How To Kill Friends And Implicate People (8 page)

TWENTY-ONE

ALEX

19:00

Alex drove home. The Pennans lived in a decent-sized house in Westerton, north-west of the city. It looked like a single-storey building from the front, but from the back the upstairs was visible, looking out onto a large garden, and to a small wooded area behind the property that crested the hill.

There was a note pushed through the front door. A clumsy scrawl written on the back of an old betting slip. Alex had hired a builder named Keith to do some renovation work in the back garden. They were installing decking at the back door, where a big gas barbecue could be kept for summer nights like this, and a water feature in the far corner, a fountain that ran down to a small brook.

They’d given Keith a key to the garage, for full access to water and tools, but Alex hadn’t been dumb enough to let him get into the house while they were out, and he communicated in a series of notes written on ever more random slips of paper. The note asked for Alex to give him a call as soon as he got in.

Keith had an odd accent. He’d been living in Glasgow for a couple of decades, but he grew up in Fife. It was as if someone had purposely designed a dialect just to confuse Alex. Keith ended every other sentence with, ‘Ken?’ Alex had only just learned that meant, ‘Understand?’

It seemed a pretty flawed approach. If you want to ask whether someone gets what you’re saying, you should probably phrase the question itself in a way that people can understand.

Talking to Keith was going to be a struggle. Alex would need a little more in the tank first, to take the edge off the meeting with that prick of a hit man. The guy had called him on it. He’d figured out Alex’s plan, and now he’d feel like he could hold it over him.

Alex knew that meant he should find someone else, but he didn’t know how. He’d only found Fergus by accident, following a trail of numbers on a few of his clients’ accounts. He could ask Joe Pepper. Joe was working with him on a big project for Asma Khan. MHW was buying out the old guard across the city, everything from gang leaders and drug dealers to law firms and money launderers. The cartel behind MHW wanted to own the city, and they were close to getting it.

Which was precisely why he
couldn’t
talk to Joe about it. He was one of the very people he needed to keep out of this.

He’d need to figure out a way to convince Fergus to reconsider. And a way to keep him from talking about it.

Bollocks. Well, first things first. He crossed the living room, a large white space decorated to Kara’s tastes with sparse furniture and a few weird pieces of art on the wall.
Conversation starters
, that’s what Kara called them. Well, anytime Alex had invited people around, they’d consciously avoided talking about the art, so how did that work?

Between the living room and the large open-plan kitchen was a wooden bar, the kind that millionaires had in movies. It was stocked with whisky, gin, vodka and a few bottles of flavoured stuff that Alex had never been desperate enough to try. The bar had been part of the deal he’d made with Kara about the decorations. She could have everything else just the way she wanted, as long as he could have this.

Alex downed a generous finger of Talisker, and prepared a second, this time with ice. He liked a fast first hit to take the edge off the day, but afterwards he’d slow it down, take his time and sip at the drink. Maintain a gentle buzz.

He read through Keith’s note a second time. Something about needing a special kind of hosepipe to install the water feature. Bollocks to that. Alex picked up the phone and dialled Keith’s number, just about legible in the note.

‘Howya,’ Keith said, in a slightly drunken Irish lilt. Apparently adding a second accent to his collection. ‘Thanks for calling, neebor.’

‘How are we getting on?’ Alex took a look out through the French doors at the back, which opened out onto where the decking was supposed to be. ‘I don’t see decking. Or a water feature.’

‘Aye, well, here’s the ’hing.’ Keith’s voice dropped, making this sound like he was letting Alex in on some secret. ‘It’s gonnae need a different kind of hosepipe.’

Alex knew for a fact there were five different hoses in the garage. Each of them thick enough, and long enough, for what Keith needed. Alex had looked the specifications up on the internet before they hired the guy.

‘We have hoses,’ Alex said. ‘You said they’d be fine.’

‘Aye. I know. Well, I wis wrang. See, it needs to be a special kind of rubber, aye? One that’ll hold out through the winters without cracking, like. Ye ken? And one that moles can’t chew through.’

Alex looked out again at the back garden. The lawn was perfect. The only marks were patches of mud trailed across by Keith himself. ‘We don’t have any moles.’

‘Well no’ the noo, no. But if they find out you’ve got a hosepipe in there
. . .
’

Was Alex hearing this right? Was Keith trying on some kind of protection racket, with moles as his mafia backup? Jesus cocking Christ. Half of Alex really wanted to lay into this guy, tear him apart, verbally. The other half wanted to go and get Kara, ask her to do it. Alex preferred to leave confrontation to her, because she handled people so well. Kara could speak to an idiot in such a calm and controlled way that she would get things done without a fuss.

But Kara wasn’t here, so it was going to have to be option A.

‘Fine.’ Alex said. ‘You go and search for this special hosepipe. I’ll drive down to B&Q and buy a normal one, then pay someone
half
what we’re paying you to fit the cocking thing. Or, better yet, I’ll type it into Google, find the instructions, and do it myself. How’s that?’

Keith clearly hadn’t expected this. There was a pause on the line.

‘Look, I’m no trying to scam you.’

‘No. You’re just trying to trick me out of money, which is a whole different thing. Now, are you going to finish the job tomorrow or am I finding one of the thousands of people round here who can do it?’

Keith grunted something. Alex couldn’t tell sometimes whether the noises were words or simply sounds. He could hear Keith moving around, away from the phone, and guessed that he might have been asking Alex to hold.

Alex smiled. Dammit, he was enjoying this. Maybe he should thank the builder for the entertainment.

‘Sorry about that.’ Keith came back on the line. ‘I was just looking for the ’hingmy, you ken?’

‘What?’

‘The hose. Aye. I’ve just found one on my shelf here that’ll do the trick just fine. I’d just forgot I had it, aye?’

‘Funny that.’

‘Ach, one of they ’hings. Just bein’ daft, you ken? But I’ve got one the noo, so it’s all sorted.’

‘Excellent. Those magic hosepipes must be very popular. It’s so good that you had one spare.’

‘Aye, and it’ll no’ cost you anything extra, don’t you worry neebor.’ Keith waited for a moment, as if he thought Alex would acknowledge his generosity. Then he said, ‘Aye, well. That’s us sorted, then. I should get back to this thing, I’ll be back round the morra.’

Alex disconnected the call and drained the glass. He stood up and poured himself another drink, then set the glass down and laughed. That call had been perfect. It had let him feel in control again.

And now he knew how to get Fergus onside.

TWENTY-TWO

SAM

19:35

‘Hello. Hey. Where are you?’

What? Oh right
.

I’d met Hanya at her favourite bar. Taking her up on the offer of a drink. But my mind kept drifting back to both Paula and Kara.

‘Sorry, Han. It’s been a strange day.’

‘You’re telling me.’

I’d tried to follow Kara, but lost her. Surveillance on a bike is a tricky thing. You can’t do a stakeout, because people in the street will notice a cyclist standing around for hours. On the other hand, it’s a good way to tail a driver. Once someone is behind the wheel of a car, they pretty much forget that cyclists exist. I can get right up close behind a driver, and they won’t notice me. There is one obvious downside to this, though, and it was exposed when Kara pulled out into the road in her car. She turned the other way, and drove uphill at speed.

Crap.

I’d texted Phil to let me know when Kara turned up at the Pennan house, then headed into town to meet Hanya.

Hanya looked great. She’d changed out of her work clothes and into a sleek silk-looking blouse under a cream jacket. Hanya could be a bit of a clothes-horse at times.

We met outside The FuBar, a small bar down from street level on Bath Street. It was in a good spot, but had never really taken off. They played low jazzy music during the day, then switched up to a mix of nineties’ indie and pop in the evening. It had a steady flow of customers, usually cops, lawyers and hangers on, and it was a good place for someone like Hanya to meet guys who understood the score:
Nothing serious, we all have work in the morning
.

We sat outside on a small metal table that had one leg shorter than the other. It wobbled every time we set our drinks down, so we’d agreed the only sensible thing to do was to keep holding them. And drink quicker, just to avoid the temptation to put them down.

‘It’s a joke,’ said Hanya.

Crap. I’d drifted off into my head again, and had no idea what she’d been saying. I judged from the tone that this
wasn’t
a joke. She was annoyed. I bluffed a response. ‘You’re kidding on.’

‘I wish I was. Anyway.’ Hanya sipped from her drink then leaned forward. Her shoulders squared, and she gave me a look that said,
Listen, I’m getting serious now.
‘So, listen, I logged into your vLove account today. After we talked.’

Wait, she wasn’t talking about the case? No. She meant the dating site. Great. Hanya had the log in details because she’d been the one to set up the account and download the app to my phone. It had been here in FuBar that we’d recorded the video, and I’d had just enough drink in me to go along with it.

‘After we talked? Before or after you started a murder investigation, Han?’

Hanya stiffened. ‘I’m not on that case. It’s weird.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I ran her name into the system. Came back with nothing. No national insurance, no address, absolutely nothing. But it must have flagged
something
because the feds came in and took it off us. I’ve been moved over to some arson job.’

The feds
was new cop slang. An in-joke aimed at the people working up in Gartcosh. The Scottish government had reorganised the police force in Scotland, merging all the regional forces into one organisation,
Police Scotland
. Gartcosh was the site of the new organisation’s big white bull, the
Crime Campus.
They would send detectives out to major cases, parachuting in to take over the investigations. Local cops around Scotland had come to see these visiting officers like the FBI in America.

‘So her name was on some list?’ I said. ‘Must’ve been.’

There’s a look cops sometimes give me. Hanya’s old partner, John Cummings, had been a master of it. It was a signal to do the opposite of whatever they were saying. If his mouth was telling me to
Stay out of the case
, his eyes might be saying,
Keep in the loop.

Hanya gave me that look as she said, ‘Don’t get involved, Sam. And whatever you’ve got, hand it straight over to them.’

She was as interested as me. Hanya was a professional, and policing was simply her job. She didn’t take work home the way I did. But territoriality was different, and the feds had made it personal by taking it off her.

‘Anyway,’ Hanya continued. Moving us both on. ‘Sam, you’ve got
loads
of guys liking your page. Have you looked?’

I rolled my eyes hard enough for people to see them two streets away. ‘No, I told you, I’m not interested in any of that. Han, I’m fine. I don’t need help.’

‘When was the last time you had anything between your legs that was old enough to remember Euro ’96?’ The problem with Hanya being English was that all of her football references were English, too. I swear she mentioned 1966 every other time we spoke. She also kept forgetting the age difference between us.

‘Han,
I
only just remember Euro ’96.’

‘Okay, wean, take a look at the site.’

She wasn’t going to give up unless I humoured her. I could make a show of it, at least. Look at a few of the pages, pretend I was thinking about contacting any of the guys. I picked my phone up off the table and loaded the app. A number glowed red at the bottom of the page, showing how many people had liked my profile. It was now down to me to decide whether I was going to return the gesture to any of them, which would then put us in contact.

Each member had their own page, where we could upload videos. Blogs. Links. Whatever. Hanya had been using it for a couple of months, and her page was filled with short clips of her trying to be funny and opinionated.

My page just had the one video. The one we’d filmed here.

I pressed the icon for the first profile. A video started to play. The guy was cute. Brown hair, stubble that looked to be carefully maintained, and a lopsided smile. He was talking about himself, telling me his name was Billy, and he was twenty-six. He looked poised. Too poised. I didn’t want someone who was going to be reading a script when he spoke to me. Even in the hypothetical world where I would follow up on these leads, I wanted it to be someone I liked the look of.

I swiped the screen to the left, which told the dating service I didn’t want any more from Billy.

‘What was his username?’ Hanya was typing into her own phone. ‘I want to look him up.’

‘BillyAndWhizz22.’

‘Ah, okay, maybe I won’t.’

The second profile loaded. A guy with a goatee trying to be way funnier than he could manage. No way. I swiped him to the left. The third person popped up. He was okay looking. Not a stud, by any measurement. Billy probably had him beat on that score. But there was something else there, something, I don’t know,
hurt
?

No way, Sam.

Not happening.

You’re not taking on any more fixer-uppers.

Hanya giggled, and I looked up. ‘You’ve got that look on your face,’ she said.

‘What look?’

‘The
patron saint of whoever
look.’

I made a
phssssst
noise, and pretended not to know what she was talking about. I clicked the video again, and this time listened to the words.

‘Hi my name’s Fergus. I’m thirty years old, and I, ummm. This is daft, aye? Look, my sister put me up to this. I have a hard time meeting people. I like action films, I like the music I listened to when I was a teenager. I like trying to make people laugh.’

My finger hovered over the screen.

I paused, laughed at myself, then swiped.