Crime Fiction (Best Defence series Book 5) Read online

  ‘A show?’ Jill latched onto my reckless words in an instant. ‘You mean like a musical?’ Jill knew I hated musicals.

  ‘Not necessarily a musical... A play or something. Or a band. How about a stand-up? There’s bound to be plenty of comedy clubs around the—’

  ‘Legally Blonde is not so much a musical as a comedy and you’ll like it because it’s—’

  ‘About a lawyer?’

  ‘Sort of... Yes...’

  ‘Tell me, do people dance about the stage singing at each other?’ I took her silence as confirmation that they did. ‘That makes it a musical, in which case I would refer you to my previous answer.’

  Jill did an about-turn and marched away. I chased after her, apologising and citing the five hour journey, most of it spent standing, in mitigation.

  ‘Why aren’t we taking the Tube?’ I asked, when I thought I’d repented sufficiently and was wondering why we were standing by the kerb-side with Jill waving at passing taxis. ‘Are they still putting you up in that nice wee hotel in Kensington? That’ll cost a fortune by cab and probably be a lot slower.’

  ‘Firstly, no, we’re not taking the tube. I’d rather not have to fight my way through a sea of east-European beggars and most likely catch something infectious and, secondly, it doesn’t matter how much a taxi costs because I have an expense account.’

  Who was being grumpy now?

  Eventually, Jill’s waving was successful and we climbed into the back of a hackney cab with a custom paint job advertising flavoured mineral water.

  ‘And thirdly,’ she said, I hadn’t been expecting a thirdly, ‘I’m not staying at the Savannah.’

  ‘Where to?’ the driver asked.

  ‘The Savannah Kensington,’ Jill said.

  I was confused. ‘I thought you weren’t staying at the Savannah?’

  ‘I’m not – you are.’

  ‘Where are you staying?’

  ‘With Felicity. She has an apartment on the Albert Embankment.’

  ‘Where’s that?’

  ‘Other side of the River, mate,’ said the taxi driver.

  ‘How far is that from the Savannah?’

  ‘Savannah Kensington?’ the driver mulled that over for a second while I took the opportunity of reaching forward and sliding shut the panel between front and rear seats, leaving a hand print on the glass.

  ‘How far?’ I asked Jill.

  ‘Not all that far,’ she said.

  ‘How far is not that far?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter. I’ll come and see you at the hotel.’

  ‘What’s so special about Felicity’s place?’

  ‘I’ve been staying there these last few weeks. Makes sense. And it’s lovely. Very modern. Very small, of course, but everything in central London is. It has a glass front looking across the Thames to Westminster. And there’s a gym in the basement. A lot of the time she stays at the apartment during the week and goes home on weekends. Just like me, except Buckinghamshire’s not so far to go.’

  If my geographical knowledge of London wasn’t great, the counties of England would definitely not be my choice for specialist subject on Mastermind; however, I did know that Buckinghamshire wasn’t London, which meant... ‘If Felicity’s away this weekend and we’re here…’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘For one thing she’s staying in London this weekend.’

  ‘And for another?’

  ‘Felicity doesn’t like…’ Jill didn’t finish the sentence.

  ‘Doesn’t like what?’

  ‘Doesn’t like people staying over.’

  ‘She doesn’t seem to mind you staying over.’

  ‘Why should she?’

  ‘I’m just saying that if she doesn’t mind you staying over, that doesn’t seem to fit in with your comment that she doesn’t like—’

  ‘It’s you. All right? She doesn’t like you.’

  Was I hearing correctly? ‘Me? What’s wrong with me?’

  ‘She thinks you’re uncouth.’

  ‘She’s met me a sum total of twice!’

  ‘And on each occasion you’ve been involved in a fight. That time at New Year and last Friday in Edinburgh.’

  ‘I was defending myself last Friday. How is it my fault if I’m attacked by some nutter?’

  ‘That’s just it, Robbie. It’s never your fault. Everything always happens to you. Did you see a nutter attack any of the other diners? No – just poor old Robbie Munro.’

  If I’d wanted an argument I could have stayed in West Lothian and continued my on-going hostilities with Sheriff Brechin. ‘All right, all right, I get the picture. I’m an uncouth oaf who’s not fit to mix in polite society. I don’t want to go to her pokey-wee flat anyway. Probably stinks of sewage from the river. But if you’re not staying at the Savannah maybe I should go somewhere less expensive,’ I said.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, I thought I’d be staying in your room, but if you’re not there anymore…’

  Jill sighed. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll pay.’

  ‘I don’t mean that.’

  ‘Really, it’s fine.’

  ‘Will you put me through on expenses too? How’s that going to look? You live with your boss. Don’t you think it will be a tad obvious if you start charging for hotel rooms?’

  ‘I don’t need to put it through on expenses.’

  ‘I’m not having you pay for my hotel room.’

  ‘Why not? The crime business booming is it?’

  ‘Seeing how you’ve asked, I did manage to find a good client this week.’ Found him and then promptly lost him again. What had happened to Mr Posh? I wondered. Still, I had five thousand of his pounds in my bank account, even though I had been hoping to put it towards a house for Jill and me and not take a chunk out of it with a stay at an over-priced hotel.

  ‘By good client, I take it you mean a bad client? Like the rest of your clientele.’

  ‘Actually, he wasn’t a criminal client, some of whom are innocent by the way. He was instructing me in a civil matter, sort of, and didn’t mind paying for the privilege.’

  ‘I don’t care. I’m still going to pay for your hotel,’ Jill said.

  We continued to argue about who was going to pay my hotel bill until the taxi stopped next to the sandstone columns either side of the front doors of the Savannah. Jill handed the taxi-driver the fare and waited for a receipt.

  I was standing, holdall in hand, expecting her to alight, when she closed the door and sat back in her seat.

  I saw the driver turn his head and say something and Jill say something back. She rolled down the window. ‘I’ve got to go.’

  ‘I thought you might have been coming up to my room,’ I said, poking my head through the window at her. ‘You know, for a drink or something. Preferably something.’

  Another cab arrived and pulled up behind ours. ‘I’ll need to get a move on, love,’ the taxi driver said.

  ‘Look, Robbie. You can’t phone me at six in the morning to announce that you’re coming down here and expect me to drop everything. I’ve got a job to do. I had to take an extended lunch hour to collect you from the station—’

  ‘Well, can’t you extend it a little more?’

  ‘No, and the longer you keep me talking here, the longer I’ll have to stay at the office to catch up.’

  I pulled my head out and stood there, doing my best to appear aloof, looking over the top of the taxi at a London sightseeing tour bus collecting passengers in a bay on the opposite side of Holland Avenue.

  Jill came to the window. ‘It’s Saturday tomorrow, we can do something nice.’ The other cab honked its horn. ‘You got your mobile with you?’ She didn’t wait for an answer. ‘I’ll call you when I’ve finished work and we can meet up for dinner. I’ll make the arrangements.’ The taxi began to drive off. Through the rear window I saw Jill mouth, ‘I’ll call you,’ while raising a hand to her face, pinky to lips, thumb to ear, in the universal g
esture.

  Right at that moment it felt like she was making another universal gesture, involving two different fingers.

  Chapter 12

  Jill didn’t call. Her PA did, to say that she’d booked a table for eight o’clock at Orgoglio di Napoli, an Italian restaurant in Knightsbridge.

  I pitched up right on time and had been chomping on giant green table olives and fresh, crusty bread for a quarter of an hour before Jill arrived, still in her work clothes and looking flustered.

  ‘Sorry I’m late,’ she said. ‘You’ve no idea what that place is like. It was going like a funfair all day and of course it didn’t help that I had to—’

  She was interrupted by a waiter who gave us each a menu and heartily recommended the Linguine con Vongole e Gamberoni, which he translated as pasta with clams and tiger prawns. According to the waiter, the chef’s signature sauce, with garlic, cream and tomato, would take my breath away. If it didn’t, the price would. I ordered it anyway and Jill opted for Ravioli Tino.

  ‘I always go for the ravioli when I come here,’ she said. ‘Either that or the Zitoni Toscanini.’

  ‘And there was me going to ask you if you came here often.’ I said.

  She smiled. ‘Sorry to ruin your only chat-up line.’

  We clinked wine glasses. I liked red, but Jill much preferred white so in a spirit of conciliation I’d ordered a bottle of her favourite Blanc de Rossis without any discussion.

  ‘And I’m sorry if I was short with you earlier,’ she said.

  ‘That’s okay,’ I lied. ‘I realise my surprise visit must have caught you on the hop.’

  ‘Doesn’t matter, I shouldn’t have just dumped you at the hotel and run off. And I wouldn’t have if things weren’t so busy just now with the amalgamation.’

  ‘Amalgamation? Is that the important thing you’re not supposed to tell anyone about?’

  ‘That was last week. They made the official announcement two days ago. This time last year no one had heard of Lyon Laboratories.’

  I still hadn’t.

  Jill swirled the wine in her inordinately-large wine glass. ‘Then they had that break-through in gene therapy and now it makes perfect sense for Zanetti to take them over.’

  I took a sip of wine. It was good. Not forty-two quid a bottle good, but definitely good. ‘I thought you said it was an amalgamation?’

  ‘That’s what the big company calls it to keep the smaller company happy, but really, in business, there are no mergers, only acquisitions.’

  I couldn’t believe what was happening. Was this really Jill? Sitting here, a few Rolls Royce lengths from the world’s most famous department store, dining beyond my means and lecturing on corporate take-overs?

  ‘It’s all timed perfectly to coincide with the opening of Zanetti UK’s new technology park near Lasswade.’

  I had a feeling Jill had told me about this exciting development previously. I think it may have been during a football match on the telly. She reminded me. Zanetti was about to complete the construction of a centre for pharmaceutical research and development, manufacture and distribution. The site was to the east of Edinburgh, on land that was formerly part of the green-belt. The company had promised, in exchange for the relaxation of certain planning restrictions, to create nearly two thousand new jobs. The Scottish Government was very excited. So was Jill. So was I. It meant Jill would return to Scotland to work and we wouldn’t have to continue our long distance relationship.

  A buzzing sound. By the time I’d laid down my glass and reached for the phone in my pocket, Jill had hers pressed to the side of her head, the palm of her other hand clamped over the opposite ear.

  ‘Felicity,’ she said, after a brief conversation in which Jill’s involvement was limited to a hello and cheerio.

  ‘Not joining us?’ I asked, unable to blunt the edge off my voice.

  ‘Apart from by the magic of telecommunications, no,’ Jill replied and took a slug of white wine. ‘She was phoning to tell me we have a breakfast meeting tomorrow.’

  ‘Tomorrow? I thought we were going to do something?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘I don’t know. You said we would do something nice together.’

  ‘We will. I’ll not be busy the whole day.’

  Our starters arrived. I’d ordered the Bresaola Della Valtellina, thin slices of beef fillet, marinated in olive oil and lemon juice and topped with rocket and parmesan shavings.

  ‘What time is your meeting?’ I asked.

  ‘Seven-thirty. Which means I’ll have to be up early to look my best.’

  ‘Where is it?’

  ‘Westminster.’

  ‘The Houses of Parliament?’

  ‘We usually meet in the dining room on the ground floor.’

  Oh, she did, did she?

  ‘Anything to do with genetics is terribly sensitive. The sort of cutting-edge research that Zanetti will be taking on once Lyon Laboratories is on-board means we must have the Government on our side. That involves a lot of lobbying, which is what Felicity excels at. She has those M.P.s eating out of her hand.’

  More buzzing. This time it was my phone. I glanced at the display and returned the phone to my pocket. ‘And where do you fit in?’

  ‘I help explain the scientific side of things in layman’s terms - so that even politicians can understand.’

  ‘You?’

  Jill stared at me through narrowed eyes. ‘Yes me. I happen to be good at it.’

  ‘I didn’t mean it like that—’

  ‘Well what did you mean it like?’ Jill set down her knife and fork, reached over and took my hand. ‘I’m sorry, Robbie. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.’

  ‘You’re under a lot of stress,’ I said. From years of painful experience I knew to make no mention of, that time of the month, even when all the evidence pointed to that time of the month. ‘Let’s eat up and I’ll take you back to Felicity’s.’

  ‘We could go back to the hotel if you like.’

  ‘No, you’ve got an early start,’ I said.

  She didn’t quibble. We started making inroads into our antipasti.

  ‘If the meeting goes well I’m sure Felicity will let me have the rest of the day off and I’ll come see you,’ Jill said.

  ‘That would be great,’ I replied, my mouth full of starter, the next wafer-thin slice of cured beef, dangling from a prong of my fork.

  ‘I’ve always wondered how they manage to cut the meat so thinly,’ she said.

  I’d always wondered that too, but right then I was wondering more why I had a missed call from Suzie Lake on my phone.

  Chapter 13

  ‘This is a coincidence,’ Suzie said.

  The small bar, just off the lobby of the Savannah Hotel, was all whirring ceiling fans, palm trees and cane furniture. We sat on high stools: Suzie sipping a French Martini and attracting admiring glances from every red-blooded male in the W11 postcode area, me enjoying a reassuringly-large tumbler of Glendronach and the envious stares.

  ‘Fancy us being in London at the same time,’ she said. ‘What brings you here?’

  ‘Oh, business,’ I said. ‘You?’

  ‘The same. I’m here to tell my agent the good news. About my new book,’ she added. ‘I really think it’s going to put my name back on the map. A non-fiction novel, it’s the sort of thing they dish out literary prizes for. My credibility rating will soar. It will—’

  ‘What have you written so far?’ I asked.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she cocked an exquisite eyebrow. ‘Once I have the material I need, the words will simply fly onto the paper.’

  I finished my whisky. The Glendronach 15 year-old Revival was a masterpiece of distilling art. Dark and sherry sweet, a drop of water brought out a flood of flavours and made it far too drinkable. Ignoring my, admittedly feeble, protests, Suzie ordered me another and when it arrived she lowered herself from the stool. ‘Come on,’ she said, lifting her own drink from the bar. Let’s find somewhere
more comfortable and you can tell me everything you know about young master Quirk. She led me over to a small couch in the corner. Barely large enough for the two of us, it was a tight squeeze. I thought it rude to complain.

  ‘Tell me the story,’ Suzie said. ‘Right from the start. Pretend I don’t know anything. I don’t want to go into this with any preconceived ideas.’

  I didn’t normally discuss my cases with anyone, but this was different. This was Suzie Lake in the flesh, and that flesh was sitting so close to me that our legs touched. Anyway, was what she wanted to know really all that confidential? The trial would start in a few weeks and everything would become public knowledge then, or, at any rate, most of it. The woman only wanted a head start. Guilty feelings thus assuaged, larynx lubricated by the fine fifteen year-old single malt, I commenced what I expected to be the opening chapter to Suzie’s soon-to-be bestseller.

  * * * * *

  In every criminal case there are at least two accounts of what happened: the prosecution version and the defence version.

  In the case against Dominic Quirk and Mark Starrs, I suspected there might be three accounts, Quirk’s, Starr’s and the Crown’s. There might even be a fourth: the truth; something that could easily get in the way of what each side wanted most: not justice: victory.

  The Crown’s view was simple and straightforward and had been disclosed to the defence in a flurry of witness statements, recorded interviews, scene of crime photographs, pathology reports and forensic analyses. Quirk and Starrs had abducted Doreen Anderson, taken her to Quirk’s house, plied her with drink and drugs, murdered her and dumped her body in the woods.

  As for the defence, what Paul was preparing for Quirk was still shrouded in mystery. All I could relay to Suzie was my client’s version of events, and she seemed happy enough with that. Sitting beside me, staring up and absorbing every word of mine through those beautiful big brown eyes.

  To replace the Range Rover, wrecked in the recent, and fatal for some, accident, Santa Claus had brought Dominic Quirk something sporty in estoril blue that could shift from zero to sixty in less time than it took to say jingle bells. The only problem was that he couldn’t drive until his ban was up and so his friend and fellow student, Mark Starrs, was acting as chauffeur for the remaining few months. Easter Saturday night they’d been cruising the streets of St Andrews and spied Doreen walking the narrow, cobbled surface of North Castle Street. She’d accepted their offer of a lift home, but instead they’d driven to Quirk’s student accommodation in the nearby village of Dunino, one of those blink-and-you’ll-miss-it places, that are scattered about the East Neuk of Fife.