What must have been at least half a gram of coke hit her brain like a sledgehammer. Inside her head a pharma-battle raged as whatever she’d been drugged with collided and fought with the cocaine. Her heart felt as if it were going to explode. It was going like a jackhammer.
She fell back on the bed and stared at the ceiling while her heart raced uncontrollably. I hope I don’t have a heart attack, she thought. She laughed in a slightly unhinged way, imagining the news story.
‘Disgraced police officer dies in hotel room in drug-fuelled frenzy after angry punch-up in toilet. Enough coke in her body to kill a horse, says medical expert.’
She sat upright on the bed and took stock of her condition. Her heart was still beating like crazy, her eyes were bulging out of their sockets, there was an incredibly bitter taste at the back of her mouth and nose, and she was now pouring with sweat.
She felt wildly elated, unstoppable. Fuck you, Big Jim and your rape plans…
One thing was for sure, she was not going to fall asleep. Victory!
Full of energy now, she stood up and went into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror. God, I look a state, she thought. Hanlon was aware she was good-looking in a strong and intimidating fashion. Now she studied her face intently in the mirror as if looking at it for the first time.
She stared at her untidy, very dark, coarse black hair. She put her hands into it and pushed it up, beehive style, and studied the effect. Then she let it fall and turned her attention to her forehead. There were two small, deep scars there. There were fine lines etched on it now, and crow’s feet around her very grey eyes when she narrowed and widened them, which she did several times, fascinated by her own face in a way she never had been before.
I must be stoned out of my mind, she thought. She grinned maniacally and crossed her eyes, pulling a face at herself in the mirror.
She moved her attention down to her nose. Her nostril was rimmed with white powder and the odd crystal. She wet the end of a towel and wiped the coke off. She rubbed the bridge of her nose thoughtfully with an index finger. She could feel the familiar small kinks in it, where it had been broken in the past. She traced the line of her strong jaw with a finger; she could feel two cracks in it on the right, and one on the left. Three healed fractures from where it had been damaged previously. She thought of Laidlaw, her boxing coach and friend. He’d be retiring soon, or dead. A lifetime of boozing was bound to catch up with him at some stage, as it doubtless would with Tremayne. Big Jim wasn’t the only one she knew with alcohol issues.
She had no control over her thoughts now, but her mood was one of almost insane optimism. God, I’m so good-looking…
Her mouth, full, sensual, her chin, determined. She ran her exploratory finger along her jaw again. Thank God the fractures didn’t show. Her right canine was an implant, the original had been knocked out long ago in a fight. It was a great prosthesis; it had cost a great deal of money.
Then she thought, Shower, that’ll wake you up even more.
She pulled her clothes off and examined her body. She could smell the drug sweat on her body, sharp and rank. It was not unpleasant, quite sexy in its own way, she thought. She stared at her stomach, flat, the small black triangle of hair. There was no fat there. She was in superb condition. She pumped her biceps, struck a couple of body-building poses in the mirror, her coked eyes staring wildly at her impressive musculature. The curve of her trapezius, her defined lats, her triceps, no bingo wings, she thought proudly, her small high breasts, her slim hips. She turned around; God, what a great ass. Ten out of ten there.
‘You told me you had even managed to find a lover with a similar laissez faire attitude to the law. Even though like calls to like, it’s quite an achievement.’
Go away, Dr Morgan, she thought irritably. But she did miss Serg. He had a great body too. She was certainly feeling in the mood. She thought to herself, Coke must be an aphrodisiac. For some reason, she suddenly thought of DS McCleod.
She tired of the game of looking at herself; besides, her eyes kept swimming in and out of focus. She showered, hot, cold, then scalding hot again, dried herself and pulled some clothes on.
She sat in the armchair facing the door in the darkness. Waiting like a tiger for its prey. Waiting for Big Jim. There was only one reason that she could think of for drugging her.
Big Jim was the man behind it, that was for sure. She could imagine him as a Rohypnol rapist, targeting single women, defencelessly unconscious. Big Jim ascending the stairs, with an unhurried tread, confident of what he was going to find, pass key in one hand, bottle of Scotch in the other. But who had administered it? It had to have been in the coffee, maybe the petits fours. Harriet? Conceivably. She could imagine her as Big Jim’s assistant/accomplice, avenging herself on the despised guests. Or maybe Kai, the suspected jailbird. He had made the coffee; that would be the easiest way to do it.
If Kai had been inside, as she suspected, what had it been for? And was the death of Eva an accident or murder? Had she been drugged and raped too? This couldn’t have been the first time that Big Jim had done it. How many single women guests at the Mackinnon Arms had found themselves in a similar situation to her? Few of them would report it even
