To Tell the Truth (17 page)

‘Come on, Rosie,’ he said, pushing his plate away. ‘You can tell me. What’s it all about, Rosita?’ He chuckled, mocking Javier’s accent. ‘Bit of an old holiday romance there? That it?’

Rosie shook her head. ‘We’re friends. Close friends, Matt.
We worked together on a story here a couple of years ago. He’s a top drawer operator.’

‘And?’ Matt raised his eyebrows.

‘And nothing. I said friends. I haven’t seen him for a while so we had a lot of catching up to do.’

‘Hah! I could see that, Rosita. That’s why I bailed out after the coffee. I was beginning to get a hot flush.’

‘Piss off!’ Rosie drank her coffee, then changed the subject. ‘Tell you what, though. Javier already had some good info for me by the time he arrived, and I only enlisted his help yesterday afternoon. That’s what I call an operator.’

One of his Guarda Civil contacts had confirmed off the record the story about the Bosnian girl, Katya, being found, and that she’d been kidnapped by traffickers.

He hadn’t said too much, but after Matt left, Javier took her to a small flamenco bar in the old town and they talked into the night. The Guarda Civil had never released the information about the kidnapped girl, according to his man on the inside, and the case was being handled by a specialist team investigating organised crime on the Costa del Sol. But Javier said the information was solid.

‘Yeah. He’s one sharp bastardo,’ Matt said. ‘I liked him.’ He laughed. ‘I couldn’t believe the way he shouted “
caballero
” to the waiters. The last guy I saw doing that was Manolito in the
High Chaparral
.’

Rosie smiled. ‘Yeah. It’s a Spanish thing. They respect age. They celebrate growing older. Not like in our country,
where youth is perceived to be everything, and everyone over fifty is past it.’

‘So is Javier past it, Rosita?’ Matt lifted Rosie’s hand and pretended to kiss it.

‘Piss off. It’s not like that.’

Rosie’s mobile rang. She lifted it off the table, looked at the screen. No name, and she didn’t recognise the British number. She looked at Matt and put her finger to her lips for him to keep quiet. It might be Jamie O’Hara offering to give an interview.

‘Hello?’ Rosie’s tone was sharp.

‘Rosie Gilmour?’ The voice was rough, a little muffled.

‘Who’s this?’

‘You don’t know me. Doesn’t matter who I am. You Rosie? Don’t fuck about.’

Definitely a lisp or some speech impediment. Or he was disguising his voice. Rosie’s brain switched to overdrive. She knew voices like this. Thugs, gangsters, and plenty who just talked the talk.

‘Hey, listen, pal.’ Rosie’s voice hardened. ‘I don’t know who you are, or where you got my number, but don’t come on the phone and swear at me. Now, you’ve got about ten seconds to tell me what this is about or I hang up.’

Silence. Rosie looked at Matt. If the caller was genuine he would start talking. If he was a crank, he’d hang up. Fuck it. She didn’t have time to piss around. Whatever this headcase wanted he’d have to be quick.

‘Somebody wants to talk to you about that missing kid. That wee lassie that got stole fae the beach.’

Rosie’s stomach tightened.

‘You in Spain?’

‘Naw. Glasgow. It’s not me who wants to talk.’

‘Then who?’

‘He’s inside. Just got fifteen years. He’s in the Bar-L. For murder. He’s a beast. He told me to contact you. He knows things.’

Rosie could feel her heartbeat.

‘I’ll see him. Of course. I’ll come over and see him in jail. Who is he? What’s his name?’ Rosie’s mental filing system tried to remember who had been done for murder recently, but she’d been away for over a month now.

‘Frankie Nelson,’ the voice said. ‘He got done for killing that woman twelve years ago. She was going to the cops about wee boys him and his bum boy Vinny Paterson was shagging. They’re paedos. Paterson’s on the run so he never got done, but Frankie got caught and he’s banged up. It’s Frankie who wants to talk to you. Says he knows stuff. Something about films.’

‘Films? About kids?’

‘Aye. Don’t know any more. Films with weans in them. Sick films. For paedos. Look, I don’t know. I’m passing the message on, that’s all.’ The lisp was quite pronounced now.

‘I’ll come over straight away. Next couple of days. Can you get me a pass for the prison? But I have to go in there as a friend, not as a reporter. It’s not allowed. No notebooks, tapes or anything. Make that clear on the pass. That I’m a friend. Just tell him I’ll be there, if you get me a pass.’

‘I can do that. Will take about two or three days to get. I’ll be in touch.’

‘By the way, can I ask you something?’ Rosie ventured.

‘Whit?’

‘How do you know him?’

‘I’m not a poof, right?’ he snapped. ‘I’m just out of jail. I was a turnkey before I left and I got talking to Frankie the last wee while. I did ten years. I shot somebody. Frankie’s a cold fucker alright, but he wouldn’t mess with me or I’d rip his lungs out. He was alright with me. He says to me, he can tell things that might help find that wee lassie. That’s all. I said he should tell the papers. If I can get him in touch with you then I’ve done my bit.’

‘You did the right thing, but why is he doing this?’

She already knew the answer – if his information helped to find Amy then maybe he wouldn’t be locked up for the rest of his life.

‘He’s lodged an appeal against his sentence, and he thinks it might do well for him if he helps get this wee girl. I don’t give a fuck what happens to him, he’s a beast. But if he knows things, then maybe they’ll get the wee lassie back.’

‘Okay,’ Rosie said. ‘Call me as soon as you get a pass, and I’ll be there the following day.’

The line went dead before she had a chance to say thanks.

Matt looked at her inquisitively. ‘Well?’

‘I’m going to have to go back to Glasgow. Some beast in jail says he has information about Amy.’

‘That him on the phone?’

‘No. It was some guy just released from Bar-L. Says a beast called Frankie Nelson wants to talk to me.’ Rosie looked for McGuire’s number in her mobile.

‘Fuck me, Rosie. That could be mega.’ Matt stretched out his legs and put his hands behind his head. ‘Fucking mega.’

‘Yeah. Could also be a complete header, but we can’t take a chance. If he wants to talk then he’ll talk to someone, and if it’s not me it’ll be another paper. I need to call McGuire. I want to see if we can nail the people-trafficker story before I go. Don’t go anywhere, Matt. We’ve got addresses to hit this afternoon, offices where the recruitment company is holed up. Javier’s coming in a little while.’

Rosie got up and looked at her watch. McGuire would be coming out of the editorial conference around now. She headed to her bedroom.

Once the usual pleasantries were over, with McGuire telling Rosie he was getting impatient waiting for O’Hara or Jenny to buckle and tell all, she was able to get him focused on the people-trafficker story.

She told him her Spanish contact had come up with addresses for the recruitment firm, and he was already running checks on them. Hopefully they’d lead somewhere. But she had to admit that at the moment she only had information that these were connected to Daletsky’s widespread empire. She hoped to have something more solid by this afternoon, she told him.

‘It has to be buttoned down, Rosie, if we’re going to connect this Daletsky to people-trafficking. Nobody has
ever had the balls or the evidence to turn him over before, and if we can’t prove it one hundred per cent, I’m telling you now it’s not going in my paper.’

‘I know, Mick. I’m working on it.’

‘Same goes for Carter-Smith. He’s the fucking Home Secretary. It was fair enough to have him on a yacht with some dubious Russian businessman. But to start talking about people-trafficking … well, we’re in deep shit if we say that and it can’t be proved.’

‘Yeah, I know, Mick.’

‘Well, Gilmour, let’s find the proof, and we can nail them all to the wall.’

‘Mick,’ Rosie began. ‘There’s something else. I just took a call on the mobile from some guy who’s just out of jail and he says some paedo called Frankie Nelson knows information about Amy. Says he wants to see me in Bar-L.’

‘Holy fuck, Rosie. Frankie Nelson? He just got fifteen years, and is appealing against sentence. He is one warped fucker. We had a big background for the trial while you were away. Does the guy who phoned sound genuine?’

‘No way of knowing really. But my gut tells me to get to Glasgow if he gets me a pass for Bar-L. He said he would, in a couple of days.’

‘Well, only one way to find out, Rosie. Get your arse over to Glasgow. I’ll send somebody over to cover press conferences and stuff. Somebody who knows what they’re doing. Probably young Declan. He’s keen and meticulous, and I’m sure he’ll take a telling from you.’

‘Great,’ Rosie said. ‘Declan will be perfect. I’ll only be
gone for a few days, and hopefully before I go I can make some headway with the trafficking story. What I’d like to do is get this in the paper soon as, and then get the hell out to Glasgow while the shit hits the fan here.’

‘Fine,’ McGuire said. ‘But we need proof first. Phone me tonight, Rosie. Let me know how you’re getting on.’

Rosie was about to hang up when McGuire spoke.

‘Hold on. Marion wants a word.’

The line went dead for a second as he transferred her.

‘Hey, Rosie. Howsit going on the Costa? I’ve been watching all the stuff on telly. Christ, it’s awful. The longer it goes on, the less chance there is of finding that wee girl.’

‘I know, Marion. But I just feel certain she’s out there.’

‘Would be great if she was. And if she comes back alive. That would be some moment.’

‘Sure would.’

‘What’s up, Marion?

Marion hesitated for a moment.

‘Rosie,’ she said. ‘Can you talk for a second?’

‘Course.’

‘Listen.’ Marion’s voice was almost a whisper. ‘I didn’t really know what to do with this, so I thought I’d just talk to you. I haven’t mentioned it to anyone, by the way.’

‘Marion, you’re making me nervous. What’s up?’

‘Rosie. Someone came into the front desk the other day and asked for you. A man.’

Rosie’s heart jumped. TJ … ? Maybe he’d lost her mobile number. Perhaps he’d been phoning her home and getting no answer. Maybe he was back and was going to surprise her.

‘An older man. Quite old,’ Marion said.

Rosie’s heart sank. TJ was older, but you would never call him quite old.

‘How old’s quite old?’

‘Old. Like maybe seventy or something? Hard to say, Rosie. He was rough looking.’ She paused. ‘Dishevelled. Not well looking. Kind of, well, kind of down and out.’

Rosie was confused. There was a pause.

‘Rosie.’ Marion cleared her throat. ‘He said his name was Martin. Martin Gilmour.’

She hadn’t heard the name out loud in thirty-two years. She couldn’t speak.

‘He … He said he was your father, Rosie.’

Silence. Rosie’s head swirled. Her father.

‘Jesus wept!’ Rosie’s voice was barely audible.

‘I haven’t mentioned it to anyone.’

‘What … What else did he say, Marion?’

Her heart was beating out against her ribs. She shouldn’t be like this. Not after all this time.

‘He came in asking for you. The front desk called up to me and I went down to see him. He asked if he could see you, and I told him you were out of the country. He looked sad, Rosie. A sad wee man. He wrote down a phone number of some hostel he’s staying in. His hands were shaking.’

‘Hostel?’ Rosie choked the word out.

‘That’s what he said. Didn’t say the name. Just wrote down the phone number. I said I’d pass it on. He was kind of sad when he walked away.’

Rosie recovered her composure. She had to.

‘Fine, Marion. Listen. I’ve got to come to Glasgow in the next couple of days to do something. I’ll get the number then. And … er … Marion? I know this goes without saying, but can you just keep that between you and me?’

‘You don’t have to say that.’ Marion sounded a little offended.

‘I know. I’m sorry, Marion, but … well, it’s … it’s … well, it’s a long story. Look, I’ll talk to you when I get to Glasgow. Thanks, Marion.’

‘Don’t worry, Rosie. Everything will be alright. See you when you get back.’

Rosie hung up. She walked out to the terrace in a daze.

He was back.

CHAPTER 23

Rosie stepped out of Glasgow Airport and into a steady drizzle. Welcome home.

She was always amused at the shock and disappointment of people when they arrived back from holidays and were met by the rain. It was never any other way when you got back to Scotland from somewhere warm – especially in July. Always the rain, just to remind you that whoever you thought you were during those carefree two weeks in the sun, this is actually who you were. It’s Glasgow. It’s pissing down. And you start back at work tomorrow. Deal with it.

She scanned the cars all along the pick-up line, boots open, waiting for returning families, friends, long lost relatives. She wondered what that felt like just for a moment, but not long enough for it to matter.

Somewhere, not far away, was a man waiting for her who said he was her father. But their story was nothing like that of people arriving to be hugged by cherished family and friends. Rosie wished she could conjure up
the grainy images of her father that had faded from her mind a long time ago. They haunted her dreams, but right now she couldn’t have picked Martin Gilmour out of the crowd if her life depended on it.

She scanned the cars, and sure enough, a car from the taxi firm the
Post
used was there under the ‘G’ at the big yellow Glasgow Airport sign, as it always was when she returned from her travels. The driver waved when he saw her. She waved back. What the heck. Taxis weren’t family, but it was a safe bet that in most cases they were more reliable.

‘Hey, Rosie. How you doin?’ The driver took her bag and put it in the boot. ‘You might have brought the sunshine.’

‘Hey, John,’ Rosie opened the passenger door and got in. ‘It wouldn’t be the same with sunshine. We’d have nothing to moan about the whole of July if it wasn’t raining.’