A Darker Domain - Val McDermid

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class, different aspirations. The only thing that I could see pulling them together was that life had landed them in the same place. So yes, when she came back in the holidays and he was around, they got back together again. She made no secret of it, even though she knew how I felt about Sinclair. I kept hoping she’d meet someone she deserved but it never happened. She kept going back to Sinclair.’

      ‘And yet you didn’t sack his father? Move him off the estate?’

      Grant looked shocked. ‘Good God, no. Have you any idea how hard it is to find a keeper as good as Willie Sinclair? You could interview a hundred men before you’d find one with his instincts for the birds and the land. A decent man, too. He knew his son wasn’t in Cat’s league. He was ashamed that he couldn’t stop Fergus chasing Cat. He wanted to bar him from the family home, but his wife wouldn’t have it.’ He shrugged. ‘I can’t say I blame her. Women are always soft with their sons.’

      Bel tried to hide her surprise. She’d assumed Grant would stop at nothing to have his own way where his daughter was concerned. He was apparently more complex than she’d given him credit for. ‘What happened after she came back from Sweden?’

      Grant rubbed his face with his hands. ‘It wasn’t pretty. She wanted to move out. Set up a studio where she could work and sell things from, somewhere with living quarters attached. She had her eye on a couple of properties on the estate. I said the price of my support was that she stop seeing Sinclair.’ For the first time, Bel saw sadness seeping round the edges of the simmering anger. ‘It was stupid of me. Mary said so at the time, and she was right. They were both furious with me, but I wouldn’t give in. So Cat went her own way. She spoke to the Wemyss estate and rented a property from them. An old gatehouse with what had been a logging shed, set back from the main road. Perfect for attracting customers. A parking area in front of the old gates, studio and display space, and living quarters tucked away behind the walls. All the privacy you could want. And everybody knew. Catriona Maclennan Grant had gone to the Wemyss estate to spite her old man.’

      ‘If she needed your support, how did she pay for it all?’ Bel asked.

      ‘Her mother equipped the studio, paid the first year’s rent and stocked the kitchen till Cat started selling pieces.’ He couldn’t suppress a smile. ‘Which didn’t take long. She was good, you know. Very good. And her mother saw to it that all her friends went there for wedding presents and birthday gifts. I was never angrier with Mary than I was then. I was outraged. I felt thwarted and disrespected and it really did not help when bloody Sinclair came back from university and picked up where he’d left off.’

      ‘Were they living together?’

      ‘No. Cat had more sense than that. I look back at it now and I sometimes think she only went on seeing him to spite me. It didn’t last that long after she’d set the studio up. It was pretty much over about eighteen months before…before she died.’

      Bel did her mental arithmetic and came up with the wrong answer. ‘But Adam was only six months old when they were kidnapped. So how could Fergus Sinclair be his father if he split up with Cat eighteen months earlier?’

      Grant sighed. ‘According to Mary, it wasn’t a clean break. Cat kept telling Sinclair it was over but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. These days, you’d call it harassment. Apparently he kept turning up with a pathetic puppy face and Cat didn’t always have the strength to send him away. And then she got pregnant.’ He stared at the floor. ‘I’d always imagined what it would be like to be a grandfather. To see the family line continue. But when Cat told us, all I felt was anger. That bastard Sinclair had wrecked her future. Saddled her with his child, ruined her chances of the career she’d dreamed of. The one good thing she did was refuse to have anything more to do with him. She wouldn’t acknowledge him as the father, she wouldn’t see him or talk to him. She made it plain that, this time, it really was over and done.’

      ‘How did he take that?’

      ‘Again, I got it second-hand. This time from Willie Sinclair. He said the boy was devastated. But all I cared about was that he’d finally got the message that he was never going to be part of this family. Willie advised the boy to put some distance between himself and Cat, and for once, he listened. Within a few weeks, he’d got a job in Austria, working on some hunting estate near Salzburg. And he’s worked in Europe ever since.’

      ‘And now? You still think he might have been responsible for what happened?’

      Grant made a face. ‘If I’m honest, no. Not really. I don’t think he had the brains to come up with such a complicated plot. I’m sure he’d have loved to get his hands on his son and take his revenge on Cat at the same time, but it’s much more likely that it was some politically motivated bastards who thought it would be clever to get me to fund their revolution.’ Wearily, he got to his feet. ‘I’m tired now. The police are coming tomorrow morning and we’ll be going through all the other stuff then. We’ll see you at dinner, Miss Richmond.’ He walked out of the room, leaving Bel with plenty to ponder. And to transcribe. When Brodie Grant had said he would talk to her, she hadn’t imagined for a moment he would provide her with this rich seam of information. She was going to have to consider very carefully how to present him to the world’s media. One foot wrong and she knew the mine would be closed down. And now she’d had a taste of what lay within, that was definitely the last thing she wanted.

      The Mint was staring at the computer screen as if it was an artefact from outer space when Karen got back to her office. ‘What have you got for me?’ she asked. ‘Have you tracked down the five scabs yet?’

      ‘None of them’s got a criminal record,’ he said.

      ‘And?’

      ‘I wasn’t sure where else to look.’

      Karen rolled her eyes. Her conviction that the Mint had been dumped on her as a form of sabotage by the Macaroon intensified daily. ‘Google. Electoral rolls. 192.com. Vehicle licensing. Make a start there, Jason. And then fix me up a site meeting with the cave preservation person. Better leave tomorrow clear, see if you can get him to meet me on Saturday morning.’

      ‘We don’t work Saturdays usually,’ the Mint said.

      ‘Speak for yourself,’ Karen muttered, making a note to herself to ask Phil to come with her. Scots law’s insistence on corroboration for all evidence made it hard to be a complete maverick.

      She woke her computer from hibernation and tracked down the contact details of her opposite number in Nottingham. To her relief, DCI Des Mottram was at his desk, receptive to her request. ‘I think it’s probably a dead end, but it’s one that needs to be checked out,’ she said.

      ‘And you don’t fancy a trip down to the Costa del Trent,’ he said, amused resignation in his voice.

      ‘It’s not that. I’ve just had a major case reopen today and there’s no way I can spare a couple of bodies on something that probably won’t take us any further forward except in a negative way.’

      ‘Don’t worry about it. I know how it goes. It’s your lucky day, though, Karen. We got two new CID aides on Monday and this is exactly the kind of thing I can use to break them in. Nothing too complicated, nothing too dodgy.’

      Karen gave him the names of the men. ‘I’ve got one of my lads looking for last known addresses. Soon as he’s got anything, I’ll get him to email you.’ A few more details, and she was done. Right on cue, Phil Parhatka walked back into the room, a bacon roll transmitting a message straight to the pleasure centres of Karen’s brain. ‘Mmm,’ she groaned. ‘Christ, that smells glorious.’

      ‘If I’d known you were back, I’d have got you one. Here, we’ll go halves.’ He took a knife out of his drawer and cut the roll in half, tomato sauce squirting over his fingers. He handed over her share then licked his fingers. What more, Karen wondered, could a woman ask for in a man?

      ‘What did the Macaroon want?’ Phil said.

      Karen bit

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