A Cold Killing (Rosie Gilmour) (8 page)

Eventually, Gerard spoke.

‘Okay. I’ll tell you a story . . .’

‘Something is ringing all my bells, Gilmour,’ McGuire said as she walked into his office. ‘Is there some kind of lone vigilante out there catching up with all the bad bastards? First that old arsehole Rab Jackson in Spain, and now Malky Cameron? Two useless scumbags off the face of the earth in a week. We need to get a real handle on this. The punters love this kind of shit. Declan’s down in Ayr for the press conference. I mean, they’re both stiffs now, so we can say what the fuck we like about them.’

‘I know. The cops are throwing a party. I’m seeing a contact later. He’s been moved to the Serious Crime Squad, so that means he gets his finger in all the pies. He might have a bit more intelligence on who bumped them off.’

Rosie sat down on the sofa. ‘But first, I’ve got even better news for you.’

McGuire came out from behind his desk and stood resting his backside against it, looking down at her. He raised his eyebrows for her to begin.

‘I went up to Hawkins’ house last night,’ Rosie said. ‘And much to my amazement, I got in.’

‘No way!’

‘I did.’ She flashed a triumphant smile. ‘And it’s incredible stuff.’

‘Come on then.’ He sat opposite her, swung his feet onto the coffee table and clasped his hands behind his head. ‘I’ve got twenty minutes till the conference. Make my day.’

‘Okay,’ Rosie said. ‘I won’t go into everything, Mick, because we can talk later and decide how we play this, but his story will blow you away.’ She paused for effect. ‘Mahoney was a spy for Stasi – you know, the East German secret service?’

‘Fuck! Seriously?’

‘Yep. But that’s not all. He was also spying
on
them – for the Brits.’

‘You are
fucking
joking.’

‘I’m not.’

‘Hawkins knows all this? He has proof?’

‘Well, that will be the difficult part. Nobody ever has real proof of these things. Stasi isn’t there any more since the Berlin Wall came down, and MI6 are hardly going to admit it.’

McGuire took a deep breath, and Rosie waited while he digested the information. Then he put his hand up.

‘First of all, Rosie, what’s Hawkins like? Is he a doddery old fucker who would make this up?’

‘Not at all. He doesn’t seem like a fantasist.’ She shrugged. ‘But of course you never know. He and Mahoney have been friends since they were students together. Hawkins is gay.’

‘Friends? What kind of friends? The kind that play Hide the Sausage when the lights go out?’

‘No.’ Rosie chortled. ‘He loved Mahoney, but I think he established pretty early on that Mahoney liked women. Lots of them, as it’s turning out.’

‘So what did he tell you?’

Rosie walked McGuire through the full story that she had gleaned from Hawkins during the hour-long chat in his house.

Over a second mug of tea, Hawkins had painted a vivid picture. Back in the sixties, he explained, life at the university campus was a melting pot of idealism and excitement. Young people everywhere seemed to want to be part of some revolution or another. If it wasn’t the students rioting in France, it was in London, in Italy, in the US over Vietnam. Tom Mahoney was at the forefront of everything. He’d become the darling of the student union and had particular kudos because his studies took him to Eastern Europe. Many of the lecturers were left wing anyway and relished the upsurge in every area of life. It was a time when people could sense change and power, and the youth were rebelling about everything, from the music they’d been raised on to everything that spelt authority and establishment. Mahoney’s studies had taken him to East Berlin for a while, where he spent almost a year, and his thesis was an in-depth study of life there and the Communist ethos in practice. He was drawn to it. After he graduated and began lecturing, he maintained his Soviet connections, at one time going on sabbatical and working at the University of East Berlin. So, Hawkins had said, it was almost a natural process that the Soviets would bring him on board. He was recruited by the Stasi. He had a KGB handler whose name was Katya, and that’s where it all went wrong. He fell for her. Rosie had patiently listened to Hawkins’s story, resisting the urge to ask him to cut to the chase and tell him how this was all connected to Mahoney’s murder.

McGuire interrupted.

‘Right. I’m loving this, Rosie. But I don’t have time for the full-length version of
Doctor Zhivago
, so what’s the bottom line?’

‘I was just painting the picture for you,’ Rosie said, faking a huff.

‘Save it for the colour piece. How did MI6 get involved?’

‘That, I don’t know for sure. Hawkins isn’t sure either, but he suspects Mahoney was a double agent for years. Says he only came out with everything in the last few months to him. Before, he would never tell him anything about his secret life. Mahoney did admit he’d had an affair over there and that there was a woman he’d fallen in love with, but because of his family he had to keep it quiet. Then, of course, the Cold War ends, and there’s no need for him to continue spying because Stasi and East Germany are broken up in the new Europe.’

McGuire nodded.

‘So,’ Rosie continued, ‘it was a few years later, after he retired, that he was asked by MI6 to get involved again – this time in the fight against crime. As we both know, the forces from different countries share information on who the major players are. They pull together, all trying to track down drugs, money laundering, organized crime. You know how it was . . . After the fall of the Soviet Union, everyone’s suddenly a gangster or some shifty oligarch. Well, apparently, Mahoney was working along with the newly formed united German force which was collaborating with the UK and the rest of Europe in trying to crack open the major crime cartels.’

‘So it was the Eastern Europeans who bumped him off?’

‘That’s the thing. Not sure who it was. That’s why Hawkins has all the information. He was handed a package by Mahoney in that café just before Mahoney was executed. He said he hasn’t even opened it yet. But Mahoney told him all about it and said it would expose everyone.’

‘Christ. Really?’

‘Yep. So he says. Mahoney was going to blow the whistle, because the people they were trying to bring down were involved in the illegal arms trade – selling guns to gangsters and stuff like that. He told me the bones of the story.’

‘And?’

‘Well, it seems they set up some kind of sting, and the woman, Katya, who he’d brought in to help because of her old East European and Russian connections, got killed. Mahoney was convinced they sacrificed her. The sting didn’t entirely fail, as they managed to capture a couple of the bad guys. But the Brits were trying to keep the whole thing quiet, because for years
they’d
actually been dealing with the gunrunners too.’

‘What? Dealing with gunrunners? The government?’

‘Yes. Let me explain. The same firm that supplied them with weapons was also supplying the gangsters here and abroad. And occasionally the firm would buy guns from Eastern European gangsters. Unbelievable! But that’s what he said!’

‘Are you seriously telling me that the British government and police force dealt with illegal gunrunners?’

‘Yes. And the army. But they didn’t know it until it was too late. Hawkins said it was a company down south called J B Solutions. The Home Office and the MoD had been dealing with them for years, unaware of their links to organized crime. J B Solutions had been supplying the British army and police force for years. But it’s the very same company the gangsters get their weapons from. Much of the illegal guns and weaponry you get on the streets today originated from this company. Who knows what we’ll find once we start digging. I haven’t had a chance to look at the cuttings yet.’ Rosie paused. ‘Oh, and by the way, Mick, I got a call from a woman who said she was the mystery Scot in the King’s Cross café when the murder happened. She’s raging at our story because she thinks it makes her look as if she’s under suspicion. But she said one thing to me – J B Solutions.’

‘What? She said that?’

‘Yep. Where did that come from?’

‘No idea. She said for me to look into them, and that she would call me back. Then she hung up.’

‘Christ!’

‘I’m sure she’ll call back. She must know something.’

‘Fuck me! I love the sound of this. All that’s missing is 007 and Miss Funnyfanny.’ He got to his feet and picked up the schedule for the morning editorial conference from his desk. ‘Prove all this, Gilmour. That should be easy for a woman like you.’

They walked towards the door. Rosie loved McGuire’s belief in her, even if he was being a bit sarcastic. But she knew she was a long way from proving anything.

‘Hawkins said he’ll help me. He wants the story out. So I’m hoping he’ll come across with the package Mahoney gave him in the café. As for the mystery Scot – we’ll just have to hope for the best.’

Rosie had been tempted to ask the barman at O’Brien’s for a large gin and tonic, but thought better of it. The problem with doubles was you drank them just as fast as singles. They had that little extra kick, but if you really felt like knocking back a few, then one double got you in the mood and before you knew it you’d be three doubles down the line and anything could happen after that. Sensibly, she ordered a single, and took as conservative a drink as she could manage.

She turned over all the information Hawkins had given her last night and reflected on her conversation with McGuire. He was hooked into the story, but proving it was another matter. Getting it past the
Post
’s lawyers was sure to be even more tricky. She needed some breaks.

‘Here’s your fancyman now.’ The silver-haired barman cast his eyes beyond her. His strong Donegal accent had become refined over the years, working among the movers and shakers who frequented O’Brien’s, so these days his dulcet tones sounded more like those of a friendly radio presenter than a barman.

She didn’t need to look over her shoulder for the Strathclyde police detective sergeant, her close friend and trusted contact. They met regularly in O’Brien’s, and anyone who saw them together would probably assume they were a couple. The barman knew different – in fact, he knew just about everything that went on at the other side of the bar: who was glad-handing who, and why; what top lawyer was trying to get the drawers off which pretty young trainee; the who’s who of the shiny-suited drug dealers – no amount of expensive tailoring could camouflage the knuckle-trailing thugs they were.

‘Hello, my little ray of sunshine.’ Don put his arms around Rosie and gave her a tight hug. ‘You’re looking fantastic!’ He brushed his hand over her hair and gave her a kiss on the cheek. ‘You look as if you’ve been on holiday – considering you’ve been getting hunted down by a mob of angry Ulstermen.’

‘Nah,’ Rosie said. ‘I have friends in low places . . . and they spoke to the lads in Belfast with all the clout. The dogs were called off. But it took a bit of time.’

‘Good. You need to watch your back, though. There will always be the random nutter who might take a pop at you.’

‘Yeah.’ Rosie didn’t need reminding of that. ‘Anyway. Pint?’

‘Stella,’ Don turned to the barman. ‘Tell Stella, I love her,’ he crooned.

‘So how’s life in the Serious Crime Squad, big man? Is it just like on the telly?’ Rosie gave him a playful dig in the arm.

‘Oh aye. Very glamorous, too. Instead of dragging some wee ned out of his bed at four in the morning in a housing scheme, we get to batter into the bigger fish. It’s great. I cannot tell you the joy when you collar some arsehole coke dealer who’s living out in Bearsden, and you get to empty his designer furniture onto the front garden while you rummage through his five-bedroom villa. The neighbours love it. It’s especially rewarding if you can do it while his wife is getting into the Range Rover to go to the hairdresser.’

‘Sounds like my kind of party. You should invite us along to one of your busts. Would be good publicity – cops warning they will hunt the dealers down . . . that kind of line. I could get that in the paper.’

Don looked at her. ‘Yeah, well, you’d need to talk to the press office for that.’

Rosie shot him a sarcastic smile.

‘You’re not going all straight on me now, with the press office phrasebook? “I can confirm there has been an incident,” when there’s actually a man lying in the street with a knife in his back.’

Don snorted.

‘If I was, I wouldn’t be here, darlin’. I just have to watch my step a bit, till I get bedded into the squad.’

‘Sure,’ Rosie said, clinking his glass. ‘To the next head of the CID.’

Don’s neck went a little red under his collar, and Rosie knew he’d at least entertained the notion that getting to the top of the heap wasn’t an impossibility. At forty-one, though, and not yet an inspector, it probably wasn’t going to happen.

‘So what are you up to?’ Don said. ‘You were saying you were on another story?’

‘Yeah. I arrived back in London just as that Glasgow Uni lecturer got shot in the café at King’s Cross, so I stuck around there for a couple of days.’ She sipped her drink. ‘Are your guys looking at this? Given that it was Eastern Europeans who bumped him off?’

Rosie decided to keep her powder dry. She studied Don’s face for a flicker of knowledge. Tom Mahoney’s murder was a top-level investigation so she guessed the SCS might have been briefed by the Met. If he knew anything, his face didn’t show it.

‘Don’t think so. It’s a Met investigation. Leave it to them. They’ll maybe get in touch when they’re looking for help. As usual.’

Rosie changed the subject.

‘So what do you make of the Malky Cameron murder? Bit of a coincidence with him and his old partner in crime, Rab Jackson, getting done in the same way within a few days of each other. Old scores?’ Don nodded.

‘Looks like it. But although they were supposedly retired – Rab was in Spain for years – they were still well enough respected by the arseholes running the show these days. And Rab was still a player. Jackson and Cameron were old school. None of these pricks here would bump them off. We’re pretty sure of that.’

‘But are the two murders connected?’

‘Have to be.’

‘Any hints?’

Don took a long drink and offered Rosie a cigarette. She declined, and he lit his, taking a lungful of smoke then blowing it upwards, watching it swirl as though it were a look he’d perfected over the years. It went well with his craggy, slept-in looks and five o’clock shadow.

‘Something
has
shown up on our radar actually. I don’t know if you know the history of Jackson and Cameron.’

‘Bit before my time,’ Rosie said. ‘But I know they were evil bastards. Pimps, armed robbers and into hard drugs. Back in the early days it was all extortion and protection money from all the places in the city. They controlled everything. Anyone who didn’t play ball with them ended up in a shallow grave.’

‘That’s right. But one of the older guys in the squad was telling us that detectives questioned them about twenty-five years ago over the death of a woman in Glasgow. A hooker, Jackie Reilly. She worked from her flat up in Maryhill, and she had to pay Jackson and Co. in kind for not forcing her on to the street. They wanted a free shag, they went there. She had two kids. Girls. Then one night she gets burned to death in a fire in the house. The kids were rescued. The wee one, Ruby, managed to pull the big sister out. Amazing story at the time, apparently. You should check back the cuttings’

‘I will,’ Rosie said. ‘Jackie Reilly . . . Ruby.’ She memorized the names. ‘What was the other girl’s name?’

‘Judy. She was the older one. Thing is, when the cops arrived, no bastard had seen a thing. Usual shite. Everyone looked the other way. But my pal says that the cops found out from a wee snitch that Jackson and Cameron had been up there just before the fire. The word was they started it.’

‘Really? Why? Surely she wasn’t going to refuse
them
sex?

‘No. Wasn’t that. Word is that she passed information to the cops on a case they were working on. Think she must have got rumbled by Jackson, so it was payback time. He was that kind of bastard. Didn’t matter if it was a woman. You stepped out of line, you were history. Even with two weans.’

‘What happened to the girls?’

‘Don’t know. One of them had been raped. The older one. The injuries showed it. She didn’t speak. Couldn’t. Just a poor wee lassie. Went into some kind of shock and didn’t utter a word to anyone. The wee one got taken into care. So they got split up. My pal said they heard later that the older girl died – Judy. Poor wee bastard. But Jackson and Cameron got away with it. They knew they were safe as long as everyone kept their mouths shut.’

‘That’s awful. So what do you think?’

Don sniffed and swallowed.

‘Don’t know really. The only person with a grudge who wasn’t a gangster was that wee lassie Ruby. But nobody knew what had become of her for years. Then . . . wait for this . . . around eighteen months ago the Serious Crime Squad was working on a case, and my mate was on it and they stumbled across information that Ruby was working with Jackson.’

‘What? Hard to believe, that. I mean, if she witnessed what happened that night – assuming she might have. She’d hardly go and work for the men who did it, would she? Where did that information come from?’

‘Yeah, I know what you’re saying. That’s what we thought: hard to believe. But she was photographed during some undercover surveillance operation in Spain which UK police were working on with the Spanish and Dutch cops. There was nothing to link her involvement, as such, to the case, but one of the snitches tipped the cops that her name was Ruby and she was from Glasgow. They didn’t have a surname. There was some kind of search done to trace what became of Ruby Reilly, but it seems she’d disappeared off the radar screen after she dropped out of university. She’d studied accountancy but didn’t graduate. Nobody knows what became of her. Amazing, really, that she amounted to anything if she saw what happened that night to her mother and sister. And the way she was dragged up, her ma a hooker and stuff. Some start in life, eh?’

Rosie nodded, swirling the ice in her almost empty glass, remembering her own early days, the men occasionally coming to her house and the noises she heard at night. She drained her glass.

‘One for the road?’

‘No thanks,’ Rosie said. ‘Better not. I’ve a lot of work to get done tomorrow.’

Her mind turned over the story of the Scottish woman who allegedly did a runner from the King’s Cross café.

‘Listen, Don, would you be able to get CCTV footage of the street outside the King’s Cross café immediately after the shooting? I thought they might have released it by now, as an appeal for any witnesses.’

Don shrugged. ‘I think, if they haven’t put it out then there’s a reason for it. The cops won’t throw everything out there all at once. But I’ll see if I can get it. Why?’

Rosie finished her drink and put it down on the bar.

‘Just thinking. I’m going to sleep on it.’ She eased herself off the bar stool.

‘You want me to help you sleep? We could spoon.’

Rosie smiled.

‘Nah. You’d disturb my train of thought. Come on. I’m knackered. First couple of days back at work and I feel like I need a holiday.’

Don finished his pint and they walked through the swing doors and out into the street.

Rosie turned to him.

‘Would that cop who remembers the Jackie Reilly murder all those years ago talk to me?’

‘Why?’

‘Just curious.’

‘Curious, my arse. Why?’

‘Honestly, Don. Just a bit fascinated by what you tell me about the Ruby girl. If I make any progress with my blue-sky thinking, you’ll be the first to know. I can promise you that. Could you ask him to talk to me totally off the record?’

‘Sure. I’ll give you a bell if he’s up for it. But he’s only got two years till he retires, so he might not want to associate with a hack like you. I’ll try.’ He kissed her on the cheek and walked away.

*

Rosie opened the doors to her balcony enough so she could hear the sounds of the city revving itself into a new day. It was only eight in the morning and too chilly to sit outside, but by the look of the sun breaking through the clouds Glasgow was basking in the glory of an unusual Indian summer. She pulled her fold-away director’s canvas chair close to the open doors and sat with her feet up on a table, clutching a mug of freshly brewed coffee. The buzz of the Charing Cross traffic was music to her ears. It was good to be home.

In the beginning, when she’d fled to Sarajevo in the wake of the
Post
’s revelations about the UVF coke dealing, McGuire had suggested she sell her flat altogether. It was too risky to stay there, he’d told her, but Rosie had protested – if the scumbags were determined to get her, they’d already know by now where she lived. She couldn’t live her life moving house every time she felt under threat. Her entire working life was on the move – if not in the UK, then abroad on some investigation or refugee camp in a far-flung land. She needed somewhere to come home to, not some sterile crash pad, she told McGuire. Her own place, with all her own things, her clutter, was her sanctuary, where she could feel grounded. She hadn’t mentioned that now, more than ever, she needed something that was rooted, because at the moment she didn’t have TJ on the other end of the phone in his Glasgow flat, or cooking dinner for her or meeting her after work for a drink. Right now, that seemed like a long time ago – but it wasn’t. She rested her head back, letting out a long breath as she reflected on her last telephone call to him in New York nearly two months ago. She’d replayed it in her head so many times while she was in Bosnia, hoping it would lessen the impact. But it never did. If ever anybody knew how to fuck up their life, it was her. She re-ran it again:

‘What do you mean, you’re going to Bosnia, Rosie? Why are you not coming here?’

TJ’s tone had been somewhere between bewilderment and hurt. It wasn’t an easy question to answer
.

‘It’s just a spur-of-the-moment thing, TJ. Try to understand,’ she said. ‘I’ve got to go tomorrow. I need to get out of here.’

‘Bullshit, Rosie. You could go to London for a couple of days, hide up in a hotel, then get to New York. Don’t insult my intelligence. I can see what’s going on here . . . I—’

Rosie interrupted. ‘TJ, nothing’s going on. What the hell do you mean by that?’

But the truth was she didn’t even know herself why she’d phoned Adrian instead of TJ when McGuire had told her she had to leave the country
.

‘Why did you phone Adrian? Why not me? It’s that simple, Rosie.’ He sounded hurt now
.

‘I know . . . I know it sounds simple. But I . . . I . . . didn’t want to come to New York. I mean . . . the way you live, the work at the club, the hours you keep. That’s not what I want right now. I want to be away somewhere I know I can be safe. My head is all over the place after all that shit in Spain. You know that.’