The Necessary Death of Lewis Winter (Glasgow Trilogy) (12 page)

Zara is upstairs. She opens her bedroom door and reaches for the light. She knows she’s going to see something horrible. She knows she has to brace herself. She’s seen terrible
things before. You don’t spend this much time in this business and not see a few things. She saw Nate beat a man half to death once. In an alleyway. When Nate was finished, the man’s
face didn’t look human at all. His head hadn’t even seemed the right shape. That guy had survived, though. Somehow. She knows she’s going to see Lewis dead. She knows it might be
gruesome. She cares about him. That’s why this is different. She does actually care.

It isn’t as bad as she expected. The smell isn’t of blood, but of urine. The sight isn’t bloody. A trickle runs from his chin, down his neck and disappears into his clothing
and the bedding. It looks almost innocuous. If she hadn’t known that it was a bullet wound, if she hadn’t known that the killer was a professional, she might have thought he had
survived. It looks like no more than a nick. There’s no movement. She should have heard breathing. Something. There’s a silence that makes her flesh creep. To be in the company of
another person who makes absolutely no sound. The silence of death.

She shakes herself. No standing around. Don’t waste time. If the police arrive now, you’re in trouble. Naked in the room with the dead body. A lover downstairs. Drugs in the
wardrobe. She walks briskly across and pulls open the wardrobe doors. The panel at the base inside the wardrobe pulls away in her hand. Underneath are two wads of cash, one bag of coke and a bag of
pills that she can’t immediately identify. Lewis knew what they were. He kept little of his supply in the house, often nothing at all, but he’d been having trouble with a peddler of his
and had been left with excess. She doesn’t know how much it’s all worth, but between the money and the drugs, it’s a few thousand. Zara has little else. She needs that money.

She puts it on the floor, and slides the panel back across the wardrobe. She picks up the cash and gear and gets out of the room, running now. Stewart is still at the bottom of the stairs,
looking nervous. He sees that she’s carrying something. His eyes widen.

‘Please, Stewart, you have to help me,’ she’s saying to him. Pleading. Pathetic. ‘If they find this in the house, I’ll go to jail too. I need you to take this for
me. Give me your address. I’ll come and collect it from you. Just store it, for a little while.’ She realizes she’s going on too long. Saying too much. He can be persuaded.
She’s reaching up and kissing him again. ‘Give me your address. I’ll come round. I don’t want to lose you too.’

She’s beautiful. She’s vulnerable. She needs you. It’s a strangely wonderful thing, to be needed. Particularly to be needed by someone you want. She has suffered a lot at her
man’s hands. It’s hardly a surprise to find that that drunk upstairs is a drug dealer as well. He must be a dealer. He couldn’t have bags of the stuff for his own use.
Stewart’s drug use has been very limited, but he knows the difference between recreational amounts and a dealer’s amount. There’s cash too. A lot of cash. They look like twenty-
and fifty-pound notes. There could be a couple of thousand there. Help her? She could name you, if you don’t. She wouldn’t, he’s sure. Much too good a woman. But she could.

‘Of course I’ll help you,’ he’s saying, reaching down and kissing her again. She’s handing him the bags and the cash, and he’s stuffing them into various
pockets, out of view. She’s grabbed a piece of paper and a pen. He’s writing his address. Is it wise? He can trust her. Those eyes. He can trust them.

‘You have to go out the back,’ she’s saying, as soon as he hands her the piece of paper back.

‘Yes,’ he stammers. Thank heavens for her presence of mind, he’s thinking, as Zara leads him to the back door. If it wasn’t for her, Stewart would be there when the
police arrive. She’s saving him. Saving herself too. She’s unlocking the back door.

‘Go straight ahead, over the back wall, turn left and you come out on the next street. Don’t draw attention to yourself.’

‘Yes,’ he’s nodding. He bends down. She kisses him again. He steps outside and she closes the door behind him.

They’re down the front path and across the road to the car. Calum drops into the driver’s seat. He’s turned the key in the ignition before George is even in
beside him. They keep the balaclavas and gloves on. Keep covered until you’re out of sight of any possible witnesses. The car starts and they pull away. Still silent. Guns out of view. Round
the corner at the bottom of the street. Out of view of the house, out of view of the witnesses. Balaclavas pulled quickly off. More good luck. They’ve passed no cars in the short journey from
the house so far. Nobody has seen them on the road in balaclavas.

‘You have any trouble with him?’ George asks. His voice is hushed. Unnatural. He’s trying too hard to sound calm.

‘Couldn’t have been easier,’ Calum’s telling him. His voice sounds strained too. Trying to hide the fact that he doesn’t want to talk. Always uncomfortable talking
after a job.

‘I didn’t have any trouble, either,’ George is telling him, having not been asked. ‘After I knocked the guy down, he stayed down. She didn’t move a muscle the whole
time. Went quick. That was good. Don’t know what either of them would’ve done if you’d been up there longer. Good job, though. Real clean.’

‘So far,’ Calum says quietly, concentrating on driving.

‘Aye,’ George is nodding.

A few minutes later. Still driving. Calum watching the road, George talking.

‘Man, there was so much I wanted to say when we got in there. Jesus! There was so much goin’ through my mind when I saw them like that.’ George bursts out laughing. Calum
smiles; one day he knows he’ll look back and laugh. Not tonight. The job is still too fresh. ‘The look on the boy’s face. That was priceless. Man, he wasn’t just scared, he
was totally bummed. Did you see it, Cal? One second he’s inside this gorgeous girl, next minute he’s got a gun at his head. Christ! Poor bastard. Nobody should lose a shag like that.
Can’t believe she was with that loser Winter in the first place. Gorgeous girl with low standards. I like that,’ George says, and he laughs loudly again. Calum is aware of the constant
references to how attractive Zara Cope is, but now isn’t the time to comment.

It takes eleven minutes to get to the drop-off point. He’s not going to leave George outside his flat, that would be crazy. There’s a risk in leaving him a mile away. He has to get
back home with his balaclava and gloves, dressed all in black. That could raise eyebrows. George is good at this sort of thing, though. He does this in his work a lot. A lot of the jobs he does
– beating and intimidations – are done during the night. He gets there and gets home again without being picked up. He needs no advice on how to do it, and do it well. That’s why
he’s more relaxed. For him, the effort is over. The drop-off point is in a rundown part of town, an old industrial area with little industry left. Calum pulls up at the side of the road.

They won’t see each other for some time. Certainly days, perhaps weeks. You keep your distance. You make sure people don’t put the two of you together. The police will have a vague
description of body types. You keep yourselves apart. George opens the car door. It seems odd to leave without saying something, but what do you say?

‘That was a good job, pal. Give us a call when the heat dies down.’ He wants to say more, but he doubts Calum wants to hear more. Calum needs to change the car, get rid of the guns
and get himself home before the sun comes up and people get out on the streets and notice him. Too much to do to hang around chatting.

‘You did well, I appreciate it,’ Calum is saying to him. It’s the first thing he’s said since they left the house that doesn’t sound strained. The first thing that
sounds genuine. George nods, and shuts the door.

He leaves George walking along a strange street in the dark. A strange pang of camaraderie. In the wake of most jobs Calum wants nothing more than to go home and be alone. There’s a
solitary streak in his nature that reigns after a job. Not tonight. Tonight he wanted to let George know that he appreciated the help. He felt a sudden urge to be in the company of someone. Anyone,
really. Ageing, he decides. Pushing thirty, and suddenly wanting someone to spend time with. He has felt that outside of work. He has felt the desire to settle down, but has lived so entirely for
his work that he’s resisted the urge. Nearly two years since he had a serious relationship – just casual flings with random women since then. It’s a curious feeling, as he turns
the corner and George disappears from view in his mirror. He still feels his work is done more comfortably alone, but he needs more people in his life.

There’s much still to be done. Precautions must be taken. It used to be much easier. The older guys will all admit it. A more difficult job now than it’s ever been. Used to be that
you could dump things in bins at the side of the road. Not now. CCTV might pick you up. Bins aren’t simply emptied into the back of a lorry, and the garbage then tipped into landfill. Most of
the bins at the side of the road will have their contents sent to recycling plants. Got to be careful with that. He decides to hang on to the balaclava for now. Not in the mood to find somewhere
safe to ditch it, this late at night. His rubbish will be collected on Monday. A risk to hold on to it that long. A risk to keep all the clothes he has on for that long. He’s going to ditch
them all. Maybe find something before then. See how the land lies.

For now, the priorities are the car and the guns. Guns first. The seller knows he’ll return. He doesn’t know when, but he knows. There’s a process. Supposedly safe. Calum
doesn’t like it much, but it’s what the man uses. Has been using it for decades, gets away with it. When you’re finished with the guns and it’s not a good time to knock on
the door, you go to the house and into the back garden. You go up to the shed, pull away a small section of side panelling and push the guns in. You put the panel back in place. Then you leave. He
checks the shed every day. He gets the guns, presumably puts them back in his loft. You go and visit him in the daytime, a day or two later, and he pays you for the guns you’ve delivered. He
doesn’t pay you what you paid him, but you get some of your money back. Calum doesn’t like the system. What if someone follows him and checks the shed? What if someone’s watching
the runner’s house when he turns up?

Forget all that. The priority is getting rid of the guns. Take them to the shed. Better they get found there than in your own flat. He drives to the house. Time is on his side. The beauty of
Glasgow being a small city – you never have far to go. He stops down the street from the runner’s house. He has his own gun in his pocket. George’s has been in the glove box since
they got into the car. Calum is taking it out, putting it into his other pocket. He can feel the surprising weight of them. He only uses guns for the job, doesn’t like them otherwise.
Doesn’t like handling them or having them around. Can never get used to them. Never mind. He’s getting out of the car.

He’s across the street. Opening the side gate. Making sure it doesn’t creak. Surely the runner is professional enough to oil the gate that his clients have to use. Surely a man of
his experience wouldn’t make such a rookie mistake. Silence. Along the back path to the shed. There’s no sign of life in the runner’s house. No sign of life on the street. No
lights on. A little moonlight creeps through the clouds. Calum looks at his watch. It’s now getting towards two o’clock in the morning. Things have moved quickly and smoothly.
He’ll be home by half past. Faster than he expected. He feels for the panel and pulls it open. There’s a small gap behind, before you feel the inside panel that the runner’s added
to make the shed look untouched from the inside as well as out. Calum places the guns carefully inside and slips the panel back into place. It wedges in.

Now Calum’s back in the car and heading for his brother’s garage. If CCTV picks him up, then it will look odd, him returning a car to the garage in the middle of the night. Too bad.
Nothing illegal about odd. Nothing wrong with driving at night. William will have parked Calum’s car out on the street, in the parking bay in front of the garage. He’ll have made as
sure as possible that there’s a space nearby. Calum will park the borrowed car in that space, slip the keys into the visor and get into his own car. Again the keys will be in the visor. Then
he’ll go home.

He pulls onto the street where the garage is. A quiet street, gloomy. Used to be full of businesses, full of life. Not any more. The garage, a warehouse and an army-surplus store. There are two
people walking along the street. Damn! Can’t be seen changing cars. Who the hell is out and about in this part of town at this time of night? They actually look like a respectable couple as
he drives past. Calum reaches the end of the street and goes round the block. By the time he gets back, the couple are gone. He’s pulling up in a parking spot along the street. He slips the
keys into the visor and gets out. Glances round – nobody there. He walks along the street and casually opens the door of his car. He’s starting the car up and he’s driving
home.

It all seems too easy. Calum suffers from a natural cynicism. When things go smoothly, he expects something to pop up suddenly and trip him up. There’s no way it should have been that
easy. The job he does should never be that easy. And yet, it often is. The majority of jobs he does are simple, effective, quick and trouble-free. Things don’t go wrong. There are no nasty
little surprises lurking. There can be. It does happen. But the jobs where things go wrong are a minority, and quite a small one. They’re life-threatening, but rare. As Calum is pulling up
outside his own flat, in his own car, he’s thinking that the job shouldn’t be this easy. He doesn’t deserve such an easy time.

First she memorizes the address Stewart gave her, then rips it into tiny pieces and burns it in an ashtray. If he’s lying about the address, then she’s lost all
that she gave him. No, he’s not that smart. Then she calls the police. She has to work herself up, get herself frantic for the phone call. The neighbours might already have called, and
it’s because of that fear that she has to call too. She doesn’t want to have to explain why someone else has called, but she hasn’t bothered. Don’t waste time. Don’t
leave a gap that needs to be explained between the neighbours’ call and yours. She’s picked up the phone and taken it into the living room, pulling on some clothes while it rings. The
woman answers, asks what service Zara requires. Now Zara’s turning it on. Acting. It’s not that she’s not upset, not traumatized. She is, but she feels she needs to show it.