I was looking forward to getting back to work, to the technicalities of handling a takeover or a share issue, the high-level discussions with board members and bankers, raising capital and restructuring contracts. I loved the job and for the foreseeable future I was going to give Scottish Corporate Advisors, and Sammy, my undivided attention.
The memory of Laing and Kyle would soon fade, an episode that I'd keep locked away in the dark recesses of my mind, along with McKinley's tortured corpse. It would return from time to time to haunt me, I knew that, and there would be times when I'd wake at night sweating and shaking after dreaming of burning cigarettes and scorched flesh, but in my heart of hearts I felt that my hands were clean and that it had been their own fault. It was behind me. It was over.
The plane touched down at Gatwick at eleven o'clock on a chilly autumn morning, the change in temperature a shock to my system after two weeks in Malta. I zipped up the linen bomber jacket that had been too warm to wear in the sun but which wasn't thick enough for Surrey with Christmas only a few months away.
I went straight through the Nothing to Declare customs hall, I had just one battered leather suitcase and a duty free carrier bag with two bottles of Glenfiddich, and I was eager to get back to Edinburgh where Shona had promised to put me up until I was ready to move back into Stonehaven. On the way to the taxi rank I bought an early edition of the Standard and I opened it as the driver pulled away from the terminal building.
Her picture was on page five under the forty-two point headline 'Police Hunt Call-Girl Killer' and she was smiling. Her hair was longer than when I'd seen her rushing out of the door, and it wasn't as curly. It was an old photograph but the pouting lips and large almond eyes were the same. It was Carol.
The story said she'd been found naked in a bath full of water with her arms tied behind her back, and that she hadn't been raped but the police suspected it was a sex killing because of the cigarette burns on her breasts and thighs, and they were working their way through her client book which the Standard understood contained a host of top people including MPs, showbusiness and City names. Blood tests had shown that she'd taken a cocaine and heroin cocktail some time before she died and police were also investigating the drugs link.
Carol was dead and it was my fault and it was far from over because if they had found Carol they would find Sammy, and Sammy knew who I was because I'd told her everything and before they were through with her she'd tell them everything, too.
My mouth was dry and my hands were shaking and I felt like I was falling, a sick emptiness in the pit of my stomach and all I could hear in my head was Shona's voice saying 'What have you done?' over and over again, and all I could see was Sammy's face and her eyes as she held me and told me it was going to be OK. The empty feeling became a cold hardness inside, and gradually my hands stopped trembling and I breathed deeply and locked her out of my mind and tried to work out what the hell I was going to do.
I rapped on the glass partition behind the cab driver's head and asked him to drive back to the airport, and he shrugged and hauled the cab round with a screech of tyres against the tarmac.
Back at the terminal I ran to the bank of payphones, rummaging through my pockets for change, sorting out the ten and fifty-pence coins.
I called Sammy first. There had been no mention of her in the Standard and there was an outside chance that she wasn't involved. Sure. And maybe pigs might fly. As it happened she wasn't in the flat and I did speak to a flying Pig 'She's in the bathroom, who shall I say is calling?' asked a male voice which was obviously more used to cautioning suspects than taking telephone messages.
'Just a friend,' I said.
'Actually, she's busy at the moment. Give me your name and number and I'll have her call you back.' At least he hadn't called me Sir.
'Good afternoon, inspector,' I said, taking a pot shot at his rank, and slammed the phone down. Damn. Sammy was missing, and the chances were that she'd been there 165 when Carol had been tortured. Tell us what you know, look what we're doing to your friend. Listen to her scream. Tell us everything about this man, Sammy. Where does he live? What does he do? Tell us about his family, Sammy. Oh my God, no. David. David?
I could feel the clammy fingers of panic clutching at my heart as I rang Shankland Hall, closing my eyes and praying until the sister came to the phone.
I fought to keep my voice steady as I asked: 'Is David all right?'
'Yes of course,' she said. 'You've just missed him. Miss Darvell was here to collect him earlier this morning.'
The sense of relief was overwhelming and I leant forward and rested my forehead against the cool plaster of the wall, allowing the tension to escape in a long drawn-out sigh. Sammy had got away, maybe she hadn't even been there when Carol was killed. And she'd gone up to Scotland to get David out of harm's way.
'They said you'd be ringing,' continued the sister.
They? They? The panic was back now, a hundred times worse than before. I took a deep breath but my lungs still felt empty and hollow. It was as if my brain had been starved of oxygen, going under for the third time, drowning.
'Who was with Sammy?' I asked eventually.
'I rather assumed he was a friend of the family, or a relative of Miss Darvell. He seemed very close and took her by the arm several times.' She paused and I could almost hear her thinking. 'There's nothing wrong is there?' she asked.
'No, no, nothing's wrong,' I managed. 'I'm just back from a holiday and I'd forgotten that Sammy was taking 166 David out. And the man will have been her brother. Did they say when they'd be back?'
I was sweating, the trembling had returned and I closed my eyes tightly. Please God let them be all right.
'No they didn't, I'm sorry. But it won't be tonight for certain, that I do know. They were going on a trip, I seem to remember Miss Darvell saying. She did say I was to give you a message, though. It was about work, I think. Let me see, I have it written down somewhere. Yes, here it is. She said you were to arrange the transfer of the funds and that she would call you at your home at seven o'clock with the details.'
I thanked her and hung up but God knows how I kept the despair out of my voice, because now they had Sammy and David and I thought about the cigarette burns and this I couldn't bury in my subconscious. My eyes stung with tears because it was all going wrong and I'd lost control, and I could still hear Shona saying 'What have you done? All hell's broken loose here.'
I wanted to run, but there was nowhere to run to, and I wanted to hide but I couldn't because I was the only hope that Sammy and David had, without me they were dead and please God don't let them be dead already.
I was to arrange the transfer of the funds, Sammy had said, which meant that whether or not they'd got their hands on the drugs they wanted their money as well, all �250,000 of it.
I didn't have the cash, but if push came to shove I would be able to get hold of quarter of a million pounds by seven o'clock. It would mean pulling a few strings and twisting a few arms but I was in the money business so it wasn't a major problem. But I was under no illusions about the message Sammy had left. There was no way on earth that the men who had killed McKinley, Iwanek and Carol, and probably Laing and Kyle too, were going to swap a suitcase of money for Sammy and David and let us all ride off into 167 the sunset.
The money was secondary, what they really wanted was revenge and a warning to others that there had to be honour among thieves. They wanted me dead and that meant killing Sammy and David, too. Please God don't let them be dead already.
I rang Tony's office. His secretary said he was in a meeting and wouldn't be available until late in the afternoon, but when I told her who I was she said that yes, Tony had been expecting my call and that if I would hold the line she'd go into his office and get him.
Tony was on the phone within seconds, and if I'd expected tea and sympathy then he soon put me right. This wasn't the friendly back-slapping Tony I knew, he was bitter and angry and for a moment I was glad he was on the end of the phone and not standing in front of me.
'You've seen the Standard?' he roared.
'I'm sorry, Tony, I'm really sorry. If I'd -'
'It's too late for sorry,' he interrupted. 'Christ, did you read how she died? And it's all your fault. You stupid, stupid bastard. Do you have any idea at all where this is going to end?'
'Tony, listen to me. We don't have time for this. Argue with me later, hit me if you want, ignore me, hate me, but first help me. I need your help now more than ever before. Just do this one thing for me.' There was silence, and I closed my eyes and willed him not to hang up on me.
'Where are you?' he asked eventually.
'Gatwick Airport. I've just arrived back from Malta.'
'Wait there. I'll be with you within the hour. And you've got some explaining to do.'
'Don't hang up, Tony. I haven't finished yet. You have to do something for me.'
I told him the two things I wanted and God bless him he didn't ask why, he just said yes, he could get them both and 168 I was to wait where I was.
If he'd been my fairy godmother and granted me three wishes, and if I didn't have to go through a metal detector before catching the plane to Edinburgh then I'd-have asked for a semi-automatic handgun as well, something small enough to hide in a coat pocket but big enough to kill at a distance. But Tony wasn't my fairy godmother and the only way to get up to Stonehaven in time was to fly, and anyway I couldn't risk using a gun that could be traced back to him. If Sammy had told them what she knew then Tony was in enough trouble already.
He arrived before twelve-thirty in his blue Lagonda and helped me load my suitcase into the boot without saying a word. It was only after we'd fastened our seat belts and my shoes had settled into the pale blue sheepskin carpeting that he turned to me, raising his eyebrows without a trace of a smile and asked: 'Well?'
'Did you get what I asked for?'
He gestured with his thumb. 'On the back seat.'
I turned and looked over my shoulder and saw a green and yellow Harrods carrier bag. 'Thanks,' I said. 'Were they easy to get?'
'I'm in the business, you know that. I had them both in stock. Where are we going?' Still no smile.
'I have to get to Edinburgh within the next few hours. The Heathrow to Edinburgh Shuttle is the best bet. Do you mind?'
'It doesn't look as if I've any choice, does it?' He started the car. 'Tell me what's happening. And what do you want with the gear in the back?'
Tony was one of those drivers who got other motorists grinding their teeth and gripping their steering wheels, cursing and hitting their horns and brakes. I'd never seen him check his mirror before manoeuvring, his eyes were always on the car in front. He treated his Lagonda like a racing car, which in effect it was with its souped-up engine 169 and specially modified steering and suspension. He weaved in and out of the traffic as we headed north towards Heathrow, hands light on the wheel and foot heavy on the accelerator, driving the way the manufacturers intended and the police frowned upon. It wasn't the most relaxing way of travelling and the atmosphere in the luxurious car was already tense.
'You know as much as I do, Tony. I told you last time I saw you, up in Edinburgh, what I'd planned, that I'd set up Laing and Kyle and got someone else to do my dirty work. I thought I'd got every angle covered but the whole bloody thing's gone wrong. Shona rang me in Malta to tell me that McKinley was killed last week, and it won't be long before they catch up with Kyle . . .'
He looked at me as he passed a Jaguar on the inside at eighty. 'They already have done,' he said. 'He died three days before they got to Carol. I suppose the news didn't reach as far as Scotland. And Laing still hasn't surfaced.'
So at least something had gone as planned, Kyle had been killed and Laing was dead or running scared. But there was no feeling of satisfaction, no warm glow of a job well done, just a gut-wrenching panic at yet another sign that the men I was up against would kill and keep on killing until everyone they thought was involved had been removed. It was a coldblooded hunt which was a thousand times worse than the revenge I'd planned. This was business with no element of personal hatred. People were being killed solely as a warning to others, coolly, calmly and professionally. No hard feelings, business is business. They'd caught Sammy and David and I was next on the agenda.
'They have killed Kyle and I thought it would end there, I swear it. They caught up with Iwanek in Spain but that was his own fault. He'd barely arrived in Benidorm before he started trying to flog the stuff. It must have been like a bluebottle flying smack bang into the middle of a spider's web, setting off all sorts of trip wires.'
'Trip wires stretching back to where?' he asked, and that was the �250,000 question and this time he deserved a straight answer because now he was in as much danger as I was. I took a deep breath to prepare myself because the shit was really going to hit the fan.
'Ireland,' I said and turned to look at him. We didn't accelerate and he didn't slam hard on the brakes but the temperature in the air-conditioned Lagonda dropped at least ten degrees. It was a full thirty seconds before he spoke, and only after he'd softly rubbed the scar where the ridge of white skin merged into his moustache.
'Jesus Christ, what have you done?' he asked quietly, and it reminded me of Shona's words, except this time it was well and truly rhetorical because he knew exactly what I'd done. 'I assumed it was a few London hoods you'd got involved with, that I could have dealt with. But the IR bloody A? You must have been mad. They'll never stop, you know that don't you? They'll keep on coming until we're all dead.'
'It shouldn't have happened this way, the circle should have been closed once Laing and Kyle were killed,' I said. 'That should have ended it, Tony. I can't understand how Carol got involved.'