Too Soon a Death: A Scottish mystery where cosy crime meets tartan noir: Borders Mysteries Book 2 (24 page)

‘I know who she’s just finished working for, if that’s any use.’

‘It may be.’

‘His name’s Simon something.’ Zoe closed her eyes, visualising the John Lewis restaurant and Kate’s client pushing back his chair and getting up to leave. Still unable to summon up his surname, she shook her head in annoyance. ‘Sorry. It’ll come to me. But in the meantime, would you like me to give you a description?’

Trent’s eyes widened. ‘You’ve seen him? When?’

‘Kate introduced us, though I was only briefly in his company. We went shopping in Edinburgh and she had a meeting with him in John Lewis.’

‘When exactly was this?’

‘A fortnight ago last Wednesday.’

‘And what you do remember about him?’

‘He’s mid-twenties, I’d guess, and built like a rugby player.’

‘Big, like?’ Trent raised a hand about six inches above his head.

‘No, about your height, but with wide shoulders, huge thighs and a nose which looked as if it’s been broken at least once. He works at the RBS head office, something in IT.’

‘It was definitely RBS?’

‘I’m pretty sure. I remember Kate telling me about the complex the bank had built on the outskirts of Edinburgh, how it’s bigger and has more shops and restaurants than a lot of Borders towns.’

‘Sounds like Gogarburn all right. Did she ever go there to see him?’

‘I don’t think so. She mostly used email, for obvious reasons. And texts. Have you found her mobile? She kept it with her all the time, to stay in touch with her family.’

‘It may be in her bedroom but that’s too dangerous to access at present. Not long after the fire crew got her out, part of the floor collapsed.’

Zoe tried to shut her mind to a vision of Kate in bed, sleeping soundly under the Laura Ashley duvet she’d recently bought off eBay for a fraction of its normal price, then plunging through the floor into the room below. Her mouth was dry and she struggled to swallow.

‘Sorry, I wasn’t thinking,’ Trent said, peering anxiously at her.

Zoe massaged the back of her neck, suddenly feeling exhausted. ‘This makes no sense, Sergeant. Why on earth would he want to harm Kate? Failing to track down all his relatives is hardly grounds for murder.’

‘Is that what she did? Fail, I mean.’

‘It’s quite complicated, but Kate found proof—not even proof really, just a possibility—that a few generations back on his father’s side, one of her client’s ancestors hadn’t been born to the couple who gave him their name and brought him up. She came up with a hypothesis about this ancestor’s real parentage, but before she could do any more work on it, Simon pulled the plug, didn’t want her to continue.’

‘Did he give a reason?’

‘She thought it was probably financial.’

‘But he didn’t tell her that?’

‘People rarely admit they can’t afford something, do they?’

Trent sat quietly staring at his notes then asked, ‘Any progress with his surname yet?’

Zoe thought again but the more she concentrated, the more elusive it became. ‘I’m pretty sure it’s also the name of a place. Not very helpful, am I?’

‘Scottish? English? Somewhere you’ve been recently?’

She let out an exasperated sigh. ‘It’ll probably come to me as soon as you’ve gone.’

‘Text me if it does. And that applies to anything else you remember which could be useful.’ Trent stood up. ‘If you’re returning to the ICU I’ll go up with you. The baby unit’s on the same floor.’

‘Oh God, Sergeant, I forgot to ask how your son is. Please forgive me.’

‘Understandable, in the circumstances. He’s doing well, thank you, although it’ll be a while before we can take him home. My wife spends a lot of time here.’

‘What have you called him?’

‘Daniel. After my wife’s late father.’

‘That’s nice. I have no idea what I’m going to call mine.’

‘It’ll be obvious as soon as he or she appears. Until we saw him, Daniel was going to be Frederick after my father.’ Trent held Zoe’s gaze. ‘Look after yourself, Doctor Moreland. I wouldn’t wish what we’re going through on anyone.’

They got out of the lift on the second floor and went in opposite directions. A wave of panic surged through Zoe as she entered the ICU and found the Mackenzies standing outside Kate’s room, Etta in tears, Ranald leaning heavily on his stick, and Douglas a distance away from them, staring out of the window.

‘Oh my God, what’s happened?’

TWENTY-SEVEN

Douglas came over from the window. ‘An alarm went off and the nurse asked us to leave. She said something about a blocked tube.’

‘Oh Zoe, I’m so frightened,’ Etta said in a shrill voice.

‘It sounds like the tube in Kate’s neck which is helping her breathe may have got blocked,’ Zoe said, making a conscious effort to keep her tone as light as possible. ‘That happens sometimes, but the ventilator sounds an alarm if it does, so the nursing staff know to clear it. I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about.’

‘I hope you’re right,’ Douglas said.

Zoe hoped so too.

Douglas returned to window-gazing and Zoe had just persuaded his parents to sit down when a nurse emerged from Kate’s room. ‘Your daughter’s comfortable again now,’ she told Etta cheerfully. ‘Come away in.’

Zoe caught Douglas’s arm as he followed his parents back into Kate’s room. ‘Auntie Joan gave me some clothes for your mother. They’re still in the Jeep. Will I bring them up?’

‘No need for you to do that. I’ll come down when you go and put them straight into my car. I’m dropping Mum back round at Eleanor’s for a few hours and taking Dad home. Thanks for driving him over, by the way.’

‘I was happy to help. Has he told you Ken turned up at Tolbyres earlier?’

‘Richard texted me while you were on your way here. As soon as you and Dad had left, he made sure Ken got the message he wasn’t welcome, though not before the stupid idiot had promised to bring the children to see their mother.’

‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’

Douglas grimaced. ‘Don’t worry. It’s not going to happen. There is some good news, though.’

‘What?’

‘While he was out checking on his chickens, Frankie spotted the cat. Bluto’s spooked and refusing to be caught at the moment, but at least he’s alive.’

Forty minutes later, Zoe’s mobile started to ring as she drove home from the hospital for the second time in less than twenty-four hours. Whereas six months ago she would have wrested it out of her bag with one hand in order to answer the call, that sort of risk didn’t seem worth taking now, so she let it go to voicemail. She debated whether to travel straight on to pick up Mac from Patrick’s house but decided against this. The later she went for him, the more likely Patrick was to have given the dogs an afternoon walk, so she wouldn’t have to.

When she reached home, she discovered the call had been from her father. Kicking off her sandals, she collapsed onto the sofa and listened to his message again. No mistake, for the first time ever, he’d asked her to phone him back. This probably wasn’t just because he no longer had to hide her existence from his wife. She remembered when Russell died; once the news first got out, she had been inundated with calls from kindly souls—many of whom she hardly knew—offering their condolences, wanting to know when the funeral was going to be held, and asking if they could do anything to help. Death brought compassion from many directions, and the rest of Andrew’s family would be unsurprised by his speaking with someone they had never met.

Several unanswered rings forced her to consider whether to leave a message or not, but she was saved from making a decision by Andrew’s voice. ‘Hello, Zoe. Thanks for calling me back.’

‘How are you? And the family?’

‘We’re coping in our own ways. Nina’s baking cakes and making sandwiches for every visitor who appears at our door. Ewan only comes out of his room for meals, but at least he’s here, he hasn’t disappeared off with his mates again.’

‘And you? Are you tending your tomatoes and walking your Border collie?’

‘You already know me so well.’ Zoe heard genuine pleasure in his voice. ‘We braced ourselves for Helen’s death for so long but now it’s happened, I still can’t believe she’s dead, even though I’ve held her body in my arms.’

Struggling to find a response which wouldn’t sound trite, Zoe said, ‘I looked her up on Amazon. She wrote an amazing amount of books. You must be proud at what she achieved.’

‘Her books used to be very popular, although these days young people seem to spend more time playing games on their phones. But her early readers are now passing on her stories to their own children. Only last summer she appeared at a local book festival and the tickets sold out. We hoped she’d be able to go again this year . . .’

Andrew’s voice trailed off and Zoe found herself trotting out the phrase everyone used when dealing with the recently bereaved. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

‘The funeral’s probably going to be next Friday. I wish you could attend, but I don’t suppose that’s a good idea.’

‘I can’t blend into a crowd at the moment. You’d keep on being asked who the pregnant woman is, and it wouldn’t be the best time to break it to them.’

‘You’re right.’

‘Was Helen able to tell you what she wanted to happen? I get the impression she was a very organised lady.’

‘She chose everything, down to the hymns and the outfit to be buried in. I can’t be doing with a lot of fuss, but her religion was important to her, and the local minister’s a friend.’

‘In my experience, even if one doesn’t have a faith, a farewell of some sort is an important part of the grieving process. Earlier this year I attended an elderly patient’s funeral at a natural burial site in a wood. There was no ceremony as such, but it gave comfort to his family and friends.’

‘In a wood? I like that idea.’

‘It’s a beautiful place. They use sheep to keep the grass down, not machinery.’

‘Even better.’ Andrew sighed. ‘Anyway, how are you, Zoe? Is my grandchild still kicking at all hours?’

‘We’re both fine. Less than six weeks to go now.’

‘I’m looking forward to meeting him or her.’

‘Me too.’

After a pause, Andrew said, ‘I’ve just seen the news for the first time in days. I hope none of your patients were involved in that awful fire near you.’

He evidently expected her answer to be in the negative, but Zoe couldn’t lie. ‘I’m afraid the house where it happened belongs to the Mackenzies. And Kate was in it at the time.’

‘Dear me. Is she alright?’

‘She’s in intensive care at Borders General Hospital. You know she’s deaf, don’t you? She was in bed when the fire started, and didn’t wake up. The firemen got her out before the flames reached her, but she’s inhaled a lot of smoke and fumes.’

‘What a dreadful thing to happen. Was it an accident?’

‘No one knows for sure yet.’

‘I can’t imagine what poor Ranald and his wife are going through. Keep me informed, will you?’

‘Of course.’

Their conversation ended shortly afterwards with a promise to meet up as soon as they could. To stop herself from fretting over things she couldn’t influence, Zoe turned her attention to her laptop. She hadn’t checked for emails in days and hardly needed to now, as more had been trapped by her spam filter than had made their way to her inbox. The genuine ones comprised a couple of promotions from book publishers, notification of reduced fares from a railway company whose line she had never travelled on, and a Google alert. She hesitated before opening the latter, unsure if she wanted to see what had triggered it.

Initially distraught at the online article Frankie Mackenzie had uncovered about her, she had decided the best way of dealing with such occurrences was to stay informed and set up an alert herself. The first two hits had been about another Zoe Moreland who lived in Canada, but today’s was definitely about her and the events surrounding the discovery of Ara’s body on the side of the River Tweed, again on the ScotlandsNews.Scot website.

Beneath the headline DOES THIS MAN HOLD KEY TO TWEED KILLING? was a photograph, obviously taken with a very long lens, of the slope down to the river she herself had negotiated a few weeks earlier. Walking up it were John Wilkie and Mather, followed by several other men and women, some of them in police uniform.

Bloody hell. Mrs Wilkie was going to be furious.

Zoe read the article under the photograph, shaking her head at every jibe and innuendo.

The investigation into the death of the youth found on the banks of the River Tweed near Paxton in the Scottish Borders has so far proved unsuccessful. A spokesman for Police Scotland confirmed yesterday that several lines of enquiry are being pursued, yet was unable to reassure the public that the killer among them will be apprehended soon. However, in an unexplained operation, a man was escorted to the body dump site yesterday, where he spent several hours with officers. Although Police Scotland refused to name him, the man is known locally as John Wilkie, aged 40, from Westerlea. Mr Wilkie is the second resident of that village who appears to be involved with the police investigation. On the day the body was discovered, Doctor Zoe Moreland, who gained notoriety last year when she became embroiled in the so-called Body in the Bonfire murder case, was seen on the Border Union Bridge from which it is believed the dead boy was thrown.

That final sentence made Zoe want to hurl her laptop against a wall. Instead, she closed it with a shaking hand and placed it down on the sofa beside her with exaggerated care. Kate had said the website was new, and thus far no one had mentioned seeing the earlier photograph of her on the Chain Bridge, so it obviously didn’t get many visitors. She had no reason to make a big deal of this.

She leaned back and closed her eyes, only to be disturbed what felt like a few seconds later by her mobile ringing. She looked at who the caller was before answering and noticed the time. She’d napped for half an hour.

‘Are you home now?’ Patrick asked.

‘Yes, sorry. I should’ve been over to collect Mac but I fell asleep on the sofa.’