Stuart MacBride - Dark Blood

Logan stiffened. ‘Rennie comes in here and grabs your arse?’

Little bastard.

‘So, where you taking me for dinner?’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘What’s that horrible smell?’

‘I’ll bloody kill him.’

She patted Logan on the cheek with a latex glove, talking in a flat, deadpan voice, ‘Oh yeah, you’re so manly and butch. Uh-huh, it really turns me on. Etcetera.’ She dropped her hand. ‘Told him I’d kick his knackers up round his nipples if he does it again.’

‘Why’s he grabbing your arse at all?’

‘Don’t be so jealous.’ She turned back to the light box. ‘He does it then runs away giggling like a schoolgirl. Don’t think you’ve got anything to worry about.’

He was still a little bastard.

Tiny wrinkles appeared between her eyebrows, then she leaned in and sniffed again. ‘It’s you! Why do you smell of sick?’

Logan hefted the evidence bags onto the table. ‘Any chance…?’

Samantha groaned. ‘Might have known. And there was me thinking you’d come to carry me off to a nice romantic restaurant.’

‘I didn’t mean-’

‘What is it anyway?’ She pointed at the clear plastic evidence bag — the one full of Angus’s little white parcels. ‘Heroin?’

‘Hopefully.’

‘Ooooo, these are nice…’ She picked up one of the boxed hair straighteners. ‘Hundred quid in Boots. Make a good Valentine’s Day present for a loved one, don’t you think? You know, if you wanted to let them know you weren’t a tight-arsed skinflint with no prospect of ever getting his leg over again.’

‘Subtle.’

She poked at the other bags. ‘You want the iPods and perfume tested too?’

‘Might as well.’

She frowned at the bag with the money in it, snapped on a fresh pair of gloves, and pulled out one of the bundles. Unfolding the origami shape till it was a stack of battered-looking twenty-pound notes. ‘Jesus, these things are everywhere.’

Logan leant against the central unit. ‘You wouldn’t believe the kind of day I’ve-’

‘Got to admire the workmanship.’ She flicked on the light box and held a note against the glowing surface. The metallic strip showed up like a malignant shadow on an X-ray. ‘Clydesdale-Bank-issue Robert the Bruce twenty, circa 1994. Still in circulation.’ She opened a drawer, took out a jeweller’s glass and squinted through the magnifying lens at the note. ‘Real money, you’ve got about eighty, eighty-five different inks, all printed one after another. These are CMYK. Resolution’s amazing though…’

Logan picked one of the notes out of the bundle. ‘Looks OK to me.’

She straightened up. ‘Paper’s too white. They don’t make the original stock any more, and it wasn’t available for public sale anyway. Whoever’s making them’s faked up the watermark pretty well, but the trouble is making them look old enough. So they stick them in a cold tumble drier with a bunch of tea towels, or socks, or something, and squirt in some stewed tea every now and then. Softens them up and makes them all sepia. Good enough to fool the punters.’

She delved into the bag and took out another bundle. ‘They’re doing fives now too! How cool is that?’

Logan smiled, pulled up the bill of her baseball cap, and kissed her on the forehead. ‘If I’d known counterfeit cash got you this excited, I’d have brought some home ages ago.’

She pushed him away, smiling. ‘Cheeky. Give me a couple minutes to finish up.’ Samantha pointed at the nine iron. ‘DS Taylor got herself a murder. Wife paid a couple of blokes to teach her cheating husband a lesson with his own golf clubs. They kinda got carried away…’

‘Lucky old Doreen.’

‘You know, maybe we should skip the restaurant — grab a curry, go home, and climb into a nice hot bath. Get all soapy…’ She stepped in close, chest-to-chest, and kissed him, running her hands through his hair.

Logan flinched back — hot shards stabbing out across the back of his head. ‘Ow!’

‘Not still sore, is it?’ She grabbed him, turned him around, then Logan could feel her fingers working their way across his scalp. ‘What the hell did you do to yourself? Got another lump like a pickled egg back here. You collecting them?’

‘Like I said: it’s been a bad day.’ He forced a smile. ‘Now tell me again about getting all soapy.’

‘C’mon, Sparks, just a wee one, eh?’ She flutters her eyelashes, big thick black things like mouldy caterpillars. ‘Please?’

Sparks turns his back, gives her the hard shoulder…or is that only on motorways? Fucked if he knows. Shouldn’t be parking on the hard shoulder: no, no, no. Dangerous. Saw this bloke on that CCTV camera show getting his piece of shit Mondeo squashed by an eighteen-wheeler. Fuck kind of car is called ‘Mondeo’ anyway? What: some marketing cunt couldn’t come up with a better name than-

‘Sparks? Come on, it’s fuckin’ freezin’ out here.’

Big Eleanor’s right for a change — it is fucking freezing. Big bastard flakes of snow, coming down like…dandruff or something.

She sidles up, gives him a smile with that bullet-hole mouth of hers. ‘Give us a cuddle…’

She snakes her arms around him, big chunky things, like a fucking anaconda. ‘Ooh, you’re all warm.’ She lays a padded cheek against his neck, a cold pillow of flesh, nuzzling in deeper.

Sparks is always warm, got one of them internal thermostat things, like central heating, always up full crank. Roasty toasty, fever fun.

‘Come on, Sparks, just a wee wrapper, yeah? Do you a favour for it?’ Big Eleanor’s hand drifts down his back and into his trousers. She wraps her cold fingers round one bony arse cheek and squeezes. Runs a wet tongue up his throat, scritching through the stubble.

Sparks wriggles free. ‘Fucksake, leave us alone, you horny fat cow.’

She steps back, bottom lip out, wobbling in the piss-yellow light like an epileptic slug. Big Eleanor sniffs. ‘Don’t be like that, Sparks, I’m only wantin’ a wee-’

‘No.’

She sticks her hand down the front of his trousers, rummaging about till she’s got hold of his cock. Squeezes. Steps in close again. ‘Just one wrap, couple of rocks, just to keep the cold-’

‘WILL YOU FUCK OFF?’ He shoves and she stumbles back, goes sprawling. Lies there with her wee black skirt up round her thighs, spotty, shaved minge on show.

Sparks wipes a string of spit off his chin. ‘Doing business here.’

Big Eleanor gets to her feet, pulls her skirt back into place, stamps her strappy high-heel down on the pavement and gives him the finger. ‘WANKER!’ She storms off, slipping and sliding on the snowy pavement.

Silly cow.

Like he’s going to do her a freebie? Fat chance.

And he’s no’ a wanker. No’ got time for wanking, got a beautiful girlfriend to keep him company.

He licks his lips.

She’s whispering from his jacket pocket. Telling him she wants it. Love him long time.

He shifts in his little spotlight. Looks up and down the street. Clears his throat.

Never touch the merchandise: never. No’ like Shaky Jake, silly cunt. Lot of good it does you when you’re on your back in intensive care with fucking gravel for ankle bones. Mr Mowat’s people don’t like sales staff with sticky fingers.

Sparks checks his watch: eight fifty-three and fourteen seconds. Fifteen seconds. Sixteen seconds. Looks up, makes sure he’s standing right under the streetlight, gotta be keen to be seen. Eighteen. Nineteen. Time is money, yeah, but money’s no’ time, is it: otherwise all them rich cunts would buy more of it and never have to die.

Fucking profound that is.