The Grass Tattoo (#2 - The Craig Modern Thriller Series) Read online

  The Grass Tattoo

  by Catriona King

  Praise for A Limited Justice:

  “a fantastic achievement... There is a new star on the scene... Belfast needs its own detective - and in DCI Marc Craig it now has one”

  Andy Angel, Ebookwyrm Reviews

  “this is what crime books should be like; realistic, believable and slightly unnerving”

  Page Central Book-Shelf Reviews

  “totally gripping...fast moving, modern and intriguing.”

  Amazon Reader Review

  “A great crime thriller which I didn't want to put down....the ultimate test of a good book and passed with flying colours.”

  Amazon Reader Review

  Copyright © 2012 by Catriona King

  Photography: Dr Daniel V. McCaughan OBE,

  Michal Zacha, Moon2112, Przemyslaw, Szczepanski.

  Artwork: Crooked Cat

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or Crooked Cat Publishing except for brief quotations used for promotion or in reviews. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

  Printed in the United Kingdom

  First Black Line Edition, Crooked Cat Publishing Ltd. 2012

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  www.crookedcatpublishing.com

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  For my wonderful mother.

  Always.

  About the Author

  Catriona King trained as a Doctor, and as a Police Forensic Medical Examiner in London where she worked for many years. She worked closely with the Metropolitan Police on many occasions. In recent years, she has returned to live in Belfast.

  Catriona has written since childhood; fiction, fact and reporting.

  ‘The Grass Tattoo’ is the second novel in the Detective Chief Inspector Craig series.

  It follows Marc Craig and his team, through the streets of Belfast and Northern Ireland, in the hunt for the killers of two people.

  A third novel in the D.C.I. Craig series is nearing completion.

  Acknowledgements

  To those who have gone. For my caring parents who gave us everything, and my brother, who lived life to the full in his young life. For my grandmother, a true lady, who lived her beliefs through her kindness and philanthropy. For my friends, Joan Rich and Angela Von Tobel, two kind, witty women who were always there. And for one other.

  I would like to thank all of the police officers that I have ever worked with, anywhere, for their unfailing professionalism, wit and compassion.

  And I would like to thank Crooked Cat for being so unfailingly supportive and cheerful throughout.

  Catriona King

  Belfast, December 2012

  The D.C.I. Craig Series

  A Limited Justice

  The Grass Tattoo

  The Visitor

  The Grass Tattoo

  Chapter One

  Monday 3rd December 2012. Belfast.

  Joanne Greer stared venomously at the phone before she spoke.

  “Persuade him, Bob. It’s what you do all day.”

  The man’s voice was quiet but firm. “We need to cut our losses.”

  “I’m not losing anything because of you! You have one week, and then London gets involved.”

  She slammed the phone down and stood completely still, her decision already made. London was getting involved today.

  ***

  Wednesday

  The first rays of the sun broke through the wet Ulster sky and the man sighed, already regretting his next action. He had no stomach for it anymore, if he’d ever really had.

  He looked up at the cloudy sky, wishing himself elsewhere, and then his shoulders slumped as he resigned himself to the task.

  He measured the distance again in his mind, and waited for them to appear, convincing himself that it was a computer game, that none of it was real. At least his distance was a shield: he didn’t know how they coped with their part. Too close.

  Gradually the wet sun lifted, and the jewel-coloured grass came into view, each blade’s edge sharp in his sight. Any minute now. Then they appeared. Two blonde heads. So different in life, so differently fated now. He watched their exchange sadly. His sorrow had deepened with every year and it was unbearable now, watching her tears and begging. It tore at his heart and made him hate his orders, and the one who gave them.

  He quickly raised the sight to his eye, turning off the voice in his head that said that this was all wrong. He shut out the faint winter breeze and the fresh hum of traffic on the comfortable street below, and he focussed.

  The steel mechanism responded smoothly to his touch as he readied himself. And then, with one hard pull the bullet left the barrel, cutting through the air. Twisting, arc-ing, angled perfectly for the light wind, until it reached its destination, just as she turned.

  It was strange how they always turned. After the bullet had gone, while its trajectory curved and twisted, but before it had even hit them. It was almost as if they knew what was coming, but they couldn’t know, could they?

  The bullet skewered straight through her, shutting out her daylight completely, causing her knees to buckle and then to fall.

  The moment of impact was different for all of them. With this one a surprise, with that one a gaze, their eyes turned upwards, locked in time like a DVD on pause. With some, quiet resignation. Or indifference, as if they’d had enough of this world.

  She fell now; perfectly vertical, kneeling down urgently, arms arching through the sky, towards the steps. He thought he could hear the soft tap of her knees upon the ground...imagination. Then forward, her kind face buried in the gentle grass, finally coming to rest.

  He hated that moment more than he hated the whole thing, and vowed again that this would be his last. His anger this time at their orders, and disgust at the victim’s innocence, was almost too much for him to bear, needing alcohol to bury it every night.

  He unscrewed the sights, quickly placing the gun in the car, and left the rooftop at speed, collecting the second blonde by the gate. Then they drove to the one place that he could find peace, in alcohol, at any time of day.

  ***

  Maggie stared across the white portico-ed square, bored. Wednesdays always bored her; they lacked the prison-break excitement of a Friday, or even the long-suffering martyrdom of a Monday. They were just boring.

  It was a cold, wet Belfast morning, and she would happily have stayed in bed, reliving last night’s dream of Christian Bale, mask and all. Why they expected her in for eight she’d never understand! Nothing worthwhile ever happened this early, every journalist knew that.

  She pulled the soggy pencil out of her mouth, examining it slowly for an un-chewed portion, and then popped it back in, satisfied, returning to her view. At least that wasn’t boring.

  A full wall of windows extended her cubby-hole of an office via a trompe-l’oeil, across the wide piazza of St Anne’s Square. A little known gem set deep in Belfast’s city centre, behind its namesake Cathedral.

  What had once been elderly banks and offices had morphed into the city’s buzzing Cathedral quarter, with a myriad of new additions to the arts and entertainment scene. There were hotels and restaurants, theatres and galleries, clubs, and coffee houses in the old style. It was a western Mecca for the tourists who poured in from all over the world. Belfast
was booming, and this time for all the right reasons.

  She glanced idly across the elegant vista, planning her next coffee break, and noticed a lithely handsome man entering the Metropolitan Arts Centre opposite, its lean, arrowed stone and glass slotting perfectly into the square’s smooth design.

  The man looked...well, she wasn’t actually sure what he looked, but he looked something, and he made her feel shy somehow, without knowing why. Then she realised what it was - he looked arty. Arty men had always attracted her, and made her shy. There was something so uncontrolled about them, and she liked to be in control.

  He sensed her gaze and smiled up at the window, in a reckless, Christmassy way. She could feel her blush rising, but before she could react by hiding or waving, her desk phone rang noisily, reminding her that she was at work.

  She grudgingly removed her pencil and lifted the receiver, just as he disappeared through the centre’s sliding door. Another failed romance.

  “Hello. Derry...”

  She stopped herself abruptly, remembering that she’d left the Derry Telegraph two months earlier, and then started again.

  “Belfast Chronicle news desk, Maggie Clarke speaking.”

  The line was quiet, apart from a faint clatter of crockery and murmured voices in the background. She imagined the caller in an up-market cafe.

  She tried again. “Hello, news desk. Can I help you?”

  Again, quiet. But now there came the sound of breathing and it occurred to her that it might be a prank: her kid sister ‘nuisancing’ her during a free class. She was just about to say “Kim” accusingly, when the caller finally spoke. The voice surprised her. It was a man’s voice, strong and deep, and at another time, she might even have said sexy. But the main surprise came from its accent, formed many miles from Belfast.

  “You will find Irene Leighton at your Stormont.”

  ‘Your’ Stormont, not mine.

  She was leaning forward now, the hairs on her journalist’s neck standing on end. Something exciting was coming next. Not nice, but exciting. It was what she lived for.

  For a moment, the man didn’t speak, and neither did she. Fighting the urge to question, each listening to the other’s breathing. Then again, the clatter of crockery, this time with the unmistakable sound of ice hitting a glass, and an optic emptying. He was in a bar. At 8am!

  He spoke again, and Maggie was sure that she heard sadness in his voice. “She found the grass, I think. Her husband bought it for her.”

  It didn’t make sense, but there was no explanation forthcoming, just more silence. She couldn’t fight her need to speak any longer.

  “Who are you?” Not the most elegantly framed question she’d ever asked.

  “It is not important who I am. You have what you need. Tell your police.”

  The background noise rose suddenly, and she heard the voice murmur something indecipherable. Then without another word the line went dead, leaving her staring at the receiver.

  She sat for a moment, confused about what she’d heard, and about what to do next. Her journalist’s nose was pulling her towards Stormont, the seat of Northern Ireland’s government, to see for herself. Before the other papers got the call, if they hadn’t already. There was a story here, and she knew it. Not some dopey two columns on the fifth page, but a real front-pager. And it was her story.

  But somewhere in her ‘normal citizen’ past she could feel a conscience stirring, boring her with ‘duty’ and all that it implied. Call the police. But that was what he wanted, and Maggie didn’t like giving people what they wanted, not until they deserved it, and often not even then. Calling the police would be the responsible, moral thing to do. But even she would admit that they weren’t words often used to describe her.

  Her brief tug of war was interrupted by the heavy thump of files on her desk, dropped so close that they caught the edge of her hand. She let out a yelp and swung her arm back at the newsboy who had dumped them, catching him on the nose.

  “Ow, that hurt.”

  Maggie grabbed her bag and phone and stood up, waving a sore finger in his young face. “And so did that.” And then without further discussion, she left her office, stomped across the newsroom floor and yelled. “Tell Ray I’ll be at Stormont, following a lead.”

  She took the lift to the car-park and gunned her V.W. Beetle down the Dunbar Link, past the Albert Clock and over the bridge, her mind made up. Of course she’d do the responsible thing and phone the police, but not until she was sitting outside Stormont’s front gate.

  Chapter Two

  Marc Craig was sitting in his car outside Belfast’s City Hall, stuck in the dense morning traffic. It was even worse than usual, people still confused by the new road system after three months, and Christmas adding to the crowds.

  He smiled, watching as the crowds milled by on the pavement, waiting for the Christmas market to open, and tapped his fingers on the wheel in time to a carol playing from its tannoy. He was late for work. Well, not late by anyone else’s standards, but by his, he was late.

  He blamed it on his sudden urge to regain his fitness, without which he would never have been in the gym at seven, pounding away on the rowing machine. But he had to admit that he felt better for it, after only two weeks. So he was late, but not really.

  His car-phone vibrated loudly. ‘Liam’. He quickly pressed answer and Liam Cullen’s gruff voice boomed over the line, waking him up.

  “Morning boss, nice day for it.”

  Craig looked out at the drizzle, smiling sceptically. “Nice day for what? I’ll be there in five minutes. Can this wait until then?”

  “Aye, well, that’s why I called. Don’t go to the squad, come here. We’ve a case.”

  “Where’s here?”

  “Stormont. You’ll see why when you get here.” Then, without ceremony, the line clicked off. Liam was being mysterious again, but Craig knew better than to dismiss it as a tease, he was a good detective. Whatever it was, it was important.

  He accelerated down Chichester Street and cut through the Lagan Courts, preparing to show his badge if challenged. Then over the Albert Bridge, and up the Upper Newtownards Road faster than was strictly legal, reaching the Stormont Estate within ten minutes.

  As he pulled into the concrete semi-circle outside the Estate’s main gates, he noticed an incongruous, lime-green Beetle nestling amongst the liveried police cars. It had a giant sunflower on its dashboard that gave it a ‘hippy’ air more common in Berkeley than Belfast, and a pink furry toy stuck to its back window.

  He climbed out of his car and strode across to a uniformed officer, quickly showing his badge. “Morning, constable. D.C.I. Craig.”

  “Good morning, sir.”

  “Is Inspector Cullen around?”

  “Down there, sir.”

  The young red-haired constable turned, pointing through the black wrought-iron gates into the distance. Craig could vaguely make out the very tall, very pale figure of Liam Cullen, standing a mile away down Prince of Wales’ Avenue, in front of the white-stone edifice of Parliament buildings.

  He nodded his thanks and was about to get back into the car when he remembered the Beetle. He walked over to it, expecting a female occupant, and knocked lightly on the passenger window.

  The young, dark-haired woman inside jumped, staring at him, startled. Craig smiled amiably and indicated to roll down the window, but instead she jumped out, storming around angrily to where he stood.

  “What do you mean banging my window like that? You scared the life out of me!”

  The constable stepped forward indignantly. “That’s D.C.I Craig.”

  “I don’t care who he is.”

  She looked up at him challengingly and Craig smiled, half-amused for a moment; whoever she was, she certainly liked drama. Then he recognised her, and instantly looked less amused, sighing inwardly.

  “What are you doing here, Ms. Clarke? You know journalists aren’t allowed at crime scenes. You’ll get a briefing later.”
r />   Maggie was taken aback by him knowing her name. Then she shrugged: journalists in Northern Ireland earned their own sort of fame.

  “Who are you to tell me where I can be? I gave the police this murder.”

  A curt response sprung immediately to his lips, but he bit it back out of politeness, looking down at her more coldly.

  “So you ‘gave’ us this murder, did you? Enlighten me.”

  She completely missed his froideur, and obliged. “A man called the news desk and told me that Irene Leighton was here. Then he told me to call the police, so I didn’t imagine she was opening a fete.”

  Her sarcasm reminded Craig of Ray Mercer at the Chronicle, so he asked the question. “Are you at the Chronicle nowadays, by any chance?”

  “Yes.”

  Her quizzical look asked for an explanation, but he merely nodded. It figured.

  “What exactly did this man say? Please tell me anything you noticed about his voice, any background noise, anything.”

  She reluctantly detailed her conversation with the anonymous caller as he listened, storing it away for future reference. Then he nodded, turned on his heel and waved her goodbye, throwing “please escort Ms. Clarke away from the area” over his shoulder to the constable.

  Maggie’s face burned in a combination of embarrassment and anger, and she stormed after him, yelling. “I gave you this murder. You owe me the story.”

  Craig wheeled round to face her, and she saw his barely controlled anger. There was no love lost between the murder squad and the Chronicle, but that had been Ray Mercer’s irresponsible coverage of the Adams’ case, not her fault. She’d been in Derry then and she wasn’t taking his bloody blame.