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CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

R obert fought the grin blooming on his face. This mission was critical. Still, his heart jumped with joy.

When he’d asked her if she trusted him, a part of him had expected her to grab the camera and flee. Aye, they’d shared some tender moments, but he’d broken her trust once before. And Nina didn’t trust easy. Yet here she was, sitting in the car beside him, the camera by her feet.

When the ‘L’ word had nearly slipped through his lips last night, Joshua’s words had come back to him. Robert valued trust in a relationship. If she didn’t share that trust, should he try to make this work? Or would he be sabotaging himself again? So he’d shared the sentiment without blurting out the three words that could change their relationship. Besides, his gut had held him back. If he parroted the words he’d once said to Anne, their meaning would dissolve in the past and lose their importance.

Before he added a label to their relationship, he first needed to uncover all the hidden corners of his past.

Robert slowed the car to a stop and parked. He observed the maroon exterior of the pub then the few joggers running past them, heading towards Glasgow Green. ‘If we do find something explosive in there, I would have to bring Cheryl and Joshua in.’

Nina picked up the backpack. ‘Don’t count your chickens and all that.’

He stepped out of the car, then followed her into the pub. Billy had emptied the place, which Robert was grateful for, though the fact Billy was losing out on business as a result didn’t sit well with him.

The moment Robert stepped through, he spotted Billy behind the counter lining up glasses. The man looked up with a grin on his face. ‘You’re a sight for sore eyes. Where the fuck have you been?’

Then Billy caught sight of Nina. ‘You look…’

Nina shook her head. ‘I feel worse. Drink, please. Whisky, neat.’

‘Oi!’ Robert barked, striding over to the counter. ‘No alcohol for you.’

Nina glared at him. Robert didn’t care if she got angry at him and kicked him into the doghouse. Painkillers and alcohol did not party together.

Draping a hand over her shoulder, Robert met Billy’s eyes. The man’s grin curved across his face. ‘I’m happy for yous.’

Robert squeezed Nina’s shoulder. ‘No alcohol for me, either. I’d like to be sharp tonight. And, Billy… thank you for doing this.’

A snort sounded from the front door as Daisy sauntered in, a wide smirk on her face. The man following her didn’t possess even a sliver of her sunshine. Finn wore his usual office attire, complete with a tie and a typical accountant’s frown. Out of them all, he looked the most out of place. The shirt revealed the man’s affinity for a good workout, and as Robert had witnessed, the man loved his cardio.

Finn spotted Robert and scowled. ‘If this is some elaborate plan to get me?—’

Daisy’s hand on his arm shut him off. ‘Why don’t you get yourself a drink?’

Robert crossed his arms. ‘I don’t want him drunk.’

‘Oh aye, a pint’s enough to get me hammered. Ye wee bastard, you think ye’re my boss man, do ye?’ Finn flashed his teeth at Robert. Then, just to make a point, picked up one of the glasses Billy had already poured and drained the entire beverage. ‘Now, what do you say?’

‘Are you sure about this?’ Nina raised an eyebrow at Robert. ‘This isn’t exactly the A team you promised me. I’m not sure we’re even equipped to log in to a computer, let alone hack into a camera with sophisticated security.’

Robert rolled his eyes and sat down next to Nina. ‘Aye, considering he just drank an entire pint of apple juice thinking it was beer, I don’t think?—’

‘Fuck off!’ Finn pushed the glass away. ‘Do you have coffee?’

Daisy walked behind the counter and found a kettle. ‘Instant coffee. None of the fancy stuff. But everyone’s getting a cup. We’re catching this bastard tonight, and then neither Nina nor Robert will bother you again, Finn.’

Finn had opened up his laptop and stared at them over the rim of the screen. ‘Eh, I fucking doubt that.’

With a small smile on her face, Nina dug out the camera and placed it next to Finn’s laptop. ‘And we,’ she said, ‘need you to break into this camera. Think you can manage?’

Finn looked at Robert. ‘Whose is this?’

Of course the man would ask questions. Looking Finn up and down, Robert realised he’d just put the fate of his and Nina’s lives in the man’s hands. Finn forged IDs for a living, but could he crack password-protected data on a camera?

Robert leaned in, his lips pulled tight in a snarl. ‘Get this done, Finn. Now.’

‘Easy,’ Finn said, reaching for the camera’s ‘on’ switch. ‘Have you tried turning it on and?—’

‘Don’t touch that!’ Robert shouted a second before Nina smacked Finn’s hand away from the button.

Robert huffed. ‘That camera connects to the cloud. We’re not sure if it has tracking features on it. But we believe it’s got password-protected or hidden images on it. We need to find all images this camera contains, especially the ones we shouldn’t have access to. And to make matters worse, the owner has glued the memory card in, so you can’t access it that way’

Finn frowned at the piece, then nodded. ‘I’ll see what I can find. But I charge?—’

‘Work first, son.’ Billy leaned on the counter. ‘Then as payment I’ll teach ye a wee lesson about helping a pal out.’

Billy might have sounded genial, but even Finn picked up on his threat. Dropping his chin, Finn began clattering away on his computer.

Daisy passed steaming mugs of coffee around, settling in beside Robert. ‘What can we do to help?’ She indicated Billy and herself.

Robert had planned on bringing Finn to a location he could work at, nothing more. But now that they were all here, he had a few things to run by his pals.

With a look at Nina, he hunched his shoulders and launched into the story of what had happened. He told them about Nina’s visit to the lockers then Shah’s attack. ‘He was killed. The police don’t consider Nina to be a suspect. It was a gunshot wound.’

‘No one just mucking about would have a weapon like that.’ Billy engulfed Nina’s hand. ‘Are you alright, lassie?’

Nina sighed. ‘I remember seeing it, and then the shock coupled with the pain started pulling me under. I tried hiding by the bins but lost consciousness.’

‘I told you that man’s a pig,’ Billy grumbled. ‘No doubt there’s a few who’d have wanted to take him out.’

Daisy tapped her palm on the counter, drawing their attention to her. ‘Hold on, old man. By the lockers, do you mean those by the St Mungo mural on the High Street?’

‘Aye, by the uni halls.’ Robert sighed.

‘I know that hill,’ Daisy said. ‘A pal of mine lives in the student halls on top of that wee hill. He can see those buildings from his room. That hill’s been cut to make way for those tenements, I think. And they’ve got a few trees, like a fence to keep students away.’

Nina nodded. ‘Yes, I noticed that. But Shah got me good, so I don’t remember seeing the student halls. Perhaps a student saw the killer?’

Daisy reached out and picked up the glasses Billy had set out earlier, including Finn’s apple juice pint. She placed them so they formed a square between them. ‘That wee square is where he attacked you. Now think: the glass on Robert’s side of the counter, and the two glasses touching it perpendicularly are the buildings. The glass opposite, the one on Billy’s side, is a fence. On the other side there are the student halls and the car park. If a killer stood on this slope and shot Shah, they would be in clear view of the students or anyone parking their car. So if someone wanted to kill Shah and remain anonymous, they would’ve shot him from one of the flats looking into that square, not from the side of the uni halls.’

She might think she was a ‘dumb blond’, but Daisy had just proved herself wrong.

Billy patted Daisy’s hand. ‘So it’s worth checking who lives in those flats.’

‘Hold on.’ Nina frowned at them. ‘Hold on. For someone to be able to kill from there, this couldn’t be a random crime but premeditated murder. Someone had to know Shah would take me out there. He was trying to kill me, but wouldn’t most people have killed me inside the shop? He planned to dump me in the bins.’

When she’d told him Shah’s plans, Robert’d had fought the urge to kill the man again. What sort of sick bastard left someone to be crushed to death in a bin?

Billy cocked his head. ‘Did someone try to save you or implicate you?’

‘That’s yet to be ascertained, but seeing as Nina successfully evaded them when Jonas and Anne died, I think someone kept her alive for a reason.’ Robert bit his lip in thought. ‘Or things went wrong, and they eliminated Shah. But all this can also mean that whoever killed him has been a part of this since the beginning.’

‘The mastermind,’ Finn said from his side of the counter. ‘You’re looking for a mastermind who gets off on human suffering.’