Stuart Macbride - Blind Eye

'Stop it.' Someone was grabbing at Logan's sleeve, but he shook them off.

'But I didn't do-'

'Stop it! Stop with the bloody comedy paedophile act! It's not fucking funny!' He was shaking, whisky and outrage surging through his veins, both hands curled into fists, just waiting for Rory to say something. Anything.

'Paedophile?' Susan stared at Logan, and then at Rory. Then she turned on Steel. 'He's a paedophile? You brought a paedophile into this house?'

'I… we… I didn't want to worry-'

'How dare you? How fucking dare you?'

Steel reached for her. 'Susan, I can explain: it was-'

'DON'T TOUCH ME!' Susan backed off, glowering at them. 'How could you bring that filthy pervert into my house? How could you lie to me?' She took a deep breath, then spat in Rory's face. 'You should've been drowned at birth!'

The little man bit his bottom lip and blinked. Blinked again. A fat tear welled over the edge of his red-rimmed eye and trickled down the side of his nose. Then he struggled to his feet and walked out of the kitchen. Didn't even slam the door behind him. The evening was balmy, an ocean-blue sky dotted with islands of high white cloud. The sound of a sprinkler came from a nearby garden, the 'Fssssssssss, ftt, ftt, ftt, fssssssssssss…' overlaid with the sound of laughing children. Fat pigeons, cooing in a thick green hedge. All managing to make Logan feel even more depressed than he already was.

Wiktorja came out into the back garden, pulled out the chair opposite and sat down in the shade of a big holly bush.

Logan didn't look up. 'How's Rory?'

'You should not have hit him.'

Fair point.

'He just…' Logan closed his eyes. Deep breath. 'He's OK most of the time, but…'

'I do not think your inspector is very pleased with you.'

Which was an understatement. Susan had stormed off to her mother's, with Steel hurrying after her, trying to explain that it wasn't her idea and she hadn't wanted to do it and it was all Finnie's fault and if Susan would just slow down they could talk about it and it was only supposed to be for a couple of days and she was really, really sorry…

Logan took another sip of whisky, trying not to think about the look of betrayal on Rory's face. 'It was an accident.'

'He says it is not the first time you have hit him.'

'I didn't… I didn't mean to. It just sort of happened.'

Wiktorja looked at him, but Logan couldn't meet her eyes.

'I know Rory Simpson looks like this nice little old man, but he's not. We've caught him four times interfering with little girls, none of them older than six. God knows how many times he's got away with it. I just…' He pulled out his cigarettes, but the pack was empty. He scrunched it up. Threw it away. Ran a hand across his face. 'I don't know.'

They sat in silence for a while, listening to the sounds of a balmy Thursday evening. Then Wiktorja said, 'I was suspended, because of what happened in Nowa Huta. Eight months undercover work, wasted.' She snapped her fingers. 'Eight months convincing Ehrlichmann I was a drug dealer from Warsaw, looking to move up. Eight months pumping his thugs for information on the Watchmaker: Gorzkiewicz.'

Logan stared at her. 'You what?'

'I have not been entirely honest with you, but-'

'Damn right you haven't!'

She finished her whisky. 'What was I supposed to do? It was bad enough you knew I was a police officer.'

'How could you be undercover?'

'Did you really think we had to go to the cathedral in Krakow to pray? I had to contact my handler, tell him we had an address for Gorzkiewicz.'

Logan scowled. 'And the next thing you know we're getting our arses shot off.'

'I am sorry. I should never have taken you with me to Nowa Huta. It was irresponsible.'

Logan reached for his whisky, the liquid sloshing in the trembling glass. 'Did they find his body? The man I shot?'

'I should have called for backup…'

'Did they check the hospitals? Doctors? Maybe he's not dead.'

'Do you know how many departments are after Gorzkiewicz? All of them. I had him at the end of my gun and I let him go.'

'Wiktorja!'

She looked up. 'What?'

'Did they find the man I shot?'

'There was a lot of blood near the Trabant, but…' She shrugged. 'Hospitals must report anyone admitted with gunshot wounds, so Ehrlichmann has his own doctors. He does not want the policja involved.'

'You're sure it was Ehrlichmann?'

'I am sure.'

'And your handler?'

'Disappeared.'

Logan sagged in his chair and took a mouthful of whisky, not really tasting anything but cordite and concrete dust. 'Every night. I dream about that bloody apartment and that bloody explosion every bloody night.'

She reached across the table and took his hand. 'I know.' The clock on the cooker was broken or something: wouldn't stay in focus for more than a couple of seconds. Logan squinted one eye shut and tried again. Seven o'clock and they'd just about killed the bottle of Highland Park. He lurched back out into the garden with a couple of packets of things. You know: crunchy things. Salt and vinegar, stuff like that.

He bumped into the table and let the packets fall from his hands. 'Help yourself.'

Wiktorja did, fumbling with a yellow bag, and then there were prawn cocktail Skips all over the place. 'Oops.' She levered herself up and wobbled back and forth a bit.

Probably a bit drunk. She'd had quite a lot to drink.

Logan took one step forward, and leant on the garden wall, only the damn thing wasn't where it was supposed to be, and he sort of staggered a little.

Wiktorja laughed at him. 'You are pijany.'

'No I'm not.'

'Yes you are. You are pijany. Drunk.'

'I'm not pijany, you're pijany.'

Wiktorja held up her good arm, posing like the Statue of Liberty. 'OK, I am pijany.' She picked up one of the little shell-like disks and stuck it on the end of her tongue. Then stepped in close. 'We are both pijany.'

Logan grinned. 'I'm not pijany, I'm an idiot.'

'No, you are not an idiot.' Her face softened. And then she was kissing him; prawn cocktail tongues on a sun-soaked Thursday evening.

Upstairs in one of the spare bedrooms they struggled out of their clothes, Logan helping Wiktorja with the buttons and zippers she couldn't get at because of her arm being in a sling. They collapsed onto the bed, wrapped around each other. Kissing, groping, fondling. She'd been telling the truth — not a real blonde after all…

And then it all went wrong.

Logan let go and rolled over onto his back. 'I can't do this.'

She lurched up until she was looming over him, breasts brushing the scars on his torso. 'You do not like me any more?'

'I do. I just… I can't do this.' He let out a little grunt as she grabbed him somewhere private.

'This bit says you can.'

Dead puppies. Warts. DI Steel in a thong. The last image had the desired effect, and Wiktorja said, 'Oh… Not any more.'

'I like you, I really do, but we're pijany. And I'm seeing someone.'

'You are? Cholera.' She sat back on her haunches. 'Is she prettier than me?' Then she punched him in the thigh. 'How can you be seeing someone?'

'It's complicated and-'

The long, sonorous biiiiiing-bonnnng of the doorbell saved him. Logan scrambled out of bed and into his trousers, in too much of a hurry to bother about socks or pants. 'I'd better get that.'

'Wait, but we have not-'

He shut the bedroom door behind him, pulling on his shirt as he thumped down the stairs, barefoot.

Biiiiiing-bonnnng…

'Coming.' He was all buttoned up and tucking his shirt into his trousers as he reached the front door.

Biiiiiing-bonnnng…

'I said I'm coming! God's sake…' Logan could see the distorted shape of whoever it was through the rippled glass on one side of the door. He unlatched the chain — having to concentrate to make his drunken fingers work — then undid the deadbolt.