Free Hell To Pay by Jenny Thomson Page B

won't stay still, but somehow I manage it.
    A noxious smell snakes its way up my nostrils and glancing down I see he’s soiled himself. For the first time, I feel a niggle of shame that this is what I've been reduced to.
    Later, as I survey my handiwork, I say," this is what it feels like to be helpless."
    There's no response from him; maybe he's passed out with the pain or fallen asleep. After using a knife to carve RAPIST into his stomach, he'd bled like a pig.
    Before I leave, I go round the apartment wiping prints off anything I might have touched. Once I’ve made sure I've left nothing behind, I close the door for the last time and shove the keys through.
    Hurrying along, I find a telephone box and phone for an ambulance, disguising my voice by pinching my nose and putting on an accent. I tell them that someone's hurt and that they need urgent medical help, and then I hang up.
    Before I left, I’d given Conlan more Rohypnol. For a while, he’ll be lucky enough to remember his name, never mind warn his partner in crime about me. And, he won’t have his phone with my text messages because I removed the SIM card and battery and smashed it to bits before I dumped it down a garbage chute.

Chapter 20
    DC McKeith's lanky frame loomed in the doorway casting a shadow so wide it could have been a net from a fishing trawler.
    "You're not going to believe this, Sir, but an ambulance was called to an address in Shettleston last night. They found Paul Conlan tied up and drugged. Someone used a knife to carve the world 'Rapist' into his stomach. He was found naked but for a pair a boxers."
    Waddell made a face. "Heck, Brian could you not have given me some warning? I've just eaten my breakfast."
    "Sorry, Sir. I should have warned you it was a bit gruesome."
    'Nah, I'm not talking about that. I'm picturing that fat bastard in his boxers. Enough to make anyone sick."
    "Oh, right."
    Christ, thought Waddell, this one was seriously missing a funny bone and if he thought a wee bit of carving was gruesome, he should have seen the man whose face had been shoved into a barbecue grill and held there. Waddell had seen that twenty years ago now and never forgotten it.
    Waddell carried on. "He's one of Sandy McNab's boys, if my memory serves me right. Or, enforcers as the media like calling psychos who keep finding inventive uses for blowtorches and hammers."
    "Aye," said, McKeith, who'd no doubt already had his nose in the file.
    He was thorough that way and that's what would make him a good copper, one day. For now, it was as though Waddell had been entrusted with a wee ducking and had to teach it how to swim, although on reflection, McKeith was more of a cygnet.
    "Is there any chance he's going to die? Get the crime stats down to make the Chief Constable happy?"
    Waddell was disappointed when the young DC said there was no chance of that happening, because Conlan was a right piece of work. He'd once stabbed a man in the back and tried to rape the man's wife over a debt. The court case collapsed after witnesses withdrew their watertight testimonies. They tended to do that when Sandy McNab's lot were involved.
    "They do reckon though that if someone hadn't phoned for an ambulance he could have got an infection and died or starved to death. He was still tied up when they found him."
    Waddell pushed his paperwork aside. "Goodie. This is the day that just keeps giving. I take it Galbraith wants us to have a wee chat with our Mr. Conlan?"
    "Aye, Sir. But, we'll need to wait. They found traces of Rohypnol in his system and he's talking a load of gibberish. The doctor’s saying that because of the Rohypnol he might not remember what happened for days, weeks or at all."
    Waddell knew the score when it came to that drug. He knew there were men roaming the streets who should have been in prison for rape, but because they’d used Rohypnol, a power sedative intended to treat sleeping disorders, they were free men. Rohypnol took away folk's memories or