She pulled out her phone and poked at the screen as she made her way behind the desk. ‘You know I’m missing Jasmine’s dance competition for this, don’t you?’
‘How is it my fault?’
‘If you hadn’t found that dead wee girl, I’d be sitting in a school gym right now, surrounded by other parents, watching their stinky kids lollop around the floor like drunken elephants …’ A sniff. ‘So it’s not all bad.’ She sank into her chair. ‘Sit.’
The only other seat in the room was a blue swivel job, but the backrest was missing, leaving the support poking up like a broken spine. She pointed at it. ‘Bum. There.’
He did, sticking to the front edge. ‘Thanks for backing me up with Napier. How did—’
‘Shhh!’ Finger to lips. ‘Nosferatu next door’s got ears like an NSA listening station.’ She narrowed her eyes at him. ‘What did I just alibi you for? What are we saying you’ve no’ done?’
‘Kill Graham Stirling.’
Her mouth collapsed, till it was a round, wet, cave. Then snapped shut again. Her eyes widened. ‘You didn’t, did you?’
‘Of course I didn’t!’
‘Pfff … At least that’s something.’
Muffled voices came through the wall. Then what sounded like laughter.
Logan turned and stared.
Should march right back in there and introduce Napier’s teeth to Napier’s rectum.
There was the thunk of a door closing, then Napier and Gibb’s voices faded down the stairs. The pair of them off to blight someone else’s life.
Logan sank back in his chair. Froze. Yanked himself upright before he went over the broken spine. ‘Gah …’
Steel grinned. ‘Good, isn’t it? Stops the lower ranks from drifting off when you’re bollocking them.’
‘How did you know?’
‘Been doing it to Rennie for months. Sometimes I try and be extra boring, to see if I can get him to cowp over backwards. All you’ve got to do is wheech out a couple of screws and the back comes right off.’
‘No, I meant how did you know I was painting?’
‘Did I no’ say you need someone to protect you?’ She pulled a blank index card from the box on her desk, frowned, then went rummaging through the drawers. ‘Sodding hell, no’ again. Place is like the Bermuda Triangle for pens …’
‘Told you: it’s Hector.’
The index cards on the board each had the name of a sex offender written on them, along with details of offence and length of time served. Everyone they’d visited on Monday night was there, along with a few others. All caught on the scarlet threads of a spider’s web. With a photo of the dead girl in the centre.
He pointed at it. ‘You getting anywhere?’
‘Do I look like I’m getting anywhere? Does this look like the buzzing hub of a successful investigation?’ She printed something on the card. ‘All I do is tramp round sex offenders’ houses and rescue silly-sod sergeants who should know better.’
He dropped his gaze to the carpet. ‘Thanks for alibiing me in there. You took a big risk, guessing like that.’
‘Pfff … You’ve got wee speckles of paint on your ears and in that kiwi-fruit-skin shambles you call a haircut. How else would they get there?’ A smile. ‘Plus, I lugged at Napier’s door for a bit before barging to the rescue.’
‘He says they know who killed Stephen Bisset.’
‘Found out an hour ago.’ She shifted a pile of paper and turned her laptop around, so the screen was facing Logan, then poked a couple of keys. ‘Look.’ The kittens disappeared, replaced by a window that took up most of the desktop. CCTV footage. What was probably a wall-mounted camera in a hospital – people marching about in scrubs with clipboards, or in pyjamas being wheeled about in porter’s chairs. Everyone looking miserable and defeated. The time-stamp in the corner of the image put it at Wednesday night. Seven minutes after eight. ‘This is outside the ward where Bisset was.’
Steel poked another button and the footage spooled forward at double speed, then eight times, then twelve. Doctors, nurses, and patients whizzed in and out of shot. What looked like Bisset’s kids whooshed past, going in with a big bunch of flowers, then out again. Poor wee sods.
Then Steel leaned forward and poked the keyboard again, setting the speed back to normal. ‘There.’
The time-stamp clicked over to ten p.m.
‘Where?’
A sigh. ‘Seriously? Rennie spotted it right off.’
29
Logan peered at the screen. What the hell was he supposed to … ‘The guy in the long coat? Must be sweltering: Aberdeen Royal Infirmary keeps the heating cranked up to stifling.’
‘Nurses didn’t think anything was unusual, because this bloke’s been volunteering at the hospital for years. Talks to coma patients, plays their favourite music, reads them their favourite books. That kind of thing. Been visiting Stephen Bisset almost every day for the last month and a half.’
Exactly what Logan had spent nearly four years doing with Sam. ‘How do you know it’s him?’
A fire-hazard smile burned across her face. ‘Elementary, my dear Logan: he’s a pervert. Marlon Brodie. Got one of those websites where he writes about bizarre fetishes and freaky kinks. What do they call it, sexblogging?’ The smile crackled brighter. ‘Rennie spotted him, and you didn’t. Beaten by Rennie, how rubbish can you be?’
He scowled at her. ‘How about the fact I haven’t seen the footage till now, and I don’t visit sexbloggers’ websites.’ He poked at the keyboard, zooming in on the figure in the long overcoat. An unremarkable man: average height, average build, features slightly blurred and pixelated. ‘And the DNA …?’
‘Course it does. Finnie got Ding-Dong to drag him in, test him, and one rush-job later: bingo. It’s Marlon Brodie’s semen on Stephen Bisset’s dead body.’ She sank back into her chair, swivelled it left and right a couple of times. ‘Course, Finnie’s trying to claim credit for it, but I’ll figure something out.’
Logan closed the laptop. ‘You got a one-hour test? What about Helen Edwards? She’s been waiting since Wednesday.’
‘Yeah, well, if you hadn’t been such a damp blouse and let me leak it to the papers we could’ve had it by now. But no, Mr Morals knows best.’ She spun the laptop back around to face her. ‘Happy?’
‘Oh, don’t start. You know I’m right, or you’d have gone ahead and done it anyway.’ He turned to look up at the board with its index cards and paedophiles. ‘Does the family know? About Marlon Brodie?’
‘So much for Detective Sergeant Barmy Becky’s theory. The kids did it. Moron.’
‘You should go easy on her. Keep treating her like the village idiot and she’ll turn into one. More carrot, less stick.’
‘Blah, blah, blah.’ Steel waved a hand, as if wafting away a foul smell. ‘Marlon Brodie denies suffocating Stephen Bisset, but what do you expect? And what kind of sadist calls their kid “Marlon” anyway? Asking for trouble. No wonder he turned into a killer. And a pervert. You seen his website? Got stuff on there that’d make me blush.’
‘Well … at least it’s—’
‘Shire Uniform Seven, safe to talk?’
‘God’s sake.’ Logan slumped, ‘Aaargh …’ caught himself before he tipped over the back of the broken chair, and sat upright again. Scowled at Steel. ‘You trying to get me killed?’ Clicked the button on his Airwave. ‘Go ahead.’
‘Sergeant McRae? It’s Maggie. I’ve got a tip-off from your friend about dealing on Rundle Avenue again. Says there’s been three of them in and out in the last fifteen minutes.’
‘Thanks, Maggie. Is Nicholson back yet?’
‘Just walked in.’
‘Good. Tell her to get the Big Car fired up, we’re going trawling for druggies.’ Though knowing the way his luck was going these days …
Steel stood. Grabbed her suit jacket. ‘What we waiting for?’
He backed towards the door. ‘It’s
some local thing. Not important. You’ve got a dead wee girl’s killer to catch, remember?’
‘Oh no you don’t. Every time I let you out of my sight, you get in trouble. And I call shotgun.’
Of course she did.
‘Pfffff …’ Steel wriggled further down into her seat, shoulders barely clearing the car windowsill. ‘Is this it? Is this all you do?’
Nicholson took them round the corner, onto Rundle Avenue again. Grey harled semidetacheds on one side, a Morse code of short wood-panelled terraces on the other. Like oversized garden sheds, painted Cuprinol Brown. Knee-high garden walls holding back an onslaught of gravel, lawns, and associated shrubbery, depending on the property.
The speedo barely nudged fifteen miles an hour.
Sitting in the back, Logan peered up and down the road. No sign of anyone. ‘You didn’t have to come.’
Steel puffed out another sigh. ‘I’m bored.’
‘We can’t kick the door in, because we don’t have a warrant. So we cruise round and pick up anyone we see coming out of the place, and search them.’
‘As if anyone’s going to be daft enough to go buy drugs when they see you circling in a dirty big patrol car.’
The shed-style terraces gave way to white harled ones.
Nicholson took a left, across Tannery Street and onto Alberta Place. ‘Oh, you’d be surprised.’
Off in the distance, a small wedge of North Sea peeked out between two houses in another street. Crystal blue beneath a shining sky.
Logan tapped a finger against the back of Nicholson’s seat. ‘When they were interviewing Klingon, do we know if he said anything about his mother? Where she was, when she’d be back, anything like that?’
‘No idea. Last time I spoke to the Custody Sergeant up there he said it was like something off a spy thriller. Everyone stomping about in sunglasses and suits. No talking to the prisoners. Top hush secret.’ She stuck the car in reverse and did a three-point turn, going back the way they’d come.
Logan leaned forward and tried Steel instead. ‘You must have heard something. You and all your MIT buddies.’
A sniff. ‘You’re kidding, right? Only way you get info out of another team is if you use a lead pipe and pliers.’
‘Do me a favour then – ask about. See if it came up.’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘Why? What are you up to?’
Shrug. ‘Just a hunch.’
Left, onto Tannery Street, then a quick right. No houses here: a line of about thirty garages, with identical blue up-and-over doors, lined either side of a short dead-end road. No sign of anyone.
Steel puffed out a breath. ‘I’m still bored. And hungry. Time for lunch.’
Another three-point turn.
Logan twisted his Airwave from its clip. ‘We’re working.’
‘Lunch, lunch, lunch, lunch, lunch!’
‘Shire Uniform Seven, you there, Maggie?’
‘Safe to talk.’
‘We got any more descriptions?’
‘Last one was an IC-one female, wearing grey joggies and an orange hoodie. Ugg boots.’
Now there was a fashion statement.
The street slipped past the window. Quiet suburbia. Manicured gardens and pedicured cars – their owners out giving them their Saturday once-over with sponge and shammy.
‘Lunch, lunch, lunch, lunch, lunch!’
Logan closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘If we stop at the baker’s, will you promise to shut up?’
The smell of chicken curry pies filled the Big Car with earthy notes of cardamom and cumin, playing off against Scotland’s real national dish: chips. Steel stuffed a couple into her mouth, chewing through the words, ‘Told you.’
Sitting in the driver’s seat, Nicholson ripped a bite out of her pie. Then made ooking monkey noises, mouth open in a little circle. ‘Hot …’
Logan sat in the back, stomach grumbling. ‘Ten minutes, then we’re back looking for druggies to spin.’
‘Shire Uniform Seven, safe to talk?’
‘Thump away, Maggie.’
‘Tayside have been through the CCTV from the Dundee Waterstones. It wasn’t Liam Barden. Sorry.’
‘Ah well, it was worth a go.’
‘And Traffic say they’ve got a burned-out Toyota Hilux in a field outside New Pitsligo. The vehicle matches one stolen from a farm north of Strichen three days ago, but apparently now the back end’s all bashed in.’
Probably where it reversed, at speed, through the front window of the Portsoy Co-op.
‘Cashline Ram-Raiders.’
‘Inspector McGregor’s out there now.’
‘OK, let me know if we need to do anything.’ He ended the call as a roll of thunder growled out from the depths of his innards, loud enough to make Steel and Nicholson turn and stare at him.
‘Sure you don’t want some chips?’ Steel wiggled the polystyrene carton.
Pause. Then he helped himself to a small handful.
She snatched the carton away. ‘Hoy! I said, “some”, not “all”.’
He climbed out into the sunshine with his pilfered chips. Popped one in his mouth and twisted his Airwave free from its clip. Picked Deano’s shoulder number into the keypad with a greasy fingertip. ‘Deano, safe to talk?’
‘Give us a minute, Sarge.’
Tiny Scottish cottages lined one side of the curving road, but the other was a line of grass and gorse that died at the edge of the cliff. Beyond that, it was all sea and sky. Tiny fishing boats bobbed in the water, their brightly coloured hulls glowing like neon against the rich blue.
Logan munched the last couple of chips. Not as nice as the plate of mince and tatties he’d left congealing on the kitchen table back home, but better than a kick in the knee.
Then Deano was back. ‘Batter on.’
‘You run a PNC check on those burglaries in Pennan? Find us any suspects?’ Logan sooked the last smear of salt and grease from his fingertips.
‘All the historical stuff? Yeah. Came back with a couple of hits. One guy’s doing a sixer in Barlinnie – so it’s not him. The other’s called Tony Wishart. Bit of a history freak, according to his social worker. Outstanding apprehension warrant for doing over that wee Aberdeenshire Heritage place in Mintlaw. So we’re already looking for him.’
At least that was something.
‘We’re going to be another twenty or so. If you’ve got a chance, swing past Alex Williams’s for a safe-and-well check. And make sure Tufty stays in the car. Don’t want a repeat of last time.’
The Big Car looped around onto Tannery Street again. Going the long way around. Steel lolled in the passenger seat, head on the window. Her breathing deepened, then little snuffling noises burrowed their way out of her open mouth.
Nicholson sniffed from the back seat. ‘What do we do if she starts to snore?’
Logan poked the car radio, bringing it to life. Not an anodyne boy-band this time, but an insipid all-girl outfit, close-harmonying their way through another beige tune. ‘Think we’re probably onto a loser here. Might as well go back to the station and try again tomorrow.’
The song limped to its bland conclusion, replaced by whatever idiot was manning the microphone. ‘I swear that gets better every time I hear it. Don’t forget: we’ll be going live to Liverpool Cathedral for the memorial service of Detective Constable Mary Ann Nasrallah, tragically shot on Sunday. So stay tuned for that. Now though, it’s time to catch a bit of Bieber Fever!’
Nicholson poked Logan in the shoulder. ‘Noooo!’
‘Gah!’ He jabbed the button just in time, and classical music filled the speakers. Logan let out the breath he’d been holding. Thank God for that … ‘One last drift past Frankie’s place and we’re done.’
She stuck her head forward, between the two front seats. ‘You know what hacks me off about this undercover officer getting shot? How come you only ever get politicians lining up to say what a great job w
e do when one of us dies? What about the rest of the time?’
‘I know.’
‘Oh yeah, we do a spectacular job when we’re dead, but other than that, nothing.’
‘Preaching to the choir, Janet.’ He took them back onto Rundle Avenue with its dot-dot-dash of terraced shed-like houses. Grass. Grass. Gravel. More Grass.
Another poke in the shoulder. ‘Sarge? Back there – shiny new blue Ford Fiesta. Does that not belong to the ugly bloke we stopped Monday for being on his mobile phone?’ A small pause, then the delicate crackle of flipping paper. ‘Here we go: Martyn Baker. AKA Paul Butcher, AKA Dave Brooks. Possession. Possession with intent …’
OK, so Martyn-with-a-‘Y’’s car wasn’t parked right outside Frankie Ferris’s house, but it wasn’t exactly a million miles to walk. ‘Think he’s buying or supplying?’
‘Yes.’
‘Me too.’ Logan pulled in to the kerb. Killed the engine and the music.
Steel sat up. ‘What? I was listening to that.’ A yawn. ‘Where are we?’
Nicholson pointed at the blue Fiesta. ‘Belongs to a dealer from down south.’
‘Good for him.’ She dug a hand in under her left breast and had a scratch. ‘Why’s there no coffee? Thought you bunnets were all about the coffee and doughnuts.’
Logan climbed out into the sunshine. Pulled his peaked cap on. Then turned and opened Nicholson’s door for her.
She joined him on the pavement, wedging her bowler down so far it bent the top of her ears. ‘We got a plan?’
Rundle Avenue didn’t exactly have a lot of places to lay low. No alleys to lurk in and keep an eye on Frankie’s place. No convenient trees or hulking rhododendron bushes. ‘Right, you go that way,’ he pointed back towards the Fiesta, ‘back onto Tannery, left, down to the end, round onto Golden Knowes, and come from the other direction. Find something to hide behind. I’ll watch from this end. We catch him coming out and we search him.’
And please, dear God, let him be carrying enough Class A drugs to put him away for a long, long time.
Logan McRae 09 - The Missing and the Dead Page 26