His dad shook his head, his expression mournful, which made Gus’s mind jump back to the concerns he’d been contemplating during his jog over. ‘Are you…’
Interrupting him, McGuire senior batted Gus’s concern away. ‘No, Angus. It’s nothing to dae wi’ oor health. Yer mum and me are fine…’ He frowned, scratched his beard, and then glanced at Corrine McGuire.
Gus’s eyes travelled from his father to his mother. ‘OK, whatever it is, you better just tell me.’
Corrine McGuire picked up an envelope from the wicker coffee table and handed it to her son. Wondering what he’d find inside, Gus scrutinised their faces, but getting no answers there, he opened the unsealed envelope and slipped out a handful of sheets of paper. As he studied the topmost sheet, Gus’s brow furrowed, and he quickly scanned each sheet in turn. There were five in total. Without speaking or looking at his parents, he went through the sheets once more, wishing that he could make some sort of sense of what was on them.
Before he could speak, his mum pointed at them, her hand trembling as she did so. ‘They arrived one at a time over the past few weeks. No name – just addressed to me and your dad. That was all that was in the envelope.’
The desire to yell at them was high, so Gus swallowed instead. What had they been thinking? It was only the previous year that he’d been the recipient of anonymous letters that had turned out to be threatening in nature. The fact that his parents had received not just any old anonymous letters, but these were enough to send the pulse at his temple into overdrive.
‘That’s why you were so upset at the crime scene.’ Gus tried to modulate his tone, but it came out accusatory, all the same. ‘You recognised the sketch left by the killer at the crime scene as having been drawn by the same person who sent these.’
Shaking the handful of sketches in his father’s face, he didn’t give his dad a chance to respond before jumping to his feet and pacing about on the lawn in front of the patio. ‘What the hell were the pair of you thinking? You should have told me the instant you got these. You both know that anonymous letters aren’t innocent – they’re sent anonymously in order to terrorise you and now, a sketch similar to these has turned up at a crime scene.’
Breathing heavily, he glared at his parents, his blue eyes, darting like lasers between them and tossed the sketches on the table. When his dad opened his mouth to respond, Gus raised his hand. ‘NO! You’ve got no excuse. You should have told me about these when they arrived!’
He gestured towards the sketches now spread over the table. ‘But you should definitely have told me about them before you left that crime scene this afternoon.’ His voice was raised, his eyes flashing, his frown furrowed. ‘I should arrest the pair of you with obstructing an investigation…’
He paused for a breath and Fergus took the opportunity to speak. ‘Och, Angus. Do ye no think you’re being a wee bit melodramatic?’
Gus closed his eyes and mentally counted to ten.
‘We thought we knew who’d sent them, Angus.’ His mum’s tone was pleading; conciliatory. ‘And it’s not like we did nothing about them. We got someone to check them out.’
Gus was not to be mollified, but he sat down again. ‘Who the hell did you think sent these to you, Mum? Who the hell do you know who would send sketches of a naked woman hanging from a hook?’
Defensively, Corrine met his glare, her fingers intertwined with her husband’s meaty ones. ‘They’re not all of a dead woman hanging…’
Gus shook his head. This was unbelievable. His mum was defending the person who sent her anonymous sketches of dead women, but what was more worrying, was that she seemed to have an inkling of who the sender might be. His fingers raked through his sweat damp hair. ‘Who? Who could possibly have sent those to you?’
If it was possible, his mum’s face paled even more, her eyes flitting to her husband and back, before head bowed, she spoke in a whisper. ‘My brother.’
Chapter 12
Bradford
He savours the high. There is nothing quite like it. No doubt about it. The adrenalin rush, being right here, right at the scene, and they don’t realise it. It’s perfect. You need to know who your adversaries are and McGuire, as he’d expected, will be a really admirable one. The Man in Black is no longer dressed in black. No need. Not when you want to blend in.
He has things to do and he doesn’t want to draw attention to himself, so he adds glasses and a mucky hoodie with a chavvy cap. He looks just like any other loser using the library services to avoid having to spend the day on a park bench somewhere. And now that he’s topped up the silicone on his fingers and made sure his head is completely shaved, he is ready to do a data search at the local library. Of course, wearing a mask is acceptable these days, so with his cap pulled down and the mask covering his lower face, he is unidentifiable.
City Park is getting ready to send the kids back to school. Well, unless Covid springs up again. Poor sods, all that time studying and for what? A complete ball’s up with their results. He remembered his own exam results day. Straight As across the board
