This time he didn’t bother to steal a car. He took the Land-Rover instead. He was quite reck less and drove down Mittingford High Street, giving our inebriated farmer a shock on the way. Do we know yet where he parked in Otterbridge?”
“Yes, sir.” It was Newell, full of himself. He’d carried out the boss’s instructions and got a result. What does he want? Hunter thought. A pat on the head? “An old chap who works part-time as a gardener saw the Land-Rover. It was in a little cul-de-sac just round the corner from the McDougalsV
“Sean followed James for most of the way by foot,” Ramsay said. “Until he realized where he was heading and he came back for the Land-Rover. When he got to the cemetery, it was empty except for James, sitting on a bench, dozing. It couldn’t have been easier for him…”
Ramsay’s voice trailed off. For the first time that evening he too was feeling tired. They looked at him, wondering if he had finished, hoping they could go to their beds, but he continued:
“When I went to see him later that night he was working in the garden at Laverock Farm. He made a joke about not having made much progress for a whole day’s work. I should have realized then that he hadn’t spent all day in the garden. Lily made the connection. I think that’s when she found she couldn’t delude herself any longer.
“By then, though, there wasn’t only herself to consider. She couldn’t admit to having strangled
Ernie Bowles without telling us about the others. She wanted the killing to stop but she thought she owed Sean more than that. Before we arrived at Laverock Farm tonight she told Slater she intended giving herself up. She was going to come into the station this morning and explain everything to Hunter here. For some reason she trusted him. She gave Slater the night to run away. Instead he found Ernie Bowles’s gun and started talking suicide pacts. Perhaps that’s what he really wanted all along.”
The team ambled out of the station and up the road to the pub for a celebratory breakfast and plenty of coffee. It was almost seven but the sun was bright. It would be another warm day. Ramsay and Hunter were left on their own in the incident room.
“Do you want to see her?” Ramsay asked. “Before she goes off to Otterbridge?”
Hunter did not answer directly. “What will they charge her with?” he said. “Murder or manslaughter?”
Ramsay shrugged. “That’s up to the CPS.” Hunter remembered the straight-backed woman with the dark eyes he’d seen in Cissie Bowles’s bedroom.
“Na!” he said. “She won’t want to talk to me.” Like Sean, he thought, he wasn’t really into independent women.
Ann Cleeves
Ann Cleeves is the author behind ITV’s VERA and BBC One’s SHETLAND. She has written over twenty-five novels, and is the creator of detectives Vera Stanhope and Jimmy Perez – characters loved both on screen and in print. Her books have now sold over one million copies worldwide.
Ann worked as a probation officer, bird observatory cook and auxiliary coastguard before she started writing. She is a member of ‘Murder Squad’, working with other British northern writers to promote crime fiction. In 2006 Ann was awarded the Duncan Lawrie Dagger (CWA Gold Dagger) for Best Crime Novel, for Raven Black, the first book in her Shetland series. In 2012 she was inducted into the CWA Crime Thriller Awards Hall of Fame. Ann lives in North Tyneside.
