18

Jason awoke to the sound of his phone. He scrabbled for it, almost falling on the floor, remembering as he grabbed it that he was on the sofa. Not because Eilidh had banished him, but because he couldn’t sleep and didn’t want her to suffer the same fate. He registered Ronan’s name and stabbed the phone with his finger then jammed it to his ear. ‘What’s the news?’ he demanded before his brother could speak.

‘It’s not good,’ Ronan said. ‘They let me talk to her for a wee minute on the phone but she could hardly say my name. She’s still on the oxygen but they say she’s not responding as well as they’d like.’

‘So what does that even mean? She’s responding a bit? She’s not getting any better?’ He squinched around and sat up, staring at the room without seeing anything. ‘How can they not talk plain English? Like, on a scale of one to ten, how bad is it?

‘They never tell you anything. That way you cannae kick off if it all goes to shit. All I know is she didn’t sound like herself.’

‘It’s driving me mad, being stuck here and not able to see her.’

‘I don’t know, I think it’s worse, being this close but still not able to sit with her and hold her hand.’ He took a ragged breath. ‘Jase, they’re talking about maybe putting her on a ventilator if she doesn’t start to improve.’

Jason felt a cold hand gripping his chest. He’d seen people on ventilators after road traffic accidents. They couldn’t speak. Sometimes they weren’t fully sedated and their eyes rolled like frightened horses’. The thought of his mother that scared made him want to cry. ‘They know what they’re doing,’ he said, as much to convince himself as Ronan.

‘But do they? Do they really? This is a new disease, it’s not like having a heart attack or pneumonia, where they know what works and what disnae. They’re just guessing, the same as the rest of us with our stupid masks and hand sanitisers. We don’t know how to beat this thing.’

‘They’re doing their best, Ro.’

‘Aye, but it’s not their mum lying there all on her lonesome struggling to get a breath. You can bet your next fish supper that the First Minister wouldn’t be so calm at the bloody podium every day if it was her mum in the hospital.’

‘That’s not the point. Nicola would be climbing the walls same as us if she was in our shoes.’

‘They’d be working a bloody sight harder to find a cure,’ Ronan said. Jason heard the sound of something being slammed. A hand on a wall or a table, experience told him.

‘You’re wrong, Ronan. We’re all in this together. Even Boris bloody Johnson. Look, there’s nothing we can do for her except not go off the rails. If I hear anything, I’ll call you. You do the same, aye?’

‘Sure.’ He sighed. ‘Stay safe, bruv, I cannae be doing with two of you in the hospital, eh?’ The line went dead. Jason buried his head in his hands again. Maybe it was time to go back to Gayfield Square and pretend everything was normal.

Daisy had decided it was time to talk to Lara Hardie’s flatmates. Belle Kenzie and Paloma Duncan had both been interviewed at the time of their friend’s disappearance but neither had been able to shed any light on it. According to the notes, neither had seen her over the weekend before she vanished; they’d gone down to Newcastle to a gig. ‘Lara wasn’t into the band,’ Paloma had said. ‘She was more into indie stuff. You know, whiny white boys with guitars.’

Beyond asking the obvious questions about boyfriends and anyone Lara might have had a problem with, in person or online, the investigating officers hadn’t explored more deeply. Daisy couldn’t blame them. There was nothing else to go on. Nothing suspicious about a clutch of books on a shelf by the same author.

But now there was a new thread to pull on.

Daisy had tracked down Paloma and Belle on Facebook. Like almost everybody else in lockdown, they were desperate for distraction. She’d arranged a Zoom call with Paloma while Karen was off questioning Rosalind Harris. The digital comms system did nobody any favours, but Daisy could tell Paloma was what she’d call pretty rather than beautiful, but that she was determined to make the most of herself. Even at ten in the morning, she was in full make-up, lips pouting at the screen. It wasn’t a look that charmed Daisy, but then it wasn’t aimed at her.

‘Thanks for talking to me, Paloma.’

A flash of bleached teeth. ‘It’s good to see another face. This lockdown is doing my head in. But Lara was my pal, I’d do anything to help you find out what happened to her.’ Pure Glasgow, with some of the rough edges smoothed off.

‘And we’re doing all we can to do just that. Do you mind if I record this conversation?’ A shake of the head. ‘I’ve seen the interview you did with my colleagues at the time of Lara’s disappearance. I don’t want to go over old ground, but is there anything, no matter how insignificant, that you’ve remembered since then?’

Paloma shook her head, disappointed. ‘I’ve racked my brains, but nothing’s occurred to me.’

‘No worries. Now, you were doing the same English course as Lara, right?’

‘Yeah, we were doing the Romantic poets that term.’ She sniffed. ‘Not that they were that romantic. Too much “half in love with easeful death” if you ask me. Lara thought Keats was cool, though.’

‘Did Lara have any other favourite writers? I mean, ones that are still alive?’

‘Oh yeah, loads. She loved crime fiction, she always said it was her dirty secret. I don’t know why, because she never made any secret of it, and I wouldn’t describe the crime novels I’ve read as dirty, but there you go.’

Hallelujah. Daisy hoped her excitement was well hidden as she asked, ‘Were there any in particular she really liked?’

‘She liked all that Tartan Noir stuff. Denise Mina, Ian Rankin, Chris Brookmyre, Jake Stein and that cute guy who writes about a bunch of women private eyes and undertakers. Weird shit.’

‘Doug Johnstone,’ Daisy said automatically.

‘Yeah, she went to see him at Portobello Books when his last book came out. I don’t get that – going to see writers doing their dog and pony show.’

Daisy didn’t dare let herself hope that she’d uncovered a definite link between Lara and Jake Stein. But she was going to test it, nevertheless. ‘Did she do that a lot? Go to book events?’

Paloma frowned in thought. ‘Well, it’s not quite that straightforward. We’re students, we don’t have, like, loads of money. So she’d check out events she could go to for free. Libraries are good for that. But if it was somebody she really rated, like Doug what’s-his-name, she’d put her hand in her pocket. She really wanted to be a writer herself. It was like she thought if she went to enough events, she’d find the magic spell she could use to transform herself into a bestseller.’ She scoffed. ‘We all read too much Harry bloody Potter when we were kids. We really believed there were magic spells that would change the world.’

‘I know what you mean,’ Daisy said. ‘It’s not magic, though, is it? It’s hard work.’

Paloma giggled. ‘It’s focus, not hocus pocus, that’s what my dad always says.’

‘He’s not wrong, your dad. So, can you remember anybody else she went to see in the weeks before she died?’

Paloma gazed upwards at the ceiling. ‘She went to see Denise Mina at the university. Lara thought she was the big kahuna. She used to retweet every single thing she said on Twitter. And she did a workshop with Ross McEwen.’

Daisy let the pause last. Then, ‘Anybody else?’

Paloma’s face lit up. ‘Of course. She was going to see Jake Stein. I think it was around the time she disappeared. She’d seen him before, she was dead excited about seeing him again.’ She sniffed disdainfully. ‘I mean, why would you want to see somebody with his attitude to women? Did you see those stories about him and that woman he exposed in his book? But Lara said it had probably been exaggerated.’ She shook her head, exasperated. ‘I mean, it’s weird. Lara had a real sense of self-respect, but if you wrote a book she loved, she’d forgive you anything, up to and including eating babies.’

Time to be cautious now. ‘Had she ever met Jake Stein?’

Paloma scoffed. ‘He’d signed a couple of books for her. Mind you, if he had chatted her up, she’d probably not have dared tell me and Belle. We’d have been all, “WTF?” ’

‘Did she have a friend that she went to see authors with?’ Daisy was desperate not to let this peter out without more to work on.

Paloma shook her head. ‘Not that she ever mentioned. And I think she would have, it’s not like we’d have been jealous or anything. It was just, like, her weird little quirk. We’ve all got something lame in our lives, right?’

Daisy smiled. ‘We do, Paloma. We do. You say Lara wanted to be a writer – did she ever go on one of those residential courses?’

Paloma shrugged. ‘If she did, she never said. But maybe in the vacation? We all do our own thing then, mostly.’

‘You said earlier that Lara had different tastes in music. Did she have mates that she went to gigs with?’

‘She used to go with her cousin Liam. But he went off at the start of the academic year to do a Masters in Vancouver. So she just went on her own. It’s not exactly an edgy scene.’

It felt as if they were running out of momentum. Daisy could always come back for more if she needed to. Besides, she was due to call Belle Kenzie in ten minutes. She wrapped up the call then punched the air. ‘Cooking with gas, Daisy,’ she muttered.

Twenty-six miles away on the other side of the Firth of Forth, Ronan Murray was in the grip of a ragbag of emotions. Fear at what might happen to his mother, rage at the failure of the medical profession to perform miracles, frustration at the refusal of his useless brother to exploit his position to get inside the COVID ward, and self-loathing for not being able to fix any of it.

The nearest he could get to his mother was to be in her house. He felt her presence here in a way he never did in his poky wee flat in Templehall, even though she was no stranger to it, regularly rocking up with a couple of frozen pizzas, a bag full of cleaning materials and clean sheets. She’d strip his bed, stuff the rancid sheets in a bin bag to take home then stand over him while he put on the fresh bedding. She’d go through the place like a tornado, then the pair of them would sit down to watch EastEnders with their pizzas. What if that never happened again? He knew he could take care of himself, he just stood back and let her do it because she loved to feel her boys needed her.

He made a brew. Two teaspoonfuls of Gold Blend, two teaspoonfuls of sugar, a slug of milk. It was only when he raised the mug to his lips that he realised the milk had turned. Reflexively, he threw it in the sink, but it splashed back, covering his white polo shirt in a scum of brown and cream. ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ Ronan yelled, hauling his top off and wiping his chest clean. He threw it in the washing machine and, still swearing, went through to his brother’s old room. The wardrobe still held some of his clothes. There would be something there to fit him.

When he opened the wardrobe, he saw much more than he’d bargained for.

Belle Kenzie’s long hair was the colour of marmalade, brushed to a shine. She had greenish eyes and a small mouth that made Daisy think of a self-satisfied ginger cat. But she was as eager to help as Paloma had been.

‘Every now and then, we just sit with a bottle of wine and go through all we know about Lara. And we come up blank.’ Her accent was posh North of England. Private school, Daisy reckoned.

She nodded. ‘I know how frustrating that is, but I’ve just been talking to Paloma, and she told me Lara loved going to listen to authors talking about their books.’

Belle looked startled. ‘What? You think that’s got something to do with her disappearing? Have you ever been to a book event? They’re about as dodgy as . . . as . . . as one of my granny’s coffee mornings. And people hang around for ages afterwards, gossiping and wittering on. You’d never manage to abduct anyone there!’

‘But maybe she met someone there who invited her for coffee, or a drink?’

Belle pondered. ‘That’s just not Lara,’ she finally said. ‘She wasn’t into casual hook-ups. When we went out on the town together, we were like the three musketeers, we looked out for each other. We never went back with guys on a first encounter, we always made them meet up for coffee or dinner or something afterwards. Some people think we’re freaks, but we’re just careful.’ She paused. ‘We’re not sanctimonious old fannies,’ she added. ‘We enjoy clubbing and tequila shots the same as anybody else. But we respect ourselves too much to take stupid risks. That’s why it’s so baffling, whatever happened to Lara.’

‘What about those book readings? Did Lara go to them by herself?’

‘Oh yeah. Sure, she did that. But that’s not like going to a bar or a club or a gig on your own, is it? I mean, your mother never warned you against readers, did she?’

Maybe she should have . . . ‘I take your point. But I’ve heard of authors having stalkers. Maybe somebody started stalking Lara at a book event?’

Belle looked doubtful. ‘She never said anything about a stalker. And trust me, Sergeant, young women of my generation know all about stalker behaviour online and in the flesh.’

That ‘my generation’ stung. Daisy wasn’t even thirty yet. Time for a different tack.

‘Paloma told me Lara had ambitions to be a writer herself. Do you know whether she ever asked any of her heroes for advice?’

‘I don’t think she had the nerve. She did talk about maybe doing a workshop, but I talked her out of it.’

‘Why would you do that?’

‘It’s just a scam for making money, isn’t it? All that creative writing stuff. Everybody knows that you can’t learn to be a writer.’

‘I think the jury’s out on that one,’ Daisy said. ‘A lot of very successful writers have done creative writing degrees or gone on courses to improve their work.’

‘And a lot of them haven’t,’ Belle said mutinously.

‘You might as well say art school or music college or theatre schools are all scams. You can always improve your craft.’ Daisy kept her tone mild. She didn’t want to alienate Belle even though she was talking a modicum of bollocks.

‘Anyway, Lara took my advice.’

Oh no, she didn’t . . .

‘It’s not that I didn’t want to help her. I totally did. That’s why she asked me to read what she was working on.’

Daisy’s interest quickened. Lara’s laptop had vanished along with her. Nobody knew what she’d been writing at the time of her death. ‘What was it? Have you still got it?’

‘She’d started writing a psychological suspense novel. You know, where somebody has a terrible secret in their past, only it turns out to be a completely different secret? She sent me the first hundred pages.’

‘A hundred pages? That’s quite a commitment. Have you still got it?’

‘I think so. I might have cleared it out of my downloads, but I’ll still have the email with the attachment. Why?’

‘I’d like to take a look at it.’

‘I get that, but why?’

‘Because I’m interested in what she was working on.’

‘You think there might be a clue?’

Daisy tried not to let her frustration show. ‘Not really. But my boss is a stickler for crossing every t and dotting every i, and I’ve learned not to leave any stone unturned. Mostly it’s a waste of time, but sometimes it isn’t.’

‘Oh. OK. I know what you mean. My dad’s like that. God forbid you come home with half a tale.’ Then suddenly, her face crumpled. ‘I’ll get that over to you soon as I can. Thanks for taking this so seriously, Sergeant. We loved Lara. Losing her has left a big hole in our lives. Not knowing what happened to her, that’s the worst of it. At least if we had the answer to that, we could find a way to come to terms with it.’

Somehow, Daisy doubted that. Whatever the answer, one question would rub away at their hearts forever – how could we have saved our friend? Daisy wouldn’t have swapped places with them for all the tequila shots in all the student bars in the country.