Deadly Code (2 page)

Rhona had known there was something Sean wanted to tell her. It was in his greeting, the choice of wine, the nice meal.

So this was it.

'What do you think?' he said.

The voice was a mixture of woman and girl. Sexy and childlike at the same time. A powerful combination.

Rhona tried not to put a face to the voice. Instead she asked, 'Who is she?'

'Her name's Esther. She came to the club today and asked to audition. We gave her a shot.'

'She's good.' It was an understatement.

'Yeah.' Sean was pleased, as if he were responsible for the wonderful sound.

‘Have you met her before?' Rhona was trying to keep the edge from her voice.

He shook his head. 'She turned up out of the blue. Said she'd stopped performing for a while, but was keen to get back.'

Rhona examined her glass, thinking they had been here before. She knew from the moment they met that Sean liked women. He was honest about it. Monogamy had not been his strong point - until now. Or so he said.

He put his glass down. 'What's wrong?'

'Nothing.'

The sultry voice flowed between them, pushing them apart. Sean stood up and switched it off.

'More wine?'

Rhona shook her head. Sean refilled his own glass.

She got up. Td better pack.'

He caught her arm. 'I hired her to sing, Rhona, not to fuck.'

'I never said that.'

'But you thought it, didn't you?'

His mouth came down hard on hers and she felt the familiar surge of desire. Sometimes she thought of Sean as a drug, his presence bringing waves of pleasure that drowned out everything else.

The window was open. Cool night air rippled over their warm naked bodies. Her shiver was as much from desire as it was from the chill. Sean was good at this. He played her body in a way that no one else could. Sometimes gentle, sometimes so hard she thought she would break and shatter into tiny pieces. Tonight his tongue was a whisper across her skin, every cell vibrating in response. Her blood beat in anticipation.

He slipped his hands beneath and lifted her. The entrance was as smooth as silk, as sweet as honey.

She shuddered on the cusp of orgasm and he retreated.

'Not yet,' he whispered into her hair.

She rose at three o'clock. Sean breathed silently, his head dark against the pillow. As she got up, the thought crossed her mind that during her absence the new singer might fill the place she had just vacated.

Sex was food to Sean. As necessary to life as playing his saxophone. And what about her?

She was no innocent either. An image of Severino MacRae crossed her mind. When they were thrown together during an arson case, the Chief Fire Investigator’s attitude had driven her first to distraction, then into a sexual dance that had been as compelling as the investigation itself.

At times like those, she thought she might break Sean's spell over her by having sex with someone else. It didn't matter what she thought. Her body's response to Sean was something she could not control.

The sitting room was in darkness, the big wooden shutters open to reveal the night sky over Glasgow; the biggest, some would say the friendliest city in Scotland.

But it was also the most violent, with a knife and drugs culture that walked hand in hand. A tally of a hundred drug-related deaths a year wasn't unusual.

The haunted face she had looked into on the Underground suggested the girl could have a place in the next statistics. And she, Rhona, had said nothing, done nothing, even when she imagined in that split second that the girl might jump.

What happened to the words Are you alright? Can I help?

You can't help everyone, Sean had said when she told him the story over dinner. And he was right.

In her job, she couldn't prevent death. She could only help the dead explain how or why they had died.

At first the black words on the white screen danced in front of Rhona's eyes, but gradually she was sucked into the comfort of ideas begun, explored, formulated, proved. This was the time she liked to write: in the dark, the peace, the streets below empty of people. This was the time she thought best. Even as a student she had gone to bed struggling with some scientific problem, only to waken in the middle of the night having solved it mysteriously in her sleep. Two hours later the paper was complete. She checked the acknowledgements. Some of these people would be at the conference. The thought filled her with both pleasure and fear. The perfect mixture. By the time Sean appeared naked at the sitting room door, she was packed and ready to leave.

'Is it that time already?'

'I've called a taxi. It'll be here in a minute.'

'Come here.'

He slipped his hands under her coat and ran them up her spine. His body was bedwarm against hers. She breathed in the smell of his skin.

'You'll phone?' he said.

'Of course.'

They parted at the front door with a kiss, the tip of Sean's tongue a reminder of what had happened between them earlier.

Glasgow was as quiet as the grave.

She watched the empty streets roll past. In the cold light of dawn, nothing seemed to matter. Death or life was inconsequential. Rhona felt herself relax, the taste of guilt at her sense of release from Sean sharp in her mouth.

Two hours and three cups of coffee later, she was still sitting in the airport lounge. Her flight had been delayed initially by twenty minutes, then by an hour.

Rhona took vengeance on her empty polystyrene cup. 'And another thing,' she muttered to herself. 'How many cups of airport coffee can a person swallow before they die of poisoning?'

'I believe four is the maximum.'

'What?'

‘A person can only drink four of those before . . .' The man to her right sliced across his throat with his finger. 'There was an article in last month's Scientific American by someone who travels a lot.'

A smile was beyond Rhona.

'As long as that's the last delay,' she said.

As if on cue, the departure board sprang to life.

'Did that just change to 10.30?' Rhona looked at her neighbour in despair. He nodded equally despairingly.

'God,' she said. 'I'd be quicker swimming.'

'The Atlantic, perhaps, but then there is the great American land mass to cross before you reach California.' He paused. 'Of course, you could go in the other direction but that would involve travelling to Edinburgh first. And I gather people from Glasgow are not keen on Edinburgh?'

He had succeeded. She smiled. He held out his hand. He introduced himself. 'Andre Frith.'

'Dr Andre Frith? The University of California?'

He nodded. 'I recognised you from your picture.' He waved the pre-conference blurb. 'I came over to propose we have a coffee together.' He looked at the crushed coffee cup. 'But maybe not.'

'What about something to eat instead?' Rhona suggested.

Chapter 2

Spike was out the door before the girl serving knew he had ever been in. Two boys waiting for hot pies saw him pocket the packet of potato scones from the counter but said nothing.

Spike didn't run. Outside the baker's, the street was busy with school kids eating fast food and dropping the papers at their feet. Spike joined them for a bit, then strolled across the road. No point in being about when the bell went for the end of lunchtime. Folk might wonder why he wasn't back in school with the rest of them. He resisted the warm smell of potato coming from his pocket even though he was hungry. He had plans for the tattie scones.

When he reached the tenement block, he walked straight past the front entrance and nipped in through the back railings in case the woman on the first floor spotted him. He ducked under half-a-dozen grey nappies flapping on a line. Nothing there worth nicking.

When he reached the third floor, he heard the peevish whine of the baby. He didn't like hearing it cry. It reminded him of his wee brother Calum. Next door was flapping open, caught in the stair's sucking breeze. The baby's whine was louder now. 'Christ. Pick it up. Pick the kid up.'

He ignored the bad smell that drifted out the neighbours' door and turned the key in his own. He was halfway in when the baby emitted a high-pitched cry. It was no use. He would have to make sure it was alright. He almost gagged at the smell of stale piss as he made his way to the living room. The baby had stopped whining now and was weeping, a lost sound that expected no answer. Spike pushed open the living room door. It ground its way over broken glass.

He looked about angrily. Where the fuck was she this time? She was on the settee, junked out of her mind. And beside her, head slumped back, mouth hanging open, was the kid's father. Spike swept the baby up from the floor and took it to the bathroom.

He ran the dirty wee hand under the tap and dried it on his shirt. The cut was only a nick, and couldn't have hurt much - it had probably been more shock than pain that had brought on the crying. Spike brushed at the knees of his dirty trousers, sending fragments of glass down the toilet pan.

'Okay. Now what do we do?' he asked his patient.

Some snot escaped the child's nose, ran down his face and met the remains of a tear. Spike pulled a bit of toilet paper off the roll and wiped the mess away.

'Come on,' he said. 'We're leaving.'

He was sharing his dinner with his new best friend when he heard the front door open. He had fried the tattie scones and heated some beans. The baby was sitting surrounded by cushions, wee hands waving in the air in anticipation of the next mashed spoonful. Spike shovelled another one in and handed it a mug of milk. He looked up as Esther came into the kitchen.

'We've got a visitor,' he said.

'So I see.'

She tried to smile, but he knew by the shadows round her eyes.

'It's bad, isn't it?' he said.

'No!'

He jumped at the sharpness of her tone and she looked sorry.

'It's okay. Honestly. It was bad in the Underground but it's quieter now.'

'I made some food,' he said. 'Yours is in the grill.'

They were drinking mugs of tea when the baby's mother banged on the door.

'Did you take the wean?'

'What do you care?'

'Fucking wee smart arse.'

She pushed past Spike and pulled the child up by his arm. He let out a squeal of rage as the biscuit he was eating flew to the floor.

'Don't feed my wean. I've told you before.'

'You feed it then.'

She kicked the door as she went out.

Esther was pale and frightened.

'They were both out of their minds on the settee,' he explained. 'The place smelt like a pisshole.'

Esther looked worried. 'She'll tell the social about you. She knows you're a runaway.'

'Then we'll move,' he said. 'I'm fed up listening to them shagging anyway.'

'Spike.'

'What?'

He could feel his face shift into worry.

'You might not be able to stay here any more.'

'You want me out?'

'No.' She shook her head. 'It's just... if the singing doesn't work out... there won't be any money.'

'There's none now.'

He fetched the pot and poured more tea. He felt sixteen going on sixty.

Esther took the mug and nursed it, her mind somewhere else.

Spike wondered about going to a doctor, asking about the voices. When he'd tried to persuade Esther to make an appointment, she'd looked so frightened. He couldn't bear it when she looked at him like that.

'Spike?' She smiled. 'Thanks.'

'What for?'

She leaned forward and touched his head with her lips. 'For everything.' She got up. 'I'd better get ready. Don't want to be late.'

'I'll walk you down.'

She looked as if she might argue, then thought better of it. While she got ready he cleared the dishes and washed up. In his whole life, this was the first place he had been happy. Esther made him happy.

'Right. How do I look?'

She'd changed and put up her hair, revealing the heart-shaped mole. Her eyes were black-rimmed, lashes thick with mascara. She stretched her red mouth into a smile. 'For the punters, right?'

He prayed that the voices would leave her alone for tonight. 'Right,' he said. 'Let's go.'

He liked walking with her. In the dark she could be his girlfriend. In the dark he wasn't sixteen. She put her arm through his. The streets were filling up with punters, blokes set on a night out.

They passed the Fantasy Bar. Four guys got out of a taxi and hung about the steps before they went in. Spike hated them, hated the way they were men before they were human.

'Hey, I'm not there yet,' she said, tugging him on.

The jazz club was busy, a trail of people edging its way in the door.

'I'll see you later,' she said and squeezed his arm.

'I could come in.'

The doorman gave him a look that suggested otherwise.

'I'll be back for you.'

Esther nodded, trying to hide her nervousness.

After she disappeared Spike stood for a while, ignoring the doorman's bugger-off look.

He tried to imagine Esther on stage, the red lips trembling with sound. He thought about looking for a back entrance, finding a way in, hiding, watching her sing.

The doorman had had enough.

'Get lost, son.'

Spike gave him the finger and walked on.