Driving through the wide gates to the Stirling University campus, Connor felt as though he was passing through a portal into a world of what-ifs. The uni had been on his shortlist of places to study when he was leaving school, and he knew it was his mother’s preferred option. A way to give him freedom but keep him close, with home in striking distance if he ever wanted or needed it.
Not that the prospect was a remote possibility. He’d wanted to get away from Stirling, the weight of his dad’s expectation, but driving past the wide, glittering expanse of Airthrey Loch, the university buildings looking like a child’s block toys beneath the granite monolith of the Wallace Monument, he found himself wondering: what if he had chosen to study here? What if he’d never moved to Belfast and seen the arrest that had caused him to join the police? What if he’d never met Karen, or Jonny Hughes? He would have been happy here, he knew. The campus appealed to him, and the international make-up of the student body would have made it easy for him to blend in, be another face in the crowd. He could even have pushed himself, used the facilities here to build his body. As the official ‘university of sporting excellence’, the approach would have been more scientific than throwing weights around at his granddad’s garage.
What if, Connor, what if?
He found a space in the small car park on the hill just before the hotel, separated from the entrance by a neatly trimmed hedge. A couple of uniforms drifted by, heading back down the hill to the campus. Made sense. The police would want to reassure the students, and the tutors, that they were on hand, and that what had happened was an aberration, rather than the new normal. He grunted a laugh at the thought. As if anything about this was normal.
He locked the car, took a slow look around, then made for the hotel.
The entrance was standard – automatic glass double doors parted with an airy rattle, revealing a tiled reception area with a couple of couches and coffee-tables. The far wall was dominated by a dark-wood reception desk, behind which a woman stood, phone held in the crook of her neck as she pecked away at the keyboard in front of her. She looked up when the doors opened, gave Connor a nervous smile of welcome, then focused back on the task at hand. The tinny Muzak was doing nothing to improve the oppressive atmosphere. He’d felt it before, at crime scenes and at venues when someone had tried to get too close to a client he was escorting. The dissipated energy of fatal violence clung to a place, making everyone wary that it could be reignited with the wrong word or thought.
He spotted Ford in the bar area to the right of the desk, talking to a tall, dark-haired woman who had her back turned to him. He saw the policeman stiffen when he caught sight of him, take a step around the woman, blocking her from his view. Ford leant in close, kissed her cheek, then stepped forward, putting himself directly in Connor’s path and walking straight for him.
So, Connor thought, he was avoiding the cop cliché of being unhappily married. He’d spotted the wedding ring on Ford’s finger when they had first met but made no judgement – many widowers and reluctant divorcés found it difficult to part with their ring, as though taking it off would confirm the truth, make it real. But this was proof. He was married – or having an affair.
Connor pushed the thought aside as Ford stopped in front of him, taking the hand the policeman extended and shaking. ‘Fraser, thanks for coming,’ Ford said, his gaze set, as though he was willing Connor to focus on him and not the woman over his shoulder.
‘Not a problem. Though I must admit your call has me curious. You mentioned the Red Hand Defenders . . .’
Ford glanced over his shoulder. Whoever that had been, he didn’t want her touched by any of this. Connor couldn’t argue with that. He wished none of it had touched him either.
‘Let’s go for a walk,’ Ford said.
Connor followed him out, nodding to the receptionist, getting another smile in return. They took a right, skirted the front of the building, following the path until they were faced with a road that led to a large car park.
Ford turned, looking back at the hotel. On the side of it, clamped to the wall, was a fire-escape staircase. At the bottom, police tape fluttered in the breeze, a uniformed officer trying not to look bored.
‘That’s where they found Helen Russell,’ Ford said.
Connor felt cold sweat prickle on his back as he remembered the pictures he had seen, the book lying among the debris. ‘What’s this got to do with the Red Hand, Detective Ford?’
Ford shook his head, a look Connor recognized all too well on his face. Later, it said. We’ll get to that later. ‘You have any dealings with them in Belfast?’ he asked.
‘Not really.’ He looked past Ford, back to the staircase, his mind flipping over the name as though it was an interesting shell he had found on the beach. The Defenders was a Loyalist group that had sprung out of discontent with moves towards peace after decades of bombing, shooting and other violence in Northern Ireland. They claimed responsibility for pipe bombings of Catholic families, and in 1999, they had killed Rosemary Nelson, a lawyer who represented Republican paramilitaries. There were rumours the Defenders were merely a cover for the UDA and other Loyalist groups, allowing them to keep up the violence and intimidation while claiming to honour the ceasefire, but Connor had never been involved in those cases. Or had he? Jonny Hughes dealt for the UDA. Was that a link? Anyway, why was Ford asking?
Ford seemed to read the question on Connor’s face. ‘What I’m about to tell you is confidential. Only reason I’m telling you is that the moment Special Branch found out, the shutters came crashing down. I’m officially off the case, but you might be a way back in.’
Connor straightened. ‘I’ll talk to you off the record, that was made clear to your boss, but, as I told you, I don’t want to make a formal statement unless I absolutely have to. I’m done with Belfast and all that shite. Last thing I want is to drag it all up here.’
‘Okay. For now,’ Ford said. ‘But we both agree that if we find something that could affect the case, you go on the record and I take it in. I want this bastard, Fraser, so does my boss, but I can’t let you go cowboying around and jeopardizing any leads we’re working on.’
Connor pushed down the memory of Jonny Hughes lunging at him, baseball bat held aloft like a club. He wanted answers, needed them, but at what cost? That a killer might walk free on a technicality because he was too afraid or ashamed of what he had done?
No. Fuck that. ‘Deal,’ he said. ‘So tell me what you know. And what did you mean about Helen Russell trying to get rid of a tattoo?’