Donor (22 page)

Dunbar knew what Ross earned. His salary was listed in the Sci-Med files. It certainly wasn’t enough to facilitate private research. On the other hand, Ross did have consultancy work in Geneva. Sci-Med hadn’t given details, merely noting that he had it. Was this because they didn’t know any more? He’d ask them when they finally got back to him about his earlier request. Why were they taking so long?

Ingrid went to lunch. Dunbar said he’d go later, in keeping with his policy of keeping his relationship with Ingrid on a strictly business footing. He still wasn’t sure about her. The possibility that she had been assigned to keep an eye on him was always in his mind, so the safest course of action was to keep her at arm’s length. While she was away, he pulled out her file.

Ingrid Landes was a fully qualified nurse, he discovered. Besides that she was a graduate in nursing studies from the University of Edinburgh. She had worked in several private clinics before joining Médic Ecosse on the administrative staff. Her last nursing position had been at the St Pierre Clinic in Geneva.

Well, well, well, thought Dunbar. It’s a small world. Had Ross been responsible for bringing Ingrid to Médic Ecosse?

His mobile phone rang and broke his train of thought. Thinking it must be Sci-Med with news about the exhumation, Dunbar snatched up the handset.

‘Steven? I’m sorry to bother you,’ said Lisa’s voice, ‘but I thought I’d better tell you where I am in case you tried my number and started to worry when there was no reply.’

‘What’s wrong? Has something happened?’ asked Dunbar.

‘It’s Mum. She took ill during the night. The doctor thinks it’s pneumonia. They’re taking her into the Western Infirmary. I’m going with her.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Dunbar. ‘Actually I was going to call you,’ he began uneasily.

‘Oh yes?’

‘It’s about Amy …’

‘What about her?’

‘I’ve requested her exhumation. I didn’t tell you sooner because I wasn’t sure how you’d take it.’

There was a long pause.

‘Are you still there?’

‘Yes,’ said Lisa. ‘It just took me by surprise. It shouldn’t have. I suppose it was the obvious thing to do.’

‘There’s no other way of finding out,’ said Dunbar gently.

‘I suppose not,’ said Lisa distantly. ‘Her poor parents. After all they’ve been through … They’re going to blame me for this.’

‘Why?’

Lisa broke off. ‘I’ll have to go,’ she said. ‘They’re waiting for me. I’ll talk to you later.’

‘Lisa—’ Dunbar heard the phone go dead. ‘Damn,’ he muttered. He sat for a few minutes, then decided to drive over to the Western Infirmary.

He parked in a side street at least a quarter of a mile away from the entrance, thinking that this would be easier than trying to find a parking space any nearer. If he tried, he’d probably fail and spend the next ten minutes kerb-crawling around adjacent streets before ending up where he already was. He walked briskly up to the hospital and followed the signs to the medical admissions ward. He found Lisa sitting on the edge of a plastic chair in the corridor outside, knees clamped together with her clasped hands caught between them. She was staring at the floor as if deeply unhappy.

‘Lisa?’

Lisa looked up and he could see that her eyes were red.

‘What are you doing here?’ she asked, although she did not seem disappointed.

‘You’re upset. I thought I might run you home.’

She smiled wanly. ‘A kind thought.’

‘So what’s upsetting you most? Your mother or Amy.’

‘Both I suppose, in their own ways.’

A plump nurse with flat feet in the ‘ten to two’ position, and holding a clipboard in one hand and a pencil in the other, appeared in the doorway. She asked, ‘Miss Fairfax?’

Lisa stepped forward. ‘Yes?’

‘Dr Campbell will see you now.’ Lisa turned to Dunbar.

‘Go ahead. I’ll wait here,’ said Dunbar.

Lisa was gone for about five minutes. When she returned Dunbar stood up. ‘What’s the news?’

‘She’s tucked up in bed. They’ve started her on a course of antibiotics. That’s about it for the moment.’

As they sat at traffic lights on the way back to Lisa’s flat, Dunbar said quietly. ‘I got the lab report on the isotope from Sheila Barnes’s house. There’s nothing to link it to Médic Ecosse.’

‘You’re kidding!’ exclaimed Lisa. ‘But it must have been them. Who else would have wanted to harm her?’

‘My feelings too,’ agreed Dunbar. ‘But the lab says it was an industrial isotope not used by anyone in Scotland as far as they know.’

‘So they covered their tracks,’ said Lisa.

‘Looks like it.’

They started moving again. Dunbar asked, ‘What did you mean when you said that Amy’s parents would blame you?’

Lisa sighed at a painful recollection. She said, ‘At the time of Amy’s death, Médic Ecosse managed to convince her parents that I was some kind of unbalanced trouble-maker because of what I was saying. I suppose to them that’s exactly what I must have seemed. I intruded on their grief, and it wasn’t a nice feeling, I assure you.’

‘I can imagine,’ said Dunbar. ‘But you did what you thought was right. That’s not always easy.’

‘And here I am about to do it all over again,’ said Lisa, her voice heavy with doubt.

‘It’s out of your hands, Lisa.’

‘Mmm,’ she said, unconvinced.

They had arrived at Lisa’s place. In the middle of the day there was plenty of room to park. Dunbar drew up outside the entrance to the block.

‘Will you come up for a minute?’

He nodded and got out.

‘Coffee?’ asked Lisa as they entered the flat.

‘I’ll make it. You go bathe your eyes,’ said Dunbar.

The comment made her self-conscious. Her hand flew to her face. ‘Oh God, I must look a sight. I didn’t think.’

She went off to the bathroom and Dunbar put the kettle on. While it boiled, he looked out of the window.

Lisa returned some minutes later, smoothing her hair and smelling of perfume. She’d put on light make-up. ‘That’s better,’ she said with a smile. ‘I feel human again.’

Dunbar smiled too, and responded to her attempts at small-talk as she tried to get back on an even keel. When she fell silent he turned to look at her and saw that her eyes were closed.

‘Are you all right?’ he asked gently.

‘There was something I didn’t tell you,’ she said.

‘What?’ Dunbar took her in his arms as the tears started to flow.

‘I went to Amy’s funeral … just to say good-bye to her properly. I tried to keep in the background but her mother saw me there … No one ever looked at me the way she did … There was such hatred in her eyes.’

‘You mustn’t dwell on it,’ soothed Dunbar. ‘She must have been confused and very upset at the time. You said what you believed to be true; that was the right thing to do and when we come up with the evidence of what really happened to Amy, you’ll be completely vindicated.’ He relaxed his hold a little and Lisa looked up at him.

‘Thank you,’ she said.

‘For what?’

‘For being here.’

‘Sssh.’

Lisa’s face was very close to Dunbar’s. He looked down into her soft dark eyes and found himself realizing just how much she had got under his skin in the past few days. Images of her had been subtly invading his mind. He saw her lips quiver and part slightly as she sensed his arousal. She didn’t draw back. He brushed an unruly tendril of hair from her face and tucked it gently behind her ear, his fingers tracing on down the curve of her cheek to tilt her face upwards. He brushed a kiss across her lips, still a little uncertain.

Lisa sensed his hesitation and reached up to tangle her fingers in his hair and draw his lips back down to hers. Their kiss, soft at first, deepened as each felt the other respond.

Any reservations Dunbar might have had about Lisa’s vulnerability ceased to matter. He was aware only of the closeness of her body and the little darting movements of her tongue inside his mouth. His hands slid down her back and over the neat curve of her buttocks to pull her into him until their hips and thighs met and she could feel him harden.

She drew back slightly. She drew in a ragged breath. ‘Come,’ she said, leading him by the hand through to the bedroom.

‘You’re sure?’ breathed Dunbar as he took hold of her again.

‘Very sure,’ replied Lisa, slipping her hands round his waist and easing his shirt free of his trousers. Pushing the fabric from his body, she smoothed her palms across the contours of his chest. Her eyes never left his as she moved her hands down to undo his belt and free him from his trousers.

Mimicking her actions, Dunbar pulled her blouse from the band of her skirt, slipped his hand underneath and ran it across the smooth plane of her stomach. He reached round to unhook her bra before capturing her breasts in his hands, making her groan with pleasure as he sought her nipples. She tilted her head back to expose her neck to his lips and allowed him to lay her down on the bed.

Dunbar trailed a line of kisses down her throat, opening her blouse in front of each kiss. His mouth encircled each nipple in turn, sucking and teasing, while his hand sought the bare skin of her thighs to peel off her panties. He straddled her and held himself poised above her to kiss her long and slow before easing into her and glorying in the depth of her arousal as she lifted her hips and took him in.

Lisa moaned and he shifted slightly to bring his hand between them, touching her softly and skilfully, capturing her cries with his mouth as he drove into her again and again until a shudder went through him and her body convulsed around him.

Passion spent, they relaxed together in a contented tangle. Dunbar was the first to move. He rolled over, kissed Lisa lightly on the forehead and cradled her in his arms.

‘God, it’s been such a long time,’ she murmured. ‘I hadn’t realized.’

‘There’s no one special?’

‘I was engaged for a while until he realized that Mother was going to be part of the deal. He disappeared like snow in July. It’s been over two years now. And you? I suppose this is where you tell me there’s a Mrs Dunbar and the twins will be three on Sunday?’

Dunbar smiled. ‘No Mrs Dunbar,’ he said. He had his arm round her and was gently stroking her forehead.

‘You know, that’s what I miss most,’ said Lisa.

‘What?’

‘Being touched. It’s so nice just to be touched like that. With affection. Sex can be great but feeling someone touch your arm or run their fingers through your hair, or even just pat your bum because they feel nice things for you, that’s really good. Does that sound daft?’

Dunbar kissed her hair softly. ‘No.’

There was a distant bleeping sound.

‘What’s that?’ she asked.

‘My phone,’ replied Dunbar, feeling silly.

‘You didn’t switch it off?’

‘I didn’t think,’ said Dunbar. ‘I didn’t imagine I’d …’

‘You’d better answer it.’

Dunbar got up and went in search of his phone. He took the call in the living room. He returned a few moments later and said, ‘It was Sci-Med. They’ve agreed to the exhumation.’

TWELVE

On the day of the exhumation, Dunbar was on tenterhooks. Sci-Med had enlisted the aid of Special Branch in carrying out an unofficial disinterment of the body, rather than taking the gamble of going to the courts for a high-profile official order, with all the subsequent upset that might cause. Dunbar was happy with that but was well aware that covert operations carried risks of their own should anything go wrong. One person in the wrong place at the wrong time and the fall-out could be spectacular.

Amy’s parents were out of the country on holiday – her mother was still suffering from depression some five months after Amy’s death and her father had thought some winter sunshine might help her. They had been in Tenerife for the last three days and would be away for another ten. It was this fact that had swung Sci-Med in favour of a secret operation. If everything went smoothly, Amy’s parents need never know anything about it.

The plan was to exhume Amy in the early hours of the morning, take her to a Glasgow mortuary and have a Scottish Office pathologist, appointed by Neil Bannon, carry out an autopsy under special instructions. When he was finished, he would phone his report to Dunbar. Amy would be returned to her grave before the day was over.

Everything was out of Dunbar’s hands now, but he still felt like an athlete pacing the area behind the start-line before a big race. The phone rang and he snatched it from its rest.

‘Yes?’

‘Steven, it’s Lisa. Any news?’

‘Nothing yet. They seem to be taking a hell of a time.’

‘I’ll get off the line in case they’re trying to get through.’

‘I’ll call you as soon as I hear.’

Dunbar went back to fidgeting and pacing the room. He began to wonder if there had been a breakdown in communications. Tension could make you imagine all sorts of things, especially when your perceived timescale of things was being stretched. Perhaps the result of the PM had been given directly to Sci-Med in London, the police had already been informed and they would arrive at the hospital at any moment, everyone having forgotten to tell the man on the ground what was going on. He was nursing this paranoia when the phone rang again.

‘Dr Dunbar, please.’

‘Speaking.’

‘Your authorization code, please.’

Dunbar gave it.

‘Sorry for the melodrama, but I was told to go exactly by the book on this one.’

‘That’s OK.’

‘My name’s McVay. I’ve been instructed by the Scottish Office to carry out a post-mortem on the exhumed body of one Amy Teasdale at the behest of the Sci-Med Inspectorate.’

‘Yes. I’ve been waiting for your call.’

‘Sorry it took so long, but there was a fair bit of lab work to do on this one.’

‘I understand. What did you find?’

‘Well, no one provided me with too much background on the case. They didn’t think to tell me that the child had already undergone extensive PM examination.’

‘I suppose that’s entirely possible,’ said Dunbar. ‘She died after a kidney transplant went wrong. A PM would probably be necessary in the circumstances.’