The DCI had built a career on reading facial expressions. She recognised the apprehension that she saw in Goram’s eyes as he looked back at her. ‘Yes,’ he murmured.

  ‘After you’d done that you and she had a private discussion and just like that, you settled for ten per cent. Is that true as well?’

  The apprehension deepened. ‘Yes, but . . .’

  ‘ “But”, indeed,’ Mann repeated. ‘That was quite a generous concession given that you might actually have had a case.’

  Goram relaxed, and shrugged. ‘I’m a generous man, Chief Inspector. And I suppose I felt sorry for Sandra, at the time.’

  ‘I’m sure you’re the soul of generosity, but also, I suspect, you’re a realist. You see, Mr Goram, before we came here we did some homework. As a teacher you’ll appreciate that. We checked the records that are open to us as investigating officers, and we found out a few things. When she left school seven years ago, and your relationship went public, your partner . . . Hazel, isn’t it? . . . was sixteen years and five weeks old. Your daughter, Beech, was born on the seventh of February the following year, three days before Ms Bulloch completed the sale of your former home.’ The DCI shifted in her uncomfortable chair. ‘You can see where I’m going with this, can’t you?’

  Goram’s face had gone ashen. His mouth opened then closed again, like a sprung trap.

  ‘I’m no mathematician,’ Mann said, ‘and neither are you, you’re an English teacher, but I do know about gestation, having had a kid myself, and I can work out that since Hazel’s medical history shows that she went full term before giving birth, and even had to be induced, she must have fallen pregnant sometime in May, when not only were you still her teacher, in loco parentis as they say, but she was still only fifteen. If I can work that out . . . well, Sandra Bulloch would have too, seasoned police officer that she was. Ten per cent?’ she exclaimed. ‘You could have got ten years, man. Did Sandra still have a soft spot for you, to let you off with a crime? Maybe, but more likely, having known her, she didn’t want any of the muck of a court case splashing on her.’

  He looked back at her. ‘Are you going to . . .?’ he began.

  ‘Charge you?’ the DCI exclaimed. ‘Now? No, we’re not. Not out of any sympathy for you, but for Beech’s sake. Your child doesn’t deserve to suffer for your criminal behaviour.’ She paused. ‘But, Mr Goram, you shouldn’t be teaching. I will give you until the end of the year to find a new career, otherwise . . . Hazel’s school record will still be accessible somewhere. One phone call to your employer and that’ll be that.’

  He stared at her for several seconds. ‘Okay, I’ll do that,’ he murmured. ‘I hate the fucking job anyway. Is that us?’ he asked. ‘Are we done?’

  ‘Hell no! Are you so naïve you don’t realise that makes you a reasonable suspect in Sandra’s murder investigation? So I’m going to ask you again. Have you ever seen her or heard from her since that day at the estate agent’s?’

  ‘No,’ Goram replied, vehemently. ‘I heard back then from someone we both knew that she’d left the police, but that’s all. Honest.’ He frowned, eyebrows knitted. ‘But,’ he murmured, ‘there was one time, maybe a year or so ago, a guy called me out of the blue, someone I’d never heard of, asking if I knew where Sandra was. I told him no, I didn’t. It was a one-off and I’ve never heard from him since.’

  ‘Would his number still be on your phone? Or was it a landline call?’

  ‘No, it was to my mobile, and I remember, the caller number was withheld.’

  ‘Write down your number anyway,’ Mann ordered. Goram fetched a Post-it label from a block on his sideboard and did as she asked.

  ‘Thanks,’ she said as she took it. ‘Can you remember the man’s name?’

  ‘Yes. He was called Stoddart, Bryce Stoddart.’

  ‘Okay,’ the DCI said abruptly, as she pushed herself upright, ‘thanks for that if nothing else. You might still make the kick-off. I hope your team loses, by the way.’

  Wright stayed silent until they were outside, in the street, admiring the river view. ‘Well?’ she ventured. ‘Did that name ring a bell?’

  The DCI nodded, eyebrows knitted. ‘Oh yes,’ she replied. ‘A fucking big one. Seconds out, Round One. But there’s only one problem . . .’

  Thirty-Two

  ‘Bryce Stoddart?’ the deputy chief constable repeated. ‘Leo Speight’s boxing promoter?’ There was heavy background interference on the call; wind noise, Mann guessed.

  ‘That’s what he said,’ she assured him.

  ‘But Bryce Stoddart’s still in jail. Isn’t he? He hasn’t found a soft-hearted parole board, has he?’

  ‘No, I’ve checked. He’s still serving his sentence. Currently he’s in an open prison in Suffolk, but up until nine months ago he was in a Category B jail in Oxfordshire.’

  ‘He could have used a phone from there,’ McGuire said.

  ‘Yes he could,’ the DCI agreed. ‘If he did, the call might have been recorded, and the number might have been withheld as a security measure. But, think back, sir, to the Speight investigation. I don’t recall that Bryce Stoddart ever met Sandra Bulloch. Indeed, Leo was so coy about their relationship, that he may never even have heard of her. So why should he, banged up in jail, be trying to track her down?’

  ‘I can’t give you an answer to that beyond the obvious suggestion: that someone used his name rather than give his own.’

  ‘But why give that name to Craig Goram?’ She heard what she thought was a laugh.

  ‘Go on, Lottie,’ McGuire chuckled, ‘you’re cooking by gas. Tell me.’

  ‘Because he thought it was a name Goram might recognise from the time he was with Sandra, one that she might have mentioned, or that Goram might even have heard from Leo Speight himself. He and Sandra were a couple, and Leo was her sister’s part time lover. Goram and Leo may well have met.’

  ‘Ask him if they did. Call him as soon as we’re done.’

  ‘I’ll wait for a bit,’ she replied. ‘I doubt that he’d hear me just now over the noise from crowds at Ibrox.’

  ‘No chance,’ McGuire agreed. ‘They’re playing my team, too. Good luck in identifying the mystery caller, but you have one thing going for you. Whoever used Stoddart’s name didn’t pull it out of the ether. He must have known who he was, quite possibly even knew him. Since Stoddart didn’t feature in the Speight investigation, the caller’s unlikely to be someone looking in from the outside. He’s most likely to have been part of the inner circle himself, and that gives you a fairly short list of suspects. I’ve got to go now. Paula needs rescuing from the waves; she likes the sea but she can’t bloody swim.’

  She was about to end the call, until: ‘Ah, Lottie, I almost forgot! One more thing, and it’s important . . .’

  Thirty-Three

  ‘Well?’ Bob murmured as he gazed westward from the terrace across the outskirts of Girona to the mountains beyond. ‘I know it’s only our first morning here, but what do you think of our new family home?’

  ‘Honestly?’ Sarah said.

  ‘No punches pulled.’

  ‘Okay, I agreed to the move, and I still see all the benefits for the kids and for us. I don’t doubt any of it.’

  ‘But?’

  ‘But . . . this is probably the best duplex in the city, it’s a great investment, it’s beautiful, it’s big enough for all of us, and it’s well situated for your work and for mine, yet my gut is telling me it’s not the total answer. It’s Sunday, it’s sunny but where are the kids just now?’

  ‘They’re out with Trish, exploring L’Espai de Girona shopping mall.’

  ‘We’ve been there,’ she reminded him, ‘and on a Sunday too. The place is a zoo. It’s mobbed, people come from everywhere. I heard as much French being spoken there as I did Spanish or Catalan. Trish will only be able to find a parking space because Dawn still needs a stroller, otherwise . . . Jazz and Seonaid don’t start school until Wednesday. What are they going to do Monday and Tuesday? What are they going to do next weekend?’

  He nodded, lips pursed, but remained silent.

  ‘Bob, we are the most privileged family I know. We can move here without needing to sell Gullane, and leave it to Alex to look after it and for Ignacio to use it when he wants to go there. We’ve got this, which you bought to use up the silly money InterMedia pays you as its executive chairman. But we also have the house in L’Escala, by the sea, which you bought with your inheritance from your dad and which we’ve been expanding. Now we’ve made the move, we need to experience it and decide which will really be our home, there or here?’

  He smiled as he took his mug from the table. ‘We could go to Cort Ingles next weekend, instead of L’Espai,’ he murmured.

  ‘Bob!’ she exclaimed. ‘I’m fucking serious.’

  The smile widened. ‘I know you are . . . speaking of which, the kids will be out for at least another hour and it is Sunday morning . . .’

  His suggestion went unspoken as his ringtone sounded. ‘Fuck,’ he hissed. She nodded. He picked up the phone without checking the caller number.

  ‘Señor Robert,’ a woman said, ‘this is Comissari Roza. I have had a report, five minutes ago, from my investigators about the matter you reported to me. I thought you would want to know straight away. Through the insurance company my people found what was left of the car that went on fire: it was in a yard close to the Ronda Litoral, waiting to be crushed. When they examined it, they found definite traces of a device. It had been placed above the rear wheel. They are not able to prove it, but they believe that it was meant to be triggered by the driver closing the car door after getting in.’

  ‘But she didn’t do that, did she?’ Skinner exclaimed. ‘Raul Sanchez told me that she realised she’d forgotten something and went back indoors.’

  ‘That is correct. And so when she closed the door she was not inside the vehicle.’

  ‘If she had been . . .’ he began.

  ‘. . . it would probably not have been fatal,’ Roza told him. ‘It was an incendiary device, not explosive. She would have had time to escape before the fire took hold. I will call my colleague in Madrid and tell him his people should take another look at the package sent to Señora Hoverstad.’

  ‘Did your team find any traces on the other one?’

  ‘They found no fingerprints, but there was a hair inside the bottle that we will assume came from the person who put the letter inside. That should be as good as a print, maybe even better. As for the bottle, the label is intact. It may be we can match it with the one in Madrid.’

  ‘That’s good to hear. You’ll continue to keep me in touch?’

  ‘As far as I can,’ she replied, ‘but as a former police officer I am sure you will understand that with a criminal investigation underway, there will be a limit to what I can share.’

  ‘Of course,’ Skinner said, with as much sincerity as he could muster. ‘One thing I forgot to ask Raul Sanchez,’ he continued. ‘What’s the product in question? I didn’t ask him and he didn’t mention it by name. You might as well share that Comissari, for I’m sure he will.’

  She laughed. ‘Yes I think I can do that. It is a drink, one that is . . . I believe the English word is fortified. It has a little alcohol, maybe more than a little. It’s called Ciervorapido. The manufacturers, Compostella SA, say it is based on a recipe from a convent in the eighteenth century in the south of Italy, but nobody believes that. They invented it themselves and created a legend around it.’

  ‘The Sisters of the Trinity might believe it,’ he countered.

  ‘Yes,’ Roza reflected. ‘Perhaps they do, if they are real.’

  Skinner ended the call, returned his phone to the table and looked up at his wife, who was standing by the glazed terrace enclosure. He grinned. ‘As we were saying . . .’

  She shook her head. ‘No, as you were saying. Anyway, the moment’s past.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  She nodded her head, and made a gesture, downwards, towards the street. ‘Very. Trish and the kids are just about to drive into the garage.’

  Thirty-Four

  ‘Did you have a good weekend, John?’ Jackie Wright asked as she draped her jacket across the back of her office chair.

  ‘I can’t really say that I did. My girlfriend took me away on Saturday morning for a surprise trip, but she could see that my head was still in Glasgow, working on the investigation.’

  His colleague smiled. ‘Oh dear, girlfriends don’t like that. I was in the same boat as you. Mine gave me a hard time for going to interview the guy Goram with the boss. She made me pay for it, literally; when I got back, she told me we were going for dinner to the Peat Inn, or rather . . . she told me I was taking her for dinner in the Peat Inn, and staying there afterwards.’

  He whistled. ‘I’ve heard of that place. It’s my mum’s lifelong ambition to go there, but my dad still hasn’t got the message. Good?’

  ‘Brilliant, but jeez, I hope a promotion comes up soon. It put a big lump on my credit card balance. You? Where were you taken?’

  ‘The Atholl Palace in Pitlochry. A big Victorian place up on a hill.’

  ‘Was it good?’

  ‘It was okay. I liked it: it’s old but it’s kind of beautiful. Funny place, Pitlochry,’ he mused. ‘Half the shops sell hiking gear; you’d think that there’s nothing to do there but walk.’

  ‘Has it got a caravan park?’ Both detectives turned to see Lottie Mann, framed in the doorway.

  ‘I suppose so,’ Stirling guessed. ‘Why?’

  ‘Sandra Bulloch was the outdoors type. She must have toured that van around, given the mileage.’ She shook her head. ‘But that’s well down our list of places to be ticked off. You two carry on. I have an appointment in the city centre. I did some digging yesterday.’ She paused as she realised that both detective sergeants were staring at her. ‘What?’ she asked.

  ‘You were working on a Sunday?’ Wright exclaimed. ‘We’ve been comparing notes on getting pelters for bringing our work home with us.’

  Mann laughed as she came towards them. ‘As normal people might expect. But normal people don’t share their lives with Dan Provan. Plus, when the deputy chief makes a suggestion, from the beach, on a Saturday, it’s best not to add it to the Monday morning to do list. I’m going to see a woman called Moira Mansfield. She’s the managing partner of a law firm called Herbert Chesters. They were Leo Speight’s lawyers, and they handled the processing of his estate. Herbert Chesters wasn’t a bloke, by the way, they were two people. The Chesters half is dead now. Joy Herbert, the other partner, retired a couple of years ago, although she’s still on the letterhead as a consultant, and no doubt still collects a profit share. Ms Mansfield was her senior associate and took over the running of the firm.’

  ‘I’ve never heard of them,’ Stirling confessed.

  His boss shrugged. ‘I’d be impressed if you had. They’re a very discreet operation. The Glasgow Herald even called them “reclusive”. They manage the affairs of high net worth individuals, in Scotland and beyond.’

  ‘Something like James Bonar’s firm?’

  ‘Way, way, way above his level, John. Leo Speight was by no means their richest client.’

  ‘If they’re that discreet,’ Wright asked, ‘how come you were able to dig all this up at the weekend and get an appointment?’

  ‘Like I said, I live with Dan Provan. Law firms here are regulated by the Law Society of Scotland, right? Dan pointed out that it’s got a PR department. I got in touch with them and their guy did all the research, even arranged my date with Ms Mansfield.’ She looked at Stirling. ‘While I’m there, John, I have another task for you . . . some proper detecting, Sergeant.’

  Thirty-Five

  Stirling sat at his desk, his computer terminal pushed to one side to accommodate a stack of old-fashioned files. He knew that he was too young to be a traditionalist, but in his short CID career he had learned that it could be quicker and easier to work with paper than sort through a list on screen. The investigation of Leo Speight’s death had been comprehensive and wide ranging, although Mann had made him aware that one name he would not find there was that of Sandra Bulloch. Every mention of her and of the circumstances of her departure from the police service had been excised from the report to the Crown prosecutors.

  ‘Maggie Steele,’ she had said, ‘ the chief constable of the day, ordered that she shouldn’t be named. She decided that Sandra’s deception at the beginning of the thing was a matter for her and not for the fiscal, so she took it out of the record. Everything else is there, John; that includes a list, with descriptions of everyone interviewed in the course of an all-embracing search for a murderer who at the end of the day didn’t exist.’

  ‘Can I ask you one question, boss? Why are we focusing on the Speight investigation for a lead to Bulloch’s killing?’

  ‘Because it’s all we have. Her CID career was relatively brief, and it was certainly uneventful. When Skinner arrived in Glasgow, I was a DI and she was a uniformed inspector. Somehow, she became his exec. When Andy Martin took over from big Bob as the head of the national force, she carried on in that role, but only for a very short time, until she got bumped up to DCI and became my boss in serious crimes. She was SIO in a couple of linked armed robberies, but Dan and I did all the hard work on those. Sandra just signed off the reports. If her death relates to her police career, that can only mean the Speight investigation, and that links in with her inheritance of his wealth. Yes, there’s her personal life and I had wondered about Goram, but he couldn’t have done it. I knew that before I went to see him.’

  ‘How come?’

  ‘I had a full background check done on him,’ Mann had told him. ‘DC Smith handled it, very efficiently. When the motor home was dumped in Irvine, Goram was in Ibiza, with his partner and their kid. However, he is one of the few living links to Sandra’s life outside the police, so he’s a person of interest from that aspect. When he told Jackie and me that somebody had called him claiming to be Bryce Stoddart, Leo’s fight promoter, that interest multiplied. Stoddart’s in the nick, plus he never knew Sandra, so it’s really very unlikely to have been him. Assuming that, whoever did phone Goram knew who Stoddart was, and plucked him out as cover. Go through the files, John, tell me who the caller might have been, and we’ll pay the candidates a visit. I have my own idea, but I’d like you to confirm it or knock it down, as the case may be. We have to go now; I’m being taken to my meeting. It’s in the middle of our new low emission zone, and my car isn’t compliant. That Thunberg kid? She doesn’t know the half of what she’s done.’