Stuart MacBride - Flesh House

‘Or Chief Constable—’

‘I’m not going to tell you again. Steel’s doing the neighbours; see if you can dig up Nichol’s brother and sister...’ Logan checked his notes. ‘Jimmy and Kelley. I’ll take the workmates.’

Which was easier said than done. PC Munro hadn’t passed on any details about Elizabeth Nichol’s employers — Logan had no idea who she worked for.

He dug out his phone and started dialling.

Kelley had cried for a while. It was difficult holding her with the bars in the way, but in the end the shuddering had stopped.

Heather gave her a squeeze. ‘How you feeling?’

‘Better... I feel better.’ She sniffed. ‘I’ve never told anyone about it before.’ Sigh. ‘I miss them. I really do miss them. They were so kind . If I messed up they’d sit down and talk to me. No more cigarette burns or cracked ribs, black eyes... Dad never raised his hand to me, not even when I broke his coronation mug.’

‘They sound nice.’

‘HELP ME!’ The bloody policewoman had started up again.

Kelley shifted in the darkness. ‘Heather? I’m glad you’re here.’

‘I’M A POLICE OFFICER!’

Heather smiled. ‘I’m glad you’re here too. Strange isn’t it, being glad someone else is trapped in this little metal prison...’

‘YOU WOn’t GET AWAY WITH THIS!’

‘You think she’s ever going to shut up?’

‘THEy’lL BE LOOKING FOR ME!’

Kelley patted Heather’s hand. ‘Yes.’ And then she moved away from the bars. ‘Do you want any more medicine?’

‘LET ME GO YOU BASTARD!’

‘It makes me feel bad.’

‘Sure you don’t want any?’

‘Positive.’

‘PLEASE!’

‘Did you hear something?’ Kelly’s voice was low and urgent: ‘He’s coming back...’

‘What do—’

‘I’M A POLICE OFFICER!’

‘Close your eyes! Pretend you’re asleep.’

Heather peered out into the darkness. ‘But—’

‘Roll over! Away from the bars! Keep your eyes closed, or he’ll know you’ve not taken your medicine!’

And he would hurt Kelley. Heather rolled over onto her side and screwed her eyes shut, lying perfectly still beneath the duvet. A metal clunk... and then the groan of un-oiled hinges — the door opening — and light flooded their prison, she could feel it burning through her eyelids.

Some rustling, and then Kelley said, ‘She’s sleeping.’

The light went out and everything was darkness again, then the boom of the door closing echoed through the metal cell, momentarily drowning out WPC Shouty.

‘I’M A POLICE OFFICER! THEy’lL FIND YOU! YOU HEAR ME? THEy’lL... Oh God... No, please, I didn’t...’

Then there was screaming.

Heather waited for the bolt gun’s ‘ Crack ’ and drifted off to sleep.

Logan tried HM Customs and Revenue, but no one would speak to him without a warrant. It was the same story at Elizabeth Nichol’s bank, so he gave up and put a call through to the PC they’d left guarding the woman’s ruined home — asking him to have a poke about and see if he couldn’t find any payslips or bank statements.

Twenty minutes later the constable was back with the name of a haulage firm in Inverurie and a complaint about the number of journalists and TV people crawling all over Nichol’s street. ‘ Had to chase two of the bastards out the back garden. Bit of backup would be nice! ’

Logan said he’d see what he could do, hung up, and tried the hauliers.

‘ Hello, Garioch United International Distribution Limited, hope you’re having a GUID day. How may I direct your call? ’

It took a while, but eventually Logan managed to persuade her to put him through to someone in charge.

‘ Oh for God’s sake. What now? ’

‘Mr Arthur? This is Detective Sergeant—’

‘ Don’t you people have anything better to do? I told your colleague everything, OK? Now if you don’t mind, I’ve got a golf game at— ’

‘Who did you speak to?’

‘ A woman. What’s her name ...’ There was some rustling at the other end. ‘ Michelle? No, Munro. Wanted to know about someone who used to work here. Elizabeth Nichol ’

‘Used to?’

‘ We had to let her go a couple of months ago. Shame: been with us eight years... Look I’ve been through all this already and —’

‘What did she do?’

‘ Driver. Trucks and vans. Used to do a lot of Eastern Europe drops for us, before we lost the bloody contract .’

Which explained the collection of unpronounceable snow globes.

‘What else did you tell PC Munro?’

‘ She wanted a list of all Elizabeth’s trips: destinations, clients, dates and stuff. As if we haven’t got anything better to do than —’

‘You do understand she’s missing, don’t you? She’s been abducted, her house trashed, there’s a policewoman missing too: both their lives are at risk. I think that’s a little more important than a round of bloody golf, don’t you?’

There was an embarrassed silence, and then, ‘ What do you need? ’

‘Everything PC Munro asked for, and a list of all your employees too. One last thing: Do you know Ms Nichol well?’

‘ She’s OK. Bit soft at times, you know, all that charity work and stuff. Forever doing sponsored this and fund-raising that .’ Pause. ‘ She really been abducted? ’

‘Yes.’ Logan dug a notepad out of his piles of paperwork and started asking questions.

By the time Faulds put in an appearance, Logan was scribbling things up on the whiteboard. ‘Cup of tea?’ asked the Chief Constable. ‘I got packet of custard creams.’ He dumped a Markie’s plastic bag on his desk and peeled off his jacket. ‘Bloody chucking it down out there.’

Logan stepped back and looked at his handiwork — a list of Elizabeth Nichol’s friends and acquaintances. It wasn’t exactly comprehensive, but it was all he could get out of the combined personnel at Garioch United International Distribution. At least now they had somewhere to start putting together a timeline of Elizabeth’s last movements. He’d put another two columns on the side: one headed ‘BROTHER [?] JIMMY’ the other, ‘SISTER [?] KELLEY’ With a couple of question marks under each.

Still no word from Rennie.

‘I said, do you want a cuppa?’

‘What?’ Logan turned away from his scribblings. ‘Oh, thanks. How did you get on with Professional Standards?’

‘Thought my days of worrying about the rubber-heelers were long gone...’ Faulds peered at the board, ‘Who the hell are Garry-otch United thingumy?’

‘It’s pronounced, “Geeree” — the area round Inverurie — Elizabeth Nichol works... worked there.’

‘Geeree? Then why the hell’s it spelt “Garry-otch”?’ He went round the office picking up the dirty mugs, muttering, ‘Honestly, that’s what’s wrong with this bloody country: all the road signs are designed to make visitors look like arseholes...’ on his way out the door.

Logan tried Rennie on his mobile phone — the clank and scrape of cutlery on crockery, some swearing, then the constable was on the line: ‘ I’m having my lunch, OK? ’

‘Jimmy and Kelley Nichol.’

‘ I’m allowed lunch, aren’t I? Even bloody mass murderers get lunch .’

‘Did you find them?’

‘ No. Tried every spelling I could think of but they’re not in the PNC, or on the electoral register. Maybe they emigrated because someone wouldn’t let them eat their fish pie in peace? ’

Logan hung up and tried himself, but Rennie was right: there was no sign of Jimmy or Kelley in the Police National Computer.