Stuart MacBride - Flesh House

He got as far as the lab door before his phone went again. HMP Peterhead phoning back.

‘ He told me about it, OK? At night, when he thought everyone else was asleep. He told me about cutting her up. How it wasn’t like butchering an animal. How the meat didn’t lie the same along the bones. How sick it made him feel. ’

‘Who was she?’

‘ He buried everything out by Bennachie. Said it was all lies: he didn’t eat anyone. ’

‘Who — was — she?’

‘ It was money. I think it was money... She had something, or was connected to something ...’

‘Will you focus? Who did Wiseman kill?’

‘ Something... something about ...’ Robertson sounded as if he was on the verge of tears. ‘ I can’t remember ...’

A voice in the background: ‘ Angus, if this is upsetting you, you can stop. You don’t have to do this. ’

‘ I don’t know who she is. I used to know. I did! I used to know, but now I can’t remember. ’

‘ It’s OK, give me the phone.’ Rustle, clunk. ‘Hello? DS McRae? ’

‘Put Robertson back on: I need a name.’

‘ Angus is upset, I —’

‘Oh boo-bloody-hoo. I need to know who Wiseman killed.’

She was obviously trying to keep her voice level. ‘ He was stabbed a couple of years ago; lost a lot of blood. There were some complications with the anaesthetic during the operation. There are some things he can’t remember, it’s very frustrating for him. ’

‘It’s no picnic this end either. I want to know—’

‘ I think you could show a little sympathy for a human being in pain, Sergeant. ’

‘A fellow human... He murdered fifteen women and raped their dying bodies! Now put the bastard back on the phone.’

‘ That’s it — this interview is over. I’ll be making a formal complaint about your behaviour, Sergeant. How dare you —’

‘Yeah? Well when he’s stabbed you twenty-three times, you can lecture me on my bloody empathy skills.’

But she’d already hung up.

Logan stuck the phone back in his pocket — already starting to feel guilty about acting like an arsehole — and pushed through into the IB lab. They’d obviously not managed to fix the little stereo on top of the freezer, because Radio Two was still playing. Three IB technicians in white lab coats and latex gloves slouched around the central desk, drinking cups of tea and moaning about having to still be there in the middle of the night, testing mounds of mystery meat.

Logan dumped the evidence bag full of carpet on the desktop and asked if someone could do him a quick favour.

Samantha — the Identification Bureau’s one and only Goth — brushed a long, dark curl from her pale face, and asked if he was taking the piss. ‘We’ve got about nine million hunks of meat to get through.’

‘It’s for Insch.’

She prodded the bag with a chewed biro. ‘What is it?’

‘Blood-soaked carpet from nineteen ninety—’

‘Oh Jesus. You not think we’ve got more urgent stuff to test?’

‘It’s from Wiseman’s car: animal and human. They couldn’t separate the DNA strands back then.’

Samantha picked up the bag and peered at the rust-brown contents. ‘This stuff’s nearly twenty years old.’

‘Yes, but you’re twenty years brighter than they were.’

‘You really think shameless flattery’s going to work?’

‘Twenty years prettier too... in a scary Night of the Living Dead kind of way.’

She tried to scowl, but a smile broke through. ‘You’re a rotten sod...’

‘Come on, bump it to the top of the queue. It’s important.’

‘I can’t—’

‘Very important.’

Sigh. ‘OK, OK. I’ll see what I can do.

Phone. Ringing. ‘Phhhhh...’ Logan tried to sit up in bed, but none of his limbs were working. The answering machine must have kicked in, because there was silence and then a bleeeeeeeeep.

Roll over. Pull duvet into cocoon. Sleep.

The phone started up again.

Logan squinted at the alarm clock: twenty-one minutes past four. He slumped back into the pillows and scrubbed his face with his hands, listening to the phone warble. ‘Urrrrgh...’

He padded through into the lounge, just in time to hear the answering machine finish its pre-recorded invitation to leave a message. The speaker crackled for a moment, and then a woman’s voice said, ‘ Bloody hell, ask someone to do you a favour and —’

He snatched the phone out of its cradle. ‘Hello?’

‘ What took you so long? ’

A yawn shuddered it’s way free. ‘It’s half four...’

‘I managed to separate out the human DNA from the rest of the garbage in your carpet sample, and yes, it was a vast pain in the arse, thank you for asking. Took bloody hours to amplify enough of it to make a viable sample. ’

Logan plonked himself down on the couch. ‘Mmmph?’ Another yawn.

‘ Ran it through the database. Guess what: no direct hit. ’

‘Bastard... Sorry, I suppose it was a long—’

‘ No direct hit, but I did get what looks like a familial one. ’ She gave it a dramatic count of five before continuing. ‘Want to guess who?’

But Logan already knew: ‘Richard Davidson — he’s in Craiginches doing three years for possession, perjury, and aggravated assault. His mum disappeared the night the McLaughlins were killed.’ They finally knew what happened to her.

‘What? No, Ken Wiseman. It would have been close enough to look like his blood in the mid nineties when they did the appeal, but it’s not. It’s female. You’re looking for his aunt, mother —’

‘Sister. Kirsty McFarlane. She was supposed to have run off with an electrician eighteen years ago.’

Showered, shaved and feeling like shit, Logan waited for PC Munro to park the pool car, then climbed out into the cold November morning. Half past five and it was still pitch dark, the hollow streetlights glowing like wet gold against the indigo sky.

Munro locked the car and yawned, her breath a thin white cloud as she shook herself. ‘Still don’t see why this couldn’t wait till later...’

McFarlane’s butcher shop had been given another graffiti makeover — four-letter words sprayed all over the plywood sheeting that covered the broken windows.

‘I mean, the guy’s going to be asleep and—’

‘Just ring the doorbell.’

She shook her head, muttering to herself as she stomped up to the butcher’s front door, then stopped, staring at the doorframe.

Logan stuck his hands in his pockets and waited. ‘Today would be nice.’

‘There’s dog shite on the bell.’ She prodded the door with the toe of her shoe and it swung open. ‘Lock’s busted. Looks like it’s been kicked in.’

All that graffiti: ‘MURDERING BASTARD!’, ‘CANNIBAL’, ‘DEATh’s TOO GOOD FOR YOU!’, ‘ENGLISH OUT’... Logan told her to call it in. ‘Tell them we’ve got a B-and-E, possibly in progress. Householder’s life’s been threatened.’

‘Oh crap...’ She grabbed the Airwave handset from her shoulder and got onto Control as Logan stepped quietly over the threshold and into the long, dark hallway. The walls were covered in spray paint: profanity, threats, and ‘UP THE DONS!’

He stopped at the foot of the stairs.

A faint glow of light broke the gloom from somewhere under the stairs. Logan crept round. It was coming from the internal entrance to the butcher’s shop. The door was almost shut, but he could make out a torch shining on a paint-spattered wall. Mumbled singing, the words soft and slurred, the tune unrecognizable.

Logan eased the door open.