Head Shot

78

'Is this going to become a habit?' she asked.

'I couldn't honestly tell you,' Mario sighed.

She stood, drew her makeshift nightgown over her head, and lowered her long olive-skinned body into the bath beside him. 'Come on then, move your bum,' she murmured. He made room for her; it was big enough and then some.

'It won't do you any good,' he murmured, 'you know that, don't you.'

'Maybe not,' she replied, 'but I know when a man needs a hug. It's been a bad day, then?'

'The worst of my life,' he told her, truthful y. 'Remember wee Ivy?

She's dead; Neil and I found her at her place this afternoon.'

Paula sighed. 'Oh, no; the poor kid. What was it? An overdose?'

'An overdose of life.'

'And what about the man who kil ed my dad? Are you any nearer catching him?'

He nodded, sending ripples across the surface of the bathwater. 'We know where he is. We'l go and get him tomorrow.'

'You wouldn't kil him for me, would you?' She smiled as she asked, but he knew that she was deadly serious.

'I won't have to go that far.'

She pul ed back an inch or two, focusing on his face. 'What do you mean by that?'

'Don't ask. Don't ask any more questions. In fact, shut your bloody mouth.' He turned half round towards her, drew her to him and kissed her. Even in the warm bath, she could feel him shiver.

'Here,' she whispered. 'I thought you said this wouldn't do me any good.'

'It won't,' he told her. 'We're going to hate ourselves in the morning.'

'You speak for yourself, big boy.'

They arrived outside the tenement building just after ten on Thursda morning; Mcllhenney looked the fresher of the two, but it was marginal.

Mario had awakened in Paula's bed three hours earlier, to find her propped up on an elbow beside him, looking down at him with a smile on her face. 'You did it again, you big bastard,' she had chuckled. 'You fell asleep on me.'

'Oops, sorry,' he had murmured in reply, reaching up to draw her down beside him. 'But I'm half-awake now.'

'You real y know how to make a girl feel wanted.'

He had barely finished shaving… the sign of the modem single woman, he had decided, was a Gil ette Mach III, stil in the wrapper, and a can of foam, in her bathroom cabinet… when his friend had arrived to collect him. He had asked no questions on the drive out to Ormiston, and Mario had told him nothing.

Pat Dewberry was cleaned up, made up and composed, when they walked into her living room, after Alice Cowan had let them in. 'He hasn't come home, you know,' she had said.

McGuire had simply shrugged. 'We'll have to look somewhere else, then.'

They had cautioned her and had told her that she would be taken into custody for questioning in connection with fraudulent claims from several insurance companies, and had called in a team from Detective Superintendent Brian Mackie's division to take her to their office in Lasswade.

And then they had headed for Bonnington, where they had found Willie Haggerty, Dan Pringle, Stevie Steele and four armed, uniformed officers, a sergeant and three constables, waiting for them.

'What's this about then, Mario?' asked the head ofCID. 'Stevie said you wanted me here, and an armed response team, but that was al. I thought I'd better tell the ACC too, then I found you'd phoned him.

You're fuckin' about with the chain of command here. Superintendent, and I don't like it.'

'Easy, Clan,' said Haggerty, calming the belligerent DCS. 'The lads 304 have been operating under my orders. You want to shout at anyone, shout at me.' He looked at McGuire. 'Okay. Tell us al your story.'

The big, swarthy detective nodded. 'We have information that the man who called himself Magnus Essary… his real name is George Rosewell… may be holed up in a flat here; the one next door to where the girl was killed yesterday. We also believe that he killed her; we should be able to prove that when we get hold of him.'

'What else do you know about him?'

'He shot my Uncle Beppe. He also killed the priest Father Green, and the doctor who certified the death; we have his accomplice in custody.

She's spilled the lot.'

Haggerty frowned. 'If he killed the girl, what the hell's he doing hiding next door?'

'We think he probably watched the place,' Mcl henney volunteered, 'and came back here after our guys had finished. Not entirely daft when you think about it.'

'And you think he's armed?'

'We must assume that.'

'Agreed; let's do it.'

The ACC nodded to the uniformed officers; weapons drawn, they led the way upstairs, moving silently until finally they reached the landing for which Ivy Brennan's taped-over apartment told them they had been heading. McGuire pointed to Rosewell's flat, and one of the constables stepped forward. He swung a heavy wooden bludgeon at the door; the frame shattered, it swung open, and the armed team rushed inside, their shouted warnings announcing their presence.

Inside a minute, the sergeant stepped out on to the landing. On floors above and below, they heard doors opening. 'He's in here, sir,' the officer told Haggerty.

The ACC led the detectives into the flat, following the armed sergeant. George Rosewell lay on his back, on a bloodstained rug, with half his face gone; a great silenced automatic hanging loosely in his right hand.

Haggerty looked down at him. 'You've done us a favour then, pal,' he said, as if the man could hear him. 'Good idea, bad bastard that you were.'

'He's had two whacks at it,' Steele murmured, pointing at a shattered mirror, above the cold fireplace. 'His hand must have been shaking the first time he tried.'

'Made no mistake next time,' Haggerty grunted. 'Okay, that's it; cal up the meat wagon, Stevie, and let's have him carted off for post mortem.'

'Are you not going to get Dorward's team in before we move him?' asked Pringle.

'Nah. No need for them. It's clear what happened; we'll do a residue test to prove he fired the gun. That'll be enough for the report to the fiscal.'

He looked at McGuire and Mcllhenney. 'That's it all sorted then, lads is it?' '

'Everything.'

'What about the woman, this Dewberry?'

'She's co-operating, sir. We've got her for the insurance scam, and she'll admit to dropping Rosewell off at Beppe's place the night he was shot.'

'What about the priest?'

'That'l have to stay unsolved. The priest, the doctor, and Rosewell are all dead. No decent brief will let her incriminate herself

'True. Well, come on; let's get moving. I haven't got al day; I'm the only bugger in the command corridor this week.' The squat Glaswegian headed for the door, McGuire by his side. 'How's Maggie, by the way? I heard you called her in sick.'

'She's got flu, sir. She'll be off for the rest of this week, at least, I'm afraid.'

'Not to worry. Manny English is back tomorrow, a bit early, and you've just sorted her investigation for her. Tell her I was asking for her.

In fact, you and Mcl henney take the rest of the week off yourselves. The pair of you look fucking knackered. Anyone would think you'd been up all night.' v