The Meating Room (28 page)

‘
Dispatched?
I like that word.
A team will be dispatched
. . .’ Purvis shook his head and laughed, a hard sound that reverberated through the chambers and returned to them in pieces. ‘You think you’re a smart-arse, don’t you?’ Something settled behind Purvis’s eyes. His face tightened, his knuckles whitened, and Gilchrist wondered what was preventing the shotgun from letting off both barrels.

Purvis steadied his aim, pointing straight at Gilchrist’s face. ‘How about I dispatch you?’

Gilchrist closed his eyes and tensed for the blast that would take his head off.

Jessie clapped her hands and shuffled her feet, trying to force some warmth into her body. Returning to the car had sounded like a great idea, but everyone had forgotten that Stan had the keys. Now her legs were chilled to the bone, her feet lumps of ice.

‘Come
on
,’ she said, calling Gilchrist’s number again, then Stan’s. Both were still unobtainable. ‘Shit.’ She tried to work out what had happened, but nothing made sense. Had they lost the signal? They had drugged the dogs and got safely into the barn, Andy had told her that. The signal had been fine then. And they would be only another few minutes. His exact words.

That was ten minutes ago.

She felt a gut-wrenching sickness wash through her at the thought that something had gone terribly wrong, and she fought off the overwhelming urge to call for back-up. It would be just like the thing that as soon as she did, Andy and Stan would turn up. Then where would she be? In serious trouble, came the answer. So she stared into the darkness across the fields, straining to pick out the slightest movement.

Her mobile vibrated and she made the connection without looking at the number. ‘Yes?’

‘So, you’ve finally deigned to answer,’ Lachie said.

Jessie gritted her teeth, then cursed under her breath. She was angry, freezing, worried sick about Stan and Andy. She didn’t have time to deal with
this
. Her anger surged to fury, and she shouted, ‘I don’t want you ever entering my house again when I’m not there. You hear me, Lachie? And I don’t want you anywhere near Robert ever again—’

‘That was an accident—’

‘And while we’re at it, I’m not interested in moving out of our home.’

‘I’ve got a nice wee place lined up for—’

‘Or having any kind of relationship with—’

‘Listen, Jessie—’

‘No, Lachie. You listen to me.’

‘I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,’ Lachie said. ‘I’m going to—’

‘Highland Tam.’

Silence.

Jessie waited a couple of beats, then repeated the name. ‘Highland Tam.’

Lachie cleared his throat. ‘What about him?’

Jessie could not fail to catch the tiniest shiver of uncertainty in Lachie’s tone. ‘You remember him well, I’m sure.’

‘What about him?’ More forceful this time.

‘You were responsible for his death, Lachie.’

‘In case it’s slipped your mind, Highland Tam committed suicide—’

‘Because you pushed him to it.’

‘He was as guilty as sin.’

‘We all knew it. And so did he. But you didn’t need to plant the drugs on—’

‘Wait a fucking minute.’

‘You can deny it all you like, Lachie.’

‘There’s nothing to deny.’

‘There’s
plenty
to deny, Lachie. I watched you do it.’

‘No one’ll believe you. It’s your word against mine.’

‘Are you prepared to take that chance?’

One beat, two beats, then, ‘It could backfire on you, Jessie. Big time.’

‘It certainly could. But d’you know what, Lachie? I’m up for it.’

‘Where do you get off, you fucking wee tramp.’

‘Right here is where I get off. This is my stop. You hear me? I’m getting off right now. Without you. And if you ever come near me again, or phone me again, I’m warning you, Lachie, I’ll—’

‘You wouldn’t fucking dare.’

‘Oh, I’ll dare all right. You’d better believe it,’ she said, then killed the call and stuffed the mobile deep into her pocket. She took a deep breath and let it out in a sudden gush. Oh, Jesus. She dabbed a hand at her eyes wiped away the tears. Oh, shit. She pressed the hand to her mouth to stop her lips from trembling. Shit and shit again.

What the hell had she gone and done?

No one crossed Lachie McKellar.
Ever
.

Not unless they wanted to ruin their career. Or worse.

Oh, fuck. She shielded herself from a hard gust of wind that shook the hedgerow by the side of the car, as if Lachie were trying to burst his way through to strangle her. She had seen him in action before, knew how vindictive he could be. No one survived an onslaught from him.
No one
. She tilted her head to the black oblivion of the night sky and closed her eyes – shit, shit, shit – and took several deep breaths that did little to settle her nerves.

When she opened her eyes again, she tried to force the worry of what she had done from her mind. She needed to focus on what was important –
really
important – and find out what was going on. She retrieved her mobile and called Gilchrist’s number again.

But his phone was still dead.

Then Stan . . .

Same result.

‘Right,’ she said, staring off into the cold night, her breath clouding the air as if she had just run the hundred metres. ‘If you think I’m going to stand around freezing my tits off, you’ve got another think coming.’ She stepped from behind the car and into the full force of a bitter east coast wind. Rather than work back to her hiding-spot near the driveway, she decided to walk across the open fields, just as Andy and Stan had done.

That way she had a better chance of bumping into them if they were on their way back.

She entered the field through the open gate, and took a bearing from the distant lights of Purvis’s cottage. Her feet kicked through damp grass and sank into puddled soil. She cursed, put her head down and strode on into the cold darkness, struggling to force all thoughts of Lachie from her mind.

‘I said turn round.
Now
.’

Gilchrist stared into the twin black bores of the shotgun.

Purvis had repositioned himself to bring Stan more into his line of fire, so that he could take out Gilchrist first, then Stan, or the other way around, if he preferred.

Gilchrist caught Stan’s eyes and nodded, and together they turned around.

‘On your knees,’ Purvis ordered.

Gilchrist felt something hard catch in his throat. He had seen wartime footage of men jogging to their spot of execution, then being shot in the back of the head, one after the other. He had often wondered why no one ever fought back. But now, as he and Stan did exactly as Purvis instructed, he knew the answer – disbelief and the horrific and numbing realisation that there was no hope of survival. Life, for all the good and bad that had been done with it, was about to end.

Stan’s eyes were closed, as if he, too, were simply waiting for the blast.

‘Eyes to the front.’

The closeness of the voice jolted Gilchrist. Then he caught the scratchy shuffle of leather soles on dusty concrete and sensed a subtle shifting of Purvis’s body – the lowering of the shotgun towards his head.

He closed his eyes, and prayed to a God he did not believe in.

It took Gilchrist’s silent counting to ten before he opened his eyes, and another ten to twenty before he took a breath and let his hopes cling to the slimmest of beliefs that it might not be his last. Of course, with encaged human body parts in wire-mesh sculptures all around them, logic told him that Purvis was only toying with them, and that there could only ever be one outcome.

‘You don’t have to do this,’ Gilchrist said.

‘Yes, I do.’

‘Give yourself up.’

‘And do what? Go back inside?’ Purvis chuckled.

‘You’ll get a fair trial.’

‘My arse. They’ll lock me up as soon as look at me.’

Stan cocked his head, risking a glance. ‘Do you have family?’

‘Shut it, you. Don’t try to give me any of that sentimental shite. It don’t work on psychos.’

‘Is that what you are, then?’ Stan said. ‘A psycho?’

‘I told you to shut it,’ Purvis snapped, and clipped the side of Stan’s head with the stock of the gun.

Stan keeled over, the side of his head gushing blood.

Gilchrist rose from his knees and felt the stock slam into his back with a force that sent him sprawling. He struggled to his knees, a burning ache telling him that the blow had either torn a muscle or cracked his scapula.

He winced as he turned to Stan. ‘Let me stop the bleeding—’

‘Stay the fuck where you are.’

Gilchrist froze, arms by his side, the flat of his hands pressing on the concrete floor. He curled his fingers, managed to scrape some dust into his loose grip. But his logic was telling him something was wrong – they should both be dead by now.

‘Why are you keeping us here?’ he asked.

‘You’ll see. Eyes to the front.’

Another hit from the stock reminded Gilchrist that Purvis was still calling the shots. What he had learned was that Purvis was waiting for something or, as it was gradually becoming clearer to him, waiting for
someone
.

And if Gilchrist had been a betting man, he might have risked a punt.

But he had also learned that with Purvis you could never be too careful.

Jessie reached the compound fence, and a rare break in the clouds gave her a moonlit glimpse of the barn. She stopped, her heart in her mouth as she searched for the dogs.

But she saw nothing.

Something else was niggling at the back of her senses, the noise of a running engine coming from the barn. She edged her way along the compound fence to the corner. In the distance, the lights of the cottage glittered. She turned her back to them, and removed her mobile and tried Andy’s number, then Stan’s, but the connection was well and truly dead. She thought again of calling the Office for back-up, but reasoned that by the time it arrived, she would likely have found a simple explanation for the lack of communication.

So she decided just to press on.

She resisted the urge to click on her torch, but held it tight as she edged onwards. She reached the gate to find the padlock dangling open. The night sky shifted again, killing light from the moon, and blackness settled all around her like a cloak. Her senses felt raw to the touch, as if her every nerve was exposed. A hard lump threatened to choke her throat as she strained for signs of movement. She gripped the cold metal, and caught her breath as the chain-links rattled. The memory of the dogs rushing the fence chilled her blood, and she waited in the darkness, afraid to take another step.

But nothing stirred.

She eased the gate open, all the while staring blindly into the black shadows for any sign of the Rottweilers. Then she stepped inside the compound and pulled the gate behind her. The latch clicked with a metallic ring, and she felt her blood turn to water as something shifted in the grass by her side.

She froze stock still, and peered into the darkness.

Movement.

Black on black.

Then she heard a low growl that rose for a terrifying moment, only to fade to a whine and the cutting song of the wind as it brushed over the grass.

She reached the barn door in fifteen quick strides. The sound of the engine was louder here, drowning out the wind. She grappled with the loose padlock, her fingers feeling thick, rattling metal on metal as they fumbled for the latch.

Then she found it and tugged the barn door open.

Inside was as black as night, and the noise from the generator deafening. She shut the door behind her, held her breath, and waited for any signs of movement. Then, for the first time since crossing the fields, she flicked on her torch.

Its beam shimmered across the floor and settled on the generator. Her ears had become accustomed to the noise, the beat of its racing engine now less invasive. She shone the torch around the barn and its beam fell on the BMW.

‘Nice one, Andy.’

She walked the length of the car, shining her torch through the side windows – to confirm it was unoccupied – noticing the cracked windscreen, the dent in the window pillar. The generator thrummed in the background. Had it been running when Andy called earlier? In the inexplicable absence of two senior officers, she knew she should phone the Office and report the discovery of the BMW, call in the registration number and ask them to check the VIN.

She laid her torch on the barn floor, removed her mobile, and started to scroll down.

‘Cut the call.’

Jessie jolted, and spun around to face the darkness from where the voice had come.

‘I said cut the call.’

In the black of the barn, Jessie could see nothing. She looked down at the torch on the concrete floor, its beam shining aimlessly under the BMW, which stood between her and the source of the voice. She shifted her feet . . .

If she could only . . .

She slowly bent her knees, lowered her hand—

‘Don’t even think about it,’ the voice said. ‘I have a gun, and I
will
shoot.’

The man had moved around to the front of the car, and Jessie realised with a stab of fear that he must be able to see her clearly, even though she could see nothing.

‘Cut the call,’ he repeated, his voice taking on a steely tone that left Jessie in no doubt that the last warning had just been issued.

She killed the connection.

‘Now drop it.’

The voice had crept closer, although still some distance away – maybe ten feet. Jessie thought she caught some movement – shadow on shadow – but she could not be sure. One part of her wished she had the strength and the courage to put up a fight, just go for it. Another part reminded her that Robert needed her, and what would he do if she was not around for him?

‘I’m waiting.’

Jessie dropped her mobile to the floor.

‘Step to the side and turn around.’

Something in the cold finality of his words caused Jessie to picture the man steadying himself and aiming the gun straight at her head. She raised both hands in the air. ‘I’m unarmed,’ she said to the darkness. ‘Don’t shoot.’