The Hit Read online

  The Hit

  Anna Smith

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  About the Author

  Also by Anna Smith

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Acknowledgements

  First published in Great Britain in 2017 by

  Quercus Editions Ltd

  Carmelite House

  50 Victoria Embankment

  London EC4Y 0DZ

  An Hachette UK company

  Copyright © 2017 Anna Smith

  The moral right of Anna Smith to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  EBOOK ISBN 978-1-78429-486-1

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover design © Blacksheep

  www.quercusbooks.co.uk

  Anna Smith has been a journalist for over twenty years and is a former chief reporter for the Daily Record in Glasgow. She has covered wars across the world as well as major investigations and news stories from Dunblane to Kosovo to 9/11. Anna spends her time between Lanarkshire and Dingle in the west of Ireland, as well as in Spain to escape the British weather.

  Also by Anna Smith

  The Dead Won’t Sleep

  To Tell the Truth

  Screams in the Dark

  Betrayed

  A Cold Killing

  Rough Cut

  Kill Me Twice

  Death Trap

  For Thea – ‘the wee rock’.

  Her courage humbled and inspired us all.

  Prologue

  Glasgow, February 2001

  There was always the chance of betrayal. Any fool could have seen that. But Helen had been so blinded. Now, the waiting was almost over.

  Like a burglar, she stepped softly around her bedroom, closing the doors of the wardrobes she’d emptied earlier. The contents were now in the Louis Vuitton suitcase in her bedroom. She locked the bedroom door, cursing her trembling fingers as she turned the key, and listened for his footsteps in the tiled entrance outside her luxury flat. Nothing. As she walked past the hallway mirror, she glimpsed her reflection, but didn’t linger on the empty eyes staring back at her. There was no point in asking herself how it had come to this. She was as guilty of murder as the hitman she’d hired, who was now about to knock on her door with his latest blackmail demand. More money. No amount would ever be enough for him, and Helen should have known that the first time she paid him off. But she’d taken naivety to a whole new level by also becoming his lover. It didn’t get much more stupid than that. She’d been devastated at his betrayal, but more angry with herself for believing they could actually make a life together. Now he wanted everything – all the money she’d squirrelled away for both of them, and more. He wanted everything. What a fool she’d been.

  She jumped at the knock on the door. She pressed her fingers to her eyes and smudged her mascara a little to make it look as though she’d been crying, in the forlorn hope he might show her a scrap of sympathy. Then she went across to the door, and opened it. Frankie Mallon stood there, and looked her up and down, his dark eyes resting for a second on the top of her breasts poking out of her tight black zipped top. Then he walked past her into the hall and stood, legs apart, as she turned to face him.

  ‘You got everything?’

  Helen met his gaze fleetingly, and went towards the kitchen.

  ‘In here. It’s in a bag for you. It’s everything I have.’

  ‘Don’t give me your shit, Helen. You know there’s plenty more where that came from.’

  ‘There isn’t. Everything else is tied up in these complicated accounts of Alan’s. I told you that. You knew that.’

  ‘Then uncomplicate it. You have all the passwords. You told me that – remember? You’ve been shifting his fucking money around for years, hiding it away. So don’t give me any of your crap.’ He grabbed her by the arm, squeezing it tight. ‘I’m telling you now. There had better be plenty in this bag, or when I walk out of here, I make a call to the cops in the next ten minutes. Tell them what you did.’

  ‘You mean what you did,’ she spat.

  ‘They’ll never know that. I’m not that stupid. I’m just going to drop you right in the shite. See how you bear up when the cops start probing for details, asking you about Alan’s disappearance. You . . . the heartbroken fucking wife.’

  ‘Christ, Frankie! Stop with your empty fucking threats. I was interviewed by the police at the time. I wasn’t even in the same country as Alan was when he went missing. I’m whiter than white.’

  ‘Aye. That’ll be right.’

  Helen lifted a fat bag from the worktop and thrust it towards him.

  ‘Take this and get the fuck out of my life.’

  Frankie glanced at her, then opened the zip in the bag. He pulled out a wedge of money, fifty-pound notes, and rummaged around the bundles. Helen knew there was five thousand pounds in there. She’d counted it herself again after the bank handed it over to her.

  ‘Fuck this! This is no good!’ He slung the bag onto the worktop.

  ‘Take it and go. Don’t make any more trouble for yourself.’

  Before she could move, he grabbed her by the throat and pushed her against the cupboard.

  ‘Trouble? You bitch! You don’t know what trouble is.’

  He pulled her hair back, and she heard his breath quicken. And even now, even though he was here to take her money, threatening to ruin her, she couldn’t resist him. He pushed himself against her, and kissed her so hard she could feel her teeth crushing against her lips.

  ‘This is what you want, isn’t it?’

  He was hard already, and Helen felt weak and angry with herself for how much she wanted him. He pulled her skirt up and tugged her pants as he pushed his hand inside.

  ‘Stop!’ />
  ‘Doesn’t feel like you want me to stop.’ He was undoing his jeans and pushing himself against her. Then he suddenly froze, and took a step back, his lips curling into a sarcastic smile. ‘Oh, you want it, all right. But tell you what. I’m giving you two more days to get all the money together – and I might even give you a shag for old times’ sake when I come back.’ He took the bag from the worktop and turned.

  As he walked out of the kitchen, Helen knew it was now or never. She fumbled in the drawer, and as he was about to open the front door, she pulled out a small revolver she’d found among Alan’s things. She took three steps towards him, worried she might miss, and fired a shot into his back. Then two more. He half-turned as he keeled over, his eyes wide in disbelief. Helen stood for a moment, rooted, as blood spread across his shirt and formed a pool on the floor. Still holding the gun, she went into the kitchen and filled a glass of water, her hand trembling, as she watched the blood spread across the light grey carpet. She had to get out of here. Right now. She hurried to the bedroom and dragged her suitcase out towards the front door. She stuffed the money bag inside it. Suddenly, she heard the lock turn as though a key had gone into it. She watched, barely breathing. The door opened slowly. She stepped back towards the kitchen, steadied herself on the worktop. It was a ghost. It must be. But it wasn’t. Beneath the beard, the long straggly grey hair and the hollow cheeks, it was Alan. Back from the dead.

  ‘A . . .’ Helen couldn’t get the word out. ‘Al . . .?’

  Alan looked down at Frankie’s body, realising his feet were in the pool of blood seeping around him. He took a step back, still scanning the body. Then he looked at Helen.

  ‘You killed him? You sent him to kill me, and now you’ve killed him?’

  ‘H-he attacked me. He wanted all my money.’

  Alan puffed and almost smiled. ‘Your money? Your money? You don’t have a fucking penny to your name, Helen. You never had. All you have is what you stole from me. I gave you everything you have, and you stole from me.’ His voice quivered a little as he glanced at Frankie. ‘And you sent this piece of shit you were shagging to kill me?’

  Helen could see the hurt in his eyes, and somewhere inside there was a pang of guilt, of sympathy for the scrawny, broken figure standing before her. But she blinked it away.

  ‘No. It wasn’t like that. We . . . we fell . . .’

  Alan threw his head back. ‘Aw, don’t tell me you fell for this chancer. Christ almighty! Spare me the details. You sent him to kill me, Helen!’ He paused, swallowed. ‘Why would you do that?’

  ‘I . . . I didn’t. I didn’t know what happened to you. I was looking for you. Everywhere. Police . . . everyone was searching for you.’

  ‘Aye. But only you and Frankie knew the truth.’

  ‘I didn’t know. I . . . I only found out when he told me what he did,’ she lied.

  ‘Liar!’ His voice strained as he tried to shout. ‘You thought I was dead and you were taking everything I have.’ He ran his hand over his face. ‘But you know what? I survived. Frankie thought I was dead, but I wasn’t.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Don’t give me your crap. You know what happened. You just can’t believe I’m standing here. And I’ll tell you what. I’m not going away.’

  Helen felt her fingers tighten around the gun.

  ‘What the fuck are you doing, Helen?’ He took a step towards her. ‘Put down the gun.’

  ‘Don’t come any closer,’ Helen blurted. ‘I’ll shoot you. Don’t come any closer. If you move, I’ll kill you, Alan.’

  ‘You already did, or so you thought. Put down the gun. You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into. You can’t get away with this.’

  She said nothing, still pointing the gun. She began to walk towards the door, giving Frankie’s body a wide berth.

  ‘Don’t come near me, Alan. Stay where you are. You’ll never see me again. Ever.’

  She opened the door. She didn’t look back. If she had, she’d have seen the tears in her husband’s eyes.

  Chapter One

  It was only when the stench of the dead body eventually polluted the other flats that one of the residents called the police. A rotting corpse wouldn’t normally bring Rosie Gilmour to the West End of Glasgow to investigate. Even the fact that it was the corpse of Frankie Mallon – a two-bob conman who would knife you just for fun – would barely get a few paragraphs in the Post. But it was the place where he had bled to death from gunshot wounds that interested her. What the hell was a lowlife thug like Mallon doing in the flat of Helen Lewis? she pondered, as she stood across the road watching the white-boiler-suited officers of Strathclyde Police forensic team go in and out of the three-storey sandstone building. Rosie had been up here before, six months ago, as she’d tried to get a handle on the disappearance of wealthy accountant Alan Lewis. He’d gone missing somewhere in Romania where he apparently owned a holiday home, and had some kind of business interest in the country’s growing wine export industry. His disappearance had a whiff of mystery about it, but Rosie could find nothing to go on, and her editor, Mick McGuire, didn’t want her to go traipsing all over Romania unless Lewis turned up dead somewhere. At the time, she’d come up to the luxury flats in Park Circus, hoping to speak to his wife Helen, but she was never home, and repeated attempts to contact her had been met with the curt reply that she was too upset and worried over her husband’s disappearance to talk to the press. She said she had nothing to say. Rosie was always suspicious when people in the middle of a drama had nothing to say, and her gut instinct told her Helen was hiding something. But you can’t keep badgering someone for information if you don’t have anything to go on. The wife had given no interviews, or made any appeal for information on the whereabouts of her husband. She’d been silent. Too silent for Rosie’s liking. And now this; pond life Frankie Mallon lying stiff in her flat, with no sign or sight of her in the past few days. Nobody saw her leave, and the last time a neighbour did see her at the flat was over a month ago, and she’d only stayed a couple of nights. Helen Lewis was a bit of a mystery herself. On paper, the forty-year-old wife of the wealthy accountant enjoyed the good life – cruises with her husband, dining in the best restaurants, exotic holidays in far-flung lands. But it hadn’t always been like this. She’d come from nothing, from the notorious Gorbals council housing scheme in Glasgow, but she’d quietly buried her past a very long time ago while she pursued the life of a rich wife. Fur coat and no knickers was how one of Rosie’s cop pals described her.

  Her mobile rang, and McGuire’s name came up.

  ‘Anything fresh?’

  Rosie chortled. ‘Are you kidding me? Mallon’s been lying dead for days. There’s absolutely nothing fresh. I can smell him from here.’

  ‘You know what I mean. How much do we know about Mallon?’

  ‘A couple of cop contacts tell me he’s been a con artist all his life. He’d sell his granny, and probably has twice over. That kind of guy. He gets a bit of a using from time to time by the big boys, but they know they can’t trust him as far as they can throw him. I’m told he has, or had, a violent streak in him.’

  ‘So was he shagging Helen Lewis? Maybe she liked a bit of rough.’

  ‘Who knows? But she is rough anyway. All the jewellery and the fast cars, it’s all a front. She’s a wee hairy from the Gorbals.’

  ‘How did she land a guy like Lewis?’

  ‘Don’t know. But if you remember her pictures when Alan went missing, she’s a looker – even now. They’ve been married around ten years, so she was probably even better-looking in her thirties.’ Rosie gazed across at a stretcher with a black body bag on it being brought down the steps and placed into the waiting vehicle. ‘Anyway, it’s anyone’s guess why he was in her flat. But that’s him being taken to the morgue now.’

  ‘Do you think she’s shot him?’

  ‘I don’t know, Mick. I just don’t know enough about her. But tell you what, Frankie Mallon turning up dead i
n her flat changes things. What the Christ was he doing there? I’m going to have a run at trying to find out what’s going on.’

  ‘We need to find Helen Lewis.’

  ‘Oh, good thinking. That hadn’t occurred to me,’ she said, sarcastic.

  ‘Don’t give us your patter, Gilmour. I’ll see you when you get back. I’m doing page one, four and five on this. I’ve got Declan ploughing through the cuts on Alan Lewis’s disappearance, so we can revisit that. We’ll see where we go with it.’ He hung up.

  Rosie stood for a few moments watching as a well-dressed older woman came out of the building with what looked like a couple of plain-clothes policemen, one of them carrying a clipboard. They stood on the pavement chatting before the woman turned and walked down the hill towards Woodlands Road. Rosie waited until the policemen went into their cars and drove off, then she went in the direction she could see the woman going in. She followed the woman as she stopped at the bottom of the road, then went into the Grassroots Café. Rosie walked past the window and saw her sitting in the corner, taking her coat off, and talking to one of the waitresses. It might be easier approaching her later at her flat, rather than in the café, risking a public knock-back. But she decided that the woman looked quite civilised, and if she was going to say no, then she didn’t seem the type to make a scene. Rosie went in and sat at a table close to where the woman sat sipping a café latte. She made brief eye contact when she sat down. Rosie ordered a decaff latte from the waitress, and when she sat down, she took a sip, and turned around to the woman. Rosie’s flat in St George’s Mansions was right at the end of this building, and she wondered if the woman might have seen her before in the street. This side of the West End was either young professionals or older residents who’d lived there for years, and while it was a friendly, much-sought-after area, it still wasn’t the kind of place where people told each other their life stories. To Rosie’s surprise, it was the woman who spoke first.

  ‘I saw you up in Park Circus, did I not? I thought I saw you from my window. Do you live around here? Terrible business that . . .’ Her voice trailed off.