Cold Heart Read online

  At first, Estelle was grateful for the fish being so slippery and the way it always fell out of her hands no matter how hard she tried to grasp it. When she finally did get a good firm grip of the thing and gently slid her strong index finger into its mouth, she just couldn’t seem to go through with the final act of snapping its neck back and ending the poor creature’s life.

  “You’d better do it quickly, Estelle, if you want to eat tonight and have it taste good too. The poor thing is suffering being out of the water for so long.”

  “Can’t we just put it back, da?”

  “We could, aye.” Her father casually replied. “But then what will you have for your dinner tonight? I have my dinner already.” Her father finished with a jolly chuckle, while nodding down at the two fish he caught for himself. But for all her father’s encouraging words Estelle still couldn’t kill the thing.

  “There must be another way, da?” Estelle cried out. The whole process was clearly stressing her out to the max. She knew her father wouldn’t be angry if she just threw it back into the river, but on the other hand, she didn’t wish to disappoint him either.

  Her father frowned before pulling out a small sharp knife from his pocket. He handed it to Estelle, which again surprised her, as she assumed, he would just take the fish from her grasp and perform whatever awful deed he was going to perform himself.

  “Slide the thin blade into its head and twist.”

  Estelle looked even more shocked and horrified while her father just nodded insistently. Estelle took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She pretended that both her and her father were in the middle of an apocalyptic war and they were the only two people left alive in the world. This was the only way they could eat tonight. If she didn’t kill her food then she would starve. Simple as that. She had to learn to be cruel sometimes in order to survive.

  Estelle took a deep breath and slid the small sharp knife, deep and slow, straight into the roof of the fish’s head. It stopped wriggling and struggling immediately.

  Later that evening Estelle helped her father to make a fire at their small campsite clearing beside the river. Her father showed her how to gut the fish, cutting its head clean off at the gills before slicing it open from tail to mouth along its belly and stripping out all of the little creature’s guts from within before preparing it for cooking.

  They cooked their fish together inside a small saucepan grated on bricks over the top of the camp fire. A fire Estelle had also helped to make with her father’s guidance. As the fish cooked, Estelle’s father sprinkled some salt and pepper onto their roasting flesh in order to flavor them up a little. While they patiently waited for their meals, Estelle began throwing her father’s knife at a nearby tree trunk where he had nailed the heads of both fish.

  She tried to hit them, but always ended up way, way off mark. Not even hitting the trunk of the tree with her blade on most occasions. Suddenly, from behind, her father threw another, bigger knife from much further away. It slammed into one of the fish heads viciously hard with the blade imbedding itself deep into the tree trunk too.

  Estelle jumped back in fright at the loud whooshing sound of the knife flying through the air followed by the thunderous stabbing thud of the blade hitting the bark, but her expression quickly turned to one of raw excitement.

  “Show me how to do that, da, please?”

  Her father chuckled hard at her new found enthusiasm.

  “After dinner, I promise. We have the whole evening to practice.”

  Later that night and after Estelle had practiced knife throwing with her father for a few hours more, she found herself lying cuddled up, cozy, warm, and safe in her father’s arms. They were both snuggled up in their sleeping bags watching the flames of the nearby fire flicker and fade.

  “When do you have to go away with the army again, da?”

  “Soon, my wee pumpkin, soon.”

  “Don’t you ever get scared that someone might shoot you in one of these far-off foreign lands?”

  Estelle’s father glanced down at her with a reassuring smile.

  “Never.” He said with a sly smirk. “Because I will always shoot them first.”

  Estelle giggled at that.

  “I want to join the army just like you when I’m older, da.”

  “And you will. If that’s what you really want to do with your life.”

  “It is.” Estelle quickly replied with a satisfied grin.

  Suddenly Estelle’s memory jumped and she remembered to almost one month later. It was in the middle of the day. A rare hot and humid afternoon in Glasgow. She was at her home with her mother and sister, and there was a loud knock upon the front door of their house.

  She remembered the wafting smell of her mother’s baking in the kitchen. She remembered how her mother always loved to bake back then. How she always seemed to be at her happiest when she was either baking or when her father was around and home from the army.

  Estelle sat in the family living room with her feet up, watching some cartoons on the television. Her little sister Gayle was sleeping soundly on the other end of the couch and Estelle resisted the urge to shove her slyly off the edge for her own self-amusement. She loved to annoy her little brat sister so much, but on this occasion, she decided to give her a free pass.

  Estelle heard the door knocking, but like she always did, she just ignored it and left it for her mother to answer. But then her mother called out to Estelle from the kitchen and asked her to get the front door for her instead while she washed her hands from baking.

  Estelle reluctantly did as her mother asked and stomped over towards the front door to open it up. She called back to her mum in the kitchen just as she unbolted the lock.

  “Maybe it’s da. Come home early, Ma?”

  “Ha. You obviously don’t know much about the bloody British Army.” Estelle’s mum called back at her.

  Estelle opened the door only to be confronted by two serious and official looking people. One young man. One young woman. Both kitted out in full, smart British Army officer uniforms.

  Estelle froze. Her heart sunk to the pit of her stomach. Just from their flat, grim expressions she knew these army officers weren’t there to promote any good news or causes to Estelle and her family.

  “Hi. Can we speak to your mother, please?” said the female army officer with a gentle tone of sorrow. “We have some news about your father?”

  Estelle hesitated for a long time. Her whole body froze up and she felt unable to even speak.

  “Da?” Estelle finally muttered, eventually able to get one word past the newly-forming huge lump in her throat.

  “I’m sorry,” said the man. Estelle still couldn’t move or even say another damn word. Her mother emerged from the kitchen and strolled cheerfully towards the front door while drying her hands upon her apron.

  “Who is it, sweetheart?”

  No sooner had she entered the hallway and saw the two army uniforms did Estelle’s mum completely freeze up herself before her whole demeanor changed. Without any further words she swiftly collapsed onto her knees, right there on the hallway floor. She began sobbing furiously. She cried so loud and hard that Gayle woke up in the living room and immediately began crying out too, just from the sight of seeing her broken-down mother out in the hallway.

  That was the moment that changed everything, Estelle thought, back on the train and only fifteen minutes away from Glasgow Queen Street Station. That was the single moment that changed their lives forever. Spiraling downward into a pit of misery, pain, anguish, and despair from that day onwards.

  Estelle glanced back over at the father and daughter pair in the seats a few rows in front of her. They were both sleeping peacefully now. Estelle noticed that the father had accidentally dropped his book onto the aisle floor and so she moved quietly over to pick it up.

  Gently, she placed the book down upon the seat beside the father and daughter twosome before returning to her own.

  Chapter 17


  As soon as Estelle stepped off the train at Queen Street Station, she immediately returned to her hotel room at the Alexander Thomason Hotel on Argyle Street. With no time to waste she grabbed the rucksack she’d kept hidden behind the old bath panel in her ensuite and well out of sight from the prying eyes of any nosy cleaning maids. She laid the rucksack down upon her bed and took out two small loaded handguns from the very bottom of the bag. She strapped one behind her lower back, tucked tightly into her jeans and secured by her belt while carefully hidden by the bottom of her hoody. The other small hand gun she strapped firmly against her ankle underneath her right trouser leg.

  From another compartment in her rucksack Estelle took out a small bottle of chloroform along with a syringe and placed it into her pocket. She didn’t think she’d need to use the substance but still it was a handy instrument to have just in case there were any... complications.

  Estelle made her way down the eerily quiet Argyle Street. It wasn’t even six in the morning and the shops wouldn’t be opening for another few hours at least. The busiest street in Glasgow was like a ghost town, but the calm quietness soothed Estelle like a newborn baby hearing a peaceful lullaby for the very first time.

  Once she reached the Trongate end of Argyle Street, Estelle approached a large apartment building complex just a few dozen meters down on her right-hand side. She knew exactly where she was going. As soon as Tommy had told her where the witness Mrs. Lamont stayed, she knew it wouldn’t be too hard to find. No google maps required when you knew the city like the back of your hand.

  Estelle rang the buzzer that supposedly belonged to Mrs. Lamont. But no one answered the call. Even after the third straight buzzing attempt nothing came back through the speaker. Estelle realized it was still early and that Mrs. Lamont, if she indeed was a real-life person, might not have risen from her bedroom pit so early. So, Estelle began ringing all of the other buzzers in the block. One at a time. One after the other before restarting from the top buzzer again. Someone had to be up and wide awake inside that building. Some unlucky workers who had to arise early for their mind numbing, dead-end shifts of work. Or perhaps some unluckier workers who had only recently arrived home from a long hard nightshift and were now trying to settle down into their beds for a few hours of well-deserved kip.

  Finally, someone buzzed her in and without even asking who the hell she was or screaming at her through the speaker about why the hell she was buzzing them for so damn early in the morning. Estelle made her way up towards the top floor via the building’s stairwell. She liked stairs. She liked them a lot, mainly because nobody ever used them anymore. People were so bloody lazy this day and age that the majority of people always opted for a lift or an escalator if given the option. Everybody hated old-fashioned stairs. Estelle loved them though. For one thing, they kept her active and moving. She was always at her best and most alert while on the move. Secondly, there was less chance of her bumping into anyone who might remember or recognize her.

  Estelle reached the second top floor. There were four apartments here in total. Estelle was looking for number twenty-four which was situated on the first right-hand side as she entered from the emergency stairwell. She knocked gently upon the apartment door. A little dog with an annoyingly loud bark began yapping furiously away from inside as soon as she’d put her knuckles to the wood. That was a good sign, Estelle thought. At least the dog from the witness’s statement was real. So perhaps Mrs. Lamont might be a real live person too and not just some made up witness to help brush her sister’s death underneath a carpet of filth and lies.

  Estelle knocked again, harder this time. The little dog within continued to bark furiously away, like its little life depended upon it. Before she knocked for a third time, she finally heard someone from beyond the frame, a woman it seemed, trying to shush the dog by telling it to shut the hell up but in a gentle tone of voice. Estelle knocked again. Then she heard the footsteps of a heavy-set woman approaching the door. The woman didn’t even attempt to open it at first. Instead, she called out from behind the comfort and safety of the other side of the thick wooded frame. In her defense, it could have been any kind of scary, mental intruder out there. She’d been woken from her cozy slumber and wasn’t expecting a soul. Especially at such an early hour. As an only child with no friends or family and both parents long since departed from this world, Mrs. Lamont’s only real family in her life was her little dog Regi. He was the only creature that she truly trusted in her life.

  “Yes. Who is it?” enquired the woman on the other side of the door.

  “Mrs. Lamont?” Estelle replied with her face right up against the wood.

  Mrs. Lamont, seemed to feel comforted by Estelle’s gentle feminine tone calling her name from the other side of the door. So, trusting her gut instincts she unlocked the two bolts and opened the frame just a touch, still keeping the door on the chain as an extra precaution. Mrs. Lamont then stuck her big fat nose and chubby features into the crack of the doorway.

  “Who wants to know?”

  “Detective Jonas sent me.” Estelle coolly stated, staring Mrs. Lamont dead in her eyes and without even blinking. Mrs. Lamont froze at the mention of the Detective’s name. It had totally thrown her off guard and her sleepy mind into a hurricane of turmoil.

  “Lewis?” she enquired further, regathering her chaotic thoughts. “Why on earth would he do that? And at such a godly hour too? Surely, he would have just called me first. Or last night even? What’s this all about? Who are you?”

  “It’s about your statement regarding Gayle Munroe?” Estelle went on. Keeping her tone serious and official but still not trying to intimidate the woman too much. “The girl who drowned in the River Clyde last month?”

  Mrs. Lamont gave Estelle another suspicious glare. But Estelle could see the pure fear in her eyes at someone else knowing about the event.

  “Are you a reporter?”

  Estelle unleashed a sly little grin.

  “No. I work with Detective Jonas. How else would I know where to find you?”

  Mrs. Lamont looked terribly anxious. The strange woman standing outside her door made a good point. But still, there was something off putting about the entire scenario playing out at her front door.

  “But Detective Jonas told me specifically that I couldn’t speak with anyone except him about the case. In fact, I’m going to call him right now. See what the hell he’s bloody well playing at. Sending someone over here like this, to my bloody private apartment of all places, without any warning. He said I wouldn’t be bothered by any of this ever again.”

  Mrs. Lamont turned away from the door, but leaving it still slightly ajar and on the chain. Still half asleep and dressed in her night gown she wandered back up the narrow hallway to find her mobile phone still charging on a nearby living room table.

  Estelle took a deep breath before kicking the front door violently open, snapping the chain from its holder in an instant. Mrs. Lamont screamed in shock. Her little dog began barking and yapping wildly again too. Estelle closed the broken front door firmly shut behind her and walked straight up to Mrs. Lamont who stood frozen in shock at the end of the hallway with her mobile phone in hand.

  “Get out of my house. I’m calling the police. GET OUT.” Mrs. Lamont cried. Estelle grabbed the phone from her grasp before punching Mrs. Lamont square in her big fat nose, knocking her to the floor in a crumpled heap. Her nose bled hard, bursting open like a crushed raspberry. The little dog, that appeared more like a giant hamster the closer Estelle came, went for her immediately with its tiny but sharp snapping little jaws. The little critter bit at her boots then her ankles like there was a big bag of beef jerky stashed inside her socks.

  Estelle crouched down and swiped the little pest up by the scruff of its neck. She entered the living room, her eyes searching for somewhere to put the little furry rodent that wasn’t a window before she lost all patience and snapped its damn neck. She eyed the open kitchen on her left before her gaze went to the wash
ing machine just inside on the near left. Estelle took a few short steps into the kitchen and chucked the little dog into the nearby washing machine, slamming the door shut in its face. From inside, the little dog continued to bark wildly away. But to Estelle’s relief, it could hardly be heard any longer from behind the sound proof and water tight door.

  Estelle turned back to face Mrs. Lamont who was still lying sprawled out on the white carpet, covered with blood stains from her burst bleeding nose. Her lower body lay just inside the hallway while her upper body lay just inside the tip of the living room. Estelle dragged the middle-aged woman back up onto her feet with little effort before throwing her down onto a nearby arm chair. Mrs. Lamont groaned with the pain and discomfort as she continued to hold her bloodied nose, desperately trying to stem the flow of blood. Estelle placed the woman’s mobile phone down upon the coffee table right beside her.

  “Please. Don’t hurt my little Regi.”

  That must be the name of her overgrown pet fucking hamster, Estelle thought, still in a rage at the dogs’ little nips and bites to her ankles and hands.

  “I will stick him in the fucking microwave next if you do not tell me what I need to know. Do you understand?”

  With a sudden rush of panic and adrenaline, Mrs. Lamont did something really stupid. She tried to grab her mobile phone which Estelle had just placed down beside her. Estelle shook her head with great disappointment. Obviously, this stupid woman didn’t truly believe that Estelle was much of a serious threat to her just yet. So, she whipped out one of her hidden knives from inside her hooded jacket pocket and stabbed Mrs. Lamont straight through her free hand which was still resting upon the other side of the arm chair.