A Taste for Malice (27 page)

‘So what makes you think she works here?’

‘She said she was in medical records. She didn’t say which hospital.’

‘Aah.’

‘This is the third one I’ve tried.’

‘Ooh.’ She tried to disguise a smile. ‘That’s determination.’

I shrug in a self-deprecating way.

‘She must be nice,’ she says. Her voice is wistful. A strand of hair is breeze-blown over her eyes and she tugs it behind an ear. Her expression changes as something occurs to her. ‘How do I know that you’re not some kind of sick psycho?’

A car draws up behind me. I hear the handbrake being ratcheted tight. A door opens and shuts. Footsteps.

‘My eyebrows.’ I point. ‘They don’t meet in the middle.’

She laughs. ‘Right.’

‘A well-known fact. Neither do I have a hunch,’ I say and turn to the side to display my straight back.

She’s grinning broadly now. ‘And you’re not wearing a mask like Hannibal Lector.’

‘You must be well up on your killer types.’

‘I’ve met a few assholes in my time.’

I sense someone at my side. ‘Excuse me,’ I hear a woman say. I apologise and move out of the way.

‘Afternoon, Leigh. How’s Joe been today?’

‘He’s been a wee darling,’ Leigh answers and smiles, slightly abashed at using a word like
assholes
in front of a mother. She moves aside to let her in and mouths “Better go” to me.

Before she shuts the door she says, ‘Try Zone 1, Block D.’

I smile, raise my hand in thanks and turn to go away. The door shuts. I go back and knock on it. She opens it straight away.

‘Yes?’ She looks kind of pleased to see me.

‘If she’s not there, what are you doing tonight?’

‘Not playing second choice.’ Smile.

She closes the door.

‘Jim, I’m leaving,’ Angela was standing at the door when he came home from work, a holdall by her side and a white-faced Ben clinging on to her arm.

‘What?’ Jim shut the front door behind him as if that would close off the thought in Angela’s head.

‘My long-term memory is fine, Jim. I can remember everything, Jim.
Everything
.’ Her face was in his, eyes all but popping from her head, her skin a deep pink. She handed him something. He opened his hand; it now held a condom. He could feel the waxy skin of it and its squishy little deposit at the end. He let it fall, disgusted.

‘I’m sure a DNA test would reveal who filled it,’ said Angela.

‘Ben, go to your room,’ said Jim, partly as a delaying tactic and mostly because he didn’t want his son to hear what was coming next.

‘Moira told me everything. You bastard.’ Her saliva sprayed on to his cheek. ‘In her moment of weakness you …’ her hand shot out and smashed into his cheek.

‘Mind you, there is a pattern there, isn’t there? You and vulnerable women. You just can’t help yourself, can you?’

‘What are you on about? A pattern?’ Jim was mystified. Unless she had remembered the day her mother died. She doesn’t remember that, does she?

He held a hand to his face trying to think. This wasn’t happening. This can’t be happening. Not again.

Angela lifted her bag and pushed him.

‘Where will you go? You can’t go. You can’t look after yourself. Can’t we talk this through?’ He held her arms. She shrugged him off. He looked around for Moira, but she was nowhere to be seen.

‘Angela, what’s got into you?’ He held out the condom wrapper. ‘I can explain this.’

‘Don’t you dare tell me any more lies, Jim Hilton. I’ve had enough.’ She stood in front of him every inch of her vibrating with rage. She lashed out with her foot and caught him on the knee.

‘Oww. That hurt,’ he rubbed at it. ‘Angela. Listen to me. It’s not what you think.’

‘I remember everything, Jim. My long-term memory has been fine for days,’ she was smiling like a madwoman. ‘I remember that we were split up before the accident. I remember why we split up before the accident. But you were being so nice. So considerate that I believed you were a changed man.’ She slapped him again. She grunted with the effort, like a tennis player might during a long rally. He took it without complaint.

‘What is it with my friends? Kirsty not enough for you, you have to go and fuck Moira as well?’

‘But she …’

‘She what, Jim? Was lonely and vulnerable? Just the kind of woman you like?’

She seduced me, he wanted to say but he knew as soon as the words were out of his mouth they would damn him. His mind wasn’t working properly. Not only was she the one who seduced him, but they didn’t use a condom. They didn’t even have full sex. So where did that come from? And what was that about Kirsty?

‘But Angela …’

She pushed past him and stretched for her bag. She was determined and nothing Jim could say would rein her in.

‘I’ll go,’ he heard himself say. ‘You can’t. You’ve nowhere to go.’

She stopped at the door, facing the wood. ‘Why, Jim? Why?’

‘But I’m taking Ben,’ Jim said. ‘You can barely look after yourself.’

Angela rounded on him. ‘My son is staying with me.’

‘No way,’ said Jim. He was not going through that again.

Angela opened the door and took a step out. Jim pulled her back in. She screamed at him. He shut the door.

‘Get your fucking hands off me.’

Jim took a step back. He was lost against the violence of her anger. ‘You can’t leave,’ he said. ‘It should be me.’

‘Too right,’ said Angela. ‘And if you think you are taking Ben, you are seriously mistaken.’

‘I am not leaving here without my son,’ Jim shouted.

‘Dad. Mum. Please don’t.’ Jim could hear Ben screaming from the top of the stairs.

‘I am not leaving here without my son,’ Jim shouted again, losing all restraint.

‘Fine, then I’ll go.’ Angela made for the door again. Jim pulled her back again.

‘Don’t …’ punch, ‘touch ...’, punch, ‘me.’

A heavy knock sounded on the door. Angela opened it.

It was a uniformed policeman and woman.

Angela and Jim were both stunned into silence. Who called them and how did they get here so quickly? They had barely begun to argue.

‘We were called in because there was a fight,’ the male said. While he did so the female stood by Angela like a private guard.

‘What’s going on?’ she asked.

Angela and Jim both spoke at the same time. Their anger at the other made the words flow out of their mouths, hot and dangerous.

‘Mr Hilton, you should pack a few things and leave,’ said the female. ‘Your wife is clearly ill and should have the minimum disturbance. I think it’s best all round if you both take some time out.’

‘What about Ben? You said it, she’s ill …’ a distant thought remained unexpressed. How did the policewoman know Angela was ill? ‘…She can’t look after herself let alone a four year old.’

‘I can help there,’ a voice said and Moira appeared from the kitchen.

‘You fucking witch,’ Jim roared and stepped towards her.

‘Sir, if you don’t calm down I’ll have to arrest you,’ said the policewoman.

As I face the girl on reception in Zone 1 Block D I can’t help but wonder what the Latin might be for “Harassed but Helpful”. Whatever it is it should be formed into a coat of arms and stuck above every sign for the National Health Service.

Her desk is a curved slab of pale wood. It contains the ubiquitous computer screen and piles of folders that could have once amounted to a small forest. Despite her obvious workload the girl’s smile is genuine. She knows she has a shitload of work and she knows that she’ll get round to it eventually.

‘Can I help?’

‘Yes please,’ I read her badge, ‘Caroline. I’m looking for Jasmine?’

‘Does Jasmine have a second name?’ She has long brown hair caught in a neat ponytail, a square shaped face and I can’t see much else of her because she’s wearing a uniform and sitting down. Looks to be around the same age as Jasmine. Chances are they might be friends.

‘I’m positively sure that she does.’ I nod. ‘I just forgot to ask her.’ I give the million-pound smile another outing.

‘If this is a personal call, sir, I’m not sure I can help you,’ she picks up a pen and fiddles with it. A good sign. Displacement activity that shows me she is a girl who doesn’t like to say no.

‘It’s not personal.’ I reach into my back pocket and pull out my wallet. From a section in the middle I select my warrant card and show it to her. ‘It’s business.’

‘I’ll see if she’s in,’ she says and then fiddles about with her computer screen via her mouse. While she searches for what I assume is an extension number I look around me. What I see is mostly bare and functional. An essay in the necessity of industrial drabness. The walls are a bluegrey and the floor is a similar colour. At least the ceiling is white. Broken only by a small closed-circuit camera aimed at the desk.

Caroline then punches a number into her phone. She’s too far away from me to hear any of the other side of her conversation. She asks for Jasmine. Then pauses. Looks at me. Makes an uh-huh sound. Then another pause. A nod. Then says, ‘Right. OK.’

She looks up at me. ‘The girls in her office are going to look for her. They think she’s gone out for an errand to one of the other wards.’

Errand
. Do people actually use that word nowadays? It seems curiously out-dated coming out of this young girl’s lips.

‘How well do you know Jasmine?’ I ask.

‘OK,’ she tucks a strand of hair that’s come loose from her ponytail behind her ear. ‘Wouldn’t say we were best buddies or anything. She’s a bit …’ Caroline looks quickly to the side as she thinks of a word. ‘Rough.’ Then colours slightly as if afraid I might think she’s a bitch.

‘Would you say you know her well enough to lie for her?’

‘Sorry?’ Her blush works at her cheeks and flows up to her eye line.

‘She told you to keep me waiting while she did a runner, didn’t she?’ I swivel round to point at the camera. ‘She can see me on that, can’t she?’

Caroline studies a file on her desk and mumbles something. Sounds like sorry.

‘Does she have a car?’

Nod.

‘Where do staff members park their cars in this place?’

‘Anywhere.’ She shrugs.

‘What kind of car does she have?’

‘A Clio. Red.’ Her expression sours against the thought she’s grassing on a mate.

‘Fuck!’ I turn to move away and then turn back. ‘Don’t go away, young lady. I want to speak to you again.’

I race out of the reception area and back to my car. As I run to the car park I keep my eyes open for a red Renault Clio. Nothing. Then I spot her just as I reach my car. From where I am parked I can see a line of cars queuing to get out of the hospital grounds. Just then a car that answers the description Caroline gave me turns right into traffic and out of sight. Fuck! This calls for a quick decision. If I get in the car and try to catch up with her I have no way of knowing which way she has gone. This is a well-connected hospital. From here and driving in that direction, she could have made her way to Govan and from there anywhere to the south of the river or she could have made for the Clyde Tunnel and from there anywhere north.

Time to have another wee chat with Caroline.

On the way back to her office I give Kenny a call. He answers immediately.

‘McBain. I was just thinking about you.’

‘Having a wank?’

‘That would be a no ... unless you’ve had a back, sack and crack done since we last spoke.’

‘Jasmine,’ I say, thinking I’ve had enough banter. ‘You got her address?’

‘Does the Pope wear a funny hat, does a bear shit in the woods, does a one-legged duck …’

‘Do you ever just give a straight answer? Can you meet me at mine in half an hour?’

‘No can do, big guy. Crime doesn’t only pay, it’s calling me.’

‘Don’t need to hear any more. Send me a text with the address, will you?’

I close the connection without saying goodbye. He’s got broad shoulders. He can take it.

Back at Zone 1 Block D, Caroline has been replaced by a man. He looks like he is in his early thirties, his hair is “styled” in what could best be described as a reverse Mohican and he is wearing a brown tie like it houses MRSA. His badge reads “Bob”.

‘Can I speak to Caroline, please?’

‘You’ll be the policeman who was bothering our staff?’ A faint scent reaches me from across the desk. Aftershave. Smells familiar, but I can’t place it.

‘You’ll be the jobs-worth who tries to get in my way.’

We size each other up. If we were dogs he’d be pissing in every corner of the room.

‘How can we be of assistance, officer?’

‘It’s Detective Inspector McBain.’

He deflates just slightly under the weight of my full title. Then he rallies. ‘Do you have a warrant?’

‘This isn’t Hollywood, Bob. And we’re just at the stage of making some enquiries. Have you ever had to help the police with their enquiries, Bob?’ As I speak I move closer to the desk. He’s sitting at the other side and I tower over him.

He stands up. I still tower over him.

It’s good to be the king.

‘As I said, we’ll do whatever we can to help the police. We are kind of busy.’ He’s being apologetic. Building his case for letting me down. ‘We’re in the middle of an audit.’ He makes a face. ‘As long as whatever you are looking for doesn’t compromise our own legal responsibilities, I am more than happy to help.’ His smile is merely a curve to his mouth. His eyes are full of uncertainty, topped off with a desire to impress any staff member who is watching on the CCTV. However, he’s alluding to Data Protection and that’s a line I don’t want him to stick with. Time to crank up the pressure.

‘You don’t seem to be bothered that one of your staff legged it as soon as the police arrived.’

‘She was going off duty and whatever our staff do in their own time is not under our control.’

‘It should be if it involves stolen prescription pads.’ Don’t know where that came from, but I’ll run with it.

His adam’s apple bobbed in his neck. ‘That’s eh…’

‘That’s a story the press would love. I’m not above going to the newspapers if it flushes out the bad guy. Are you a bad guy, Bob?’

‘Certainly not,’ he says and bristles. His scalp gleams and the tufts on the side of his head are on full alert. He pushes the knot in his tie closer to his neck. Several thoughts play across his features. It would not look good if a story like this was real. He’s not to know that occasionally I take the truth for a wee walk, come back and leave it behind.