Last Resort Read online

  I glanced up at a street sign that was only just visible in the deepening darkness and was mildly amused to see that we were in Carrer de Trafalgar. I suspect that a Catalan mayor of another era had enjoyed naming a street after a Spanish naval defeat.

  Hector’s apartment was on the top floor, the fifth of a classic city block; not a Gaudi building, but one of a similar vintage, which meant, no lift. By the time we reached the top we were going slowly, as Xavi’s old football injury took its toll.

  ‘One day,’ he said, as we reached the top landing, ‘I will need a knee replacement. When my consultant told me that, I didn’t believe him, but now I do.’

  He pointed to a door that opened almost directly on to the stairs, then stepped forward and pushed the bell button. We heard it ring inside and listened for the sound of feet approaching; there was only silence. Xavi rang again then thumped the door with the side of his huge fist.

  ‘Hector,’ he boomed, ‘don’t piss me about, let me in.’

  He waited for another half-minute, before muttering, ‘Fuck it,’ then reaching into his pocket.

  He found the brass key that Pilar had given him, slipped it into the lock and twisted it; nothing happened. He frowned. ‘Bloody thing’s . . .’ he muttered as he turned the handle and opened the door.

  I can no longer remember the number of times in my police career that I’ve opened a door without knowing what was behind it, only for my copper’s instinct to kick in.

  Xavi was about to step inside when I put a hand on his sleeve.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Wait. This is for me; it’s why I’m here.’

  The hallway was dark, but I didn’t feel for a light switch; I knew where I was going. Another door faced me and it was ajar, letting in enough light from the street outside and beyond to guide my way, as I followed my nose.

  It doesn’t take long for the smell of death to gather, but after a couple of days in a centrally heated apartment it’s unmistakeable.

  The light in the big reception room had an orange tinge, from the street lamp that was fixed to the wall not too far from the window and the balcony outside. There was enough of it to let me see that the figure lying face down in the centre of the room was not Hector Sureda.

  No, it was a woman, elegantly dressed, dark-haired, face down in a pool of dried blood that was big enough for me to know I didn’t want to see the exit wound left by the bullet that had killed her. Splatters of red, streaked with brain matter, spread outwards and across the room, in a pattern that almost matched the roses that were scattered on the floor.

  It took me back six months, to another place, another time, and another dead female.

  The central chandelier exploded into light; Xavi, behind me, had hit the switch.

  ‘Who the hell . . .’ I murmured.

  ‘I can tell you,’ he said, softly. ‘You don’t even have to turn her over. That’s Bernicia Battaglia.’

  I don’t know why but I remembered a promise made. I took out my phone and made a call.

  ‘Amanda,’ I murmured as it was answered, ‘you are going to have such news to pass on to your Italian.’

  Fifteen

  As I drove back to Edinburgh, my head was full of Roger McGrane. I hadn’t been chatted up (girlie term) like that in longer than I could remember. In the aftermath I was surprised that I felt not a trace of annoyance at what I might have seen as presumptuous behaviour, only pleasure at what I decided was flattery. He’d made me feel desirable, and nobody, male or female, is ever going to object to that.

  I’d asserted my independence by insisting on paying for lunch; he’d understood that and hadn’t argued about it. As we left Kelvingrove, I’d offered to drop him at his office, but he said that he’d rather walk and get some fresh air into his lungs.

  We parted with a handshake. ‘I will call you,’ he promised, his eyes holding mine.

  ‘You do that,’ I told him. ‘But give me that week.’

  The guilt began to kick in as I left Glasgow. My dad can read me like a book; when he told me to watch myself, I knew he hadn’t been kidding. He likes me to be safe; that’s why he’s always been cool about my relationship with Andy, apart from when it all started, when I was, as he saw me, barely out of school uniform. No, he was not cool then.

  Dad’s seen too many women preyed upon in his life, and like most alpha males he’s never been able to consider the possibility that some of us might be predators ourselves. He still can’t, not even after his experience with the recently departed Aileen.

  If I did see Roger again, he wasn’t going to be very pleased.

  However, I wasn’t thinking only about how he’d look in the shower first thing in the morning. I found myself dwelling on what he’d said about the two people in the car, who seemed to be photographing Dad.

  A man and a woman; two people he’d taken for plain-clothes police. I’d asked him if he could describe them, but all he could recall was that she was blonde and he was dark, and as for age, ‘youngish’.

  My immediate assumption was that they had been the McDaniels woman and Baillie, working in tandem. I thought about calling my father, but decided that his blood pressure was probably high enough, without me adding to it by telling him about stuff he was unable to deal with.

  Instead, I decided that as soon as I was home, I’d make tracing Linton Baillie my number-one task.

  As I drove I remembered something Dad had mentioned: Baillie’s name came into the frame when Detective Sergeant Sauce Haddock discovered in his unofficial inquiry that he had paid for McDaniels’ flight to Barcelona.

  As soon as I hit the outskirts of Edinburgh, I pulled into a lay-by and called Leith CID where Sauce is based. I don’t know him all that well, but I guessed he’d talk to me.

  ‘Alex,’ he said as he came on line. ‘Two calls from two different Skinners in two days: can I take it they’re connected?’

  ‘Yes, you can. I’m looking into the problem my father has.’

  ‘With the McDaniels woman?’

  ‘Yes, but I’m more interested in the man Baillie. Do you have anything more on him?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he replied, ‘but we haven’t been looking. There’s no grounds for an official inquiry. We did try to put a name to a face in a photo your father sent us, but no joy. No match on our database.’

  ‘You told my father he paid for the flight by credit card,’ I ventured.

  ‘He did; the airline gave me a billing address. Since I last spoke to the chief, I’ve followed that up. It’s in Edinburgh like I told him, but it’s a PO Box number. They said also that the card itself is a Visa, issued by something called First National Mutual. That’s an offshoot of a Chinese bank and it does all its business online. That’s as far as I can go, until the guy does something illegal. He hasn’t, has he?’

  ‘No. I wish to hell he would.’

  I heard a deep breath being drawn. ‘Alex,’ Sauce murmured. ‘What’s this about? The gaffer said he thought he was being stalked, but he didn’t say why.’

  I frowned, thinking about a very small loop. ‘There’s something you know,’ I replied, ‘something very personal and pretty secret that came out of the Bella Watson investigation. I don’t want to spell it out over the phone, but are you with me?’

  ‘Yes, I am.’

  ‘Right. There have been a couple of phone calls that suggest it may be known to Baillie as well. So far it’s a family affair, but the guy’s going to find out that he’s up against the wrong bloody family.’

  ‘Jesus, Alex. Listen,’ he sounded agitated, ‘if that’s been leaked, it isn’t through me or DI Pye. I haven’t mentioned it to a living soul, not even my girlfriend, and I’m certain it’s the same with Sammy.’

  ‘Nobody’s even thinking that, I promise you. If you’ve got any ideas, I’d like to hear them, but for now, all I’m really interested in is finding Baillie.’

  ‘Thanks for that, Alex. Do you want me to have a word with George Regan, in Special Branch?’
/>   ‘Christ, no,’ I exclaimed. ‘If it gets that serious I’ll leave that to Dad. If there’s anything else I need checked, discreetly, I’ll come back to you. Meantime, thanks for your help.’

  I switched off and re-joined the traffic; it was beginning to build up as evening approached, and it took me as long to cross the city as it had to cross the country, but eventually I pulled into our underground garage, parked and took the lift up to my apartment.

  As I closed the door behind me, the ‘Incoming message’ tone sounded on my phone. I took it out; a text from Andy. ‘Stuck in Glasgow tonight, sorry. We need to talk; maybe tomorrow.’

  ‘Yes,’ I whispered, ‘maybe we do.’

  I needed a reviver after the drive, and so I went through to the kitchen and poured myself a glass of an energy-packed smoothie that’s like Red Bull without the caffeine. I took it with me into my office and booted up my computer.

  I’d read as much of Baillie’s work as I wanted to but I went back into the downloaded books, looking for the standard author bio that you find in most. Not in those, though; there was no personal information at all.

  I logged on to the Internet and looked up Amazon. That was slightly more helpful, but not much; the blurb for each of his titles volunteered only that he was an allegedly best-selling author, and that he was Scottish, nothing more.

  However, I did have one place to go: I searched through the notes on my desk until I found the number that I’d noted for Baillie’s publisher. It was closer to six o’clock than five, so I had no great hope of an answer as I dialled, but I came up lucky.

  ‘Donside,’ a female voice drawled in my ear, managing to fit an extra syllable into the name. ‘Denise speaking. How can we help? Unsolicited manuscripts will be destroyed.’

  ‘I’ll bear that in mind when I finish mine,’ I said. ‘I’m trying to contact one of your authors, a Mr Linton Baillie.’

  ‘One of ours, is ’e? Do you know who his editor is?’

  ‘No, Denise, but I’m hoping you can tell me.’

  ‘Hold on a minute then, madam; I’ll look though our list but whoever it is, she’ll pro’lly have gone by now.’

  I held on, for longer than a minute. I was beginning to suspect that she’d hung up on me and pissed off herself when she restored my battered faith in human nature by coming back on the line.

  ‘You’re in luck, madam. Mr Baillie’s edited by Clarissa Orpin, and she’s still ’ere. One moment and I’ll put you through.’

  ‘This is Clarissa.’ The new voice on the line was as clipped as Denise’s had been languid. ‘To whom am I speaking?’

  ‘My name is Alexis.’

  ‘You’re interested in one of my authors, I’m told: Linton Baillie?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘You’re not a reviewer by any chance?’

  ‘Sorry, no.’

  ‘Pity, he could always use a few more. A journalist, then?’

  ‘Not that either, I’m afraid; I’m a lawyer.’

  ‘Oh my God,’ she sighed, wearily, ‘not another one. Listen, let me spell something out for you. Donside is a small publisher; no way can we afford to be on the wrong side of a libel action or even to be caught up in one. We insist on all our non-fiction authors giving us specific indemnities, on the basis of legal opinion, against that possibility. What that means is talk to Mr Baillie, not me.’

  ‘No, Ms Orpin, it means you’re jumping to conclusions, although it does suggest this has happened before with this particular author. I do want to talk to him, but not about defamation.’

  ‘Then what is your purpose?’

  ‘I can’t say, I’m afraid. Client confidentiality, you understand. My hope is that you can give me an address, or a contact number for him.’

  ‘I would if I could, Alexis,’ she said, ‘if only to get you off the line, and me on the tube, but I don’t have either. Truth be told I have never met the man.’

  ‘But you’re his editor,’ I observed.

  ‘No matter. I don’t need to see him to do my job; sometimes it’s better not to. One might form an opinion of a person, good or bad, that might colour one’s attitude to his work. Baillie’s manuscripts arrive in my in-box, I edit them and send back my observations and the final text is agreed. That’s how it works.’

  ‘That may be so, but you must have contracts, yes?’

  ‘Yes we do, but it’s always the agent’s address on those. In Baillie’s case it’s the agent who forwards the manuscript, and responds to my queries.’

  I frowned. ‘What you’re saying to me in effect is that for all you know, Linton Baillie might be a pseudonym. There might be no such person of that name.’

  ‘That hadn’t occurred to me,’ she admitted, ‘but it is the case. An author can call himself what he likes. Indeed, given some of the areas that Mr Baillie discusses in his work, that might a sensible precaution.’

  ‘He has a credit card,’ I told her.

  ‘So what? As long as he services the debt the issuer won’t give a damn if his real name is Joe Bloggs.’

  ‘Point taken,’ I conceded. ‘Tell me, Clarissa, am I the first person to come looking for Baillie?’

  She sniffed. ‘No, you’re not. I had a very nasty phone call last year from a chap with a Scottish accent. I reported it to the police; they investigated and told me that the man’s objection was to his name being used in Linton’s first book. They pointed out to him that he didn’t hold the copyright on it and that if his namesake happened to be a dead East End gangster, that was his unfortunately tough luck.’

  She paused. ‘There was also a call after the publication of The Public Executioner, from a chap in the Home Office. They weren’t too pleased by the content, but as the book didn’t make the Sunday Times top ten, they didn’t make a public fuss.’

  ‘Lucky old Linton.’

  ‘He’d agree with you. I never expected that book to ever earn out its substantial advance, but it has done, and then some.’

  ‘Does he have anything else in the pipeline?’ I asked.

  ‘We have an option on his next work, through a clause in his previous contract. His agent promises me that it will be special, but after the success of Executioner, he isn’t going to commit to a contract until he’s finished the manuscript.’

  ‘When is it due?’

  ‘He didn’t give me a specific date, but I’ve been told to expect it by the end of April, next year. I have to tell you, my dear, I am holding my breath; Baillie has kept our head above water for the last couple of years.

  ‘This business is very risky. True crime sells, no question, but there’s more and more of it around, and readers tend to be going crazy for anything Scandinavian. My best advice to an aspiring author these days is to write in a Nordic language and then have it translated into English.’

  She chuckled at her own joke. I didn’t because I didn’t get it.

  ‘And now,’ she said, ‘I really must go. The only help I can offer is the name of Baillie’s agent. It is Thomas Coyle, of the eponymous literary agency, and this is his number.’

  She dictated eleven digits. The first four were familiar. ‘He’s based in Edinburgh,’ she added, but I’d worked that out. ‘I can’t recall the address, I’m afraid, and I don’t have time to look it up.’

  ‘That’s all right,’ I said. ‘I do. Thanks.’

  ‘Will I be hearing from you again?’ Clarissa Orpin asked. Her tone was cautious rather than curious.

  ‘That may depend,’ I replied, ‘on what Mr Baillie is up to.’

  I left her wondering and reached for the Edinburgh Yellow Pages. I found four literary agencies listed, alphabetically: Thomas Coyle was the second, and his address was shown as Bengal Place. I had never heard of it, but Google maps soon showed me that it was a very small street between Canonmills and Stockbridge, where I used to live.

  I called the number Clarissa had given me. It rang out five times then voicemail picked up.

  ‘Congratulations,’ an o
ver-enthusiastic man exclaimed, in a husky voice. ‘You have reached the Coyle Literary Agency. The slightly bad news is that I can’t take your call at this moment. However, if you leave a message, and a contact number, I will get back to you soonest. That’s a promise. While you’re waiting, you might like to check out my website, www.coylelitagency.com.’

  All that phoney sincerity must have infected me, for I put on my best girlie simper and ad-libbed, ‘Hello, Mr Coyle. My name’s Lexie Martin and I’m an author. I write these really terrific detective novels. I’m trying to get them published and a friend said I should call you. I’ve got some free time tomorrow morning, and I’d really, really appreciate it if you could see me then.’

  I left my mobile number, then hung up. A few keystrokes and couple of clicks later and I was in his site.

  I plan to set one up myself as soon as I’ve passed the Bar exams, but I haven’t got around to choosing a web designer. When I do, it won’t be the one who set up Coyle’s. The wallpaper was a miscellany of bad taste, a mix of images that I guessed were meant to demonstrate the categories of work he represented; gambolling bunny rabbits and bloodstained corpses are all very fine, but not side by side.

  There was a photograph of the man himself; he looked as unctuous as he sounded, a chubby-cheeked middle-aged man with what looked like a toupee in a garish blue jacket with big lapels. Add in some sparkles and I could have been looking at a reincarnation of Liberace.

  I looked along the menu bar and selected ‘Bio’. It told me that Coyle was thirty-seven . . . I didn’t believe that for a moment; even in a studio photo, he looked forty-five, minimum . . . and that after a ‘stellar’ career in entertainment management he had set up an agency dedicated to ‘the best of Scottish literary talent’.

  His client list was also available. I opened it and looked for recognisable names among the two dozen or so listed; Linton Baillie was there, and a couple of people I knew as newspaper columnists, but the rest were unknown to me.