As Paula drove back towards home in the West End of the city, she recalled the bag of Thomas’s personal effects the hospital had given her when she had gone to identify his body. All the items he had on him when he died had been thrown into a plastic carrier.
Unable to look at them, she’d dumped the bag … but where?
In her mind, she retraced her steps. She remembered the weight of it as the man had given it to her – he’d said he’d had to double-bag it, as there was so much stuff. He’d handed her a folder with a piece of paper on top of it. It looked like a list.
‘Sign at the bottom, please,’ he’d said. His tone was deadpan, but his expression held a note of boredom.
She duly signed, barely registering what she was doing. Numb, she’d walked back to the car park, and unable to bear looking inside, she’d dumped the bag in the boot … And it must still be there.
In seconds her mind made several connections.
The iPad could be there.
Thomas might have used it when accessing those bank accounts in the notebook.
Was that why Farrell had died? For the information in that machine?
Almost on automatic, she stood on the brakes and aimed the car at the kerb. This rash movement earned her a loud beep of the horn from the car behind her. She flushed and offered a conciliatory wave out of her side window as the offended driver passed.
She quickly stepped out of the car and walked round to the boot, and opened it. Sure enough, there was the large bag she’d received at the hospital. Reaching in, she pulled the bag closer. Resisting the urge to lift it up and tip everything out, she teased it open and peered inside.
At the top was Thomas’s belt and wallet – a matching set that she’d bought him for his birthday about ten years ago. She felt the now familiar catch in her throat. Then she saw a light-blue shirt and dark-blue tie. She pushed them to the side and felt the soft fabric of his suit trousers and jacket. Under that was a pair of highly polished black brogues. She snatched her hand away, as if burned. This was too much, how could anyone be expected to shoulder this? She hiccupped a couple of sobs and forced herself to inhale, to slow everything down. She had to breathe, she commanded herself. This needed to be done.
With trembling hands she reached again for the bag and pushed her hands inside. Only when she was sure she’d touched everything inside could she be sure of it. There was no iPad.
With that thought came the realisation there was no phone either. If the iPad was always within arm’s reached, his iPhone was permanently in his hand.
Where were they?
Paula considered what the police told her about his last moments. He’d been in a restaurant in the city centre when the heart attack happened. He was on his own, according to the staff, and no one had accompanied him to the hospital. A diner at another table happened to be a doctor and tried to resuscitate him while they waited for the paramedics. He died in the back of the ambulance before they’d even set off.
She sagged at that thought. Her knees hitting the car bumper, keeping her upright. Dying in the back of the ambulance. On his own. Yet another sob escaped the tight clutch of her throat. She forced a breath. And another. She should have been with him. She should have been there, holding his hand, reassuring him.
She was clutching his wallet. She imagined it in his broad hands, saw the light hair that grew in a clump at the base of each finger, just up from the knuckle. Those long broad fingers had…
She shook her head. She had to stop torturing herself.
She opened the wallet and looked through the slots. A couple of credit cards, coffee shop loyalty cards, his driving licence. Some cash. She flicked through the notes, counting a round hundred pounds. And there, behind them, a small, folded photograph. She pulled it out and unfolded it to see the smiling faces of her and Christopher – the stretch of sand behind them signalling it had been taken at Ettrick Bay. She’d no idea he kept this with him.
She held a finger to Christopher’s cheek. He would have been about ten when this was taken. His smile sending out nothing but good cheer and promise into the world. Holding it to her nose, she tried to inhale a sense of him.
Was Cara right? Had he been targeted? And because of something his father had done? No. It couldn’t be.
Her boy.
Her man.
Both dead.
It was all too much. What had she done to deserve this?
She felt her knees give again, and had to flex her thighs to stop herself falling to the ground.
Enough, she scolded herself. There would be plenty of time to feel sorry for herself. First, she had to find out what had happened – what Thomas had really been up to.
She mentally ran through each of the series of numbers she’d memorised from the notebook. It was still all there, intact in her brain. She needed to get to a computer to check it out properly. But the death of Kevin Farrell made her cautious – she wasn’t going to risk using her own laptop back in the house. Because she was in danger too, he’d said.
She felt a twist of fear. Then a flare of anger. What did it matter if she died? What else did she have to lose?
A face imposed itself on her mind. Cara Connolly. What she’d been saying couldn’t be ignored. It had sounded like she was reading from a poor script for a B movie; but, now, with everything else Paula had discovered – and with Kevin and Elaine’s deaths – she knew she had to find out if there was any truth to it.
A piece of gravel popped and she became aware of a presence just behind her. Too close behind her. She turned. Mouth open, ready to tell whoever it was to go away. Saw a tall man wearing a black hoodie, but not much else.
A blow to the right side of her face, before the wallet was ripped from her hand and she was pushed into the boot, and lid slammed on her.
Then the sound of rapid feet fading into the distance.
A shout. A deep male voice. ‘Hey!’
Pain was a dull throb in her head. Her limbs were a tangle. She scrabbled to turn herself over.
‘Bastard,’ she shouted, and damped down her fear. She was safe. They’d gone. And all they’d got was Thomas’s wallet.
But then she gasped. The photo. That lovely wee photo in that arsehole’s hands.
The car was a hatchback, so the boot was huge and thankfully the lid hadn’t been fully closed. With difficulty, she clambered over from the boot into the backseat.
Pushing open the back door, she struggled out and looked up and across the road trying to track the trail of her assailant. Her adrenaline was raised. She’d chase the bastard down every back street in Glasgow if she had to.
‘You okay?’ she heard a man’s voice just behind her, and recognised the accent. She turned to face him.
Anton Rusnak. And he was holding Thomas’s wallet in his right hand.