Stuart Macbride - Blind Eye

'Nothing.'

'Well, she's making little effigies of you out of Blu-Tack and whacking them in the balls with a stapler.'

Logan swigged back the last mouthful of tea, handed the empty mug to Rennie, and made for the garage. 'Keep an eye on Rory this morning, OK? He's feeling a bit delicate.'

He hauled the door up and slipped inside.

Rennie followed.

The crappy Fiat looked as if it had aged overnight; it was covered in a thin film of dust, fresh cobwebs stretching from the wing-mirrors to the windows.

'This yours?' Rennie wandered around Logan's car, kicking the tyres. 'Nice colour: looks like a motorized turd.'

'It was cheap. And shut up.' Logan climbed in behind the wheel. The key skittered around the ignition before finally going in. The engine started the long squealing grind into life. Then died.

Rennie leant on the roof and peered in through the driver's window. 'Want a push?'

'Go away.'

'Just being nice.' He stood back as the Fiat's engine finally resurrected itself with a loud backfire and a cloud of black smoke. 'Jesus, this thing doesn't need a push, it needs a decent burial.' He waved a hand in front of his face, coughing. 'And before I forget: someone's waiting for you at the station. Woman called Branding?'

'Branding?'

'Branding, Branson? Something like that. Blonde, pretty, about this tall, nice boobs. Got a little dog in a stupid-looking coat?'

Wonderful. As if today wasn't going to be bad enough. She was pacing up and down in reception, picking the varnish off her scarlet nails. The terrier scurried along in her wake, wagging its tail, and sniffing the passers-by. Today the dog was wearing pastel blue with lime-green diamonds, as if it was heading off for a round of golf later.

All the interview rooms were in use, so Logan steered her through the front doors and out into the sunshine.

She peered up and down the street. 'Can we not go somewhere private?'

'Still haven't told me what you're doing here.'

'A whole hour I've been waiting!' She stooped and picked up her Westie, clutching it to her chest. 'What if someone sees me talking to you?'

'Hilary: what — do — you — want?'

'It's…' She looked at her dog, a passing car, the strange little shop across the road with its windows jammed full of shoes and boots and jackets and hats. Everywhere but at Logan. 'You have to let Colin go.'

'No I don't.' He hopped down from the wall and started walking back towards the station. 'Bye, Hilary.'

'Wait!' She grabbed his arm. 'It wasn't him; he wasn't even there. He was… He was with me.'

'It's an offence to give a false alibi, you know that don't you? Attempting to pervert the course of justice: look what happened to your mum-in-law.'

'It's not a false anything, we were together, OK?' A blush raced all the way up from her cleavage to her forehead. 'Simon was still in hospital and we… It was…' Silence.

'Your husband's in hospital with his eyes gouged out and you're at home shagging his brother?'

She let go of Logan's sleeve, turned away. 'It wasn't like that.'

'How long's it been going on?'

'You can't tell anyone. He'll kill me if he finds out. And I don't mean figuratively: I mean he'll kill me.'

Logan gave her a small round of applause, and she stared at him.

'Got to hand it to you, Hilary: that was a great performance. "He'll kill me!" Classic. You should try for tears next time though, give it a bit of realism.'

'It's true!'

'No it's not. You're lying to get Colin out of prison. You McLeods are all the bloody same. If he was with you all night, playing hide the sausage, why did he have a hammer in his garage with Harry Jordan's blood on it?'

'Because… That was from before, when…' She went back to staring at the shop across the road. 'When he did Harry's knees.'

'So you're saying Colin crippled him, but didn't go back for seconds?'

Hilary laughed, short and bitter. 'If he had, Harry wouldn't be a coma, he'd be in a coffin.'

Logan ran a hand across his stubbly chin. 'I still can't believe you're having an affair with Creepy Colin McLeod.'

'Six years, off and on. It was… Simon's not the easiest man to live with. People always think gangsters are all violence and virile, but he's…' Her eyes sparkled, rimmed in red. 'Thank God for Viagra, eh?'

'Well-'

'He wakes up screaming in the middle of the night now. Ever since…'

Logan put a hand on her shoulder. 'Come on, we'll go inside. You can make a statement and-'

'No! No statements!' She clutched her scabby dog even tighter and the thing barked at Logan. 'I told you: he'll kill me!'

'What's the point of giving Colin an alibi if you won't do it properly?'

'Can't you just… you know: investigate, or something? If it wasn't Colin it must've been someone else. That's who you should be doing for attempted murder. Not him!'

The CID office was empty except for Logan and a single bluebottle. It buzzed and battered against the window, then disappeared up behind the Venetian blind, the plastic amplifying the noise. According to the duty whiteboard by the door, everyone else was off on a job: burglaries, muggings, fire raising, drug dealing, assaults, prostitution. The whole colourful pageant of big city life.

Logan made himself a cup of tea and slumped behind his desk. The paperwork had backed up while he'd been off on the sick, piles of forms, reports, spreadsheets and statistics all needing urgent attention so some government idiot could pretend they were tough on crime…

But really Logan was just hiding from DI Steel.

And besides, how much of an idiot did Hilary Brander think he was? Having an affair with Creepy Colin McLeod? Who was she kidding? Everyone knew the man had a hard-on for junky prostitutes. She wasn't even a good liar.

Logan took a mouthful of tea, looked at his pile of paperwork, sniffed, then made a start.

Half an hour later he unearthed a padded envelope addressed to 'DETECTIVE SERGEANT LOGAN MCRAE, GRAMPIAN POLICE, FORCE HEADQUARTERS, QUEEN'S STREET, ABERDEEN, SCOTLAND' in a child's painstaking block capitals.

He fought his way through the straightjacket of Sellotape and poured the contents onto his desk: photocopied bits of paper in Polish and Russian. Rafal Gorzkiewicz's file on the man who blinded him: Vadim Mikhailovitch Kravchenko.

There was even a copy of the army photograph they'd seen at the flat. Rory's e-fit had been spot on. Kravchenko hadn't changed much. Obviously he was older and had a few more wrinkles, but other than that he was exactly the same, right down to the scar on his chin.

'Still alive then?'

'Hmm?' Logan swivelled his chair.

DS Pirie was standing in the doorway, running a hand through his curly red hair. 'Not seen Rennie have you?'

Logan picked a pile of burglary reports from the pile and dumped them on top of the Kravchenko file, burying it from view. 'No. Well, not since this morning. Think he's off questioning security guards for DI Steel again. Or something.'

'Ah… Finnie's not going to like that. He's already pissed off she's got you assigned full time. Says it's pandering to the sick-note culture: we should all be thrown in at the deep end, not mollycoddled.'

'That's nice.'

'If this was the First World War, he'd probably have you taken outside and shot.' Pirie settled back against the door frame. 'Seriously though: you OK?'

'Why does everyone keep asking that?'

'Only you look like a pile of shite with a hangover.'

Logan stiffened. 'I've got a cold!'

The DS snorted. 'Yeah, good luck with that. Might work better if you eat a pack of Lockets though, menthol might cover the smell of stale booze.' He pulled himself upright. 'We all know Beattie's going to screw up sooner or later. And when he does, they'll bust his beardy arse back to sergeant, and that DI's post will be up for grabs again. Twenty quid says I get it.'