Deadly Code (Rhona MacLeod #3) Read online

  Praise for Lin Anderson

  Greenock born Anderson’s work is sharper than a pathologist’s scalpel. One of the best Scottish crime series since Ian Rankin’s Rebus. Shari Low, The Daily Record

  Deadly Code

  Lin Anderson

  Copyright 2011 Lin Anderson

  This book is available in print at most online retailers

  Discover other titles by Lin Anderson at www.Amazon.com and www.Amazon.co.uk

  The voices were there again. Chitter chatter, chitter chatter. The two men were bad enough, whispering confidences, offering advice. She could just about cope with them.

  But not the woman. It was the woman’s voice she hated most. Screeching away at her.

  Esther’s stupid. Esther’s stupid.

  The wind met her abruptly at the Underground entrance, snatching the voice from her head. She imagined the woman being dragged away screaming, and smiled.

  It’s one pound twenty.’ She was startled back into reality.

  ‘Sorry. Right.’

  Her right hand shook as she tried to pluck the ticket from the curved metal tray. The guy waited, his chin raised in mock patience, as she fumbled.

  Her hands didn’t work any more. They didn’t do what she told them.

  She walked stiffly to the turnstile. As the slot sucked in the ticket, the woman’s voice was back, nipping her brain. When the train emerged from the tunnel, the roar momentarily drowned the voice. She looked down at the track and imagined being enveloped in a thick black silence.

  Then the woman was back, calling her a stupid bitch, a stupid fucking bitch.

  Esther stumbled forward, tipping her centre of gravity towards the edge.

  Chapter I

  A body in water is prey to all manner of hazards: rocks, fish, boats in too much of a hurry to notice the soft thump of swollen flesh against a bow. This body - or more precisely, bit of a body - was no exception.

  The left foot had been severed from the leg ten centimetres below the patella. Both fibula and tibia bones were divided at the same place. All the toes were intact, although the nails had disintegrated or been eaten off during the foot’s time in the water.

  Dr Rhona MacLeod stepped back from the examination table and eased the mask from her face, letting in the tang of the sea and the smell of watered death.

  ‘Well?’ The pathologist, Dr Sissons, raised an eyebrow.

  DI Bill Wilson stood opposite. He raised an eyebrow to match, making sure Sissons didn’t see, then winked at Rhona.

  Chrissy Mclnsh, Rhona’s young assistant, stepped back, her face growing pale. This week her hair was bright auburn. The contrast made her face even paler. Mortuary assistants grew used to the smell of corrupt flesh. Forensic assistants didn’t get exposed to it often enough to become immune.

  ‘I’d say the foot’s been in the water between three and four weeks,’ Rhona said.

  Sissons nodded in agreement.

  ‘A fisherman caught it in Raasay Sound,’ said Bill.

  ‘So the crime scene is a fishing boat?’ Rhona smiled. ‘I pity the crime scene manager on that one.’

  ‘Tempers are running high on Skye. A boat went down there a month ago,’ Bill said. ‘They haven’t found the bodies of the crew yet. Locals blame an MOD submarine. Chances are, the foot belongs to one of the missing men.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be the first time a submarine has snagged a net and sunk a boat.’

  Bill nodded. ‘Then again, it could be someone trying to get rid of a body.’

  ‘Judging by the size, it’s male.’ Sissons glanced at Rhona. ‘Dr MacLeod will confirm that with DNA sampling.’

  ‘How did it get separated from the body?’ Bill asked.

  ‘Difficult to be certain,’ Sissons said, ‘after this amount of time in the water.’

  Rhona contemplated the grey mass of soggy flesh. The limb had been cut off just below the knee, but by what? Most Glasgow villains liked to dispatch their victims with a knife, although hatchets, axes, machetes, meat cleavers and samurai swords were also popular. Glasgow was knifing capital of the UK, the Western Isles of Scotland were not.

  ‘I’ll take samples from the cut-off point,’ she suggested. ‘There might be microscopic fragments of metal left in the wound.’

  There was a gagging sound. Chrissy was making for the door.

  ‘Out on the town last night,’ Rhona explained. ‘Stomach’s a little fragile.’

  ‘I have to go,’ Sissons said. ‘I’ll leave the rest to Dr MacLeod.’

  ‘A call-out?’ Rhona asked when he had left.

  ‘A body. Fortunately not in my division.’

  “The rest of this one could turn up.’

  ‘Then again, it might not.’

  The rugged west of Scotland, including the islands, had thousands of miles of coastline, mostly uninhabited. Depending on weather and tides, the rest of the body could end up anywhere, or never be found.

  ‘We could DNA-test the families of the missing fishermen,’ Rhona suggested.

  ‘No authorisation to do that yet.’

  ‘The MOD won’t like the publicity.’

  ‘There won’t be any if they can help it.’

  After Bill left, Rhona carefully examined the wound and succeeded in retrieving what could be particles of metal and some fibres. She bagged the metal for delivery to Chemistry and set about making slides of the fibres.

  It was while she was extracting the samples that she noticed a possible area of pigmented or tattooed skin above the ankle bone.

  Putrefaction had rendered the mark indistinct but if she removed the loose epidermis, it would be clearer on the underlying dermis. If her hunch was right and it was the remains of a tattoo, it might help identify the owner.

  An hour later there was a shuffle outside and the door squeaked open.

  ‘Finished with Long John Silver yet?’

  Chrissy was holding her nose.

  ‘Almost. How’s the stomach?’

  ‘Fine. I came to remind you of the time.’

  Rhona glanced at the big clock above the door, already knowing she was running at least two hours behind. Trust the foot to arrive on this particular afternoon.

  The phone rang when she was pulling on her coat.

  ‘How’s it going?’

  ‘Hey, Bill.’ Rhona managed a smile despite her hurry.

  Married with two teenage kids, DI Bill Wilson represented the father-figure Rhona had lost when her own father died two years before. Her adoptive parents had a marriage made in heaven. Her dad had outlived her mother by only a couple of years.

  Bill Wilson filled the gap left by her father in her life. They also worked well together. Attuned to each other’s thought processes, their combined brains had solved a number of difficult cases.

  Rhona waited, sensing Bill’s sombre mood.

  ‘I’ve had a meeting with the Super. The Ministry of Defence want the discovery of the foot kept low profile until we find out who it belongs to.’

  Rhona wasn’t surprised.

  ‘If it helps, I’ve dug out what might be tiny fragments of metal and rope. I also identified a faint mark above the ankle bone that just might be a tattoo. If we manage to enhance the image digitally, it could identify the owner.’

  ‘Good.’

  Rhona caught sight of the clock again. ‘Sorry Bill I have to go. I have an early flight to LA and I haven’t done my homework yet.’

  ‘Business class, I hope?’

  ‘Paid for by our transatlantic cousins.’

  Rhona took a last look round the lab, then slipped her laptop into its case and slung it over her shoulder.

  The disappearance of fishing boats was not uncommon in the waters
off the west coast of Scotland. The MOD had to practise submarine manoeuvres somewhere and where better than Raasay Sound? If the MOD thought they were responsible for this death, it would go some way to explaining the secrecy. Get in before the press. Stop uncomfortable questions being asked in parliament. Anyway, if the rest of the body didn’t turn up, some poor woman would be burying a foot in place of her fisherman husband.

  Rhona pulled the lab door shut and headed for the stairs. Old George was on duty in reception, strains of the ‘Grand Ole Opry’ escaping from his earphones.

  ‘Hey, Doc’

  She was halfway to the front door when he called her back.

  ‘This was handed in for you. Something about your trip.’

  Rhona took the white envelope and turned it over. It had the travel agent’s address on the back. God, she had said she would pick up the final bits of paper this afternoon and the work on the tattoo had put it right out of her head.

  ‘Thanks, George. Wouldn’t have got far without this.’

  He smiled and pointed to the CD, giving Rhona the thumbs up. The image of a severed foot was replaced with something much worse: a long night shift with only George’s choice of country music for company.

  She took a left into University Avenue and headed for Byres Road. Early May in Scotland could bring four seasons in one day, or one hour. This evening it was spring-like with a sharp wind that sent threatening clouds rushing across the sky.

  Rhona took a deep breath of the crisp air. After the stuffiness of the lab it tasted good. She loved this part of Glasgow. The gothic university campus standing dominant on the hill, watching over the city. At its southern foot, the green of Kelvingrove Park. Northwards, the university gardens, criss-crossed by downward paths ending in the grounds of the Western Infirmary.

  Rhona had been a student here. On graduation, she’d had to go south for work, but she’d eventually succeeded in coming back to her favourite city.

  She took a right into University Gardens, passing the Maths building. Further along, the Gregory Building housed her GUARD colleagues (Glasgow University Archaeological Research Division). The GUARD team was responsible for analysing stomach contents of victims, and more generally entomological and botanical evidence.

  Expertise was a team effort now. Gone were the days when a single renowned forensic expert entered the witness box and gave his opinion, though those eminent fathers of forensics, Professor Glaister in Glasgow and Sir Sydney Smith in Edinburgh, had paved the way for the work she did now.

  Rhona quickened her step. In about twelve hours she would be boarding a plane for Los Angeles and she had done next to nothing to prepare for either her departure or the paper she was to deliver.

  The Underground entrance was littered with spent tickets making small pirouettes in the wind that rushed to fill the two tunnels. This was one subway tourists could not get lost on. Opposite directions took you to the same places if you stayed on long enough. It was like travelling a Mobius strip. You started and ended in the same spot, having apparently flipped across to the other side of the track on the way.

  As Rhona waited on the narrow central platform, a mixed group of Glasgow’s nouveau-cool appeared at the top of the stairs, all giggles and expensive aftershave. They clattered down the steps, hearing the rumble from the tunnel, anticipating a train.

  The young woman arrived seconds later. She stood next to Rhona, mouth moving silently, shoulders hunched. She was high on something.

  Drugs - Glasgow’s curse. .

  Rhona tried not to stare at the pale face, the clouded eyes, the mouth plucking silent words. How old was she? Eighteen, nineteen? Did her mother know she was like this?

  Rhona thought of her own teenage son, Liam, doing voluntary work in some village in Nigeria that didn’t even exist on a map.

  As the train emerged from the tunnel, the girl stumbled and for a screaming moment Rhona thought she might fall in front of it. Then the orange door hissed open and the girl was inside and curled against the glass in a corner seat.

  Rhona sat opposite, irritated by her need to categorise her, examine her like a piece of forensic evidence. It was both the raison d’etre and the curse of her profession. Everyone in the world was a potential victim. Everyone was some mother’s child.

  The young woman had stopped her silent mouthings and was staring sideways through the glass. She reached up and pushed a strand of damp blonde hair behind her left ear, exposing a beauty spot in the shape of a small and perfect heart. Without the hunched shoulders and haunted eyes, she could be a pre-Raphaelite painting. She turned in Rhona’s direction. For a moment their eyes met and then she was up and heading for the door as the train drew into the next station, but not before Rhona saw the mixture of torment and tears on her face.

  The big bay window shone with light. Sean was already home. The familiar knot arrived in Rhona’s stomach. Ever since they had got back together she had been like this. Wanting to arrive home to an empty flat. Seeking the luxury of being alone again.

  Then she would see him and the knot would dissolve. She couldn’t explain it, even to herself.

  She had always enjoyed living alone. When a day went badly she could go home and shut the door. Her work brought her into contact with so much horror, there had to be somewhere she switched off. Somewhere she didn’t have to talk. Her cat, Chance, was there if she needed to unburden her soul and he never talked back, apart from an occasional purr.

  When Sean entered her life, he had disturbed its equilibrium. His blue eyes and Irish charm had invoked a passion she feared she could not control. Worse, did not want to control.

  Then Sean moved out. Her decision, of course.

  The parting hadn’t lasted long. One night, after a difficult day, she found herself outside the jazz club again. She sat in the shadows listening to Sean play his saxophone. When he played the tune he wrote for her, she realised he knew she was there, waiting.

  Rhona stood the briefcase on the hall floor and hung up her coat. Chance came running to greet her, wrapping her legs in a cocoon of warm fur.

  ‘In the kitchen,’ Sean called.

  Rhona hesitated for a moment before she went in.

  ‘You’re late.’

  ‘Sorry. I was late leaving. We had a leg, or I should say a foot, in last thing.’

  ‘A leg?’

  Rhona made a face and chose not to explain. Sean handed her a glass of red wine, at exactly the right temperature.

  ‘Chateau de France ‘94,’ he said. ‘Good.’

  Rhona listened as he related the story of the acquisition of the wine.

  ‘So what’s the celebration?’

  ‘Your trip, of course. Not every day my lady gets an all-expenses paid trip to LA, where she is the guest speaker.’

  ‘A guest speaker,’ Rhona corrected him. ‘It’s not that important.’

  But he knew it was. They raised their glasses.

  ‘What’s for dinner?’ she said, anchoring her thoughts in the here and now.

  ‘Leg of lamb,’ Sean said. *Not a good choice.’

  Rhona laughed.

  He played the audition tape as they sat in front of the fire finishing the wine, anticipating sex.

  Rhona had known there was something Sean wanted to tell her. It was in his greeting, the choice of wine, the nice meal.

  So this was it.

  ‘What do you think?’ he said.

  The voice was a mixture of woman and girl. Sexy and childlike at the same time. A powerful combination.

  Rhona tried not to put a face to the voice. Instead she asked, ‘Who is she?’

  ‘Her name’s Esther. She came to the club today and asked to audition. We gave her a shot.’

  ‘She’s good.’ It was an understatement.

  ‘Yeah.’ Sean was pleased, as if he were responsible for the wonderful sound.

  ‘Have you met her before?’ Rhona was trying to keep the edge from her voice.

  He shook his head. ‘She turned up
out of the blue. Said she’d stopped performing for a while, but was keen to get back.’

  Rhona examined her glass, thinking they had been here before. She knew from the moment they met that Sean liked women. He was honest about it. Monogamy had not been his strong point - until now. Or so he said.

  He put his glass down. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  The sultry voice flowed between them, pushing them apart. Sean stood up and switched it off.

  ‘More wine?’

  Rhona shook her head. Sean refilled his own glass.

  She got up. Td better pack.’

  He caught her arm. ‘I hired her to sing, Rhona, not to fuck.’

  ‘I never said that.’

  ‘But you thought it, didn’t you?’

  His mouth came down hard on hers and she felt the familiar surge of desire. Sometimes she thought of Sean as a drug, his presence bringing waves of pleasure that drowned out everything else.

  The window was open. Cool night air rippled over their warm naked bodies. Her shiver was as much from desire as it was from the chill. Sean was good at this. He played her body in a way that no one else could. Sometimes gentle, sometimes so hard she thought she would break and shatter into tiny pieces. Tonight his tongue was a whisper across her skin, every cell vibrating in response. Her blood beat in anticipation.

  He slipped his hands beneath and lifted her. The entrance was as smooth as silk, as sweet as honey.

  She shuddered on the cusp of orgasm and he retreated.

  ‘Not yet,’ he whispered into her hair.

  She rose at three o’clock. Sean breathed silently, his head dark against the pillow. As she got up, the thought crossed her mind that during her absence the new singer might fill the place she had just vacated.

  Sex was food to Sean. As necessary to life as playing his saxophone. And what about her?

  She was no innocent either. An image of Severino MacRae crossed her mind. When they were thrown together during an arson case, the Chief Fire Investigator’s attitude had driven her first to distraction, then into a sexual dance that had been as compelling as the investigation itself.

  At times like those, she thought she might break Sean’s spell over her by having sex with someone else. It didn’t matter what she thought. Her body’s response to Sean was something she could not control.