St Andrews, Scotland: When a woman's eviscerated body is found on the golf course close to the Fairmont Hotel, DCI Andy Gilchrist and his associate DS Jessie Janes are assigned the investigation. But the post mortem examination uncovers a shocking detail that must be kept from the public.
Who could carry out such a brutal murder? And what is the significance of the gruesome trophy?
But DNA uncovers links to a murder committed thirty years earlier, and has Gilchrist fearing a killer of old has resurfaced, or worse, a debut serial killer setting out to learn his murderous trade. The hunt for the killer forces Gilchrist down a dangerous path that puts his and Jessie's life in danger, and ultimately leads them to a mind-playing madman who will kill again rather than go to prison.
As Gilchrist homes in on the murderer, he finds himself relentlessly drawn into the killer's mind games, and a desperate fight for his life, in which there can only be one winner.
Has Gilchrist finally met his match?
PRAISE FOR T.F. MUIR:
'Rebus did it for Edinburgh. Laidlaw did it for Glasgow. Gilchrist might just be the bloke to put St Andrews on the crime fiction map.' Daily Record
'A truly gripping read, with all the makings of a classic series.' Mick Herron
'Gripping and grisly, with plenty of twists and turns that race along with black humour.' Craig Robertson
'DCI Gilchrist gets under your skin. Though, determined, and a bit vulnerable, this character will stay with you long after the last page.' Anna Smith
'Gripping!' Peterborough Telegraph
Release date:
November 7, 2024
Publisher:
Little, Brown Book Group
Print pages:
90000
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7.15 a.m., Sunday, late MarchThe Castle Course, St Andrews, Scotland
Detective Chief Inspector Andy Gilchrist turned his face to the wind, a stiff easterly that blew in from the North Sea with bitter fingers cold enough to squeeze tears from his eyes. Thick clouds as dull and grey as a convict’s blanket hung low to the horizon, doing what they could to smother a rising sun. Beyond the dark silhouette of the old Scottish town, rain covered the Eden Estuary like sheer curtains, blocking Tentsmuir Beach and the northern shores from view. He shrugged off a shiver, pulled up his collar, and shifted his gaze to the distant clubhouse, already stirring with addicted golfers preparing to do battle with the links and the elements.
From behind, he heard his car door slam, then Jessie stood by his side, blowing into her hands. ‘You ever imagine what this place would be like if it didn’t rain?’
‘Dry?’
‘And pleasant.’ She clapped her hands together, then stuffed them into her pockets. ‘And this is supposed to be spring?’ She puffed out her breath. ‘The only thing springy about this morning is the clocks have sprung forward. That’s something. Come on. Looks like the SOCOs have made a start. Let’s see what we’ve got.’
Gilchrist watched Jessie stride through the damp grass towards tape that flapped in the wind like thin bunting that surrounded the Incitent, the yellow forensic tent erected by Scenes of Crime Officers to protect the crime scene from disturbance. Two female SOCOs he didn’t recognise were removing equipment from their Transit van, their gruesome task of going over the area in microscopic detail not yet begun. The police photographer had been and gone, and the slender figure of the police pathologist, Sam Kim, camera in hand – she always insisted on taking crime scene photos of her own – stood by the tent, twenty metres away. As Jessie approached, Sam Kim slung her camera over her shoulder, said something out of Gilchrist’s earshot, then stood back while Jessie snapped on her gloves and slipped inside the Incitent.
Silent, Gilchrist pulled on his own latex gloves, flexed his fingers, a sickening feeling already settling in his stomach. Despite having attended countless murder scenes, he’d never become inured to the horror of it all, never been able to shift that rising sense of dread before the initial viewing, the first sight of a murdered body, the mental struggle against the urge to turn away and leave it to others, or study the crime scene with the professional dispassion all investigations demanded. He filled his lungs with clean cold air, and forced his mind to free itself of emotional attachment, knowing only too well that the victim was more than likely someone’s daughter, sister, or mother, whose lives would soon be changed forever.
He’d taken the call from Jessie just after six that morning, as he was about to set off on an early morning run along the West Sands, his long-promised attempt to bring some regimented exercise back into his life. He hadn’t learned much from her, for the simple reason that she hadn’t known the facts herself – only that the body of a woman had been found on the Castle Course, in the rough close to the fifteenth green, by one of the greenkeeping staff tasked with cutting new pin locations before the first golfers of the day arrived.
He scanned the area around him, trying to work out why the woman had been killed out here, in the open, not a car in close proximity, two hundred metres at least, maybe more, from the Fairmont Hotel, and a good fifty metres from the edge of the hotel’s entrance road. She wouldn’t have come by way of the Castle Clubhouse, he felt certain of that. From what he knew, the Clubhouse was more pro shop than restaurant, serving golfers rather than the public. Even so, they would have to close the course and block off the access road until the SOCOs had completed their forensics examination.
He shifted his attention to the hotel.
Lighted windows dotted three-storey wings that reached out like arms either side of the entrance portico, as if to protect arriving guests from whatever weather Scotland could throw its way. A car park fell away from the hotel, dotted with vehicles parked here and there – plenty of spaces – which told him that the hotel was not filled to capacity. Had the victim and her killer made their way here from the hotel? Gilchrist had already organised a team to question the hotel staff and create a list of everyone on duty last night, including names of all guests. But he couldn’t shift the troubling thought that the killer had not been a resident of the hotel, and was there only for an evening at one of the restaurants or bars. Which really opened up the list of suspects to the wind. On top of that, his team would have to question greenkeeping and golf club staff, which caused a niggling worry to stir at the growing likelihood of budgetary constraints.
His peripheral vision caught movement, and he turned in time to see Jessie step from the Incitent and stumble from the scene. She stopped ten metres away, her back to him. Her stillness, and the way her breath heaved and clouded the air, warned him that the crime scene was a bad one. He whispered a curse, then waded through the damp grass, teeth gritted, jaw tight, conscious of trying to keep his own breathing steady.
Sam Kim watched as he approached, but said nothing, just grimaced with a shake of her head, then stepped aside. He steadied himself for a moment, took a deep intake of breath then let it out as he struggled to force all emotion from his being. He had to study the scene with the utmost detachment, learn as much as he could from that initial viewing, but even so, there was only so much a person could stomach. He chanced another look at Jessie, but she still had her back to him. He could do with catching one of her black humour quips that could lighten the intensity of even the bleakest of moments. She seemed to sense his eyes on her, for she held her head to the side for a long moment, as if waiting for him to say something, then turned away.
He was on his own.
He took one last deep breath, then entered the tent.
The first thing that struck Gilchrist was the smell, the air thick with the cloying aroma of shit, fresh and raw and strong enough to coat the tongue. The second was blood. Lots of it. Everywhere. As if someone had emptied a bucketload. An adult human body contains over a gallon of blood – depending on the individual’s size and weight – and from what he could see, every last ounce of that life-supporting fluid had been drained from this victim. It pooled in congealed puddles by her body, painted rain-flattened grass all around, coloured her skin from head to toe.
Whoever killed her must have been splattered with the stuff.
He forced himself to have a closer look, struggling to make sense of something that didn’t seem right, as if his nervous system was too overloaded to work it out, and was trying to shut down his brain. The victim was a young woman in her late teens, early twenties, as best he could tell by the slimness of her waist, the muscled tone of her skin, the swell of her buttocks. She lay naked on her stomach, legs apart, her rectum and pubic area a mess of clotted blood and faeces. He couldn’t see any open wounds; her calves, thighs and buttocks appeared undamaged, the skin taut and devoid of cellulite. She’d kept herself in good shape. Her arms, too, had fine muscle tone, and lay outstretched above her head, as if she were about to take a headlong dive into the dune grass. In contrast to the rest of the body, her hands were clean, her fingernails square-tipped, painted white, one nail on either hand contrasted blue-and-white-crossed to represent the saltire. But it was her hair that confused him. Long and blonde and thick with blood, it spread across the nape of her neck and shoulders in a congealed mass that looked like . . . that looked . . .
He felt the hot nip of bile sting the back of his throat as his stomach spasmed, but he gritted his teeth, fought it down, and managed to preserve some level of professional dignity. He wiped his sleeve across his mouth, conscious of someone entering the tent.
‘Who in their right mind would do this?’ Jessie said.
He had no answer, managed only to shake his head, fight off another spasm.
Without a word, Jessie bent down, pushed her gloved hand through what should have been hair at the back of the neck, and eased a handful of intestines loose. He wanted to tell her not to touch the body, leave the poor soul alone, but his voice was trapped in his throat. He took a step back as she let the string of guts slip through her fingers, slippery and thick as bloated worms.
‘You seen anything like this before? Guts and everything?’
He had. Not long after he’d joined the Force. But it had been suicide by train. What he did remember was witnessing the victim’s intestines being bagged by the side of the track. He shook his head. ‘Can’t say that I have. Not like this. No.’
Jessie pushed to her feet. ‘I’d say we’ve got some nutter running wild.’
He nodded. ‘She’s naked.’
She looked at him, and frowned. ‘I can see that.’
‘I mean, where are her clothes?’ It was all he had the strength to say.
Jessie shook her head, glanced around her, then stared at the body again. ‘Maybe he took them with him.’
‘Why?’
‘Wanking material? Sniffs at her knickers? Who knows?’ She shrugged. ‘But have a look at this. I think he’s taken more than her clothes.’ She stepped over the victim’s left leg, and reached for her hand. ‘No rings. But I’m thinking she was married. Or maybe engaged.’ She fiddled with the ring finger. ‘See that? The tan mark? That’s from a ring, but it’s been removed. She’s got a nice tan, too, so I’m thinking she’s maybe just back from holiday.’ She glanced up at him. ‘What do you think?’
He didn’t know what to think, only that one of his team – the family liaison officer – would have to let the victim’s next of kin know, and how on earth could the FLO look the family in the eye and offer such news, knowing the manner in which she’d been killed?
Jessie stumbled to her feet again, opened the tent and shouted to Sam Kim. ‘You got all you need?’
Kim tapped her camera, and nodded.
‘You might want to come in and take some more,’ Jessie said. ‘I’m going to turn her over.’
‘Leave that to the SOCOs,’ Gilchrist said.
‘Just a quick peek. I want to see her face. Might be able to ID her. I’m thinking the sooner we catch this nutter, the better.’
Ordinarily, Gilchrist would insist on leaving the body for the SOCOs, but the police photographer had been, and Sam Kim had taken an additional set, and the SOCOs were still fiddling with their equipment, so he said nothing while Jessie bent down, adjusted one of the victim’s legs, slipped a hand under the waist, another under the shoulder, and gently, very gently – he would grant her that – eased the body over and onto its side where it balanced for an unsteady moment before slumping into an awkward position, not quite flat on its back.
At first glance he struggled to identify the wounds. Congealed blood and grass and some other stuff that looked like lumps of mud, but more likely faeces, or maybe the contents of her stomach, stuck to the skin making it impossible to determine what was an open wound or smeared blood. But as he stared at the body, his mind working through the visual mess, he came to see that most of the marks were open wounds, slits all about the same size – four inches or so – telling him that a wide-bladed knife could be the murder weapon, and already asking the question – who would bring a knife like that out here, or more to the point, where had the knife come from? Even as his mind ticked the mental box to instruct his team to focus on the hotel’s kitchen staff, he found himself counting the stab wounds on the victim’s neck and chest. And as his gaze drifted the length of her, he forced his eyes away from the open gash across the stomach where the body had been eviscerated, and counted six more open wounds around the pubic area.
‘Fuck sake,’ Jessie whispered, and glanced up at him. ‘You seen this? Her eyes?’
Gilchrist pressed his lips tight.
‘The bastard’s cut her eyes.’ She whispered a hissed curse. ‘This guy’s gone and lost the plot.’ She turned her attention to a wound on the neck, and said, ‘Her throat’s not been sliced open, but stabbed. See? So I’m thinking that wound’s been done post-mortem.’ She ran her hand over the chest. ‘Ah fuck,’ she said. ‘You see this?’
He found himself leaning closer.
‘Both nipples have been sliced off,’ she said, and whispered another curse as she raked her fingers through the grass where the body had lain face down.
‘He’ll have taken them as trophies,’ Gilchrist said. ‘Along with her rings, too.’
Jessie hissed yet another curse, then said, ‘It’s a small mercy, if you think about it. He could’ve cut her boobs off, too.’ She sniffed. ‘Isn’t that what they used to do in the Wild West to Indian women? Cut off their boobs and use them as tobacco pouches?’
Gilchrist shook his head, and watched Jessie work her fingers around a group of open cuts in the middle of her chest. ‘Not sure which one of these would’ve been the fatal wound,’ she said. ‘What do you think?’
Despite himself, Gilchrist leaned closer to study six wounds in the centre of the chest, bunched so close together that several overlapped. What could drive someone to carry out such a frenzied attack? How angry would you have to be? If the woman had been stabbed in the chest first, she would surely have died from only a couple of blows. Even as his thoughts processed that, he struggled to make sense of the sequence. It seemed that she’d been naked before being attacked, although he could have that wrong. But if so, had she willingly walked out here to have consensual sex, say, then stripped herself naked before being killed? Surely not in this weather. Even though spring was in the air, March nights in Scotland often hit sub-zero temperatures. Or had she been dragged by her hair, screaming and kicking? Too many questions, not enough answers. But the answers would come, he felt certain of that. He just had to focus on the facts, the evidence, which first of all meant trying to make sense of the wounds.
‘You could be right,’ he said. ‘If this was where she was first attacked, then the only blessing was that she was dead before he cut her open.’
Just then, Sam Kim stepped into the tent, camera at the ready, and he was only too willing to step outside for a breather while she captured the horrific scene for posterity.
Jessie followed Gilchrist through weather-flattened dune grass until they came to the fifteenth green. The flagstick shivered in the wind, which now blustered in from behind them, as if to hound the gulls and terns seawards.
‘Penny for your thoughts?’ she said.
He breathed in hard and deep, then let it out in a defeated burst. ‘Why?’ he said. ‘That’s what I’m thinking. Why kill someone like that? Why keep stabbing her again and again when you must surely know she’s dead?’
‘Rage?’
‘That goes beyond rage,’ he growled. ‘That’s out and out insanity.’
‘He’s off his meds, that’s for sure. But you know what I’m thinking? I’m thinking she knew him, and he knew her. Not just in the passing. But lovers.’
He turned to face her. ‘I’m listening.’
‘There’s no way she’d come out here on her own. Last night, it was pissing it down. And blowing a gale, too. I’m thinking it’s that age-old chestnut – jealousy.’
‘They were in a relationship, and she broke it off?’
‘More like, they were in a relationship, and she got shagged on the side.’
‘And he found out about it, lured her out here, and killed her?’
‘Yeah.’
‘There’s a lot of ifs, buts and maybes in that lot.’
‘I know, I know, but to my way of thinking it kind of explains the missing ring.’
‘Why?’
‘The ring means something to him. It has to. Why else would he take it?’
‘Trophy?’
‘No, that’s what serial killers do, and I don’t think we’re dealing with a serial killer here. I think we’re looking for some jealous nutter who can’t control his temper.’
Gilchrist stared off to the horizon. The sun was doing what it could to break through the clouds, but the way the wind was blowing, they might not see it until later in the day. What Jessie was saying made sense. But it was only one answer from a thousand possibilities. ‘I didn’t notice any other jewellery. Did you?’
‘Didn’t see any.’
‘How about earrings?’
‘Shit. I never noticed, what with the . . . you know . . . the stuff. Want me to check her ears? See if they’re pierced? She might have a couple of studs. Who hasn’t these days?’
Gilchrist had seen enough blood and guts for the day, so said, ‘Let’s wait until the body’s back in the mortuary.’
Jessie said nothing, just turned her gaze to the tent.
‘What are your thoughts about her clothes?’ he said.
‘Aye, well, that’s another matter.’ She faced the sea again, ran a hand under her nose. ‘But if you ask yourself – what’s he going to do with his own clothes? I mean . . . unless he was starkers, they’ve got to have been covered in blood. His hands, too. He would’ve soiled anything he touched.’
‘Unless he was wearing gloves.’
‘With that mess back there?’ She shook her head. ‘He would’ve needed to have been covered from head to toe in full forensic gear to avoid getting anything on him. I’m thinking it’s more like the guy’s only now realising what he’s done, and asking himself – what am I gonnie do with these clothes? How am I gonnie clean the mess in my car?’
‘You think he’s driven here?’
‘Well he wouldn’t have got the bus, would he? And he wouldn’t have called for a taxi. So, yes, he’s driven here, and driven back, and this morning he’s waking up wondering how the hell he’s going to clean it all up.’
Gilchrist glanced back at the forensic tent. Sam Kim had finished taking more photos, and was striding back to her car. Off to the side, one of the SOCOs had widened the crime scene area, and now stood about thirty metres away, deep in the rough, holding the police tape in one hand, and trying to catch the attention of Colin, the lead SOCO, with the other.
‘Looks like they’ve found something,’ Gilchrist said.
‘Maybe her clothes?’ Jessie said, and chased after him.
By the time he reached the SOCO, his shoes were wet through. ‘What’ve we got?’
‘Looks like a man’s sock, sir.’
Gilchrist leaned down for a closer look at a black sock, half-calf length, saturated, a red Pringle logo at the ankle, lying on top of a clump of dune reeds, as if it had been placed there to dry in the sun – if it ever emerged from the clouds. He cast his gaze around, half-expecting to find its companion, but saw nothing. What he did see he might never have noticed if he hadn’t been looking from that spot – a pressing of the winter grass to one side, then the other, not windblown damage, but from someone wading through the rough.
He pushed himself to his feet as his eyes followed what he could only describe as the faintest of trails. Was that what he was looking at? A trail made by the killer walking away from the victim’s body? As his gaze shifted farther through the long grass, he thought he saw how the killer had left the scene; stumbling through the rough, across the dunes, then onto one of the fairways where the walk to a car in the Castle Course car park could be done with relative ease, and well out of sight of prying eyes of guests of the Fairmont, or anywhere else for that matter.
But why leave a sock? Was it the killer’s? And why here?
Another look at the forensic tent with the Fairmont Hotel in the background, and he thought he saw the outline of some answer, maybe not an exact answer, but one that ticked all the boxes, in a manner of speaking. ‘He stripped off,’ he said.
‘Andy?’
He stared at Jessie. ‘He stripped. He’s taken his clothes off. Here. Stuffed them into a bag and walked back to his car in the nude. It was raining last night, so he’d be soaked, and more importantly, his skin and hair and face would be cleaned of any blood.’ He smirked at Jessie. ‘And it was wild and windy, too.’
She stared down at the sock as realisation rose within her.
‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘He dropped one of his socks in the pitch black, and didn’t notice.’ He turned to the SOCO. ‘Bag it, and secure this area.’
By midday, the SOCOs had confirmed that the spot where the sock had been found was almost certainly where the killer had stripped off his clothes and stuffed them into some carrier bag of sorts, most likely a plastic bag, maybe two – one for his own, the other for the victim’s. A closer examination of the sock identified spots of blood. Blades of grass under the sock revealed minute traces of blood, too, protected from the elements by the sock itself. The SOCOs would find other traces of blood in the immediate area, Gilchrist felt certain of that, showered off the killer by last night’s downpour. But in the cushion of trampled grass, there was no chance of finding footprints, and he had to settle for the fact that the sock and minute traces of blood were the only evidence they were ever likely to find. A great result when you thought about it, and a lucky one, too, but he knew from experience they had a long way to go before they ID’d the killer – if they ever could.
Both the sock and the samples of blood had been sent off for DNA analysis, marked urgent, with a request by Gilchrist to have the results back by the end of the day – fat chance of that happening. But Sam Kim had proven herself to be a demanding forensic pathologist, and if anybody could expedite DNA results, she could.
CCTV footage from the Castle Course clubhouse came up empty, no signs of any late-night driving anywhere near the car park, leaving Gilchrist to wonder if the killer had parked somewhere remote from the clubhouse and walked farther through the wind and rain in the nude to some destination, as yet unknown. He didn’t like that thought, as it opened up the possibilities by an exponential factor, but two uniforms were tasked with tracing CCTV footage from adjacent properties.
Even so, he felt his investigation was best focused on the Fairmont Hotel. He’d already instructed a team of four uniforms to obtain the names and addresses of all guests checked into the hotel last night, and to create a list of individuals who attended any of the hotel’s restaurants or bars. Bar or menu receipts would help identify those who weren’t overnight guests. Had there been any events on last night – wedding reception, birthday party, work outing? Had anyone seen a couple by themselves in a bar, in a restaurant, in the spa? Had anyone noticed anyone arguing, seen a disturbance of any kind? And check the kitchen staff, he’d instructed. Find out if any knives are missing – deep bladed, like a butcher’s knife. Had any of the kitchen or hotel staff not turned up for work, called in sick, acted strange, done something different?
All those questions and others, he’d asked his team to focus on.
Seated in his BMW in the car park overlooking the Castle Course, holding a coffee courtesy of the hotel, Jessie said, ‘Do you think the killer knows he’s dropped a sock?’
Gilchrist gave her question a moment’s thought, then shook his head. ‘Once he’d stuffed his clothes into the bag, I don’t think he’d check its contents before getting rid of them. He wouldn’t want to risk c. . .
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