Unknown, p.1
Unknown, page 1
Unknown
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
CHAPTER FIFTY
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
CHAPTER SIXTY
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE
CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
CHAPTER SEVENTY
EPILOGUE
Acknowledgements
Canelo Crime
About the Author
Also by Heather Critchlow
Copyright
Title Page
Cover
Table of Contents
Start of Content
To Will, Rachel and Adam, for treading the paths of my imagination.
PROLOGUE
Her feet aren’t as steady on the path as they used to be. It’s strange to fumble once-familiar steps, to look down and see thinned-out ankles and scrawny calves, when inside you are still the girl with the skinny legs and the knitted sweater with the threads unravelling.
Everything else around her is a facsimile of memory – the Highland landscape laid out just as she remembers it. Fifty-one years on, the overwhelming rush of nostalgia is painful. It makes her chest clench and, as she reaches the top of the brae, she has to stop and push her hand hard against herself to keep her heart in her chest, lungs bursting from emotion as well as physical exertion. Her vision sways and then the purple-clad hills come back into focus.
Above her and out of sight lies the lochan: a plate of fresh glass, reflecting a chasm of sky. The thought of it makes her shiver. Beneath its waters lie secrets kept too long. The wind strikes and she staggers a little, planting her feet more securely between the rocks. When she thinks back to that time, it still hurts like a raw wound. In fact, it’s worse with an adult’s perspective. She aches for the girl she was. It’s time to set those secrets free.
Despite the lateness of the hour, it’s bright as noon. She had forgotten how the land of her birth keeps the light for longer in the summer, how it barely gets dark at all and the earth seems to glow. At home, night falls like a switch has been flicked.
Since her trip through the village, memories have flooded into her mind and the anger has grown. She was just a child back then. The same age as her granddaughter Leia is now. She was too young to understand, too young to be culpable.
The woman shivers, a full-body movement that goes right through her. There’s a creeping feeling at her back and in the shadows of the rocks. It’s the ghosts of the past, that’s all it is. It’s time to throw back the shutters and hold him to account. She thought about going straight to the police station but had an unaccountable urge to see this place again first. To decide if it is real or a figment of nightmare.
Her mind flutters to her daughters. At home, capable, married and running their lives. To her son. Her sandy, sun-tanned grandchildren feel like little drops of memory, quenching her thirst but no longer belonging to her. They’ll be having the usual Sunday meal later, the family collected together, loud and raucous and foreign to her. Recently, she’s been sitting in the corner, observing instead of partaking. It’s been that way since Ian died. Her slide into obsolescence beginning with widowhood.
She hadn’t realised until she returned to Scotland, to the scene of her crime, that this is home, not there. She’s only been borrowing her adopted country and even after all these years, it doesn’t fit properly; it’s been rubbing a blister on her soul.
Coughing a little and waiting to recover, she steels herself and sets off once more, leaving the well-trodden path and inching upwards, one laboured footstep at a time. It’s weighing her down, all this guilt. She longs to be free of it, to let it go.
A burn cuts a trickling path through the undergrowth to her right, invisible but insistent, spilling from the lochan’s chilled waters. Then a rock skitters on the slope above her and she startles, turning to see. The woman shades her eyes with a thin hand, liver-spotted and bony, but she is looking into the sun and she cannot tell if there are sheep above her, or deer, or just the shifting of the rock face as the day cools down.
Finally, she makes it to the shore. Something grips her inside, like a hand. Her legs are unsteady and the water makes her queasy with memory. Rattled, she turns from it and scans the slope above, seeking out her destination.
It takes another hour to ascend the cold valley, dark and untouched now by the sun, eschewed by walkers in favour of the ridge above.
Finally, she finds it. The flat area of grass surrounded by rocks. She collapses onto the green platform with relief, sweat cooling on her as she presses her forehead to the earth. The thing she did that day was the work of a moment, but it cast its ripples through the rest of her life.
It is there, as she lies prone, sucking in air, that he finds her.
She cries out in recognition as he steps over the lip of the rise onto the platform. Of course. A wash of tiredness covers her like a weighted blanket. The demon is here. Now and then merge together. Those eyes. That angular jaw. Not something you’d ever really forget. She staggers to her feet because she’s not that girl, not anymore. She turns to face him and her rage rises.
CHAPTER ONE
The glasses sparkle in the light of the chandeliers as the waiter pours foaming champagne into a cluster of flutes crammed onto the round table. Some of the liquid oozes over the top but is immediately soaked up by the thick white tablecloth. Cal barely notices, transfixed by the refracted beauty that glimmers across the stuffed ballroom, overwhelmed by the cacophony of industry small-talk and laughter around him. He tucks a finger into the collar of his shirt, stretching it a little, unused to the constraints of a dinner jacket and bow tie. This is not the natural habitat of the true-crime podcaster.
Shona slips her hand into his beneath the table and squeezes, drawing his attention back from the sight of the Grosvenor Ballroom on Park Lane in full swing. She looks radiant – her shoulder-length blonde hair swept up into an elegant chignon and her shoulders shimmering above a tight black sheath. Outside, a heatwave is assaulting the capital, but in here, underground, it is cooler.
‘You’re glittering,’ he tells her, pressing a finger experimentally to her collarbone. ‘Literally.’
She laughs, passing one of the glasses to him, and her earrings dance in the light. ‘It’s that stuff Chrissie gave me for Christmas. Finally, a chance to use it.’ Her face softens at the mention of Cal’s daughter, who called from her Edinburgh uni flat earlier to wish him luck. ‘We’re going to be finding it everywhere, I’m afraid.’
He kisses her, momentarily forgetting the mixture of nerves and gin and tonic in his stomach. ‘Everywhere? Do you promise?’
Shona raises an eyebrow suggestively and then turns to her left, where Cal’s producer Sarah is tugging her arm to introduce her to one of the advertisers. As a forensic anthropologist, Shona is a novelty in this room of media darlings and Sarah is delighted to use her to full effect. Unlike Cal, his producer is in her element. Her red dress is low-cut and devastating, judging by the looks of most of the men in the room. She’s ignoring every one of them, far more interested in lining up funding for future projects and making business connections. As ever, he’s in awe of the younger woman.
He knows Shona doesn’t mind lending her expertise, and her distraction gives him another moment to catch his breath. He doesn’t fit in here. Definitely doesn’t deserve the award for which his Finding Justice podcast is nominated.
Another waiter sets a perfectly round beetroot and goat’s cheese tart in front of him. He picks up a fork and toys with the lamb’s lettuce garnish, unable to eat but trying to force himself. He longs to break free from this place. On the surface, it is glossy, but all he sees is a carefully crafted veneer. Luckily, Cal knows he won’t win the award – the list of competitors is intimidating – but he’s struggling to dispel a sense of unease. He’s the proverbial fish, flopping around on the sumptuous carpet, waiting for someone to put him back in the water and leave him alone.
‘Angie texted,’ Shona whispers in his ear. He turns, his attention snagged by the mention of the mother of the subject of his last podcast series. ‘She says good luck. They’re all rooting for you.’
He tries to smile. It doesn’t fool Shona.
‘What’s up?’
‘It feels wrong,’ he says, gesturing at the excesses around them. ‘Indulgent.’
How can he sit here and drink champagne when the families he works with have voids in their lives that can never be filled? It’s as if he’s profiting from their misfortune. He knows all too well how they feel. He has his own void too.
Shona’s fingers close over his. ‘I know you’re not one for pomp and ceremony, but this is a big deal, Cal. No matter what happens, the nomination is a testament to the sacrifices you’ve made. It’s another sign that people have listened, that these stories matter. No one begrudges you this.’ She squeezes his hand again. ‘Except maybe you.’
Cal feels a lump in his throat that is little to do with the tartlet he’s failing to eat. Her words make logical sense but he feels something building inside him, threatening to burst out.
‘Thank you,’ he says, forcing himself to push away the past for a moment. ‘It’s not like I’m going to win, so we can just drink this free champagne and then maybe I can check where the rest of that glitter has got to.’
Shona tosses her head back and laughs – the paleness of her throat gleams in the glow of this night. Cal sips his drink and lets the bubbles fizz down his throat. It’s fine. He’s fine.
For the next hour, he makes polite conversation with the people Sarah has invited to the table – current and potential advertisers – fending off comments about his chances of winning and hoping they’re not too disappointed when the announcement is made. The fact that the table is at the back of the room should be enough of a clue.
Eventually, the dessert plates are cleared and the room falls as quiet as a room of over a thousand people can. The host takes the microphone and the lights dim further, throwing the stage and a backdrop of stars into relief. He listens almost absent-mindedly to the first few categories, knowing Best Podcast is one of the last. Shona is right – he doesn’t like big events and ceremonies. That’s all this simmering feeling is. Introspection always leads him back to the same place.
Margot. Red curls, a strong personality and a fierce love for her younger brother. At nineteen, she was as much a parent to him as his mother and father were. Her absence is a phantom limb. Part of him will always be the nine-year-old he was when they lost her. Or rather, when she was taken from them. He puts his drink down to applaud the Best TV Documentary winner, an old BBC colleague, and feels the hypocrisy of this night pulsing inside him.
How can he sit here and celebrate his successes when the case he cared most about was a complete failure? Jason Barr killed his sister and walked free, and there is nothing Cal can do about it. His fingers curl into fists at the thought of the ex-nightclub bouncer.
He’s so tangled in the web of the past, Cal isn’t listening to the acceptance speeches and hardly realises they are on to his category. Not that it matters. It’s only when he catches the excited glances thrown his way by the others at the table and sees hopeful tension fix on Sarah’s face that he remembers where he is and sits up straight, readying a rueful, philosophical expression for the moment the announcement is made.
Everything spins and blurs around him. Too much champagne? He should have paced himself. That’s why he’s spiralling over Margot, maudlin and regretful when he has promised himself he would relinquish the anger. He tries to tune into the summary of each of the nominated shows. His money’s on the history podcast – it has record numbers and is far glossier than all the other offerings.
Then it’s happening. His name inexplicably in the mouth of the comedian holding a gold trophy shaped like a microphone. The rush of sound and cheers around him, Shona leaning in to hug him, Sarah leaping to her feet and shrieking in triumph. What’s happening?
It comes to him like an echo down a long corridor, gradually getting closer, coming into focus. Tears in Shona’s eyes. ‘You’ve won, Cal, you’ve won!’
They’re pushing him to his feet and he’s reaching for Sarah, beckoning her to come and accept the award, but she’s shaking her head, laughing, and he’s stumbling across the room alone but surrounded by people. He’s acutely aware of the clumsiness of his movements, the applause and the focus, the long time it takes to walk to the stage.
Then he’s there, mounting the steps on shaky legs, and the applause dies down. He holds the trophy in his hands and everything stills as he realises he hasn’t prepared anything to say. There is no ‘just in case’ speech in his pocket. His mind is a sheet of blank paper and he needs something, fast. All he feels is despair. He steps up to the lectern, his mouth dry and the award slipping in his sweaty fingers.
‘Er… wow. Good evening. Thank you…’
The host is frowning at the delay, his body language twitchy and impatient. It’s hot up here under the lights and Cal can’t see past the glare to the individuals – the audience an amorphous mass in the darkness. Out there, somewhere, are Shona and Sarah.
He begins by rattling through the personal and professional thank yous, starting with the families of the missing and murdered, and praying he hasn’t missed anyone at the production company. The host is shifting forward in anticipation of regaining the microphone when Cal pauses and looks directly at the audience. That wave of tiredness once more sweeps over him. More than that. He’s pissed off. He doesn’t want this charade anymore. Enough.
‘Our podcast is called Finding Justice,’ he says. ‘And I’ve dedicated my life to looking for that very thing. The reality is – it’s not always possible to find. All you have to do is look at our politicians and our establishments to see that sometimes there is no justice. That those who trample and hurt other people rise to the top. It’s torture, watching perpetrators freed on a technicality or given token jail terms. For the families of the missing and murdered, there is no reprieve. Their grief is a life sentence. Our justice system makes a mockery of their pain.’
The room is utterly still now. He can almost touch the moving beast of silence. Where is he going with this? It’s like jumping from a height, the earth billowing up towards him. The host is frozen, a rictus smile on his face, eyes darting in panic.
‘I am living a life sentence of my own. My sister Margot was abducted from the side of a country road and killed almost forty years ago. Last year, her murderer was acquitted by a jury of his peers. I cannot keep pretending that when you find the truth, it fixes things. I know the truth and it made no difference.’
He touches the shining trophy with one finger, notices his name engraved on the tiny plaque at its foot. ‘Thank you, sincerely, for this honour, but I will not accept this award while Jason Barr walks free.’
There’s a moment, a pause and an intake of breath, then the sound explodes around him. Voices, jabbering, shouting, calling his name. Cal is already gone: down the steps, through the fire doors, out into the stifling night, the trophy abandoned on the podium behind him.
CHAPTER TWO
It’s early but they aren’t the first to park in the car park at the foot of Ben Lawers. As Cal swings his backpack onto his shoulders, he takes in the small red Mini nestled in a shady spot, though there will be no respite from the heat anywhere in a few hours’ time. Shona clicks the fob of the car, locking it with their planned route displayed on the dashboard. She sprays her face with suncream and tosses him the can.
Cal looks up at the hill, resplendent in the morning air. ‘I hope we have enough water with us.’ He looks down at the dog doubtfully, though his backpack is straining at the seams with bottles.
‘Just imagine the breeze up there. I can’t wait. Rocket will be happier too.’
