Stuart MacBride - Shatter the Bones

Logan smiled. ‘“Git-bag”?’

‘Well, he is.’ The foil square was perfectly mirror smooth. She scrumpled it up into ball. ‘You know that Finnie and Bain are worried SOCA are going to take over the McGregor investigation?’

Bob nodded. ‘They’ll be all over us like Gary Glitter in an orphanage.’

‘Don’t be disgusting.’ She dropped the foil ball in his empty mug. ‘And they’ve no intention of taking over. I heard Green talking on his mobile last night — they won’t touch this case with a bargepole. We’ve got nothing to go on: no leads, no witnesses, no forensics. If they move in they’ll be just as stuck as we are.’

‘Ah…’ Logan stuck his mug back on the table. Winced slightly. His right arm ached — one huge mess of blue and purple and green where Shuggie Webster had pounded his fist into it. ‘So when the deadline comes round on Thursday morning, and we’ve got no choice but to hand over the ransom money, they don’t want to be the ones in charge.’

Doreen slumped over her coffee. ‘Exactly: they point the finger at us for messing everything up, we get the blame, and they take over as soon as we get Alison and Jenny back.’

‘Dirty bastards.’ Bob stabbed the table with a finger. ‘We do all the sodding about, and they swoop in and interview the only witnesses we’re likely to get.’ He raised one cheek off his seat, squinted an eye shut, then sighed. ‘Right, I’m off.’

Bob disappeared, giggling.

The smell, when it hit, was like being battered around the head with a mouldy colostomy bag.

Rennie was waiting for Logan in the little makeshift office, sitting at the borrowed desk peering at the laptop’s screen, his fingers rattling across the keys.

‘You better not be messing about on some porn chat site.’ Logan placed a wax-paper cup next to the mouse. ‘Coffee. For not dumping me in it with Professional Standards.’

‘Ooh, thanks, Sarge.’ He creaked the plastic lid off and nodded at a small stack of paper. ‘Been looking up kidnappings — got seven years’ worth so far.’

Logan picked up the PNC printouts and leafed through them. ‘Anything?’

‘Nothing even vaguely like the McGregors. There’s not as many legit kidnappings as you’d think — with proper ransom notes and stuff — most are drug dealers getting nabbed by rivals, a couple of silly sods kidnapping themselves for the attention, and about a dozen tigers.’ He raised an eyebrow. Probably waiting to be asked what a ‘tiger’ was.

Tough.

Logan dumped the pile on the desk. ‘What about older cases?’

‘You know: when you abduct someone’s family, ’cos you want them to help you rob their bank or something?’

‘You want me to take that coffee back?’

‘Just trying to-’

‘Rennie!’

A sigh. ‘I’ve got an appointment with the force historian at ten. She’s got a bunch of stuff booked out for an exhibition she’s putting on.’

‘Good. While you’re there, see if you can’t go back another ten years, just to be on the safe side.’ Whatever shite-storm Napier was whipping up with SOCA, no one was going to accuse Logan of not being thorough.

The constable groaned. ‘Can we not stick this stuff on the back burner for a bit? I mean, I could help you interview Alison’s student mates instead? Maybe we can crack the case: get Alison and Jenny back before Superintendent Soapy-Tit-Wank takes it off us?’ He struck a pose, one hand on his chest, the other reaching out towards the manky ceiling tiles. ‘Rennie and McRae save the day!’ A grin. ‘Hey, that rhymes.’

Logan chewed on the inside of his lip. ‘You want to help interview everyone on Alison McGregor’s course?’

Nod. ‘OK, you can.’

‘Woot!’ Rennnie punched the air. ‘Thanks, Sarge!’

‘Just as soon as you’ve finished digging stuff out of the archives.’

‘Nope.’ Sergeant Eric Mitchell looked up from his computer screen, then ran a finger through his oversized moustache, sunlight glinting off his bald head. ‘Everything’s booked out.’

‘How can everything be booked out?’ Logan tried to peer at the screen, but Eric twisted it away.

‘Finnie’s got everyone off interviewing doctors and vets again, that’s why. Take a bus like normal people. Or get a taxi.’

‘Right. A taxi. You ever tried to claim one of those back on expenses?’

‘So walk.’

‘To Hillhead?’

‘Ahem…’ The voice came from just over Logan’s shoulder. ‘Perchance I can be of assistance, young Logie? I happen to be going that way myself.’

Logan closed his eyes. ‘I’m not sharing a car with you, Bob.’

‘I’ll let you drive?’ Bob jangled a set of keys at him. ‘Come on, what’s the worst that could happen?’

Logan climbed out into the cool morning and slammed the pool car’s door shut. Hauled in a lungful of clean air.

Bob got out of the other side. ‘What? I opened the window, didn’t I?’

‘You need medical help. Or a bloody cork.’

‘Better out than in, as my granny always said.’ He stood and stared up at the soulless collection of Stalin-style concrete apartment blocks, then bit at his top lip. ‘Don’t fancy coming in with me, do you? I fucking hate suicides.’

‘Thought you took the body in yesterday?’

‘Yeah, but…’ He shuffled his shoulders beneath his shiny grey suit jacket. ‘Murder’s different: something horrible happened and we catch whatever sick bastard did it. Make sure the victim gets justice. With suicide, they’re the same person.’ He sniffed. ‘Don’t tell me it’s not creepy. Bloody depressing too.’

The room wasn’t huge, just enough space for a single bed, a built-in wardrobe, a little table and one chair. A pair of bookshelves sat above the desk, full of dog-eared medical textbooks. The obligatory Monet, Klimt, and Star Wars posters. A copy of FHM lay on the floor by the bed. ‘KAREN GETS THEM OUT! IS THERE A DOCTOR IN THE HOUSE?’

The little window looked out onto yet another block of student accommodation. Pale and drab and lifeless.

‘Bruce Sangster, twenty-one. Got pissed on Highland Park, then shot himself full of morphine, tied a plastic bag over his head, never woke up again.’ Bob tucked his hands into his armpits. ‘Twenty-one and you go do that to yourself. What a fucking waste.’

Whisky, opiates, and suffocation. It wasn’t a cry for help: whatever Bruce Sangster was running away from he’d made bloody sure it wasn’t going to catch him. How could anyone’s life be so bad they’d just throw it all away?

Bob shuddered. ‘Was going to be a doctor…’

Medical textbooks and lads’ mags weren’t the only reading material in the place. There was a little pile of Heat, Hello!, Now and OK! : ‘ALISON’S SECRET SCHOOLGIRL SHAME: “I WAS A TEENAGE TEARAWAY”, ADMITS BNBS SEMI-FINALIST.’

DI Steel had got it word perfect. Which was worrying.

Logan picked the magazine up and skimmed through all the cheesy smiles, fake tan, flock wallpaper and chandeliers, until he got to Alison McGregor’s photo. She was sitting in her living room, looking off into the middle distance, holding that framed portrait of Doddy in his uniform. Hair: immaculate, make-up: perfect, dressed in a silky top that managed to be respectable and revealing at the same time.

No doubt about it, she was a very attractive woman. Very, very attractive.

The article seemed to be about her admitting she’d done everything Vicious Vikki accused her of. And more. Acting out because her foster parents couldn’t relate to her on an emotional level, whatever the hell that meant. Then she’d met Doddy and discovered she wasn’t a horrible person after all and there was more to life than drinking, smoking, and vandalizing bus shelters. Along came the little miracle that was Jenny growing inside her, then the tragedy of losing Doddy’s parents, a fairytale wedding, the birth…