A thin face peered out: Richard Knox. Pointy nose, pointy chin, and a crooked-teeth overbite that made him look a bit like a partially shaved rat. His hairline was receding, probably trying to get away from his face. ‘Cold.’
The big man closed his eyes for a moment, mouth working silently on something. And then he said, ‘We’ve been over this, Richard, you know what I’m saying?’
‘Just an observation.’ Knox’s voice was nearly an octave higher, but still broad Geordie. He took a grip of the handrail and picked his way down the steps to the wet tarmac. ‘Not like this all the time, is it?’
DI Steel grinned at him. ‘No, most of the time it’s a lot worse. Why don’t you try somewhere warmer? Like hell? That’s meant to be nice this time of year.’
Knox stared back, expressionless. ‘Funny. You’re a funny lady.’
‘And you’re a raping wee shitebag.’
‘Served me time. Paid me debt to society, like. God has forgiven us.’
‘My sharny arse! People like you-’
‘All right.’ The big man limped between them. ‘I think that’s enough team bonding for one morning.’ He stuck out his hand for Steel to shake. ‘Detective Superintendent Danby.’
She looked at the hand for a moment, then grabbed it, her fingers disappearing into the DSI’s grip. ‘Detective Inspector Steel.’
‘Excellent.’ Danby nodded, getting an extra chin for his trouble. ‘Now, any chance we can go inside before we all freeze to death?’
Knox didn’t say much on the way into town, just sat in the back of the patrol car, sandwiched between Logan and PC Guthrie, clutching an Asda carrier bag to his chest while Steel drove.
DSI Danby was a lot more chatty. ‘So there we were, half the bobbies in Newcastle, and we still can’t find our missing grandad anywhere. We’ve checked the shops, the post office, every shed and garage for three miles round his house. So it gets dark and we have to give up for the night. Newspaper appeals, radio, even got us a two minute spot on the local telly news. Nothing.’
Knox shifted in his seat, rubbing against Logan in the confined space. Up close he smelled of lavender and peppermint. Like an old lady’s handbag. ‘Do we really need to hear this, again?’
‘Three days later, the old boy turns up at the local library, still in his jammies, gabbling on about how he’s been abducted by aliens. Course, everyone knows he’s got Alzheimer’s, you know what I’m saying? So they pat him on the head and get someone to drive him home. Only he keeps going on about how the aliens took him to their underground lab and did experiments on him. Anal probes and all that.’
Danby sniffed, one hand wrapped around the grab handle above the passenger door, staring out of the window. ‘So finally his sister calls the doctor and he examines the old man, doesn’t he? You know what?’
Knox cleared his throat. ‘You’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you? Spoiling things for us.’
‘Just making conversation.’
‘Well don’t. It’s not funny.’
‘Suit yourself.’ The DSI went back to staring at the drab, grey scenery. On a good day, Aberdeen sparkled…but this wasn’t a good day. The granite buildings sulked beneath the heavy clouds, their grey walls stained dark by the never-ending drizzle. Headlights shimmered back from the wet road, taillights glowering red through a haze of spray.
DI Steel flicked on the radio, breaking the silence. Annie Lennox — Aberdeen’s favourite local-girl-made-good — singing about walking on broken glass. The song ended, there was some banal chat from a DJ who obviously thought he was a lot funnier than he actually was, another record, and then the news.
‘London grinds to a halt as snowstorms grip England. The A96 is closed between Inverurie and Huntly following a five-car pile-up. McLennan Homes announce jobs boost for the beleaguered North East building industry. And a legal challenge is launched today against a proposed expansion to Donald Trump’s golf resort. Hi, I’m Karen MacDonald. Today the Balmedie Dunes Preservation Society confirmed it would be issuing a legal challenge…’
PC Guthrie snorted. ‘How come every time there’s half a millimetre of snow, England goes tits up? What a bunch of wanky…’ He drifted to a halt, DSI Danby had swivelled round in the passenger seat to stare into the back of the patrol car.
‘Er…’ The constable’s cheeks went pink. ‘I mean…it’s…’ He looked at Logan. ‘We…’
Logan shook his head. ‘No chance: you’re on your own, Sunshine.’
Idiot.
‘Come on then, Constable,’ Danby’s voice rumbled through the confined space, ‘you have something to say: let’s hear it.’
‘I just…it…erm…’ Cough. ‘With the snow, and it’s probably, you know, unexpected, and the councils don’t grit the roads…’ He wriggled in his seat. ‘Got nothing against the English. Got lots of mates who’re English…’
Danby looked at him. ‘How long you been in the force?’
Guthrie licked his lips. ‘Erm…Seven years?’
‘Take a tip, Constable, if you ever want to make sergeant, practice your lying. Cos right now you’re crap. You know what I’m saying?’
4
Grampian Police Force Headquarters was a lot busier at five to nine on a Thursday morning than it had any right to be. By now the CID dayshift should have been out there, keeping the city safe from the people who lived in it; instead they were hanging around the station, making the place look untidy. Logan picked his way carefully down the corridor, two coffees and a pair of tinfoil parcels balanced on a manila folder like a wobbly tray.
DI Steel’s office was the last one before the noisy main CID room. Logan stopped outside her door and carefully rearranged his hands so he could knock without spilling scalding liquid all over himself.
Only he didn’t get that far.
Someone coughed behind him, and Logan turned to find Detective Inspector Beattie standing there with his arms folded. ‘Weren’t you supposed to come see me first thing this morning, Sergeant?’
Sodding hell. DI Beattie: sixteen stone of useless with a beard.
‘Had to go pick up Richard Knox.’
Beattie looked down at the carpet for a moment. ‘We were supposed to go over those counterfeit goods, remember? Handbags, MP3 players, cameras, perfume…What are we doing about them?’
‘Have you spoken to Trading Standards yet?’
‘No I thought you-’
‘I told you to go speak to them. Jesus, George, you’re supposed to be a DI now, remember? I can’t do everything for-’
Inspector Steel’s office door banged open, and she lurched to a halt on the threshold, mouth hanging open as if she was about to shout something. She took one look at Beattie, then turned to Logan, ‘Where the hell have you been?’
‘Had to-’
‘Get your arse in here.’ She hauled up her trousers, stood back, waited till Logan was inside, then slammed the door in Beattie’s face.
Steel’s new office didn’t look anything like the old one: the knobbly ceiling tiles were still white, not coated in a sticky beige film of cigarette tar; the walls didn’t have those greasy Blu-tack acne spots; and the carpet was still a recognizable colour. Logan gave it six weeks, tops.
Steel slumped back behind her desk and Logan handed her a mug and a tinfoil parcel. She unwrapped the bacon buttie and got stuck in, chewing and talking at the same time: ‘What we got?’
He pointed at the manila folder, now with an Olympic logo of coffee rings on it. ‘Not a hell of a lot. Far as we can tell, Knox hasn’t been to Aberdeen since he was eleven.’ Logan peeled the tinfoil off his fried egg buttie and bit down. Yolk splurged out into his palm. ‘Sod…’ He transferred the dripping roll to his other hand and licked at the sticky yellow puddle. ‘Got them to pull all sexual assaults on OAPs for the three years before he left: two women in their late seventies. No men.’
Steel nodded. ‘Good. Means we’ll no’ have a bunch of angry relatives sniffing about causing trouble.’ Anoth
er bite, then a scoof of tea. ‘Next: Erica Piotrowski?’
Logan went rooting through the folder and pulled out a stack of forms covered in scuffed yellow Post-it notes. ‘Trial date’s been set for three weeks next Tuesday. She’s still sticking to her story, but the PF thinks she’ll cop to aggravated assault if we give her the option.’
‘Sod that. She went after her next-door-neighbour with a carving knife, I’m no’ settling for anything less than attempted murder.’ Steel pursed her lips and swivelled back and forth in her office chair for a minute. ‘Anything else?’
Logan slapped the papers out on her desk, one at a time. ‘Forensics found trace fibres when they did the rape kit on Laura McEwan, and they think they’ve got enough DNA for a match if we can get them a suspect. Fingerprints have come back on the Oldmeldrum Post Office job. Looks like our friend Mr Maclean is up to his old tricks again.’
‘Get him picked up.’ The inspector crammed the last two inches of bread and bacon into her mouth then lobbed its tinfoil wrapper into the bin. Mumbling, ‘She shoots, she scores!’
‘No need — Traffic arrested him for drink driving last night. Out celebrating his “windfall”.’ Logan stuck the final sheet on her desk.
‘Last but not least, another batch of counterfeit twenties turned up. That private bank on Albyn Terrace called yesterday to say someone tried to deposit four and half grand’s worth.’
She pursed her lips and went, ‘Hmmm…’ for a while. ‘And what did DI Beardy want?’
‘Me to do his sodding job for him.’
‘All right, settle down, settle down.’ Detective Chief Inspector Finnie had the kind of face normally found under a wet rock: wide rubbery lips, floppy Hugh Grant hairstyle, beady little eyes. He stood at the front of the new CID office, with his back to the whiteboards, waiting for silence.
Logan wheeled his office chair out from the walled-off section reserved for detective sergeants, and settled down next to Steel while she fiddled with her phone.
The large room smelled of fresh paint, fresh coffee, and second-hand curry. It wasn’t even as if they could open a window: there weren’t any. But it was still a lot better than the cramped hovel they used to work in upstairs. The middle of the office was divided up into six cubicles, each lined with beech-veneer desks — arranged so the constables could sit back to back — separated by low walls of purple fabric.
Nine fifteen and the whole CID dayshift was there — eighteen detective constables, four detective sergeants, three detective inspectors — fidgeting as Finnie took them through the usual day-to-day morning briefing. Waiting for him to get to the reason they’d all been allowed to slob about in the office for the last two and a quarter hours, drinking coffee and moaning about the football.
‘Next up.’ Finnie checked his notes. ‘You’ll have seen in our illustrious local press that we’ve got a special visitor staying with us for the foreseeable future.’ He held up a copy of that morning’s Aberdeen Examiner, the headline ‘SEX-BEAST TO SETTLE IN NORTH EAST’ stretching above a blurry photo of a man in a shell suit. Richard Knox.
‘Aye,’ said someone at the back, ‘like we don’t have enough perverts of our own to deal with.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Finnie turned a blistering smile on the room, ‘did I give the impression this briefing was open to audience participation? Did I? Because I don’t remember doing that.’
No one spoke.
‘Let’s try and behave like professionals, shall we children? For a change?’
He turned and pointed to the large figure sitting at the front of the room. ‘This is Detective Superintendent Danby from Northumbria Police, the man who put Knox away in the first place. DSI Danby has kindly agreed to come up here, brief us, and help liaise with Sacro. Superintendent?’
Danby levered himself to his feet, turned, and nodded at everyone. ‘Right, Richard Knox…’ The DSI’s big bass voice filled the CID room just as easily as it had the patrol car. He picked up a long, black remote control and pointed it at the huge plasma TV bolted to the back wall between the little kitchen recess and the lockers.
Everyone swivelled around in their chairs.
Knox’s face appeared on the screen, staring out at them with a black eye and a swollen lip. It was an old photo, from back when Knox had more hair, but other than that he was still the same weedy-looking rodent.
‘Richard Albert Knox was convicted of the illegal imprisonment and rape of a sixty-eight-year-old man suffering from dementia.’ Danby pressed the button on the remote again, and an old man’s torso filled the screen, covered in bruises, scabs and bite marks. ‘William Brucklay was held for three days and subjected to repeated, violent sexual assaults. Chained up in the basement, beaten, abused, forced to eat dog food. A sixty-eight-year-old man…You know what I’m saying?’
Danby paused for a moment. ‘At the trial, Knox claimed the victim was a willing sexual partner who liked a bit of rough. Judge gave him ten years.’
Another click, and Knox’s face was back, grinning in front of a bland concrete slab of a building. ‘He was out in less than seven, released on licence, and he’s been living under twenty-four-hour supervision ever since. We know Knox was responsible for at least six other attacks on older men before we caught him, but we couldn’t prove it.’
Danby pressed something else and the TV screen went blank. ‘Don’t be fooled by the weedy-strip-of-piss-God-is-my-co-pilot exterior — Richard Knox is a violent sexual predator who gets off on other people’s pain.’
There was a moment’s silence, then the same voice as before piped up from the back: ‘So why the hell are we getting lumbered with him?’
‘He’s served his time.’ Danby folded his huge arms. ‘We’ve got no legal right to restrict his movements any more. If it was up to me he’d be stuck in a little dark hole for the rest of his natural, you know what I’m saying? But as of three months ago he can go wherever he likes.’
One of the uniformed PCs stuck up a hand. ‘Yeah, but why Aberdeen?’
‘Because blood’s thicker than water.’
5
‘Hold on, maybe this’ll help…’ PC Guthrie yanked open the curtains, unleashing a cloud of dust. Pale grey morning light oozed in through the grubby bay window. If anything, it just made the place look worse.
Once upon a time the velvet curtains were probably a rich red, but now they were the colour of dried blood. The wallpaper was a collection of faded roses and vines, the room’s corners infested with the familiar black spider webs of mildew. Standard lamps with tasselled edging, a sagging couch, a nest of tables, a mantelpiece weighed down with dusty porcelain figurines.
The sour taint of ancient cat pee.
Steel wrinkled her nose. ‘No’ exactly Better Homes and Gardens, is it?’
Logan had to agree. The whole place looked like the contents of a bring and buy sale, circa 1975. ‘Could do with a bit of a clean.’
Richard Knox stood in the middle of the worn carpet, one hand on the back of a rickety armchair and smiled. ‘I think it’s perfect…’
It was a rundown detached house in Cornhill, with an overgrown front garden, sagging gutters, moss-covered roof, and peeling paintwork.
A pair of black-and-white photographs hung on the wall above the fireplace, one of a dour-looking man in an old-fashioned suit, the other a severe woman with a fifties haircut and scowl.
‘I never met me real grandfather.’ Knox stared up at them. ‘The Lord took him when me mother was still a little girl. But Granny Murray was a terror, you know? Always banging on about Jesus this, and Bible that.’ Knox smiled. ‘Wish I’d listened to her when I had the chance, like. Bet things would’ve turned out very different for us if I’d found God before the Devil found me.’
Creepy little bastard. Ever since they’d arrived at the manky old house he’d been practically glowing.
They followed him from room to room, opening the curtains, upsetting the dust and mould, ending up in a double bedroom at the back of
the house overlooking a long back garden choked with bushes and weeds. The large bed drooped in the middle, its quilted cover pockmarked and cat-clawed. Knox settled on the edge, clutching the same old battered carrier bag to his chest.
A woman’s head poked around the door: John Lennon glasses, chubby cheeks, short curly ginger hair. A hamster in a lumberjack shirt who’d introduced herself as PC Somethingorother from the Offender Management Unit. ‘Seems OK to me, location-wise, but I’m still not happy about Richard staying here. Might be a bit risky with it belonging to a relation and all.’
DSI Danby shook his head. ‘You don’t have to worry about that. Euphemia Murray remarried after Knox’s grandfather died. Even if someone gets hold of his mother’s maiden name, it won’t be the same as the old woman’s.’
Knox smiled. ‘Outlived two husbands, didn’t she? You have to admire that.’
The DSI pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket. ‘Before we leave you in the capable hands of Constable Irvine and her team, we have to go through the terms of your SOPO.’
Knox groaned, then flopped back on the quilt, provoking another puff of dust from the ancient fabric. ‘Do we have to? I mean-’
‘Yes we do.’ Danby handed the paperwork to Logan. ‘Do the honours will you, Sergeant?’
Logan cleared his throat. ‘Sexual Offences Prevention Order for Richard Albert Knox, Thirty-Five Cairnview Terrace, Aberdeen. Applied for by Chief Constable Brian Anderson and approved by Sheriff McNab. This order is valid for five years from today’s date and lays out-’
‘How about,’ said Danby, ‘we skip the bumph and get to the conditions?’
‘Oh, right…er…You will not go within two hundred yards of any retirement home or recreation centre where older men might congregate. You will not contact any other registered sex offender.’
Knox gave a theatrical sigh. ‘You know, the power of God can change a man. There’s no sinner so desperate that he cannot be redeemed.’
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