Blind Eye lm-5

by Stuart MacBride

  'Do I fuck, but try telling Creepy that. Bastard starts screaming at me and my bitches, like.' Harry jerked his chin up, bruised face pulled into a defiant pout. 'Couldn't have that, could I? So I twat him one. Bang!' He threw a right hook at thin air, then followed it up with a left. 'Bang! Creepy goes down and he's begging me to let him be, you know? So I says to him, I says, "You learn your lesson, Man, you don't disrespect a guy in his own home."' Sniff. 'That's just bad manners.'

  Steel applauded. 'Bravo! God, that was better than Harry Potter that was.'

  Harry shifted in his wheelchair, the whole thing squeaking as he moved. 'You calling me a liar?'

  'Hurrah! Got it in one! You're on fire today, Harry.' She stuck her feet on the floor, rested her elbows on her knees, then her chin in her hands. 'So come on then, dazzle me with your fictional prowess. If you gave Colin McLeod a spanking, how come you're the one with two smashed knees?'

  'Gave as good as I got, OK?' But Harry wouldn't look at them.

  'Shhhhhure you did.'

  Logan pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket — faxed over from Aberdeen Royal Infirmary that morning. 'The orthopaedic surgeon who put your legs back together says you're never going to be able to walk properly again. Even if they give you a pair of artificial knees, you're always going to limp.'

  Shrug. 'Fucking doctors, what do they know?'

  Steel picked up one of the fallen porno mags, flicking through it. 'Here's the deal, Harry: my governor's a sarcastic frog-faced tit, with a serious stiffy for putting the McLeods behind bars. So I want you to press charges against-'

  'No!' Harry sat bolt-upright in his wheelchair. 'No! I'm not pressing anything!' A shudder ran through his battered body. 'It was an accident. I fell down the stairs. Told you — I gave Creepy a hiding, then we had a drink. Yeah, a drink. And I got wankered, fell right down the stairs.'

  'He took a hammer to your knees, Harry. Crippled you for life.'

  'I told you, it was a fucking accident.' Harry fumbled a little metal tin from his pocket — rolling papers, loose tobacco, and a chunk of resin as big as his thumb. 'That's all it was, an accident.' His fingers wouldn't stay still long enough — a thin sheet of Rizla wafted to the carpet, little shreds of brown going everywhere as the tobacco refused to cooperate. 'Fucking thing…'

  'Here,' Steel stood and took the tin from him, balancing it on her knee as she laid out a couple of papers, put down a line of Old Virginia, then took a lighter to the lump of resin. A tiny curl of black smoke made its way into the expectant silence. 'I want you to have a good hard think about who your friends are, Harry.'

  She crumbled in the little dark flakes, then rolled the whole thing up, sealing the papers with her yellowy tongue. 'Creepy Colin McLeod's no' your mate, he's a borderline psychopath. Today it's your knees, what's he going to break tomorrow? Your arms? Back? Skull?' The inspector levered herself to her feet. 'Maybe next time you'll wind up a vegetable in a hospital bed, eating through a tube till someone comes along and switches you off.'

  She lit the joint, drawing in a lungful of smoke, then stood there in silence with her eyes closed. It oozed out with a sigh. 'Good shit…'

  Steel popped the spliff into Harry's mouth. 'Think about it. We'll let ourselves out.'

  13

  Someone was waiting for them in the hallway. She probably wasn't much more than eighteen, but looked a lot older. Her face was pinched, prematurely lined, with matching purple bags under her eyes. Hair like deep-fried string. Spots. Wearing a silky negligee that had dried egg down the front. At least Logan hoped it was dried egg.

  She waited for him to close the door. 'Did Harry…' She coughed, wrapped her arms around herself, fidgeted from one foot to the other. Then glanced back at the lounge, and whispered, 'Kylie's sick.'

  Steel didn't stop on her way to the front door. 'What do we look like, the clap clinic? Use a bloody condom.'

  'No… it's…' Another cough. She grabbed Logan's sleeve. 'Please?'

  'We-'

  'Please!' She dragged him towards a door opposite the kitchen.

  Steel marched out of the flat. 'I'll be in the car.'

  It was a small, brightly lit bedroom — the open window letting the sunshine in. Kylie was lying in bed, curled up on her side, a cigarette smouldering away between her cracked and swollen lips.

  It looked as if a herd of elephants had trampled across her head, leaving black eyes and bruises behind.

  Her friend let go of Logan's sleeve and wobbled into the room. 'Kylie? Kylie, there's a policeman here. He's going to help you, OK?'

  It might have started out as a sarcastic laugh, but it ended up as a wheeze and a grimace — Kylie's face creased up in pain. Ash tumbled across her pillow.

  Logan sank down on the end of the bed. 'Who did this?'

  She closed her blackened eyes and shook her head. 'Fell down…' Her voice was soft and wet, the sort of sound you get when someone knocks out a couple of teeth.

  The girl in the eggy negligee produced a bottle of vodka from God knows where and glugged a hefty measure into a chipped china mug. It had 'WORLDS GREATEST DAUGHTER' printed on the side, along with faded red hearts and teddy bears. Then she helped Kylie to sit up, fussing around, making sure she was all tucked in.

  'Thanks…'

  'Hey, what are big sisters for?'

  Kylie took a deep drink and shuddered. Then had another one.

  Logan waited for her to surface. 'A lot of people seem to be falling down in this flat, Kylie. First Harry, now you?'

  This time the laugh turned into a painful coughing fit. She lay back in her pillows, sweat covering her bruised face. 'He… he didn't fall down shite.' Pant, groan, mouthful of vodka. 'Creepy comes round and he's shouting his head off. Never seen him so angry… Usually he's nice, you know? Well… he's nice to me. He's always nice to me.'

  Logan frowned at her. 'Wait: Kylie? Like the tattoo on his arm?'

  Her sister nodded. 'He's always saying he's going to take her away… but his mum won't have it. You know? Like Kylie's not good enough for her ugly bastard son.'

  'We're like that Romeo and Juliet…' Kylie closed her eyes and smiled — the liquid anaesthetic obviously starting to work.

  The silence drew out for nearly a minute, until Logan was beginning to think she'd fallen asleep.

  And then Kylie sighed. 'But he was so mad, coz of Simon getting blinded, you know? Real pissed. He's screaming at Harry and Harry's all "yes Colin, no Colin", but Colin wants to know who did it. And Harry says he doesn't know… So he gets a kicking. And I'm hiding behind the sofa watching Colin do it.' She drained the last of the vodka. Then stared into the depths of the empty mug. 'Harry's on the ground and he's crying and his face is all bloody, and Colin… Colin takes this claw hammer from his jacket, you know? And it looks fucking huge.'

  She shuddered again and her sister topped up the mug.

  'He smashes it right into Harry's knee. And Harry screams. Then he does it again and again and again, and Harry's wriggling on the floor, only he can't get away, coz Colin's sitting on him. Battering away. And by now Harry's all quiet and he's not moving or nothing, but Colin just keeps on going. The hammer makes this horrible noise, wet thuds and squelching, and there's bits of blood and bone and stuff going everywhere… And then he saw me…'

  The girl in the eggy nightie, took a swig straight from the bottle. 'You're going to help her, right? Get her a doctor or something?'

  'Colin McLeod did this to you?'

  Kylie shook her head, the motion sending a little vodka slopping onto the duvet cover. 'No. Colin loves me… He just wanted me to blow him, coz he's all… all hard after doing Harry over.' The words were becoming slurred. 'Harry's blood all up his arm and on his…' She waved a hand in front of her face. 'Freckles. You know? Just like freckles…'

  'So who hit you?'

  Kylie's sister spat. 'Who do you think?' She pointed back through the door towards the lounge. 'Harry comes back from the hospital, like, about three in the morning
, and he hits the booze. Starts going on about how he's the man and Creepy's going to pay. How no bastard pushes Harry Jordan around…' She patted Kylie's hand. 'And this silly bitch starts laughing. Coz there he is, sitting in a wheelchair, telling us how nobody can push him around. And he grabs her hair, you know? So she can't get away. And he starts punching and shouting about how it's her fault Creepy's round here the whole time… We tried to help her, we did, but he was… I'm sorry Kylie.'

  Kylie managed a smile. There were teeth missing. 'I know, Tracey, I know.'

  Logan pulled out his notebook. 'Right, here's what we'll do: I'll call an ambulance. We can write up your statements while we wait.'

  'No! No way! No statements.' Tracey was on her feet in an instant. 'And no ambulance; Harry'll go mad if he finds out. Can't you just get someone to come and fix her up or something?'

  'You want him to get away with this?'

  'I won't testify to nothing. You saw what he did to Kylie

  — I'm not stupid.' 'But-' 'Please.' Kylie started to cry. 'Please don't tell anyone! It wasn't Harry's fault. I made him do it. I shouldn't have laughed.'

  'Kylie, we have to-'

  'No!'

  'Fine.' Logan dug a Grampian Police business card out of his wallet, flipped it over and wrote his mobile number on the back. 'If you change your mind, give me a call.'

  Tracey followed him out of the room, all the way to the front door. 'What about a doctor?'

  'There's a GP who owes me a couple of favours. I'll give her a call, see if she can swing past.'

  'Thanks.'

  Logan stood in the doorway, looking down at the girl in the dirty nightie, with her needle-track arms and sunken cheeks. 'You don't have to live like this. We can get you and your sister into a rehabilitation programme, sheltered housing; off the drugs, off the streets, and away from bastards like Harry Jordan.'

  'Aye,' she almost smiled, 'and maybe me and Kylie'll meet nice blokes, and get married, and we'll have kids, and live next door to each other in Cults, and no one'll give a toss we was hoors and drug addicts. Nice fucking dream.' Steel was slouched against the pool car, smoking in the sunshine. 'Well,' she said, as Logan climbed back in behind the steering wheel, 'hope you used a condom. They looked a bit skanky to me.'

  'Why the hell do we bother?' Logan started the car. 'I've just spent the last ten minutes listening to an eighteen-year-old girl called Kylie lying to protect the pimp who battered the living hell out of her.'

  'What, Harry?' Steel scowled back at the flat. 'The little bastard…'

  Logan pulled away from the kerb, heading back towards the station. 'She says it was definitely Colin McLeod who hammered Harry's knees; she watched him do it.'

  'Good. Serves him right.'

  'What do you want to do now?'

  Steel puffed out her cheeks. 'Go to the pub and drink myself into a happy haze. But I suppose we should report in to our great lord and master, Finnie the Unwashable.' She dug out her phone and did just that, flicking two fingers in the general direction of Force Headquarters whenever the DCI was speaking. And then she hung up and added a long, wet raspberry. 'Detective Chief Inspector Frog-Face is un impressed with our lack of progress.' She dug about in her trouser pocket, coming out with a handful of loose change and a couple of crumpled notes. 'How much do I owe the swear box?'

  'Four pound fifty.'

  'Let's make it an even fiver. Finnie is a complete and utter, total WANKER!' And then Steel handed over a five pound note that looked as if it'd been lining the bottom of a birdcage for a month. 'He wants us to rush straight back to the station. So we're going in the opposite direction: Turf 'n Track, Laz, and don't spare the horses.' The betting shop was alive with the sound of greyhounds. They pelted round on the two wall-mounted television screens, all teeth and tongues and flying legs. A pair of baggy old men sat watching the race, passing a half-bottle of Bells whisky back and forth.

  Mrs McLeod sparkled away behind the counter — dripping with jewellery — face buried in a copy of the Racing Post. She looked up as the door bleeped, her face souring as she recognized Logan and DI Steel. 'What the hell do you Muppets want?'

  Steel slapped her wallet on the counter. 'Fifteen quid on Mary Hinge: three thirty at Chepstow.'

  'Why aren't you out there catching the bastard who blinded my Simon?'

  The inspector slumped onto one of the cracked-leatherette barstools in front of the televisions. 'Where's Colin?'

  'None of your damn business.'

  'Come on, Agnes, you and I both know he should be here, looking after his dear old mum in her dotage, not out gallivanting with a claw hammer.'

  'Who the hell are you calling "in her dotage"?'

  'Leaving you here to run the shop while he's off cracking people's kneecaps, it's not right is it?'

  Mrs McLeod threw her Racing Post across the counter. It smacked into Steel's chest and fell apart, riders and runners fluttering to the sticky linoleum. 'Get out.'

  The inspector didn't budge. 'When he comes back, I want you to tell him it's over. This stops now. I don't care if he's only battering drug-dealing scumbags, I want him to hang up his hammer.'

  'My Colin's a good-'

  'Oh, give it a rest, Agnes. We've just spoken to one of the guys he crippled: Harry Jordan's prepared to finger him.' Wink. 'And I don't mean in a sexual way.' She stood and shambled her way to the door. 'No more kneecaps, Agnes. Understand?'

  Mrs McLeod glowered, her pinched face almost white in the artificial light, golden earrings glinting, mouth a hard red line. 'Get the fuck out my shop!'

  14

  Archibald Simpson was packed with off-duty police officers. Quarter past five and nearly the entire day-shift was in there, getting themselves outside the first pint of the evening. Logan pushed his way through the throng to the bar, flashed his warrant card and got a free pint of Stella from the Polish barman.

  The hubbub rose, and then someone shouted, 'As you know…' Then tried again: 'SHUT UP!' Silence settled into the crowded bar. 'That's better.'

  Logan couldn't see who was speaking, but it sounded like Detective Chief Superintendent Bain, the baldy head of CID.

  'As you know, we had a great result today, thanks to DI McPherson-'

  Everyone cheered.

  '-excellent job. He and his team have dealt a significant blow in the fight against gang violence in Aberdeen.' Bain raised his glass. 'Ladies, gentlemen, and Custody Assistants, a toast: DI McPherson, and his team.'

  And they all drank to his health, honour, and the large stash of weapons he'd stumbled upon hidden in a caravan in Stoneywood.

  'Right,' said, DCS Bain, before the noise could start again, 'there's three hundred quid left behind the bar. First come, first served!' Logan sat at their usual table, under the television in the little alcove off the main bar, watching DC Rennie weaving his way through the crowds with a tray of drinks and crisps.

  The constable sank into his seat and everyone helped themselves: pint of Stella for Logan, pint of Export for DS Beattie, pint of ice and a bottle of cider for Gary from fingerprints, and a lager for himself. 'Tell you,' said Rennie, popping open a packet of prawn cocktail, 'it was funny as hell. McPherson's just done this big motivational speech thing — all duty and public trust and stuff — then he turns to walk back to the car, slips, and goes arse over tit all the way down the hill! Right through a dozen gorse bushes and a pile of dog turds big as your house.' Rennie took a mouthful of lager, chasing it with a handful of crisps, crunching round the words. 'So he's lying there, spread-eagled, covered in scratches and jobbies, groaning away to himself, and we're all up at the top of the hill trying not to piss ourselves laughing.'

  More lager disappeared. 'So I go down there to help him up and what do I see, but this manky looking caravan hidden away in the trees and bushes. "Oh-ho," I thinks, "this looks a bit fishy." And when we pop it open, guess what: it's full of bloody Kalashnikovs!'

  Logan still couldn't believe it. 'So you're saying this was all down
to you?'

  Rennie posed, one hand on his chest, the other flopping about in the air. 'I am a detecting machine!'

  DS Beattie scratched a hand through his beard, sending a dusting of dandruff fluttering down the front of his shirt. 'Is it just me, or is Aberdeen getting bloody scary? What do they need machine guns for?'

  The constable snapped his fingers. 'Maybe it's Al-Qaeda? Eh? Maybe I just foiled some huge terrorist plot.'

  'In Stoneywood?' Another little snowfall drifted from his chin.

  'You want to know what I think?' said Rennie, scooting forward in his seat, 'I think-'

  A voice cut him off. 'What happened to all the free drink?' Samantha, the IB's pet Goth, stood with a frown and a noxious looking pint of something dark purple. 'Had to pay for this myself!' She grabbed the only free chair and helped herself to Rennie's crisps.

  The constable snatched the packet away. 'Your own fault for being late.'

  'It's you greedy bastards in CID more like. First sniff of free booze and you drop everything.'

  'I'll drop everything for you, Sam, especially trousers.' Rennie gave her what was probably meant to be a suave smile. 'Go on, show us your tattoos.' Two hours later they'd vacated Archie's for the Pizza Express on Union Street. By which time Rennie was making even less sense than usual, and Beattie looked as if he'd emptied a carton of desiccated coconut all down his front.

  Logan topped Samantha's glass up with the last of the wine, then ordered another bottle. 'Did it turn out OK? The tattoo Twit-Boy tried to ruin?'

  She smiled and rolled up the sleeve of her skull-and-crossbones T-shirt. It was a life-sized handprint in black ink, made up of little tribal squiggles, the skin still slightly red and inflamed around the design. 'What do you think?'

  'That must have hurt.'

  'Not as much as this one.' She turned her back on him and pulled open the neck of her T-shirt. 'It's OK, you're allowed to look.'

  Logan peered down inside — it was a Chinese dragon and it covered pretty much everything, the bright colours only broken by the black of her bra strap. 'Wow.'