Page 23 of Stripped

Chapter 13

Wraith watched as she fled, hanging up on Gabriel as he made his way over to the gathering crowd. Peter was yelling at a man.

"What happened?" he asked Paul.

"This dobber walked in and started accusing Pim's grandfather of horrible things. Some kind of reporter."

Wraith inserted himself between Peter and the balding man, ripping the notebook from his hand. "What paper?" he asked. McGuire, much shorter in stature than Wraith, backed up. He grabbed the reporter's cheap polyester shirt, bringing his face within inches of his own. "What God damn paper?"

"The S-S-Scottish Sun," he stuttered, little balls of spit gathered in the corners of his mouth.

"Fucking tabloid." Wraith gripped his shirt tighter, twisting it in his fist. "If you so much as print one fucking word about the McNeils, I'll make sure you're on a liquid diet for the rest of your pathetic life. Understand?"

The man raised an unkempt eyebrow and straightened his back. "Free speech," he had the guts to say.

Wraith punched him squarely in the stomach, and he dropped to the ground, writhing, as he tried to catch his breath. "Someone get this arsehole out of here." Grabbing his coat, he left. Pim couldn't have gotten far; she was wearing four-inch stilettos. It was sprinkling rain and the streets were wet and dark, the headlights of passing cars reflected off the water in long streaks. He looked around, but she was nowhere to be seen. Paul followed him out. "Where would she have gone?" Wraith asked.

Paul looked at him with what might have been respect. "Somewhere she could be alone. She was wearing thin, I could see it in her eyes. You don't dance with someone for years without learning to read them intimately. My guess is she either went home or to Òran Mór."

"Òran Mór, the bar?"

"Aye, but she won't be in the bar or clubs. You'll find her in the auditorium if there's not an event going on."

Wraith drove to her flat first, but found it empty. He left the car and walked the short distance to the pub, using the time to process the past events. Gabriel agreed that Andrew McNeil's murder had been intentional and not a random mugging. The brutality of the attack was probably meant as a message, and the fact that he was at the docks meant it was presumably for business. Import or export was the question. And of what? Drugs in Edinburgh were funneled up from London; even Angus wasn't crazy enough to impinge on that area. It would start an all-out turf war. The other question was Natasha. Gabriel couldn't find any records of her in Scotland but that would be hard with only a first name. He had clearly heard the word papa. Was she a relation of some sort? She had to be around the same age as Pim. The fact she kept turning up the past two days suggested some type of connection.

Wraith climbed the stairs to the entrance of the old brick church. It was Tuesday night and the venue sat practically empty, except for the restaurants. Climbing the spiral staircase, he found her in the balcony of the auditorium by herself, sitting at a table. He stopped and watched her, his conscience in juxtaposition with his responsibility to The Watch, the contrasting effects both destructive. Either way, she would get hurt in the end. The more time he spent with her, the guiltier he felt. He was asking for her trust. She was helping him find her grandfather's killer, the very thing he himself was—an assassin. He weighed the principles of responsibility he felt. Where on the spectrum of evil did he lie if he was willing to use Pim as his pawn, if he was willing to kill? How far removed was he from Angus's morality?

* * *

She felt his eyes on her as he studied her and glanced up as he sat down at the table. "You shouldn't have run off," he said. "You're still in danger."

She regarded him with narrowed eyes, taking a sip of her drink. "This was the last place I saw my father before he died. He brought me here to see the mural."

Wraith looked up, taking in the celestial ceiling, a mix of ancient mythic symbolism, astrology, and local legend, as it creeped down the walls.

"It's beautiful," he said. "I can imagine one could spend hours here looking at it, trying to interpret it."

"Alasdair Gray became one of my favorite artists. I read Lanark five times that year as I tried to come to terms with my father's death. I came here when I could, constantly trying to find the answer."

He reached out, taking her hand in his, their fingers interlocking. "He told me that day, an artist should have broad experiences and a good education, to listen to music, read poetry, literature, visit exhibitions. The more an artist knows, the deeper their spirituality and the better their art." She smiled, shaking her head as she finished her drink. "I'm sorry. I'm rambling."

"No, please continue." His thumb stroked her palm.

"I wanted to be that artist, that dancer. I thought if I could be perfect, then maybe I could make him proud. But no answer came, no matter how hard I tried or searched. There was no answer to the violence he experienced and the one thing I loved, I began to resent. Then hate. There's no perfection in art. That's what Gray finally taught me. What defines you as an artist, is the bravery to be extraordinarily different. Not perfect. But still, I try."

"Can I get you another drink?"

She held up her empty glass. "Sure."

Wraith came back with two whiskeys, setting them down.

"And you, Robert Wraith, what secrets do you have lurking in your past? What made you want to become a private investigator?"

"You can say I didn't chose it. It chose me."

"So, we have that in common." She gave him a smile. "But you're not from Glasgow."

"No."

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