Detective Inspector Steel was Laurel to DI Insch’s Hardy. Where Insch was fat, she was thin. Where Insch was bald, Steel looked as if someone had sellotaped a Cairn terrier to her head. Rumour had it she was only forty-two, but she looked a lot older. Years of chain smoking had left her face looking like a holiday home for lines and wrinkles. She was wearing a trouser suit from Markies, in charcoal grey so it wouldn’t show the ash that fell constantly from the end of her fag. The burgundy blouse underneath it hadn’t fared so well.
It was hard to believe she was the biggest womanizer on the force.
There was a mobile phone rammed between her ear and her shoulder and she talked into it out of one side of her mouth so as not to disturb the cigarette sticking out of the other. ‘No. No. No. . .’ she said in a hard staccato. ‘You get this: I get hold of you, I will rip you a new arsehole. No . . . no, I don’t care who the fuck you have to screw around. You don’t come across with the goodies before Friday, you and I are going to fall out. . . Fucking right I will. . .’ She looked up, saw Logan standing there and waved him towards a tatty-looking chair. ‘Yes . . . yes, that’s better. I knew we could come to an understanding. Friday.’ DI Steel snapped her mobile shut and smiled evilly. ‘Fully fucking fitted kitchen, my arse. You give these people an inch they’ll piss all over you.’ She picked a packet of king-size up off her desk and shook it in Logan’s direction. ‘Fag?’
Logan declined and she smiled at him again.
‘No? Aye, you’re right: it’s a fucking filthy habit.’ She winkled a cigarette out of the pack and lit it from the one she was still smoking, before grinding the stub out on the windowsill. ‘So what can I do for you, Mr Police Hero?’ she asked, settling back in her chair, her head wreathed in fresh smoke.
‘Your floater: Mr No Kneecaps.’
Steel raised an eyebrow. ‘Listening.’
‘I think it’s George “Geordie” Stephenson. He was an enforcer for Malcolm McLennan—’
‘Malk the Knife? Fuck. I didn’t think he was doing business up here.’
‘Word has it Geordie was sent up to cut a deal with the planning department: three hundred houses on greenbelt. The planner said no and Geordie pushed him under a bus.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ She even went so far as to take the cigarette out of her mouth. ‘Someone from Planning turned down a bribe?’
Logan shrugged. ‘Anyway: it seems that Geordie had a liking for the horses. Only Lady Luck is not Geordie’s friend. And he was into some of the local bookies for some serious money.’
DI Steel settled back in her seat, picking at her teeth with a chipped fingernail. ‘I’m impressed,’ she said at last. ‘Where’d you hear this?’
‘Colin Miller. He’s a reporter on the P&J.’
She took a long draw on her fag, making the end glow hot orange. Smoke trickled down her nose as she examined Logan in silence. The room was shrinking, the walls obscured by curling layers of tobacco fog until only that glowing orange eye remained. ‘Inschy tells me you’re running the kid-in-the-bin-bag case now.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘He tells me you’re not a complete waste of skin.’
‘Thank you, ma’am.’ But he wasn’t sure if that was really a compliment.
‘Don’t thank me. If you’re not a fuck-up, people notice. They give you things to do.’ She smiled at him through the smoke and Logan felt a small chill go down his spine. ‘Inschy and me: we’ve been talking about you.’
‘Oh?’ There was something unpleasant coming: he could feel it.
‘It’s your lucky day, Mr Police Hero. You’re going to get another chance to shine.’
17
Logan went straight to DI Insch. The inspector sat on the edge of a desk like a large, round vulture and listened calmly as Logan complained about DI Steel slope-shouldering the no-knees investigation onto him. He was just a detective sergeant! He couldn’t carry multiple homicide investigations! Insch listened and tutted and commiserated and then told him that things were tough all over and he shouldn’t be such a bloody prima donna.
‘What have you got going on the bin-bag case?’ asked Insch.
Logan shrugged. ‘The appeal went out on the telly last night, so there’s a pile of sightings to go through. There was this one old lady who said we could call off the search, because little “Tiffany” was playing in the sand pit at the foot of the garden.’ He shook his head. ‘Silly old bat. . . Anyway, I’ve got a dozen uniform out working their way through the list.’
‘So you’re basically twiddling your thumbs till something comes up, then?’
Logan blushed and admitted that yes, he was.
‘So what’s to stop you digging into the floater?’
‘Well, nothing as such, it’s just that. . .’ He tried not to meet Insch’s eyes. ‘Well, there’s the incident lines—’
‘Get a uniform to take the calls.’ Insch settled back on his large rump, arms crossed.
‘And . . . and. . .’ Logan stopped talking and flapped his arms a little. Somehow he couldn’t get the words out: I’m terrified of screwing all this up.
‘And nothing,’ said Insch. ‘You can have WPC Watson when she’s finished in court.’ He checked his watch. ‘I’ve not factored her into any of the search teams anyway.’
Logan just slumped slightly.
‘Well, what are you waiting for?’ The inspector levered himself off the desk and dug out a half-eaten packet of Polo Mints, helping himself to one before winding the tinfoil shut like a silvery fuse. ‘Here.’ He tossed the little dynamite-shaped package to Logan. ‘Call it an early Christmas bonus. Now bugger off and get to work.’
When they heard that Logan had a body in the morgue that might be Geordie Stephenson, Lothian and Borders Police were delighted. But before they threw a full-blown party with cake and balloons, they wanted to make sure Logan’s stiff really was Malk the Knife’s favourite enforcer. So they emailed up everything they had on the man: fingerprints, criminal record, and a nice big photo that Logan had printed off in colour. Twelve copies. Geordie had a large face with heavy features, bouffant hairstyle and a porn-star moustache. Just the sort of face to go demanding money with menaces with. He looked a lot more battered and pasty now he was dead, but it was definitely the same man they’d dragged out of the harbour with his knees hacked off. And to make matters certain, the fingerprints were an exact match.
Logan phoned Lothian and Borders back to give them the news. Geordie Stephenson was now collecting debts in the great beyond. They promised to send Logan up some cake.
Now that they had a positive ID, the next thing to do was find out who killed him. And Logan was willing to bet it had something to do with Geordie’s gambling habit. So that meant doing the rounds of the bookies in Aberdeen. Flash Geordie’s face and see who squirmed.
Logan popped into his little incident room on the way out, just to make sure everything was still going OK. On Insch’s instructions he’d commandeered an efficient-looking WPC with sandy-brown hair and thick eyebrows to woman the phones and co-ordinate the uniforms going door-to-door. She sat at the cluttered table with a phone headset on, taking down yet another possible identity for the dead girl. Then she brought him up to speed with the latest developments, which took all of three seconds – there weren’t any – and promised to call him on his mobile if anything came up.
That done, all he had to do now was pick up WPC Watson from the Sheriff Court and get cracking.
She was still sitting in the main courtroom, watching a huge youth with a pockmarked face giving evidence. WPC Watson looked up and smiled as Logan sat down next to her.
‘How’s it going?’ he whispered.
‘Getting there.’
The kid on the stand wasn’t much more than twenty-one, and sweat made his flushed, lumpy face shine in the courtroom lights. He was massive. Not fat, just big-boned. Big jaw, big hands, long, bony arms. The grey suit the CPS had lent him to
make him look more credible as a witness, was far too small, straining at the seams every time he moved. His dirty-blond hair looked as if it hadn’t seen a comb for a long time and his big hands fluttered and fidgeted as he mumbled his way through his encounter with Gerald Cleaver.
An eleven-year-old boy, so badly beaten by his drunken father that he gets to spend three weeks in Aberdeen Children’s Hospital. And that’s where his luck goes from bad to worse. Gerald Cleaver, in charge of the wards at night, practises his own special ‘bedside manner’ while the kid’s strapped to the bed. Making him do things that would make a porn star blush.
The prosecutor gently drew the details from him, speaking softly and reassuringly even when the tears start to flow.
Logan split his attention between the jury and the accused as the boy spoke. The fifteen men and women looked appalled at what they were hearing. But Gerald Cleaver’s face remained as expressionless as a slab of butter.
The prosecutor thanked the witness for his courage and handed him over to counsel for the defence.
‘Here we go.’ WPC Watson’s voice dripped with contempt as Slippery Sandy the Snake stood, patted his client on the shoulder and wandered over to the jury. Casually, he leaned on the rail at the front of the box and smiled at the assembled men and women. ‘Martin,’ he said, not looking at the trembling young man but at the jury, ‘you’re not exactly a stranger to this court, are you?’
The prosecutor was on his feet as if someone had run a thousand volts up his bum.
‘I object. The witness’s past situation has nothing to do with the case being tried.’
‘Your honour, I am merely trying to establish the veracity of this witness.’
The judge looked down his nose, through his glasses and said, ‘You may proceed.’
‘Thank you, your honour,’ said the Snake. ‘Martin, you’ve been up before this court thirty-eight times, haven’t you? Breaking and entering, criminal assault, numerous charges of possession, one of possession with intent to supply, shoplifting, arson, indecent exposure. . .’ He paused. ‘When you were fourteen you tried to have sex with a minor and when she refused you beat her so severely she required forty-three stitches to put her face back together again. She can never have children. And just yesterday you were arrested for masturbating in a ladies’ changing room—’
‘Your honour, I strongly object!’
And that was how it went for the next twenty minutes. Sandy the Snake calmly ripped the witness to shreds and left him a swearing, sobbing, scarlet-faced wreck. Every humiliation Gerald Cleaver had submitted him to was explained away as the disturbed fantasy of a child in desperate need of attention. Until, in the end, Martin had lunged for the lawyer, screaming, ‘Fuckin’ kill you!’
He was restrained.
Sandy the Snake shook his head sadly, and excused the witness.
Watson swore all the way back to the cells, but she perked up when Logan told her about his new assignment.
‘DI Steel wants me to follow up on Geordie Stephenson: that body they dragged out the harbour,’ he said as they made their way down the long corridor that linked courtroom number one to the holding cells. ‘I said I’d need some help, and Insch volunteered you. Said you’d keep me right.’
Watson smiled, pleased at the compliment, not knowing Logan had made it up himself.
Martin Strichen had been escorted from the court straight to the holding cells. By the time Logan and Watson got down there he was sitting on a thin grey bunk with his head in his hands, moaning softly beneath the flickering overhead lights. The back of his borrowed suit jacket was groaning under the strain, the seam getting more and more visible with every shivering sob.
Looking down at him, Logan didn’t know what to think. It was terrible that any child should have to undergo the kind of abuse Cleaver subjected his victims to. Even so, Slippery Sandy’s words stayed with him. That list of crimes. Martin Strichen was a dirty wee toerag. But that didn’t mean he hadn’t suffered at the hands of Gerald Cleaver.
Watson signed for Martin Strichen and they led him, handcuffed and whimpering, up through the building and out the back entrance. It was only a short walk to the pool car Logan had appropriated. As Watson pushed her prisoner’s head down so it wouldn’t bang on the roof of the car, Strichen said, ‘She was fourteen.’
‘What?’ Watson peered into the car, into Martin Strichen’s puffy red eyes.
‘The girl. We was both fourteen. She wanted to, but I couldn’t. I didn’t force her. . . I couldn’t do it.’ A large, tear-shaped drop suspended from the tip of his nose and as she watched it slowly fell, sparkling in the early afternoon light.
‘Arms up.’ She buckled the seatbelt around him, making sure that Grampian Police didn’t end up in court defending a negligence claim if they crashed the car. As her hair brushed his face she heard him whisper, ‘She wouldn’t stop laughing. . .’
They dropped their passenger off at Craiginches Prison. Once the rigmarole of signing him back into custody was over and done with, they were ready to start on DI Steel’s investigation.
Logan and WPC Watson slogged their way around Aberdeen’s less salubrious bookmaking establishments, showing the staff Geordie Stephenson’s porn star picture but getting nothing but blank stares for their troubles. There was little point in visiting the majors – William Hill and Ladbrokes – they weren’t likely to hack Geordie’s kneecaps off with a machete if he failed to settle his debts.
But the Turf ’n Track in Sandilands was exactly that kind of place.
The shop had been a baker’s back in the sixties when the neighbourhood was a bit more upmarket. Not that much more upmarket, but back in the days when you could walk the streets after dark. The shop was part of a block of four equally tatty and run-down establishments. All were covered in graffiti, all had heavy metal grilles on the window, and all had been broken into and robbed at gunpoint many times. Except the Turf ’n Track, which had been robbed only once in living memory. And that’s because the McLeod brothers hunted down the bloke who burst into their father’s shop waving a sawn-off shotgun and tortured him to death with a gas lighter and a pair of needle-nosed pliers. Allegedly.
Council-owned housing surrounded the shops – three- and four-storey concrete tenement buildings thrown up in a hurry and left to rot. If you needed a home fast, had no money and weren’t fussy, this was where you ended up.
A poster outside the grocer’s next door declared: ‘MISSING: PETER LUMLEY’ beneath a colour picture of the five-year-old’s smiling, freckled face. Some wit had drawn on a pair of glasses, a moustache and ‘RAZ TAKES IT UP THE ARSE’.
There were no community notices pinned up outside the Turf ’n Track: it offered only blacked-out windows and a green-and-yellow plastic sign. Logan pushed through the door into the gloomy interior where the air was thick with the smell of hand-rolled tobacco and wet dog. The inside was even shabbier than the outside: dirty plastic seats in grimy orange, sticky linoleum with cigarette burns and holes worn all the way through to the concrete floor. Woodwork so thickly impregnated by generations of cigarette smoke that it oozed sticky black. There was a chest-high counter running across the room, keeping the punters away from the paperwork, the tills, and the door to the back room. An old man sat in the corner, a grey-muzzled Alsatian at his feet, a tin of Export in his hand. His attention was fixed on a TV screen with dogs screeching round a track. Logan was surprised to see a pensioner in here. He thought they were all too scared to come out on their own. And then the man took his eyes off the television to examine the newcomers.
There were tattoos all the way up his neck: flames and skulls; his right eye cloudy-white and slack.
Logan felt a tug at his sleeve and WPC Watson hissed in his ear, ‘Isn’t that—’
But the old man got there first, shouting, ‘Mr McLeod! There’s some fuckin’ police bastards here tae see you!’
‘Now, now Dougie, that’s not nice,’ said Logan, taki
ng a step towards the old man. The Alsatian was on its feet in an instant, teeth bared, its low growl making the hair on Logan’s neck stand on end. A string of saliva spiralled down between the animal’s broken teeth. It was an old dog, but it was vicious enough to frighten the crap out of him.
Nobody moved. The dog kept on snarling, the old man kept on glowering, and Logan kept on hoping he wasn’t going to have to run for his life. Eventually a round face stuck itself out of the back room.
‘Dougie, what have I told you about that fuckin’ dog?’
The old man cracked a smile, exposing green-and-brown dentures. ‘You said if the pigs come in, let ’im tear their fuckin’ throats out.’
The newcomer frowned, then a smile broke his face in two. ‘Aye, you’re right. So I did.’ He was a good thirty years younger than Dougie, but the old man still called him ‘Mr’ McLeod.
Simon McLeod had inherited his father’s coarse features. His left ear was missing a chunk, courtesy of a Rottweiler called Killer whose head now adorned the back office.
‘What do you bastards want then?’ he asked, settling his massive arms on the counter.
Logan pulled out a colour picture of Geordie and held it out in front of him. ‘You recognize this man?’
‘Fuck you.’ He hadn’t even looked at the picture.
‘Nice offer, but I’ll pass this time.’ Logan slapped the photo down on the grimy counter. ‘Now: do you recognize him?’
‘Never seen him before.’
‘He was a loudmouthed git from Edinburgh. Came up here to do a job for Malk the Knife. Made some big bets and didn’t settle them.’
Simon McLeod’s face closed up. ‘We don’t have a lot of people who don’t settle. It’s against management policy.’
‘Take another look, Mr McLeod. Sure you don’t recognize him? Ended up floating face down in the harbour with his kneecaps missing.’
Logan McRae Crime Series Books 1-3: Cold Granite, Dying Light, Broken Skin (Logan McRae) Page 17