Since Callanach’s journalist friend, Lance Proudfoot, had published his online article, the phone lines had been alive with callers offering information about both Fenella Hawksmith and her daughter, Alice. Ava was all too aware that most of it would turn out to be a diversion rather than substance, but they had to start somewhere.
She’d just reviewed Pax Graham’s report on the nursing home murder, noting with dismay the additional evidence that Bruce Jenson’s genitalia had been damaged in the attack. There was no doubt about Callanach in her mind, though. He’d proved himself to her time and again. There was nothing hidden between the two of them, no lies. She’d be willing to bet her life on that, so she was more than happy to bet her career on it.
Callanach had texted her at 7 a.m. to warn her that he’d set up the online article, trying to push for results in the Hawksmith case, while she’d been busy swallowing painkillers for her head and hoping the alcohol hadn’t invalidated the benefits of the antibiotics completely.
‘How was Natasha?’ Callanach asked before Ava had time to look up as her half-open door received a brief single knock.
‘On her usual electrifying form,’ Ava grinned. ‘She asked after you.’
‘I miss Natasha. Why don’t you both come to dinner at my apartment next week?’
‘She’s a bit busy with the latest conquest,’ Ava dissembled. There was absolutely no prospect of her putting Natasha and Callanach in the same room while Tasha was so intrigued by their misconstrued nights together. ‘Good call asking Lance Proudfoot to release the article. Looks like it’s been shared successfully. There’s information flying in.’
‘That’s why I’m here,’ Callanach said. ‘Fenella Hawksmith’s medical notes just arrived. She had a history of suicide attempts, including a period when she was committed to a hospital for her own safety.’
‘Was she still taking medication?’ Ava asked.
‘Not any that was prescribed; although it’s possible she was taking non-prescription drugs. The tox screen will give us more details. I’ve checked with the Scenes of Crime team. There was no medication, legal or otherwise, found at the flat, other than standard over-the-counter stuff, and they were out of date with some still in the pack.’
‘So no sign of addiction, then.’
‘None,’ Callanach agreed.
They stared at one another across the desk. Ava studied her fingernails, still ragged from clutching the wall at Tantallon, and wondered who was going to say it first. Callanach let her do the honours.
‘You don’t think …’ she said slowly.
‘It has to be a coincidence,’ he replied. ‘Because otherwise you and I are going back to Tantallon, and back up on that fucking wall.’
‘It’s rained almost non-stop since the night Stephen Berry died. The chances of us picking up anything useful now is slim, but I think we have to try.’
‘Ava, we already have one victim from the nursing home and Fenella Hawksmith. Are you sure about this?’
‘Stephen Berry attempted suicide a few weeks ago, now he’s dead following a long drop from a castle wall in the middle of the night. Think about it. The chemicals in his body that showed up on the tox screen confirmed that he hadn’t gone off his meds. He was doing what his doctor had instructed him to do. There should have been enough serotonin in him to keep him steady, if not what you and I would think of as happy. He had a girlfriend, right?’
‘Ex,’ Callanach confirmed.
‘So let’s talk to her, confirm his movements and moods between the attempt from the Queensferry Crossing and his trip to Tantallon.’
‘I’ll get Tripp on it,’ Callanach said. ‘Anything concrete regarding Mrs Hawksmith’s daughter yet?’
‘No death certificate,’ Ava said. ‘So either she’s still alive, is dead but wasn’t identified, or is dead but hasn’t been found.’
‘How are you going to persuade Overbeck that we need to investigate the Berry death as a possible murder?’
‘I’m not,’ Ava said. ‘I shall be engaging a secret weapon. You don’t need to worry about it.’
‘You’ve got a secret weapon you’re not prepared to share with me? That’s hardly fair.’
‘Believe me, you don’t want any part of it. And in case you’re wondering, Pax Graham’s team are proceeding on the assumption that the Bruce Jenson killing was committed by a staff member. Forensics has shown the initial blow to the glass door was from the inside and that afterwards someone hit the fractured area from the outside. They’ve concluded it was an attempt to make it look like an intruder.’
‘Motive?’ Callanach asked.
‘Nursing home killings often come from a build-up of frustration or work stress. Occasionally, there’s an underlying condition like Munchausen’s by proxy or angel-of-death syndrome that attracts carers into the profession in the first place.’
‘If that were the case, I’d expect there to have been other unexplained deaths there.’
‘Because we don’t have enough to deal with at the moment?’ Ava raised her eyebrows. ‘It could have been a new staff member, a temp. Other deaths could have been expected but just hastened, meaning there’d have been no postmortem. A lack of evidence doesn’t mean this is an isolated incident. It’s the hardest possible environment to make sure all deaths are natural. I’m only telling you so you can relax about it a bit. Graham’s a good detective. He’ll figure it out.’
Callanach nodded. ‘Okay,’ he conceded. ‘I’ll start sifting through the Hawksmith information. Good luck with Overbeck.’
Back at his desk, he checked his emails. There were a few from Lance – responses to his article that should have gone straight to MIT but that had gone to him. There were a few adverts that had escaped the trash folder and some online bills. Below that was a bounce back from the email he’d sent his mother. He felt suddenly sick. The last time an email to his mother had bounced back was when she’d disappeared from his life while he was fighting the rape allegation. That time it had been deliberate. She’d needed to get away from the whole dreadful situation and the memories it was dragging up. But in Paris she’d seemed fine. They’d undone most of the damage and reclaimed the close relationship they’d enjoyed before. Now this …
Callanach read his original email, checking the address he’d entered carefully for typos. There were none. Hitting resend, he doubled it up with a text to her, explaining that he’d tried to contact her but failed, hoping there was nothing more serious going on. It was difficult enough to bring up the subject of Bruce Jenson’s death without worrying that his mother wasn’t coping again.
Sergeant Lively’s face resembled a punctured beach ball. Ava pointed at the empty chair opposite her desk as she finished typing a note requesting extended funding for forensic testing at Tantallon. It was a low trick to get Lively to request it for her, but it wasn’t as if Detective Superintendent Overbeck could complain publicly about it.
‘I need you to use your considerable influence with the super to get a full crime scene workout at Tantallon Castle,’ Ava smiled at him. ‘I’m just finishing my notes, then I’ll hand this straightforward administrative task over to you.’
‘The Tantallon file’s closed,’ Lively said. ‘Dr Lambert decided it was suicide gone badly wrong, but nonetheless suicide.’
‘Yeah, only that would make two in a row,’ Ava replied quietly.
‘Now hold on. The Berry case bears no resemblance to the Hawksmith case. The evil Overlord is going to be having none of that. I’m not going upstairs bearing that bouquet of poisoned ivy, thank you very much,’ Lively grumbled.
‘You don’t need to link the two cases unless she asks. I’m about to phone the pathologist and have that discussion with her, and I’m sure she’ll agree that we need to consider the similarities between the two cases.’
‘Similarities? One man, one woman, different ages. The first was a fall and the second was deliberate cutting in a warm bath.’
‘You’re starting to sound like her,’ Ava quipped.
‘With respect, ma’am, you can do one.’
‘I’m giving you a pass for that, Sergeant, but it’s the last one you’ll get. I’ve got two bodies that seem superficially like suicides, but neither is quite that simple.’
‘Two’s a coincidence, three’s a pattern. The superintendent won’t like it,’ Lively said. ‘And with respect, it’s not fair of you to use me like this.’
‘Is that your social conscience speaking out, only you’ve given your colleagues more crap over the years than any other officer I’ve known. It didn’t bother you before.’
‘I never used an officer who was in a relationship to try to gain an advantage,’ Lively said quietly. ‘You wouldn’t be asking if I were female.’
Ava stood up, hands on hips. ‘Are you accusing me of sexism?’
Lively took a deep breath. ‘Aye, I suppose I am. If your new constable, Janet Monroe, were seeing a man higher up the chain of command than you, you’d sooner poke out your own eyes than abuse her position with him to get what you wanted.’
‘Shit,’ Ava muttered. ‘I didn’t think of it like that. I’m sorry. Truly. Forget it, I’ll see Overbeck myself. For what it’s worth, you’re right. I wouldn’t have done that to a woman. It just didn’t occur to me …’ She wasn’t sure how to end the sentence.
‘That I might have feelings? Thanks for that, ma’am. I’ll be in the incident room if you need me for anything that actually constitutes my duties.’
He left without actually slamming the door, but Ava felt the impact as if he had.
Grabbing her notes, she strode to the stairs and did her best to run to Overbeck’s office, choosing action rather than considering how badly she’d misjudged Lively’s reaction, not to mention her own culpability. She’d expected Lively to give her some grief, complain about the assignment, but not considered the ethics of asking him in the first place. Police Scotland was a hotbed of ribbing and political incorrectness, but none of it was meant. When push came to shove, she was as sure as she could be that every one of the officers under her command had each other’s back. Lively had given out vastly more abuse than he’d ever had to take, which was why she hadn’t considered the appropriateness of her request. If anything, it had seemed light-hearted and trivial. Now, she saw it for what it was – an abuse of the knowledge of his relationship.
Detective Superintendent Overbeck was exiting her office as Ava approached.
‘If you want me, you’ll have to walk with me to my car,’ she said.
Ava turned on her heel and did so.
‘Give me the good news.’
‘It’s not good news, I’m afraid,’ Ava said.
‘Sarcasm failure, Turner. Of course it’s not good fucking news. You’re coming to see me holding a file. Get on with it, then.’
‘I need to open a crime scene in a public place. Tantallon Castle, in fact, which will mean closing the castle to the public.’
‘Tantallon? I love it there.’ Overbeck smiled wistfully. ‘High fall, right? If I’m not mistaken, that case has been closed. Why are you seeking to reopen it?’
Ava explained as concisely as she could given the time constraints and Overbeck’s dislike of long speeches.
‘All right,’ the superintendent concluded. ‘You can have complete forensics from the scene, interview Stephen Berry’s nearest and dearest, and see if you can establish any other link between Berry and Hawksmith, but no other follies, got it? This is tenuous. Don’t start taking the piss.’
‘Yes. Speaking of which,’ Ava said as they approached Overbeck’s car, ‘I did something I shouldn’t have.’
‘That’s unusually exciting of you,’ Overbeck laughed. ‘Come on then, shock me.’ She unlocked her car and slid into the driver’s seat.
‘I asked DS Lively to approach you to extend the funding. He quite rightly refused. He also … well, he accused me of sexism, and I’m afraid he was right. I wanted you to hear it from me rather than him. I’ve apologised.’
Overbeck’s face contorted, her mouth pursed, then she gave a huge guffaw, clutching the steering wheel as she got her laughter under control.
‘Chief Inspector, the only shocking thing about that is that it’s exactly what I’d have done in your shoes. Don’t get your knickers in a twist about it. It may be the first thing you’ve ever done that’s made me respect you, you devious little cow.’
Ava stared at her open-mouthed.
‘And he accused you of sexism, did he? He has been a bit snippy lately. If he were a woman, I’d think he was due his period.’
‘Oh God,’ Ava murmured.
‘Don’t worry about it, Turner. He’ll get over it. It’s me he’s pissed at, not you.’
‘I’m sorry about that,’ Ava said, and she meant it.
It was becoming increasingly obvious that her obnoxious but loyal sergeant had fallen very much in love with the superintendent.
‘He wants me to file for divorce. The problem is that I feel rather sentimental about my husband, blithering idiot that he is. I’m not sure I’m ready to take the next step. Isn’t that what the popular media calls it? Why on earth can’t men be happy with a quick shag? If I had a pound for every string that got attached, I sure as shit wouldn’t be doing this job.’ Overbeck closed her door but lowered the window. ‘And what’s happening on the other murder? That nursing home job.’
‘Most likely a member of staff,’ Ava said, wishing Overbeck would just get going.
‘Fine. Now, be a good girl and don’t upset any other MIT squad members with that nasty sexism of yours.’
She wheel-spun away, cackling at her own hilarity, leaving Ava feeling both relieved and upset. DS Lively was obviously at a low point, which made her attempt to use him all the more unfortunate.