Stuart MacBride - A Dark So Deadly

The proprietor didn’t even look up from her frying pan.

Mother slumped. Grabbed a handful of napkins and dried her face. ‘I’m sorry, children, but I am more than a little upset.’

Callum pushed her latte across the sticky tablecloth, till it was in front of her. ‘Is it the Media, Detective Superintendent Ness, or the high heedjins from Tulliallan causing problems?’

‘You remember the swabs Cecelia took from under the taps at Ashlee Gossard’s house and the flat Ben, Brett, and Glen were doing up? Well our oh-so-wonderful labs came back with the results.’ Mother ladled sugar into her latte, thumping each spoonful in, as if she was punishing it. ‘Would you like to guess who our prime suspect now is?’

‘Lord Lucan.’ McAdams still had that grin plastered across his skeletal features. ‘No, wait: Anne Widdecombe. Oh, I know: J.R. Hartley! It was, wasn’t it?’

She thumped him on the shoulder. ‘Don’t be facetious.’ More sugar was thrown to its death. ‘According to the labs, Imhotep is sitting right here. At this very table.’

‘It’s Callum, isn’t it? I always thought his shifty little eyes were hiding something. You can tell by the way they’re all piggy and—’

She hit him again. ‘It’s you , you spanner.’

‘Oooooooh.’ Both of McAdams’ eyebrows made a break for the top of his head. ‘Now there’s a twist we didn’t see coming: the trusted old police officer is actually... dan-dan-daaaaa! A psycho killer! OK, so it’s a trope of genre, but who doesn’t love the classics?’

Mother stared at him. ‘You’re just all-the-time hilarious, aren’t you?’

‘I like to think I have a certain homespun charm, yes.’

‘Gah...’ She lumped in more sugar. ‘If I ever get my hands on the idiot who awarded our forensic-lab services to the lowest bidder, I’ll throttle them with their own innards.’ She took a sip of her latte and grimaced. Pushed it away and helped herself to a couple of Dotty’s chips instead. ‘They’re rerunning the tests again.’

‘I was definitely in the flat after we discovered Ben Harrington’s body in the bath. But I don’t think I’ve ever been to the Gossard house, have I?’

Callum joined the free-for-all on Dotty’s chips. Stuffing one in his mouth and chewing through the words, ‘I’ll bet it was the same idiot who cocked up the samples on my mother’s head.’

‘Oh, I can top that.’ McAdams licked a smear of tomato sauce from his fingertip. ‘Did you know that they IDed a strangulation victim as Wee Davey Roberts, last week? Didn’t seem to matter that Wee Davey is, last time I checked, a fifty-four-year-old man with an artificial leg, and the victim was a twenty-one-year-old woman with all her own limbs. They thought they’d got a DNA match and that was it.’

Mother snorted. ‘I heard one of their lab techs has come up as a positive match in eighteen murder cases. Keeps picking his nose when he’s running the samples and forgets to change his gloves.’

‘Well I heard they had our very own Constable MacGregor down for trying to batter DCI Reece Powel to death. And— Ow!’

Callum kicked him under the table again, for luck. ‘Serves you right.’

‘It’s a disaster.’ Mother flopped in her seat, head back, arms dangling. ‘All right, we go back to the plan: interview everyone at Strummuir Smokehouse till they squeak. Someone has to know something . Don’t they?’

Everyone looked away.

Rain clattered against the window.

‘Oh for goodness’ sake.’ McAdams thumped Mother on the back. ‘Look at you all sitting there with your faces like fizz. We should be celebrating !’

Nobody set off a party popper.

He shrugged. ‘All right, so whoever Monaghan was working with has slipped free to strike again. And yes: the labs couldn’t identify a breezeblock in a box of cornflakes. But we just saved Ashlee Gossard’s life! She’s alive because of us, and that’s worth celebrating.’

Still no party poppers.

‘Isn’t it?’

Dotty drained her tea and banged the mug down on the sticky checked tablecloth. Fixed them all with a hard gaze. ‘I’ll get some more chips.’

Callum looked down at the Mondeo keys nestling in his palm. ‘Are you sure?’

The road outside the Tartan Bunnet was packed with cars, parked with a studied disregard for the double-yellow lines on both sides. That was the trouble with police officers — no respect for the law. If they couldn’t get a parking spot at Division Headquarters, why not abandon their cars on the surrounding streets?

At the end of Doyle Lane, the ugly Victorian red-brick bulk of DHQ loomed over the surrounding sandstone buildings, like an angry drunk challenging them to start something.

Mother nodded. ‘Just don’t crash it. Or run anyone over. Nothing that’s going to cause me a backside full of paperwork.’

‘Thanks, Boss.’

‘I’m serious — don’t make me have to explain to Professional Standards why I let a suspended DC borrow a pool car.’

He pocketed the Mondeo’s keys. ‘If you need any help chasing anything down, unofficially, off the books, give me a call, OK?’

She inched back a little, staying in the shelter of the café doorway as the wind shifted, keeping out of the rain. ‘How did Andy seem to you? When you were searching the house, was he OK?’

Ah...

Callum licked his lips. ‘He gets out of breath all the time. He looks like death. And he’s developed a kind of sour funky smell. A bit like a cat that needs a bath?’

‘I’m worried about him.’

‘He blames himself for what happened to Watt.’

‘He’s skipping his chemotherapy treatments. He thinks I don’t know, but I didn’t climb out of a packet of Wotsits yesterday.’ Mother picked at the front of her fleece, pulling off little bobbly bits. ‘He turns every-thing into a big joke, but he’s dying, Callum. He’s dying and he’s scared and there’s nothing I can do about it.’

The door behind her swung open and Franklin squeezed into the doorway. ‘You ready?’

Callum nodded. ‘If you are.’

Mother reached out and took hold of his arm for a moment. ‘Don’t tell him I know. Please.’

Her cheek was soft and warm against Callum’s lips. ‘Our little secret.’

The kiss left her blushing. She mumbled something, turned, and headed back inside.

Franklin watched the café door close, then raised an eyebrow at him. ‘So now you’re trying to snog Mother? Just can’t keep it in your pants, can you?’

‘I can wait if you like?’ Granite houses slid past the Mondeo’s windows, stonework darkened to charcoal by the rain. ‘Not a problem. I’m not doing anything anyway.’

Franklin poked away at her mobile phone, not looking up. ‘I’ll get a lift back with Dotty. We’ll be hours.’

‘I’ve got a book to read, I’ll be fine. Be glad of the peace, to be honest. You know, after everything.’

‘Callum, we’ve got to interview everyone that works there all over again. Do you have any idea how long that’ll take? And you’ll be what, pining away in the car, waiting for me? Like a lovesick Labrador?’

Straight through at the roundabout. ‘Did it maybe occur to you that you’re not as irresistibly desirable as you think?’

‘Says the man who thought we “had a thing”.’

‘I’m just trying to be nice, OK?’ Up ahead, the traffic had slowed to a crawl, backed up behind a council lorry laying out yet more orange sodding cones for yet more sodding roadworks. He took a left at the next junction. Cutting through Castleview proper. ‘OK, you want the truth? I don’t want to go back to Dotty’s and sit in the dark, brooding about Alastair, and Leo McVey, and Elaine-and-Powel...’ The big granite houses gave way to brick tenements. ‘I don’t know what to do any more. I’ve not been on my own since I started seeing Elaine.’ Her name was bitter on his tongue. ‘I’ve not had a family since I was five years old. Everything’s changed. It’s all... It’s like someone’s cut the anchor free and all these big chunks of me are drifting away.’