He closed the folder, turned away slightly in his chair, crossing his leg and raising his shoulder protectively so she couldn’t see it.
‘There’s nothing in there,’ said Watling. Trust me. We’d know. If there had been a payment recently it wouldn’t be paper-based – he’d use hard currency so there’s no trace. My guess? He’d use Krugerrands – he had links to that RAF currency scam years ago, remember? The humble Kruger was a very hot ticket in those days.’
‘What sort of person would he hire?’
‘Usually ex-military. At the moment the market’s flooded with ex-IRA boys – they’ll drop someone for ten K. But it’s not Mooney’s style. They’re loose cannons, too unreliable, too flappy with the old gums in the pub afterwards. He’d pay more and get someone he could trust.’
Zoë put her elbows on the table, her chin in her hands, and stared at the files, thinking about this. A hired gun. If Goldrab really had been offed by Mooney, and she could find out whom he had paid to do it, the whole thing might start to unravel. If there was a connection between Goldrab, Mooney and Lorne that SIB hadn’t uncovered it would pop out in no time. If not, at the very worst she’d be sure Goldrab was really gone.
‘And where is Mooney at the moment?’
‘He’s on holiday with his wife – soon to be his ex-wife when this thing breaks.’
‘Anywhere I could go and visit him?’
Zhang snorted. ‘Yeah – hang on a minute. I’ll just write the address down.’
‘What I mean,’ Zoë said slowly, ‘is how do we work it from here? Who backs off? Who scratches whose back? I mean, I’ve got primacy on Goldrab, which means I’ve got a right to investigate his connection to Mooney.’
‘And we’ve got primacy on what Mooney did in Kosovo. And the bulk of the evidence.’ Watling shook her head. ‘Please – we’ve spent years on this, Zoë. Years. You can’t calculate the man hours. Everything’s in place – just teetering like that.’ She held up a hand and seesawed it, like a car on a clifftop. ‘Mooney’s arrest’s scheduled for next week. But he’s a flight risk – if he gets even a whiff of this there’s any number of ways he can disappear out of the country. His secretary’s already getting windy from your phone calls because you said the CID word, didn’t you? Forgive me but you’ve already jeopardized the case. One more cock-up now and we’re going to lose the whole thing. No.’ She placed two hands on the desk. As if she’d made up her mind and it was all over. ‘We’ll take on Goldrab’s disappearance, share our SPA disclosure files when it’s all tied up. You get the results without the work. Goldrab can’t be that important to you, can he?’
‘Yes. He can.’
‘Why?’
‘For all the usual reasons,’ she said sweetly. ‘Like when I close the case and my superintendent hangs out the bunting for me. When every plain-clothed officer in Bath lines up and sings, “We love you, Zoë,” as I walk through the briefing room. When bluebirds come in and tidy my desk every morning.’
‘Any of the glory we can spare we’ll pass on to you. You have my word. You’ll get your bunting, Zoë. You will. Bluebirds and whatever.’
She nodded and smiled. If they were in the movies, the way Zhang said, this would be the point at which she’d argue, refuse to have the case wrested from her. Why did they always do it like that? she thought. What did people have against just nodding, making a promise, then getting the hell on with whatever they’d intended doing in the first place? In her experience it saved a lot of trouble.
She gave a long sigh and sat back in her chair, arms flopping open. ‘OK. OK. But if there’s going to be bunting, I get to choose the colour.’
Chapter 19
It was late and Millie wanted to stay with the Sweetmans, have a sleepover with Sophie. Apparently they were friends again. Sally wouldn’t have agreed after what had happened tonight, but maybe, she thought a little hopefully, Millie would spend time not just with Sophie but with Nial too. Get Peter Cyrus out of her head. And anyway, Steve insisted, Jake wasn’t a problem now: Sally could relax, she could come to his place and they could get drunk, celebrate the end of the whole bloody awful affair. Secretly she was glad. It gave her a chance to escape the silences that seemed to be building in the fields surrounding Peppercorn Cottage.
They stayed up late drinking a sweet dessert wine Steve had found for ten euros a bottle in a supermarket in Bergerac. They had sex twice – once on the kitchen counter with their clothes still on, and once much later in bed, under the covers, when they were very drunk and Sally couldn’t stop hiccuping or giggling. Things seemed almost normal on the surface. Even so, the last thing she did before she went to sleep was open the windows so the unfamiliar city noises would come into the room and get into her dreams – maybe stop Zoë, or David Goldrab sitting up in the field and grabbing her arm.
She woke late, her head thick and heavy, to a morning as hot as midsummer. She and Steve ate breakfast on the terrace. They drank cranberry juice and ate fresh raspberries. Today he was going to America and she had thought she was ready for that, but when, after breakfast, she came into the hallway to find him dressed in a suit, luggage on the floor next to him, she felt suddenly cold.
‘What if something happens? What if I get questioned again? I won’t know what to say.’
‘You won’t get questioned again. It won’t happen.’
‘What happens if someone traces that money you changed?’
‘The Krugerrands? They won’t. Trust me.’ He picked up his suitcase. ‘It’s going to be OK.’
Sally was subdued on the drive to the airport. The Audi would need to be repaired so they took her car, Steve driving, the window open, the radio on full blast, as if he didn’t have a worry in the world. She sat hunched on the passenger seat, her handbag clenched on her lap, staring out of the window at the Bristol suburbs, at the sunshine in sharp, blocky shapes on the dingy houses. She wondered whether Zoë sometimes came to Bristol. Of course she must – all the time. She’d been all around the world. Zoë’s face as she had stood at the table came back to Sally then, saying, ‘I apologize.’ She tried to imagine the image being taken away from her, pulled like a grey thread out of her head, out of the car window, whipped away by the slipstream, like a twisting ghost.
She and Steve didn’t speak much as they parked, made their way out of the sunshine into the terminal, through Check-in and up the escalator. They were already calling his flight, so he went straight to Security. It was after she’d kissed him goodbye and was walking away, her head down, that he stopped her.
‘Sally?’
She came to a halt, ten feet away, and turned. He was standing in the security line, facing her, the other passengers streaming past him. He wore an odd expression. He was rubbing his fingers together, studying them curiously. ‘What? What is it?’
He was frowning. He opened his hand to show her. ‘Lipstick?’
She walked back to him and together they looked at the lipstick on his fingers. A sort of orangey-red. ‘Where did that come from?’
‘I don’t know. Just from when I kissed you …’ He put his hand on her shoulder and rotated her away from him, looking at her back. ‘It’s on your dress. Look.’
Sally craned around, pulling the seat of the dress out to inspect. He was right – the back of her dress was covered with lipstick. A very distinct orange-red colour.
‘Did you brush up against something?’
‘I don’t think so.’ She strained to see it. ‘There’s lots of it.’
‘You have – you’ve leaned up against something. Here.’ Steve pulled out a folded handkerchief, made to rub at the cloth.
‘It’s OK. Don’t.’ She took it from him, let go of her dress and put the handkerchief back in his top pocket. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll sort it out. You’ll be late.’ She kissed his cheek and gave him a gentle push towards the security checkpoint. ‘Go on.’