Chapter 20
EDINBURGH
Brodie pulled into the hospital car park, Lucy riding shotgun.
‘You think I should give some of them a go?’ Lucy asked Brodie.
Brodie looked at her, puzzled. ‘Give what a go? Weight-loss tablets?’
She shook her head and looked at him with wide eyes. ‘Where did that come from? Do you think I need to lose weight?’
‘No, of course not,’ he said, realising he’d put his foot in it. ‘I just threw that out there.’
‘Bloody hell. I mean, I know I have a little junk in the trunk, as the Americans say, but I go to the gym. I run. Watch what I eat. Are you saying I’m fat?’
‘Of course not,’ Brodie said, trying to put the pin back in the hand grenade. ‘I wasn’t sure what you were talking about.’
‘Thrillers. Books. What you were talking about earlier.’ She took her seat belt off and looked down at her stomach.
‘You’re the only person who can pick up a conversation an hour later as if we’re still talking about it.’
‘I was thinking about what you said.’ She opened the door and stepped out into the sunshine. Brodie gave thought to waiting until she had slammed the door shut, and then driving away at high speed. Changing his name and living somewhere by the sea.
The door slammed and he winced. ‘Is that door closed?’ he asked, sarcastically.
‘What did you say?’ Lucy asked as he got out.
‘Nothing. Thinking out loud about what you said about the books.’
‘And?’ she said, pulling on sunglasses.
‘And I think you should. Broaden your horizons,’ Brodie said.
‘So now I’m uneducated as well as fat?’ Lucy said, walking round to his side of the car.
‘No, I’m not saying that.’
She grinned. ‘Just yanking your chain. I knew you wouldn’t have the balls to call me fat.’
Brodie made a face and shook his head. ‘While we’re at it, you could do with a fucking haircut.’
Lucy laughed. ‘So could you. Fatso.’
They walked across to where Det Supt Rob Cross was standing next to his car.
He was smoking a cigarette. ‘Look at this,’ Cross said, holding out the cigarette.
‘Fucking smoking again. That bastard in there. He’s bringing so much heat down on me from up top.
I should stub one out on the bastard’s eyeball. ’
‘I thought there was no smoking in the hospital grounds?’ Brodie asked.
‘There’s a nutcase in there who toppled a gravestone on top of a woman. I think they’ve got more to worry about than me smoking in the car park. Besides, just let them fucking try. I’m in the mood to deal with them.’
‘What does your wife have to say about your smoking again, sir?’ Lucy asked.
‘Let’s just say, I didn’t broadcast it to her this morning. I’ll email her later. Let her chew out some spotty wee office boy before she gets home, then we can sit down with a glass of wine, and she’ll say I have to stop, and I’ll agree and tomorrow I’ll buy an extra packet of mints.’
‘Mints don’t cover the smell of smoke,’ Brodie said. ‘And yes, I’m talking from experience.’
‘Don’t piss on my parade,’ Cross said, taking another drag. ‘I’d forgotten how good these things taste.’
‘We’ll have that written on your tombstone,’ Brodie said.
‘Here lies Robert Cross. Anybody got a light?’ Cross chuckled. ‘You know, there’s a hundred per cent chance that all non-smokers are going to die.’
‘Can’t argue with that logic,’ Brodie said.
Cross nipped the ciggie and put it in the packet beside the unsmoked ones. ‘Right, fill me in before we go up and see Dr Jekyll.’
‘I thought he was the sane one?’ Lucy said. ‘Mr Hyde was the nutcase.’
Cross conceded the point. ‘Aye, you’re right.’
They entered into the secure reception area.
‘Anybody would think you’ve been reading,’ Brodie said.
‘I know things,’ Lucy said. ‘You don’t have to read to be smart. Or a smart-arse.’
Brodie filled Cross in about Ivy Jack working in the bookshop at the time Kane was captured on the CCTV.
‘You think that’s her?’ he asked. ‘The one under the gravestone?’
Brodie shrugged. ‘Kane bought a Bible from the bookshop. And it was a Bible we found on the victim.’
‘Right. I’ll hold Kane down and you stomp on his bollocks if he doesn’t talk.’
‘Old-school technique?’ Lucy asked.
Cross grinned. ‘I wish. We would often talk about how we would interrogate those bastards, each of us trying to outdo the other with as gruesome a fate as we could imagine. And still it would be nothing to how their victims felt. Nobody advocates for them, Lucy. When you’re in the job long enough, you’ll hit the wall, mentally. ’
‘Every day,’ she replied, side-eying Brodie.
He mouthed, Fuck off, and she stuck her tongue out at him.
Inside, the hospital was cool and had the universal smell of all hospitals, whether they were for ill or mentally ill patients.
Maybe they bought the disinfectant in bulk, Brodie thought.
This place reminded him of his granny dying when he was a boy, back in the old Royal Infirmary down by the Meadows.
He recalled having to stand with his mother just inside the ward doors with everybody else until they were given permission to go in, then he would sit with a couple of toy cars, or a colouring book, waiting for the bell to go, telling them it was time to leave.
Then it would be like a football match just got out.
In his eyes, the wards were huge, with many beds in them.
Maybe it was just his perspective when he was young, but now they had all been made into apartments, and the new Royal had four beds to a ward.
‘Earth to Brodie,’ Cross said. ‘You still with us, captain?’
‘Sorry, I was miles away,’ Brodie said.
‘I’m smoking. You’re going fucking doolally,’ Cross said. ‘All we need now is for Lucy to pull an axe out and start saying, “Here’s Johnny,” and that would complete the picture.’ He popped a Polo mint and offered them around. Lucy shook her head, and Brodie took one.
‘They’re not too bad,’ Cross said, ‘considering I found them in the car park.’
Brodie made a face. ‘Fuck’s sake.’
Cross grinned. ‘I’m kidding. I found them in a suit pocket. But I picked the lint off.’
‘You’re a laugh a minute, if you don’t mind me saying, boss,’ Brodie said as they stopped at the lift.
Cross looked at him. ‘I do mind you fucking saying. A bit of respect for your superior officer. Cheeky bastard.’
Brodie grinned and hit the call button several times, the universally known trick that would make the lift come down faster.
Upstairs, the hospital director, Simon Lake, was waiting for them.
‘The board have been giving me grief over this,’ he complained. ‘They’re being bombarded by the press looking for a statement. The press officer is about to take her own life. At the very least, she’s threatened to quit.’
‘Oh, boo-fucking-hoo,’ Cross said. ‘You know who else was getting grief? The woman we found dead under a fucking gravestone yesterday. Get one of those poncy board members to give her family a call and tell them how stressed they are. Listen, son, if you want to, give any of those tossers my number and I’ll gladly speak to them. ’
Lake shrugged. ‘Don’t shoot the messenger. I couldn’t give a monkey’s about them. I passed it on, now I don’t give a crap. I’m just biding my time here.’
‘Good for you, son. I don’t blame you. Now, let’s go and see Dr Crippen.’
‘Still can’t call him by his real name?’ Lake said, smiling.
‘He doesn’t deserve it. Plus, it’s better than what I really want to call him. The swear jar is overflowing as we speak.’
They went through the security doors and into the therapy room, where each of the detectives took a chair.
‘Call if you need me. We should do this again soon. It’s been fun,’ Lake said.
‘Don’t let the door bang your arse on the way out, doc,’ Cross said.
Lake grinned as he left the room.
‘Must be fucking nice, not giving a shite about your job,’ Cross said. ‘I think he must be vaping something dodgy.’
‘There are cameras in here, sir,’ Lucy said. ‘He’ll hear what you’re saying.’
‘Good.’ Cross held up a middle finger.
‘Are you sure there are cameras in here?’ Brodie asked.
‘This is not a room where psychiatrists talk to patients. It’s more of an interview room,’ Lucy said.
‘Is that a fact?’ Cross said. ‘Or are you just blowing smoke out your arse again?’
‘I heard Lake saying that ages ago.’
‘He also said he didn’t stand outside a primary school with a bag of sweeties. Pick which one you want to believe.’ Cross looked around. ‘Do you think they would notice if I smoked in here?’
‘No, but I would,’ Gabriel Kane said as he was escorted into the room by two orderlies.
Cross whipped his head round. ‘Fucking creeping about. Still, that’s your thing, isn’t it? Sneaking up on people,’ Cross said.
‘Dry wit as usual, I see,’ Kane said, taking a seat.
‘You can wait outside,’ Brodie said to the orderlies, who nodded and left.
‘Trust me, there was no humour intended,’ Cross said.
‘Offence taken,’ Kane said, settling back and crossing his legs.
‘I couldn’t give a fu—’
‘Anyway,’ Lucy jumped in before any fists were thrown, ‘we’d like to talk to you about your victim, the one we found yesterday.’
‘What about her?’ Kane said.
‘We already told you it wasn’t Marianne Taylor,’ Brodie said.
‘Yes, you did, Liam,’ Kane said, locking eyes with the DCI, scepticism in his voice.
‘What do you know about Ivy Jack?’ he asked.
There was a shift in Kane’s demeanour, a slight hardening of the eyes, narrowing as he maintained eye contact. He didn’t look away as he answered. He was too good at this game to do that. Brodie would have seen that as a sign of guilt, according to the body-language class he had taken.
Instead, Kane smiled after he’d recovered, which only took a split second. It was enough for Brodie to notice. ‘Nice woman. Very chatty. Sylvia shouldn’t have kept her hidden through the back so much. Ivy had such a nice personality.’
‘Had?’ Cross said. ‘She isn’t of this world any more?’
Kane slowly turned to look at him. ‘You know she isn’t.’
‘Is that who we found yesterday?’ Brodie asked.
Kane shifted his gaze once again. ‘You tell me.’