Read Online (2002) Deception aka Sanctum by Denise Mina - Free Book Online
Authors: Denise Mina
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sacked only two months or so previously, and I thought his appeal was a reminder.
She went straight into the kitchen the night she was sacked; she didn’t come into the front room with me and Margie. She didn’t even reply when I called her. I found her at the table, drinking our second-best brandy and smoking a cigarette indoors. I knew something big had happened.
I was pleased when Susie told me she’d been sacked. Finally, I thought, we’ll get to spend days and days together. I can show her what I do all day, introduce her to my small enjoyments; she’ll slow down. We’d be all right for money; we could live on the interest and I could work again if we ran short. Let’s travel together, I said. Let’s get another nanny and go and see Africa or China together before we’re too old.
“There are things”— Susie squeezed my fingers together, pressing the knuckles so tight it hurt—“things you don’t know about, Lachie.” Her eyes overflowed and she climbed onto my knee, pressing her face into my neck to hide the tears. I held her, felt her rib cage deflate, stroked her bony little back as she struggled to breathe in. I held her until she caught her breath again and she called me her Lachie. I remember that strong, possessive feeling, that she was my girl, that no one could give her this sort of comfort but me. At the time, I thought to myself, I’m not a completely useless bastard after all.
She had told me that, despite all the public pressure, Gow would never get out because her risk assessment of him was so bad. She was shaken when they sacked her, because she knew they’d get her replacement to do another RA. Gow’s lawyer could easily argue that her report was biased because she’d been accused of stealing his files. But she wasn’t scared when Gow did get out. She didn’t introduce any new security measures to the house and said, “Nah,” when I asked whether we should get rid of the decoy box and buy an actual alarm. Did she think he’d hurt Donna? Was she afraid he’d hurt other women? I must ask her when I visit.
I think she was more afraid when Donna and Gow went missing than when he got out. They had disappeared for over a week before the call. All our phone records show is a forty-second call from the hotel in Durness, and then Susie took off.
* * *
I mustn’t give in to this insistent self-pity. Yesterday evening was the zenith. After tea I went into an apoplexy of miserable self-loathing: I ate a whole box of Celebrations in front of the television and almost choked on the irony. Yeni had put Margie to bed by the time I finished the chocolates, and I suddenly felt that I was missing her growing up. I went upstairs and stood by her bedroom door, looking in at her sleeping. I stood there, wishing I was less ineffectual, until I realized that nothing could be more ineffectual than standing about in dim halls, wishing I was otherwise. If I were a friend of mine, I’d give me a slap.
At the start of all this, when Susie was first arrested, I promised myself that I’d be a good man. I promised I’d put my own feelings aside and attend to those of my family, but time and time again I find it’s beyond me. The whole thing has been so emasculating: having the mother of my child taken from me, then sitting in the court like a spare prick, listening to the prosecution suggest that she was in love with Gow. It makes me so angry. I have an urge to go about smashing people in the face just to prove I’m still here, still making my stamp on the world, still a man.
I phoned Susie’s colleague Harvey Tucker again, but he wasn’t in. I need to talk to him. Tucker didn’t pick up this time, but he must have the message by now. He obviously doesn’t want to talk to me. I left a message saying I wasn’t angry or anything. Just wanted to ask him a couple of things to set my mind at rest. He still hasn’t called back. Maybe I could use Gow’s prison files as an inducement to Tucker to
She went straight into the kitchen the night she was sacked; she didn’t come into the front room with me and Margie. She didn’t even reply when I called her. I found her at the table, drinking our second-best brandy and smoking a cigarette indoors. I knew something big had happened.
I was pleased when Susie told me she’d been sacked. Finally, I thought, we’ll get to spend days and days together. I can show her what I do all day, introduce her to my small enjoyments; she’ll slow down. We’d be all right for money; we could live on the interest and I could work again if we ran short. Let’s travel together, I said. Let’s get another nanny and go and see Africa or China together before we’re too old.
“There are things”— Susie squeezed my fingers together, pressing the knuckles so tight it hurt—“things you don’t know about, Lachie.” Her eyes overflowed and she climbed onto my knee, pressing her face into my neck to hide the tears. I held her, felt her rib cage deflate, stroked her bony little back as she struggled to breathe in. I held her until she caught her breath again and she called me her Lachie. I remember that strong, possessive feeling, that she was my girl, that no one could give her this sort of comfort but me. At the time, I thought to myself, I’m not a completely useless bastard after all.
She had told me that, despite all the public pressure, Gow would never get out because her risk assessment of him was so bad. She was shaken when they sacked her, because she knew they’d get her replacement to do another RA. Gow’s lawyer could easily argue that her report was biased because she’d been accused of stealing his files. But she wasn’t scared when Gow did get out. She didn’t introduce any new security measures to the house and said, “Nah,” when I asked whether we should get rid of the decoy box and buy an actual alarm. Did she think he’d hurt Donna? Was she afraid he’d hurt other women? I must ask her when I visit.
I think she was more afraid when Donna and Gow went missing than when he got out. They had disappeared for over a week before the call. All our phone records show is a forty-second call from the hotel in Durness, and then Susie took off.
* * *
I mustn’t give in to this insistent self-pity. Yesterday evening was the zenith. After tea I went into an apoplexy of miserable self-loathing: I ate a whole box of Celebrations in front of the television and almost choked on the irony. Yeni had put Margie to bed by the time I finished the chocolates, and I suddenly felt that I was missing her growing up. I went upstairs and stood by her bedroom door, looking in at her sleeping. I stood there, wishing I was less ineffectual, until I realized that nothing could be more ineffectual than standing about in dim halls, wishing I was otherwise. If I were a friend of mine, I’d give me a slap.
At the start of all this, when Susie was first arrested, I promised myself that I’d be a good man. I promised I’d put my own feelings aside and attend to those of my family, but time and time again I find it’s beyond me. The whole thing has been so emasculating: having the mother of my child taken from me, then sitting in the court like a spare prick, listening to the prosecution suggest that she was in love with Gow. It makes me so angry. I have an urge to go about smashing people in the face just to prove I’m still here, still making my stamp on the world, still a man.
I phoned Susie’s colleague Harvey Tucker again, but he wasn’t in. I need to talk to him. Tucker didn’t pick up this time, but he must have the message by now. He obviously doesn’t want to talk to me. I left a message saying I wasn’t angry or anything. Just wanted to ask him a couple of things to set my mind at rest. He still hasn’t called back. Maybe I could use Gow’s prison files as an inducement to Tucker to
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