Driftnet (3 page)

‘A bath.’

He came towards
her and she forced herself to smile.

‘Come on,’ he
said.

She wanted to
be in the bathroom alone with the door locked, but Sean led her in,
turned on the taps and began to undress her, his big hands never
fumbling. He dropped the blouse and skirt to the floor, turned her,
unclipped her bra and slipped his hands round to catch her breasts.
He held them gently for a moment before he rolled down her tights
and pants and freed her legs. Behind Rhona the water pounded into
the tub, hot and cold, like her thoughts. He sat on the chair and
pulled her onto his knee, stroking the back of her neck with one
hand while his other tested the water. When it was right, he turned
off the taps.

‘Get in. It’s
fine.’ She stepped into the water like an obedient child. ‘I’ll
give you a shout when tea’s ready.’ He left the door open when he
went out. She leaned over to shut it properly.

‘Don’t lock
it!’ he called. I’ll bring you in a glass of wine.’

Rhona sat down
defeated, leaned back and closed her eyes.

Sean came in
twice. First with the wine as promised and again with the bottle to
refill her glass. Rhona kept her eyes closed the second time,
although he knelt beside the bath so that she could feel his warm
breath on her face. Then the water parted with her knees, hitting
the sides of the bath in a wave of emotion, as he ran his hand
slowly up her thigh.

This was what
it was like, she thought. To be primed. Made ready. Sean was good
at that. She pushed herself up and opened her eyes.

‘Okay now?’ He
was smiling at her, the dark blue eyes full of confidence.

She stood up
and he handed her a towel and then the dressing gown. ‘Don’t bother
getting dressed,’ he said.

Sean liked
women. He was comfortable in their company. But most of all he
liked to take them to bed. He played his saxophone with the same
sensual concentration he gave to sex. He would cradle it, stroke
it, press the right buttons and blow into it until it squealed with
pleasure. Recently Rhona had noticed a difference. She had begun to
suspect that Sean was not playing her any more, he was playing with
her, an entirely different thing.

‘Good?’ Sean
said.

‘Delicious.’

‘I put the
pasta in the fridge. It’ll do for tomorrow night.’

Sean played a
regular gig in a club in the centre of town every Friday night. The
Ultimate Jazz Club was dark and intimate. On Fridays it was always
packed. The gig started at ten o’clock and didn’t finish till two.
Sean often stayed there jamming until sunrise. Rhona had loved to
watch him play, his knowing hands squeezing emotion out of the
golden instrument. She would sit there, just like the night they
met. He’d been booked to play at a police function at the club. At
the interval he’d come over to her table and asked if he could talk
to her. He was so straightforward, she couldn’t refuse. Besides,
she’d been having erotic thoughts about him all evening. She stayed
on till late, as the band wound down, playing soft soul music while
the crowd drifted off. After he’d packed up his gear, they’d left
together and they’d been together ever since.

I can’t go back
to the club, she thought. Not now I know.

They had
reached the coffee stage. Sean was up, whistling as he rattled cups
and spooned the freshly ground coffee into the machine.

‘I went to the
Art Gallery on Friday,’ Rhona heard herself say in a detached
voice.

Sean didn’t
answer at first and she wondered whether he had been listening.
Often when he whistled he was miles away, planning a tune in his
head. Not this time. This time he heard her.

He brought the
cafetière over to the table and poured the coffee. He was whistling
again, bringing the notes to a proper end before he spoke.

‘Ordinary
people go to art galleries here. I like that. It reminds me of
Dublin.’

His voice was
unperturbed and soothing. He was not going to be drawn into a
sparring match. They lapsed into silence. Rhona fingered her
cup.

‘You were in
the Gallery on Friday,’ she said.

‘I was.’

(Was that a
question or an answer?)

‘You were with
a woman,’ she said.

‘I was.’

He took a sip
of coffee then placed his cup gently back on the saucer. He did
everything like that, his big hands moving in firm gentle ways.

‘Who was she?’
Rhona tried to make her voice as if she didn’t care.

Sean studied
her carefully, his eyes catching hers.

‘A woman I know
who likes art galleries,’ he said.

‘Like me.’

‘No,’ he shook
his head, ‘not like you.’ He ran his fingers through his hair.

I’ve got to
him, she thought. She waited for him to say something else then
interrupted him when he tried.

‘Rhona...’

‘Are you
fucking her?’

‘Fucking her?’
He repeated the words so lightly they no longer seemed important.
‘It doesn’t matter if I am.’

‘It matters to
me,’ she said angrily.

He didn’t
answer. In the distance Rhona heard a church clock chime. She
counted eight before he spoke.

‘That’s because
you make it matter,’ he said quietly.

Sean was never
outright angry. When he was ruffled or irritated he always gave the
impression he couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about.
Sometimes Rhona wished he would argue with her, let it out. But he
never did and she was always left yapping at his heels like a
terrier.

‘If I tell you
I’m not, will you believe me?’ he said.

She had known
this would happen.

‘Listen,’ he
reached over the table and lifted her chin and made her look at
him. ‘I will not cook for her or play for her or stroke the back of
her neck when she’s tired,’ and he ran his hand tenderly down the
curve of her face.

They left the
table without clearing it and moved through to the living room.
Sean lit the gas fire and closed the curtains. He sat on the couch
and made a place for her in the crook of his arm. Rhona allowed
herself to slip close against him, laying her head on his chest;
already thinking of what her life would be like without him.

When the phone
rang, Sean was the one who got up and answered it.

‘It’s for you,’
he said. ‘A man. Didn’t give his name.’ Sean’s face betrayed
nothing.

She took the
receiver and Sean left the room. From the bedroom she heard a
trickle of notes.

‘Hello?’

‘Rhona? It’s
Edward. Edward Stewart.’ The repetition was unnecessary. As if
Rhona wouldn’t know that voice anywhere, at any time.

He’s talking to
me like a client, Rhona thought. There was the sound of a throat
being cleared.

‘Would it be
possible to speak to you about some business?’

‘No.’

‘Rhona, this is
difficult for me...’

Things were
always difficult for him, never for anyone else. ‘Fuck off Edward,’
she said and began to put the phone down.

‘Rhona, wait,
please. It’s important.’

There was
something in his voice that stopped her from hanging up.

‘Could we
meet?’ he was asking.

Rhona heard
herself agree.

‘Tomorrow. Half
ten?’

Edward was
confident again as he said goodbye. He’s got what he wanted, she
thought. What sort of business could he possibly want to discuss?
Business, as in his law firm, or business as in the by-election
he’s hoping to win next month? And why now? she asked herself. We
haven’t spoken in three years, and then only across a bench in
court. He hadn’t been pleased when her evidence put his client
away. Edward didn’t like losing.

Sean was still
playing his saxophone but now he’d moved to a tune that Rhona had
come to think of as theirs. The tune he’d been playing, he said,
when he fell in love with her.

She knew he
meant it now as a peace offering.

Sean wouldn’t
ask her who the man on the phone was. He wouldn’t ask her if she’d
slept with him in the past or was sleeping with him in the present.
He wouldn’t ask because it wouldn’t make any difference to the way
he felt about her.

Rhona only
wished she could feel the same.

Chapter 4

There were
times when Bill Wilson thought he had been in the police force too
long. Such negative thoughts usually surfaced when Margaret, his
wife, told him off for talking to their two teenage children ‘like
you’re interrogating them’, or when (like last night) he’d told an
unmarked police car to follow his daughter, Lisa home from a club.
It was ironic, really. After this latest murder he should have
asked the patrol to follow his son Robbie home instead. Either
child would hit the roof, if they found out. Having a policeman
father had never been easy. When Lisa complained he was over
protective, he could only say, ‘I’m a man. I know how men
think.’

It was part of
his job to climb into sick minds. If his family had been able to
see what he was thinking half the time, Bill suspected they would
have packed up and left him years ago.

When he’d told
Rhona MacLeod that he thought the latest victim was a regular rent
boy, though higher class than usual, he’d been wrong. The boy
wasn’t known in the Glasgow rent scene at all and it was beginning
to look as if he couldn’t have been a runaway. If he had been on
the game, it couldn’t have been for long.

Just long
enough to end up dead.

Bill lifted the
mug and took a mouthful of the cold liquid. Most people would have
baulked at the taste, but he liked his coffee cold. He ran the
sweet liquid round his mouth and stared at the photograph on his
desk. Most photo shots taken in booths were done for a laugh. Two
or three faces pressed together in a moment of hilarity, eyes
reddened by the flash.

This photograph
wasn’t like that. As Bill lifted it from the table and cradled it
in his hand he remembered the Sergeant’s comment on the likeness to
Dr MacLeod.

The boy had
positioned himself carefully for the camera. He was smartly dressed
in a buttoned up shirt with a small collar and a dark blue jacket.
His thick and curly hair had refused to be tamed for the picture
and it flopped over his eyes, making him look very vulnerable. And
there was no mistaking it. The set of the jaw, the neat nose, those
eyes. The resemblance to Rhona was inescapable.

Bill leaned
back in the old leather chair he hadn’t let them throw out when
they re-furnished his office. In this chair he could think, even if
the Super thought it screwed up the décor.

He felt sure
that this was no regular rent boy. He hadn’t looked streetwise,
trussed up in death in that sordid little flat, and he didn’t look
streetwise alive in this photo.

Why would he
have wanted a photograph like that? He thought about his own son.
Sixteen years old and not half as civilised looking. Why would
Robbie want such a formal picture? Maybe for an identity card?

Bill sat up and
pressed the button on his desk. After a few insistent buzzes, the
door opened and DC Clarke stuck her head round.

‘Check the
universities and colleges, Janice. Ask if any of their students
have gone awol.’

‘You think he
might have been a student stuck for cash?’

They’d already
cautioned a student newspaper for advertising jobs in a local sauna
to ‘willing young female students needing extra cash’. The editor
had withdrawn the advert but was unrepentant. As far as he was
concerned, it was a legit way to pay for an education.

‘Go and see the
editor of the student paper that ran the sleazy advert. See if
they’ve had any requests to place adverts for willing young
boys.’

Janice raised
her eyebrows in distaste.

‘And get Dr
MacLeod on the phone for me. Maybe she’s found something that might
help confirm this line of enquiry.’

But Dr MacLeod
was not available. ‘Chrissy says she left two hours ago and hasn’t
come back yet. Went to meet some mysterious man with a sexy
voice.’

‘Constable...
’

‘Chrissy’s
words Sir, not mine. They’ll get back to us later about any
results.’

It didn’t
matter what day it was or what time of day, the Kelvingrove Art
Gallery and Museum was always busy. This morning there was a class
in from Glasgow School of Art. The students were clustered on and
around the south steps leading up from the main hall, sketch pads
on their knees. The grand hall was beautiful, Rhona thought, each
layer a work of art in itself. A series of statues gazed over the
first floor balcony; smooth white marble forms that Rhona stroked
as a child. Early spring sunshine filtered through the stained
glass windows, rainbows over the dark polished wood.

A group from a
primary school was weaving towards the dinosaur room. Rhona
wandered after them and watched them gaze up in awe at the
reconstructed skeletons. A wee blonde boy was standing apart from
the others, squinting through a microscope at the fossilised
remains of a mosquito, that had been trapped for eternity in tree
sap turned into amber. Jurassic Park comes to Glasgow, she thought.
And what did that matter, if it made the child think and ask
questions?

Rhona’s father
often brought her here and as they’d wandered together through the
endless rooms she’d asked him hundreds of questions. Her Dad
answered every one of them. He’d made most of it up, she knew that
now, but it didn’t matter because his interest and sense of wonder
had been real, and he’d passed that on to her.

She’d left
Chrissy at the lab sitting at the bench with a black cloud hovering
above her head. Whatever the ‘domestic’ had been, Rhona knew better
than to ask. If she had, she would have got her head in her hands
to play with. When she told Chrissy where she was going, Chrissy
said nothing, just gave her a look borrowed from the black
cloud.