Professor Kitchen shifted up a gear. ‘Two things.’ She lifted Buckland’s head and pointed to a wound in the short blond hair above his ear. ‘This blow to the head would be sufficient to render him unconscious.’ She moved swiftly in long strides around the table and lifted his arm. ‘Old track marks here too, but this one is fresh.’ She pointed to a small mark almost hidden among the freckled skin. ‘He was beaten prior to death. It’s possible he self-administered drugs for the pain, but it’s also possible he was injected while unconscious.’
‘And the bandaged right hand?’ Shona asked. She exchanged a look with Sue that showed they were both thinking the same thing. Was self-administration even possible with this hand injury? Shona pictured Jamie Buckland after their interview, at the custody desk signing for his possessions. ‘I’m pretty sure he was right-handed.’
‘It might explain the clumsy injection. We’ll do X-rays and we’ve fast-tracked the toxicology and bloods,’ said Professor Kitchen, pulling off her gloves. ‘It shouldn’t be long.’
Shona and Dan had paced the corridor, exhausted their small talk and finished a cup of indifferent machine coffee when they were called back in. Professor Kitchen pulled up the results on the computer screen.
‘Your man died of heroin overdose. The pills are benzodiazepines and a small amount of alcohol is also present.’
‘Could the benzos be Quinox? It’s mostly available in the Far East.’
Professor Kitchen spent a few moments tapping on the keyboard. ‘The recovered sample and Quinox are both 2-keto compounds, so it’s possible. I can’t tell you if the heroin was self-administered. It’s a clumsy job but he could have done it himself. Now, Shona.’ She replaced the lines of numbers and figures with X-ray images of Buckland’s bandaged right hand.
Shona leaned closer. ‘Is it the same as Sami Raseem?’
‘Partially healed fractures to the metacarpals.’ A second image appeared on the screen, side by side with the first. ‘And, yes, the injuries are almost identical to your road victim, who also showed small traces of benzodiazepines in his blood.’ The pathologist swivelled in her seat to look keenly at Shona.
Shona turned to Dan. ‘You said Isla Corr had broken bones in her hand?’ Dan nodded and Shona continued, ‘Did you ever see the toxicology report?’ It was the detail that had been nagging at her, the question at the top of her newly written list pinned to the front of Isla’s case file.
Dan looked apologetic. ‘I tried. I did what you said, went over there, but I just got the run-around. I had a case in court the next day, paperwork to finish, so…’
Professor Kitchen pushed her chair back from the desk and looked at Dan over her glasses with the kind of withering pity her students would immediately recognise. ‘Leave this with me,’ she said curtly, and left the room.
Shona perched on the edge of the desk and bit her thumb. Dan was still smarting from the exchange and sat down at the desk opposite, picking silently at the elastic band around his notebook.
‘I’ve seen something like this before, a long time ago,’ said Shona eventually, indicating the black and white pictures on the screen. ‘London gangs used to punish thieves by breaking their hands. The victim was given a time limit to repay four or five times the value of what was stolen, or they’d get a return visit. A visit that usually proved fatal.’
Before Dan could respond, Professor Kitchen came back through the door. ‘I called Carlisle. No drugs found in her system except small traces of 2-keto benzodiazepines, so potentially your Quinox. There were similar injuries to the metacarpals, but these were sustained peri-mortem, with no time to heal.’
‘Wazir confirmed Buckland, Isla Corr and Sami Raseem knew each other. Now it looks like their deaths have a physical connection. Thanks, Sue, I’m really grateful for your help.’ Shona got up and motioned to Dan. ‘We’ll let you get finished now.’ They all shook hands.
At the end of the pathology corridor Shona stopped by a row of plastic chairs. ‘What if they’d all been caught skimming from the same boss and had been trying to pay off the debt?’ she began. ‘What if they couldn’t source enough baby milk? Wazir said they didn’t get what they thought they could for it. Wazir doesn’t have the same injuries – could he have been the one doling out these beatings? Doesn’t strike me as the enforcer type,’ Shona said. ‘But could he be the boss behind this?’
‘He’s smart,’ Dan agreed.
‘Maybe, but he doesn’t fit for Buckland’s death. He’s inside.’ Shona began chewing her thumb nail again. ‘Dan, get onto his solicitor. Wazir’s in protective custody in Glasgow, see if we can set up a meeting. We need another chat with him. You’re right. I’m not convinced he’s told us everything he knows about Sami’s death. I’ll give Murdo a call, update him on the PM.’
Dan got out his phone and walked to the other end of the corridor but a few minutes later he returned grim faced.
‘No joy?’ Shona asked.
‘It’s worse than that. Wazir was found this morning hanged in his room,’ Dan replied. ‘The doctor’s been in. They’re saying suicide, no question. Tore up his shirt to make a ligature. No one thought him at risk, so there were no extra checks.’
‘They can get to you anywhere,’ Shona murmured. ‘That’s what Wazir said Sami told him.’
‘You think someone got to him?’
‘I think the fiscal should consider the possibility. He was in protective custody for a reason,’ Shona said firmly, then sighed. ‘Jamie Buckland, our best lead, is dead. Now Wazir’s gone too.’ She shook her head. Witnesses were disappearing, avenues of enquiry closing off. Shona searched back for any potential living source and landed on Tony Kirkland, the ex-soldier who ran the homeless support centre and who knew Sami. He was a second-hand witness at best and there was no guarantee Kirkland would talk to her again. ‘I’ll just be a minute.’ She pulled out her phone, took up Dan’s spot at the end of the corridor and dialled his number.
‘Well, well, if it isn’t the little mermaid.’ Kirkland’s sleekit tones, set against a background of a muffled radio and the clatter of plates, sounded uncomfortably intimate.
‘Mr Kirkland,’ Shona ignored the comment, ‘I’ve a couple of questions about Sami I think you could help me with.’
There was a pause. ‘Hang on a minute till I close the door.’ The background noise died away. ‘Okay, what is it?’ His voice dropped and acquired a harder and more cautious edge.
‘Couple of things, and I’d ask you not to repeat these matters to anyone.’
‘Fire away.’