Good. From what I’ve heard of Brown’s history, now that we have released 
his name, the first thing the press will do will speculate that it’s gang 
wars. That’ll be fine by me. Let them chase that hare as long as they can. 
Meantime, you need to look at his family and his associates. Do you know 
them?’

‘I know the main one; that would be Cecil, his brother,’ Lottie Mann 
replied. ‘Younger by two years, but they were as inseparable as twins.’

‘Cecil?’ Skinner repeated. ‘Basil and Cecil? Not exactly Weegie names.’

Provan’s eyes twinkled. ‘Remember that old Johnny Cash song, about a boy 
called Sue? Their old man, Hammy, he had the same idea. He gave them soppy 
names, and the pair of them grew up as the hardest kids in Govan. The muscle 
was equally divided, but Bazza got a’ the brains. Ah’ve lifted Cec in my 
time. He’s no’ likely tae help us.’

‘Lift him again; tell him it’s on suspicion of conspiracy to murder Toni 
Field. If the brothers were that close, we have to go on the assumption that 
whatever the connection was to Smit and Botha, Cecil was part of it. See how he 
reacts under questioning. Whether he was involved or not, he’ll be thinking 
revenge. If you tell him there’s nobody left for him to kill, he might just 
cooperate.’

‘He might, sir. Just don’t build your hopes up, that’s all Ah’m 
sayin’.’

‘Understood. Now, what else do you have to tell me?’

‘The satnav in the rental car, sir,’ the DI said. ‘We’ve looked at it 
and it was used. Since they’ve had it, they’ve been to several locations. 
One was in Edinburgh, and another in Livingston.’

‘The first would be when they first met up with Freddy Welsh, their armourer, 
when Cohen upped and died on them. The second was when they collected the 
weapons from Welsh’s store. We know that already. Anything we don’t know?’

She nodded. ‘We’ve found out where they were living. Their journeys were to 
and from a hotel out on the south side; it’s called the Forest Grove. It’s 
a quiet place, family run, with about a dozen bedrooms. They were booked in for 
a week, Sunday to Saturday, full board, signed in as Millbank, Lightbody and 
Mallett. Millbank said they were there for a jewellery convention, and that the 
other two worked for the South African branch of his firm. The owner knew him; 
he’d stayed there before, a couple of times.’

‘Do we have dates?’

‘Yes, boss. And yes, we’ve checked for unsolved crimes to match them. There 
were none, neither in Glasgow, nor anywhere else in Scotland. But there was a 
watch fair in the SECC each time, so it looks like he was there on legitimate 
business.’

‘Fair enough; good on you, for being thorough. Who paid the bill?’ he asked.

‘The man the hotel people knew as Lightbody. He settled up on Saturday 
lunchtime, then they left. The owner, his name’s MacDonald, remarked to him 
that he hadn’t seen Mr Millbank for a couple of days, and that his bed 
hadn’t needed making. Lightbody said that he’d been called away to a 
meeting in Newcastle and that he’d flown back to London from there. Mr 
MacDonald thought that was odd, for his daughter had serviced the room the 
first morning he was gone and his stuff was still in it. Thing about the bill, 
though, sir, it was settled in cash, old-fashioned folding money.’

‘New Bank of England fifties?’

Mann’s looked at him, surprised. ‘How did you know that?’

‘Our investigation in Edinburgh last week, after we found Cohen’s body, led 
us to a kosher restaurant in Glasgow. The three guys ate there, and that’s 
how they paid. Does MacDonald still have the notes?’

‘I’m afraid not, sir. They went straight into his bank’s night safe. 
I’ve got somebody contacting his branch though; they’re probably still 
there.’

‘Good. The notes from the restaurant are in Edinburgh. If we can match them 
up with these and they are straight from the printer, we might be able to trace 
them to the issuing bank and branch.’

‘Wouldn’t that have been Millbank’s?’ the DI pointed out.

Provan shook his head, causing another micro snowstorm. ‘Ah don’t see that. 
If he’s had two identities, he’s going tae have kept them completely 
separate.’

‘For sure,’ Skinner agreed. ‘It may be that he had a separate Beram Cohen 
account, or a safe deposit box, but there’s also a chance the cash came from 
the person who bought the operation. If we can trace its movement in the 
banking system, you never know.’

‘If we can recover them,’ Mann said. ‘I’ll chase it up.’

‘Do that, pronto. Anything else from the satnav?’

‘Yes, one other journey, but I’m not getting excited about it. On Friday, 
they went from the hotel to the Easthaven Retail Park, not far from the M8 
motorway.’

‘Indeed?’ the chief said. ‘Why are you writing that off?’

‘Because it seems they went there to shop and to eat, that’s all. We found 
receipts in the car for two shirts, and a pack of underwear from a clothes 
shop, and for two pizzas, ice cream and coffee from Frankie and Benny. The next 
journey programmed was the second last, the one to Livingston; the last being 
from their hotel to the car park next to the concert hall, where we found the 
car.’

‘Yes, you’re probably right; sounds like a refuelling stop, no more.’ He 
frowned. ‘Forensics. What have they given us?’

‘They say that Bazza was shot in the car. They dug a bullet out of the 
upholstery, and found blood spatters. Other than that, they’ve given us 
nothing we didn’t have before.’

‘Post-mortem report? What about that? Has Brown been formally identified? I 
don’t want as much as a scratch in him until that’s done. If we ever do put 
anyone in the dock for this, he can’t be allowed to walk out on a 
technicality.’

‘That’s done,’ she said. ‘His wife did it first thing this mornin’. 
Pathology’s not holding us up but still I’m not pleased about it. Either 
Dan or I will have to be there as a witness. That’s going to use up the rest 
of the day for whoever it is, with there being two of them.’

‘Two?’

‘Yes, there’s Bazza, and there’s the one on Chief Constable Field.’

‘Of course.’

‘Yes, I’d hoped that could be done yesterday, but it turns out it 
wasn’t.’

‘Bugger that,’ the chief grumbled. ‘What was the problem?’

‘The chief pathologist was away on what he said was “family business”, 
then this morning the so-and-so went and called in sick. I don’t fancy his 
deputy, not since his evidence cost me a nailed-on conviction in the High Court 
last year. I said I wasn’t having him do them, so they’ve called somebody 
through from the Edinburgh University pathology department.’

‘Professor Hutchinson?’

She shook her head. ‘No, sir. I asked for him but he wasn’t available 
either. Instead they’ve sent us his number two. A woman, they said. I hope 
she’s up to the job.’

Skinner’s eyebrows rose. ‘Oh, she is, Inspector, she is. I can vouch for 
her. As for you being there,’ he continued, ‘your priority has to be 
keeping the investigation up to speed.’

‘Fair enough, sir. I never mind not going to post-mortems. Do you want me to 
send a couple of detective cons along instead?’

‘No, Lottie, you leave that to me to sort out. The autopsies may be only 
formalities, but given that my predecessor’s going to be on the table, our 
representative has to be appropriate in rank. Luckily, I know the very man for 
the job.’





Twenty-Nine



Every so often, in the office where he spent most of his time, Detective Chief 
Superintendent Neil McIlhenney would find himself daydreaming. When he awakened 
it was always with a start as he looked out of his window. He was still well 
away from being used to life in the Metropolitan Police Service, and he 
wondered if he ever would.

When a move south, on promotion, had been offered to him he had taken no time 
at all to accept. There had been more involved than his own future. Louise, his 
wife, had taken time out of her acting career to have a family, but he had 
known there would come a time when she would want to go back to work, and 
London was where she was known and where the opportunities arose.

As she had put it, she was beyond the ‘age of romance’, in that lead roles 
in major movies were no longer being offered, but it had always been her 
intention to go back to the stage when she passed forty, as she had a few years 
earlier. They had been in London for only a few weeks, yet she was in rehearsal 
for a major role in a West End play and the arts sections of the broadsheets 
were trumpeting her return.

The sound of his mobile put an end to his contemplation; he looked at the 
screen and smiled when he saw who was calling.

‘Good morning, Chief Constable,’ he said. ‘I’m guessing this isn’t a 
social call.’

‘Why shouldn’t it be?’ his former boss challenged. ‘We have lunch 
breaks in Strathclyde too. I take it you’ve heard what’s happened.’

‘How could I not, even if I hadn’t had my best mate call me on Saturday 
night, as soon as he got Paula back to Edinburgh? He was crying, Bob; Mario. 
Can you believe that? He started to tell me what had happened and then he broke 
down, sobbing like a baby. Was Paula really that close to the victim?’

‘Their heads couldn’t have been any more than three feet apart when Toni 
Field’s was blown open,’ Skinner told him.

He shivered. ‘God, it doesn’t bear thinking about. How is she?’

‘Most people, put in her situation, would be under sedation right now. Clive 
Graham’s wife still is, and she wasn’t even there. Maybe at another time 
Paula would be too, but at the moment she’s completely focused on the baby, 
so, once she was sure he was okay in there, she was fine. I was with them 
yesterday morning and saw no sign of a delayed reaction. She’s still on 
course to deliver in a couple of weeks.’

‘Yes,’ McIlhenney said. ‘That’s something else I won’t be around for, 
but I’ll get up to meet wee Eamon as soon as I can. You know Mario’s 
calling him after his father, don’t you?’ He paused. ‘It’s not plain 
sailing for me, you know, being down here. To move or not to move, it was my 
choice; Lou didn’t put any pressure on me. If I’d said no, we’d have got 
by, but I want what’s best for all of us, Lauren, Spence and wee Louis, and 
this is it. That said, I miss you lot and not being around for Mario when he 
really needed me, that was tough.’

‘I can imagine. But I admire you nonetheless, for making the move. I have to 
admit, you’re so Edinburgh that I didn’t think you’d have the balls.’

‘Thanks, pal.’ The DCS chuckled. ‘By the way, does Joey Morocco still 
have his? He had a small part in one of Lou’s movies a few years back. She 
says he had a reputation for nose candy and shagging anything female and alive, 
the latter probably being optional.’

‘Fu—’ Skinner snorted. ‘You are one of the few guys in the world who 
could say that and get away with it. Yes he has, maybe more by luck than 
judgement. Aileen and I are history, but what you saw in the papers probably 
happened because of that, rather than the other way round. I’ve got no beef 
with Morocco, but there’s a freelance photographer here in Glasgow who should 
leave town sharpish.’

‘That sounds as if you’re planning to be there for longer than the three 
months Mario told me about. I called him back yesterday,’ he explained, 
‘just to make sure he was all right.’

‘Ach, Neil, I’m not planning anything. This whole thing… it’s so 
bizarre, so bloody terrible, and with the Aileen situation too, I haven’t had 
time to gather my thoughts. I just don’t know any more. What I do know is 
that I’m at the head of the highest profile investigation of my career, and 
I’m going to consider nothing else until it’s done. Speaking of which… 
you were right. This isn’t a social call.’

‘Some things never change. Go on, Chief, let me hear it.’

‘Okay, but you’re not due anywhere soon, are you? It’s best that I fill 
you in from the start, and it’ll take a while.’

‘No, I’m clear for an hour. I was just about to go for lunch, but I can do 
without that.’

‘Thanks. Knowing how you like your chuck, I appreciate that.’

He ran through the events of the previous few days, from the discovery of a 
body in a shallow grave in Edinburgh, through the chain of events that led to 
the assassination of Chief Constable Antonia Field, then gave McIlhenney the 
story of the investigation as it stood.

The chief superintendent stayed silent throughout, but when Skinner was 
finished, he asked, ‘Am I right in thinking that you’ve run all these 
checks on your planner, this man Cohen, alias Byron Millbank, without any 
reference to my outfit?’

‘You’re spot on, chum. I chose not to involve the Met until I absolutely 
had to, and that time is now. Make no mistake, this is a Strathclyde operation, 
but I am going to need to interview people in London, and I will need 
assistance. I propose to phone your commissioner and ask for it, but what I do 
not want is for the job to be handed to anyone who might have been personally 
acquainted with Toni Field. I know she had an affair with a DAC, but I don’t 
have a name.’

‘Couldn’t you ask the Security Service for help? I know you’re well in 
with them.’

‘I could but I don’t want to. Their paws are all over Beram Cohen’s false 
identity.’

‘Forgive me for asking the obvious, but couldn’t Beram Cohen be the false 
name? They told you about him, after all.’

‘No, because there’s no trace of Millbank any further back than half a 
dozen years.’

‘Right, box ticked. So, boss… listen to me; old habits and all that… cut 
to the chase. Why are you calling me? As if I can’t guess.’

‘I’ll spell it out anyway,’ Skinner told him. ‘When I call my esteemed 
colleague, I want to ask him to lend me someone I know and who knows the way I 
work. But I don’t want you press-ganged. Do you want to take this on, and can 
you?’

‘Of course I want to,’ McIlhenney replied. ‘Can I, though? I’m heading 
up a covert policing team down here. I have officers operating under cover, 
deep and dangerous in some cases. I don’t run them all directly, but I have 
to be available for them, and their handlers, at all times.’

‘Not a problem. All I’m talking about here is partnering one of my guys in 
knocking on a few doors. Millbank was a family man, so there’s a wife to be 
told. He had a legitimate job, so that will have to be looked at. I need to 
know whether there was any overlap between his life and that of Beram Cohen, 
and if there was, to see where it takes us.’

‘Who will you give me? You can’t know anyone through there yet, apart from 
the assistant chiefs.’

‘Wrong, I do. I’m going to send my exec down. He’s a DCI and his name is 
Lowell Payne.’

‘That’s familiar. Isn’t he…’

‘Alex’s uncle, but our family link is irrelevant. He’s been involved in 
this operation almost from the start. He’s the obvious choice.’

‘In which case,’ McIlhenney exclaimed, ‘I’ll look forward to meeting 
him.’





Thirty



Anger writhed within Assistant Chief Constable Michael Thomas like a snake 
trapped in a jar. He had seen enough of Bob Skinner, and the way he dominated 
ACPOS meetings, to know that he did not like the man.

He was ruthless, he was inflexible, he was politically connected and in 
Thomas’s mind he had an agenda: Skinner was out to mould the Scottish police 
service in his own image, planting his clones and protégés in key roles until 
they came to dominate it.

He had done it with the stolid Willie Haggerty in Dumfries and Galloway, with 
quick-witted Andy Martin in the Serious Crimes and Drug Enforcement Agency, and 
most recently in Tayside, with Brian Mackie, ‘The Automaton’, as some of 
his colleagues had nicknamed him.

When Antonia Field had been appointed chief constable of Strathclyde and he had 
taken her measure, he had been immensely pleased. Finally there was someone on 
the scene with the rank, the gravitas and the balls to tackle his enemy head 
on. The truth, that he was afraid to do so himself, had never crossed his mind.

She had identified him from the beginning as her one true supporter among the 
command ranks in Pitt Street, and he had demonstrated that at every 
opportunity. She had been in post for less than a month when she took him to 
dinner, and laid out her vision of the future.

‘Unification is coming, Michael,’ she began. ‘My sources among the movers 
and shakers tell me that the Scottish government is going to create a single 
police force, as soon as it deems the moment to be right. I will make no bones 
about it; I want to be its first chief.

‘As head of Strathclyde I should be the obvious choice, but we both know 
there’s a big obstacle in my way. I need allies if I’m going to overcome 
him, and in particular I need you. You’re the only forward-thinking policeman 
in the place. Theakston, Allan, Gorman, they’re all old-school thinkers; 
they’re not going to be around long. Back me and you’ll be my deputy inside 
a year, and again when the new service comes into play. Are you up for that?’

‘Of course, Toni, of course.’

After dinner she had taken him to bed, to seal their alliance, she said, 
although there were times later, after he felt the rough edge of her tongue, as 
everyone did, when he wondered whether it had been to give her an even greater 
hold over him, insurance against his ambition growing as great as hers. It had 
been a one-off and when it was over she had more or less patted him on the bum 
and sent him home to his wife. There had been no hint of intimacy from then on; 
he wondered whether there was a new guy in the background, but that was one 
secret she did not share with him.

For all that, she had been as good as her word and he had been almost there: 
DCC Theakston gone to enforced early retirement, and Max Allan with his 
sixty-fifth birthday and compulsory departure only four months in the future. 
Within a few weeks he would have been deputy. And beyond that?

She had been right about the new force. It had come up in ACPOS, and while 
Skinner had won the first battle, by a hair’s breadth, the next round would 
be theirs, and the First Minister would be able to claim chief officer support 
as he moved the legislation. The enemy would be marginalised and unable to go 
forward as a candidate for commissioner, having fought so hard and publicly 
against the creation of the job.

Toni had promised him that she had no ambition to grow old, or even 
middle-aged, in Scotland. She was bound for London, back to the Met when its 
commissioner fell out with the Mayor, as all of them seemed to do. ‘I have 
levers, Michael, and I will use them, when the time comes. When I go, the floor 
will be yours.’

Three shots, inside two seconds, that was all it had taken to put the skids 
under his entire career. He had been doing a spot of evening fishing with his 
son near Hazelbank when the call had come through. ‘An incident reported at 
the concert hall, sir,’ the divisional commander had told him. ‘A shooting, 
with one reported casualty.’

He had known that Toni would be at the hall that night… for the previous 
fortnight she had been full of her ‘date’ with the First Minister… and so 
he had almost stayed on the river, but a moment’s reflection had convinced 
him that the smart thing would be to tear himself away and rush to the scene. 
He had arrived to discover that Toni was the reported casualty, and that Max 
Allan was another, having suffered some sort of collapse, suspected heart 
attack, they were saying. Her body was still there, with crime scene 
technicians working all around it in their paper suits and bootees. He had 
tried to take charge of the shambles, and that was when DCI Lowell bloody Payne 
had told him about Skinner being there.

He hadn’t believed the man, until Dom Hanlon had told him Skinner had taken 
command, and that he would have to live with it, even though the guy had no 
semblance of authority. Outrageous, bloody outrageous. Then next day, to cap it 
all, they’d gone and appointed him acting chief.

That was when the grief had set in, for his own foiled prospects as much as for 
his fallen leader. He knew where he stood with Skinner, a fact confirmed when 
he had chosen Bridie Gorman, whom Toni had sidelined almost completely, as 
acting deputy. He had been considering resignation, quite seriously, when he 
had been called to the chief constable’s office, urgently. Twenty-four bloody 
hours and suddenly it was urgent.

There he had been, Toni Field’s arch-enemy behind Toni Field’s desk. God, 
it had been hard to take.

He hadn’t expected subtlety and there had been none. ‘Michael,’ Skinner 
had begun, ‘you don’t like me, and I don’t like you much either. But 
that’s irrelevant; if everyone in an organisation this size were bosom 
buddies it would get sloppy very quickly. Far better that some of us are 
watching out for each other, and that there are some rivalries in play.

‘I had two CID guys in Edinburgh who could have been twins, they were so 
close; indeed, twins they were called, by their mates. Eventually they rose 
until they were at the head of operations. It didn’t work out; things started 
to slip through the net, because each one overlooked the other’s weaknesses 
and mistakes. At least that’s not going to happen with you and me, in the 
time I’m here.’

‘In that case,’ Thomas had ventured, ‘wouldn’t that make me an 
excellent deputy?’

The response, a frown. ‘Nice try, but no. In my ideal world, people like you 
and me would be elected to our post by the people we seek to command, not 
appointed by those who command us, or by boards of councillors. I’ve been 
here a day and I’ve worked out already that if we did that, you wouldn’t 
get too many votes.

‘I don’t doubt your ability as an officer, not for a second, but what 
I’ve seen in ACPOS and heard since I’ve been here make some believe that 
you’re not a leader. Forgive me for being frank; it’s the way I’m built.

‘However,’ Skinner had continued, ‘even though I chose ACC Gorman as my 
deputy when necessary, you are still my assistant and that I respect. So 
let’s work together, not against each other, for as long as I’m here. I’d 
like to meet with you and Bridie tomorrow morning, so that you can both brief 
me on your areas of responsibility. Meantime… there’s something quite 
important that I’d be grateful if you could handle. It’s not going to be 
pleasant, but it needs a senior officer.’

And that was how Michael Thomas had come to be standing, seething with anger, 
in an autopsy theatre, gowned and masked, looking, not for the first time, at 
the naked body of Antonia Field. The pathologist had followed him into the 
room. She was a woman also, a complete contrast to Toni, and not only in the 
fact that she was alive. She was tall, fair-skinned, and the strands of hair 
that escaped her sterile headgear were blonde.

‘You’re the duty cop with the short straw in his hand, I take it,’ she 
said. ‘I’m Dr Grace.’ She turned and nodded towards a young man. From 
what Thomas could see of his face, his skin tone looked similar to that of 
Toni. ‘And this is Roshan, who’ll be assisting me.’

He realised, to his surprise, that she was North American, possibly Canadian, 
possibly US; he had never been able to distinguish the respective accents.

‘ACC Thomas,’ he replied. ‘Given the circumstances, I felt it was 
appropriate that I come myself.’

‘And I don’t imagine Bob tried to talk you out of it,’ she murmured, 
through her mask.

He looked at her, puzzled. ‘I’m sorry?’

‘Chief Skinner. He’s my ex, my former husband. The older he gets, the more 
squeamish he gets.’

‘I see.’ The bastard had set him up!

‘That said, he’s been to more than his fair share. How about you?’

‘I’ve spent most of my career in uniform,’ he told her, avoiding a 
straight answer.

‘Ah, so you’ll have seen mostly suicides and road fatalities. They have a 
pretty high squeamishness quotient.’

‘Mmm.’

She looked at the man. His eyes told her what the rest of his face was saying. 
‘You’ve never been to an autopsy in your life, have you?’

‘No,’ the ACC confessed.

‘So here you are, looking at somebody you knew and worked with, who’s now 
dead and you’re going to have to watch me cut her open and take her insides 
out, all in the line of duty?’

Thomas felt his stomach heave, but he mastered it. ‘That sums it up pretty 
well,’ he conceded. ‘I suppose your ex would say “Welcome to the real 
world”, or something like that.’

‘That sounds like a Bob quote, I admit. Since he didn’t, I assume you 
didn’t tell him you’ve never done this duty before.’

‘Of course I didn’t.’

‘Ah,’ she exclaimed, ‘the macho thing. The traditional pissing contest, 
in yet another form. As a result I’ve got somebody in my workplace who’s 
liable to faint on me or, worse, choke himself to death by barfing inside a 
face mask. You should have told him, and he’d have sent someone else, because 
he knows that’s the last thing I need. And by the way, he isn’t an ogre, 
either.’

‘Well, I’m here now, Doctor,’ he replied stiffly, ‘so we might as well 
take the chance. I’ll make sure I don’t land on anything important when I 
fall over.’

‘Not necessary.’ She peeled off her mask. ‘You’re a legal necessity but 
in practice don’t have to watch every incision or every organ being removed. 
This is not going to be a complicated job. Cause of death is massive brain 
trauma caused by gunshot wounds; we know that before I touch her. But the law 
needs a full report and that’s what it will get.

‘You can go sit in the corner and read a book, or listen to your iPod. If I 
find something I believe you need to look at up close, I will tell you and you 
can look at it. But that’s not going to happen. And from what I’ve seen of 
our next customer, that’s going to be the case with him as well. He was shot 
from so close up that some of his chest hairs are melted. So go on, get out of 
my space.’

He looked at her, gratefully. ‘Thank you,’ he said. He started to move 
away, then paused. ‘Doctor Grace,’ he ventured, ‘this is a silly thing to 
ask, I know, but Toni and I, well, we were friends as well as colleagues. Be 
gentle with her, yes?’

‘As if she were an angel,’ Sarah replied, feeling pity for the man, then 
adding, in case he thought she was being sarcastic, ‘Who knows, by now she 
may be one.’





Thirty-One



‘Ye cannae do this,’ the prisoner protested, ‘ma lawyer’s no’ here. 
I’m saying nothin’ till he gets here. And this charge! What the fuck yis on 
about? Conspiracy tae fuckin’ murder? That’s pure shite. Ah never murdered 
onybody.’

‘Technically that’s true, Cec,’ Dan Provan admitted. ‘The jury was 
stupid enough tae convict you of culpable homicide, and the judge was even 
dafter when he gave you five years. But the boy ye killed was just as fuckin’ 
deid, so let’s no’ split hairs about it.’

‘We can do it,’ Lottie Mann assured him. ‘We can do pretty much what we 
like.’

‘Oh aye?’ Cecil Brown stuck out his jaw, with menace, then took a closer 
look at the expression on her face and realised that aggression was not his 
best option.

‘Oh aye.’ She pointed at the recorder on the desk. ‘That thing is not 
switched on. When your brief gets here it will be and we’ll get formal, but 
until then, tell me what business you and your brother had with the South 
Africans.’

He stared back at her. When they had arrested him, the DI’s impression had 
been that he was genuinely surprised. As she studied his big, dumb eyes, that 
feeling moved towards certainty. ‘What fuckin’ South Africans?’ he asked.

Provan leaned forward. ‘Son,’ he murmured, ‘off the record, who’s your 
biggest rival in Glasgow?’

‘Ah don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.’

He laughed. ‘Of course you do. Don’t fanny about, Cec. I’m askin’ you 
who you’ve got in mind, what mind ye have, that is, for toppin’ your 
brother. Paddy Reilly? Specky Green? Which of those have you crossed lately? 
Which of those are we liable tae find in the Clyde any day now?’

When the sergeant floated the second name he saw Brown’s eyes narrow; very 
slightly but it was enough. ‘It’s Specky, right? Let me guess; you and 
Bazza ripped him off on some sort of a deal, or moved gear intae one of his 
pubs. So you’re thinkin’ it was him that bumped off the boy. Well, if ye 
are, ye’re wrong.’

‘Aye, sure.’ The tone was a mix of scepticism and contempt. ‘Ah might be 
thick, but no’ so thick Ah’d believe youse bastards.’

‘He’s not kidding, Cecil,’ Lottie Mann assured him. ‘This is how it 
was. We found your brother’s body yesterday afternoon crammed into the boot 
of a car in the multi-storey park next to the Buchanan Street bus station. It 
had been there for a day, and it was starting to hum.

‘It was a hire vehicle from London, and it was meant to be the getaway car 
for the two men, those South Africans I mentioned, who shot and killed our 
chief constable in the Royal Concert Hall on Saturday evening. Unfortunately 
for them, they didn’t get away, and they’re no longer,’ her eyes narrowed 
and she smiled, ‘in a position to assist us with our inquiries.’ She 
paused, letting the slow-moving cogs of his mind process what she had said.

‘Now we don’t actually believe,’ she went on, ‘that you and your 
brother were the masterminds behind a plot to kill Ms Field, but the fact that 
we found him where we did, and also that our forensic team will prove that he 
was killed by the same gun that was used to shoot two police officers outside 
the hall, that puts you right in the middle of it.’

Cecil Brown’s mouth was hanging open.

‘Yes,’ she continued. ‘I can see you get my point. So we need you to tell 
us what your role was, and how Bazza came to meet up with those guys. You help 
us, before your brief gets here to shut you up, and your life will be a hell of 
a lot better. For openers, you will have a life.

‘We are going to put somebody in the dock for this, make no mistake, and at 
the moment you’re all we’ve got. I’m not talking about five soft years 
for manslaughter here, Cecil. If you’re convicted of having a part in Chief 
Constable Field’s murder you’ll be drawing your old age pension before you 
get out.’

‘Personally, laddie,’ Dan Provan yawned, ‘Ah’d love tae see that 
happen. You sit there and say nothing and we’ll build a case against ye, no 
bother.’

‘Ah don’t know anything!’ the prisoner shouted. ‘Honest tae Christ, Ah 
don’t. Bazza said nothin’ tae me about any South Africans.’

‘What did he tell you?’

‘Nothin’.’

‘Come on,’ the DS laughed, ‘when did your big brother keep secrets from 
you? The pair of you wis like Siamese twins. You lived next door tae each 
other, drove the same gangster motors… what are they, big black Chrysler 
saloons… ye both married girls ye’d been at the school with, ye shared a 
box at Ibrox. Come on, Cec. You cannae expect us to believe that Bazza was 
involved in the shooting of the chief bloody constable and he kept you in the 
dark about it.’

‘Man,’ the surviving Brown brother protested, ‘ye’re off yir heid. 
Bazza would never have got involved in anything as crazy as killin’ the chief 
constable, or any fuckin’ constable. The amount of shite that would have 
brought down on our heids! It’s the last thing he’d have wanted. He had 
nothin’ to do with it.’

‘But he had, Cecil,’ Lottie Mann boomed. ‘Like it or not, he was with 
Smit and Botha, the two men who shot Ms Field. He was involved with them, and 
he could have identified them, so they killed him when they had done whatever 
business they had with him.’

‘If you say so,’ the prisoner muttered, his lip jutting out like that of a 
rebellious child. ‘But he never telt me about it, okay?’

She sighed. ‘Yes, right. Let’s say I accept that, for the moment. Did Bazza 
keep a diary?’

‘Eh?’

‘Did he keep any sort of written record of his life; his meetings, deals, and 
so on?’

‘In a book, like?’

‘Book, computer, tablet.’

‘Ah don’t know. Maybe on his phone.’

‘We don’t have that,’ Mann said. ‘Would he have had it on him?’

‘Oh aye, a’ the time.’

‘Did he have a contract or did he use a throwaway?’

‘He had a top-up. He took it everywhere, even tae the bog.’

‘Then Smit and Botha must have dumped it after they killed him.’ She leaned 
closer to him. ‘Cec, we want whoever was behind them. So do you, for your 
brother’s sake. Help us.’

He met her gaze. ‘How can Ah, if Ah don’t know anything?’

‘Where’s Bazza’s car?’

Brown turned, at Provan’s question. ‘Parked outside his hoose,’ he 
replied.

The DS looked at the DI, eyebrows raised, as if inviting a response.

It came. ‘Did Smit and Botha pick him up from home?’ she asked.

‘Naw. Ah’d have seen them,’ Cec volunteered, with certainty. ‘We’ve 
got CCTV. It covers both houses. Ah checked it this mornin’, as soon as Senga 
told me he was deid. Ah was looking for Specky, or his boys. There was 
nothin’, other than us, the paper boy and the postie.’

‘So that makes us wonder. How did he get to wherever he met them?’

‘Ah suppose Ah must have took him.’

‘Where? When?’

‘Friday evenin’. Ye know that big park with a’ the shops, beside the 
motorway? Bazza asked me if Ah’d take him there for seven o’clock. He said 
he was meetin’ a burd. He always had bits on the side,’ he added, in 
explanation. ‘Our cars are a wee bit obvious, so if he is… when he wis… 
playin’ away he liked tae use taxis. Ah took him there and Ah dropped him 
off, in the car park, must hae been about seven, mibbes a wee bit after.’

‘And that was the last time you saw him?’

‘Aye.’

‘But you didn’t see the woman?’

‘Naw.’ His eyes were fixed on the table. ‘There couldnae have been one, 
could there? Ah must have delivered him tae the guys that killed him.’

‘Then it’s too bad for him he didn’t tell you what was going on. You 
could have hung around and watched his back.’

‘Fuckin’ right,’ Cec muttered.

‘Is there anything else?’ Mann asked him. ‘Anything that could help us?’

‘I wish there wis. If Ah could, Ah would, honest.’

‘You know what,’ she said, ‘I think I believe you. Cec, you’re free to 
go, but I warn you, we’ve got search warrants for Bazza’s house, and for 
yours, and for the office of that so-called minicab company that you run. 
We’re enforcing them right now, going through the records, and looking for 
anything that’ll tie your brother to those guys. If we find something, and 
you’re involved after all, you’ll be back in here before you’ve even had 
time to take a piss.

‘In the meantime, my advice is to watch your back. If the man we’re after 
gets it into his head that Bazza might have confided in you, he might decide 
that it’s too big a risk to leave you running around loose.’

Brown’s eyes seemed to light up with a strange intensity, that of a man with 
two bells showing on a one-armed bandit and the third reel still spinning. 
‘Ah hope he does, Miss. Ah’d like tae talk tae him.’





Thirty-Two



‘So there you have it. Sir Bryan Storey, the Met commissioner himself, has 
approved your trip. Funny,’ Skinner mused, ‘I met that man for the first 
time at a policing conference a few weeks ago. D’you know what he said, 
“Ah, you’re Edinburgh, are you?” as if he was a Premier League manager 
and I was mid-table Division Three. Just now when I spoke to him, he was almost 
deferential. It seems that this office does have clout nationally, more than 
I’d realised.’

‘I don’t have to report to him when I get there, do I?’ Lowell Payne 
asked.

‘No, not even a courtesy call. I doubt if he’s spoken to a DCI since he got 
the final piece of silver braid on his cap. You just catch the first London 
flight you can tomorrow, go to New Scotland Yard and ask for Chief 
Superintendent McIlhenney. He’ll be waiting for you.’

‘What’s he like, this man?’

The chief smiled. ‘Try to imagine a quieter, more thoughtful version of Mario 
McGuire; but when he has to, Neil can be almost as formidable. The division he 
works in, covert policing, has some tough people in it. He’d never be any 
good in the field himself because he’s too conspicuous, but he will always 
have the respect of the people who are.’

‘How do we play it with Millbank’s family?’

‘You should take the lead in the questions. You’re the investigator, in 
practice; Neil’s just your escort. He knows that and he’s okay with it. 
I’d suggest you begin by being circumspect. Remember, we’ve only just 
identified Cohen under the name Byron Millbank. Now we have done, Storey’s 
going to send two female family support officers to break the news to his 
widow, but you’ll be going in soon after.’

‘How much will they have told her?’

‘Only the basic truth, that he died suddenly, of a brain haemorrhage, and 
that he had no identification on him at the time, hence the delay in getting to 
her. It’s your job to fill in the rest, and find out as best you can whether 
she has a clue that her old man had another identity. The book’s open on 
that. My bet is that she doesn’t, but you reach your own conclusions, 
gently.’

‘Once we get past gentle, what then?’

‘You don’t,’ Skinner told him, with emphasis. ‘You ask to see her 
husband’s computer, to check his calendar, recent contacts, all that stuff. 
Kid-glove stuff, Lowell. It’s only if she doesn’t play ball that you have 
to make the request formal, and take it all away.

‘It should be the same with his workplace, this teleshopping outfit. It’s 
pretty obvious that it’s a family business, given the similarity with the 
wife’s maiden name, so unless you find a box of Uzis in his desk, you 
maintain the front that it’s a formal sudden-death inquiry, required by 
Scottish law, and that all we’re doing is confirming his appointments, 
movements, etc.’

‘Understood.’ Payne stood up. ‘When do you want me back?’ he asked.

‘When you’re done; that’s all I can say. I have no idea how this thing 
will go, but I do know this. An outside agency has an interest in it, and I 
want to head it off. So, any leads that are thrown up have to be followed up, 
fast. If you need to stay tomorrow night, or even beyond that, so be it.’

‘Okay, I’ll take enough clothes and stuff for a couple of days.’ He 
smiled. ‘There’s just one thing, though, Bob. It’s our wedding 
anniversary on Thursday, and I’ve got a table booked at Rogano. If it comes 
to it and I have to cancel, I’d appreciate it if you call Jean and tell her, 
and say that it was your fault.’

Skinner whistled. ‘There ought to be no absolutes in the field of human 
courage,’ he said, ‘but it would take an absolute fucking hero to do that. 
If necessary, her niece and I will take her to Rogano ourselves, and I’ll 
pick up the tab.’

‘That’s a deal. Hopefully it won’t come to that. Here,’ he added, 
‘what will you do for an assistant while I’m away? You’re still on a 
learning curve here.’

‘Yes, and I’m going to rely on my ACCs to instruct me. Mr Thomas and I had 
a getting to know you session earlier on. I asked him to attend the post-mortem 
on Toni Field and to sit in on Bazza Brown’s while he was there.’

‘Oh shit,’ Payne murmured.

The chief frowned. ‘What?’

‘Maybe I should have told you, but I never thought to, because it was no more 
than office gossip. Not long after Field arrived, when she lived on the 
Riverside, a couple of PCs in a Panda car saw Michael Thomas leaving her 
apartment block at three in the morning. The story was all round the force 
inside a day. ACC Allan heard about it and put the word out that anybody who 
even thought of posting it on Twitter or Facebook would wind up nailed to a 
cross.’

‘Indeed?’ Skinner murmured, with a thin smile. ‘Typical Max; he’s too 
nice a guy for his own good. Yes, it sounds like I really have put Thomas on 
the spot. Was this a continuing relationship?’

‘I’m pretty sure it wasn’t.’

‘How sure?’

‘Not a hundred per cent, I admit. Why?’

‘Oh nothing. Between you and me, Marina Deschamps gave me a rundown on her 
sister’s sex life. It hadn’t occurred to me till now, but the numbers 
didn’t quite add up.’ He nodded, as if he had reached a conclusion, then 
spelled it out. ‘That’s made my mind up,’ he said. ‘I’m going to tell 
Marina she can come back to work. If any more Toni skeletons pop out during 
this investigation, it’ll be useful to have her around.’

‘Do you want me to…’

‘No, I’ll call her myself, after I’ve told the fiscal that I want the 
body released tomorrow morning.’

‘The fiscal here doesn’t like to be told, Chief,’ Payne warned.

‘Then I’ll make it seem as if it was his idea all along.’

‘He’s a she.’

‘Aren’t they all these days? When my dad was in practice just after the 
war, there wasn’t a single female solicitor in the burgh. Now the majority of 
law graduates are women, like our Alex. It’s magic; it hasn’t half shaken 
up the establishment. What’s her name?’

‘Reba Paisley. Mrs.’

‘Get her on the phone for me, please. Then you’d better get off home, once 
you’ve booked your flight.’

‘Will do. By the way,’ he volunteered, ‘that bloody safe; you were right. 
It was installed at Chief Constable Field’s request and we do not have the 
technical capability in-house to open it. I’ve asked our plant and machinery 
people to source the supplier and get someone to deal with it.’

As Payne headed back to his own office to make the call to the procurator 
fiscal, the regional chief prosecutor, Skinner moved from the table to his 
desk. As he eased himself into his seat… not a patch on my Edinburgh chair, 
he grumbled, mentally… his mobile buzzed and vibrated in his pocket, 
signalling an incoming text. He dug it out and read it.

‘In Glasgow. Can I blag a lift? We came in Roshan’s car. Be about 6. 
Sarahx.’

He keyed in a reply, awkwardly because of the thickness of his index finger; he 
had never mastered using his thumbs on the mini-keyboard.

‘I know, & what ur doing. Sure. Take a taxi to Pitt St when ur done. L Bob.’

He had no sooner sent the message than the phone rang. ‘Chief Constable,’ 
he said as he picked up.

‘Procurator fiscal,’ an assertive female voice replied. ‘What can I do 
for you, Mr Skinner?’

‘Nothing, Mrs Paisley. I don’t ask for favours. Let’s get that clear from 
the start.’

‘So this is a social call?’

‘Yes, partly.’

‘Even “partly” makes a change. In the time she was here I never once 
heard from your late predecessor.’

‘You won’t be wanting to hang on to her then,’ Skinner chuckled.

‘To tell you the truth,’ the fiscal replied, ‘I hadn’t given that any 
thought.’

‘What’s your normal procedure with homicide victims?’

‘I don’t have one. I make my judgement on a case by case basis, but it’s 
my judgement, I stress. It’s not a call that I delegate to a deputy. In this 
case… is the PM done?’

‘As we speak.’

‘Who are the immediate family?’

‘Mother and sister.’

‘Are there any prospects of further arrests?’

‘Further?’ Skinner repeated. ‘We never actually got round to arresting 
Smit and Botha.’

He heard a sound that might have been a chuckle. ‘You know what I mean. 
Because if there are, defence counsel might want access to the body.’

‘I know that, but it isn’t an automatic right. I can’t say for sure we 
will ever trace the people in this chain of conspiracy, let alone guessing 
when. We’re interviewing the brother of the man found dead in the getaway 
car, but I don’t believe he will be able to help us.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because he’s still alive. If Cec knew anything, he’d probably be in the 
cooler next to his brother.’

‘How about if I authorise release for burial only?’

‘Toni Field was born in Mauritius. What if her mother wants to take her home 
there?’

‘It would be a lot easier in an urn than a coffin. Is that what you’re 
saying?’

‘I’m not saying anything, only asking questions.’

‘But good ones,’ Paisley said. ‘Tell you what. If the post-mortem report 
satisfies me that there are no unresolved questions about the death, the family 
can have her, and do whatever they like with her.’

‘That’s fair enough,’ Skinner agreed. ‘I’ll tell them. The only 
unresolved questions about the death aren’t related to the autopsy. There are 
only two: who wanted her dead and why.’

‘Do your people have any ideas about either of those issues?’

‘I don’t encourage my people to deal in ideas, only evidence. As I speak 
they’re looking for any that’s to be found. When they have more to report, 
they will, to both of us. Good to talk to you; you must come here for lunch 
some time.’

‘That will also be a first,’ the fiscal remarked. ‘I’ll look forward to 
it.’

As he hung up, Skinner scribbled, ‘Lunch Pitt St with fiscal: arrange,’ 
then called the switchboard and asked to be connected with Marina Deschamps. It 
was her mother who came on the line. ‘I regret that Marina is unavailable,’ 
she said. ‘Will I do?’

‘Of course, Miss Deschamps. I want to talk to you about Antonia’s 
funeral.’

‘Good, for we were going to call you about that. We contacted an undertaker, 
but he said that he had no access to her body.’

‘Not yet,’ he agreed. ‘There are issues in any homicide, but once the 
fiscal has some paperwork in place, everything should be all right. What I want 
to talk to you about is the form of the funeral. Antonia was a chief constable, 
and she died in office. If you want a private family funeral, so be it, but 
it’s only right that her force should pay its tribute. I’m happy to 
organise everything for you, if that’s what you would like. Did she have a 
religion?’

‘She was raised in the Roman Catholic Church,’ she fell silent for a few 
seconds, ‘although she was not a regular visitor, I must admit.’

‘Nonetheless. Cardinal Gainer, in Edinburgh, is a friend of mine. I’m sure 
he would officiate, or approach his opposite number in Glasgow.’

‘That is very generous of you, Mr Skinner. I would like to talk to Marina 
about it when she returns.’

He heard a sound, in the background, as if someone was calling out. ‘Is that 
her now?’ he asked.

‘No, it’s just street noise. We will call you, Mr Skinner. Thank you very 
much.’





Thirty-Three



‘Anything on Bazza’s computer, Banjo?’ Lottie Mann called out to a 
detective constable who was seated at a table on the other side of the inquiry 
office, working on the confiscated PC. He rose and crossed towards her.

‘No email account that I can find, and that’s disappointing. He was very 
big on porn sites, though,’ he advised her. ‘Nothing illegal, nothing that 
Operation Amethyst would have hit on; all grown-ups, all doing fairly 
monotonous and repetitive stuff. Strange; from what I saw of Mrs Brown when we 
raided the house, he shouldn’t have needed any diversions like that. There 
are some pictures of her on the computer that bear that out, and a couple of 
videos.’

‘Chacun à son goût.’

The DC nicknamed Banjo… his surname was Paterson, but none of his colleagues 
made the connection to the man who wrote the words of ‘Waltzing Matilda’ . 
. . stared at her. ‘Eh?’ he exclaimed.

‘It’s the only French I know,’ she said. ‘It means there’s no telling 
what you’ll find under a guy’s bed when you take a look. Or something like 
that.’

‘I’ll take your word for it, boss. I only speak Spanish and a wee bit of 
Mandarin Chinese.’

‘Smart bastard,’ she snarled. ‘What else?’

‘Video games; the thing was wired up to a big high-def screen. And casinos, 
he was quite a gambler, was our Bazza. He played roulette and blackjack mostly, 
but poker as well, from time to time. He also had an account with an online 
bookie, and bet heavily on the horses and on boxing.’

‘Was he any good at it?’

‘He seems to have been. He paid through a credit card; I’ve looked at the 
records and most months there was more going in than coming out. He had a 
system for roulette and he only ever backed favourites.’

‘That’s not a complete surprise; Bazza’s old man had a bookie’s licence 
and a couple of betting shops. As I recall, Bazza ran them for a while after he 
died, then sold them on to a chain. So yes, he’d a gambling background. He 
backed the wrong horse, though, when he took up with the South Africans. How 
about Cec?’ she asked. ‘Did he have a PC?’

‘Cec couldnae spell PC,’ Dan Provan muttered.

‘Possibly not,’ the detective constable agreed. ‘He’s got a PlayStation 
and that was it. He likes war games; anything where people get blown to bits. 
He also likes porn, but DVDs in his case. We could nick him for a few of those 
if you want.’

‘Can’t be arsed,’ Mann said. ‘What about their office?’

‘Definitely non-ecological. They don’t give a shit about how many trees 
they kill. All their records are on paper. However, they did fail to hide a 
list of addresses. They didn’t connect to anything so we’re having a look. 
Our search warrant was broad enough to let us go straight in.’ Paterson 
smiled. ‘Now for the good bit. Uniform have visited just one so far, a 
four-bedroom villa in a modern estate near Clydebank; it’s a cannabis farm, 
and you can bet the others are too.’

She laughed. ‘Poor old Cec; it’s not his week. He’s probably home by now; 
have him rearrested and brought in, then hand him and that address list over to 
Operation League. He’s their business now.’ She turned to Provan. 
‘Bilbo,’ she began.

He glared at her. ‘The chief wis bad enough,’ he growled. ‘No’ you as 
well.’

‘What do we have on Bazza as a force? Is there an intelligence report on 
him?’

‘Now there’s a hell of a question to be askin’ a garden fuckin’ 
ornament like me.’

‘Okay, Dan,’ she laughed, ‘I’m sorry.’

‘No more funnies?’

‘No more funnies.’

‘Good, because that really was a hell of a question. Ah’ve got a mate, a 
good mate, in what we’re no’ supposed to call Special Branch any more, in 
Counter-Terrorism Intelligence Section. He’s jist told me that the chief… 
the old chief, no’ the new one… asked for updated files on all organised 
crime figures as soon as she came in. When SCT went to work on Bazza, they 
asked the National Criminal Intelligence Service for input, and a big red sign 
came up, warnin’ them off.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means he wis a fuckin’ grass, Lottie; he was protected. And if it 
wasnae for us, and it wasn’t, it must have been for MI5. They’ve got a 
serious crime section.’

‘Jesus!’

‘You’ll get brownie points wi’ the new chief when ye tell him that, eh?’

‘Maybe. But have you thought through the implications?’

‘Sure,’ Provan admitted, ‘but Ah’m no’ paid enough to spell them out. 
Ye’d better go and see the gaffer.’

‘I will do. While I’m up there, you concentrate on the only other line of 
inquiry we have with Bazza. Have we got the CCTV tapes from the Easthaven 
Retail Park yet?’

‘Aye, and I’ve cleared up something; nothin’ major, just a point for the 
record. We know that Smit and Botha were at Easthaven and that Bazza went there 
too, to meet them. We know from the gaffer that the South Africans were in 
Livingston on Friday, collecting their weapons. Ah’ve checked with the team 
in Edinburgh, spoke to a DC called Haddock, bright-soundin’ kid…’

‘Nothing fishy about him?’ Mann murmured.

‘Whit… ach, be serious, Lottie. He said that there was no mention of a 
third man bein’ with them. So, Bazza must have been in the boot o’ the 
motor by then.’

‘Fair enough, fills in the timeline. Take a look at that video and see if it 
shows them meeting, then we’ll join all the dots. What does the recording 
cover?’

‘Two cameras, all day Friday, midnight to midnight. But there’s a clock on 
it so Ah’ll speed run it back to just before seven and go from there.’

‘Fine, you do that. I’ll go and see the boss.’





Thirty-Four



‘You do realise, Lottie,’ a frowning Skinner said, ‘that I should be 
water-boarding the wee man until he tells me who his contact in CTIS is. That 
section is supposed to be completely confidential. Information like that 
shouldn’t be passed on outside the reporting chain.’

‘That’s why I didn’t bring him up here with me,’ the DI replied. ‘But 
you’d be wasting your time, boss. He’d drown before he told you. Dan’s 
old school.’

‘Don’t I know it. That’s why the tap’s not running. I won’t press the 
point, for now, but I won’t forget it either. Make sure he knows that, so 
that his mate, whoever he is, will get to hear about it.’

‘Understood, boss. I’ll drop a word in his ear.’

‘Don’t be too friendly about it. I know he was your mentor, but you’re 
his line manager, not the other way around. Now, since he has given us this 
information… you know what it suggests?’

‘I think so,’ she said, ‘if it was the Security Service that flagged 
Bazza Brown as off limits… and who else would it be?’

‘Drugs enforcement,’ the chief suggested, ‘but that’s unlikely. I can 
and will check it, though. If that was the cause of the red notice, it would 
have come from Scotland. The head of the SCDEA and I are close. He’ll tell me 
if it was his mob that were running Brown. Indeed, I’ve got a feeling that if 
it was them, he’d have been in touch with me by now to let me know.

‘So, let’s say that Bazza was on the books of MI5’s serious crime 
section. If our speculation that they fixed Beram Cohen up with a new identity 
is well founded, then he would have as well, and that’s our link.’

‘What do you want me to do about it, boss?’

‘Absolutely nothing,’ Skinner replied, almost before she had finished her 
question. ‘As far as you’re concerned, you never had the information you 
just brought me and neither did Dan. He shouldn’t have been given it in the 
first place, and if he made any written note of his conversation, it must be 
destroyed.’

‘Yes, sir.’ She rose from the chair that faced the chief constable’s 
desk. It was low set, so that whoever sat behind the desk was always looking 
down on his visitors, an intimidating tactic that Skinner disliked, and vowed 
that he would change. ‘Since I was never here,’ she said, ‘I’d better 
make myself scarce.’

He laughed. ‘You do that, Lottie. Concentrate on the video you told me about. 
If you can show Bazza Brown meeting Smit and Botha, you can wrap up the inquiry 
into his murder, and pass that on to Reba Paisley’s office. Why he met them, 
if we’re right about that, she doesn’t need to know. How they came to know 
him, that’s completely off limits.’

‘Fine, I’ll report back on the first part as soon as we’ve nailed it 
down.’

He watched her as she left then reached across his desk for the phone, only to 
be interrupted by his mobile signalling another incoming text. ‘Done here. 
Scrubbing up, then on my way. Sarahx.’

No reply needed; he smiled as he put it back in his pocket, then picked up the 
other instrument, selected ‘direct dial’ and made the call he had been 
intending.

‘Mario? How are you settling into my old office? Do you like the view? You 
can see every bugger who comes in and goes out. Useful at times.’

‘Sure,’ the newly appointed ACC conceded, ‘but they can see me.’

‘Not if you angle the blinds right.’

‘I’ll try that. Have you got any other advice for me?’

‘Yeah, keep your eye on David Mackenzie; he’s after your job.’

‘I worked that one out for myself, Bob, quite some time ago. Anything else? 
Anything serious?’

‘No, but a question. How’s Paula?’

‘Blooming. No sign of delayed shock, post-traumatic stress or any of that 
crap, I’m relieved to say. Maybe because she’s got too much on her mind. 
She saw her consultant again this morning, at his request. When he checked her 
over yesterday, he thought he might have got her dates wrong. Now he’s sure, 
he’s given her to the end of the week to get the job done herself, or he’s 
going to induce labour.’

‘They did that with Myra, when she had Alex. As I recall, it started with 
castor oil. Tell her that; the threat alone might be a trigger.’

‘I will. Now let me ask you one. How’s Aileen? First off, I’m sorry about 
you two, and about all the other shit. She’s had a very tough forty-eight 
hours, man.’

Skinner felt his forehead tighten. ‘Are you saying I made it worse?’ he 
asked.

‘No, absolutely not,’ McGuire insisted. ‘I wasn’t implying that. I 
understand how things are between you. It was a straight question.’

‘In that case, she’s fine. She and I spoke not that long ago and 
everything’s okay. We’ve put our situation on the record, so the press will 
have to be very careful with what they say about her. I know she had that 
bother at her press conference this morning, but given the trouble the Hatton 
woman’s been making, it’ll work for her rather than agin her.’

‘Good. Now would you like to come to the point?’

‘What makes you think there is one?’ Skinner asked.

‘How long have we known each other? About fifteen years? I’m not saying you 
never call me just to pass the time of day, but I don’t recall you ever doing 
it from the office, not once.’

‘Christ, is that true? You know, McIlhenney said much the same earlier. What 
does that say about me?’ He sighed. ‘The sad thing is, you’re right. 
I’ve got a situation here, I need it resolved, but I can’t be bothered 
going through channels. It would take too long. Instead, I’m looking for a 
simpler solution. Do you remember a wee guy called Johan Ramsey?’

‘Wee Jo? Of course. A master of his craft, if ever there was one.’

‘It didn’t stop him getting lifted a few times though. Do you know where he 
is now?’

‘As a matter of fact I do. He’s here in Edinburgh, on parole after his last 
sentence. We were advised when he was released.’

‘Good,’ Skinner declared. ‘That’s what I wanted to hear.’

‘How come?’ McGuire laughed. ‘What do you want with him?’

‘I want to employ him.’

‘You what?’

‘I mean it. I’ve got a job for him. There’s a safe in my office here. 
Toni Field had it installed, and only she knew the combination. I don’t have 
the time to wait for some bloody company in the south of England to free up one 
of their specialists, so I want to hire one of my own. I’d like you to pick 
him up, and invite him to join me here tomorrow morning, to see what he can do. 
Tell him there’s a hundred in it for him, regardless, cash, and that his 
probation officer will never know. Can you do that for me, ACC McGuire? Make it 
work and I’ll buy you lunch after your first ACPOS meeting.’

‘Hell, Bob, you don’t need to bribe me to get me to do that. That’s a 
first, and it’s going in my memoirs.’

‘That’s fine,’ Skinner grunted, ‘but you’d better make it clear to 
wee Jo that if it winds up in his, then next time he gets sent down, I will 
make certain, personally, that parole is off the table.’





Thirty-Five



‘In my office, please, Dan,’ Lottie Mann said as she returned to the 
investigation suite.

‘Absolutely,’ Provan muttered, but too quietly for her to hear, and he rose 
from his seat and followed her into a small room at the end of the open area.

‘See that friend of yours in CTIS?’ she began, without preamble. ‘Whoever 
he is, you’d better warn him that where he works careless talk costs lives, 
and in this case it’s his that’s on the line. On Toni Field’s watch there 
would probably have been a leak inquiry over what he told you. There won’t be 
this time, but probably only because Skinner likes you too much to use a 
nutcracker to get the name out of you.

‘We are not to follow up what you were told. Instead we’re to wrap up 
Bazza’s murder, pass the file to the fiscal and mark it case closed, then get 
on with the main investigation, which is still, unlike Field, very much alive. 
That’s the way it is, Dan. You are from Barcelona. You know nussing.’

‘Ye’ve got the accent wrong,’ the DS said. ‘Ah’m old enough to have 
seen Fawlty Towers when it wis new. Unfortunately, Lottie, Ah don’t know 
nothin’. In fact, Ah know too fuckin’ much.’

‘Oh, I know that,’ she laughed. ‘Too much for your own good.’

‘No, love,’ he sighed, ‘for yours.’

She stared at him. ‘What are you on about, Detective Sergeant? Can we just 
keep up the pretence that I’m your senior officer?’

‘No, we can’t.’

Her eyes narrowed. A spasm of something strange ran through her, and she 
realised that it was fear. ‘Dan,’ she murmured, ‘what is this?’

‘This, Lottie, is me doin’ something Ah shouldn’t. By rights Ah 
shouldn’t be talking to you alone. There should be a senior officer in this 
room right now, probably the chief constable himself. There isn’t, because Ah 
care about you, lassie, and I want you to know about this from me, first. This 
might have to be another of those conversations that never happened, like mine 
with Alec in CTIS, but this is a hell of a lot more serious.’

He reached across her desk and switched on her computer; it was an 
old-fashioned tower type, probably on its last legs, and took an inordinate 
length of time to boot up.

‘Dan,’ she said once more, as they waited, but he hushed her, with a finger 
to his lips.

‘They store the CCTV recordings on DVDs,’ he told her, as he loaded a disk 
on to the computer’s player tray, and slid it into position, then settled 
into the DI’s chair so that he could control playback.

‘I started at the end, like Ah said,’ he began. She looked at the screen 
and saw a still image of an empty car park, and with numerals in the bottom 
right corner. ‘These things can hold eight hours at a time,’ he explained. 
‘They have a bank of recorders tae cover the whole park. When one disk gets 
full, another starts, so it’s constant. Ah thought I’d have to go a’ the 
way back tae seven, but…’

He clicked a rewind icon, three times; the image began to move, as did the time 
read-out, fast, backwards. Provan’s finger hovered above the mouse until the 
clock showed seven twenty-eight, when he clicked again, freezing the recording 
once more.

‘Ah nearly missed this first time. Watch.’ He clicked on the ‘Play’ 
arrow and the images started to move.

Mann peered at the screen. The park was almost as empty as it had been before; 
only a few cars remained. Then she saw a silver saloon roll into view, moving 
jerkily, for the camera was set to shoot only a few frames per second. It came 
to a stop and as it did so, a figure walked towards it, his speed enhanced. He 
was carrying a large parcel. She could just make out a face in the front 
passenger seat, and a hand, beckoning.

‘Bazza,’ Provan murmured. ‘Now see what happens.’

The man she took to be Brown opened the rear door, slid into the back seat, and 
closed it behind him. Everything was still for a few seconds. Then she saw what 
seemed to be three flashes, inside the Peugeot, as if someone was sending a 
Morse message with a torch. Immediately afterwards, the car zoomed off, at high 
speed.

‘That was the execution of Bazza Brown,’ the DS said.

‘No doubt about it,’ his DI agreed. ‘So?’

‘So, what was wrong with that picture?’

‘Enlighten me,’ she growled. ‘Stop playin’ games, Dan.’

‘This is no game, kid. The parcel.’ He emphasised the word. ‘Where did 
Brown get the fuckin’ parcel? Cec never mentioned that. As far as he was 
concerned he was takin’ his brother to meet a bit on the side. And what was 
in it? Did he take her chocolates? If he did, it’s the biggest box of Black 
Magic Ah’ve ever seen.’

‘True,’ she murmured. That cold feeling revisited the pit of her stomach. 
Her old crony was taking her somewhere, and she had a bad feeling about their 
destination.

‘Then there was the time,’ the DS continued. ‘Bazza wanted to be there 
for seven, yet the South Africans never turned up for another half hour. So Ah 
ran the recording back to the time Cec told us, like this.’ He rewound once 
more, stopping at six fifty-eight, with a large black car in shot, near to 
where the Peugeot had pulled up.

Provan let the recording go forward, and Mann saw Bazza Brown step out of his 
brother’s Chrysler, and into the last half hour of his life. He went nowhere, 
but stood his ground, pacing up and down, waiting, as Cec drove away.

And then a door opened; it was set in the side of a large warehouse building at 
the top of the frame. A figure stepped out. He was carrying a large parcel, and 
he walked towards Brown. There was no handshake between the two, barely a 
glance exchanged, it seemed, as the bundle was handed over. The second man 
seemed about to turn on his heel, when Provan froze the screen.

‘I need you to confirm, ma’am,’ he said, ‘that the man with Brown is 
who I think he is.’

Standing behind him, Lottie leaned over and grasped his shoulder, and the 
corner of the desk, for support.

‘Oh no,’ she moaned. ‘Oh my God, no. You know it is, Danny. You know 
it’s my Scott.’

The sergeant let out a sigh that seemed bigger than he was. ‘Ah’ve never 
wished in ma life before,’ he murmured, ‘that Ah wasnae a cop. But I do 
now, so that somebody else could be doin’ this.’

He stood, and gave her back her own chair. Then he went to the door, opened it 
and beckoned to Banjo Paterson, who crossed the office and joined them.

‘Detective Inspector,’ Provan announced, his accent vanishing in the 
formality of his voice, ‘in view of what we’ve just seen, and what you’ve 
confirmed, in spite of my subordinate rank I have got no choice but to ask you 
to remain here with DC Paterson while I take this matter to senior officers.’





Thirty-Six



‘So this is where it all happens,’ Sarah Grace said, with a smile in her 
tone as she looked round the room that had become his. ‘This is the nerve 
centre of Scottish policing.’

‘A week ago,’ Bob told her, ‘I would have denied that suggestion, with 
all the vehemence at my disposal. Today, I’m forced to agree with you.’

‘I prefer the command suite in Edinburgh,’ she confessed. ‘It has a more, 
I dunno, a more lived-in feel about it. This is all very antiseptic, very 
impersonal.’

‘Honey child,’ he laughed, ‘don’t you think that might be because I 
haven’t had time to stamp my personality on it?’

‘Maybe. I’m sure you will… as long as that doesn’t involve importing 
that coffee machine you inherited from your old mentor Alf Stein.’

‘It won’t, I promise you. You told me I should give myself a caffeine 
holiday and that’s what I’m doing. I haven’t had a coffee this week. Are 
you pleased with me?’

She grinned. ‘Yes and no. If you really are sticking to it, that might mean I 
have to give up too. When you’re around, at least. Speaking of which,’ she 
added, ‘do you want to stop off tonight? The Gullane house will be empty, 
since the kids are with me.’

‘I think I would like that very much, although I do have something to do 
there, before the place can be truly empty.’

‘Can I help?’

‘Mmm,’ he mused. ‘No, I don’t think so. I don’t reckon either of us 
would feel right if you did.’

‘Ah,’ Sarah whispered. ‘I think I can guess what you mean. Clearing out 
all the evidence, yes?’

‘Yes, at the other party’s request.’

‘Then you’re right. That is something you should do on your own… unless 
it involves a bonfire, in which case I’ll be happy to help.’

‘Hey, hey!’

‘I’m joking,’ she said. ‘The strangest thing happened to me this 
morning. I saw the newspapers and all of a sudden I found that I don’t bear 
that woman any ill-will, not any more, however she might feel about me.’

‘To be honest with you, Sarah,’ Bob confessed, ‘I don’t believe she 
feels any way about you, and I doubt that she ever did. She thought I was 
somebody I’m not. Now she’s found out the truth, she’s happy to make me, 
and everything to do with me, part of her past.’

‘Does that include not trying to take you for plenty in the divorce?’

‘That hasn’t been mentioned,’ he grinned, ‘and I’m not going to raise 
the subject.’

He loaded a handful of documents and files into his attaché case, an aluminium 
Zero Halliburton that Sarah had given him as a birthday present a few years 
before, clicked it shut and picked it up. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Constable 
Davie, my driver, will be waiting for us in the car park.’

He turned, and was in the act of heading for the door that led directly into 
the corridor when he saw a small, crumpled, moustachioed figure in his 
anteroom, his hand raised as if he was about to knock on the door.

‘What the hell?’ he murmured. ‘Hold on a minute, love,’ he told his 
ex-wife. ‘There’s something up here. Detective sergeants don’t turn up 
uninvited in the chief’s office without a bloody good reason.’

He signalled to Dan Provan to enter, but the little man stood his ground. 
‘What the fu—’ Skinner muttered. ‘Sit down for a minute, Sarah,’ he 
said. ‘Maybe the wee bugger’s scared of strange women.’

He walked towards the glass doorway, then stepped through it into the outer 
office. ‘Yes, Dan?’ he murmured. ‘Where’s your DI and what can I do for 
you?’

‘She’s detained, sir, downstairs in the office.’

Skinner had a low annoyance threshold. ‘What the fuck’s detaining her? Has 
it paralysed her phone hand?’

‘No, sir, you don’t understand. Ah’ve detained her. Out of bloody nowhere 
she’s become involved in the investigation. The rule book requires that Ah do 
that and report the matter to senior officers, plural. In this case, Ah don’t 
think that means a couple of DIs.’

The chief’s face darkened; looking up at him, Provan, experienced though he 
was, felt a chill run through him.

‘Where is she?’ Skinner murmured.

‘She’s in her private office, boss. DC Paterson’s with her; Ah’ve 
ordered him not to allow her to make any phone calls or send any texts.’

‘You’ve done that to Lottie?’ Skinner said, and as he did he realised how 
upset the sergeant was. ‘Right, let’s hear about it, but not here.’

He opened the door behind him and called out to Sarah, ‘Urgent, I’m afraid. 
Hang on please, love; I’ll be as quick as I can.’ Then he led the way into 
the corridor and along to ACC Gorman’s office, relieved to see through the 
unshaded glass wall that she was behind her desk. He rapped on the door, and 
walked straight in.

‘Bridie, sorry to interrupt, but something’s arisen that DS Provan feels he 
has to bring to the top of the reporting chain. He’s been around long enough 
to know the rule book off by heart, so we’d better hear him out.’

‘Of course.’ Skinner’s deputy rose. ‘Hi, Dan,’ she said. ‘You look 
as though the cat’s just ett your budgie.’

The little sergeant sighed. ‘Ma’am, if it would make this go away Ah’d 
feed it the bloody thing maself.’

‘So what do you have to tell us?’ she asked.

‘To show you,’ he corrected her. ‘Is your computer on?’

‘Give me a minute,’ she said, then pressed a button behind a console that 
sat on a side table.

The command suite computers were of more recent vintage than those in the 
floors below, and so it was ready in less than the time she had requested.

Provan inserted the DVD he had brought with him into a slot at the side of the 
screen. ‘This is CCTV footage,’ he explained to the two chief officers, 
‘from the Easthaven Retail Park. It was taken on Friday evening. Our 
investigation established that the two men who killed Chief Constable Field 
went there at that time, and later Bazza Brown’s brother, Cec, told us that 
he took Bazza there as well. Now, please watch.’

He played the recording in the same way that he had shown it to his DI twenty 
minutes earlier, stopping as the Peugeot roared away from the park.

‘That’s your homicide wrapped up,’ Skinner remarked. ‘But where did the 
parcel come from?’

‘Watch again,’ Provan replied, rewinding the recording by half an hour, 
showing Brown’s drop-off by his brother, the unexpected encounter, and the 
handing over of the package. Once again, he froze the action to show the 
newcomer’s face.

‘I see,’ the chief constable murmured. ‘Are you going to tell me who that 
is, now?’

It was Bridie Gorman who answered. ‘I can tell you that,’ she hissed. He 
looked at her and saw that her eyes, normally warm and kind, were cold and 
seemed as hard as blue marble. ‘That is Scottie Mann, one-time police officer 
until the bevvy got the better of him, and still the husband of Detective 
Inspector Charlotte Mann. What’s the stupid fucking bastard gone and done? 
Dan, what was in the parcel? Do you know?’

‘I would bet my maxed-out pension, ma’am,’ the veteran detective 
declared, ‘that it was two police uniforms and two equipment belts.’





Thirty-Seven



‘I’m sorry that took so long,’ Bob told Sarah as he stepped back into his 
office, ‘but it had to be done straight away, and by nobody other than my 
deputy and me.’

‘What’s happened?’ she asked. ‘Can you tell me?’

‘In theory no, I can’t, but bugger that. If I don’t I’ll be brooding 
over it for the rest of the night. Bridie Gorman and I have just found 
ourselves in the horrible position of having to interview, under caution, the 
senior investigating officer in the Toni Field murder. Her husband turned up 
not just as a witness, but as a suspect in the conspiracy. That’s what wee 
Provan came to tell me, and it must have been bloody tough on him, because the 
two of them are bloody near father and daughter.’

‘Oh my. How did it go?’

‘We put the question directly to her and she swore that she had no knowledge 
of her husband’s involvement, and that if she had she would have declared 
it.’

‘Do you believe her?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, we do. The poor woman’s in a hell of a state. She 
alternates between being tearful and wanting to rip her old man’s heart 
out… and she’s big enough to do that too.’

‘What happens now?’

‘Scott, the husband… the ex-cop husband,’ he growled, his face twisting 
suddenly in anger, ‘will be arrested. In fact it’s under way now. 
Provan’s taking a DC and some uniforms to their house to pick him up. Their 
son will see that happen, I’m afraid, but there’s no way round that. DC 
Paterson and the uniforms will take him away and Dan… he’s the boy’s 
godfather… will stay with him till Lottie gets back.’ He chuckled, 
savagely. ‘She wanted to make the arrest herself! I almost wish that was 
possible. It’d serve the guy right. No chance, though; she’s out.’

‘You mean she’s suspended?’ Sarah looked as angry as he did.

‘No, of course not.’ He smiled to lighten the moment. ‘Calm down. No need 
to get the sisterhood wound up. She’s on an unanticipated holiday, that’s 
all. She can’t continue on the inquiry, because she’s been hopelessly 
compromised.’

‘Who’ll take over from her?’

‘Dan will,’ Skinner replied, ‘reporting to me, just as she’s been 
doing. I could parachute in another DI, indeed maybe I should, given his 
closeness to the family, but Scott was a cop himself and it would be difficult 
to find someone who had never crossed his path.

‘Anyway, Provan’s forgotten more about detective work than most of the 
potential candidates will ever learn, and he’s still got enough left in his 
tank to see him through. He won’t interview Scott, though. Bridie and I will 
do that, tomorrow morning. Not too early, though, I want him to stew in 
isolation for a while. Now,’ he declared, ‘let’s you and I get out of 
here. Change of plan; we’ll take the train, then a taxi to yours. I can’t 
have PC Davie drive me through to Edinburgh at this time of night.’

They took the lift down to the headquarters car park, where PC Cole was 
waiting. The chief constable introduced the extra passenger, ‘Doctor Grace, 
the pathologist, from Edinburgh University,’ then apologised for the delay, a 
gesture that seemed to take his driver by surprise. His reaction rose to 
astonishment when Skinner told him that the destination was Queen Street 
Station.

‘Are you sure, sir?’ he exclaimed.

‘Certain. You can pick me up from there tomorrow as well. I’ll let you know 
what train I’m on.’

The train was on the platform five minutes from departure as they settled into 
its only first-class compartment. Sarah grinned. ‘I’m on expenses, or I 
would be if you hadn’t bought my ticket. What’s your excuse?’

‘I’m not quite sure,’ he confessed, ‘since everything happened very 
quickly at the weekend, but I think I am too. But the truth is that I prefer 
first, on the rare occasions that I take the train, simply because there’s 
less chance of me meeting an old customer, so to speak.’

‘And that would worry you?’ she asked, eyebrow raised. ‘Are you feeling 
your age?’

‘No to both of those, and not that it’s likely to happen, but I’d rather 
avoid those situations. I’m not just talking about people I’ve locked up; 
there’s councillors, journalists, defence lawyers. I don’t like to be 
cornered by any of them, because I don’t care to be in any situation where I 
have to watch every word I say.’

‘I can see that,’ she conceded.

No other passengers had joined them by the time the train left the station.

‘This preference of yours for privacy,’ Sarah ventured, as it entered the 
tunnel that ran north out of Queen Street, ‘would it have anything to do with 
you not wanting to be seen with me?’

‘What?’ He laughed. ‘Don’t be daft.’ He reached out and took her 
hand. ‘There is no woman in the world I would rather be seen with.’

‘Apart from Alex.’

‘Alexis is my daughter, and so is Seonaid, our daughter, yours and mine. We 
made her and I am very proud of that, even though I was fucking awful at 
showing it for a while. You are different, you are you, and I love you.’

‘This hasn’t happened too soon, has it?’ she wondered. ‘A week ago, if 
you’d asked me, I’d never have imagined you and me, here like this, now.’

‘Me neither,’ Bob admitted, ‘but I am mightily pleased that we are. It 
should never have been any other way. I was stupid, and not for the first time 
in my life. Feeling my age, you asked. Well, maybe I am, in a way. It’s led 
me to a point where I’m honest with myself about my weaknesses, and the 
things I’ve done wrong in the past, and strong enough to be able to promise 
you that I will never let you down again.’

‘You realise that if you do,’ she whispered, as the train passed out into 
the open with leafy embankments on either side, ‘I will do your autopsy 
myself, before they take me away?’

He gave her a big wide-open smile, a rarity from him. ‘Yes, but I don’t 
need that incentive.’

When the door slid open, they were both taken by surprise. ‘Tickets please.’

The guard’s intervention ended the moment. They were passing through the 
first station on the route before Sarah broke the silence. ‘When did you eat 
last?’ she asked.

‘Good question; probably sometime between one and half past; sandwiches with 
Mann and Provan, my office. They were crap. The bread was turning up at the 
edges by the time we got round to them.’

‘That sort of a day, uh?’

He nodded. ‘That sort. How about yours?’

She scrunched up her face for a second or two. ‘Usual blood and guts, but 
pretty run-of-the-mill, as my job goes.’

‘No surprises? No complications?’

‘None, in either case. The two cadavers I’ll be looking at tomorrow… 
remind me of their names again? Not that it matters.’

‘Smit and Botha, also known as Mallett and Lightbody.’

‘Well, one thing I can tell you about them right now is that they were very 
good at their job, and humane too. Neither of their victims had any time to 
think about it. Mr Brown died on Friday evening. He may have seen the man who 
was killing him, but he died instantly. He still had a surprised expression on 
his face.’

‘I know,’ Bob reminded her. ‘I saw him in his second-to-last resting 
place. And,’ he added, ‘I’ve just seen a recording of him being shot.’

‘Why didn’t they kill the detective inspector’s husband?’

‘Because he never saw them, otherwise, you’re right, poor Lottie would be a 
widow.’

‘Then too bad for Mr Brown that he did, otherwise his life expectancy would 
have been pretty good. He was a fit guy.’

‘And how about Toni?’

‘Same with her, as you might expect, given her job. She was killed even more 
humanely than Brown, if I can use the term. She would not have had the faintest 
idea of what had happened to her. Well,’ she corrected herself, ‘maybe a 
few milliseconds, but no more than that. She’d have been brain-dead even 
before the force of the impact threw her out of her seat. If that’s some 
small comfort to her family, you might like to tell them.’

‘I have done already. I saw her mother and sister this morning.’

‘How were they?’

‘Very dignified, both of them. I’ve let the fiscal talk herself into 
releasing the body as soon as she gets your report.’

‘Then I’ll complete it and send it to her before I move on to Smit and 
Botha.’ She paused. ‘But how about her husband? How about the child?’ she 
asked. ‘Or is it too young to understand?’

He stared at her, a slight, bewildered smile on his face. ‘Husband?’ he 
repeated. ‘Child? What child?’

‘Hers of course, Antonia Field’s. I assumed she was married or in a 
familial relationship.’

‘No, never,’ Bob said. ‘She was never married, and she lived with her 
sister. What makes you think she had a child?’

‘Hell,’ she exclaimed, ‘I might not be a professor of forensic pathology 
yet, but I do know a caesarean scar when I see one.’

He sat up straight in his high-backed seat. ‘Well, honey, that is news to me, 
and neither her mother nor her sister… who wants to come back to work for 
me… gave me the slightest hint of its existence.’

‘Then tread carefully if you decide to tackle them about it. Yes, she has a 
scar, and there were other physical signs of child-bearing. However, there is 
no way I could guarantee that her baby was delivered alive.’

‘I accept that, but the odds are heavily in favour of that. If a kid goes 
full-term or almost there…’

‘That’s true, but Bob, where are you going with this? Suppose she did have 
a baby and kept quiet about it in case it harmed her career; that’s not a 
crime.’

‘In certain circumstances it might be. An application for the post of chief 
constable requires full disclosure.’

‘But honey, she’s dead. Does it really matter?’

‘Probably not at all.’ He grinned. ‘But it’s a mystery and you know how 
I feel about them. How old was this scar? Can you tell?’

‘I can take a guess. I’d say not less than one year old, and not more than 
three.’

‘Okay. One year ago she was chief constable of the West Midlands; if she had 
it then it would have been a bit noticeable. But hold on.’

He raised himself from his seat and took his attaché case down from the 
luggage rack. He spun the combination wheels and opened it.

‘I’ve got Toni’s HR file in here. Let’s take a look and see what that 
tells us.’ He removed the thick green folder, then closed the case again, 
putting it on his knee to use as an impromptu table.

‘Let’s go back three years. Then she was a Met commander, on secondment to 
the Serious and Organised Crime Agency; she built her legend there knocking 
over foreign drugs cartels. If she’d taken time out to have a kid, that would 
have been noticed and recorded. It isn’t, so we can rule it out. So where 
does that take us?’

As he read, a smile split his face. ‘It takes us to her becoming the chief 
constable of West Midlands, just over two years ago.’

‘She couldn’t have been there long,’ Sarah remarked.

‘She wasn’t. She barely had time to crease her uniform before the 
Strathclyde job came up. But, it says here that before she was appointed to 
Birmingham she took a six-month sabbatical, which ended a week before she was 
interviewed. That fits like a glove,’ he exclaimed.

‘It does,’ Sarah agreed. ‘But what do you do about it?’

‘I could simply ask her family, but you’re right; there could be 
sensitivities there. It’s even possible they don’t know about it. Marina 
gave me a pretty full rundown of her sister’s sex life and didn’t mention 
her being pregnant. She may have assumed that I knew from her record, but on 
the other hand, is there any reason why she should? If the child was safely 
delivered, it could have been put up for adoption. Toni was the sort of woman 
who wouldn’t have fancied any impediment to her career ambitions.

‘So no,’ he decided, ‘I won’t take it to Sofia or Marina. Instead 
I’ll do some digging of my own. I have a timeframe, her full name, Antonia 
Maureen Field, and her date of birth; they’ll be enough for the General 
Register Office to get me a hit. But I’m not counting on it.’

‘No?’

‘No. I have a feeling that there’s another possibility, one that might even 
be more likely.’

‘You love this, don’t you?’ Sarah chuckled. ‘The thrill of the chase, 
and all.’

‘It’s what I do, honey,’ he replied. ‘It’s the part of the job that 
I’ve always loved. These days, I don’t have too many chances to be hands 
on, so I take every one that’s going.’

‘Including interviewing the guy tomorrow morning? Surely you don’t really 
have to do that. An ACC alone’s pretty heavy duty, isn’t she?’

‘Oh, I have to do it, make no mistake. Not only was he a police officer until 
a few years ago, his wife still is. I’ve come to rate her in the last couple 
of days, and to like her a lot too. This bastard’s gone and compromised her 
career and even put her in a situation where she had to be formally detained 
for a short while.

‘Tomorrow morning, he’s going to have me across the table, and if he thinks 
that his obligatory lawyer will prevent me from coming down on him like an 
avalanche, he’s kidding himself.’

‘It’s a new thing in Scotland, isn’t it, the prisoner’s right to a 
lawyer?’

Bob nodded. ‘Indeed, but to be frank, I don’t know how we got away with the 
old system for so long. It doesn’t bother me anyway; I’m at my best when I 
don’t say a word.’

Sarah grinned, as a gleam came into her eye. ‘You can say that again, 
buddy,’ she murmured.





Thirty-Eight



‘Where is ma daddy, Uncle Dan?’ Jake Mann asked, not for the first time. 
His godfather realised that there was no ducking the question.

‘I told ye before, Jakey, it’s all hush-hush, but maybe this’ll explain 
it. Ye know your daddy used to be a policeman.’

The child nodded, with vigour. ‘M-hm.’

‘Well, it’s like this. They’ve asked him to go back and help them again. 
Yer mum and I, we’ve been asked no’ tae talk about it, not even tae you.’

‘Wow! Secret squirrels?’

‘That’s right, secret squirrels; undercover.’ He ruffled Jake’s hair. 
‘Now away ye go to your bed, like yer mum asked ye to a while back.’

‘Okay.’ He hugged his honorary uncle and ran into the hall, heading for the 
stairs, as if he was fuelled by excitement.

‘You’re a lovely wee man, Danny Provan,’ Lottie said, from the kitchen 
doorway. ‘I’d never have thought of that.’ She was carrying two plates, 
each loaded with fish and chips still in the wrapper. She handed him one and 
settled into her armchair. ‘It won’t hold up for long, though,’ she 
sighed. ‘Eventually, this is going to hit the press.’

‘Eventually,’ he conceded, ‘but these are special circumstances. The 
husband of the SIO bein’ lifted? Okay, it’s bound to leak within a day or 
two, but Ah’d expect the fiscal tae go to the High Court and get an interdict 
against publishing Scott’s name, at least until the trial begins, maybe even 
till he’s convicted.’

‘There’s no doubt he will be, is there?’

‘Ah’d love tae say he’s got a chance, but Ah can’t. We found the 
wrapping from the parcel in the car. You know as well as I do that the forensic 
people will find fibres on it and match them to a police uniform.’

‘It’s as well for him he is done,’ she barked. ‘I could bloody kill 
him, for what he’s done to Jakey; it’ll be hellish for him at school. Ye 
know what kids are like. I tell you this, even if by some miracle he does get 
out of this, he and I are done. He’s never coming back here. Never!’

‘Come on, Lottie, Scott wouldnae harm his laddie for a’ the tea in China.’

‘And what about me? Do you think he hasn’t harmed me?’

‘No, Ah don’t,’ the sergeant admitted. ‘I concede that. Ah want you to 
know, hen,’ he added, ‘that this has been the worst day of my police 
career. What I had to do this afternoon…’ His voice trailed away, as if he 
had run out of words.

‘But you had to do it, Dan,’ she countered. ‘As you say, you had to do 
it. If you hadn’t, I’d have thought the worse of you, and so would you and 
all, for the rest of your life. You’ve always been a hero to me, since I was 
the rawest DC in the team, but never more so than this afternoon.’





Thirty-Nine



‘You’ll be DCS McIlhenney, then,’ Lowell Payne said as he approached the 
hulking, dark-suited stranger who stood at the entrance to the platform at 
Victoria Station where the Gatwick Express arrived.

‘How do you work that out?’ the other countered.

‘The boss’s description was enough. That and the fact that you’ve got his 
warrant card hung around your neck.’

‘Ah. I deduce that you are a detective. DCI Payne?’

They shook hands. ‘That’s me. It’s a pleasure to meet the other half of 
the Glimmer Twins.’

‘You know my Latino compatriot?’ he asked, surprised. ‘Bob never 
mentioned that.’

‘Yes, I do. I was involved in the investigation in Edinburgh that led up to 
the shit that happened at the weekend. That’s how I met Mario. He and I got 
to the Glasgow concert hall not long after the shooting. Now I find myself 
right in the middle of the follow-up.’

‘You were there?’ McIlhenney’s eyes flashed. ‘How’s Paula? McGuire 
says she’s all right, but I couldn’t be quite sure that he wasn’t 
spinning the truth to keep me off the first plane.’

‘Trust me, he wasn’t,’ Payne assured him. ‘She’s a tough lady. 
Everything happened so fast that I don’t think she had time to be scared. She 
was fine when we got there, shaken, but well in control of herself. From what 
the boss said when he called me last night she still is. Mind you, you can 
think about booking a flight this weekend, from what I hear. The baby’s 
expected by the end of the week.’

‘Is that right? That’s terrific.’ He laughed. ‘Mario has no idea how 
much his life is going to change. He reckoned nothing could ever slow him down, 
but this will. Who knows? I might even get to overtake him.’

He read the question written on Payne’s face. ‘He’s always been first to 
every promotion,’ he explained. ‘Then when I get one, he lands another. 
It’s the same again this time. I come all the way to London to make chief 
super, he stays in bloody Edinburgh, and gets the ACC post.’ He beamed. 
‘There’s a longer ladder here, though; he’ll be struggling from now on. 
He’s got one more rung left in him, max, while I could have two in the Met.’

‘Good for you guys,’ Payne said. ‘I’m not on a ladder any more. I 
won’t see fifty again, I’ve reached my level, and I’m happy with it.’

‘Don’t write yourself off,’ McIlhenney murmured, ‘not if you’re 
working for Bob Skinner.’ He frowned, rubbing his hands together. ‘Now,’ 
he continued, ‘enough career planning. You and I have got a grieving widow to 
interview.’

‘Does she know she’s a widow yet?’

The chief superintendent checked his watch, as they walked towards the station 
exit. ‘She should by now. We ran some checks on her and found that she’s 
not in employment, so we guess that she’s a full-time mum. The family support 
people were going to call on her at nine thirty, and I’ve had no message to 
say that she wasn’t in. It’s going on ten now, so hopefully by the time we 
get there, she’ll have had time to absorb what’s happened.’

‘Or not, as the case may be,’ the visitor countered. ‘It’s the worst 
possible news they’ll have given her. She might not be capable of talking to 
anyone.’

‘In that case, we get a doctor, we sedate her and while she’s in the land 
of nod we search the place, quietly but carefully.’

‘Can we do that?’ Payne wondered. ‘Legally, I mean?’

McIlhenney opened his jacket, displaying an envelope in an inside pocket. 
‘I’ve got warrants,’ he said. ‘Everything the Met does these days has 
to be watertight. We are all book operators now. I hate to think how Bob 
Skinner would get on down here. He’d do his own thing, because that’s all 
he knows, and wind up on page one… just like his bloody wife! That was a 
shocker; it blew me right out of my seat when I saw those pictures. Some of my 
brother officers think it’s funny, fools that they are, to see the big man 
embarrassed like that. How’s it going down in Pitt Street?’

‘Very quietly. The new chief’s reputation travels before him. One of our 
ACCs might be found chortling in a stall in the gents, but he’s got his own 
secret to protect, so he’s poker-faced in public.’

‘Sensible man.’ McIlhenney slowed his pace as they approached a waiting 
police car. ‘I can’t get over Aileen getting herself compromised like that. 
She always struck me as super-cautious, given her political position. What 
doesn’t surprise me, though, is that the marriage was up shit creek even 
without the Morocco complication.’

‘No?’

‘No. Those are two of the most powerful people, personality-wise, that I’ve 
ever met. I never thought it would last. Just as I never thought he and Sarah 
would actually split, even though she can be volatile and though Bob doesn’t 
have quite the same control over his dick that he has over everything else. 
McGuire tells me that Sarah’s back in Edinburgh. Is that right?’

‘So I believe. I have met her, you know. For example, a few years back, at my 
niece’s twenty-first… well, she’s my wife’s niece, really. Sarah and 
Bob weren’t long married at the time. She was well pregnant at the time.’ 
McIlhenney was staring at him, puzzled. ‘Alex,’ he explained. ‘Alexis, 
Bob’s daughter. I’m married to her mother’s sister, although Myra had 
died well before I came on the scene.’

The chief superintendent beamed, then laughed. ‘Jeez,’ he exclaimed, ‘the 
man’s like a fucking octopus; his tentacles are everywhere. He’s had a 
family insider in Strathclyde CID all this time and he’s never let on.’

‘Oh, come on,’ Payne protested, ‘you’re making it sound like I was his 
snitch. I rarely saw him, other than a few times when he came with Alex to 
visit our wee lass, or family events, like weddings and such, and before now 
our paths only ever crossed the once professionally, way back when I was a 
uniform sergeant and he’d just made detective super.’

‘Maybe so, but I’ll bet when you did see him, you spent a hell of a lot 
more time talking about policing than about Auntie Effie’s bunions.’

‘Mmm,’ the DCI murmured. ‘We don’t have an Auntie Effie, but yes, I 
suppose you’re right. It was mostly shop talk. Mind you, I’m not a golfer, 
and I don’t follow football, so there wasn’t much else on the agenda.’

‘Wouldn’t have made any difference,’ McIlhenney assured him. ‘Come on, 
let’s get on our way.’ They slid into the back of the waiting police car. 
‘You know where we’re going?’ he asked the constable at the wheel.

‘Yes, sir,’ the driver replied. ‘There was a message for you while you 
were away,’ he added. ‘The family support gels say it’s okay for you to 
go in. The lady’s been advised, and she’s okay to speak to you.’

‘I hope she’s still okay after we’ve finished,’ the chief 
superintendent grunted.

The car pulled out of the station concourse and into the traffic. ‘Tourist 
route, sir?’ the constable asked.

‘Not this trip. We can show DCI Payne the sights later.’

The visiting detective had no more than a tourist’s knowledge of London, and 
so he sat bewildered as they cut past New Scotland Yard and along a series of 
thoroughfares that might have been in any developed city in the world, had it 
not been for the omnipresence of the Union flag and the Olympic rings, and for 
the Queen’s image beaming from shop windows displayed on a range of souvenir 
products from clothing to crockery. The sun told him that they were heading 
roughly north, and occasionally a sign would advise him that Madame Tussaud’s 
lay a mile from where they were at that moment, or that they were passing an 
underground station called Angel, or that the Mayor of London wished him an 
enjoyable stay in his city.

They had been on the road for twenty minutes when McIlhenney pointed out of the 
window to his left, indicating a modern steel edifice, its clean lines sharp 
against the sky. ‘The Emirates Stadium,’ he announced. ‘Home of Arsenal 
Football Club.’

‘Are you a fan?’

‘No,’ he chuckled. ‘Spence, my older laddie, won’t allow it. He plays 
rugby, pretty well, they say, and I usually follow him on winter Saturdays. Not 
that we’ve had too many of them down here, not yet. Next season, though; 
he’s been accepted by London Scottish. Dads on the touchlines can be bad news 
at junior rugby, but they like me, being a cop.’

And a brick shithouse into the bargain, Payne thought. ‘The stadium. Is that 
where we’re heading?’

‘Not quite. We’re going to the Gunners’ old home, Highbury. In fact,’ 
he paused as they made a turn, ‘there it is.’

Ahead the DCI saw a tall building with ‘Arsenal Stadium’ emblazoned in red 
along its high wall, with a wheeled gun underneath.

‘Who plays there now?’ he asked. As he spoke he glanced forward and caught 
in the rear-view the constable driver giving him a look that might have been 
scornful, or simply one of pity.

‘Nobody, sir,’ he volunteered. ‘It’s been turned into flats and stuff. 
They weren’t allowed to knock down the front of the main stand… more’s 
the pity. Should have bulldozed the lot, if you ask me.’

‘I take it you’re not a follower.’

‘God forbid! No, I’m Totten’am, till I die.’

‘You don’t want to get into that, Lowell,’ McIlhenney advised. ‘Serious 
London tribalism.’

‘When you’ve been on uniform duty at an Old Firm match,’ the visitor 
countered, ‘nothing else can seem all that serious.’

‘Before I came down here, I might have agreed with that.’

The driver indicated a right turn, then waited for oncoming traffic to pass. 
Reading the street sign, St Baldred’s Road, McIlhenney tapped him on the 
shoulder. ‘Don’t turn in there. Pull over here and we’ll walk the rest; 
this vehicle would tell the whole neighbourhood that something’s up.’

‘Sir.’ The PC changed his signal, then parked twenty yards further on. The 
two detectives climbed out, and crossed the street.

St Baldred’s Road told a story of comfortable middle-class prosperity. The 
Millbank family home was four doors along, on the left, a brick terraced villa, 
smart and well-maintained like all of its neighbours.

A blue Fiesta was parked outside, out of place between a Mercedes E-class, and 
a Lexus four-wheel drive with a child seat in the back. Payne glanced inside 
the little Ford and saw two female uniform caps on the front seats. Discretion 
seems to be the watchword in the Met these days, he thought.

The door opened before they reached it; one of the pair, a forty-something, 
salt-and-pepper-haired sergeant, stood waiting for them. ‘How is she?’ 
McIlhenney asked, quietly, as they stepped inside.

‘Shocked, but self-controlled,’ the woman replied. ‘She’s got a kid, 
little Leon. In my experience that usually helps to keep them together.’

‘The child’s here? Not in a nursery?’

‘He’s here, outside in his playground. Molly, PC Bates, my colleague, is 
looking after him. I’m Rita,’ she added ‘Sergeant Caan.’

‘Has she called anyone? Friends, family?’

‘No, not yet. She said something about having to phone her mother, to let her 
know. I said we could do that for her. She felt she had to do that herself, but 
she hasn’t got round to it yet.’

‘Do you know,’ Payne began, ‘if we’re right in our assumption that the 
husband worked for her family business?’

Rita Caan nodded. ‘Yes, spot on. The mother runs it; Golda’s father’s 
dead.’

‘Thanks, that’s helpful; one less question for us. Have you picked up 
anything else?’

She frowned at him. ‘Other than the fact that she’s four and a half months 
pregnant, no.’

‘Doctor on the way?’ McIlhenney asked.

She sighed. ‘Of course he is. It’s standard in a situation like this. She 
didn’t want to bother him, but we persuaded her that he’d want to be 
bothered. He’s coming after his morning surgery.’

‘Good. Sorry, Sergeant. I wasn’t doubting you; I just had to know for sure. 
Let’s see her, then, before the doc gets here.’

‘Okay. She’s in the living room. This way.’ She led them to a solid wood 
door, as old as the house, tapped on it gently, then opened it. ‘Golda,’ 
she called out. ‘My colleagues have arrived. Chief Superintendent McIlhenney 
and Mr Payne, from Scotland. Mr McIlhenney is too, as you’ll realise very 
quickly, but he’s one of ours.’

The widow was in the act of rising as they stepped into the room, which 
extended for the full length of the house, with double doors opening into the 
garden. As Payne looked along he saw a ball bounce into view, and heard a 
toddler’s shout, as Caan’s colleague retrieved it.

‘Don’t get up, Mrs Millbank, please,’ McIlhenney insisted. ‘I’m the 
local,’ he added, ‘he’s the visitor. First and foremost, we are both very 
sorry for your loss.’

‘Thank you,’ Golda Millbank, née Radnor, said. Her voice was quiet, but 
strong, with no hint of a quaver. ‘Please, can you tell me what happened to 
Byron? All that Rita could say is that it was a brain thing.’

‘That’s correct,’ Payne confirmed. ‘An autopsy was performed; it showed 
that your husband suffered a massive, spontaneous subarachnoid cerebral 
haemorrhage. Death would have been almost instantaneous, the pathologist 
said.’

‘When did this happen?’

‘Last week.’

‘Last week?’ she repeated. ‘Then why has it taken so long for you to tell 
me?’

‘When your husband’s body was found,’ the DCI explained, ‘he had no 
identification on him. It took the police in Edinburgh some time to find out 
who he was.’

‘What does Edinburgh have to do with it?’

‘That’s where he was found.’

‘But he was supposed to be in Manchester, then in Glasgow, at a jewellery 
fair, and then in Inverness, visiting one of our suppliers. I don’t 
understand why he would be in Edinburgh.’

‘When was he due home, Mrs Millbank?’ McIlhenney asked.

‘Not until today; I expected him back this evening.’

‘When was the last time you spoke to him?’

‘On the day he left for Scotland. Byron doesn’t like mobile phones; he 
won’t have one. When he’s away on business, I don’t expect to hear from 
him, unless he sends me an email. He tends to do everything through his 
computer. He has a laptop, a MacBook Air. It goes everywhere with him; he says 
that all his life is on it.’

‘When did you meet him?’ The DCS kept his tone casual.

‘When he came to work for my parents’ business; I called in there one day, 
a few months after he started. Neither my father nor mother were there but he 
was. He introduced himself and,’ she smiled, ‘that was that.’ She shook 
her head. ‘He was such a fit, strong man. I can’t believe this has 
happened.’ She stared at McIlhenney, and then at Payne. ‘Are you telling me 
the truth?’ she asked. Her voice was laden with suspicion. ‘Has somebody 
killed my husband?’

It was Payne who replied. ‘No, absolutely not. I assure you, his death was 
completely natural. I can get you a copy of the post-mortem report, if it’ll 
help you. I can even arrange for you to speak to the pathologist, Dr Grace. 
She’s one of the best in the business, I promise you. If there had been any 
sign of violence, or anything other than natural causes, she’d have found 
it.’

‘Then why are you here?’ she demanded. ‘You two, you’re detectives, 
you’re not wearing uniforms like Rita and Molly. And you, Mr Payne, you’ve 
come all the way from Scotland. Would you do that if there was not something 
more to this?’

‘When he died, Mrs Millbank, he was unattended, not seen by a doctor,’ the 
DCI explained. ‘That makes it a police matter; nothing sinister, a formality 
really, but we have to complete a report.’

‘Very good, but such things must happen every day. For a senior officer to 
come down to London… please, Mr Payne, don’t take me for a fool.’

He glanced at the DCS, who nodded. ‘Very well, there is more to it,’ he 
admitted. ‘Can I ask you, Mrs Millbank, how much do you know of your 
husband’s background, of his life before you two met?’

‘I know that he was born in Eastbourne, that he never knew his father and 
that his mother is dead. He spent some time in Israel, was a lieutenant in the 
army, but left because of his opposition to the Iraq war, worked in mail order 
and finally for an investment bank, before he joined Rondar… that’s our 
family business.’

‘How about friends, family? Did you ever meet any of them?’

‘He has no family, and as for friends, when he left the army, he left them 
behind too. We have friends, as a couple, but that’s it.’

‘Has he ever mentioned a man called Brian Lightbody, from New Zealand, or 
Richie Mallett, an Australian? Or have you ever heard of either of them 
indirectly?’

She shook her head. ‘No. Those names mean nothing to me. Why do you ask?’

‘Because we know that your husband ate with them in a kosher restaurant in 
Glasgow, on the day he died, and that they were all registered in the same 
hotel, and that the other two told staff they were there for the jewellery 
fair.’

‘So?’ she retorted. ‘That’s your explanation surely. I don’t know 
everybody in the business, and if they were jewellery buyers also, they do tend 
to be in the same place at the same time.’

‘Sure, but… Mrs Millbank, Lightbody and Mallett weren’t jewellery buyers, 
and those weren’t their real names. I’m not free to tell you at this stage 
who they were, but we do know, and we do know their real business.’

‘Are you saying they killed Byron?’

‘No,’ Payne insisted, ‘I am not, but they were with him when he died. 
There is physical evidence that one or both of them tried to revive him after 
he collapsed. When they failed, they removed all the identification from his 
body, including his clothing, and concealed him. Then, after a day or so, they 
called the police and told them where he could be found.’

Golda Millbank opened her mouth but found that she could not speak. She looked 
towards Rita Caan, as if for help. ‘Is this…’ she whispered.

‘I don’t know any of it,’ the sergeant told her. ‘It’s not what I do. 
Molly and me, we’re only family support, honest.’

‘It’s true, Mrs Millbank,’ McIlhenney said. ‘We’re here to find out 
everything you knew about your husband and about what he did.’

‘I know all about him,’ she insisted. ‘He was a good husband and a 
faithful family man. Or are you trying to tell me that he had a piece on the 
side?’

‘Not for a second, but suppose he did, that wouldn’t be our business. Let 
me chuck another name at you. Beram Cohen; Israeli national. Mean anything?’

Both he and Payne gazed at her, concentrating on her expression, looking for 
any twitch, any hint of recognition, but neither saw any, only utter 
bewilderment.

‘No,’ she declared. ‘I’ve never heard of him.’ She rose from her 
chair. ‘I have to phone my mother. She needs to know what’s happening 
here.’

‘Where will she be at this moment?’ the DCS asked.

‘She’ll be at work.’

‘In that case, I’m sorry, but we’d rather you didn’t contact her.’ He 
paused. ‘Look, Mrs Millbank, I’m as satisfied as I can be that you know no 
more about your husband than you’re telling us. But let me ask you, how 
successful is the family business? I could find out through Companies House, 
but if you know, it would save time.’

She took a deep breath, frowning. ‘I can tell you that. I’m a director, so 
I know. Frankly, it’s been on its last legs since my father died three years 
ago. We’re being out-marketed by other companies and we don’t have the 
expertise in the company to reverse the trend. Mummy’s trying to sell it, but 
there are no takers.’

‘Byron wasn’t a director?’

‘No, Mummy wouldn’t allow that. She didn’t want a situation where she 
could be outvoted. There’s just the two of us on the board; I’m unpaid of 
course.’

‘How about Byron? Was he on a good salary?’

‘Thirty-five thousand. He had to take a pay cut at the beginning of last 
year, down from fifty.’

‘In that case, living in his house must be a stretch,’ McIlhenney 
suggested. ‘This isn’t the cheapest part of London, from what I’m told. 
How long have you lived here?’

‘We bought it when Leon was on the way, and moved in just after he was born. 
But it’s okay, we get by easily, because we don’t have a mortgage.’

‘Lucky you. Did your father leave you money?’

‘No. It was Byron. He made a pile in bonuses working with the bank, and never 
spent it. He wasn’t the type to buy a flashy sports car or anything like 
that. No, one way or another we’ve always been comfortably off.’ Her eyes 
narrowed. ‘Are you saying…’

‘I’m not saying anything,’ the DCS replied. ‘I’m asking. We’re 
trying to build up a complete picture of Byron. To do that we need to search, 
where he lived, where he worked, everywhere we can. Was he a member of a sports 
club, for example?’

‘He played squash, but otherwise he wasn’t the clubbable sort. He ran, on 
the streets, he cycled and he did things like chins and press-ups… he could 
do hundreds of those things… but always on his own.’

‘So all his private life was here in this house?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did he have a computer here?’ Payne asked.

‘We have one, yes, but it’s mine and he never used it. I’ve told you, he 
had his laptop, his MacBook, and he took that with him when he left.’

‘Can we look in your machine nonetheless? Just in case he was able to access 
it without you knowing about it.’

She let out a sigh, of sheer exasperation. ‘Yes, if you must, but honestly, 
Byron wouldn’t do that, any more than I would look in his. That’s assuming 
I could get into it. He used to laugh about it and say that breaking his 
password was as likely as winning the Lottery.’

‘If that’s so,’ McIlhenney said, ‘I wouldn’t like to try to access 
it, just in case it spoiled my luck for the jackpot.’

‘No worries of that happening,’ Payne pointed out.

‘You mean you didn’t find it,’ the widow asked, ‘among his effects?’

‘I told you, we didn’t find anything, Mrs Millbank. Not even his clothes.’

She shuddered and for a second her eyes moistened, her first sign of weakness. 
‘How awful,’ she whispered. ‘Robbing a dead man. How could they have done 
that? Of course I’ll help you in any way I can. What do you need to see?’

‘That computer for a start,’ the DCS replied. ‘If you could take us 
through it, looking for any files you don’t recognise, and at its history, 
its usage pattern. Then if we could look though his belongings, and examine any 
area where he might have worked at home.’

‘There wasn’t one. He never did. But you can look. If it’ll help, you can 
look; anything that’ll help you find those so-called friends of his.’

‘Oh, we know where they are,’ Payne said.

‘Then what are you looking for?’

‘I’m afraid it’s one of those situations where we won’t know until we 
find it. And if we do,’ he added, ‘we might not be able to tell you, for 
your own protection.’

Her forehead wrinkled. ‘That sounds a little scary. You can’t tell me 
anything?’

‘No more than we have already.’

‘Nothing? What about that name you mentioned, the Israeli man, Beram Cohen. 
Where does he fit? Who is he?’

The DCI looked at his escort colleague, raising his eyebrows, asking a silent 
question. McIlhenney hesitated, then nodded.

‘I’m sorry, Mrs Millbank,’ Payne replied, ‘but he was your husband.’





Forty



‘Thanks, Bridie,’ Skinner said, as the ACC rose from her chair at his 
meeting table, their morning briefing session having come to an end. ‘I’ll 
give you a shout when I’m ready to start interviewing Scott Mann. He can stew 
for a bit longer.’

‘His lawyer’s not going to like that,’ she pointed out.

‘Then tough shit on him. The Supreme Court says he has a right to be there, 
but we still set the timetable, up to a point, and we haven’t reached that 
yet. He can wait with his client.’

Gorman liked what she heard; her smile confirmed it.

‘Do something for me,’ he continued. ‘Ask Dan Provan to come up here, 
straight away. With Lottie being stood down, he’s carrying the ball, and I 
need to speak to him.’

The third person in the room was on his feet also, but the chief waved him back 
down. ‘Stay for a bit, Michael, please. I’d like a word.’

ACC Thomas frowned, but did as he was asked.

‘I want to apologise to you,’ Skinner began as soon as the door had closed 
behind Gorman.

‘For what, Chief?’ For which of the many ways I’ve been offended? he 
thought.

‘For asking you to attend Toni Field’s post-mortem. It’s been suggested 
to me since then that your relationship might have been more than professional. 
If I’d been aware of that at the time, no way would I have asked you to go.’

‘Even if the suggestion was untrue?’

‘Even then, because I wouldn’t have been quizzing you about it. If you and 
she had a fling away from the office, so what? When I was on my way up the 
ladder, and widowed, I had a long-standing relationship with a female 
colleague. Nobody ever questioned it and if anyone had they’d have been told 
very quickly to fuck off.’

‘Then I accept your apology, and I appreciate it, sir… although it wasn’t 
really necessary, since it was my duty as a senior officer to attend the 
autopsy.’

Skinner grinned. ‘Which means, by implication, that if it was yours, then it 
was mine even more, and I shirked it.’

‘I didn’t say that.’

‘No, but if you had I couldn’t have argued, ’cos you’d have been right. 
The truth is, I’ve seen more hacked-about bodies than you or I have had years 
in the force, combined, and I tend not to volunteer to see any more. I should 
have stood up for that one, though.’

Thomas shook his head. ‘No, you shouldn’t,’ he said.

‘How do you work that out?’ the chief asked.

‘Because the examination was performed by your ex-wife, who still speaks of 
you with a smile and a twinkle in her eye; in my book that disqualifies you as 
a witness. Suppose that she’d made a mistake, and her findings had been 
challenged by the defence in a future trial and you’d wound up in the witness 
box. You’d have been hopelessly compromised.’

Skinner stared at him. ‘Do you know, Michael,’ he murmured, ‘you are 
absolutely right. It’s years since I attended one of Sarah’s autopsies, but 
I have done, when we were married. I shouldn’t have, unarguably. I should 
have known that, so why didn’t it dawn on me?’

‘I’d guess because the possibility of her slipping up didn’t enter your 
head,’ Thomas suggested. ‘She does seem very efficient.’

‘She’s all that. She gave up pathology for a while, when we went our 
separate ways, but I’m glad she’s back. I confess that the very thought of 
what she does turns my stomach from time to time, but I can say the same about 
my own career.’

‘Is it public knowledge?’

The chief blinked. ‘What?’

‘Toni and me. Does everybody know?’

‘From what I gather, most of the force does.’

‘Jesus!’ The ACC stared at the ceiling. ‘It’s never got back to me, 
then. I’ve never heard a whisper, not once. And once is the number of times 
it happened so how the…’

‘You were unlucky. You were seen by the wrong people, the kind whose 
discretion gene was removed at birth. Max Allan did what damage limitation he 
could, but for what it’s worth, when Lowell Payne gets back from a wee job 
I’ve given him, I’m going to ask him to root out the people who started the 
story. Then I’m going to draw them a very clear picture of their futures in 
the force. What’s the shittiest part of our vast patch, Michael? Where does 
no PC want to be posted?’

‘I’ll give it some thought,’ Thomas growled.

Skinner nodded and pushed his chair back. ‘You do that,’ he declared. 
‘Let’s you and I start again, with a clean sheet,’ he added, extending 
his hand.

As the two men shook, Skinner’s phone rang. ‘Need to take this,’ he said. 
‘It might be Payne.’

It was.

‘We’ve just left Mrs Millbank, Chief,’ his exec told him. ‘We got 
nothing from it. Neither of us believe that she had a clue about her 
husband’s previous, or any idea about his sideline. It helped their 
lifestyle, though; the family business is pretty well fucked, but they live 
debt-free and drive a nice Lexus.’

‘But no clue to where he kept his Cohen money?’

‘Yes and no. The wife, widow now, told us that he had a computer, an Apple 
MacBook Air laptop that he was never parted from. His life was in it, was how 
she put it. Am I right in thinking that hasn’t shown up anywhere?’

‘You are,’ Skinner agreed. ‘Nothing of his has turned up. He was buried 
naked, wrapped in a sheet. Leave that with me, Lowell. I’ll check it out and 
get people moving if I have to. Where are you off to now?’

‘To check out his workplace, in the Elephant and Castle, wherever that is. 
It’ll be a shock for his mother-in-law, or maybe not, depending on how she 
felt about him. From what I gather, Byron, or Beram, wasn’t much bloody good 
as a buyer. That’s what the father did, and the business has been suffering 
since his death.’

‘Let me know how you get on. Then we can decide whether there’s anything 
else to be done in London.’

‘Will do, boss.’

The chief constable flicked a button on his console to end the call, another 
for an outside line, then dialled a number that was ingrained in his memory, 
yet which he had never called before.

A female voice answered. ‘Yes?’

‘Bet you got a shock when that rang,’ he said. ‘Theory being that it’s 
for your private calls, and not routed through the comms centre.’

‘Are you kidding?’ Maggie Steele replied. ‘This is the fourth call I’ve 
had on it. One was from Chief Constable Haggerty in Dumfries, another was from 
Archbishop Gainer, and the third was from old John Hunter, the freelance 
journalist, who’s got onset dementia and asked me for a prawn biryani with 
naan bread. He got me mixed up with the Asian takeaway. Are there any of your 
friends who don’t have this number, Bob?’

‘One or two. How are you getting on?’

‘Okay, but I still feel a wee bit overawed. It feels strange, sitting in this 
chair, and you on the other side of the country. Only for three months though, 
yes?’

‘That’s the duration of my appointment,’ he agreed, ‘or my loan if 
you’d rather put it that way.’

‘Can I have a straight answer to that question? You will be back, won’t 
you?’

‘That’s my intention.’

‘Bob! Don’t prevaricate. Have you been seduced by the bright lights and the 
glitter balls of Glasgow already?’

‘No, but…’

‘I knew it!’ she declared.

‘No, really. I still have three months in my head, for reasons that are more 
than just professional.’

‘The kids, I imagine.’

‘And Sarah,’ he added, ‘but keep that very much to yourself. I know that 
you and she didn’t always see eye to eye, but much of that was my fault. 
It’s best for us as a family that she’s here, and that we get along.’

‘But? I can still hear it, hanging there.’

‘But, there are good people through here, Mags, and they need leadership. 
There is no successor here, from within, and frankly, nobody else in Scotland 
either, except possibly for Andy, and he wouldn’t want it.

‘The force has already been disrupted and demoralised by Toni Field, God rest 
her, by her blind ambition and her half-arsed ideas. I’ll hear about the 
likely runners when the job is advertised. If I don’t fancy any of them, I 
won’t rule out applying for the post myself.

‘As I say that, I’m thinking that it sounds incredibly conceited, but I am 
a good cop and I do believe that I’m capable of doing the job, in spite of 
the misgivings I’ve always held about the size of this effing force.’

‘That’s not conceited,’ she retorted, ‘it’s the plain truth. And 
beyond that,’ she asked, ‘will you go for the police commissioner post, if 
unification happens?’

‘I haven’t thought that far, but if I can overcome my doubts about policing 
half of Scotland, I suspect I’ll be able to do the same about the rest.’

Maggie laughed. ‘Now there’s a sea change, after what you were saying in 
the press last weekend. If it’s what you want, Bob, or what you feel you have 
to do, good luck, although I’ll worry about who we might get here as your 
permanent successor.’

‘I’m listening to her,’ he said.

‘Nice of you to say so, but I don’t have the seniority. The councillors on 
the Police Authority won’t have it.’

‘The councillors will have it, because I’ll bloody tell them. Their 
political parties all owe me favours and I will call them in, make no 
mistake.’

‘But maybe I don’t want it,’ she suggested.

‘Bollocks,’ he laughed. ‘You do, because your late husband would have 
insisted on it.’

He heard her sigh. ‘You’ve got me there. Stevie would. Hell, though, my 
in-tray’s stacked high here, and yours must be even bigger.’

‘True, but I didn’t just call you to shoot the breeze. I need your help in 
our top-priority investigation, Toni Field’s assassination. You weren’t 
really involved when it began, but are you up to speed now?’

‘Yes,’ she confirmed, ‘fully.’

‘In that case, you’ll know it all began when we found the body of a man in 
Edinburgh, having been directed by the people who left him there, his 
ex-soldier buddies. They’re now dead, having been killed on the scene after 
the Field hit. We’ve found their car, and what was in it, including the body 
of a well-known Glasgow hoodlum. Although we haven’t linked his death to 
them, but there was nothing there that referred back to Cohen. Everything that 
he had is missing. That includes a MacBook Air laptop… you know, the 
super-light kind… and that’s what we would most like to find.

‘It may no longer exist. Freddy Welsh told me he burned his clothes but he 
didn’t mention the computer. Maybe that went into the fire as well, but maybe 
not. Either way, Freddy needs to be asked; use Special Branch. Have George 
Regan go to see him. He’s been well softened up, so he’ll talk with no 
persuasion.

‘If he can’t help us, I would like you to institute a search, city-wide, 
but looking initially at the area near Welsh’s yard, where Cohen died, and 
around Mortonhall, where he was found. Will you do that for me?’

‘Of course. What’s on the computer?’

‘I don’t know; his wife in London said his whole life was on it, but maybe 
that means nothing more than his iTunes collection and photographs of her and 
their kid. On the other hand, there may be the key that unlocks all the fucking 
boxes.

‘We know already all there is to know about Byron Millbank; that’s the 
alias he was given by somebody’s friends at MI5. If what the widow told 
Lowell Payne and Neil McIlhenney is literally true, the MacBook, if it still 
exists and we can find it, may tell us everything we need to know about Beram 
Cohen, including the name of the person who paid him to kill the chief 
constable of Strathclyde, and why.’

‘We’ll get on it right away,’ Steele promised.

‘Thanks,’ Skinner said. ‘It’s a long shot, I know, but if you don’t 
buy a ticket, you won’t win the raffle.’





Forty-One



‘Where have you been, Sarge?’ Banjo Paterson asked, as Provan came into the 
room. ‘The DI was on the phone looking for you.’

‘Did ye tell her I’ll call her back?’

‘No. I thought you might not want to. It’s awkward with her being 
suspended.’

‘She’s not fuckin’ suspended!’ Provan yelled, flaring up in sudden 
fury. ‘She’s on family leave. If I hear that word used once more Ah’ll 
have your nuts in a vice, son.’

The DC backed off, holding up his hands as if to keep the little man at bay. 
‘Sorry, sorry, sorry.’

‘Aye, well… just mind your tongue from now on.’

‘Understood. So,’ he continued, ‘where have you been? You went out that 
door like a greyhound. I’ve never seen you move so fast.’

‘Doesnae do tae keep the chief constable waiting,’ the DS said, a smirk of 
bashful pride turning up one corner of his mouth.

Paterson whistled. ‘A summons from on high, eh? What did he want?’

‘He wants us to do a wee job for him. Ah need you to get intae your computer 
and find me a phone number for the equivalent of the General Register Office in 
the Republic of Mauritius… wherever the fuck that is.’

‘It’s in the Indian Ocean. Give me a minute.’

Provan looked on as he bent over his keyboard, typed a few words, clicked once, 
twice, a third time, then scribbled on a notepad. ‘There you are,’ he 
announced, as he ripped off the top sheet and handed it over. ‘That’s the 
number of the head office of the Civil Status Division, in the Emmanuel 
Anquetil Building, Port Louis, Mauritius.’ He glanced at the wall clock. ‘I 
make that fifteen seconds short of the minute.’

‘Since you’re that fuckin’ clever, can you access birth records through 
that thing?’

‘I doubt it, but I’ll have a look.’ He turned back to the screen and to 
his search engine, but soon shook his head. ‘No, sorry; not that I can see. 
You’ll have to call them.’

‘Will Ah be able to speak the language?’

‘Possibly not; it’s English.’

‘Cheeky bastard,’ the DS growled, but with a grin. He dialled the number 
Paterson had given him. The voice that answered was female, with a musical 
quality.

He introduced himself, speaking slowly, as if to a child. ‘I am trying to 
find the record of a birth that may have taken place in your country two years 
ago.’

‘Hold on please, sir. I will direct you to the correct department.’

He waited for two minutes and more, becoming more and more annoyed by the sound 
of a woman crooning in a tongue he did not understand, but which he recognised 
as having Bollywood overtones. Finally, she stopped in mid-chorus and was 
replaced by a man.

‘Yes, sir,’ he began. ‘I understand you are a police officer and are 
seeking information. Is this an official inquiry?’ His voice was clipped and 
his accent offered a hint that he might have understood the lyrics of the 
compulsory music.

‘Of course it is,’ Provan replied, his limited patience close to being 
exhausted, ‘as official as ye can get. It’s a murder investigation.’

‘In that case, sir, how can I be of help?’

‘Ah’m lookin’ for a birth record. Ah don’t know for certain that 
it’ll be there, but ma boss has asked me to check it out. All we have is the 
name of the mother, Antonia Field.’

‘What is the date?’

‘We don’t know that either, just that it was two years ago, in the period 
between January and June. The lady took six months off work tae have the child, 
so our guess is that it was probably born round about May or early June.’

‘Field, you said?’

‘Aye, but when she lived in Mauritius she was known as Day Champs.’

‘Pardon?’

‘Day Champs.’

‘Are you trying to say Deschamps, officer?’ He spelled it out, letter by 
letter.

‘Aye, that’s it.’

‘Very good. I will search for you. If you tell me your number, I will call 
you back. That way I will know that you really are a policeman.’

‘Fair enough.’ Provan gave the official the switchboard number, and his own 
extension, then hung up.

With time to kill, he wandered into Lottie Mann’s empty office, sat at her 
desk, picked up the phone and dialled her number.

She answered on the first ring. ‘Dan?’

‘Aye. How’re ye doin’, kid?’

‘Terrible. Wee Jakey isn’t buying the story about his dad any more. I’ve 
had to tell him the truth, and it’s breaking his wee heart.’

‘Maybe he’ll be home soon,’ the sergeant suggested, knowing as he spoke 
how unlikely that was.

‘Get real, Dan,’ she sighed. ‘There’s more. On Sunday I gave Scott 
thirty quid to take the wee man out for the day. They went to that theme park 
out near Hamilton. It occurred to me, that’s a hell of a lot more than thirty 
quid’s worth, so I had a rummage in his half of the wardrobe. I found an 
envelope in a jacket pocket, with four hundred and twenty quid in it. The 
envelope had a crest on the back: Brown Brothers Private Hire.’

Provan felt his stomach flip. ‘Lottie,’ he murmured. ‘What are ye telling 
me this for? Ah’ll have tae report it now.’

‘No you won’t. I’ve done that already, I called ACC Gorman and told 
her.’ She paused. ‘Here, did you think I was going to cover it up? For 
fuck’s sake, Danny!’ she protested. ‘Don’t you know me better than 
that?’

‘Aye, right,’ he sighed. ‘Ah shouldae known better. Sorry, lass.’

‘Have they interviewed him yet?’ she asked. ‘The big bosses?’

‘They’ll just be startin’ about now. Ah’m no long back frae seein’ 
the chief. He was just gettin’ ready to go down there, him and Bridie.’

‘Then God help my idiot husband. There’s no prizes for guessing who’ll 
play “bad cop” out of that pair, and I would not like that bugger sitting 
across the table from me. Why were you seein’ him anyway?’ she asked. 
‘Are you telling me there’s been a development?’

‘No, just something he asked me to handle for him.’ As he spoke he heard a 
phone ring outside, then saw Paterson pick up his own line. The DC spoke a few 
words, then beckoned to him. ‘I think that’s ma contact now,’ he said. 
‘Ah’ll need tae go. Ah’ll call ye if I hear anything from the 
interview.’





Forty-Two



The chief constable paused outside the door of the interview room. ‘Who’s 
his solicitor?’ he asked his deputy.

‘Her name’s Viola Murphy,’ Bridie Gorman told him. ‘She’s a hotshot 
in Glasgow, a solicitor advocate… that means…’

‘I know what it means. She takes the case the whole way through, from first 
interview to appearing in the High Court. I know about her too. She was one of 
my daughter’s tutors when she did her law degree. Alex couldn’t stand 
her.’

‘Will she know you?’

‘Not personally. She might from the media, though.’

‘Of course, she’s bound to. How do you want to play this?’

‘Very simply. We’re going to walk in there and inside five minutes Mr Mann 
is going to be singing like a linty. He’ll tell us everything we want to 
know. And you know what? It might even be true.’

Gorman was sceptical. ‘Mmm. I know Scott. He used to be a cop, remember, a 
DC. He’s interviewed people in his time, so he’ll know what’s going on in 
here. He’ll know that he has a perfect right not to say a single word, and 
you can bet that’s how Viola bloody Murphy will have advised him to play 
it.’

‘We’ll see. You keep her in her box and let me have a go at him. Remember, 
the right to silence goes both ways.’ He opened the door and stepped into the 
interview room.

Scott Mann was seated at a rectangular table. His solicitor was by his side, 
but she shot to her feet. ‘I don’t appreciate being kept waiting like 
this,’ she protested.

Skinner ignored her. He and Gorman took their places and she reached across and 
switched on the twin-headed recorder, then glanced up and over her shoulder to 
check that the video camera was showing a red light.

‘I mean it,’ Viola Murphy insisted. ‘I am a busy woman, and you’ve kept 
me sitting here for an hour and a half. I promise you, as soon as this 
interview is over I’ll be complaining to your chief constable.’

Now there’s a real kick in the ego, Skinner thought. She doesn’t know who I 
am after all.

‘For the purposes of the tape,’ the deputy began, ‘I am ACC Bridget 
Gorman, accompanied by acting Chief Constable Bob Skinner, here to interview Mr 
Scott Mann, whose legal representative is also present.’

Murphy glared at Skinner, but could not hide her surprise at his presence. He 
could read her mind. If the top man is doing this interview himself, my client 
is in much deeper shit than I thought.

‘Well? Get on with it,’ she snapped.

‘Ms Murphy,’ Gorman said, ‘you’re here to advise Mr Mann of his legal 
rights and to ensure that these aren’t infringed. But you don’t speak for 
him, and you don’t direct us.’

As they spoke, Skinner fixed his gaze on Scott Mann, drawing his eyes to him 
and locking them to his as if by a beam. He held him captive, not blinking, not 
saying a word, keeping his head rock steady. The silent exchange went on for 
almost a minute, until the prisoner could stand the invisible pressure no 
longer and broke free, staring down at the desk.

‘Look at me,’ the chief murmured, just loud enough for the recorders to 
pick up. ‘I want to see what we’re dealing with here. I want to see what 
sort of person you are. So far I’ve seen nothing; a nonentity in the literal 
sense of the word. They say you were a cop once. They say you’re a loving 
husband and father. I don’t see any of those people; they’re all hiding 
from me. Look at me, Scott.’

‘Mr Skinner!’ Viola Murphy yelled, her voice shrill. ‘I won’t bloody 
have this! I protest!’

His head moved, very slightly, and his eyes engaged hers. She stared back, and 
shivered, in spite of herself.

‘No you don’t,’ he told her, in a matter-of-fact voice. ‘You sit there, 
you stay silent and you do not interfere with my interview. If you raise your 
voice to me again and use any more abusive language, I will suspend these 
proceedings and charge you with breach of the peace, and possibly also with 
obstruction. Then we will wait for another lawyer to arrive to represent both 
Mr Mann and you.’

‘You’re joking,’ she gasped.

‘I have a long and distinguished record of never joking, Ms Murphy. I advise 
you not to test me.’ He turned back to Mann who was looking at him once more, 
astonished. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I have your attention again.’

He fell silent once more, then reached inside his jacket, and produced what 
appeared to be three rectangles of white card. He turned the top one over, to 
reveal a photograph, of Detective Inspector Charlotte Mann, then laid it in 
front of her husband.

‘For the tape,’ he said, ‘I am showing the prisoner a photo of his wife, 
a senior CID officer.’

He turned the second image over and placed it beside the first.

‘For the tape,’ he said, ‘I am showing the prisoner a photo of his son, 
Jake Mann.’

He turned the third over and put it beside the other, watching Mann recoil in 
horror as he did so.

‘For the tape,’ he said, ‘I am showing the prisoner a close-up photo of 
the body of Chief Constable Antonia Field, taken after she was shot three times 
in the head in the Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, on Saturday evening.’

He paused, as the shock on the prisoner’s face turned into something else: 
fear.

‘What I’m asking you now, Mr Mann,’ he continued, ‘is this. How could 
you betray your wife and compromise her career, how could you condemn your wee 
boy to the whispers and finger-pointing of his school pals, by being part of 
the conspiracy that led to Toni Field lying there on the floor with her brains 
beside her?’ His gaze hardened again; in an instant his eyes became as cold 
as dry ice. He reached inside his jacket again and produced a fourth image. It 
was grainy but clear enough.

‘For the tape,’ he said, ‘I am showing the prisoner a photograph of 
himself in the act of handing a parcel to a second man, identified as Mr Basil 
Brown, also known as Bazza.’

He glanced at the solicitor. ‘To anticipate what should be Ms Murphy’s next 
question, we know that Mr Mann was not receiving the package because that image 
was taken from a CCTV recording that shows the exchange. However, Ms Murphy, 
your client did receive something from Mr Brown and that is also shown on the 
video.’

His hand went to his jacket once more, but this time to the right side pocket. 
He produced a clear evidence bag and slammed it on to the table. ‘For the 
tape,’ he announced, ‘I am showing Mr Mann an envelope which his wife 
discovered today in their home and sent to us. It bears the crest of Mr 
Brown’s taxi firm and contains four hundred and twenty pounds.

‘It hasn’t yet been tested for fingerprints and DNA but when it is we’re 
confident it will link the two men. We can’t ask Mr Brown about this as he 
was found dead in Glasgow on Sunday. However, Mr Mann, we don’t need him, or 
even that evidence. We’ve recovered the paper from the package you handed 
over and we’ve got your DNA and prints, and his, from that. We can also prove 
that the package contained two police uniforms, worn as disguises by the men 
who assassinated Chief Constable Field.’

He stopped, and locked eyes with Mann yet again. His subject, the former 
detective, and veteran of many interviews, was white as a sheet and trembling.

‘All that means,’ Skinner continued, ‘that we can prove you were an 
integral part of the plot to murder my predecessor, and it is our duty to 
charge you with that crime.

‘You’ll be lonely in the dock, Scott; it’ll just be you and Freddy Welsh, 
the man who supplied the guns. Everybody else in the chain is dead, bar one, 
the man who gave the order for the hit, recruited the planner and funded the 
operation.’ He paused. ‘I think we’ve reached the point,’ he went on, 
‘where you bury your face in your hands and burst into tears.’

And Mann did exactly that.

Skinner waited, allowing the storm to break, to run its course and then to 
abate. When the prisoner had regained a semblance of self-control, he asked 
him, ‘What’s your story, Scott? For I’m sure you have one.’

‘My client,’ Viola Murphy interposed, ‘isn’t obliged to say anything.’

The chief sighed, then smiled. ‘I know that as well as you do,’ he replied. 
‘And you know as well as I do that given the evidence we have against him, if 
your client takes that option and sticks to it, then the best he can hope for 
is a cell with a sea view.

‘Silence will be no defence, Ms Murphy. The best you will be able to offer 
will be a plea in mitigation, and by that time it will be too late, because 
once he’s convicted, the sentence will be mandatory. I’m offering the pair 
of you the chance to make that plea to me now, and through me to the fiscal, 
before he’s charged with anything.’

‘He said he was only borrowin’ them,’ Scott Mann blurted out. ‘He said 
he would give me them back.’

‘Okay,’ the chief responded. ‘Now for the big question. Did he tell you 
why he was borrowing them?’

‘He said it was for a fancy dress dance, for charity. He told me that he and 
Cec wanted tae go as polis, and that they wanted it to be authentic.’

Skinner leaned forward. ‘And you seriously believed that?’ he exclaimed.

‘I chose to. The fact is, sir, Ah didn’t want to know what they were really 
for, because I didn’t have any choice.’

‘What do you mean by that? You had a very simple choice. You could have told 
your wife that Bazza Brown had asked you to acquire two police uniforms for 
him, and let her handle his request. Jesus, man, even if your half-arsed story 
is true, by not telling Lottie and co-operating with Brown, you condemned a 
woman to death.’

‘I ken that now,’ Mann wailed. ‘But like I said, I didnae have any 
choice. Bazza’s had a hold on me from way back, since I was a cop. It’s 
no’ just the drink that’s a problem for me. Ah’m an addictive 
personality. Anything I do, I do it to the limit and beyond.’

‘Drugs?’

‘Not that: gambling. Horses, mostly, but there was the cards too. Bazza’s 
old man was ma bookie, and then he died and the brothers took over. Bazza gave 
me a tab, extended credit, he called it, but what he was really doin’ was 
lettin’ me pile up debt. One night he introduced me to a poker school. Ah did 
all right early on, but I think that was rigged, to suck me in. Then I lost it 
all back, but Ah was beyond stoppin’ by then. Bazza kept on stakin’ me, 
letting my tab get bigger and bigger. It got completely out of control, until 
before I knew it I was about seventy-five grand down, on top of twelve and a 
half that I’d owed him before.’

He paused, and his eyes found Skinner, reversing their earlier roles. ‘That 
was when I was truly fucked. He pressed me for the money, even though he knew I 
didnae have it. He got heavy. He threatened me, he threatened Lottie and he 
even threatened wee Jakey, even though he was only a baby then.

‘I threatened him back, or Ah tried to, told him he was messing wi’ a cop 
and that I could have him done. He laughed at me; then he put a blade to my 
throat and told me that it would be the easiest thing in the world for me to be 
found up a close in an abandoned tenement with a needle hangin’ out my arm 
and an overdose of heroin in ma bloodstream. And Bazza did not kid about those 
things. So I agreed tae pay him off in kind.’

‘How?’ the chief murmured.

‘I became his grass, within the force. I told him everything we knew about 
him. Every time he was under surveillance he knew about it. If one of his boys 
was ever done for anything, Ah’d fix the evidence, or I’d give Bazza a list 
of the witnesses against him and he’d sort them.’

‘You mean he killed them?’

‘No, he never needed to go that far. That would have been stupid, and he 
wasn’t.’

‘So you were his safety net within the force?’

‘Aye. And I got uniforms for him, once before.’

‘You did? When?’

‘About six months before I was kicked out. He gave me the same story: a fancy 
dress party. That time he did give me them back, after they’d been used in a 
robbery at an MoD arms depot. All the guys that were in on it were caught 
eventually, apart from Bazza.’ He frowned. ‘That was a funny one, a Special 
Branch job rather than our CID.’

And I know why, Skinner thought. Bazza was off limits on the NCIS database 
because he’d grassed on his accomplices in the robbery . . . or possibly set 
the whole thing up for MI5.

‘How did you get the uniforms, then and this time?’ he asked.

‘I’ve got a friend who works in the warehouse. I asked for a favour.’

‘I don’t imagine it was done out of the goodness of your friend’s 
heart.’

Mann shot him a tiny smile. ‘It was, as it happened.’

‘Eh?’ The chief constable was taken aback. ‘So why did you have that cash 
from Bazza Brown?’

‘Ah told him that Ah had to pay the supplier.’

‘What’s your friend’s name?’

‘Aw, sir. Do ye really need it?’

Skinner stared at him, then he laughed. ‘Are you kidding me? Of course we do. 
The guy’s as guilty as you are, almost. Name, now.’

‘Chris McGlashan,’ the prisoner sighed. ‘Sergeant Chris McGlashan. And 
it’s no a guy; it’s Chris, as in Christine. Please, sir,’ he begged. 
‘Can ye no’ leave her out of it? Can you not say I broke intae the 
warehouse and stole them?’

‘Why the bloody hell should I do that?’

‘She’ll deny it.’

‘I’m sure she will, but we’ll lift her DNA as well, from the package and 
the equipment.’

‘Aw Jesus, no! Lottie…’

The obvious dawned. ‘Aw Jesus, indeed!’ Skinner exclaimed. ‘You stupid, 
selfish, irresponsible son-of-a…’ he snapped. ‘This Chris, she’s your 
bit on the side, isn’t she? You’re an addictive personality right enough, 
Scott. The booze, the horses, the women… Is she the only one you’ve been 
two-timing Lottie with, or have there been others?’

Mann seemed to slump into himself. ‘One or two,’ he sobbed.

‘Mr Skinner,’ Viola Murphy ventured, ‘is this relevant to your 
investigation?’

‘Probably not, but it does demonstrate what a weak, untrustworthy apology for 
a husband and father your client is… let alone what a disgrace he was as a 
serving police officer.’

He turned back to his subject. ‘How did Bazza react when you were chucked out 
of the force, Scott? I don’t imagine you could have worked off all that 
ninety-odd grand, just in doing him favours.’

‘He was okay about it, more or less. He told me he’d still come to me for 
info, and that he’d expect me to get it through Lottie, but he never really 
did, no’ until this business. To tell you the truth, I half expected tae wind 
up in the Clyde, but nothin’ happened.’

‘No, you idiot,’ Skinner’s laugh was scornful, ‘because the debt was 
never real! The poker school, where you supposedly lost all that dough. Did it 
never occur to you that it wasn’t just the first few hands that were rigged 
in your favour, but that the whole bloody thing was rigged against you, to set 
you up? Who were the other guys in the school? Did you know them?’

‘A couple of them; they were Bazza’s drivers in the taxi business.’

‘Then they must have been on bloody good tips, to be able to sit in on such a 
high-roller card game. You got taken, chum, to the cleaners and back again, 
just like everyone else who was involved with your friend Mr Brown. Did you 
really never work any of this out?’

‘No. Now you say it, I can see how he done it, but honest, sir, he had me 
scared shitless most of the time and on a string. He was even the reason I got 
chucked off the force.’

‘What? Are you saying he fed you the booze?’

‘It had nothin’ tae do wi’ the booze. The station commander caught me 
liftin’ evidence against Cec, one time he got arrested for carvin’ up a 
dope dealer that had crossed the pair of them. I photocopied the witness list. 
He walked in on me while Ah was doing it, and saw right away what it was about. 
He gave me a straight choice: either Ah resigned on health grounds and blamed 
alcoholism, or I’d go down for pervertin’ the course of justice.’

‘Why did he do that?’

‘For Lottie’s sake, he said.’

‘And who was this station commander, this saviour of yours?’

‘Michael Thomas,’ Mann replied. ‘ACC Thomas, he is now. He was a 
superintendent back then.’

‘Indeed?’ Skinner murmured. ‘And what happened to Cec? I don’t recall 
any serious assault convictions on his record.’

‘The charges were dropped anyway. The two key witnesses withdrew their 
evidence. They must have got to them some other way.’

‘Not through you?’

‘No. I never knew who they were. Ah never got that far. They must have had 
another source in the force.’





Forty-Three



‘Do you ever feel like you’re in a movie, or a TV series?’ Lowell Payne 
asked.

Neil McIlhenney laughed. ‘All the bloody time. My wife’s an actress, 
remember. As a matter of fact, she’s just been offered the lead in a new TV 
series, about a single mother who’s a detective, but it would have meant 
spending months at a time out in Spain, so she turned it down. Why d’you ask? 
Are you a frustrated thesp?’

‘Hell, no. No, it’s being down here, in this place, where all the names 
come straight off the telly. Highbury earlier on; now it’s the Elephant and 
bloody Castle, for God’s sake. Makes me feel like Phil Mitchell.’

‘Nah, you’ve got too much hair, mate.’

‘Where does the name come from anyway?’

‘I’m told by my cockney colleagues that it goes back to one of the 
worshipful companies that had an elephant with a castle on its back on its coat 
of arms. Somehow that became the name of a coaching inn on this site, about two 
hundred and fifty years ago.’

‘So it’s got fuck all to do with real elephants, or castles.’

‘Absolutely fuck all.’

The two detectives were standing on the busy thoroughfare they had been 
discussing, having been dropped off by their driver in the bus lane that ran 
past the Metropolitan Tabernacle Baptist Church, a great grey pillared building.

‘Where’s the office?’ the visitor asked.

‘On the other side of the road, on top of that shopping complex; that’s 
what I’m told.’

Payne looked at the dual carriageway, and at the density of the fast-moving 
traffic. ‘Crossing that’s going to be fun,’ he complained.

‘No. It’s going to be dead easy,’ his companion replied, heading towards 
a circular junction. At the end of the road was a subway, running under the 
highway and surfacing through the Elephant and Castle tube station. ‘The 
office should be just around the corner here,’ he said, as they stepped out 
into the sunlight once more.

They walked up a ramp that led into a shopping centre, and found the block 
without difficulty, and the board in the foyer that listed the tenants, floor 
by floor.

‘There we are,’ McIlhenney declared. ‘Rondar Mail Order Limited, level 
three, north. Just two floors up.’

They took the elevator, at Payne’s insistence. ‘I’d an early start, and I 
am knackered. Buggered if I’m walking when there’s an option.’

As they stepped out, they saw, to their left, the Rondar logo, emblazoned 
across double doors of obscured glass. There was no bell, no entrance 
videophone, so the two officers walked straight through them, into an open 
space furnished with half a dozen desks and a few tables. At the far end, there 
were two partitioned areas, affording privacy. They counted five members of 
staff, all female, all white, all dark-haired, all in their twenties.

‘Fuck me,’ Payne whispered, ‘it’s like a room full of Amy Winehouses. 
I’m sure you don’t have to be Jewish to work here, for that would be 
illegal, wouldn’t it, but I’m even surer it helps.’

The woman seated at the desk nearest to the entrance looked up at them. They 
judged that she was probably the oldest of the five. ‘Yes?’ she said.

‘Mrs Radnor, please,’ the DCS replied, showing her his warrant card. 
‘Police. I’m Chief Superintendent McIlhenney, from the Met, and this is 
Chief Inspector Payne, from Strathclyde.’

‘Aunt Jocelyn’s busy, I’m afraid. She’s making a new product video, and 
can’t be disturbed.’

McIlhenney smiled. ‘I think you’ll find that she can. But we’d all prefer 
it if you did it, rather than us.’

For a moment or two, the niece looked as if she might put up an argument, but 
there was something in the big cop’s kind eyes that told her she would lose. 
And so, instead, she sighed and stood. ‘If you’ll follow me.’ They did. 
‘Can you tell me what this is about?’ she asked as they reached the private 
room on the right.

‘Family matter,’ Payne told her.

‘But I’m…’ she began, swallowing the rest of her protest when he shook 
his head. ‘Wait here, please.’ She rapped on the door and stepped inside.

They waited. For a minute, then a second, and then a third. McIlhenney’s fist 
was clenched ready to knock, when it reopened and Jocelyn Radnor, glamorous, 
late fifties and unmistakably Golda’s mother, stepped out. She did not look 
best pleased, even under the heavy theatrical make-up that she wore.

‘Gentlemen,’ she exclaimed, ‘I haven’t a clue what this is about, but 
it had better be worth it. I’ve been trying to get that bloody promo right 
for an hour now, and I had finally cracked it when Bathsheba came in and ruined 
it.’

‘We’re sorry about that,’ McIlhenney said, lying, ‘but it is important, 
and better dealt with in your office.’

‘If you say so,’ she sighed. ‘Come on.’ She led them into the other 
room; they found themselves looking down the Elephant and Castle, back towards 
the tabernacle. The furniture had seen better days, but it was quality. She 
offered them each a well-worn leather chair and sat in her own. ‘What’s it 
all about, then? “A family matter,” my niece said.’

‘We want to talk to you about your son-in-law,’ Payne replied.

She tilted her head and looked at him. ‘You’re one too?’ She chuckled. 
‘Scotland Yard is finally living up to its name. What about my son-in-law?’ 
she asked, serious in the next instant. ‘Why are you asking about Byron?’

‘We’ll get to that. Can you tell us, how did he come to work for you?’

‘We needed a buyer, simple as that. Jesse, my late husband, always handled 
that side of the business, from the time when he founded it. That was the way 
it worked; he bought, I sold. Eventually, there came a time when he decided to 
plan for what he called “our retirement”. What he really meant was his own 
death, for he was twenty years older than me and had heart trouble, more 
serious than I knew. So he recruited Byron.’

‘How?’

She frowned at the DCI. ‘I don’t know; he recruited him, that’s all. I 
can’t remember.’

‘Think back, please. Did he place an ad in the newspapers, or specialist 
magazines? Did he use headhunters?’

Her eyebrows rose, cracking the make-up on her forehead along the lines of the 
wrinkles that lay underneath. ‘That was it. I asked where he found him and he 
said he had used specialists.’

‘Do you know anything about his career before he joined you?’

‘Jesse said he had worked for other mail order firms, in his time, and for a 
bank, but he never specified any of them.’

‘Doesn’t he have a personnel file, Mrs Radnor?’ McIlhenney asked.

‘Please, officer,’ she sighed, with a show of exasperation. ‘This is a 
family business. We don’t need such things. I know he was born somewhere on 
the south coast, although I can’t remember where, I know that he never had a 
father and that his mother is dead, I know that he’s nowhere near as good a 
buyer as my husband was, I know that he’s a very good husband to my daughter, 
and I know that he spent some time in Israel, a lot of time.’

‘How do you know that last bit?’

‘The accent would have told me, if he hadn’t. He didn’t get all of that 
in Sussex. I asked him about it, not long after he joined us; he said that 
after his mother died he went to work in a kibbutz.’

‘Do they have mail order in kibbutzes?’ Payne murmured.

‘Of course not, but after that he stayed in Tel Aviv for another few years, 
or so he said.’

‘You didn’t believe him?’

‘Let’s say he was never very specific.’ She paused. ‘Look, to be 
absolutely frank, my guess has always been that when Jesse took him on he was 
doing a favour for a friend from the old days.’

‘The old days where?’ the DCI asked.

‘My late husband was a soldier in his earlier life, a major in the Israeli 
army. He fought in the Six Day War, back in sixty-seven. He didn’t come to 
Britain until nineteen seventy-two.’

‘But he kept his links with Israel? Is that what you’re saying?’

‘Yes, through work with Jewish charities. He had a couple of friends at the 
embassy as well.’

‘So, Mrs Radnor,’ McIlhenney murmured, ‘if we told you that the man 
you’ve known all these years as Byron Millbank was known before that as Beram 
Cohen, am I right in thinking you wouldn’t be all that surprised?’

‘Not a little bit.’ She gazed at the DCS. ‘So what’s he done, that 
you’re here asking about him?’

‘He’s died, I’m afraid.’

Jocelyn’s hands flew to her mouth, but she regained her composure after a few 
seconds. ‘Oh my. That I did not expect. Golda, my daughter, does she know?’

‘Yes, we’ve just left her. You’ll probably want to go to her when we’re 
finished here.’

‘Of course. When did this happen? Where? And how?’

‘Last week, in Edinburgh, of natural causes.’ He carried on, explaining how 
it had happened and what his companions had done with his body.

She listened to his story without a single interruption. ‘What was he doing 
with these men?’ she asked, when he was finished.

‘Planning a murder,’ he replied. ‘You’ve probably heard of the shooting 
of a senior police officer in Glasgow on Saturday evening. Your son-in-law 
organised the whole thing. The two guys who buried him were his comrades, 
soldiers like he was in Israel, working these days for money, not for flags.’

‘Yes,’ she acknowledged, ‘I read of it. His buddies, they’re dead too, 
yes?’

‘Killed at the scene.’

‘So Byron was a soldier. That’s what you’re saying?’ McIlhenney nodded. 
‘Israeli army, I guess.’

‘That and more. Latterly he was Mossad, the Israeli secret service.’

‘So was my husband,’ she told them, ‘in the old days, and for a while 
after he came to Britain. It all fits. So why did they send him over here?’

‘From what I’m told, he’d become an embarrassment, so he was relocated. 
He kept in touch with his old community though. The concert hall killing 
wasn’t the only job he did, not by a long way. I guess it all helped pay for 
your daughter’s lifestyle.’

‘I have wondered about that,’ she admitted. ‘And Golda, does she know any 
of this?’

‘Only that her husband had another identity.’

‘Am I allowed to tell her the rest?’

‘If you want to, but do you? Isn’t being widowed enough for her to be going 
on with?’

‘True,’ she agreed. ‘So why did you tell me?’

‘Because you don’t strike me as the sort of person who’d fall for a 
phoney cover story when we say we need to take Byron’s computer and all the 
other records he kept in this office.’

‘I’ll take that as a compliment,’ Jocelyn said.

‘So, can we have it?’

‘I imagine that’s a rhetorical question, and that you have a warrant.’

‘Call it a courteous request, but yes, we do.’

‘Warrant or not,’ she retorted, ‘I’d be happy to cooperate, and let you 
take everything you need. Unfortunately, someone’s beaten you to it.’

‘Eh?’ Payne exclaimed. ‘What do you mean? Nobody else knows about this 
branch of the investigation.’

‘That’s irrelevant. This is London, Chief Inspector, and there’s a 
depression. Two nights ago we had a burglary. The thieves took a few pieces of 
not very valuable jewellery, and they took Byron’s computer. Of course, I 
reported it to your people, as we have to for the insurance claim, but frankly, 
they didn’t seem too interested. That’s how it is these days.’





Forty-Four



‘What do you think, Bridie?’ Skinner asked. They were in her office; she 
held a mug of coffee in a meaty hand, he held a can of diet Irn Bru.

‘I think,’ she began, ‘that I accept his story about the fancy dress. 
Okay, he knew he was being spun a line, and that he chose not to ask questions, 
but I don’t believe that Scott Mann would knowingly be a part of any 
conspiracy to murder, or that if we charged him with that, we’d get a 
conviction.

‘However, we can tie him to those uniforms beyond reasonable doubt, so he’s 
not walking away. I would propose that we charge him with theft, and his 
girlfriend, assuming we do get her DNA from the packaging. We’ll get guilty 
pleas for sure, I could read it in Viola Murphy’s dark Satanic eyes.’

The chief gave a small nod. ‘I agree with that. What about McGlashan? Do we 
let her resign quietly or do the full disciplinary thing?’

‘Formal,’ Gorman replied, without hesitation. ‘If I could I’d put her 
in the public stocks in George Square.’

Skinner laughed. ‘I once suggested to my soon to be ex-wife that her party 
should propose that as a way of dealing with Glasgow’s Ned hooligan problem. 
She took me seriously, started arguing that the rival gangs would turn out in 
force to throw rocks at them. So I started arguing back to wind her up. She got 
angrier and angrier, wound up calling me a fucking fascist. Looking back, it 
was maybe the beginning of the end. We won’t go that far with this lady, but 
yes, I agree, she has to be made an example of.’ The humour left his 
expression. ‘The consequences might be worse than an hour being pelted with 
rotten fruit. Imagine how Lottie’s going to react when she finds out.’

His deputy sighed. ‘Need she?’

‘She’s bound to. Her husband’s going to court and so’s his girlfriend. 
We’ll make sure there’s no mention of a relationship during the hearing, 
but she’ll figure it out, for sure. It might be best for the pair of them if 
the sheriff puts them out of her reach for a few months.’

‘Do you think he will?’

‘I’m bloody sure of it. They’ve got to go down.’

‘And what about the elephant?’ she asked.

‘Which one would that be?’ he murmured.

‘The great big one in this bloody room: Michael Thomas.’

‘I’ve been trying to pretend it isn’t there,’ the chief admitted.

‘But it is,’ Gorman insisted. ‘Scott Mann claims that Thomas caught him 
photocopying a witness list for the Brown brothers, and hushed it up. For 
Lottie’s sake, indeed. Do you buy that?’

‘No. Not for a second. If what Mann says is true, then he had an obligation 
to call in another officer to corroborate what had happened and then to charge 
him.’

‘So why didn’t he?’

‘I’ll let you speculate on that, Bridie,’ Skinner said. ‘I’m too new 
here.’

‘If you insist. The witnesses against Cec Brown were nobbled anyway, and as 
Scott said, that suggests Bazza had another source. According to his story, 
Michael Thomas saw the list, and we know that he kept quiet about Mann nicking 
it. That has to raise the possibility that he was that source. If he’d done 
what he should have, the investigation would have gone all the way to Brown, 
the witnesses would have been protected and both brothers would have been 
finished.’

‘I can’t argue against that. So what do you suggest we do about it? Get the 
brush out again and sweep it under the carpet? After all, Brown’s dead and it 
will only be Scott’s word against his.’

‘We couldn’t do that, not even if we wanted to, and I don’t believe that 
either of us do. Viola Murphy heard the accusation, and she has the copy of the 
recording that we were bound by law to give her. She’s riding the bloody 
elephant in the bloody room!’

‘Colourful but true. What’s your recommendation?’

‘We take a further statement from Mann, not as an accused person, but as a 
witness, and we give it to the fiscal. What do you say? New or not, you are 
where the buck stops.’

‘Yes and no,’ the chief said. ‘Action has to be taken, but not by us. I 
suggest that you call in Andy Martin, and the Serious Crimes Agency. I don’t 
want to do it myself, or to be involved, because Andy’s in a relationship 
with my daughter. That might not have mattered in the past, but we have to be 
spotless here. His people have to take the statement, and have to decide what 
happens after that. Almost certainly that will not involve the local fiscal. 
For all we know she could be a member of the Michael Thomas fan club. See to 
it.’

‘Will do, Bob. After the statement’s taken, what will we do with Scott?’

‘We charge him, and his girlfriend as soon as we have a DNA match. Murphy 
will probably apply for bail. Likely she’ll get it, since we have no strong 
grounds for opposing it, so we might as well let them go, until their first 
court appearance.’

‘What about Lottie?’ Gorman asked. ‘Are you going to tell her about 
this… new development?’

‘Hell no! Dan Provan can do that. I’m nowhere near brave enough.’





Forty-Five



Detective Sergeant Dan Provan sat at his absent boss’s desk staring at the 
notes he had made. He was unsure of the significance of what he had discovered. 
Instinctively he doubted that it had any relevance to the investigation on 
which he was engaged. But one thing he did know: it was well outside his 
comfort zone as a police officer.

He had spent most of his thirty-something year career catching petty thieves 
and putting them out of business, sorting out those who thought that violence 
was an acceptable means of self-expression, or in one short but horrible 
chapter, pursuing and prosecuting those he would always refer to only as 
‘beasts’, sicko bastards who preyed upon children, their own on one or two 
occasions, leaving them with physical and emotional scars they would carry 
through life.

Always, those issues had been clear, and he had known exactly what he was doing 
and why. But this stuff, Glasgow hoodlums coming up with big red ‘hands 
off’ notices on the national intelligence database, and the latest, Mauritian 
mysteries, it was all unfocused, and way outside the rules of the game that he 
was used to playing. Yet it excited him, gave him the kind of thrill he had 
experienced as a young man, before it had been washed away by a river of 
sadness and cynicism.

When the door opened he did not look up. Instead he growled, ‘Banjo, will you 
fuck off! Did Ah no’ say Ah want to be alone in here?’

‘Indeed?’ a strong baritone voice replied. ‘Anyone less like Greta Garbo 
I cannot imagine.’

Provan gulped and shot to his feet. ‘Sorry, sir,’ he said to the chief 
constable. ‘Ah thought it was DC Paterson. Around here we’re no’ used to 
the brass comin’ tae see us. Always it’s the other way around, and usually 
for the wrong reasons. As a matter of fact,’ he continued, ‘I was just 
about tae ask for an appointment wi’ you.’

Skinner laughed. ‘You make me sound like the fucking dentist. Sit down, man, 
and relax. Before we get to your business, I’ve got another task for you. Not 
a very pleasant one, but I reckon you’d rather do it that anyone else.’

‘Sounds ominous, gaffer.’ He took a guess. ‘Scott Mann?’

‘Got it in one. ACC Gorman and I have not long finished interviewing him. 
He’s going to be charged.’

‘Conspiracy to murder?’ the DS murmured.

‘No, he’ll only be charged with theft. We’re satisfied that he had no 
specific knowledge of why Bazza Brown wanted the uniforms. He’s heading for 
Barlinnie though, or Low Moss.’

‘Still,’ Provan countered, ‘all things considered, that’s a result for 
him. It’ll no’ be nice for Lottie and the wee fella, but a hell of a lot 
better than if he got life.’

‘True, but it’s not as simple as that. There will be a co-accused, Sergeant 
Christine McGlashan, who works in the store warehouse.’

Provan stiffened in his chair. ‘Christine McGlashan?’ he repeated. ‘She 
used to be a DC, until she got promoted back intae uniform. She worked 
alongside Scott in CID and it was an open secret that he was porkin’ her. But 
that was before he met Lottie. Are you gin’ tae tell me he still is?’

The chief constable nodded. ‘I’m afraid so. You’ll see that’s why 
you’re the best man to explain the situation to Lottie. That said, if you 
think it’s Mission Impossible, you don’t have to accept it. This tape will 
self-destruct in five seconds and I’ll handle it myself.’

‘No, sir, Ah’ll do it. You’re right; it’s best she hears that sort of 
news from someone who knows the both o’ them.’

‘Thanks, Dan. None of this is going to go unnoticed or unrewarded, you 
realise that?’

‘Appreciated, boss, but that “Thanks”, that was enough. There’s no way 
you could reward me, other than promotion to DI, and I wouldn’t accept that. 
I am where Ah want to be. If you can make sure that for as long as Ah’m here 
Ah’ll be alongside the Big Yin, tae look after her, that’ll be fine.’

‘For as long as I’m here myself, I’ll make sure that happens. That’s a 
promise, Dan.’

‘In which case, Ah hope you stick around.’ He frowned. ‘What’s 
happenin’ tae McGlashan?’

‘She’ll have been arrested by now, and on her way here. You and Paterson 
can interview her, but make sure you listen to the recording of Mann’s 
interview first. Once you’ve done that, you can charge them both, then 
release them on police bail, pending a Sheriff Court appearance.’ He took a 
breath, then went on. ‘Now, what were you coming to tell me?’

‘The thing you asked me tae do, sir,’ Provan responded. ‘Ah’ve got a 
result, sort of. There’s a hospital in Port Louis… that’s the capital of 
Mauritius,’ he offered, with a degree of pride. ‘It’s called the Doctor 
Jeetoo. Its maternity department has a record of a patient called Antonia Day 
Champs. She had a baby there, a wee girl, on May the twenty-third, two years 
ago. It was born by caesarean section, and she was discharged a week after. The 
address they had for her was in a place called Peach Street. I checked the 
local property register; it said it’s owned by a woman called Sofia Day 
Champs.’

‘Toni’s mother,’ Skinner volunteered. ‘She got knocked up and went home 
to Mum.’

The sergeant sniggered. ‘Makes a change from goin’ tae yer auntie’s for a 
few months, like lassies used tae do in the days before legal abortions. Ah 
wonder why she didnae have one herself, given that she was such a career woman. 
Her clock must have been tickin’ Ah suppose.’

‘Who knows?’

‘I spoke to the ward sister. She said she remembered her. She said that a 
woman came to visit her when she was in, but no husband. There was one man came 
to visit her, though; much older, about seventy. The sister heard Sofia call 
him “Grandpa”. She said his face was familiar, like somebody she’d seen 
in the papers, but that whoever he was he was pretty high-powered, because the 
consultant was on his best behaviour when he was there, and Antonia had a room 
tae herself.’

‘Then I guess that could have been her father. Marina told me he was a bigwig 
in government, and Sofia was his mistress. So what about the birth 
registration, Dan?’ the chief asked. ‘That’s what I’m really interested 
in.’

‘Then you’re no’ goin’ tae like this. Mauritius is more modern than 
ye’d think. All the latest records are stored on computer. The doctor who 
attends the birth gives the parents a form tae say that it’s happened, but 
that’s the only written record, apart from the official birth certificate 
that the parents are given when they register it. And you have tae do that; 
it’s the law. The government guy Ah spoke to checked the whole period that 
she was out there after the twenty-third of May, and there is no record of a 
birth bein’ registered. He’s in no doubt about that.’

‘Bugger!’

The DS held up a hand: it occurred to Skinner that one day he would make an 
excellent lollipop man. ‘However,’ he declared, ‘he did say that he’d 
found an anomaly. On the thirtieth of May, a week later, there were forty-six 
births notified, but when he looked at the computer, he noticed that number 
seven two six four is followed by seven two six six. There’s a number 
missing; he had his computer folk look at it. They said it had been hacked. How 
about that then, boss? D’ye think Grandpa was powerful enough to have the 
record removed?’

‘I doubt it, Dan,’ Skinner replied. ‘But I know someone who is.’





Forty-Six



‘So much for the tour of the capital,’ Lowell Payne grumbled.

‘We drove past the Tower of London, didn’t we?’ Neil McIlhenney pointed 
out. ‘And if you went up on the roof here and found the right spot, you’d 
be able to see the top of Big Ben. Not only that, you’ve seen the home of the 
mighty Arsenal Football Club. All for free too, in the most expensive city I 
know.’ He grinned. ‘Tell you what. You check in with the King in the North 
and I’ll take you for a pint and a sandwich. It’s getting on past lunchtime 
and I’m a bit peckish myself.’

‘I’ve been trying but he’s not in his office, and his mobile’s switched 
off.’

‘Maybe he’s still doing that interview you told me about.’

‘If he is and the bloke hasn’t been charged yet, he’ll be entitled to get 
up and walk out.’

‘He’s probably still hiding under the table. Big Bob doesn’t like bent 
cops, even ex ones. Try him again, go on.’

The DCI took out his phone and pressed the contact entry for Skinner’s direct 
line. He let it ring six times, and was about to hang up when it was answered.

‘Lowell?’

‘Yes, Chief.’

‘How’s it going down there? Got anything useful?’

‘Some, but don’t get excited. We’ve worked out how an Israeli 
ex-paratrooper and disgraced spook hit man came to get a job as a jewellery 
buyer with a London mail order company. His late father-in-law was Mossad, once 
upon a time.’

‘Surprise me,’ Skinner drawled, with heavy sarcasm. ‘How did you find 
that out?’

‘We decided to be forthcoming with his mother-in-law. She was equally frank 
in return; she told us.’

He chuckled. ‘Giving the guy a job, that’s one thing; marrying your 
daughter off to him might be taking it a bit too far.’

‘You’d think so, but the impression we’re getting is of a popular, 
charming bloke. The wife’s devastated. It was just starting to hit home when 
we left.’

‘How about the mother-in-law? How did she take it?’

‘Calmly. She was upset, of course, but it didn’t come as a bombshell to 
find out that poor Byron had a second line of business. Before we left, she 
told us she hoped he was better at that than he was at the jewellery buying.’

‘Did you get anything else from your visit, apart from a compendium of Jewish 
mother-in-law jokes? Did you take his computer?’

‘No, and that’s the real news I have for you. Somebody beat us to it; 
Rondar Mail Order had a break-in last Friday night. A few small items were 
taken, but the main haul was Byron Millbank’s computer. I’m sorry about 
that, boss, but this trip’s been pretty much a waste of time.’

‘Like hell it has,’ the chief retorted. ‘There are three possibilities 
here, Lowell. One, the break-in was exactly that, a routine office burglary. 
Two, it was an inside job, staged to hide something incriminating from the 
sharp eyes of the VAT inspectors. Three, someone who knew about Byron’s 
background, and the fact that he was no longer in the land of the living, 
decided to make sure that nothing embarrassing had been left behind him. I know 
which of those my money’s on. You’ve had a result, of sorts, Lowell. What 
was only a suspicion until now, it’s confirmed in my book. The cleaners have 
been in, and not just in London.’

‘But what have they been covering up?’

‘Work it out for yourself. It’s too hot for any phone line, especially a 
mobile that can be easily monitored. The thing that’s getting to me is that 
they’ve been too damn good at it. If I’m right, I know what the big secret 
is, but I can’t even come close to proving it, and the bugger is that I 
don’t believe I ever will. Our investigation into Toni Field’s murder is 
dead in the water, as dead as she is.’

‘Are you sure?’ Payne asked.

‘I don’t believe in miracles, brother.’

‘What do you want me to do, then?’

‘You might as well come home. Get yourself on to an evening flight. I’ll 
see you tomorrow.’

As the DCI ended the call, he realised that McIlhenney was gazing at him. 
‘How did he take it?’ he asked.

‘He reckons that’s it. We’re stuffed. He’s going to close the inquiry. 
He sounded pretty pissed off. I know he hates to lose.’

The chief superintendent shook his heard. ‘No,’ he said. ‘You don’t 
know. He refuses to lose. You wait and see. He’s not finished yet.’

‘He says he doesn’t believe in miracles.’

‘Then he’s lying. When he’s around they happen all the time.’





Forty-Seven



‘Bastards!’ Skinner exclaimed. The room was empty but there was real 
vehemence in his voice. ‘It’s like someone’s farted in a busy pub. 
You’re pretty sure who it was but you’ve got no chance of proving it and 
the more time passes, the more the evidence dissipates.’

Frustrated, he reached for his in-tray and began to examine the pile of 
correspondence, submissions and reports that his support team had deemed worthy 
of his attention. He had planned that it would go to Lowell for further 
filtering but his absence had landed it all on his desk.

‘Commonwealth Games, policing priorities,’ he read, from the top sheet on 
the pile. ‘One, counter-terrorism,’ he murmured. ‘Two, counter-terrorism, 
three counter-terrorism, four, stop the Neds from mugging the punters.’ He 
laid the paper to one side for consideration later, probably at Sarah’s, and 
picked up the next item, a letter.

It was addressed to Chief Constable Antonia Field, from the Australian Federal 
Police Association, inviting her to address its annual conference, to be held 
in Sydney, the following December.

He scribbled a note, ‘Call the sender, tell them about Toni’s death. If he 
asks me to do it, decline with regret on the ground that I have no idea where 
I’ll be in December,’ clipped it to the letter and dropped it into his 
out-tray.

He worked on for ten minutes, finding it more and more difficult to maintain 
his concentration. He felt his eyes grow heavy and realised for the first time 
that he had missed lunch. A week before he would have poured himself a mug of 
high-octane coffee, but Sarah had made him promise to give up, and he had 
promised himself that he would never cheat on her again, in any way. Instead, 
he took a king-size Mars Bar from his desk drawer and consumed it in four bites.

As he waited for the energy boost to hit his system, he picked up his direct 
telephone, found a number and dialled it.

He hoped that it would be Marina who answered rather than Sofia; and so it was.

‘Bob Skinner,’ he announced.

‘Good afternoon. This is a pleasant surprise… do you have something to tell 
us about Antonia’s death?’

‘No, sorry. In fact I have something to ask you. When were you going to get 
round to telling me about Toni’s child?’

He counted the silence; one second, two seconds, three…

‘Ah, so you know about that.’

‘Of course. You must have realised that the post-mortem was bound to reveal 
it.’

‘Yes, I suppose I did. Maman and I hoped you wouldn’t regard it as 
relevant. It isn’t really, is it?’

‘Probably not,’ he agreed, ‘but when we set out to create a picture of 
someone’s life, it has to be complete. We can’t leave things out, 
arbitrarily, for personal, or even for diplomatic, reasons.’

‘No, I accept that now. We should have volunteered it.’

‘What happened to the child?’

‘She’s here, with us. When you visited us the other day, she was upstairs, 
playing in the nursery that Antonia made for her there. She was born in 
Mauritius, two years ago. Her name is Lucille; she’s such a pretty little 
thing. Normally she lives in London, with Maman, in a house that Antonia’s 
father bought for them. He is widowed now, and when he heard of the child he 
was overwhelmed. He had never recognised my sister as his daughter, not 
formally, not until then.’

‘Does he know she’s dead?’

‘Oh yes. Maman called him, straight away. She said he was very upset. So he 
should have been. I don’t care for the man, even though I’ve never met 
him.’

‘Who’s Lucille’s father?’ Skinner asked.

‘I don’t know,’ Marina confessed. ‘Antonia never told me, and she never 
told Maman. But she registered the birth herself, in Mauritius. You should be 
able to find out there.’

‘That’s right,’ he agreed, ‘we should.’ We should, he thought, but 
some bugger doesn’t want us to.

‘When you do, will you let me know, please. Maman and I have been looking for 
Lucille’s birth certificate among Antonia’s papers, but we can’t find 
it.’

‘Sure, will do. But until then we’re guessing. Those men friends you told 
me about, her lovers: she never gave you any clue to their names?’

‘No, not really. She gave one or two of them nicknames. The DAC in the Met, 
for example, she called him “Bullshit”, for whatever unimaginable reason. 
The mandarin she called “Chairman Mao”, and the QC was always “Howling 
Mad”. Other than that, she never let anything slip.’

‘You mentioned five men in her life,’ the chief said, ‘but when we met 
you said she’d had six relationships in the time you lived with her. Was the 
sixth Michael Thomas?’

She laughed. ‘Him?’ she exclaimed. ‘You know about that?’

‘The whole bloody force seems to know about that. He was seen leaving the 
flat she was renting, far too late for it to have been a work visit.’

‘Then that was careless of her, and not typical. It was very definitely a 
one-night stand. It was also the only time that she ever had a man when she and 
I were under the same roof. Actually, I found it quite embarrassing,’ she 
confessed. ‘The walls were thin.’ He heard what might have been a giggle. 
‘It’s very off-putting to hear your sister faking it. Next morning I 
complained. She laughed and said not to worry, that it had been what she 
described as “tactical sex” and wouldn’t happen again.

‘No,’ she continued, ‘her most recent relationship was still going on, 
and had been for at least three months. I’m more than a little surprised that 
I haven’t heard from the poor man; he must be distraught, for they were 
close. For the first time I sensed that there was no motive behind the 
relationship, nothing “tactical” about it.’

‘I don’t suppose she told you his name, either.’

‘Ah, but this time she did,’ Marina exclaimed. ‘That’s why I believe it 
was serious. She told me he is called Don Sturgeon, and that he works as an IT 
consultant. She never brought him home and she never introduced us, but I saw 
him once when he came to pick her up. He is very attractive: clean-cut, 
well-dressed, almost military looking.’

Skinner felt his right eyebrow twitch. ‘Indeed?’ he murmured. ‘Anything 
else that you can recall about him?’

‘Yes,’ she replied at once. ‘His skin tone; it’s almost the same as 
mine. It made me wonder if he was Mauritian too, and that’s what she saw in 
him.’

‘In this life,’ the chief observed, ‘anything is possible. Marina,’ he 
exclaimed as a picture formed in his mind, ‘are you doing anything, right 
now?’

‘No. Maman is with Lucille, so I’m free.’

‘Then I’d like you to come into the office, quick as you can.’





Forty-Eight



Lowell Payne had seen the interior of Westminster Abbey several times, but only 
on television, when it had been bedecked for royal weddings or draped in black 
for funerals, and packed with celebrants or mourners. As he stepped inside the 
great church for the first time, he found himself humming ‘Candle in the 
Wind’ without quite recalling why.

It was the sheer age of the place that took hold of him, the realisation when 
he read the guide that its origins were as old as England itself, and that the 
building in which he stood went back eight centuries.

He knew as little of architecture as he did of history, but he appreciated at 
once that the abbey was not simply a place of worship, but also of celebration, 
a great theatre created for the crowning of kings and, occasionally, of queens.

In common with most first-time visitors, he paused at the tomb of the Unknown 
Soldier, wondering for a moment whether the occupant’s nearest and dearest 
had been told secretly of the honour that had been done him. ‘Somebody must 
have known,’ he whispered as he looked down, drawing an uncomprehending smile 
and a nod from a Japanese lady tourist by his side.

He moved on and found a memorial stone, commemorating sixteen poets of the 
First World War, recognising not a single name. Charles Dickens he knew, 
though, and the Brontë sisters, and Rabbie Burns, and Clement Attlee. Stanley 
Baldwin was lost on him, but somewhere the name Geoffrey Chaucer rang a bell.

His mobile did not ring, but it vibrated in his pocket. He took it out, feeling 
as if he was committing a form of sacrilege, until he realised that half of the 
tourists in the place were using smart-phones as cameras.

He read the screen and took the call. ‘Chief,’ he said, keeping his voice 
as low as he could, and moving away from the throng of which he had become a 
part.

‘Where the hell are you?’ Skinner asked. ‘You at the station already?’

‘No, I’ve got time to kill, so I’m doing the tourist thing. Does the name 
Stanley Baldwin mean anything to you?’

‘Of course. He was a Tory prime minister between the wars, and even less use 
than most of them. He took a hard line on Mrs Simpson and made the King 
abdicate, but he didn’t mind Hitler nearly as much. Bloody hell, Lowell, what 
did you do at school? You’ll be asking me who Attlee was next.’

‘No, I know about him. What can I do for you?’

‘Cancel your return flight. I’d like you to stay down there overnight. Can 
you do that?’

‘Sure. Has there been a development?’

‘Maybe. I’m not sure. But if something plays out…’ His voice drifted 
off with his thoughts for a few seconds. ‘I’ll know in a couple of hours, 
but meantime you just hang on down there. I’ll be back in touch.’

The conversation ended with as little ceremony as it had begun, leaving Payne 
staring at his phone. ‘If you say so, Bob,’ he murmured. ‘I wonder if I 
can put a West End show on expenses.’





Forty-Nine



Skinner smiled as he gazed at the ceiling. Stanley Baldwin, he thought. He 
guessed where Payne had been when he had reached him. The abbey was one of his 
favourite stopping-off places when he was in London.

London. For all that the prospect of an independently governed Scotland was 
looming, the great monolith in the south remained the centre of power. He had 
decided that he would vote ‘Yes!’ with his heart in the referendum, but he 
had no illusions over the difficulty his country faced in extricating itself 
from the British state, if that was what the majority chose.

Scotland might become a nation, fully self-governing, a member of both the 
European Union and the UN, but it would still share a head of state and an 
island with its English neighbours and their common problems of security would 
remain. He knew better than most what that would mean. MI5 would continue to 
operate north of what would have become a national border.

Even if a future first minister had access to its work and to those of its 
secrets that affected his interests, he would have a very small voice in 
decisions that affected its remit and its funding, and no control at all over 
its activities. Strings would continue to be pulled in secret, by secret 
people, like his friend Amanda Dennis and her immediate boss, Sir Hubert 
Lowery, the director of the service.

It would be up to the new Scotland to come to terms with the need to have its 
own counter-espionage service, to protect itself against potential threats from 
wherever they came, even if that was Westminster. He had discussed this with 
Clive Graham, at a meeting so private that he had kept it from Aileen. Whatever 
their differences on the unification of the police forces, the two men were 
agreed that if the time came, their country would need its own secret service. 
There was also an understanding over the man who would head it.

His smile was long gone when the phone sounded; he flicked the switch that put 
it on speaker. ‘Yes?’

‘Sir,’ a woman replied, ‘it’s PC May in reception. I’m very sorry to 
bother you, and I wouldn’t normally, but there’s a man here, an odd-looking 
wee chap, and he’s asking to see you. He won’t give me his name but he says 
to tell you that he’s been sent by Mr McGuire in Edinburgh. What should I 
do?’

‘He’s okay,’ Skinner told her. ‘He’s a tradesman I need to solve a 
practical problem. Take him to the lift, then come up with him to this floor, 
straight away. I’ll meet you there and take charge of him.’

He hung up and walked from his office. He was waiting by the elevator door when 
it opened less than two minutes later. A small wiry man with a pinched face and 
a jailhouse complexion stepped out.

The chief looked towards his escort. ‘Thanks, Constable. I’ll call you to 
come and collect him when we’re done. By the way,’ he added. ‘I’m 
expecting another visitor quite soon. Let me know directly he arrives.’

She was nodding as the lift door closed, leaving Skinner alone with his 
visitor. ‘Well, Johan,’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s good to see you, under 
different circumstances from the usual.’

Johan Ramsey was dressed in baggy jeans and brown jerkin, over a Rangers 
football top that his host judged, from its design, to be at least three 
seasons old. He was one of those people whose only expression was furtive. 
‘Is this legit?’ he asked.

Skinner laughed. ‘Johan, I’m the chief fucking constable; of course it’s 
legit. A wee bit unorthodox, that’s all. Come on.’

He led the way to his office, and into his private room, where he pulled aside 
the door that concealed the safe. ‘That’s the problem,’ he said. ‘My 
predecessor took the combination to her grave, and I can’t open it. Six 
digits, I’m told.’

Ramsey took a pair of spectacles with one leg from a pocket in his jerkin, and 
perched them on the narrow bridge of his nose. He appraised the task for a few 
seconds, then nodded, and declared, ‘A piece of piss,’ with a degree of 
pride. ‘If you’ll just step into the other room, sir, Ah’ll have it open 
in a couple of minutes.’

The chief’s jaw dropped, then he laughed. ‘Jo, if you think I’m leaving 
you alone in here, you’re daft.’

The little man pouted. ‘Professional secrets, Mr Skinner,’ he protested.

‘My arse! Jo, you’re a professional fucking thief! I don’t know what’s 
in the bloody thing. Tell you what, I’ll stand behind you, so I can’t see 
your hands.’ He took five twenty-pound notes from his wallet and waved them 
before the safe-cracker’s eyes. ‘And there’s these,’ he added.

‘What about ma train fare?’

Skinner snorted, but produced another twenty. ‘There you are: and a couple of 
pints when you get home. Now get on with it.’

‘Aye, okay.’

He turned and hunched over the safe. The chief saw him reach inside his jacket 
again then insert a device that could have been a hearing aid in his ear. 
Everything else was hidden to him; all he could see were small movements of 
Ramsey’s shoulders.

‘A couple of minutes’ he had said, and it took no longer, until there was a 
click, and the safe swung open.

‘Piece of piss, Ah told ye. Three four eight five’s the combination. Four 
digits, no’ six.’

Skinner smiled as he handed over the notes. ‘Do you know what 
“recidivist” means, Johan?’ he asked.

‘No, sir,’ Ramsey replied as he pocketed them.

‘No, I didn’t think so. Do me one favour, even though it’ll be a big one 
for you. Try not to get nicked again on my patch, whether it’s here or in 
Edinburgh. This can’t get you any favours, and I really don’t want to have 
to lock you up again. Come on, let’s get you back home. Remember, you were 
never here.’

His desk phone rang again as they stepped back into his office. He picked it up.

‘PC May again, sir. Your next visitor’s arrived.’

‘Good timing,’ he said. ‘Bring him up, and you can take this one back.’





Fifty



‘When will they be in court?’ Viola Murphy asked, as soon as Dan Provan had 
finished reading the formal charges, and the two accused had been taken away to 
complete the bail formalities.

‘Ah can’t say,’ he replied, ‘but we’ll let you know. Will you be 
defending them both?’

‘Probably, unless either one of them changes their mind and decides to plead 
not guilty; in that event, there could be a conflict. Does Skinner mean it? 
Will he press for custodial sentences?’

‘From what Ah hear you got on the wrong side of him. Did you think he’s the 
kind that bluffs?’

‘No,’ the lawyer conceded.

‘It’s no’ just him. ACC Gorman’s of the same mind.’

‘And you?’

‘Listen, Viola, we all are. It’s tough for me, personally, you must know 
that, but we cannae let this go by wi’ a slap on the wrist, especially for 
McGlashan. If she goes down, he has tae and all. That would be the case suppose 
he wasn’t an ex-cop and married to somebody who still is. The fact that he is 
just underlines it. The fiscal will demand jail. The best you can hope for is a 
soft-hearted sheriff that gives them less than six months.’

‘I’ll ask for a suspended sentence.’

‘Ye better no’. He might hang them.’ He winced. ‘Bad joke, Ah know, but 
you know the bench. Sometimes, the more that lawyers chance their arm, the 
harder they go. Would ye like some advice?’

‘I’ll listen to it,’ she said. ‘Whether I’ll act on it…’

‘Okay. If I was in the dock, I’d want the youngest, freshest kid in your 
firm tae do the plea in mitigation. Ah’d even be hopin’ that they made an 
arse of it, and the judge took pity on them. Because that’s the only way 
those two will get anything like sympathy from any sheriff in this city.’

‘Mmm,’ she murmured. ‘You may well be right. I suppose you should be; 
you’ve been around long enough to have seen it all. I’ll have a word with 
my partners, and see what they think. Thanks, Sergeant.’

The door had barely closed behind her when it opened again. Provan looked up, 
to see Scott Mann framed there.

‘Dan,’ he began. ‘Sarge.’

The older man bristled. ‘Don’t you fuckin’ call me Sarge.’ He jerked a 
thumb in the direction of DC Paterson who stood beside him, gathering notes and 
papers and putting them in order. ‘That’s reserved for colleagues, like 
Banjo here; for police officers, and that you’re no’. And don’t “Dan” 
me either. Mr Provan, it can be, but frankly Ah’d prefer nothing at all. 
Ah’d rather no’ see you again.’

‘Will ye put a word in for me?’ Mann begged.

‘What? Wi’ the high heid yins? You must be joking.’

‘No, I meant wi’ Lottie.’

The DS started round the table towards him, only to be restrained by 
Paterson’s strong hand, grabbing him by the elbow. He stopped, gathering 
himself.

‘There is even less chance of that,’ he said when he was ready. ‘From now 
on, I will do all I can to protect Lottie from you. Now you fuck off out of 
here, boy, get off wi’ your tart. And be glad you’re leavin’ in one 
piece. In the old days ye wouldn’t have.’





Fifty-One



‘Who was that little guy?’ Clyde Houseman asked, as he settled into the 
chair that Skinner offered him. ‘He wasn’t the sort you expect to see on 
the command floor of the second largest police force in Britain.’

‘Just a technician,’ the chief replied. ‘I had a wee problem, but he 
sorted it out for me.’

‘Computer?’

He shrugged. ‘You know IT consultants, they live in a different world from 
the rest of us. Some of them turn up and they’re dressed like you, others, 
they’re like him. I know which ones I trust more. I’m not a big fan of 
dressing to impress.’

The younger man winced and his eyes seemed to flicker for a moment. ‘I 
do…’

Skinner laughed. ‘Don’t take it personally. I wasn’t getting at you. 
You’re ex-military, an ex-officer; you’ve had years of training in taking a 
pride in your appearance. Plus, you’re not a computer consultant; you’re a 
spook. Whatever, you look a hell of a lot better than you did as a gang-banger 
in Edinburgh half a lifetime ago.’

‘Thank God for that.’

‘Me, now? I’ve never changed. I joined the police force because I felt a 
vocational calling, and I followed it even though I knew that my old man had 
always hoped I would take over the family law firm eventually. I think he died 
hoping that. I never let myself be swayed, though. I applied to join the 
Edinburgh force, they saw my shiny new degree and they accepted me. And you 
know what? The first time I put on the uniform, I realised that I hated it. The 
thing was ugly and uncomfortable and when I looked in the mirror I didn’t 
recognise the bloke inside it.

‘It didn’t kill my pride in the job, but it did make me want to get into 
CID as fast as I could. Look at me now; I’m a chief constable, but my uniform 
is hanging in my wardrobe next door. I’m only wearing a suit because I feel a 
wee bit obliged to do that, at least until I get settled in here.

‘The real me might dress a wee bit sharper than the guy you passed at the 
lift, but it would still be pretty casual. So what you see here, to an extent 
it’s a phoney. Old George Michael got it right; sometimes clothes do not make 
the man.

‘But yours, though, they do. They mark you out, they define you. The military 
defined you. It made you; you became it. Before that you were no more than 
eighty kilos of clay waiting to be given proper form.

‘I could see that when I came across you in that shithole of a scheme in 
Edinburgh. That’s why I gave you my card that day: I thought you might see 
the light and get in touch. You didn’t, but you still went in the right 
direction. If you had… you’d still be the man you are, but you’d just 
look a bit different, that’s all.’

Houseman laughed. ‘Scruffy at weekends, you mean? How do you know I’m 
not?’

‘I know, because I’ve met plenty of soldiers in my time and quite a few 
were officers who rose through the ranks, like you. I’ll bet you don’t have 
a pair of jeans in your wardrobe. Am I right?’

‘You are, as a matter of fact. Is that a bad thing?’

‘In a soldier, no. In a lawyer, no. In an actuary, for sure no. When I hang 
out in Spain I see these fat blokes on the beach in gaudy shirts and ridiculous 
shorts, with gold Rolexes on their wrists and all of them looking miserable 
because their wives have dragged them there and they’re starting to panic 
because they don’t know who anyone else is and, worse, nobody knows what they 
are. My golf club’s full of people who’ve never worn denim in their fucking 
lives, and that’s okay, because if they did they’d be pretending to be 
something they’re not.’

‘Exactly. So what are you saying?’

‘I’m trying to tell you,’ Skinner said, ‘that conformity is fine for 
normal people. But you, Clyde, you’re not a normal person, you’re a spook. 
You’re a good-looking bloke, of mixed race, so you have an inbuilt tendency 
to be memorable. The way you dress, the way you present yourself, makes you 
unforgettable, and in your line of work, my friend, that is the very last thing 
you want to be. If they didn’t teach you that when you joined up at Millbank, 
then they failed you.’

Houseman’s eyebrows formed a single line. ‘Point taken, sir. Any 
suggestions?’

‘Nothing radical; the obvious mostly. Vary your dress, and when you go 
casual, don’t wear stuff with big logos or pop stars on the front. Shop in 
Marks and Spencer rather than Austin Reed. Let your hair grow a bit shaggy. 
Don’t shave every day. Wear sunglasses when it’s appropriate, the kind that 
people will remember rather than the person behind them. Choose what you drive 
carefully.’

He smiled. ‘That day you and I met, back in the last century, I was driving 
my BMW. That was an accident; normally I’d have been in my battered old Land 
Rover. If I had, you and your gang wouldn’t have given it a second glance, 
and I wouldn’t have had to warn you off.’

‘Then whatever caused that accident, I’m grateful for it. You gave me the 
impetus to get out of there. Otherwise I might not have. I might have stayed a 
stereotype and wound up in jail.’

‘Nah, I think you’d have made it. You were a smart kid. You’d have worked 
it out for yourself, eventually.’

‘Maybe.’ He pulled himself a little more upright. ‘However, I’m sure 
you didn’t call me here to give me fashion advice.’

‘No,’ Skinner agreed, ‘that’s true. I felt I should give you an update 
on the investigation, since you were in at the death, so to speak.’

‘Thanks, sir. I appreciate that. How’s it going?’

‘It’s not,’ the chief sighed. ‘It’s stalled. All our lines of inquiry 
have dried up. There is no link between Beram Cohen and the person or 
organisation who sponsored the hit. We know how it was done, and even if it 
points in a certain direction, the witnesses are all dead. That’s probably my 
fault,’ he added. ‘You had no choice but to take down Smit, but if I was a 
better shot I’d have been able to stop Botha without killing him.’

‘There will be no further inquiries about our part in that?’ Houseman asked.

‘None. Everything is closed.’

Skinner rose to his feet, and his visitor followed suit. He moved towards the 
door, then stopped. ‘I’m aware,’ he said, ‘that in Toni Field’s time 
MI5 policy was to keep our counter-terrorism unit at a distance. It’s okay, 
I’m not asking you to comment. Toni may not even have been aware of it, but I 
know it was the case. I just want you to know that while I’m here, I won’t 
tolerate that. You can keep secrets from anyone else, but if they affect my 
operational area, not from me. Understood?’

Houseman nodded. ‘Understood, sir.’

They walked together to the lift. The chief constable watched the doors close 
then went back the way he had come, but walked past his own room, stopping 
instead at the one he had commandeered for Lowell Payne. He knocked on the door 
then opened it halfway and looked in.

‘Come on along,’ he said.

Marina Deschamps put down her magazine, stood and followed him. ‘This is all 
very surprising,’ she murmured, with a smile. ‘Even a little mysterious. By 
the way, did you solve the mystery of the safe?’

He nodded. ‘This very afternoon. I’ve still to check its contents, but if 
there’s anything personal in there I’ll let you have it. As for the rest, 
you’re right, but now I can show you what this visit’s all about.’

He sat behind his desk and touched the space bar on his computer keyboard to 
waken it from sleep.

‘This room has a couple of little bonuses,’ he began. ‘Having worked next 
door, you’re probably aware that there’s a security system. There’s a wee 
camera in the corner of the ceiling and when the system is set, anyone who 
comes in here is automatically filmed, without ever knowing it.’

‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘Some evenings I would be last out of here, and so I 
had to be shown how to set it.’

‘Yes, I imagine so. But did Toni tell you that it’s more than an alarm?’

‘No, she never did. It is? In what way?’

‘It can also be used to record meetings. Clearly, if that happens, all the 
participants should be made aware of it, but if they weren’t they’d never 
know.’ He used his mouse to open a program then select a file. He beckoned to 
her. ‘Come here and take a look at this.’

As she walked round behind him he clicked an icon, to start a video. There was 
no sound, but the image that she could see was clear and in colour. The chief 
constable with his back to the camera and facing him a sharply dressed, 
immaculately groomed man, whose skin tone was almost identical to her own.

‘Ever seen him before?’ Skinner asked, hearing an intake of breath from 
over his shoulder.

‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘That’s Don Sturgeon. What’s he doing here?’





Fifty-Two



‘What d’you think of the beer?’ Neil McIlhenney asked.

‘It’s okay,’ Lowell Payne conceded. ‘What’s it called?’

‘Chiswick Bitter. I don’t drink much, not any more, but when I do it’s 
the one I go for.’

‘That’s because it doesn’t take the top of your head off,’ one of their 
companions remarked, ‘unlike that ESB stuff. Bloody ferocious that is. I’ve 
seen tourists staggering out of here after a couple of pints of that stuff. Not 
like you Jocks, though. You’d drink aviation fuel and never feel it.’

‘I used to,’ the DCS chuckled. ‘Me and my mate. In those days we used to 
say that English beer was half the strength of a Scotsman’s piss, but since I 
came down here I’ve developed an occasional taste for it. Travelling to work 
on the tube has its compensations.’

The other Londoner glanced at him. ‘Where do you live?’

McIlhenney raised an eyebrow. ‘Was that a professional inquiry? I’ve heard 
about you guys; you’re never off duty.’

‘No, not at all.’

‘Richmond, actually.’

The man had his glass to his lips, he spluttered. ‘You what? On a copper’s 
pay? Maybe it should have been a professional question.’

‘My wife’s owned the place for years. When we lived in Edinburgh it was 
rented out. We used her flat in St John’s Wood if we ever came down.’

‘You’re shitting us.’

‘Oh no he’s not,’ Payne laughed. ‘Ask him who his wife is.’

As he spoke, the phone in the pocket of his shirt vibrated against his chest. 
He knew who the caller would be without looking at it. He excused himself as he 
took it out, and stepped out into the street.

‘Where are you now?’ Skinner asked.

‘I’m in a pub called the Red Lion, in Whitehall, with Neil McIlhenney and 
two guys he says are part of the Prime Minister’s protection team. This might 
be a good night to have a go at him.’

‘Given what happened on Saturday,’ the chief pointed out, ‘that’s not 
very funny. Have you got a hotel?’

‘Yes, the Met fixed me up with one near Victoria Station.’

‘Good. I want you to meet me tomorrow morning. Victoria will do fine. I’ll 
be coming up from Gatwick, same flight as you caught today.’

‘I’ll see you there. Where are we going?’

‘I have a meeting, and given where it is and what’s on the agenda, I’m 
not going in there unaccompanied.’

‘Sounds heavy. Where?’

‘Security Service, Millbank. I’m just off the phone with my friend Amanda 
Dennis, the deputy director. She’s expecting us.’

Payne gasped. ‘Jesus Christ, boss. Why are we going there? What’s 
happened?’

‘Nothing that I can slam on the table, point at and say “He did it”, but 
enough for me to fly some kites and see how they react. I can see a chain of 
events and facts that lead to a certain hypothesis, but I can’t see anything 
that resembles a motive. Still, what we’ve got is enough for some 
cage-rattling. I’m good at that.’

‘I think I know that.’

‘Then you can sit back and learn.’

‘At my age I don’t want to.’

‘You’re a year older than me, Lowell,’ Skinner chuckled, ‘that’s all. 
One thing I want you to do in preparation for the meeting. When you call Jean, 
as I’m sure you will, tell her where you’re going. I’ll be doing the same 
with Sarah. I know, I said that Amanda’s a friend, and she is, but in that 
place, friendship only goes so far.’





Fifty-Three



‘Are you going to work in Glasgow for good, Dad?’ Skinner’s elder son 
asked, ranging over three octaves in that single sentence.

Mark McGrath, the boy Skinner and Sarah had adopted as an orphan, was at the 
outset of adolescence, and the breaking of his voice was not passing over 
easily or quickly. James Andrew, his younger brother, laughed at his lack of 
control, until he was silenced by a frown from his mother.

‘I dunno, mate,’ Bob confessed. ‘Last week I’d never have imagined 
being there. On Sunday, when I agreed to take over, the answer would still have 
been no. But with every day that passes, I’m just a little less certain. But 
remember, even if I did apply for the job, so would other people. There’s no 
saying I’d be chosen.’

Both of his sons looked at him as if he had told them Motherwell would win the 
Champions League.

‘No kidding,’ he insisted. ‘There are many very good cops out there, and 
most of them are younger than me. I won’t see fifty again, lads.’

‘You’ll get it, Dad.’ James Andrew spoke with certainty, his father’s 
certainty, Sarah realised, as she heard him. ‘Will we have to move to 
Glasgow?’

‘Never!’ The reply was instant, and vehement.

‘Come on, guys,’ Sarah interrupted. ‘It’s past nine, time you headed 
upstairs. And don’t disturb your sister if she’s asleep.’

‘She won’t be,’ Mark squeaked. ‘She’ll be practising her reading.’

‘That’s a bit of an exaggeration surely,’ Bob chuckled. ‘She might be 
looking at the pictures.’

‘No, Dad. She’s learning words as well; I’ve been teaching her. There’s 
a computer program and I’ve been using it.’

Skinner watched them as they left, and was still gazing at the door long after 
it was closed. Sarah settled down beside him on the sofa, tugging his arm to 
claim his attention. ‘Hey,’ she murmured, ‘come back from wherever you 
are. Whassup, anyway?’

‘Ach, I was just thinking what a crap dad I’ve been. I should be teaching 
my daughter to read, not subcontracting the job to Mark. Last week I was all 
motivated, pumped up to do that and more. We had a great morning on the beach 
on Saturday, the kids and I, then I had a phone call, the shit hit the fan and 
I had to go rushing off, didn’t I, and get it splattered all over me. Now 
I’m thinking seriously about taking on the biggest job in Scotland, when 
I’ve already got a job that’s far more important than that.’

She turned his face to her, and kissed him. ‘Bob,’ she said, ‘I love you, 
and it’s good to see you taking your kids so seriously. But you always have 
done. You’ve been great with the boys all along, and you’ve never neglected 
Seonaid. It’s taken you a while to realise that she isn’t a baby any more, 
that’s all. Me living in America didn’t help, since that meant you missed a 
big chunk of her infancy, but I’m back now, and we can help her grow 
together.’ She put a hand on his chest. ‘That does not mean I expect you to 
become a house husband, because you couldn’t. There’s too much happening, 
too much at stake just now, and if you don’t get involved in it, you’ll 
regret it for the rest of your life.

‘You can’t walk away anyway, it’s not in your nature. This thing 
tomorrow, this high-stakes meeting at MI5 that you’re so worked up about, 
even if you’re not saying so, you don’t have to go there, do you? But you 
want to, you feel you have to. Isn’t that right?’

‘I set it up,’ he admitted. ‘Yes, it is a bit of a fishing trip, and 
there are other ways I could have played it. For example, I could just write a 
report, a straight factual account of the things that we know, and suggest 
certain possibilities. Then I could give that report to the Lord Advocate, 
who’s my ultimate boss as a criminal investigator in Scotland, with a copy to 
the First Minister.’

‘Why don’t you?’

‘Because they’d burn it. If I told them what I know to be fact and what I 
see as a possibility, they’d be scared stiff. If they acted on it, it could 
provoke a major conflict between them and the Westminster government. All in 
all, it’s best that I keep it from them, and that I go and have a full and 
frank discussion with Amanda.’

‘Bob,’ Sarah ventured, ‘are you suggesting that MI5 had something to do 
with Toni Field’s murder?’

‘No, I’m not, because the evidence doesn’t take me there. Even if I 
thought they were capable of doing that, I can’t see why they would. But I do 
know that they created the conditions for it to happen, and that they’ve been 
doing what they can to cover up. There’s a piece of that I still don’t 
understand, but I never will because they’ve been too good at it.’

‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Here’s what I think you should do. See this thing 
through to its conclusion, and let it go, however unsatisfactory the conclusion 
may be. Then apply for the Strathclyde job. You’ll get it; even the boys know 
that. And once you’re there, be everything you can be. Build your support 
staff so that you can delegate and not have to change every light bulb. Work 
the hours a normal man does, and be the father that a normal man is expected to 
be.’

He grinned. ‘And the husband?’

‘Nah,’ she laughed in return. ‘You were always lousy at that; we’re 
fine as we are.’

‘Yeah,’ he agreed. ‘I’ll go with that.’

‘Would you like a drink? I put some Corona in the fridge for you. I take it 
it’s still your favourite beer.’

‘Absolutely, but I’ll give it a miss tonight. Early start tomorrow. Hey,’ 
he added, ‘you realise that from now on I’ll be able to tell whether 
you’ve got another bloke just by checking the fridge?’

‘Yes, but how will you know I don’t have another fridge somewhere, one with 
a combination lock just in case you do find it?’

Her joke triggered a memory. ‘Bugger,’ he exclaimed. ‘I finally got into 
my own safe this afternoon, in the office. I haven’t had a chance to check 
the papers that were in it. They’re in my briefcase; mind if I go through 
them now?’

‘No,’ she replied, jumping to her feet, ‘you do that, and I’ll check 
that Madam Seonaid isn’t halfway through War and Peace by torchlight under 
the duvet.’

As she left the room, he reached for his attaché case and opened it. He had 
brought the remnants of his in-tray with him, to be worked on during his flight 
to London, but the contents of Toni Field’s safe were in a separate folder. 
He took it out and set the rest aside.

His dead predecessor’s papers were contained in a series of large envelopes. 
He picked up the first; the word ‘Receipts’ was scrawled on the outside. He 
shook out the contents and saw a pile of payment slips, two from restaurants, 
three from petrol stations, five for train tickets, two for books on 
criminology bought from Amazon, another from a hotel in Guildford, double room, 
breakfast for two, he noted, recalling a policing conference in the Surrey town 
two months earlier that he had declined to attend. Maybe she took Marina, he 
thought.

Or possibly not. Might Toni have been capable of taking the so-called Don 
Sturgeon along for the ride, and slipping him on to her expenses?

He stuffed the slips back into the envelope and picked up the next. His 
eyebrows rose when he saw his own name written on the front. He was about to 
open it when he found a second envelope attached, stuck to it by the gum on its 
unsealed flap. He prised them apart and read another name, ‘P. Friedman’. 
He looked inside, but it was empty, and so he laid it aside and slid out the 
contents of his own.

He found himself looking at two photographs of himself. From the background he 
saw that they had been taken surreptitiously at ACPOS, probably by Toni, with a 
mobile phone while his attention had been elsewhere. They were clipped on to a 
series of handwritten notes.

As he read them he saw that they were summaries of every meeting they had ever 
attended together, and one that had been just the two of them, when he had paid 
a courtesy call on her in Pitt Street in the week she had taken up office. That 
note was the most interesting.

Robert M. Skinner (Wonder what M stands for?)



The top dog in Scotland he thinks, come to let me know no doubt that he could 
have had my job for the asking . . . if he only knew. Tough on him; this is the 
season of the bitch. Sensitive about his politician wife. Eyes went all cold 
when I asked about her. Wonder if he knows what I do, about her screwing the 
actor guy every time he’s in Glasgow. Or if he’d like me to show him the 
evidence. If he knew about the other one! But that definitely stays my secret, 
till the time is right.





Skinner’s eyes widened as he read.

The man has testosterone coming out of his pores, which makes it all the more 
ironic that his wife plays away, as did the one before, from what I hear. As a 
cop, old school. He will not be an ally over unification. Question is, will he 
be an opponent for the job? Think he will, whatever he says; he’s a 
pragmatist, used to power, and not being questioned. Also, will he stand for 
Scotland’s top police officer being a woman, and a black one at that? Sexist? 
Racist? His sort usually are, if old Bullshit is anything to go by. Must work 
out a way to take him out of the game. Main weakness is his wife; use what I 
know and work on getting more on her. Other weakness his daughter, but she’s 
protected by the dangerous Mr Martin so too much trouble. Summary: an enemy, 
but can be handled.





‘No wonder this fucking woman got herself killed,’ he murmured to himself. 
‘I might have been tempted to do it myself.’

He replaced the notes and the photographs, then turned to the next envelope. It 
was inscribed ‘Bullshit’. It contained nothing but photographs, of Toni 
Field and a man. In one they were both in police uniform, but in the others 
they were highly informal. It was all too apparent that at least one of the 
participants had been completely unaware that they were being taken, most of 
all in one in which he was clad only in his socks.

Skinner stared. He gaped. And then he laughed. ‘Bullshit,’ he said. ‘B. 
S. for short. B. S. for Brian Storey, Sir Brian bloody Storey, deputy assistant 
commissioner then, going by his uniform, but now Commissioner of the 
Metropolitan Police. And weren’t he and Lady Storey guests in the royal box 
at Ascot a few weeks ago?’

His smile vanished. Was Brian Storey a man to be blackmailed and take it 
quietly? Maybe, maybe not.

He moved on to the next envelope. It was labelled ‘Brum’, another 
collection of candid camera shots of the star of the show with a West Midlands 
ACC, in line with Marina’s account. Skinner knew the guy by sight but could 
not remember his name, a sign that the days when he might have been of use to 
Toni lay in the past.

The same was true of the men featured in the next two. The broadcast journalist 
had been a name a couple of years before but had passed into obscurity when he 
had signed up with Sky News. As for Chairman Mao, the only thing for which he 
was remarkable was the size of his penis, since Toni had been able, easily, to 
swallow it whole.

The fifth envelope in the sequence was ‘Howling Mad’. There was something 
vaguely recognisable about the man, but if he was a QC as Marina had said, he 
would normally be seen publicly in wig and gown, as good a disguise as the 
chief constable had ever encountered. In addition, he was the only one of the 
five who was not seen completely naked, or in full face, only profile. However, 
there were a series of images possibly taken from a video, in which the pair 
were seen under a duvet, in what looked to be, even in the stills, vigorous 
congress.

‘Howling Mad,’ Skinner repeated. ‘Who the hell are you, and why is that 
name vaguely familiar?’

His question went unanswered as he refilled the envelope and turned to the 
last. It was anonymous; there was no description of its contents on the 
outside. He upended it and more photographs fell out. They showed Toni Field as 
he had never seen her, out of uniform, without make-up, without her hair 
carefully arranged. In each image she was holding or watching over a child, at 
various ages, from infancy to early toddler.

He felt a pang of sadness. Little Lucille, who’d never see her mother again. 
One photograph was larger than the rest. It showed Toni, sitting up in a 
hospital bed, holding her child and flanked by Sofia and a man, Mauritian. He 
had given his daughter his high forehead and straight, slightly delicate nose. 
And how much of his character? Skinner wondered.

He was replacing the photographs and making a mental note to hand them over to 
Marina, after burning four of the others… the ‘Bullshit’ file was one to 
keep… when he realised that something had not fallen out when they did. He 
reached inside with two fingers and drew out a document.

He whistled as he saw it, knowing at once what it was even if its style was 
unfamiliar to him. A birth certificate, serial number ending seven two six 
five, recording the safe arrival of Mauritian citizen Lucille Sofia Deschamps, 
mother’s name, Antonia Maureen Deschamps, nationality Mauritian, father’s 
name Murdoch Lawton, nationality British.

In the days when Trivial Pursuit was the only game in town, Bob Skinner had 
been the man to avoid, or the man to have on your team. There was never a fact, 
a name or a link so inconsequential that he would not retain it.

‘Murdoch,’ he exclaimed. ‘The A Team, original TV series not the iffy 
movie, crazy team member, “Howling Mad” Murdock, spelled the American way 
but near enough and that’s how Toni would have pronounced it anyway, played 
by Dwight Schultz. Hence the nickname, but who the hell is he?’

Sarah’s iPad was lying on the coffee table. He picked it up, clicked on the 
Wikipedia app, and keyed in the name of the father of little Lucille Deschamps.

When Sarah came back into the room he was staring at the tablet’s small 
screen, his face frozen, his expression so wild that it scared her.

‘Bob,’ she called out, ‘are you all right?’

He shook himself back to life. ‘Never better, love,’ he replied, and his 
eyes were exultant. ‘Can you print from this thing?’ he asked.

‘Of course. Why?’

‘Because the whole game is changed, my love, the whole devious game.’





Fifty-Four



‘Are ye sure you’re all right, kid?’ Since his visit earlier in the 
evening he had called her three times and on each occasion he had put the same 
question. Lottie understood; she knew that he was hurting almost as much as she 
was, but was incapable of saying so.

‘I promise you, Dan, I’m okay. That’s to say I’m not a danger to 
myself, or to wee Jakey. Nobody’s going to break in here tomorrow and find me 
hanging from the banisters. Ask me how I feel instead and I’ll tell you that 
I’m hurt, embarrassed, disappointed and blazing mad, but I’ll get over all 
that… apart, maybe, from the blazing mad bit. I’ve made a decision since 
you called me earlier. Jakey’s going to his granny’s tomorrow and I’m 
coming back to work.’

‘But Lottie,’ Provan began.

She cut him off. ‘Don’t say it, ’cos I know that I can have nothing to do 
with the Field investigation, but there’s other crime in Glasgow; there 
always is.’

‘The chief constable said ye should stay at home until everything’s 
sorted.’

‘As far as I’m concerned it is sorted. Scott’s been charged, right?’

‘Right.’

‘He’s no longer in custody, right?’

‘Right.’

‘And I’m not suspected of being involved in what he did, right?’

‘Right.’

‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘In that case, there is no reason for me to be 
stuck in the house twiddling my thumbs. The longer I do that the more it will 
look like I’m mixed up in my husband’s stupidity. So, Detective Sergeant, I 
will see you tomorrow. If the chief doesn’t like it, the only way he’ll get 
me out of there is by formally suspending me, and as you’ve just agreed, he 
doesn’t have any grounds to do that. I won’t come into the investigation 
room in Pitt Street. I’ll go to our own office in Anderston instead.’

‘Then ye’ll see me there. The chief’s told me to shut down the Pitt 
Street room. He says the investigation’s went as far as it can, and there’s 
no point in our bein’ there any longer.’

‘Why?’ she asked, surprised. ‘Have we run out of leads?’

‘Worse than that. Everywhere we’ve gone, some bugger’s been there before 
us. See ye the morra.’

As Lottie hung the wall phone back on its cradle in the hallway, her eye was 
caught by a movement. She looked at the front door and saw a figure; it was 
unrecognisable, its shape distorted by the obscure glass, but she knew who it 
was. She felt a strange fluttering in her stomach, and realised that she was a 
little afraid. She thought of calling Dan back. She thought of going back into 
the living room and listening to loud music through her headphones.

But she did neither of those things. Instead her anger overcame her 
nervousness, and she marched to the door and threw it open.

Her husband stood on the step, with a key in his hand, wavering towards the 
Yale lock that was no longer within reach. She snatched it from him.

‘Gimme,’ he protested.

‘No danger. You’ll not be needing it any longer.’ She grabbed him by one 
of the lapels of his sports jacket and pulled him indoors.

‘Aw thanks, love,’ he sighed, misunderstanding her.

‘Thanks for nothing,’ she replied. ‘You won’t be staying. You’re as 
drunk as a monkey and I’m not putting on a show for the neighbours, that’s 
all.’

‘Ach Lottie, gie’s a break. I’m goin’ tae the fucking jail, is that not 
enough for you?’

‘That’s the last thing I want, you pathetic twat,’ she hissed. ‘What do 
you think that’s going to do for your son at the school? Every kid in the 
place will be pointing fingers at him and calling him names. The only thing 
that’ll save him from being bullied is that all of them know me. As for your 
slapper, though, that McGlashan, they can stick her in Cornton Vale for as long 
as they like.’

‘Leave Christine out of this,’ Scott snarled, lurching towards her.

‘I’d leave her out of the human race,’ she retorted, her voice filled 
with scorn. ‘And you take one more step towards me,’ she added, ‘and it 
won’t be a police car that’ll come for you, it’ll be an ambulance. It was 
you that brought her into it. I hope you’re happy that you’ve ruined her 
life as well as your own. If I didn’t feel the contempt for her that any 
woman would feel, and that any good police officer would feel five times over, 
I could actually find it in my heart to be sorry for the poor cow. Do you have 
the faintest idea how cruel you’ve been in even asking her to do what she 
did, far less in talking her into it?

‘I know you and she were at it before we met, and I suspect that you always 
have been, behind my big stupid plodding back. That can only mean that the daft 
bitch actually feels something for you. And that you’ve let her down just as 
badly as you’ve betrayed and shamed Jakey and me.’

She took him by the arm, as if she was arresting him and began to push him 
towards the door. ‘Now go,’ she ordered, ‘and don’t you ever come back 
here.’

‘Lottie,’ he pleaded, ‘gie’s a break.’

‘Certainly. Which arm would you prefer?’

‘Ah’ve got nowhere else tae go!’

‘No? Why don’t you just go to her place?’

‘Aye, that’ll be right. Her husband’s lookin’ for me as it is.’

‘Her what? Well, I’ll tell you what, you go down to the riverside and find 
yourself a nice bench to sleep on, so that if he comes here, I can tell him 
where to find you.’ She opened the front door and thrust him outside. ‘As 
soon as I get inside,’ she warned him, ‘I’m going to phone the station. 
If you’re seen within a mile of this house for the rest of the night, 
you’ll be lifted. But I won’t tell them to arrest you. Oh no, I’ll have 
them drive you to Christine McGlashan’s house, drop you there and ring the 
doorbell. You think I wouldn’t do that, you snivelling bastard?’ she 
challenged.

He shook his head.

‘Aye, damn right I would. You know, Scott, what I feel right now, looking at 
you? I feel ashamed that I let you father my son. Well, I tell you this. There 
is no way that I will let you pass your weakness on to him. It might hurt him 
for a bit, but you’re never going to see him again.’

With that, Charlotte Mann slammed the door on her husband, walked quietly into 
her living room, slumped into an armchair, and wept as she had never wept 
before.





Fifty-Five



‘It’s bloody warm in this city,’ Lowell Payne remarked, as they stood on 
the pavement outside Thames House.

‘It can be in the summer,’ Skinner conceded. ‘I have this theory that all 
big cities generate their own heat. Mind you, it can be cold here too. I 
remember, oh, must be twenty years ago now, standing here on Millbank one 
evening in February, with a wind whistling up the Thames that felt as if it had 
come all the way from Siberia. That’s still the coldest I’ve ever been in 
my life.’

‘Are we going to get a chilly reception in here, d’ you think?’

‘No, I don’t, but things may cool down quite a bit once we get going.’

‘Who are we meeting?’

‘I’m not absolutely certain. As things stand, our appointment is with 
Amanda Dennis, the deputy director of the service. Whether she has anyone with 
her, that may depend on whether she guesses why we’re here.’

‘What’s my role?’

‘You’re a witness,’ Skinner told him. ‘Did you do what I suggested?’

‘Tell Jean, you mean?’ Payne frowned. ‘No, I didn’t, I’m sorry. 
You’ve known her for longer than I have, so I shouldn’t have to tell you 
that if I just happened to mention casually that you and I were off to a 
top-level meeting with MI5 but I couldn’t tell her what it was about, she’d 
have gone into full worry mode, and not slept a wink. Did you tell Sarah?’

‘Of course. Sarah gave up worrying about me years ago.’

‘Did you tell her what the meeting’s about?’

‘No, and she didn’t ask. She’s used to me moving in mysterious ways. She 
calls me God, sometimes.’

The DCI grinned and shook his head. ‘What is it with you two?’

‘What do you think?’

‘Honestly?’

‘Always. I’d expect nothing else.’

‘I think that Aileen getting caught out with Joey Morocco came in very handy 
for both of you.’

‘What does Jean think?’ Bob asked.

‘There’s nothing for her to think about,’ Lowell told him, ‘as far as 
you and Sarah are concerned, not yet, but she’ll be fine. They didn’t know 
it at the time, but I heard her and Alex compare notes one day. Neither of them 
were too keen on Aileen.’

‘I know that now.’

‘I’ve got nothing against her, mind, but on the two occasions that I’ve 
met Sarah, I thought that she was a sensational woman and that the two of you 
together just filled the whole room.’

‘Maybe we did at that, Lowell. We lost our way for a while, that was all. I 
hope we’ve found it again.’

‘What’s made the difference?’

‘I’ve stopped living in the past. Recently, somebody very close to me told 
me that for the last twenty and a bit years, since Myra was killed in that 
bloody car, I’ve been in denial, that I’ve never accepted it, never moved 
on. I’ve come to accept that’s true. It drove Sarah and me apart, and with 
Aileen… I made myself see Myra in her, when in fact they couldn’t be more 
different. Myra was wild, self-indulgent and she lived her life on the spur of 
the moment. She was also promiscuous, as Jean may have told you, more than I 
ever was, even when I was single.

‘Aileen, on the other hand, is one of the most calculating people I have ever 
known. I don’t mean that unkindly, not any more, but everything she does is 
to a plan, and everyone around her must conform to it, even me.

‘She supports police unification for two reasons. One, she does believe in 
it, but two, she thought that it would make me leave the force and help her 
achieve her real ambitions, which don’t lie in Scotland, but down here, in 
Westminster.

‘I’m sure she’ll get there, but not with my help. As for me, as was said 
to me, my soul’s been broken, but Sarah’s helping me fix it, and I feel 
more at peace with myself than I have in years.’ He checked his watch. ‘And 
I’ll be even more so when we’ve done our business here. Are you all set?’

‘Yes, I’m ready.’

‘Good. Come on then, I like to be bang on time when I visit this place.’

They entered the headquarters of the Security Service through a modest door to 
the right of the building’s great archway, and stepped up to a reception desk 
that might have belonged to any civil service department. Skinner announced 
them to one of the uniformed staff. When he told the man that he had an 
appointment with Mrs Dennis, there was a subtle change in his attitude. He 
checked a screen that the police officers could not see, then nodded.

‘Yes, gentlemen,’ he announced. ‘I’ll let the DD know you’re here and 
she’ll send someone down to collect you.’ He made a quick phone call, then 
filled in two slips, which he inserted in plastic cases and handed them over, 
one to each. ‘These must be surrendered on leaving. Now, if you’ll follow 
me, I’ll check you in through our electronic security. It’s just like an 
airport, really.’

‘I know,’ Skinner said. ‘But I have a pacemaker so you’ll have to pat 
me down.’

‘That won’t be necessary, Rashid,’ a woman called out.

The chief constable looked over towards a line of lift doors and saw Amanda 
Dennis approach. ‘Oh, but it will,’ he insisted. ‘I’m not having your 
lot plant a gun on me when we get upstairs then say I carried it in.’

She laughed. ‘Damn it! There goes Plan A.’

The deputy director of MI5 was not what Lowell Payne had been expecting. In his 
mind he had pictured Dame Judi Dench, or someone like her. Instead he saw 
someone who was around fifty, with dark, well-cut hair and sparkling eyes that 
had none of the chilly aloofness that were a feature of her film and television 
equivalents.

‘Hi, Mandy,’ Skinner greeted her when the security search was over and he 
and Payne had retrieved their bags from x-ray. ‘Good to see you; this is DCI 
Payne, Lowell, my sidekick, but you’ll know that by now.’ He kissed her on 
the cheek. ‘You’re looking better than ever. Still finding time for the toy 
boy?’

She winked. ‘Shows, does it?’

‘Does he still think you work in a flower shop?’

‘No, it closed down. Now he thinks I’m a proof-reader in a law firm.’ She 
grinned. ‘Actually he knows exactly what I do. He’s a bright enough chap to 
read the parliamentary reports where my name crops up occasionally. You know 
how it is, Bob. It’s the junior ranks who have to be anonymous. Thanks to 
John bloody Major, the rest of us can’t.’

‘I know,’ he sympathised, as they stepped into a lift. ‘The Don Sturgeons 
of this world have to be protected, but you and Hubert can walk around with 
targets on your backs.’

‘Who on earth is Don Sturgeon?’ she remarked, but did not wait for an 
answer. ‘As for Hubert, why do you want to see me? He’s the director, not 
me.’

‘He’s also a prat, a Home Office toady dropped in here because the Prime 
Minister of the day decided the place needed some new blood, after that wee 
scandal you and I uncovered a couple of years back. He may have been the 
transfusion, but you’re still the heartbeat.’

The elevator stopped and they stepped out, then along a corridor. Mrs Dennis 
unlocked her office door and followed them into the room. It was oak-panelled 
and grandly furnished, in contrast to the utilitarian style of the reception 
area.

‘Welcome,’ she said. ‘We’ll use the conference table, but before we 
start, Bob, I assume you’d like coffee.’

He held up a hand. ‘No thanks, Amanda, I’ve signed the coffee pledge, and 
Lowell here had a Starbucks on the way up from Victoria. By the way,’ he 
added, ‘he was propositioned by a whore, sorry, that’s non-PC, by a sex 
worker in his hotel last night. Very English, could even have been public 
school. Three hundred quid. Isn’t that right, Lowell?’

‘Yes indeed, Chief. She said it was her way of paying off her mortgage.’

‘Unluckily for her, he’s a Jock, and a tight-fisted bastard like all of us. 
She wasn’t one of yours, was she?’

‘She could have been,’ the deputy director replied. ‘About a third of the 
women in this place fit that description. But if she was, she wasn’t on duty. 
We tend to use Russian girls, or Polish. That’s what our targets expect, and 
let’s face it, chaps,’ she winked, ‘have you ever met a posh English girl 
who really knew how to fuck?’

Skinner laughed out loud. ‘As a matter if fact I have, but you probably know 
about her. Likely she’s on my file.’

‘Come on, Bob,’ she chided him. ‘We don’t keep files on senior police 
officers.’

‘Of course you bloody do, Amanda. You keep files on everyone, apart from the 
odd militant Islamist who slips through the net and blows up a London bus. For 
example, you kept a file on Beram Cohen. I know that, because you sent my young 
friend Clyde Houseman through to see me last Saturday, to tell me who he was. 
What I didn’t understand at the time was why MI5 should know about Cohen. He 
wasn’t Islamic, he was Jewish. He wasn’t an internal security threat to us. 
No, he was an Israeli secret service operative who got compromised and had to 
vanish.’

‘Yes,’ she agreed, ‘and we helped, as you know by now. We did a favour 
via our friends in MI6, for their friends in Mossad, and took him on board.’

‘You turned him into Byron Millbank?’

She frowned and the change seemed to add a couple of years to her age in the 
time it took. ‘What a bloody stupid name! I was livid when I heard about it, 
but when it was done I wasn’t involved. I was running our serious crime 
division then.’

‘I imagine it flagged up with you as soon as my people ran a DVLA check on 
him.’

‘Yes, that’s how it happened.’

‘And as soon as it did, you broke into the Rondar offices and removed his 
computer.’

‘We did, as a precaution, although it turned out to be unnecessary. He seems 
to have kept his two identities absolutely separate.’

‘But you knew he still functioned as Beram?’

‘I did, and a very few others. Six advised us of a couple of operations he 
had undertaken for them and for the Americans. There was the one in Somalia, 
for example; that’s how we knew of the connection between him, Smit and 
Botha. As soon as you came looking for him, trying to identify his body, I knew 
that something was up.’

‘And you knew who the target was, but you didn’t tell me,’ Skinner said. 
‘Because MI5 wanted her dead.’

She stared back at him. ‘Of course not,’ she protested. ‘Why the hell are 
you saying that?’

Lowell Payne had been following the exchange, fascinated; he had sat in on, or 
led, hundreds of interviews during his career, and he realised what Skinner was 
doing. As Dennis spoke, he detected a very subtle shift in her posture, as if 
she had slipped, very slightly, on to the defensive.

‘Because I believe it’s true,’ the chief replied. ‘Twenty-four hours 
ago, I was simply curious about the chain of events, mostly because of Basil 
“Bazza” Brown. As you said earlier, Mandy, you used to run the serious 
crimes operation in this place. Inevitably that would involve you in suborning 
criminals up and down the country and turning them into informants, either 
through blackmail or bribery.

‘When we found Bazza’s body in the boot of Smit and Botha’s supposed 
getaway car… rented by Byron Millbank… and we checked him out through NCIS, 
they’d never heard of him. Now, Bazza might not quite have been one half of 
the Kray Twins, but he was a person of significant interest to Strathclyde CID 
and the Scottish Serious Crimes and Drugs Agency. So it just wasn’t feasible 
that he wouldn’t be on the national criminal database, unless he had been 
taken off it, and the only organisation I can think of with the clout to do 
that, is yours. Come on, he was an MI5 asset, wasn’t he? Give me that much.’

She sighed, then smiled. ‘I should have known,’ she murmured. ‘Yes, he 
was. I turned him myself.’

‘Thought so. By the way, was Michael Thomas involved in any way, my ACC?’

‘Yes, I had to involve him at one point, on pain of disgrace if he breathed a 
word. Why?’

‘It answers a question, that’s all. And gets him off a nasty hook.’ He 
paused, straightening in his seat. ‘Okay,’ he went on, ‘so you must see 
where I’m coming from. I’ve uncovered an operation in Scotland, planned by 
a man who is known to MI5. Then right in the middle, I find a key equipment 
supplier, eliminated to keep him quiet, and I discover that he was also known 
to you. At the very least that was going to start me wondering. You’ve got to 
concede that, chum.’

‘Yes, okay, I do. But answer me this. If we were behind it, why did I send 
Clyde Houseman through to see you, to tell you who Cohen was? Surely I’d have 
kept quiet about it all.’

‘No,’ Skinner murmured. ‘You wouldn’t have taken that chance. If you 
had you’d have been betting that I wouldn’t have found out about the 
operation on my own, without your help, and you know me too well for that. So 
you sent Clyde with his order, and with his personal connection to me to cloud 
my judgement.

‘I bought into him, but now I’ve come to believe that his job was to make 
sure that the hit went ahead; not to help me, but to get in my way, and to keep 
me from getting to the concert hall on time, by any means necessary.’

‘And I gave him orders to shoot you if he had to? Come on, old love,’ she 
protested.

‘No,’ he conceded, ‘just to fuck me about, to make sure we were chasing 
the wrong hare. It worked too. We didn’t find out that the target was female 
until it was too late. Even then, when we did, I still assumed that it was 
political, as Clyde had said, and that meant that it had to be Aileen, my 
wife.’

‘Bob,’ Dennis murmured. ‘This is all very flight of fancy. What on earth 
has brought it about?’

‘Two things. First, you told me that official MI5 policy has been to steer 
clear of cooperation with the Strathclyde Counter-Terrorism Intelligence 
Section because you didn’t trust Toni Field. But in fact I find out that 
you’ve had her under very close supervision, through Clyde Houseman, or Don 
Sturgeon, the identity he used to… how to say it… penetrate her.’

Amanda smiled and raised an eyebrow.

‘Second,’ Skinner continued, ‘I’ve solved a mystery.’

‘It seems to me that you’ve created one, but go on.’

‘Toni Field’s secret child, Lucille.’

‘Her what?’ Dennis exclaimed.

‘Come on, Mandy, Clyde must have told you she had a kid. The scar was a clear 
giveaway, as we found at her autopsy. As soon as I heard about it, I found 
myself wondering why. Why did she have to hide the fact, take a sabbatical and 
fuck off to Mauritius to have the baby under her old name?

‘A child wouldn’t have been a roadblock in her career, not these days, and 
not even as a single parent, for Toni’s mother’s hale and hearty and still 
young enough to help raise her, as she is doing.

‘So I started wondering who Daddy was, and I started to consider five people 
that Marina, her sister, told me about, five men in her life before they came 
to Scotland. The only problem was, Marina didn’t know them by name, only 
nickname.’

‘How inconvenient.’ Her tone was teasing, but Payne, the shrewd observer, 
detected tension beneath it.

‘Yeah. But somebody must have known one of them, somebody with the resources 
to hack into the Mauritian general registry and remove all records of the 
birth. If it hadn’t been for the hospital patient log, we’d never have been 
able to prove it happened at all. Nice one, my dear. Tell me, did you have to 
send someone to Mauritius or were you able to do it without leaving this 
building?’ He looked at her, inquiring, but she was silent.

‘Yup,’ he chuckled. ‘This week, it’s been a whole series of dead ends, 
until I found out about Mr Sturgeon and until a specialist thief of my 
acquaintance finally managed to get into Toni’s safe, in what’s now my 
office.’ He picked up his attaché case and opened it. ‘When I did, I found 
these.’ He removed two envelopes and placed them on the table.

Amanda Dennis frowned and pulled her chair in a little. She reached out for the 
envelopes, but Skinner drew them back. ‘All in good time,’ he said. 
‘There were three others, but their subjects were of no relevance to this, so 
I’ve destroyed them. These two, though, they tell a story.’

He removed the contents of the envelope marked ‘Bullshit’ and passed them 
across.

As the deputy director studied them, her eyebrows rose and her eyes widened. 
‘Bloody hell!’ she murmured.

‘I wondered if you knew about him,’ Skinner remarked. ‘Now, I gather that 
you didn’t. I expect you’ll find that when Toni was appointed to both West 
Midlands and Strathclyde, Sir Brian Storey gave her glowing testimonials, both 
times. I don’t like the man, so if you use these to bring him down, it 
won’t bother me.’

He picked up ‘Howling Mad’ and reached inside. ‘These, on the other hand, 
are a whole different matter.’ He withdrew several photographs. ‘I didn’t 
know who this bloke was at first,’ he said, as he handed them across, ‘the 
one she’s fucking, but I do now. Once he was Murdoch Lawton, QC, a real star 
of the English Bar. In fact he was such a big name that the Prime Minister gave 
him a title, Lord Forgrave, and brought him into the Cabinet as Justice 
Secretary.

‘There he sits at the table alongside his wife, Emily Repton, MP, the Home 
Secretary, the woman who controls this organisation, and to whom you and Hubert 
Lowery answer.’

She stared at the images. Even to Payne, that most skilled reader of 
expressions, she was inscrutable.

‘Those are bad enough,’ the chief constable told her, ‘even without 
this.’ He took Lucille Deschamps’ birth certificate from the envelope and 
laid it down. ‘You knew about it of course, since MI5 removed the original 
registration. Lawton knocked her up, fathered her child.’ He sighed, with 
real regret.

‘So now you see, my friend, how I’m drawn to the possibility that Toni 
Field was murdered by this organisation, to prevent her from advancing herself 
even further than she had already by blackmailing the woman at its head, and 
her husband.

‘Amanda, I don’t actually believe that you’d be party to that, which is 
why I’ve brought this to you and not to Lowery, who’d probably have the 
Queen shot if he was ordered to.’

Amanda Dennis leaned back, linked her fingers behind her head and looked up at 
the ceiling. ‘Oh dear, Bob,’ she sighed. ‘If only you hadn’t.’

As she spoke, a door at the far end of the room swung open and two people came 
into the room, one large, the other small, almost petite. Skinner had met the 
man before, at a secret security conference the previous autumn, not long after 
his appointment as Director of MI5, but not the woman. Nonetheless, he knew who 
she was, from television and the press.

Dennis stood; Payne followed her lead instinctively, but Skinner stayed in his 
seat. ‘Home Secretary,’ he exclaimed, ‘Hubert. Been eavesdropping, have 
we?’

‘No!’ the director snapped. ‘We’ve been monitoring a conversation that 
borders on seditious. To accuse us of organising a murder…’

‘Go back and listen to the recording that you’ve undoubtedly made,’ the 
chief constable said. ‘You’ll find no such accusation. I’m investigating 
a crime, and my line of inquiry has led me here. You people may think you’re 
off limits, but not to me.’

As Sir Hubert Lowery’s massive frame leaned over him, the chief recalled a 
day when, as a very new uniformed constable, he had policed a Calcutta Cup 
rugby international at Murrayfield Stadium, in which the man had played in the 
second row of the scrum, for England.

‘Skinner,’ the former lock hissed, ‘you’re notorious as a 
close-to-the-wind sailor, but this time you’ve hit the rocks.’

He pushed himself to his feet. ‘Get your bad analogies and your bad breath 
out of my face, you fat bastard,’ he murmured, ‘or you will need some 
serious dental work.’

Lowery leaned away, but only a little. Skinner put a hand on his chest and 
pushed, hard enough to send him staggering back a pace or two. ‘You were 
never any use on your own,’ he said. ‘You always needed the rest of the 
pack to back you up.’

‘Bob!’ Dennis exclaimed.

He grinned. ‘No worries, Amanda. He doesn’t have the balls.’

‘Probably not,’ the Home Secretary said, ‘but I do. Let me see these.’ 
She snatched up the photographs. ‘The idiot!’ she snapped as she examined 
them. ‘Bad enough to get involved with that scheming little bitch, but to let 
himself be photographed on the job, it’s beyond belief, it really is. Are 
these the only copies?’

‘I’d say so,’ Skinner replied, sitting once again. ‘Toni was too smart 
to leave unnecessary prints lying around. Plus, she thought she was 
untouchable.’ He took a memory card from the breast pocket of his jacket and 
tossed it on to the table. ‘I found that among the envelopes. The originals 
are on it.’

Emily Repton picked it up, and the birth certificate. She walked across to the 
deputy director’s desk and fed the photographs into the shredder that stood 
beside it. The memory card followed it. She was about to insert the birth 
certificate when Payne called out, ‘Hey, don’t do that! The child’s going 
to need it.’

The Home Secretary gave him a long look. ‘What child?’ she murmured. The 
shredder hummed once again. ‘Why did you give those up so easily?’ she 
asked the chief constable.

‘Because I’m a realist. I’ve been in this building before. I know what 
it’s about, and I know that there are certain things that are best kept below 
decks, as Barnacle Hubert the Sailor here might say. But they’re kept in my 
head too, and in DCI Payne’s.’

‘Sometimes it can be a lot harder to get out of here than to get in,’ 
Repton pointed out.

‘Not in this case,’ Skinner told her. ‘We’re being collected in about 
half an hour from the front of Thames House by Chief Superintendent McIlhenney, 
of the Met. If we’re any more than five minutes late, he will leave, and will 
come back, with friends.’

She smiled. ‘See, Sir Hubert. I said you were underestimating this man. 
What’s your price, our friend from the north?’

He pointed at Lowery. ‘He goes. Amanda becomes Director General, as she 
should have been all along. Then you go.’

‘What about my husband? Do you want his head too?’

‘Nah. I imagine you’ll cut his balls off as soon as you get him home for 
landing you in all this. I wouldn’t wish any more on the guy.’

‘I see.’ She frowned and pursed her lips, calling up an image from the past 
as she stood in her pale blue suit, with every blonde hair in place. ‘The 
first of those is doable, because you’re right: Sir Hubert isn’t up to the 
job, and Mrs Dennis is. The second, no, not a chance.’

‘No? You don’t think I’d bring you down?’

‘I don’t think you can. Okay, my husband had an affair with someone he met 
in the course of his work at the Bar and, unknown to him, fathered her child. 
I’ll survive that… and it’s all you have on me.’

Her mirthless smile was that of an approaching shark, and all of a sudden 
Skinner felt that the ground beneath his feet was a little less solid.

‘Explain, Amanda,’ she said.

‘We didn’t do it, Bob.’ His friend looked at him with sympathy in her 
eyes, and he found himself hating it. ‘When you asked to see me, I was afraid 
this was how it would develop. The thing is, we knew about the child, and we 
knew of Toni Field’s ambitions, which were, granted, without limits, but we 
felt they were pretty much contained.

‘We knew what the sabbatical had been about, even before she went on it. 
After we deleted the Mauritian birth record, we felt she had nothing to use 
against us, or against the Home Secretary, so we simply parked her in Scotland, 
with Brian Storey’s assistance. I can see now why he was so keen to help.’ 
She grinned, but only for a second.

‘We made her your problem, Bob, not ours. No, we didn’t know about the 
photos, but if we had, I’d have been relying on you or someone like you to 
find them, as you did. As for the birth certificate, well, we thought that had 
been dealt with.

‘Oh sure, she still had her career planned in her head, Scotland, and then 
the Met as Storey’s successor, but in reality, she’d never have got another 
job in England. Toni Field was a boil, that was all, and we thought we had 
lanced her, so there was no need to bump her off.’

‘So why did you plant Clyde with her?’ he asked. ‘To check whether she 
had any more damaging secrets?’

‘Bob, we never did! There was no liaison, there was no Don Sturgeon. Clyde 
never met the woman, I promise you.’

Skinner gaped at her as he experienced something for the first time in his 
life: the feeling of being a complete fool, dupe, idiot.

‘This is bluff,’ he exclaimed. ‘Repton’s laid down the party line for 
you.’ But as he did, he thought of his own ruse with Houseman, and knew that 
she was right.

‘I’m afraid not.’ She rose, walked across to her desk, and produced a 
paper, from a drawer. ‘This is a printout of the data we removed from the 
Mauritian files. It shows, along with everything else, the name and nationality 
of the person who registered the birth, and it even carries her signature.’

She handed it to him.

‘Marina Deschamps,’ he read, his voice sounding dry and strange.

‘Exactly. She’s how we came to know about the child, and who her father 
was. The same Marina who told you she didn’t know any of her sister’s 
lovers by name. Marina, who invented Toni’s relationship with Clyde Houseman. 
Marina, who it is now clear to me had her half-sister killed.’ She smiled at 
him once more, but with sadness in her eyes. ‘My dear, I’m sorry, but 
you’ve been played. The scenario you have in your head, about the Home 
Secretary having Toni assassinated, to keep her husband’s dark secret and to 
spare the government from possible collapse in the ensuing scandal, it’s 
plausible, I’ll admit, but it seems that Marina put it there. But don’t 
feel too bad about it,’ she added. ‘She was an expert. She used to be one 
of us.’

‘She what?’ he spluttered.

‘She worked here for five years, in MI5, with a pretty high security 
clearance. When she applied, she was with the Met, and Brian Storey recommended 
her for the job.’

‘Doesn’t that tell you something?’ he challenged her. ‘Given that Toni 
had Storey by the balls?’

‘With hindsight it does. But he may have done it to get himself a little 
protection from her. Marina left here when Toni took the job in Birmingham. 
That was our idea originally; we wanted to keep a continuing eye on her and she 
agreed to do it. She sold it to her sister, so well that she thought it was her 
own wheeze. Marina’s been keeping an eye on her all along.’

‘Did Toni ever know she was a spook?’ Payne asked, as his boss sat silent, 
contemplating what he had been told.

‘No, never.’ Dennis gave a soft chuckle. ‘Believe it or not, she also 
thought Marina worked in a flower shop, of sorts, after she left the Met. I can 
and will check, but I’m certain that while she was here she would have been 
in a position to know about Beram Cohen, and his second identity, and that 
she’d have known about poor old Bazza too.’

She looked at Skinner. ‘You do believe me, Bob, don’t you? If you don’t, 
there’s an easy way to test me. Call her, at home. Send a car to pick her up, 
under some pretext or other. She won’t be there, I promise you.’

He glared back at her. ‘Then tell me why,’ he demanded. ‘Tell me why she 
did it.’

‘If I knew,’ Amanda replied, ‘I would tell you, without hesitation. But I 
don’t. I don’t have a clue. All I can suggest is that you find her and ask 
her. However, if you do, and knowing you I imagine that you might, you must 
hand her over to us. None of the stuff that we’ve talked about here could 
ever come out in open court.’

‘Don’t you worry about that,’ he growled. ‘It won’t.’ He started to 
rise, Payne following.

‘Hold on just a moment,’ the Home Secretary said. ‘We’re not done yet, 
not quite. There is still the matter of your continuing silence on this 
business. I’m not letting you leave without that being secured.’

‘How are you going to do that? I’ve got nothing to gain, personally, by 
going public, but if you knew anything about Scots law and procedures, you’d 
realise that having begun the investigation I’m bound to report its findings 
to the procurator fiscal.’

‘Then it will have to be edited, otherwise…’

He looked at her, and realised that she was a rarity, a politician who should 
not, rather than could not, be underestimated. He had read a description of 
Emily Repton as ‘a prime minister in waiting, but not for much longer’. 
Feeling the force of the certainty that radiated from her, he understood that 
assessment.

‘Otherwise?’ he repeated.

‘Show him, Sir Hubert,’ she murmured.

‘No,’ Skinner countered, ‘I don’t listen to him. You tell me.’

‘Very well.’ She reached out a hand; Lowery took a plastic folder from his 
pocket and passed it to her.

She selected a photograph and held it up. ‘You seem to have recovered well 
from the public break-up of your marriage, Chief Constable. This was taken 
early this morning, as you left the home of your former wife.’

‘So what?’ he laughed. ‘Our children are with her just now, and I wanted 
to see them.’

‘But you have joint custody; you’ll see them at the weekend.’

He snatched the image from her, crumpled it, and threw it on the floor. ‘Go 
on, then,’ he challenged her. ‘Leak it and see what follows. I’ll tell 
the Scottish media that it’s a Tory plot to discredit me. See those two words 
“Tory plot”? In Scotland they’re a flame to the touch paper. They’ll be 
on you like piranha. You’ve got to do better than that.’

‘I can. Your ex-wife is an American citizen. Now that you and she are no 
longer married, she’s here because she’s been given right to remain. That 
can be revoked.’

‘We’d see you in court if you tried that.’

‘It would have to be an American court; we’d have her removed inside 
twenty-four hours.’

‘And twenty-four hours after that I’m on a plane to New York and we 
remarry. Come on, Home Secretary, up your game. You still need to do better.’ 
And yet, as he spoke, he sensed that she could, and that her first two shots 
had been mere range-finders.

‘If you insist,’ she replied, and her voice told him that he had been 
right. ‘It might come as a surprise to you to learn that your present 
wife’s liaison with Mr Joey Morocco has been going on for years. It began 
before you met and it continued during your marriage.’

She took a series of photographs from the folder and handed them to him. He 
glanced through them; they showed Aileen and the actor at various locations: in 
a garden with Loch Lomond stretched out below them, on the balcony of her 
Glasgow flat, leaving a hotel in a street he did not recognise. None of them 
were explicit, but they displayed intimacy clearly enough.

He handed them back, and shrugged. ‘Sorry, no surprise,’ he said. ‘Nor is 
it my business any more either. By the way, after the Daily News photos you 
might be able to sell those to Hello! or OK! but nobody else is going to buy 
them.’

‘Probably not,’ Repton conceded, ‘but every newspaper in the country 
would run this, front page. The trouble with our modern celebrity culture is 
that it’s so damn predictable. Where there are actors, there are the 
inevitable parties, with the same inevitable temptations. Most politicians have 
the sense to steer clear of them, but not, it seems, Ms de Marco.’

She took the last two items from the folder and gave them to him. The 
photographs had been taken in a ladies’ toilet. There were three washbasins 
set into a flat surface, with a mirrored wall above.

The first picture showed two women, expensively clad, watching while a third, 
her face part-hidden by her hair, bent over a line of white powder, with a tube 
held to her nose. In the second, all three women were standing, their laughter, 
and their faces, reflected in the mirror.

He stared at it, then at Emily Repton with pure hatred in his eyes.

‘The original is in a place of safety,’ Sir Hubert Lowery barked. ‘Not 
here, though, just in case Mrs Dennis feels obliged to do a favour for an old 
friend. I don’t have to tell you…’

Skinner moved with remarkable speed for a man in his early fifties. He moved 
half a pace forward and hit the Director General with a thunderous, hooking, 
left-handed punch that caught him on the right temple. The man’s legs turned 
to spaghetti and he was unconscious before he hit the floor.

‘I’ve wanted to do that,’ he murmured, ‘ever since I saw him blindside 
our outside half at Murrayfield.’

‘I did warn him,’ Amanda Dennis remarked. ‘I told him you’d want to hit 
somebody, and since he’d be the only man in the room…’

‘He’ll be all right,’ the chief growled. ‘His skull’s too thick and 
his brain’s too small for there to be any lasting damage.’

He turned to Emily Repton. Her eyes told him she had enjoyed the show. ‘Spell 
it out,’ he told her.

She nodded. ‘Hard man, soft centre,’ she said. ‘Your marriage may be 
over, but I don’t believe you would wish to cause Ms de Marco the damage, the 
distress and the disgrace that would follow publication of those images. The 
fact that it was a one-off doesn’t matter. Her career would be gone, way 
beyond the U-bend, and so would her employable life. As indeed it will, if one 
single line in one single newspaper, or blog, should ever link my husband to 
Antonia Field and her child.

‘You can write your report to the procurer physical or whatever he’s 
called. It will say that your investigation has reached the conclusion that the 
balance of probability is that Chief Constable Field’s killing was ordered 
and funded by Mexican or Colombian drug cartels that she compromised during her 
time with the Serious and Organised Crime Agency. There will be not the 
slightest hint of impropriety by the Security Service.’

She frowned. ‘I’m not going to ask if you agree. There is no alternative on 
the table; you will do what you’re told. Go back to Scotland, Mr Skinner, and 
be the big provincial copper in your little provincial pond. This is London; 
the power will always lie here. If you can’t live with that truth, you could 
always resign.’

Skinner stared down at her, unblinking, until the coldness in his eyes made her 
shiver and look away.

‘You really don’t know me, Home Secretary,’ he told her. ‘My report’s 
already dictated and that is more or less what it says. Even if my suspicions 
had been one hundred per cent right, there would have been no mileage for me in 
pulling this building down.’

He nodded towards Lowery, who was beginning to stir on the floor. ‘Getting 
rid of him will do nicely thanks, and I’ve shown you why that has to 
happen.’

‘Agreed,’ Repton said.

‘But you are right,’ he continued, ‘that I won’t see Aileen broken by 
you. Hell, woman, I know you and Lowery set her up. Any idiot, even me, could 
see that. She can’t hold her booze at the best of times, and I can tell from 
the photo she was rat-arsed when that all went off. I’m sure that if I could 
identify the two other women, I’d find that at least one was on Five’s 
payroll.

‘But that’s by the by; I’ll go along with your deal. Your husband’s 
safe. If you’re prepared to tolerate his adultery, that’s your business. 
I’ve never met the man, so he really means nothing to me. Plus, I have no 
practical need to remove him, since he isn’t in my sphere of influence.’

‘That’s pragmatic of you,’ she mocked, her tone heavy with sarcasm.

‘But you are,’ he snapped, as he picked up his case. ‘And you disgust me. 
You’re the embodiment of everything I loathe about politics and politicians. 
Frankly, I don’t want to be any part of any world in which someone like you 
operates, and there are only two things I can do about that. So I’ll go back 
to my provincial, sub-national pond, and I will work out which one it’s going 
to be.’





Fifty-Six



‘No thanks, Amanda, I’ll pass on that one personally. Maybe I’ll send 
Lowell Payne instead. I was impressed by the way he handled himself the other 
day, and it’s persuaded me that he’s the man to take over what was a 
vacancy as head of CTIS.

‘He’s in post already. It wouldn’t be right of me to come, when I might 
not be a police officer for much longer. You take care now, and watch your back 
as long as that woman’s standing behind you.’

He ended the call and slipped his mobile into the big canvas bag that lay by 
his side.

‘What was that about?’ Sarah asked. They were sitting on a travelling rug 
on the beach at Gullane, watching their two sons trying to persuade Seonaid 
that the seawater was as warm as they said.

‘Amanda Dennis,’ he said. ‘She’s having a two-day review of the Field 
fiasco in London, on Monday and Tuesday. It’s a natural response: what went 
wrong and how to prevent any recurrence. She said she’s ordered Houseman and 
his entire Glasgow team down there, and asked if I wanted to attend.’

‘Were you serious in what you said to her?’

‘About Lowell? Sure. He never wavered in there and he turned out to be very 
good at reading people. He’s a natural for the job, and it gives me grounds 
to give him an acting promotion, without anyone calling it nepotism. Mind 
you,’ he chuckled, ‘Jean wouldn’t be too pleased if I send him off to 
London again so soon, so I don’t think I’ll pass on the invite.’

She shook her head. ‘I didn’t mean were you sure about Lowell. I was 
talking about the last part. Do you really mean that?’

‘I think I do,’ he said. ‘I am edging myself towards walking away from 
the Strathclyde job and leaving the police service altogether, as soon as I 
can. All the way back from London I argued the toss with myself, and I still am 
arguing. It’s doing my head in. I never wanted to destroy the Security 
Service itself, only to sort any people that might have crossed the line. I’m 
a realist, I understand how the world has to work at times. But given what I 
knew, or thought I knew, I had some questions that needed answers.

‘As it was, I got it wrong, although not all of it: the Home Secretary did 
misuse her position by having Lowery delete the Mauritian birth record. Now 
I’m being blackmailed by Emily Repton herself, to save her husband’s 
reputation and both their careers. You should have heard her, and seen her. 
That woman is fucking evil.’

‘She threatened me? Really?’

‘Yes, but we both knew that was crap; that was just her way of telling me how 
far she could reach into my life. I’ve taken legal advice since. Your 
passport may be American, but your children are British. There isn’t a judge 
in Scotland who’d allow your deportation.’

‘But her threat against Aileen? Is that for real?’

Bob nodded. ‘Oh yes. She went with Morocco to a party in Glasgow, after the 
premiere of a movie he was in. They’d been watching the pair of them for long 
enough to be fairly sure she would go, especially since I was at a security 
conference that MI5 had set up.

‘While Joey was away schmoozing the press, Hubert Lowery’s two women got 
her shit-faced, possibly with a little chemical assistance, then set up the 
cocaine scene in the toilets. I know all this because Amanda made Lowery tell 
her as he was clearing his desk.’

‘How did she make him cough that up?’

He gave a bitter laugh. ‘She threatened to tell me where he lives. That was 
enough.’

‘Can Amanda do anything about it, now she’s in the top job?’

‘Not with Emily Reptile as Home Secretary.’

‘If you had been right, and Toni Field had been killed on Repton’s orders, 
what would you have done?’

‘As much as I could, although that might not have been a lot, since so many 
of the players are dead and so much of it is deniable.’

‘Are you really satisfied that isn’t what happened?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, I’m sure. I got taken. As Mandy suggested, I did send a 
car to pick up Marina, as soon as I got out of there. She’d gone, right 
enough. Sofia thought she was just shopping… or so she said… but she 
hasn’t been seen since. Amanda was right. The woman made me look like an 
idiot. Hell, I am an idiot! She fed me little hints to steer me in the 
direction she wanted, towards them and away from her.

‘That last scene, her identifying Clyde Houseman as Toni’s mystery lover, 
that was the final piece of the con. I bought it, like an absolute sucker, and 
went charging off down to London, to commit professional suicide.’

‘It wasn’t suicide,’ Sarah insisted. ‘You don’t need to do anything 
so drastic as quit.’ She paused. ‘Don’t go off on me for asking this, but 
could this depression from which speaking as a doctor, you are clearly 
suffering, be related to the fact that you feel humiliated, embarrassed, and 
maybe even a little unmanned by what this Marina woman did to you?’

‘Why should I take the hump?’ he asked. ‘It’s a fair question. But the 
answer’s no. At the time, sure, I had a red face. Now, I see it the same as a 
golf game. Marina was good, and so was I. But where I shot a birdie, she had an 
eagle. When that happens out there on Gullane Number One, you don’t give up 
the game. You say to the other guy, “Good shot,” and then you stuff him at 
the next hole. If I leave the force, it’ll be because I can’t go after 
Repton from within it. But whatever happens, I’m going to find Marina 
Deschamps.’

She looked at him, a little afraid of the answer to the question she was about 
to pose. ‘When you find her, what will you do?’

‘I could eliminate her,’ he told her. ‘As long as I don’t do it in the 
middle of Piccadilly Circus at rush hour, I really don’t believe anyone would 
want to know. Too many guilty secrets.’ He stopped, then laughed at the alarm 
on her face. ‘I could,’ he repeated, ‘but don’t worry, I won’t. There 
is an alternative.’

He jumped up from the rug. ‘Come on, let’s go and paddle with the kids. The 
water can’t be that cold.’

‘Okay.’ She took his hand and let him pull her to her feet, then laughed, 
as his phone sounded. ‘I thought you were going to leave that at home,’ she 
said.

‘Force of habit. I’ll ignore it.’

‘Hell no,’ she retorted, fishing it out of their beach bag. ‘You’ll 
fret if you do that.’ She handed it to him. ‘It’s Mario.’

‘Ah, that’s different.’ He took it from her and accepted the call. 
‘What is it?’ he asked. ‘Has Paula had the baby?’

‘She has indeed,’ the new father replied. ‘Wee Eamon put in an appearance 
about half an hour ago. Like shelling peas, the midwife said, although not 
within Paula’s hearing.’

‘Big fella, that is absolutely great, I am so pleased for you both.’

‘In that case, you’re going to be even more pleased. About two hours ago a 
bloke walked into the St Leonards office with a bag that he found when he was 
sorting old clothes from one of those public recycling points. It was mixed up 
among them all, and there was a laptop inside it, wrapped in a shirt with a 
Selfridges label on it. The battery was flat, but the desk staff found a 
charger and plugged it in. When they switched it on, it said “Byron’s 
MacBook”. I reckon we’ve found your man Cohen’s missing computer.’

Looking at Bob, Sarah saw his face light up, saw all his gloom and pessimism 
evaporate, and she knew that whatever he had been told, it had been a tipping 
point in his life.

‘Mario,’ she heard him exclaim, ‘that’s brilliant. It means the 
show’s back on the road. I’d like it in Glasgow in my office, by Monday 
morning.’ She thought he was about to end the call, but he went on, as if an 
afterthought had come to him just in time.

‘One other thing,’ he added. ‘I want to see wee Ramsey again, but not in 
my office. Find him and tell him I’ll be shopping in Fort Kinnaird at noon 
tomorrow and that I’ll fancy a hot dog from the stall by the crossing. 
There’ll be one in it for him as well if he turns up.’





Fifty-Seven



‘Welcome back, Detective Inspector,’ Skinner said, with feeling. He jerked 
his thumb in Provan’s direction. ‘This little bugger’s been intolerable 
since you’ve been away.’

‘Tell me about it,’ Lottie chuckled. ‘He’s never been off the bloody 
phone. He’ll be wanting to adopt me next.’

‘Everything’s all right at home, is it?’ Her eyes went somewhere else for 
a second. ‘Sorry,’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s none of my business and if you 
don’t want to talk about it, that’s fine by me.’

‘Not at all, Chief, not at all,’ she replied. ‘I had a tough couple of 
days, but I’m okay now. Scott’s living with his brother out in Airdrie… 
at least that was the address they gave when he made his court appearance this 
morning. He turned up at the house again on Saturday, but he was sober, and it 
was only to collect his clothes.’

‘Did you know that Sergeant…’

Her nod stopped him in mid-sentence. ‘Yes, I was told. Her husband got 
himself arrested for thumping her. I’d have put in a word for him if he’d 
battered Scott, but he must have decided that hitting her was less risky. Maybe 
she’s with him now. I don’t know and I don’t want to. Jakey’s come to 
terms with the fact that his dad won’t be back, and that’s all I’m 
worried about.’

‘Of course,’ Skinner agreed. ‘He’s the most important person involved. 
Right,’ he exclaimed, ‘if we’re all ready, let me explain to you what 
this is about.’ He smiled. ‘They thought it was all over…’ he chuckled. 
‘But no, thanks to a large slice of luck, the game may still be on…’ He 
rose, stepped over to his desk, and returned holding a laptop, which he laid on 
the table. ‘. . . and those who don’t believe in miracles may like to have 
a rethink. That, lady and gentleman, is Byron Millbank’s missing MacBook, the 
place where his wife told Detective Superintendent Payne that he kept his whole 
life. Normally,’ he continued, ‘there would have been a team of experts 
huddled over it for a week, trying to work out the password. In this case Byron 
gave us an unwitting clue, when he said to Mrs Millbank that the chances of 
getting into it were the same as winning the Lottery.

‘So we had her rummage about among his personal things, and guess what she 
found? Yup, a payslip for a lottery season ticket.’ He opened the computer to 
reveal a slip of paper, with six twin-digit numbers noted on it. ‘There you 
are,’ he said, and slid the slim computer across to Mann.

‘Has anyone looked at it?’ she asked.

‘No, it’s all yours. I want you and that bright young lad Paterson to get 
into it, and see if you can find anything that doesn’t relate to the dull and 
fairly uneventful life of Mr Byron Millbank but to the rather more colourful 
world of Beram Cohen.’

‘What about me, Chief?’ Provan asked, with a hint of a rumble. ‘Am Ah too 
old for that shite?’

Skinner threw him a sharp look. ‘Almost certainly,’ he said. ‘But as it 
happens I’ve got something else in mind for you. I want you to get back on to 
your friends in Mauritius, and find the birth registration of Marina Deschamps. 
She’s thirty-two years old, so the probability is that it will be a paper 
record. Birth date, April the ninth, so you’ll know exactly where to look.’

‘Marina Day Champs? The last chief’s sister?’

‘Not quite,’ Skinner corrected him. ‘The last chief’s missing 
half-sister. There are things I don’t know about that lady, and I want to.’

‘Can Ah no’ just ask her mother?’

‘No chance. You do not go near her mother. Leave that to CTIS, Superintendent 
Payne’s new team. She says she doesn’t know where her daughter’s gone, 
but we’re tapping her phone, just in case. Like mother like daughters? You 
never know.’





Fifty-Eight



‘The chief seems in better form today,’ Dan Provan remarked, as they 
stepped back into the suite in Pitt Street that he had left the week before. 
‘When Ah saw him on Thursday, when Ah wis closing this place up, he wis like 
a panda that discovered he’d slept in and missed his big date wi’ Mrs 
Panda.’

‘Why’s he interested in Marina Deschamps all of a sudden?’ Lottie Mann 
pondered.

‘How come you can say that and Ah cannae? Day Champs.’

‘Possibly because I have a wider outlook on life than you, and expose myself 
to other cultures,’ she suggested. ‘You’ve got no interest in anything 
that doesn’t involve crime, real or imaginary.’

‘Maybe no’, but Ah’m shit hot at that. Ah’ve thought about puttin’ ma 
name up for Mastermind.’

Beside him Banjo Paterson spluttered.

‘You can laugh, son, but tell me, how many murders was Peter Manuel convicted 
of?’

‘Eight.’

‘No, seven. One charge wis dropped for lack of evidence. What was Baby Face 
Nelson’s real name?’

‘Who was Baby Face Nelson?’

‘Eedjit. Lester Gillis. What was Taggart’s first sergeant called?’

‘Mike?’

‘Naw, he wis the second. It was Peter, Peter Livingstone.’

‘Enough!’ Lottie Mann laughed. ‘If they ever have a “Brain of 
Cambuslang” contest you might be in with a shout, but until then stop 
showboating for the lad. All these things happened before he was born.’

‘So did Christmas,’ Provan retorted, ‘but he knows all about that.’

He shuffled off to the desk he had adopted, and dug out the old-fashioned 
notebook that was still his chosen style of database. He opened it at the most 
recent entries and found the number of the Mauritian government. He keyed it in 
and waited.

‘Mr Bachoo, please, Registry Department,’ he asked. ‘Tell him it’s DS 
Provan again, Strathclyde Police in Glasgow, Scotland.’

Paterson grinned across at him. ‘You didn’t have any problem with that 
name,’ he said.

‘It sounds like a sneeze. Yes, Mr Bachoo,’ he carried on, without a pause, 
‘it’s me again. Ah’ve got another request for ye, another registration 
Ah’m trying to trace. This one goes back thirty-two years, but Ah’ve got a 
birth date this time: April the ninth. The name of the wean… Ah mean the 
child, is Marina Day Champs. Could ye do that for me?’

‘Without difficulty,’ the official replied. ‘That period has not been 
computerised yet, and the records are kept on this floor. This time, could you 
hold on, please. Last week I was reprimanded for making a foreign call without 
permission.’

‘Aye sure. Sorry about that; your bean counters must be worse than ours.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Nothin’, nothin’. Ah’ll hold on.’

He leaned back in his chair, the phone pressed loosely to his ear, expecting 
more Bollywood music but hearing instead only the background chatter of an 
open-plan office. He glanced across at Paterson’s desk but saw that it was 
empty, and guessed that the DC and DI were pressing on with their task.

He passed the time by listing, mentally and chronologically, the fictional 
officers who had been Jim Taggart’s colleagues and successors, and the names 
of the actors who had played them. He was wondering, not for the first time, 
about the real relationship between Mike and Jackie, when he heard the phone in 
Mauritius being picked up.

‘I have it,’ Mr Bachoo announced, sounding pleased with himself. ‘The 
child Marina Shelby Deschamps, Mauritian citizen, was born in Port Louis on the 
day you mentioned and registered on the following day. The mother was Sofia 
Deschamps, Mauritian citizen, and the father, who registered the birth, is 
named as Hillary, with two ls, Shelby, Australian citizen. I could fax this 
document to you; my superior has given me permission.’

‘If ye would, Ah’d appreciate that.’ He scrambled through the papers on 
the desk, and found the Pitt Street fax number, which he read out, digit by 
digit. ‘Thanks, Mr Bachoo. Ah’m pretty sure that’ll be all.’

‘It was a pleasure, Detective Sergeant. As I believe you say, no worries.’

Provan smiled as he hung up, then added the name he had been given to his 
notebook. ‘Hillary Shelby,’ he murmured. ‘Hillary Shelby.’ And then he 
frowned, as another potential Mastermind answer popped out of his mental 
treasure chest.

‘Hillary Shelby,’ he repeated as he booted up his computer. ‘Now that 
name definitely rings a bell.’





Fifty-Nine



‘So what have we got here?’ Banjo Paterson asked himself, with his DI 
looking over his shoulder. ‘Standard MacBook screen layout. Let’s see where 
he keeps his email. Mmm, he’s got Google Chrome loaded up as well as Safari. 
Probably means he used that as his search engine. Let’s see.’

He clicked on a multicoloured icon at the foot of the screen. ‘Yes,’ he 
murmured with satisfaction as a window opened. ‘Big surprise, I don’t 
think; the Rondar mail order site is his home page. Let’s see what else 
he’s bookmarked. Okay, he’s got a Google account for his email.’

He clicked on a red envelope, with a two-word description alongside. ‘Byron 
mail.’

‘Auto sign-in,’ he murmured. ‘Lucky us, otherwise we’d have had to go 
back to the IT technicians to crack his password. His email address is Byron at 
Rondar dot co dot UK. Here we go.’

He inspected the second window. ‘That’s his inbox. He’s got three 
unopened messages… What the hell?’ He opened one headed ‘National 
Lottery’. ‘Oh dear.’ It was half sigh, half laugh. ‘The poor 
bastard’s lottery ticket came up last Wednesday; he matched four balls and 
won ninety-nine quid.’

He hovered the cursor over an arrow and the next message opened. It was from 
someone called Mike, confirming a squash court booking on the following 
Thursday for a semi-final tie in the club knock-out competition.

‘Lucky boy, Mike,’ Mann muttered. A wicked grin crossed her face. ‘Let me 
in,’ she told Paterson, leaned across him and keyed in a reply. ‘Can’t 
make it, have to scratch; good luck in the final.’ She hit the send button.

‘Should you have done that, boss?’ the DC asked, as she backed off.

‘Maybe not, but the guy deserved to know. Go on.’

He moved on to the last unopened message. The sender was identified as 
‘Jocelyn’ also using the Rondar mail system. ‘The mother-in-law, as I 
understand it,’ the DI told him.

‘Mother-in-law from hell, in that case,’ Paterson replied. ‘Look at 
this.’

Mann peered at the screen, and read:

I have just received the latest quarterly management accounts. These show an 
operating loss of just under seventy-seven thousand pounds and make this the 
seventh successive quarter in which this company has lost money. Our auditors 
estimate that at this rate we will be insolvent by the end of the next 
financial year.



I have analysed the situation and have reached the inescapable conclusion that 
we have been on the slide since your father-in-law passed away. He and I always 
knew that the key to this business is not only what we sell but, as 
importantly, what we buy. We have to offer our customers attractive products at 
attractive prices while maintaining our profit margins. When Jesse was our 
buyer, we were able to do so very successfully. He was sure that when you took 
over from him, this would be maintained, but it is now clear to me that this 
confidence was misplaced.





I cannot allow this situation to continue, simply to sit on my hands and watch 
my company go out of existence. Son-in-law or not, I am going to have to 
relieve you of your duties and to declare you redundant. You and I both know 
that you are not suited to this line of work and never have been. So does Golda 
but she is too loyal to admit it. I intend to handle the buying function 
myself, with the assistance of my niece Bathsheba. When we are back in profit, 
Golda can expect to receive dividend income, but until then you are on your own.





‘Lovely,’ the DI said. ‘Byron Millbank doesn’t seem to have had a hell 
of a lot of luck.’

‘Neither did Beram Cohen,’ Paterson pointed out, ‘culminating in them 
both being in a cool box in the mortuary.’

‘Aye, but we’re not so lucky ourselves. This doesn’t tell us anything 
about Cohen, and that’s what we’re after. How about old emails? Could there 
be anything there?’

‘I’m checking that, but I don’t see anything. There’s nothing filed or 
archived, not that I can see. I’ve checked the bin and even that’s empty. 
He must have done that manually, the sign of a careful man.’

‘What about the rest of it, other than his correspondence?’

‘Gimme a few minutes. Please, gaffer.’ He looked up at her. ‘I don’t 
really work best with somebody looking over my shoulder.’ He smiled. ‘A mug 
of tea wouldn’t go amiss, though.’

‘You cheeky bastard,’ she exclaimed. ‘I’m the DI, you’re the DC; 
you’re the bloody tea boy around here. However, in this situation… how many 
sugars do you take?’

‘Me? None, thanks. Just milk.’

She left him in her room and crossed the main office. She glanced across at 
Provan, but he had his back to her and a phone to his ear. She shook the kettle 
to check that it was full, then switched it on. And watched. And waited.

As she did, her mind wandered to her shattered family. Scott had been remanded 
on bail to a future court hearing, and to its inevitable conclusion. He had 
shown some contrition when he had come for his clothes, but she had smelled 
stale alcohol on his breath, and that had been enough to maintain her resolve. 
There would be no way back for him, no way, Jose.

And for her? There would be nothing other than her career, and bringing up her 
son. I will not be making that mistake again, she told herself. There are no 
happy endings; sooner or later fate will always kick you in the teeth . . . and 
very much sooner if your husband is an alcoholic gambler who was shagging 
another woman within the first year of your marriage.

The forgotten kettle broke into her thoughts by boiling. She made the tea, 
three mugs, one for Provan, stewed, as he liked it, distributed them and sat at 
her desk, waiting patiently for Banjo to finish his exploration of the dead 
man’s double life.

Eventually he did, and turned towards her. ‘Byron Millbank,’ he announced, 
‘liked Celine Dion, Dusty Springfield, Black Sabbath, Alan Jackson, and 
Counting Crows, at least that’s what his iTunes library indicates. He loved 
his wife and child, respected his late father-in-law but had no time for his 
mother-in-law. That’s obvious from a study of his iPhoto albums. There’s 
only one photograph of her on it, it’s as unflattering as you can get and 
it’s captioned “Parah”, which I’ve just discovered is Hebrew for 
“Cow”.

‘He was a fan of Arsenal Football Club, not unnaturally, given where he 
lived. He had an American Express Platinum card, personal, not through the 
company. He had an Amazon Kindle account and his library included the complete 
works of Dickens and Shakespeare, the biography of Ronald Reagan and a dozen 
crime novels by Mark Billingham, Michael Jecks and Val McDermid.

‘He had an Xbox and liked war games, big time. His most visited websites were 
Wikipedia, Sky News, the BBC and ITV players, the CIA World Factbook, and a 
charity called Problem Solvers.’

‘Wow!’ Mann exclaimed, with irony. ‘How much more typical could this man 
have been? You’re just described Mr Average Thirty-something.’

The DC nodded. ‘Agreed. There is nothing out of the ordinary about him at 
all… apart from one thing. The charity: it doesn’t exist. And that’s 
where he does get interesting.’





Sixty



‘It’s not a charity at all, sir,’ Paterson ventured. ‘If you ask me, 
it’s more of a doorway.’

‘Explain,’ Skinner said.

‘It’s the website, sir. It’s called www dot problemsolvers dot org. Dot 
org domains used to be just for charities, but these days that’s not 
necessarily so. To be sure I checked with the Charities Commission; they’ve 
never heard of it.

‘On top of that,’ the DC continued, ‘it’s weird in another way. It’s 
password protected. I only got in because Millbank was careless in one respect: 
he saved his passwords on his computer, thinking, I suppose, that nobody else 
would ever use it.’

‘When you did get in there, what did you find?’ the chief constable asked.

‘Nothing much; it’s very simple. I’m sure he set it up himself. There’s 
just the two pages. The home page has only six words: “Personnel problems? 
Discreet and permanent solutions.” Then there’s a message board. But 
there’s no history on the site at all. He’s wiped it all. However, there is 
one message still up on the board. It’s possible that he left it there 
because the reply will go automatically to the sender, without Millbank ever 
needing to know who he was.’

‘Not Millbank, Cohen,’ Skinner countered. ‘This is definitely Beram 
Cohen. You’ve found him. What did the message say?’

‘Confirm payment made as agreed, to sort code eighty-one forty twenty-two, 
account number zero six nine five two one five one.’

‘Have you followed it up?’

‘Not yet, sir.’

‘Then do so, tomorrow morning. Wherever the bank is it’ll have knocked off 
for the day by now. When you find it, trace the source of the payment and find 
out if any withdrawals have been made from it lately. Lottie, Banjo, that’s 
good work.’ He turned to Provan. ‘Now, Sergeant, you’re clearly bursting 
your braces to tell me something. It’s your turn, so out with it.’





Sixty-One



‘Is this not a real bore for you, Davie?’ Skinner asked his driver, as they 
passed the clubhouse that welcomed golfing visitors to Gullane, and picked up 
speed. ‘Same round trip every day, sometimes twice a day.’

‘Absolutely not, Chief,’ Constable Cole replied. ‘I love driving, 
especially nice big motors like this one. I’ve done all the advanced courses 
there are, too. When I get moved out of this job, as I will, ’cos nothing’s 
for ever, I’m going to try to get a spot as an instructor.’

‘Good for you. But don’t you ever miss the company? Most cops work in 
pairs. Most cops meet people through their work… even if some of those are 
rank bad yins.’ He laughed at his own words. ‘Listen to me,’ he 
exclaimed. ‘Second week in post and I’m lapsing into Weegie-speak already. 
I’m spending too much time with that wee bugger Provan, that’s what it is. 
Maybe being a lone wolf isn’t such a bad thing.’

‘Maybe not,’ Cole agreed.

‘No, but seriously, does this never get to you? Don’t you ever get the urge 
to see some action?’

The constable tilted his head back slightly, to help his voice carry into the 
back seat. ‘The last action I saw, Chief, was over two years ago. We got a 
call to a cesspit of a housing scheme they’d used as accommodation for asylum 
seekers. Some of the neighbourhood Neds had given one of their kids a 
going-over and the dads went after them, mob-handed. It went into a 
full-blooded riot. My crew was sent in there with shields, batons and helmets, 
to re-establish order, we were told.’ He chuckled. ‘There hadn’t been any 
proper order in that place for about five years, so they were asking quite a 
lot of us.

‘Anyway, we waded in, and got the two sides separated. Just as well, because 
the local hooligans had turned out in force. They were winning the battle and 
there would have been fatalities if we hadn’t stopped it. What we done, in 
effect, was protect the immigrants, but they never seen it that way. We had 
tearaways coming at us with swords and machetes, and behind us the foreigners 
were chucking bottles, rocks, all sorts of shit at us.’

Skinner glanced at the rear-view mirror as he paused, and saw him frown.

‘Those riot helmets, sir,’ he continued, ‘they’re pretty good, but if 
somebody drops a television set on you from the balcony of a third-floor flat, 
there’s only so much protection they can give. It probably saved my life, but 
I still had a skull fracture, three displaced vertebrae in my neck and a broken 
shoulder. I was off work for nearly a year. When I came back they sent me on an 
advanced driving course. I did well at it. When Chief Constable Field arrived 
she wanted a full-time driver, and I got picked.’

‘I see,’ Skinner said. ‘In that case, as long as I’m here, you’ll be 
in the driving seat. Besides,’ he continued, ‘this is good for me too. 
Having you lets me get through shedloads of paperwork that I couldn’t do if I 
drove myself, or if I took the train, for that would be too public. And the 
more of that I do while I’m travelling, the more time I have to put myself 
about, to see people, and, as important, to let them see me. So,’ he said, 
pulling his case across the seat towards him, ‘time to shift some of it.’

He worked steadily for fifteen minutes until the car was half a mile from the 
slip road that joined the Edinburgh bypass.

‘Davie,’ he called, ‘I want to make a detour, if you would. Go straight 
on, then take the next exit and head left, until you come to the second 
roundabout. You’ll see a hot food and coffee stall. I’d like you to wait in 
the shopping centre car park, while I pick up a couple of bacon rolls. It’s a 
lot less fuss to buy my breakfast than to make it myself.’

‘I’m lucky, sir. I get mine made for me.’

‘I’m lucky too. Looking out for yourself can be a price worth paying.’ He 
grinned as he saw the driver’s expression in the mirror. ‘Don’t mind 
me,’ he said. ‘I’m not always that cynical. The fact is, when we are 
together as a family, I enjoy making it for everybody.’

His directions were clear and accurate. PC Cole spotted the stall as he passed 
the first exit from the second roundabout, did a complete circuit and parked in 
the road facing the way he had come.

‘Want anything?’ the chief asked him.

‘No thanks, sir, I’m fine.’

He relaxed in his seat as his passenger stepped out. He watched him in the 
nearside wing mirror as he sprinted towards the pedestrian crossing to catch 
the green light. Davie had never seen a senior cop who would go to work in a 
light tan cotton jacket; even the CID people usually wore suits, or expensive 
leather jackets in the case of some of the young, newly blooded DCs.

The stallholder must have known Skinner, he reckoned, for the boss smiled at 
him as he gave him his order. Or maybe he was only in a chatty mood, for he 
seemed to strike up a conversation with the scruffy wee man who was the only 
other punter there.

Whatever they were talking about, it must have been serious, for the other guy 
never cracked a smile, not even when the chief, his back half turned towards 
the car, slipped him something.

Christ, Cole thought, the wee sod’s on the scrounge. Not a bad guy, my boss. 
He likes getting the breakfast for everybody, even for a wee panhandler like 
that.





Sixty-Two



It took almost no time at all to track down the bank account of Problem 
Solvers, once Banjo Paterson had opened the resource site that would take him 
there. He keyed in the sort code and number and clicked ‘Validate’, then 
leaned back with a smile on his face that broke all previous office records for 
smugness.

‘There you are,’ he announced. ‘The account’s held in the Bank of 
Lincoln, in an office in Grantham. There’s no street address, only a PO box 
number, but there’s a phone number.’ He scribbled it in a pad and passed it 
to his DI.

‘Thanks,’ she said.

‘Son,’ Provan grunted, ‘you better get a safe deposit box for a’ these 
gold stars ye’ve been gettin’, otherwise you might find yersel’ bein’ 
mugged on the way home.’

Mann took the note into her small office and dialled the number. ‘Bank of 
Lincoln,’ a cheery female voice answered. ‘How can I be of service?’

‘You can phone me back.’

‘Pardon?’

‘This is Detective Inspector Charlotte Mann, Strathclyde CID, Glasgow. I need 
to speak to your manager, urgently. If you call me back through my main 
switchboard number which I’ll give you now,’ she read it out, ‘he’ll 
know I am who I say I am. When you ring back, ask for extension one 
forty-eight.’

‘Yes, madam. I won’t be a minute.’

She was over-optimistic, by just under ten minutes, but did have the grace to 
apologise. ‘I’m sorry to have kept you waiting, madam, but Mr Harrison, the 
branch manager, has only just become available. I’ll put you through to him 
now.’

Mann had time to growl a curt ‘Thank you’ before the line clicked and a man 
spoke.

‘Inspector, is it?’

‘Detective Inspector.’

‘I see. My name is Nigel Harrison, how can I help you?’ There was a 
wariness in his voice. She had heard its like often enough in her career to 
know that assistance was not at the top of his agenda.

‘I want to talk to you about an account that’s held at your branch.’ She 
recited the number. ‘We believe that it’s in the name of an entity calling 
itself Problem Solvers.’

‘Let me check that,’ the manager murmured. She waited, anticipating another 
long interlude, but he came back on the line after less than a minute. ‘Yes, 
I have it on screen now. Problem Solvers; it’s a charity.’

‘So it says,’ Mann retorted. ‘I’d like to know about money moving in 
and out recently, within the last few weeks.’

‘Ahh. I was afraid this conversation might take such a turn. I don’t think 
I can help you there. I took the precaution of consulting my general manager 
before I returned your call, and was reminded that it’s our head office 
policy to afford our clients confidentiality.’

‘It’s my policy,’ she retorted, ‘to get tough with people when I 
believe they’re obstructing my investigation.’

She was sure she heard him sniff before he replied. ‘If your questions are 
well founded,’ he said, ‘I’m sure the court will furnish you with the 
appropriate warrant.’

‘I’m in no doubt about that,’ she agreed, ‘but I was hoping you’d be 
more cooperative. You’re not, and that’s too bad, because my questions are 
now going to move up a notch. You say this client of yours is a charity, yes?’

‘Yes. We have a special account category for charities.’

‘So it will be registered with the Charities Commission, yes?’

‘Of course.’

‘Sorry, Mr Harrison; it isn’t.’

‘But Mr Cohen assured me…’

‘This would be Mr Beram Cohen, yes? The late Mr Beram Cohen?’

‘The late…’ the banker spluttered. ‘Oh my! What happened?’

‘He died. People do. So you see, he’s got no confidentiality left to 
protect.’

‘But Problem Solvers has.’

‘A bogus charity? Tell me, sir, do the words “proceeds of crime” and 
possibly also “money laundering”, which I’ll throw into the mix just for 
fun, have any meaning for you?’

‘What are you saying?’

‘I’m saying that unless you cooperate with me, my next conversation will be 
with my colleagues in Lincolnshire Police. No more than an hour after that, 
they’ll descend on you with that warrant you’re insisting on, and they 
won’t do it quietly. In fact, I’ll ask them to make as much noise as they 
can. How will that go down with head office and your general manager?’

‘Well…’

She had been bluffing, but his hesitancy told her that she was winning. ‘I 
don’t want to bully you, Mr Harrison, but this is urgent, and you’ll be 
doing us a great service if you talk to me.’

She heard an intake of breath as he weighed up his options and made his 
decision. ‘All right,’ he sighed. ‘Recent traffic through the account, 
you said?’

‘Yes. Go back three months for starters.’

‘Can do. I have it on screen, in fact. Two months ago, the charity received a 
donation of three hundred thousand pounds. One month later, two money transfers 
of fifty thousand pounds each were made, one to a bank in New Zealand, the 
other to Australia. Both of these were private accounts; that means I can’t 
see the owner’s name. That was followed by a third, for thirty thousand 
pounds, to a company in Andorra called Holyhead.

‘The most recent transaction took place just under three weeks ago. Ahh,’ 
he exclaimed, ‘I remember that one. Mr Cohen called into the branch and made 
a withdrawal of fifteen thousand pounds in cash. It was potentially 
embarrassing, as my chief teller had let us get rather low on cash, and there 
had been a bit of a run that morning. We were forced to pay Mr Cohen his money 
in new fifties. Some customers would have been unhappy about that, but he said 
it was no problem.’

‘I don’t suppose you have a record of the serial numbers, do you?’ she 
asked.

Harrison surprised her. ‘As a matter of fact I do. Those notes were brand 
new; we were the first recipients. I can send that information to you.’

‘Thanks. It would let us tick some boxes.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Oh yes,’ Mann replied, ‘the most important of all. Who made the payment 
of three hundred thousand?’

‘That came from a bank in Jersey, from an account in the name of an 
investment company registered in Jersey. It’s called Pam Limited.’

Mann felt her eyebrows rise halfway up her forehead, but she said nothing.

‘Is that all?’ Harrison asked her.

‘Yes. Thank you… eventually.’

‘Come on, Inspector. You must understand my caution.’

‘I suppose.’

‘What about the Problem Solvers account? Mr Cohen was the only contact we 
have with the organisation, whatever it is.’

‘I’d suggest that you freeze it,’ the DI told him. ‘I have no idea what 
its legal status is, although Cohen’s widow might fancy laying claim to it. 
Whatever, it’s not my problem. I’ll be reporting this; I’m sure someone 
will be in touch.’

‘Your investigation,’ Harrison ventured. ‘You didn’t say what it’s 
about, but am I right in guessing that it’s into Mr Cohen’s death rather 
than this Problem Solver business?’

‘No, you’re not; it’s into someone else’s murder. You see, Mr Harrison, 
Mr Cohen’s business was making people dead. Those were the sort of problems 
that he solved.’





Sixty-Three



‘Pam Limited,’ Skinner repeated.

‘Yes,’ Mann confirmed. ‘I checked with the company registration office in 
Jersey. According to the articles, it stands for Personal Asset Management. Its 
most recent accounts show that it’s worth over two hundred and fifty 
million.’

‘Who owns it?’

‘According to the public record, its only shareholder is a man called Peter 
Friedman.’

‘And who the hell’s he?’ the chief asked, frowning, then muttering, 
‘Although there’s something familiar about that name.’

‘Banjo ran a search on people called Friedman,’ she told him. ‘He came up 
with two singers, a journalist and an economist, although he’s dead. The only 
references he got to anyone called Peter Friedman were a few press stories. He 
showed them to me; they all related to donations to good causes, charities and 
the like.’

‘What, like Problem Solvers?’ Skinner retorted.

‘No, sir. Real ones, like Chest Heart and Stroke, Cancer UK, Children First, 
and Shelter. Only one of them gave any detail on him beyond his name and that 
was the Saltire, in a report on a charity fund-raiser dinner in the Royal 
Scottish Museum, in Edinburgh, six months ago. It described him as “a 
reclusive philanthropist”; nothing beyond that. If a wealthy man has that low 
a profile on the internet, then he really is reclusive.’

‘Sounds like it. Friedman, Friedman, Friedman,’ he repeated. ‘Where the 
fu—’ He slammed the palm of his hand on the table. ‘Got it!’ he 
shouted. ‘It was…’ He stopped in mid-sentence as he remembered who were 
in which loop, and who were not.

‘I’ll take the mystery man from here, thanks,’ he told the DI. ‘I’ve 
got another task for you, Lottie, for you and you alone. Thanks to Dan, we have 
Sofia Deschamps’ address in Mauritius, but we don’t know exactly where she 
lives in London, beyond that it’s in Muswell Hill. She moved there very soon 
after Toni came back from her so-called sabbatical, to look after the child. 
Marina told me that Lucille’s grandfather, Toni’s dad, bought it for her. I 
took her word for that, like I swallowed everything else she fed me. She lied 
to me about other stuff, so maybe she lied about that too.

‘I want you to dig deep, get the address and look into the purchase 
transaction. When it was bought, and if it was indeed an outright purchase, no 
mortgage, then I want to know exactly where the cash came from. And while 
you’re at it, just for the hell of it, look into Toni’s house in Bothwell, 
asking the same questions. Remember, don’t involve the guys in this and 
report to me alone, as soon as you get a result. Use my mobile if you have 
to.’ He gave her a card, with the number.

‘I understand, sir,’ Mann said. ‘What do you expect to find?’

He smiled. ‘Who knows? Maybe it’s something to do with living at the 
seaside but I like flying kites.’

‘Maybe you can show me how,’ she replied. ‘I’m going to have to find 
new ways to amuse my Jakey, with his dad out the picture.’

As soon as she had gone, he picked up the phone and made a direct call.

‘Sal-tire,’ a male telephonist announced, the confident public voice of a 
confident newspaper.

‘June Crampsey, please. Tell her it’s Bob. She’ll know which one.’

‘There may be other men called Bob in my life,’ the editor said as she came 
on line.

‘But you still knew which one this is.’

‘It’s my phone; it goes all moist when you call. Why didn’t you use my 
direct line, or my mobile?’

‘Because my head’s full of stuff and I couldn’t remember either number.’

‘I thought you had slaves to get those for you.’

‘That’s Edinburgh. In Glasgow they’re all lashed to the oars and rowing 
like shit to keep the great ship off the rocks.’

‘Do I detect a continuing ambivalence towards Strathclyde?’ she teased.

‘It’s a lousy job, kid, but somebody’s got to do it. For now that’s me. 
June, I need your help.’

‘Shoot. You still have a credit balance in the favour ledger.’

‘Six months or so back, you ran a story about some charity dinner in the RSM. 
It mentioned a man named Peter Friedman, a recluse, your story called him.’

‘I remember that one.’

‘How much do you know about him?’

‘No more than was in the paper. He’s a very rich bloke who keeps himself to 
himself. We ran that dinner to honour people who gave decent sized bucks to 
good causes last year. The guests were all nominated by the charities and we 
sent the formal invitations. His address was a PO box in Tobermory.’

‘Tobermory?’ he repeated.

‘That’s what I said. He lives on the Isle of Mull. That qualifies as 
reclusive, doesn’t it?’

‘Hey, I’m from Motherwell. Everything north and west of Perth’s reclusive 
in my book. Your story: was there a photo with it?’

‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘That’s why I remember it so well. I had a 
photographer in the hall, snapping groups; real dull stuff, but I felt we had 
to do it since it was our gig. Your man Friedman was in one of them and he made 
a fuss about it. First he tried to bribe the photographer, then he threatened 
him. When neither of those worked he sought me out and asked me, more politely, 
not to use it. I said I’d see what I could do, then I made bloody sure that 
it went in.’

‘Did you hear from him afterwards?’

‘No. Fact is, I doubt if he even saw it. The next day was the Saturday 
edition; most people just read that for the sport and the weekend section.’

‘Do you still have the photo in your library?’

‘Of course, everything’s in the bloody library. I’ll have somebody dig it 
out, crop him out of the group and email it to you. What’s your Strathclyde 
address?’

‘Thanks, but use my private address. I don’t want it on this network.’

‘Okay, but what’s this about, Bob? Why are you interested in him?’

‘His name came up in connection with another charity donation,’ Skinner 
replied, content that he was telling the truth. ‘I like to know about people 
with deep pockets; maybe our dependants’ support group can put the bite on 
him in the future. Thanks, June, you’re a pal. You and that other Bob must 
come to dinner some night.’

‘I’ll take you up on that, only his name’s Adrian. Now I’m wondering 
who the hostess will be. Cheers.’

He hung up, leaned back in his chair, his fingers steepled in front of his 
face, gathering his thoughts and seeing images flow past his mind’s eye. He 
sat there until a trumpet sound on his phone told him that he had a personal 
email, and a glance confirmed that it was from June. He opened it, then viewed 
the attachment. As he did, possibilities became certainties.

The chief constable rose from his desk, left his office and his command floor, 
taking the stair down one level and walking round to a suite that overlooked 
Holland Street, and the group of buildings that once had housed one of 
Scotland’s oldest and most famous schools.

He keyed a number into a pad, then pushed open a door bearing a plaque that 
read ‘Counter-Terrorism Intelligence Section’. As he entered the long open 
room, a female officer looked up at him, first with a frown, then in surprise. 
She started to rise, but he waved her back down, and headed to the far end of 
the room.

A red light above Lowell Payne’s door said that he was in a meeting. Skinner 
knocked on it nonetheless, then waited, until it was opened by a glaring man 
with a moustache.

‘Aye?’ he snapped.

‘Intelligence section?’ he murmured, as Payne appeared behind the officer.

‘Chief.’

‘Sorry to interrupt, Detective Superintendent, but you know me. Everything I 
do has “urgent” stamped on it.’

‘Indeed. That’ll be all for now, DS Mavor,’ he said, almost pushing the 
other officer out of the room.

‘Sorry about that,’ he murmured once he and Skinner were alone. ‘He was 
somebody’s mistake, from the days when a guy might get dumped into Special 
Branch and forgotten about, because he was too rough-edged for the mainstream, 
or because he’d done somebody higher up a big favour in the witness box, and 
an SB job was his reward.’

‘Where do you want him sent?’

‘Anywhere that being rough-edged will be an advantage.’

‘I’ll ask Bridie. She’ll have an idea. Now, I have a question, best put 
to somebody who was here six months ago and who’d know pretty much everything 
that went on then.’

‘That would be DI Bulloch,’ Payne replied at once. ‘Sandra. You probably 
passed her on your way along here.’

‘I did. At least she knows who I am, which is a good start.’

‘I’ll get her in.’

‘Fine, but before you do, let me set the scene. When I got into Toni 
Field’s safe finally, and found those envelopes, there was another. It was 
marked “P. Friedman” and it was empty. It was stuck on to the back of 
another, and I reckon that was a mistake on Marina’s part.’

‘Marina’s?’

‘Oh yes. Marina knew that stuff would be there for me to find, in time, once 
I’d got past her stalling me by giving me the wrong code for the safe. But 
she didn’t intend me to find the Friedman envelope. She destroyed what was in 
it, but failed to notice that she’d left it in there. Now, let’s talk to 
the DI.’

Sandra Bulloch was a cool one, neither too pretty nor too plain to be 
memorable, but with legs that few men would fail to notice, and that she 
probably covered up, Skinner guessed, when she went operational.

‘Peter Friedman,’ she repeated. ‘Yes, sir, I remember him. It was Chief 
Constable Field’s second week here; she called Superintendent Johnson and me 
up to her office, and told us that there was a man she wanted put under full 
surveillance. His name, she said, was Peter Friedman and he lived on Mull.

‘I handled the job myself, with DS Mavor.’ A small flicker of distaste 
crossed her face, then vanished. ‘We found that he owned a big estate house 
up behind Tobermory, set in about forty acres of land. We photographed him from 
as close as we could get, we hacked his emails and we tapped his phones.

‘He lived alone, but he had a driver, a personal assistant type, who also 
flew the helicopter that appeared to be his means of getting off the island. He 
left the estate once a day, that was all, to go down to Tobermory, in his white 
Range Rover Evoque, to collect his mail from the post office, and to have a 
coffee and a scone in the old church building next door that somebody’s made 
into a shop and a café.

‘He had no visitors and he never took or made a phone call that wasn’t 
about his investments. Nor did he file any emails; they were all deleted after 
study. I assume that if he wanted to keep something he’d print it.

‘The only thing we intercepted that was of any interest,’ Bulloch said, 
‘was an email from a consultant oncologist, with a report attached. It 
didn’t make good reading. It confirmed that Friedman had a squamous cell lung 
carcinoma, in other words lung cancer, that it was inoperable, and that no form 
of therapy was going to do him any good. It gave him somewhere between nine 
months and two years to live.’

‘Ouch,’ Skinner whispered. ‘Did you report all of this back to Toni, to 
Chief Constable Field?’

‘Of course, sir. We gave her a file with everything in it. She kept it and 
she ordered us to destroy any copies.’

‘Which you did?’

Bulloch stared at him, as if outraged. ‘Absolutely,’ she insisted.

‘Did she ever tell you why she wanted this man targeted?’

‘No, and we didn’t ask. Sometimes the chief constable knows things that we 
don’t need to. For example, why you’re here now, asking questions about the 
same man.’

He laughed. ‘Nice one, Sandra. You’re right; I’m not going to tell you 
either.’

His mobile sounded as she was leaving the room. The caller was Lottie Mann, 
with not one result, but two. He listened carefully to her, said, ‘Thanks. 
I’ll be in touch,’ then ended the call.

‘Lowell,’ he asked, ‘has our tap on Sofia Deschamps produced anything?’

‘Nothing, Chief. Only a call from Mauritius, a bloke we think was Chief 
Constable Field’s dad, going by his distress if nothing else. Nothing from 
Marina, though. In fact, when she was talking to the man, she said, “Now 
I’ve lost both my daughters, and I won’t get either one back.” I suppose 
that doesn’t rule out her knowing where the other one is, but from the tone 
of her voice on the recording, I don’t believe she does.’

‘That’s all right, I do. Pretty soon, I expect that everything will become 
clear. I’m tired of this business, Lowell,’ Skinner sighed, ‘tired of the 
entire Deschamps family and their devious lives. Tomorrow, the two of us will 
go on a trip. I’d like to meet this guy Friedman. Can you put me up at your 
place tonight? Otherwise it’ll be an even earlier start for Davie.’





Sixty-Four



‘Sailing is not something I do very often,’ Bob remarked. ‘In fact, the 
last time I was on a boat on this side of the country was when Ali Higgins took 
Alex and me for a weekend on her rich brother’s schooner. It was a cathartic 
experience in an emotional sense.’

He was leaning on the rail of the Oban car ferry as it made a slow turn towards 
the jetty at Craignure, landing point for visitors to the island of Mull. Their 
driver, PC Davie Cole, was in the car, asleep.

‘Funnily enough,’ Lowell Payne said, ‘I remember that; on your way there, 
the three of you were at Jean’s dad’s funeral. It was the first time you 
and I met.’

‘You’re right, it was. I think about that trip often, whenever I’m 
feeling low. I loved it. By the end of the voyage, I was talking seriously 
about jacking it all in and buying a boat of my own, doing the odd charter, 
that sort of stuff. Then the fucking phone rang, didn’t it, and it all went 
up in smoke.’

‘What if you had?’ Lowell asked. ‘Maybe you and Alison would be off in 
the Caribbean or the Med right now. Jean had hopes for the pair of you.’

‘I know she had, but they were misplaced. We didn’t last, remember; Ali was 
more career driven than me.’ He sighed, and his eyes went somewhere else. 
‘But if we had bought our tall ship and made it work, she would still be 
alive. If I’d taken her away from the fucking police force,’ he muttered, 
with sudden savagery, ‘she wouldn’t have been turned into crispy bits by a 
fucking car bomb.’

‘You both made the same choice,’ Lowell pointed out. ‘And it could as 
easily have been you that got killed. A couple of times, from what I hear.’

‘Yes I know that, but still. This fucking job, man, what it does to people, 
on the inside. Ali and I, we spent a couple of years banging each other’s 
brains out, yet by the time she died, it was all gone and she was calling me 
“sir” with the rest of them.’

He was silent for a while, until he had worked off his anger and his guilt, and 
his mood changed. ‘By the way,’ he said quietly, ‘I enjoyed last night. 
You and Jean, you’re such a normal down-to-earth couple.’ He gave a soft, 
sad laugh. ‘As a matter of fact, you’re just about the only normal 
down-to-earth couple that I know. And that lass of yours, young Myra, she’s 
blooming. What is she now, thirteen? She reminds me a lot of Alex when she was 
that age. Prepare to be wound round her little finger, my friend.’

‘There is a difference, though. You had to bring Alexis up on your own. Yes, 
I might be a soft touch, I’ll admit, but Jean’s there as a buffer; she 
takes no nonsense… not that Myra gets up to much, mind. She’s a good kid. 
That is, she has been up to now. I suppose it all changes the further into 
their teens they get.’

‘It does, and the trick is to accept that. There comes a time in every young 
person’s growing up when they’re entitled to a private life, in every 
respect. When it’s a daughter, that can be difficult for dads, because we all 
inevitably remember the hormonal volcanoes we were at that age. I was no 
exception, and I’ll always be grateful to Jean for being a really good aunt 
to Alex during that couple of years.’

‘From what she said, and indeed from what I saw for myself, you were a great 
dad.’

‘Ach, we all are to our girls, or should be. I’m beginning to learn that 
boys take much more managing.’

‘Do you think that’s what went wrong with Toni and Marina? The absence of a 
father’s influence?’

He pursed his lips. ‘In Toni’s case, nah; I reckon she was just a bad 
bitch. As for Marina, maybe it was the opposite. The jury’s still out on 
that.’

‘What do you mean?’ Payne paused. ‘You realise I’m completely in the 
dark about this trip. You’ve hardly told me anything. Now it turns out 
we’re going to see some recluse in Tobermory, and I still don’t know why.’

‘You will.’ He pushed himself off the rail. ‘Come on, let’s go and see 
if Davie’s awake yet. We’ll be ready to offload soon.’

Twenty minutes later they were seated in the back of the chief constable’s 
car, as PC Cole eased it carefully down the ramp then on to the roadway.

‘I thought the terminal was in Tobermory itself,’ Payne observed as he read 
a road sign outside the Caledonian MacBrayne building. ‘Twenty-one miles 
away: I never realised Mull was so big.’

‘I’d forgotten myself,’ Skinner confessed, ‘until I looked it up on 
Google Earth. I didn’t think it would have street view for a place this size, 
but it does. Now I know exactly where we’re going.’

‘The post office?’

‘No, the café place next door that DI Bulloch mentioned. The Gallery, it’s 
called. We’ll have a cup of something there and wait for Mr Friedman to 
arrive. It’s a nice morning, and they’ve got tables outside.’

‘What if he’s already been for his mail?’

‘There’s no chance of that. This is the first ferry of the day, and the 
Royal Mail van was six behind us in the queue to get off. We’ll be there 
before it.’

The Gallery was exactly as DI Bulloch had described it. A classic old Scottish 
church building, with a paved area in front with half a dozen tables, four of 
them unoccupied. It offered a clear view across Tobermory Bay and, more 
important, of anyone arriving at the post office, next door.

Cole dropped them off outside, then, on Skinner’s instruction, reversed into 
a parking bay, thirty yards further along on the seaward side of the road, half 
hidden by a tree and a telephone box.

They took the table nearest the street, and the chief produced a ten-pound 
note. ‘I’m not pulling rank,’ he said, ‘but since I actually know who 
we’re waiting for, it’s better you get the teas in. I’ll have a scone 
too, if they look okay. They should be; you’d expect home baking in a place 
like this.’

As he took the banknote, Payne sensed the excitement of anticipation underlying 
Skinner’s good humour. There was no queue in the café. He bought two mugs of 
tea and two scones, which looked better than okay, and was carrying them 
outside on a tray when he saw the Royal Mail van drive past, slowing to park.

There was no conversation as they sat, sipping and eating. The chief was 
relaxed in his chair, but his colleague noticed that it was drawn clear of the 
table, so that if necessary he had a clear route to the street.

And then, after ten minutes, a large white vehicle came into view, approaching 
from their left. It was halfway in shape between a coupé and an estate car. 
‘How many white Range Rover Evoques would you expect in Mull?’ the chief 
murmured.

The car swung into an empty bay on the other side of the road. Its day lights 
dimmed as the driver switched off, then stepped out: not a man, Payne saw, but 
a woman, tall, in shorts and a light cotton top, with a blue and yellow motif.

Her hair was jet black, cut short and spiky. Although a third of her face was 
hidden behind wrap-round sunglasses, Oakley, he guessed, by the shape of them, 
the lovely honey-coloured tone of her skin was still apparent, and striking.

She was halfway across the road, heading for the post office, when Skinner put 
his right thumb and index finger in his mouth and gave a loud, shrill whistle. 
The woman, and everyone else in earshot, looked in his direction. But she alone 
froze in mid-stride.

She made a small move, as if to abort her errand and go back to the Range 
Rover, but the chief shook his head, then beckoned her towards them. She seemed 
to sag a little, then she obeyed, as if she was on an invisible lead and he was 
winding it in.

He stood as she drew near, reaching out with his right foot, gathering in a 
spare chair and pulling it to the table. ‘Have a seat,’ he said. He 
inclined his head towards Payne, never taking his eyes from hers. ‘Lowell, 
you didn’t get up to the command floor in the last chief’s time, so you 
probably don’t know her sister, Marina Deschamps, or Day Champs, as wee Dan 
Provan would say. Mind you,’ he added, ‘even if you did, you’d have had 
bother recognising her with the radical new hair and the designer shades. I 
probably wouldn’t have been sure myself if she hadn’t been driving her 
dad’s car.’

‘Her what?’ Payne exclaimed.

‘Her dad,’ he repeated. ‘Peter Friedman’s her father. There’s been a 
consistent feature in this investigation. Most of the players in it have had 
two names, making them hard to pin down. Byron Millbank was Beram Cohen, and 
vice versa when he had to be, Antonia Deschamps became Toni Field, in the cause 
of advancing her career like everything else she ever did, and even Basil 
Brown, gangster and MI5 grass, had to be called Bazza.’

‘So what about Peter Friedman?’ Marina asked, as she sat. ‘What was he?’

‘He used to be Harry Shelby.’

She removed the sunglasses, as if she was peeling them off her face, and stared 
at him, with eyes that were colder than he had ever imagined they could be. 
‘How did you find out?’

‘MI5 erased the records of wee Lucille’s birth,’ he replied, ‘but they 
had no reason to wipe out yours. It wouldn’t have been that easy anyway, you 
being born before the computer era. When you steered me towards your conspiracy 
scenario, and I was stupid enough to embarrass myself, even endanger myself, by 
falling for it, you may have thought that I wouldn’t survive professionally, 
maybe even personally. You certainly didn’t envisage me coming after you, nor 
Five either, not after I’d handed them all Toni’s blackmail leverage. For 
that’s what your sister was, wasn’t she? Inside Supercop, there was a nasty 
little blackmailer… as you well knew, for you were put alongside her to spy 
on her, and you found the evidence.’

‘I…’ she began, protesting, but he raised a hand, to stop her.

‘I know you were, because Amanda Dennis told me so, and I know you did, 
because you left it for me, after you’d doctored it a wee bit. So come on, 
just nod your head, and admit it.’

She did.

‘God knows what Toni got out of the civil servant,’ Skinner continued, 
‘or the TV guy, or the other cop, but she got advancement from Storey, and I 
know now that she got a house out of the Home Secretary and her husband, the 
one your mother lives in in London. Her father didn’t buy it, they did; they 
paid her off, and if that was known, the scandal would be compounded. That 
house was bought and paid for by Repton Industries, Emily Repton’s family 
business. You knew that, Marina, and you didn’t care a toss about it.

‘But when she pulled the same stroke on your father, that was different. 
Lottie Mann traced both transactions right to the source of the money. She 
found out that the house in Bothwell was paid for by Pam Limited, Peter 
Friedman’s investment company. Thanks to one single, unfortunate newspaper 
photo, Toni found out who Friedman really was. She contacted him and she sold 
him her silence, for five hundred and seventy-five thousand pounds, the cost of 
a nice big villa.’ Skinner frowned. ‘Or her silence for a while: and that 
was something you couldn’t tolerate, the idea that she could unmask him any 
time she chose, so… you had your sister killed!’

‘Half-sister,’ she murmured. ‘So prove it.’

He shrugged. ‘I can’t, not to court standards. Anyway, not only did your 
fiction add up, that Repton had her removed, it still does, for you could claim 
that everything you did was on their orders.’

‘Do you really know it wasn’t?’ she challenged.

‘Oh yes, I do. And I can prove that.’

‘How?’

‘It was your old man that paid Cohen to do the job, not them.’

‘My God,’ she said, ‘you have been busy. You know that much?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, I do.’

‘In that case, tell me, Mr Skinner… I can see you’re desperate to, 
you’re so pleased with yourself… how did you find out who my father was?’

‘I’m not pleased with myself,’ he contradicted her. ‘But I’m dead 
chuffed for Dan Provan, the guy I mentioned earlier. He’s a walking 
anachronism of a detective sergeant, who’s been hiding in Strathclyde CID for 
years. You probably never saw him when you were there, just as your path and 
Lowell’s never crossed, but even if you had you wouldn’t have noticed him. 
That’s one of his strengths. The other is that he never forgets a criminal, 
if the crime is big enough to get his attention.’

He picked up his ever-present attaché case and spun the combination wheels to 
open it.

‘I was never just going to forget about you, Marina,’ he told her as he 
flicked the catches. ‘I don’t like being made to feel like an idiot. I take 
it personally. The first thing I did when I got back to Glasgow was send Provan 
to dig out your birth records from Mauritius. I wanted to build a complete 
picture of you and obviously I couldn’t rely on the things you had told me, 
or the hints you had dropped, since you’re as consummate a deceiver as your 
sister was.’

A flicker of a smile suggested she took that as a compliment.

‘Provan discovered that your father was listed as Hillary Shelby,’ he 
continued, taking a document from the Zero Halliburton and handing it to her. 
‘See? Hillary not Harry, and there’s an Australian passport number. 
However, that surname niggled him, and the itch wouldn’t go away. And 
that’s where his special skills came into play. “Shelby,” he told 
himself. “I know that name from somewhere.” Dan isn’t of the IT 
generation,’ Skinner said, ‘but he went to the computer and ran a Google 
search.’ He grinned. ‘He called it “that Bugle thing” when he told me 
about it. He did try the full name first off, but got zilch, so then he entered 
simply Shelby, on its own. He came up with a car designer, an actor, and three 
different towns in America, then at the foot of the page, he got Harry Shelby, 
and it all came back to him, and that pub quiz mind of his.

‘Harry Shelby was an Australian financier, a real tycoon… or typhoon, as 
Dan called him. He built a business empire of considerable size in Australia, 
South Africa and in Hong Kong from the early seventies on. He started in 
minerals, then moved into currency trading, and pretty soon he had become a 
national business icon, stand-out even in an era in Australian history when 
there were quite a few of those around.

‘In nineteen ninety-six, he was awarded a knighthood, in the Birthday Honours 
list. He was scheduled to be invested in Canberra, by the High Commissioner. 
Everything was set up, but the day before, Harry Shelby vanished, off the face 
of the earth. He was never seen again, and he never left a penny behind him, or 
rather a cent.’

‘I remember that,’ Payne exclaimed. ‘It was big news for a week or so, 
internationally.’

‘I confess that it passed me by,’ the chief said. ‘But nineteen 
ninety-six was a busy year for me; my mind was full of other stuff, on my own 
doorstep. Anyway,’ he carried on, ‘you can imagine that after Shelby 
disappeared, his whole life was dug up. It didn’t take the investigators long 
to find out that in fact he ran out of business steam in the mid-eighties, 
after a series of bad currency deals that he managed to cover up. Everything 
he’d done after that had been a huge Ponzi scheme, paying investors with 
their own money, as he drew more and more in with the promise of attractive 
profits that were evidently being delivered. If Harry Shelby hadn’t had such 
a big reputation, chances are he’d have been caught, but because he was such 
a hero he got away with it.’

He stopped to sip his tea, only to find that it had gone cold.

‘Why did he run?’ he asked, then answered. ‘It may have been because he 
knew that all Ponzi fraudsters are caught eventually, unless they shut up shop 
before it’s too late.’ He paused. ‘However, Provan happened upon another 
theory, one that the Australian authorities… Dan checked this with the 
Australian Embassy… believe to this day, possibly because it suits them so to 
do. They think, indeed they’re pretty well sure, that a couple of his biggest 
investors were Americans, Mafia figures, using his investment scheme to launder 
money. The scenario is, they caught on to the swindle, so they dealt with it 
the old-fashioned way. They made Shelby and his money disappear at the same 
time. On the day that he did, Australian air traffic control traced an 
unregistered flight out of Canberra heading for Tasmania. The investigators had 
a tip that Shelby was on it, until they dropped him out halfway there over the 
ocean.’ He gazed at Marina. ‘But we know that’s not true, don’t we?’

She stared back at him, silent. He took a photograph from the case, held it up 
for Payne to see, then passed it to her.

‘That’s Harry Shelby, aged about forty.’

He produced a second. ‘That’s Peter Friedman, photographed, to his 
annoyance, at a charity dinner last winter. He’s over thirty years older, but 
I’ve had the images run through a recognition program, and it confirms 
they’re one and the same man.’

He went back into the attaché and took out a third image. ‘And that’s 
you,’ he said, ‘from your HR file in Pitt Street. You can’t hide from it, 
Marina. You are your father’s double.’

She picked up his mug, and drank his cold tea in a single gulp. ‘And proud of 
it,’ she whispered.

‘It was the newspaper photograph that did it, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘Antonia was in her first month in Glasgow when it 
appeared. She read every newspaper, every day, to familiarise herself with the 
place, and she saw that. She used CTIS to trace him, then one day, just as you 
have, she turned up here, alone. When he got over the shock, he assumed that 
she had come to arrest him, but no. I mean, why would she have done that? There 
would have been nothing in it for her.

‘Your assumption was correct; she did to him what she had done to Lawton and 
his wife. She showed him the brochure for the house and told him that she 
wanted it. She told him to forget about trying to vanish again, as she would 
know about it the moment his helicopter took off, or he boarded the ferry. But 
in truth she knew that there was no point in him running. He was dying, and 
even then the house was being turned into a hospice, a place for him to be as 
peaceful as he could be in his last days. So he bought the Bothwell place for 
her.’ Her eyes flashed. ‘He told me she should have chosen a bigger one.’

‘Why did he go to the damn dinner? That doesn’t sound like typical 
behaviour.’

‘He was in Edinburgh, seeing an oncologist for tests,’ she explained. ‘It 
was that day, and he had a feeling the news wasn’t going to be the best, so 
he went, in the hope it might cheer him up. As it turned out it did the 
opposite.’

‘Does your mother know any of this?’ Skinner asked.

‘None,’ Marina insisted. ‘Maman is not a stupid woman. She had a good job 
in the civil service, but she was looked after by men for much of her life, 
first Anil, and then Papa. She’s naive in some ways, so when Antonia told her 
that she had done well in property in Britain, she believed her.’

‘How did Sofia meet your father?’

‘He was part of an Australian business delegation to the island, in nineteen 
eighty, after her thing with Anil was over. Maman was in charge of official 
government hospitality. That’s when it began.

‘I was born two years later, and for all my childhood he spent as much time 
as he could with us. He was as good to Antonia as he was to me. That’s what 
made her behaviour all the more despicable. You were right. She was just a 
nasty little blackmailer.’

‘When did you get back in touch with him?’

‘I was never out of touch. Gifts would arrive, and letters, never traceable, 
only ever signed “Papa”. The theory is wrong, incidentally, about the 
Mafia. They were his partners in the Ponzi business, not his victims. They all 
made lots of money and when the time came to close it down, they helped him get 
away, and they planted the idea that they had killed him. In fact he lived in 
the West Indies for six years, as Peter Friedman. He moved to Mull ten years 
ago, around the same time as I came to Britain. It was then he told me his new 
name.’

‘Whose idea was it for you to join MI5?’ Skinner asked.

‘A shrewd question, because I think you know the answer. Papa suggested it. 
The idea was that if the Australians started looking for him again, in Millbank 
I would be well placed to hear about it. By that time I was in a security 
department within the Met, so when I applied, it seemed a natural step, and I 
was accepted. Brian Storey was my boss then, and he endorsed me. Antonia never 
knew, though, not ever. The service, as it does, gave me a front as an importer 
for a chain of florists.’

‘That sounds like an Amanda Dennis touch.’

‘It was. She’s a good teacher.’

‘You were a good student, Marina. You could have been Amanda yourself, if 
you’d stayed the course, instead of letting them move you out to spy on your 
sister.’

‘But if I had stayed, I wouldn’t have been able to deal with her when the 
need arose.’

‘By telling your father how to get rid of her? No, I don’t suppose you 
would.’

‘Papa never knew,’ she said.

Both police officers stared at her.

‘It’s true, I swear,’ she exclaimed. ‘If I had told him he would have 
forbidden it, absolutely. All he ever did was make a donation of three hundred 
thousand pounds to a charity I told him about. He was a sucker for charities, 
especially those involved with cancer research; I told him it helped patients 
with difficult personal circumstances. I approached Cohen, using a contact 
email address I’d picked up in the service. I gave him the commission and he 
named his price. No conscience, that man, only a cash register. I also gave him 
Brown as a resource on the ground in Glasgow. I’m sorry they had to kill him, 
but not too sorry, as he was a traitor to his own kind. No, the decision was 
mine, and the orders were mine. Knowing what Antonia was, and what she might 
have become, I don’t regret them. I’m sorry for Maman, and for Anil, and 
for Lucille, of course, but they will bring her up as if she was their own. 
Maman is still young and fit enough to see it through.’

‘But what about Papa?’ Skinner murmured. ‘He isn’t, is he?’

‘Yes, Papa,’ she sighed. ‘I suppose you have come to take him away, as 
Antonia did not.’

‘We haven’t come to ask for a raffle prize for the policeman’s ball, 
that’s for sure. As for taking him away, we’ll see about that. But I would 
like to meet him.’

‘Then come with me, Chief Constable, and you shall.’ She stood; Skinner and 
Payne followed suit. ‘In your car? You have a car, I take it.’

‘Yes, but Superintendent Payne can take that. I’ll come with you, just in 
case the minder panics at the sight of strange vehicles. By the way, no 
nonsense up there, Marina. There are firearms in my car; that’s a practice 
your sister introduced.’

‘He isn’t that sort of minder, I promise. Rudolf is a driver and a pilot, 
that’s all.’ As she spoke, they heard the heavy engine sound of an 
aircraft. She looked up and pointed, towards a helicopter above them, gaining 
height. ‘In fact, that’s him.’

‘Hey!’ Skinner exclaimed. ‘Are you…’

‘No. Papa is not with him. He’s still at the house. Come and meet him.’

The chief frowned, still cautious, weighing her up, not anxious to be taken 
twice. ‘Okay,’ he said at last. ‘Don’t you want to collect your mail?’

‘It can wait. Come on.’ She led him across the road to the waiting Range 
Rover.

With the police car following close behind, they drove out of Tobermory, taking 
a narrower road from the one they had used earlier, passing a campsite on the 
edge of the small town, then climbing for two or possibly three miles, although 
its twists and turns made it difficult to judge distance travelled.

She slowed as they approached a gate on the right, with an unequivocal sign 
beside it: ‘Private’. It was shut, but Marina pressed a button on a remote 
control and the barrier slid aside.

The surface of the estate road was gravel, but better than the one they had 
left. Their tyres crunched beneath them, early warning, Skinner thought, for 
anyone waiting.

The house itself was a grey mansion, large but not ostentatious. It reminded 
him of some of his neighbours on Gullane Hill, although the stone was 
different. She drew up at the front door, then waited until the second car 
stopped alongside and Payne climbed out to join them.

He was holding a pistol, in the manner of a man for whom it was a new 
experience. Skinner frowned and shook his head; he handed it back to Davie Cole.

‘This way,’ she said, leading them inside, walking briskly through a 
chandelier-lit hallway, and, ignoring a wide mahogany stairway, into a room on 
the far side of the house.

It was large, decorated with old-fashioned flock wallpaper. A bay window faced 
south over a sunlit garden, laid out in shrubs and fruit trees, with stone 
statuary among them. Soft music was playing, a female singer with a gentle 
voice; the chief guessed at Stacey Kent.

There was a smell about the room, a smell of disinfectant, a hospital smell, 
one that seemed fitting given the metal-framed bed that was positioned facing 
the window. Skinner saw an oxygen cylinder on the far side as they approached, 
and beside it, in a stand, a vital signs monitor.

All the lines on it were flat.

The man on the bed was old, but his face was unlined. He looked peaceful, with 
his eyes closed.

‘Papa died just over two hours ago,’ Marina murmured. ‘Rudolf has gone to 
Oban to fetch an undertaker, and to take Sister Evans to the station. She’s 
been with us for the last month. She did a great job; he was pain-free all the 
way to the end. The doctor from Oban was with him at the end. He was kind 
enough to stay overnight. He caught the first ferry back this morning.’

‘I suppose I should say I’m sorry for your loss,’ Skinner told her. 
‘And I am, honestly, even if he was a billion-dollar fraudster, and you’re 
a sororicide… if that’s a word. You are a first, Marina. I’ve come across 
plenty of conmen in my career… although not on your dad’s scale, I admit… 
but I’ve never met someone who’s killed her own sister.’

‘What are you going to do with me?’ she asked. Payne, standing on the other 
side of the bed, saw a hint of trepidation in her eyes, for the first time 
since their encounter in the café.

‘What do you think?’ the chief retorted. ‘I’m duty bound to arrest you 
and charge you with murder. You’ve admitted it, and even if you recant that, 
I know enough now to put a case together.’ And then he sighed. ‘That’s my 
duty, but the judge would be bound to knock out so much of my evidence on 
national security grounds that you would walk. Your problem would then be that 
you wouldn’t walk very far, before you were hit by a runaway lorry, or killed 
in a random mugging, or died of a peanut allergy that nobody knew you had, or 
just plain disappeared.’

Her trepidation turned to undisguised fear as she acknowledged the truth in 
what he said.

‘Who are you now?’

His question took her by surprise. ‘My new identity, you mean?’

‘Yes.’

‘I have a Jamaican passport, in the name of Marina Friedman. My father 
obtained it for me, in case we both needed to move on in a hurry.’

‘What was your next move? Your plan for life after Papa?’

‘His will is with his lawyer in Jersey. It names me as his sole heir. He told 
me to go there, with the death certificate and my passport, to claim my 
inheritance.’

‘That won’t be happening now,’ Skinner said.

‘No, I realise that. So, what will you do with me? Will you save the expense 
of your abortive prosecution by handing me straight over to Amanda Dennis?’

He took a breath and blew out his cheeks. ‘Like she would thank me for 
that,’ he exclaimed. ‘It would be better all round if I just shot you 
myself and buried you somewhere on this big island.’

She backed away, staring at him in sudden naked terror.

‘Hey!’ he exclaimed. ‘Calm down. Better all round, but I’m not one of 
them, Marina. Besides,’ he added, with a half smile and a nod in Payne’s 
direction, ‘there are witnesses, and your man Rudolf will be back from Oban 
soon. So,’ he told her, ‘here’s what you do. You take whatever you can 
pack quickly, and as much as you can in the way of cash and valuables, you get 
in that car and you drive it straight on to the ferry. When you get to Oban, 
keep on driving, in any direction you can and in any direction as long as it is 
out of the jurisdiction of any Scottish police force.’

‘But not Jersey, I take it.’

‘No; there’ll be nothing there by the time you get there. Whatever fortune 
your father’s left isn’t for you, it’s for the people he swindled, even 
if some of them will be dead themselves by now.’ He gazed at her. ‘This is 
what’s happened,’ he said. ‘Lowell and I arrived to arrest him, following 
my discovery of some papers in Toni’s safe. Sadly, we were too late. You were 
never here. When Rudolf gets back and asks, “Where’s Marina?” I will say, 
“Marina who?” That’s the outcome. We get Papa, you get lost. We will be 
fucking heroes, Lowell and me, in Australia most of all. As for you, you will 
be alive.’

She looked at him, still doubting, until he nodded, to reassure her.

‘You’re a resourceful lady. You’ll get by for a couple of years, and 
after that you can probably go back to Mauritius and become yourself again, 
because nobody will be looking for you. But don’t ever show up here again, 
for I will know about it. You’re getting away with murder, because that’s 
what suits everybody best. But don’t you ever forget it.’





PostScript



‘Why did you decide to quit as leader? Were there knives out for you because 
of the Joey incident?’

Aileen snorted across the lunch table in a restaurant next to Edinburgh Castle. 
They had gone there after finalising their divorce, in the Court of Session, 
further down the Royal Mile.

‘They wouldn’t have been nearly sharp enough. No, to be frank I resigned 
because we are going to get absolutely slaughtered at the next Holyrood 
election and I don’t want that on my CV. That twerp Felix Brahms will inherit 
it, now that I’ve endorsed him.’

‘Foresighted as ever,’ Bob chuckled.

‘Of course, and there’s this. I won’t be a candidate in Scotland next 
time. One of our guys in a safe seat on Tyneside is about to retire early on 
health grounds. I’ve called in some favours; it’s mine.’

‘The divorce won’t be a problem for you, will it?’

‘I don’t see it. We’ve settled on unreasonable behaviour as the grounds, 
not adultery. As for the Daily News pictures, they’re old, cold news by now. 
Besides, it’s a safe seat, like I said. The Lib Dems don’t count there and 
as for the Tories, they’re really too nice to use those sort of tactics.’

‘Will Joey put in an appearance for you?’

‘As if I’d ask him. Look, Joey and me, it’s a thing from way back. I 
suppose I can confess now, there were other times while we were married, not 
just that one. Sorry if it dents your male ego, but there were.’

‘I know,’ he admitted. ‘Toni Field had a file on you. It’s long since 
gone into the shredder. Mind you, she did hint that there was somebody else, 
apart from Joey.’

Aileen’s eyes widened. ‘She did what? Any name mentioned?’

‘No, and I’m sure I don’t want to know.’

‘Oh but you do. Who knows? It might come in useful to you one day. The US 
government ran a big hospitality shindig a couple of years back in the 
Turnberry Hotel. All the party leaders were there, and the champagne was fairly 
flowing. As usual, I had a wee bit too much, and God knows how it happened, but 
I woke up next morning with Clive Graham. So there you are. My deep dark 
secret, and Clive’s, except… somewhere there may be CCTV footage of the two 
of us going into his room, and probably of me leaving. Find it and it could buy 
you a lot of influence.’

He sighed. ‘My predecessor did that sort of thing, and it got her fucking 
killed.’

‘What? She tried to blackmail Colombian drug lords?’

‘Not quite. That was the official version. The true story’s a lot 
different, but I’m not sharing, as the spooks say.’

She shrugged. ‘Be like that. Here,’ she went on, ‘the way you said “My 
predecessor” there, it sounded as if you’ve made a decision.’

‘I have. I’ve decided that I can’t go back to Edinburgh. Mario and Maggie 
are getting on fine without me. They don’t need me any more; if I went back 
I’d be a spare wheel. So my application for Strathclyde, permanently, is in 
the hat with the rest.’

‘And you will get it, especially after all those headlines you got when you 
found that Australian fraudster.’

Bob laughed. ‘You ain’t kidding. The day I moved into Pitt Street, I 
inherited an invitation to address an Australian Police Federation conference. 
Since then I’ve had twenty-two more, from other organisations down under. 
Yes, I know I’ll probably be confirmed in post. If not, I’ll do something 
else. I might even retire and buy a boat.’

‘And sail away, with Sarah and the kids?’

‘They’re all too young, and she’s not ready.’

‘It’s cool, though? You and her?’

‘Honestly? It is, for the first time really. We’ve discovered that being 
nice to each other, all the time, is all it takes.’

‘Maybe I’ll try that, next time.’

‘Some chance of that,’ he scoffed. ‘You’re a politician. By the way,’ 
he added, ‘the Turnberry tape did exist, kept carelessly by Toni in a plain 
envelope that I found deep in the desk that is currently mine. It does not 
exist any longer.’

‘Thank you,’ she whispered. ‘To be honest, I was really worried about 
that, and not for Mrs Graham’s sake.’

‘It’s nothing to be concerned about any more,’ he replied, ‘but this 
is.’ He took an envelope from a slim document case that he had brought with 
him.

She took it from him and her face paled, as she studied its contents: two 
photographs of her, with two other women, in a ladies’ toilet.

‘What are… Bob, I think I know when those were taken, but…’

‘You have to give up the booze, Aileen,’ he said. ‘You must. I didn’t 
realise you had a problem, maybe because whenever we had a drink at home, you 
went straight to sleep, or else you got amorous and I put it down to my fatal 
attraction. But that’s twice you’ve courted potential disaster, not 
counting the Morocco fiasco.’

‘How did you get these?’

He smiled. ‘The strangest thing happened a few weeks back. Amanda Dennis 
called all her Scottish team down to London for a two-day performance review. 
While they were gone, somebody broke into their office, and opened the safe. I 
don’t think they even know it happened, not yet. All that was taken were 
those photos, and the master tape. It’s in there too. Somehow they found 
their way into my possession.’

She gazed at him. ‘You know, I could fall in love with you.’

‘Nah, you didn’t before, so how could you now?’

She laughed. ‘Okay. Then how about a farewell shag? We could get a room.’

He shook his head. ‘I’m sworn to be faithful. You should try it too. 
Besides, someone would be bound to photograph us. For example…’

He took another, larger envelope from the document case. ‘These are my 
parting gifts to you, Aileen, and my greatest. Where you’re going to be after 
your by-election, these will represent your ticket straight to the front bench, 
and a fast track to the shadow Cabinet. In this package you will see Toni Field 
doing what she did best. You’ll also recognise the bloke she’s doing it to, 
and I think you will find that you know his wife too. The stupid bloody woman 
actually believed I wouldn’t make copies! That same lady had you set up by 
those two scrubbers, who are, incidentally, no longer Security Service staff, 
and tried to use your moment of weakness to club me into submission and 
silence.’

He lifted his glass and drank a toast, to her, to them, to their past, and to 
their separate futures.

‘Use them wisely, choose your moment, and when you do, make certain sure that 
the damage to Emily Repton is terminal. “Provincial copper” indeed. 
Doesn’t she bloody know that we’re a nation?’

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