Tooth for a Tooth (39 page)

He waited for her reaction, but he could have been talking to a wax dummy. ‘Then later, you went to Spain,’ he went on. ‘That was when Dougie tagged along, but also where I slipped up. You see, I thought Dougie and you got together
after
Spain. But I never knew until Dougie told me that you had been out with him before.’

Not even a glimmer.

He held up the Mexican postcard. ‘Remember this?’

Her lips tightened.

‘Want me to read it?’

‘Go on,’ she said. ‘Bore me.’

‘This one first.’ He flipped over the St Andrews postcard. Her eyes never wavered.
‘Going to Mexico for a short break. Will be in touch. Kelly.’
He stared at her, felt hatred stir and simmer deep within him. ‘This is clear evidence of premeditation,’ he said.

Megs eyed him with a dead stare.

‘And this one. Written after Kelly was murdered,’ he said. ‘
Staying on in Mexico a bit longer. Expect to be back at the end of April.’
He lowered the postcard, gave a dead stare of his own. ‘Still deny it?’

‘Deny what? Murdering her? What for?’

Her answer confused him for a moment. Was she questioning her reason to deny it, or her reason for committing murder? ‘For Dougie,’ he tried.

‘Dougie was a man. She was a woman. Men and women screw on the side. We were all doing it back then. What’s the big deal?’

He noticed the past tense, wondered if it meant anything. ‘The big deal was that Dougie wasn’t just any man. He was
your
man.’

‘You’re off your head, Andy. Look at you. You’re knackered. You need a break. Forget all this stuff about murder. You’re barking up the wrong tree. I didn’t do it.’ She patted the sofa again. ‘Come here. Sit down.’

‘Of course, back in the late sixties, forensic science was not what it is today,’ he pressed on. ‘Fingerprint technology—’

‘You can’t get fingerprints off that postcard,’ she objected. ‘I’m not stupid enough to believe that. It’s been through the mill, that has.’

‘So you’re saying you’ve touched it?’

Her face closed down as if he had slapped her.

‘I wasn’t thinking about fingerprints,’ he went on. ‘I was thinking more along the lines of DNA.’

Her eyes came alive then, shifted from side to side as if trying to recall where she had slipped up, what she had missed.

‘The stamps,’ he offered.

Her eyes stilled, her lips pressed together.

He turned the postcard over, pointed to the stamp. ‘Our forensics boys will lift it off, peel it back and take a sample—’

‘Of what?’

He cocked his head, looked out the window, thought he heard a car door closing. Had Tosh returned? Outside, the street lay deserted. He strained to hear the faintest sound. Had he imagined it?

Megs stood, the move so sudden that Gilchrist almost jumped. ‘Waste of bloody time trying it on with you. You always were a cold bastard, Andy. Just like Jack. That’s why that American bimbo screwed around. She wasn’t getting any at home.’

Her words stunned him, but he just managed to beat her to the door again.

‘Are you going to open this fucking door,’ she said, ‘or am I going to have to fight my way through it? One thing’s for sure, Andy. I am going into my own kitchen.’

He caught a glimmer of madness in her eyes, had a sense of her brute strength. In full attack mode, Kelly would have been no match for her. He readied to open the door, put his hand on her shoulder—

She struck at it with the speed of a snake.

‘Keep your filthy fucking hands off me.’

The venom in her voice surprised him. He wondered if he should just arrest her there and then. But the instant he stepped into the office, even with Megs, he would be locked up before he could make a case. Tosh would see to that. Maybe McVicar, too. He realized he needed to play along a bit, try to trip Megs up, trick some confession from her. So far she had denied everything. Even his threat of DNA sampling had failed to evoke a response. If he was going to turn himself in, he needed more than his own convoluted logic and two postcards.

‘I’m waiting.’

He cocked his head, strained to catch the metallic rattle of something.

But again, nothing. He was too tense, by far. He had Tosh on the brain.

He stepped back and Megs barged into the kitchen. She clattered a kettle under the tap, smacked it on to the tiled surface, spilling water. Even through her moments of anger, he came to understand that she would not attack him, for doing so gave him some form of confession, without which he had nothing.

Except the stamps.

Who could he give them to? Who could he trust?

He laid the postcards on the nearest shelf, on top of a pile of hand-printed recipes that acted as a makeshift bookend for a row of paperback cookbooks. One toppled over as he lifted the wall phone from its cradle. He noticed the message light was blinking.

‘Why don’t you use the phone?’ A drawer opened, spoons rattled. ‘Then get the hell out.’ The drawer slammed.

He turned his back to Megs, but kept sight of her reflection in the window, just in case, and pressed the button.

He puzzled at the sound of the voice . . .

Megs? Andy Gilchrist’s been here . .
.

Took a fraction of a second to recognize it . . .

I think he’s on his way
. . .

And an instant too long to sense the rush of movement behind him . . .

Don’t say anything to—

A blow like a hammer-hit struck the back of his neck and the floor swept up to meet him with a thud that pulled a grunt from his throat.

His day sank into darkness.

But not before his dying sight caught tartan turn-ups and brown brogues.

CHAPTER 31

When Gilchrist came to, he was trussed and gagged and naked.

And lying on a sheet of plastic that crinkled with every move.

A dull pain burned the nape of his neck. The taste of oil and dirt lay thick on his tongue. A piece of sacking was jammed into his mouth, held in place by a rough rope that cut into his face and crushed his ears. His hands were twisted behind his back. When he tried to move, something tugged at his ankles, telling him he was hog-tied.

For a second, panic swept through him in an acid attack that threatened to heave bile from his stomach and choke him to death. He tried to still his heart, take long breaths through his nose, force his mind away from even the thought of throwing up.

Just keep breathing. Deep and slow. Deep and slow.

He could not tell how long he had been out, only that it was dark. Despite the cold, sweat tickled the corner of one eye. He felt light-headed from lack of air, and fought off the overpowering need to have the gag removed. He tried to force his thoughts awake, work out what had happened, or more to the point, what was about to happen.

His legs felt cramped, and a deep ache worked its way through his thighs and buttocks and into his back and shoulders. He tried to ease the pain, rolled on to his side and cursed when the cartilage of his ear hit something hard and metallic. He held still for several seconds while the pain faded.

Where was he? What time was it? It felt cold enough to be night.

He lifted his head to the metal thing that had cut his ear, and tried to feel it with his nose. He could not tell what it was, only that it seemed to form part of the lid of whatever box he was in, and that it had a hard, straight edge. He twisted his body, pressed his cheek against the metal bar, felt the rope that held his gag catch, then slip off.

He tried again, pressed harder, ignored the pain in his cheek as he eased back, hoping he was not tearing skin from his face. The rope slipped from the edge of the bar, but it felt different, not so tight, and cut across his cheeks at a different angle.

Four attempts later, he was able to shake the rope free and spit the sacking and oiled dirt from his mouth. He breathed in long cool gulps of fresh air that brought life back to his body. It took him a few seconds longer to work out that he was locked in the boot of some car. The smell of petrol and oil, musty and unclean, reminded him of Megs’ old Vauxhall.

Was he in Megs’ garage?

He worked his way around the confined space, contorting his body to probe the tiniest of corners with his fingers, touch some wires, lift the edge of some boot covering, search for anything sharp enough to cut the rope.

As he struggled, his powers of reasoning came back to him.

Dougie and Megs were in it together. Of that he was certain. Between them they had concocted a string of events that had delayed the discovery of Kelly’s disappearance and even had the wrong police force searching for her. But which of them had killed her, Gilchrist could not say.

Perhaps Dougie. With his fear of flying, he would have needed someone he could trust, someone he knew would keep his secret, someone who would fly to Mexico for him and send the postcard to Kelly’s parents, that single piece of evidence that would clear the crime from the shores of Scotland. Who better than his soulmate, Megs?

Or maybe Megs had caught Dougie and Kelly in flagrante delicto and, in a fit of rage, the stirrings of which Gilchrist had witnessed earlier, had decided to put a permanent stop to their sexual liaison. Or perhaps Megs and Dougie had done it together, taken advantage of Kelly’s inquisitive sexual nature, maybe convinced her to engage in a threesome and, at the moment of truth, or penetration, or whatever, one of them changed their mind and—

He stilled.

His fingers gripped a plastic cover on the side of the boot, with a knob that released it and gave access to what felt like a plastic toolbox. He battled against the pain of the rope as he groped in the darkness, worked at the toolbox latch, opened it and felt inside.

His hand landed upon a socket with a bent handle, for loosening wheel bolts. He searched for a blade-headed screwdriver, one he might use to cut through the rope, but from the way he was trussed, he worried he could not twist his wrists sufficiently to cut himself free.

The sound of a padlock being unclasped and a garage door opening stopped him. He listened to the screech of the door-spring and the rattle of the wheels as the garage door rolled overhead, then puzzled as the noise seemed to reverse and it closed again.

He thought he caught the soft shuffle of shoes on concrete, then the unseen presence of someone close by, the click of the boot lid—

The burst of light blinded him.

Ewart stood over him like some colossus, the closed garage door in the background.

‘Ah,’ he said, ‘I see you’ve been busy.’ He reached inside the boot for the oiled rag and discarded rope. ‘And this, too.’ He removed the toolbox. ‘I’m going to have to tie it tighter.’ He leaned forward, grabbed the rope that secured Gilchrist’s wrists to his ankles and gave a hard tug.

‘There’s no need for this, Dougie,’ Gilchrist gasped. ‘Think of what you’re doing—’

‘What I’m doing is making sure we don’t go to prison.’

‘You could strike a deal, work something out with—’

‘Premeditated murder is what you told Megs. We won’t be working anything out. But I’m surprised you found the postcards,’ he said. ‘What did you do with them?’

‘What postcards?’ Gilchrist tried.

Ewart shook his head. ‘We’ll find them. And if we don’t? Well, after tonight, it won’t matter a damn.’ He leaned forward, placed one gloved hand behind Gilchrist’s head, pushed the oily rag into his mouth with the other. He tried to work the rope around Gilchrist’s head, but Gilchrist spat out the rag.

Ewart stood back and smiled down at him. ‘Your choice,’ he said, dangling the rope with one hand, removing a syringe filled with clear fluid from his pocket with the other.

Gilchrist stared at the needle, fighting back the rising panic. If Ewart injected him with whatever concoction the syringe contained, he would be unconscious in seconds, never to be revived, of that he was certain. Why had Ewart not already done that? His hesitation gave Gilchrist the answer.

‘A post-mortem would reveal drugs in my blood,’ he said, ‘which could point to someone in the medical profession.’

‘A detective to your dying breath, Andy. I’m impressed.’

‘And you don’t want to take that chance. Do you?’

‘As I said, it’s your choice.’

Gilchrist eyed Ewart, stunned that he had never before seen the killer in him. Dead eyes belied a beguiling smile. A career as a doctor had made him immune to the feelings of the dying. But it seemed surreal to be having a conversation with his executioner-to-be. Like choosing from which side he would like his throat slit. Oh, from the right, please.

‘I’m waiting.’

Gilchrist really had no decision to make. An injection ended it there and then. An oily rag in the mouth kept him alive, at least for the time being.

‘I won’t shout,’ he tried.

‘I know you won’t,’ Ewart agreed.

Gilchrist opened his mouth to accept the rag, and Ewart leaned down and pressed it in with gloved hands. The rag was pushed in deeper than before and that, along with the stench of petrol and oil, nearly brought up the contents of his stomach. He worked his tongue and pushed the gag behind his teeth as Ewart, true to his word, tied the rope tighter around his face with a roughness intended to confirm he was not fooling around.