And yes, they could have let Uncle Pete get dressed, but sod it. Getting dragged down the station in his boxer shorts, beige slippers, and an old T-shirt would be good practice for him. Going to be plenty more humiliation where he was going.
Roberta slipped the previously stolen Nokia into an evidence bag. Glanced at Aunt Vicki. ‘Do you want to tell Josie’s mum, or will we?’
‘If I ever see that bastard again I’ll kill him!’
No’ a bad plan.
‘So …?’
Aunt Vicki’s chin came up. ‘You do it. I’ll never be able to look her in the eye again after this. Because of that BASTARD!’ Still struggling in Harmsworth’s hairy embrace.
‘Fair enough.’ Roberta turned and wandered out into the evening.
She’d barely gone halfway down the garden path before Aunt Vicki exploded from the front door. Screaming at the broken droopy wee figure of her husband as Tufty man-handled him into the back of the police van.
‘YOU’RE DEAD TO ME, YOU HEAR ME, PERVERT? YOU’RE DEAD!’
Harmsworth bustled out after her. Grabbed her arms again. ‘It’s not my fault, Sarge, she bit me!’
‘YOU’RE DEAD, YOU KIDDY-FIDDLING PAEDO BASTARD! DEAD!’
‘Get her back inside.’
‘Sarge.’
Every window had someone peering out of it, getting a good eyeful of the wee domestic drama playing out on their cosy middle-class street. The dinner-party set would be dining out on it for months.
Roberta scuffed over to the van.
Tufty was strapping scumbag Uncle Pete into the cage. Snapping the seatbelt over his handcuffs. After all, wouldn’t want him hurting himself before someone got the chance to shank him in the prison showers.
Soon as Uncle Pete was all trussed up and cosy, Roberta hooked a thumb over her shoulder. ‘Constable Quirrel, go give Owen a hand calming the wife down before she breaks something.’
He looked at her, then at the house, then back again, a worried frown on his weaselly face. ‘Sarge? You’re not …?’ Nodding at Uncle Pete.
‘Now, Constable.’
‘OK …’ He scurried off back into the house.
She gave it a count of ten, then climbed into the prisoner cage and thumped the doors shut behind her. Glowered.
Uncle Pete was folded as far over as the seatbelt would allow. ‘Oh God, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry …’
‘Your brother’s dying in hospital and you’re screwing his fifteen-year-old daughter.’
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to …’
‘YOU TOOK PHOTOS OF IT ON YOUR BLOODY PHONE!’ It boomed around the van like thunder.
He shrank back into his seat.
Roberta took a breath. Hissed it out. Calm.
‘You pin back your lugs and you listen good: we’re going to take you back to Queen Street and process you. You’re going to call your solicitor and he’s going to tell you to “no comment” the whole thing. He’ll tell you if you keep your mouth shut he might be able to get you off with a slap on the wrists.’ She held up the evidence bag with the offending DIY-porn-filled Nokia in it. ‘And then we’ll all have to go to court. They’ll put Josie on the stand and make her tell the world how her uncle abused her. We’ll have to show the photos. In court. In front of her mum, while her father’s dying. You going to put Josie through that?’
‘I … love her.’
‘Because either way, Good Old Uncle Pete’s off to prison.’
He stared at his bare knees. Sniffed. Cleared his throat. Did his best to sound reasonable. ‘It wasn’t my idea. She got me drunk and—’
‘DON’T YOU BLOODY DARE! You’re a middle-aged man and she’s fifteen.’
‘But—’
‘Let’s count off how screwed you are, shall we?’ She stuck out her thumb: ‘Sex with an older child.’ Forefinger: ‘Sexual abuse of trust.’ Middle finger: ‘Making indecent images of a child.’ Ring finger: ‘Attempting to pervert the course of justice.’ She stepped closer, looming over him in the back of the van. ‘And you know what, Petey-boy? I’d love you to “no comment”, because if you don’t plead guilty before the trial we get to send you down for twenty-nine years.’
‘Twenty …?’ His cheeks paled, then his mouth fell open. A smear of snot glistened on his top lip.
‘Twenty-nine years locked up with all the other paedos and rapists.’ OK, so that wasn’t strictly true – get a soft enough sheriff and they’d bundle all four charges into one concurrent job-lot, which meant fourteen years max – but Good Old Uncle Pete didn’t know that. ‘And if you tell anyone about this conversation, I swear to God the nonces in prison are going to be the least of your troubles. Understand?’
Uncle Pete collapsed into himself and sobbed.
‘Good.’ She climbed out, slammed the van doors hard enough to make the whole thing rock on its suspension. Turned, and marched back to the house.
Tufty was waiting for her. ‘Sarge?’
‘The wife any calmer?’
‘Stopped screaming, which is nice.’ He shuffled his feet and stared over her shoulder at the van. ‘Er, Sarge, you didn’t …?’
‘When we get back to the ranch, you process and interview him.’
Tufty raised an eyebrow. ‘You don’t want to?’
‘No. Because if I have to look at his slimy wee face once more tonight, I’m going to do what you think I just did. Only harder. And with a baseball bat.’
North Deeside Drive drifted by the van windows, the grumbling diesel engine no’ quite loud enough to drown out Uncle Pete sobbing in the cage at the back.
Big houses, big gardens, big hedges, big trees, all painted in sparkling sunshine.
Roberta’s phone buzzed at her, like a teeny ineffective vibrator. Text message:
Are you coming home tonight or not? You
still owe me a fancy French meal, you
workaholic bumhead!
True.
She was halfway through thumbing out a reply when the thing launched into Cagney & Lacey. ‘WEE DAVEY BARRETT’ popped up on screen. She hit the button. ‘Davey? Tell me you’ve got good news for your lovely Aunty Roberta.’
‘Sorry, Sarge. We’ve been through the security camera footage and Jack Wallace was right where he said he was. Doug’s Dinner for an hour and three-quarters, then off to the cinema to see Once Upon a Time in Dundee.’
She frowned out at a chunk of parkland. Happy couples strolling hand-in-hand along the winding path. ‘Maybe he slipped out?’
‘Nope. We went through the restaurant’s footage too – longest he’s away from the table is a five-minute trip to the loo. We rousted him from Screen Four, just as Ewan McGregor was mid-shootout in the Overgate Centre. Got a lot of swearing chucked our way when we had the lights turned on. Him and his two buddies were right in the middle of a row. No way they could’ve sneaked away with no one noticing.’
Gah …
The perfect end to the perfect day.
Roberta sagged back in her seat and covered her eyes with a hand. ‘Thanks, Davey. You and Lund write it up and head off home.’
‘Cheers, Sarge.’
And, no doubt, tomorrow there’d be yet another visit from Jack Bloody Wallace and Hissing Sodding Sid. In to moan about how the poor raping wee turdbasket was being ‘harassed’.
Tufty poked her in the shoulder. ‘Sarge, you OK?’
‘No. No I’m not.’ She deleted her text to Susan and composed a new reply:
Too late to get a table booked.
Stick the vodka in the freezer and get the
holiday brochures out.
Let’s make a night of it.
Think they’re going to fire me tomorrow.
Send.
And you know what? Good riddance to the lot of them.
Tufty was looking at her with that spanked puppy dog expression on his stupid face. ‘Want to talk about it?’
‘No. I want to go home and get very, very drunk.’
Whatever crap was coming
tomorrow could wait.
CHAPTER NINE
in which some tractors drive down Union Street
and Everyone Has A Bath
I
‘Urgh …’ Roberta struggled her way into the itchiest black trousers ever invented by man. And it had to be a man – no woman would ever create something as horrible as Police-Scotland-issue uniform leg torturers.
Didn’t help that they’d shrunk about two sizes since she’d last had them on.
She thumped back onto the floral-print duvet and puffed and wriggled, hauling them up.
Susan leaned back against the vanity unit, one foot up on the tartan chaise longue. Smiling away in her floaty Laura Ashley dress.
Rotten sod.
Finally the trousers gave up the fight! Roberta rolled off the bed, pulled in her stomach and did up the button. Zipped the bulgy bits in.
These trousers had definitely shrunk.
Susan sauntered over and brushed a bit of cat hair from the epaulettes buttoned to Roberta’s black T-shirt. ‘Oh, I do love a woman in uniform.’
‘Surprised they still fit … Almost … Long as I don’t breathe … And they’re all itchy.’
‘Well I think you look very sexy.’ She threaded the black belt through the belt loops. Bit her bottom lip. ‘Maybe you should keep it on when you get home? And don’t forget your handcuffs. After all, I’m going to cream Marion Bridgeport on the golf course today: I’ll be in the mood to celebrate.’
Roberta groaned down onto the chaise longue and pulled on her boots. Laced them up as all the blood above her trousers shoved its way into her head and the waistband made breathing impossible. Slumped back and sucked in a deep breath. ‘Sodding hell …’
Really needed bigger trousers.
She looked up at Susan. ‘Turns out Hissing Sid didn’t defend me for free – someone paid him. It was—’
‘Logan. He didn’t want you to know and be all stubborn about it.’ A small sad sigh as she brushed at the epaulettes again. ‘It’s a shame they had to swap the shirt-and-tie for a T-shirt. I always loved you in a tie.’
Wonderful. So everyone knew but her.
Roberta looked away. No’ meeting Susan’s eye. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Because I didn’t want you to be all stubborn about it either. How am I supposed to get my kinky on with you banged up in prison somewhere?’
She pulled herself up with one of the bed’s four posts. ‘He ratted me out to the rubber heelers.’
‘Plus, I really don’t think I could trust you – locked in with all those naughty women, twenty-four hours a day? Communal showers? What would you get up to?’
‘I trusted him.’
‘I know you did, Robbie.’ Then she reached around and took a good handful of Roberta’s bum and squeezed. ‘Now, get this sexy itchy backside downstairs. French toast for breakfast!’
‘Hi.’ He’d been aiming for cool-and-manly, but what came out was more of a testicularly ruptured squeak. Tufty cleared his throat and tried again. Much deeper this time. ‘Constable Mackintosh.’
A faint pink tinge spread across her neck, where it poked out of her stabproof vest and high-viz waistcoat. ‘Detective Constable Quirrel.’
Uniformed officers crowded the muster room, laughing, joking, moaning, whinging, talking about how great it was to be kicking off at nine in the morning instead of seven for a change.
‘So … You all set for today?’
She nodded. ‘You?’
He slipped his hands into the armpits of his stabproof. ‘Nice being back in uniform again. Don’t get me wrong, CID’s fun, but it’s not the same when you’re running about in your own clothes. Like you’re only playing at being a police officer.’
‘Right.’
Yeah, this wasn’t really going as well as he’d planned.
Tufty cleared his throat again. Safer ground. ‘So … Half two this afternoon?’
‘Yes.’ A small smile. ‘Looking forward to it. Well, not. Sort of. It’s a wee dog’s funeral and what kind of sicko enjoys that? I mean, it’s good to be doing something nice for an old lady …’ Constable Mackintosh straightened her equipment belt with its collection of limb restraints, handcuffs, pepper spray, and extendable baton. ‘Shame we don’t have an urn though. For the look of the thing.’
‘Yeah. A lot nicer than getting your dog back in a shoebox.’ He stared at his feet. ‘After the funeral, do you want to—’
A voice boomed out from the doorway. ‘All right, everyone, settle down.’ Whoever was speaking, they were hidden behind the sea of heads. ‘Chief Superintendent Campbell wants a word before you head out. Boss?’
‘Thanks, Steve. Ladies, gentlemen, and Detective Sergeant Marshall, social media is fizzing with posts from those who look at today’s farmers’ protest as an excuse to settle old scores. Independence: in–out. Brexit: in–out.’ A sheaf of paper appeared above the waves of close-cropped haircuts for a brief shoogle. ‘You should all have an information sheet – I want you to pay particular attention to Gareth Thannet and Angus Menzies. Last time this pair of individuals clashed, Glasgow city centre was turned into a warzone. And now they seem to think that they can come up to Aberdeen on a jolly and cause trouble on our streets. Are they right?’
They all thumped it out in unison: ‘NO, BOSS!’
‘They think we’re going to just let them run riot in our city. Are we?’
‘NO, BOSS!’
It was like electricity, crackling through the room, making all the hairs stand up on Tufty’s arms.
‘No we bloody well aren’t. Now get out there and make me proud!’
A cheer belted out. This was it. They were ready. And if Thannet and Menzies tried anything they were in for a nasty shock. Because North East Division was pumped up. Energised. Ready to rock.
Hell, yeah: bring it on!
‘Christ, I’m bored.’ Roberta sagged, but no’ very far. The stabproof vest squeezed her tight, as if she was an overfilled sausage, squooging her boobs and making every breath a struggle. Because the shrunken itchy trousers weren’t bad enough.
Even rubbing her legs against the waist-high metal barrier that held back the unwashed masses didn’t help. Swear to God they made these things out of ants, fleas and midge bites.
A massive seething mob filled the square outside Markie’s. Placards poked up above them, rehashing old arguments for and against everything from the last general election to farm subsidy payments. Those temporary metal barriers kept a clear patch in the middle of the square free, another two lines stopping them from spilling out onto Union Street, but the crowd stretched down past the Prince of Wales on one side, and all the way around to the Kirk on the other. There was even a crowd on the St Nicholas Centre’s roof terrace.
The organisers had set up a stage outside the Clydesdale Bank, blocking access to the cash machines, big enough to fit a dozen chairs, a lectern and a microphone stand. And last, but no’ least, about seventy-five percent of Aberdeen’s police officers making a solid black-and-fluorescent-yellow line between the various factions. Big Tony Campbell had even managed to call in a couple of horse-mounted plods from Strathclyde.
Roberta checked her watch again. ‘An hour we’ve been here. A whole hour, and no one’s so much as trodden on anyone’s toe.’
Lund smiled up at the blue sky. ‘Still, it’s nice to be out in the sunshine for a change.’
On the other side, Harmsworth grunted. Scowling. ‘Probably getting a massive melanoma just from standing here. And my trousers are itchy.’
Roberta peered around his bloated lump of a body. Tufty was chatting up that perky Wildlife Crime Officer again.
Horny wee sod that he was.
Lund stood on her tiptoes. ‘Ooh, I can see tractors. Here we go.’
Roberta had a squint, but the corner of the Royal Bank blocked off most of Union Street from here.
Pfff …
No’ that there was anything particularly exciting about tractors, but at lea
st it’d be something to look at other than the motley collection of placards. And once you’d spotted the obligatory ‘DOWN WITH THIS SORT OF THING!’ and ‘I’M SO ANNOYED I MADE A SIGN!’ ones, there was nothing left to do but stand there in the blazing sunshine, dressed all in black, wearing a stone’s-worth of equipment – sweat trickling down your back and into your underwear.
Fun.
Harmsworth had another dig at his backside. ‘Itchy, itchy, itchy, itchy …’
Roberta thumped him. ‘I’m no’ telling you again: leave your arse alone.’
‘It’s itchy.’
‘We’re all itchy, Owen, that’s how life works: you’re born, you’re itchy, then you die.’
He went in for another howk.
‘Stop it!’ She pointed across the square, where the media had set up camp. A blonde weather-girl-type was primping her curly hair in the mirror of a cameraman’s lens. ‘You want to be on national TV mining for bum-nuggets?’
‘Oh that’s right, poor Owen just has to suffer in silence, as usual.’
‘Silence? You never stop moaning on about everything!’
Five people emerged from behind the Royal Bank, carrying a banner nearly as wide as Union Street: ‘DON’T LET THEM KILL OUR FARMING INDUSTRY!!!’ Waving at the crowds. Right behind them was a massive combine harvester, blades rotating slowly. Presumably as a warning to the banner carriers – don’t slow down or fall over, or else.
Blondie finished primping and stood back a couple of paces, microphone up and ready. No’ that she needed it – hers was the kind of voice that carried. A foghorn with a west-coast accent. ‘You ready, Chris?’
Anne twisted the microphone around in her hand, so the BBC logo was visible from the front. Here we go. Deep breath. Red leather, yellow leather. Red leather, yellow leather.
She flashed her warmest smile at the camera.
You can do this, Anne. You can!
Just don’t screw it up and everything will fall into place. They’ll see that you’re more than just a pretty face standing in front of a map blethering on about low pressure moving in from the west. That you’ve got what it takes to be a serious television journalist.
Now We Are Dead Page 24