The Stone Gallows (44 page)

I spoke. ‘Beverley, this is getting boring. Look, we're not leaving without Rosie, so you might as well just make it easy and tell us where she is.'

She looked at me like I had just crawled out from underneath a rock. ‘No chance.' Then she turned and pressed the button on the side of her desk.

I moved fast, grabbing her by the hair and jerking her head back, putting my knee against the base of the spine so that she fell loose-limbed to the floor. I'd met her type before, back when I had been a member of the police force, the constraints of the uniform meaning I was unable to treat them the way that they deserved. She was nothing – a soulless, dead-eyed, amoral hustler, living off the sale of flesh, the more demeaning the act, the higher the price and the greater her cut.

Left unchallenged, she would continue, forever lowering people until they were nothing more than animals. I blamed her for the shit state of the world, and for the fact that everywhere I looked, people were becoming more and more disposable. Every day, in every walk of life, we're surrounded by people like Beverley, dealers of flesh, peddlers of skin, perpetuating the awful fact that everything – and I mean everything – can be bought. The world's a sad place, and the saddest thing of all is the fact that the only thing that's not going up in price is the value of human life.

I punched her in the face as hard as I could.

Not the proudest moment of my life, I'll admit, but it had been a long night,

Besides, she fucking well deserved it.

3.

Then a door crashed open and Kenny the bouncer was upon us, larger, hairier and more aggressive than I had remembered. He took a second to survey the situation before leaping at me, his mouth opening in a silent scream like an attack dog.

I had one final trick up my sleeve – or, in this case, in my pocket.

When you become a cop, they give you lots of cool new toys to play with. A warrant card that opens doors. A uniform so that people will respect you (in theory). A truncheon to protect you. Handcuffs that will help you to arrest criminals. Of course, in the eyes of some the people you swore to serve, the uniform makes you a target, and the truncheon makes you a thug, but that's not your fault.

When you leave the force, they expect a lot of this stuff back, but in reality, a lot of it goes ‘missing' – actually finding its way into the private collection of many an ex-copper.

Before going out, I had borrowed such an item from Joe. Holding it with my thumb on the top, I raised, pointed, and fired.

Pepper spray.

The liquid arched across the rapidly decreasing gap and hit him directly in the face. He ploughed into me, his momentum causing both of us to crash to the ground. It was like having a cement mixer dropped on me. I rolled out from underneath him and looked for something to hit him with. There were plenty of things I could use – a fire extinguisher, the computer monitor – but they were all too heavy. I didn't want to kill him. Much. Eventually I selected the handset to the cordless telephone. It was ideal: hard, smooth plastic, with just enough weight to turn the lights out for a few minutes. Kenny was rolling around on the floor, rubbing furiously at his eyes, whimpering like a kicked dog, which was a fairly apt analogy. I got down on my knees and picked a spot on his smooth, shiny cue-ball of a skull.

‘It's for
you
.'

(WHACK!)

‘It's your
mother
.'

(WHACK.)

‘She says you've been a
very

(WHACK)

naughty

(WHACK.)

BOY!
'

(WHACK!)

And with that, he passed out.

4.

I looked up, breathing heavily. Susan was watching me, her face shocked. So was Beverley, her mouth a red-rimmed ruin of smeared lipstick and broken teeth. I watched her bleed for a few seconds before brandishing the phone at her. ‘Rosie. What room?'

She tried to speak, but all that came out was a mushy sound. Her eyes found mine and pleaded. I was unmoved. ‘Try again.'

‘Ayeeee. . . Aye. . . ' Her face twisted with the pain of effort.

‘Eight?'

Nodding frantically, she rolled to her hands and knees, blood falling from her face to the floor. I pointed a finger. ‘Don't fucking move. Susan, where's room eight?'

She indicated a door opposite the entrance. ‘Through there.'

‘Lead the way.'

I followed her down another corridor, past closed doors. We saw nobody, but all around us were traces of human presence. Scents filled the air – perfume, aftershave, sweat, incense. With them came emotion – hope, despair, guilt. From one room came the sound of leather on flesh, followed by a gentle cry of pain – male, or I wouldn't have been able to stop myself. From another came the unmistakable sound of ugly sex – pig grunting and a noisy, faked yell of delight. I wondered how many people had passed through this corridor, how many punters, how many girls. Did they all find what they were looking for? Was the pleasure worth the price? The humiliation worth the cash? I hoped so, but knew it probably wasn't.

Susan came to a sudden stop. ‘This is it.'

I didn't, kicking the door open. I found myself in a room almost identical to the one I had first met Susan in. There was the futon, there was the massage table, there was the bedside cabinet with the cheap stereo on it – playing, of all things, a pan-pipe version of Bon Jovi's
Living on a Prayer
.

There was the girl, kneeling on the floor in front of the futon, her head in somebody elses' lap.

Her eyes rolled to meet mine, and for a brief instant, there was a sense of deja vu, of a key turning in a lock somewhere. I'd seen her before, but I had no idea when. She was pretty, but there was something in her face that broke my heart a little. Blank misery. A desolate void of pain. An acceptance that this was it, this was all she would ever have. This was life, and all it held for her was degradation and humiliation.

In my life, I'd never seen a person so without hope.

Susan moved forward. The man who was on the receiving end of Rosie's attention turned from where he lay on the futon. His voice was offended, as if we were somehow inconveniencing him. ‘What's going on? You can't just barge in here like this.'

And in that instant, I realised where I had seen her before. It had been a long time ago. Just before the accident. She'd been a passenger in a black Mercedes that had belonged to the man whose penis she was currently polishing with her tongue.

I wondered about the circular nature of all things. It's not true what they say; sometimes two wrongs do make a right.

Sometimes.

And even when they don't, they at least complete a chain. I had been wrong when I said that Susan and Rosie were the final loose ends to be tied up. The final loose end was
him
, Rosie's customer, the man who had set this tale of woe in motion.

I put my hand in my pocket, moving my fingers over the heavy links of the dog lead, feeling for the nylon loop. I remembered the night I had been mugged in the stairwell, and the damage it had caused. This time, I would not be so gentle. I took the chain out of my pocket and let it dangle by my side, the weight pleasant and reassuring. The man's eyes widened in fear. ‘Do I know you?'

‘No. But I know you.'

Realisation dawned on his face. He'd recognised me.

With my foot, I gently pushed the door closed. ‘Grierson, you and I have some unfinished business.'

Writing may be a solitary act, but writers tend to forget that there's a lot more to publishing a book than simply coming up with the words.

The Stone Gallows
is no exception, and could not have happened without the help of a great number of people.

I am extremely greatful to Ed and Julie Handyside for spotting me and giving me a chance, and to all the staff at Myrmidon Books who have worked so hard. A particular mention is due to my editor, Anne Westgarth.

While writing Gallows, I worked in three different nursing homes: Breamount Nursing Home, Craigielea Care Centre, and Elderslie Care Home. All three establishments are uniformly excellent; staffed with kind, hard-working people who care very deeply about the welfare of the people in their care. It's important to point out that none of them provided a model for Inchmeadows, which is – of course – entirely fictional. I should also mention a couple more names here: Eileen Docherty and Madge Cluckie.

Thanks are due to my old pal Philip Gray for all the advice and beer, usually at the same time, which meant that by the time I had finished the latter I had usually forgotten the former.

I'd like to thank my family – my mother, my sister, my aunt, my brother, and my father, who gave me the idea in the first place.

I'd like to thank my lovely wife, Karn, who puts up with me long after she should have told me to pack my bags and leave. Every writer should have a partner like her; not all of us deserve one. I'm damn sure that I don't.

Finally, I'd like to thank the readers. For any of you who were wondering, Cameron Stone
will
be back – he does, after all, have some unfinished business.

“I turned thirty-seven that summer, older than Dante when he
toured Hell, but only by a couple of years. . .”

Life couldn't be better for David Albo, an associate professor of English at a small mid-western university. He lives in an idyllic, out-of-town, plantation-style mansion with a beautiful and intelligent wife and an adoring teenage stepdaughter. As he returns to the university after a long and relaxing sabbatical, there's a full professorship in the offing- and, what's more, he's managed to stay off the booze for two whole years.

But, once term begins, things deteriorate rapidly. The damning evidence that he has sexually harassed his students is just the beginning as Dave finds himself sucked into a vortex of conspiracy, betrayal, jealousy and murder.

Unless he can discover quickly who is out to destroy him, all that he is and loves is about to be stripped away.

£7.99 ISBN 978-1-905802-34-0