Stuart Macbride - Blind Eye

The silhouettes ducked and Logan struggled to his feet, then slammed his foot into the open bathroom door, forcing it back against its hinges. One more kick and the top one gave way.

A bullet ricocheted off the wall beside his head as Logan grabbed the door's edge and ripped the whole thing free.

'futttt'

He staggered under the weight as something thumped into the wood.

'Logan!'

He clambered into the bath, trying to drag the door on top of them, like a lid. It was a tight squeeze, elbows and knees sticking in uncomfortable places. The two of them a jumble of limbs. The door awkward and heavy.

He could see the men framed in the doorway of the flat, lunging forward into Gorzkiewicz's maze of junk. Logan swore and pulled the door into place.

'What's Polish for "bomb"?'

'What?'

'WHAT'S POLISH FOR "BOMB"?'

Flames.

Blinding light.

Shockwave.

A grey pall hung over Aberdeen, threatening rain but never quite getting around to it. A pair of plastic bags played chase across the road outside the primary school, swirling up for a moment, before disappearing over the railings and into the empty playground.

'Uh-huh.'

Logan rested his forehead on the steering wheel, mobile phone clamped to his ear as Samantha said, 'And I thought we could go out for a drink, Friday. Celebrate you being allowed back to work?'

'Uh-huh.'

'Rennie wants to go. And Steel. Maybe Big Gary and Eric?'

'Uh-huh.'

Pause.

'Uh-huh.'

'Are you OK?'

'What? Oh, sorry, yeah.' He pulled himself upright and rubbed a hand across his gritty eyes. 'You know what it's like. All this varnishing… the fumes.'

'You're not still at it are you?'

He looked across the road at the bland granite lump of Sunnybank Primary School. 'Just giving the lounge floor another coat right now.'

'The doctor said you should take it easy for a bit.'

Silence.

'Logan?'

'Sorry.'

'Is that journalist moron still camped out on your doorstep?'

A light breeze ruffled the leaves overhead, making little ovals of sunshine dance across the car's dirty bonnet. 'What? Oh… no. Guess he's got more important things to do than stalk some idiot who got himself blown up.'

Another pause. 'Logan, are you sure you're all right?'

'Sorry, I just… Look, that's the doorbell, I gotta go, OK?'

They said their goodbyes and he hung up. Slipped the phone back in his pocket. Scowled at himself in the rearview mirror. 'You're a lying bastard.' And an ugly one too: his face was a mass of scratches and white butterfly stitches. Dark purple bags under his eyes to match the bruises on his forehead and chin. Six days worth of stubble. He couldn't shave without taking the top off half a dozen scabs.

Logan reached for the glove compartment and pulled out the packet of cigarettes he'd bought from the corner shop. There was something wrong with the lighter — it wouldn't hold still, the flame trembling past the end of the cigarette until he used both hands. He dragged the smoke deep into his scarred lungs.

Coughed. Spluttered.

Then wound down the window.

At least it was a bit cooler for a change. Yesterday the ratty little car he'd picked up for two hundred pounds at Thainstone Mart was like an oven. His very first car and it was a piece-of-shit three-door Fiat in diarrhoea brown that smelled of old lady, stale cigarettes, and mould. But it'd been cheap, and it would do.

He sat there, smoke curling out of the window, trying not to shiver. Wasn't even that cold. Stupid.

Logan didn't trust the dashboard clock — half the electrics were shot — so he checked his watch instead. Nearly half ten.

Bloody doctor. What did he know? Not fit to return to work. Logan wasn't the one they should be sending home, it was that moron Beattie. Detective Inspector Beardy Beattie. How the hell could they promote Beattie? What idiot thought that was a good idea?

The cigarette tasted like burning flesh, so Logan ground it out in the car's ashtray, along with the corpses of its half-smoked friends.

He covered his mouth as a jaw-splitting yawn tore free. Then shoogled about in the lumpy seat, trying to get comfortable. Two whole days sitting outside a closed school. Must be mad… Everything goes bright.

The noise hits a fraction of a second later, and then the heat: blistering the paintwork on the door, flames billowing into the room. Screaming- Logan sat bolt upright, banged his knee on the steering wheel, then slumped back into his seat. 'Fuck!'

He sat there, clutching his leg, heart thumping, feeling sick. Struggling to breathe.

There was a packet of caffeine tablets in the carrier bag at his feet — he washed four down with a tin of Red Bull. Shuddered. Swore. Lit another trembling cigarette.

Jesus…

Every.

Single.

Time.

Someone slumped past on the other side of the road, head down, shopping bags in hand. Bowed by the weight of the world and every bastard in it. Logan toasted him with the tin of Red Bull. 'Screw them all.'

The scruffy old man stooped to tie his shoelace. Then stood and stared across the road at the empty school.

He was wearing a brown corduroy jacket with frayed cuffs, a pair of faded jeans with turn-ups. Scrappy beard. Grey hair sticking out at all angles. Glasses.

'Ah…' Logan smiled. 'About time you showed up.'

He waited for the old man to shamble across the road, then stepped out of the car; not bothering to lock it — what self-respecting thief would be seen dead stealing something like that?

The old man stopped at the playground fence, looking wistfully through the railings at the dark, silent building beyond. And then he turned and started to walk away again.

Logan shouted, 'Want to see some puppies, Rory?'

The old man dropped his carrier bags and ran for it.

He didn't get far. Logan grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and rammed him into the nearest tree, hard enough to make the man's glasses fly off into the gutter.

'Aaaagh… get off me! I'm not-'

'The schools closed last week, you idiot: summer holidays. No kiddies for you.' Logan pulled him back and slammed him into the tree again, bouncing the little sod's forehead off the bark.

'Aaaaagh. Jesus…'

When Logan let go, Rory Simpson slumped to the pavement, holding his head as if it were about to split in two. Up close he stank of BO, greasy hair, and unwashed clothes.

'You look like shit.'

He scowled up at Logan. 'You can talk… attacking innocent people like that…'

'Innocent?'

'I think I'm bleeding. Am I bleeding? I need to go to the hospital.' He pulled his hands from his forehead and checked them for signs of blood. Nothing. 'Probably got a concussion. I- Hey!'

Logan hauled him to his feet. 'The glasses your idea of a disguise, Rory? What, you think you're Clark Kent? That shite might work on the good people of Metropolis, but you're in Aberdeen now.'

The little man went back to massaging his forehead. 'That's police brutality, you know.'

'It's called resisting arrest.' He tightened his grip on Rory's collar and dragged him towards the car.

'Wait! Wait — my shopping! My glasses…' Hands flapping towards his fallen possessions.

Logan didn't let go, but he did let him pick up his stuff. Then marched him back to the ratty little Fiat. 'Get in.'

Rory stopped, peered in through the window, curled his top lip. 'Doesn't look very clean.'

Logan yanked the door open, hauled the driver's seat forward, and shoved him between the shoulder blades. Rory sprawled across the back seat, face down.

'Wrists together, behind your back.'

'But-'

'Don't fuck with me, Rory, coz I've had a shitty week and I'm just dying for someone to take it out on. Understand? Now put your bloody hands behind your bloody back!'