Stuart MacBride - Dark Blood

‘You try lighting a petrol bomb wearing padded gloves. How do you get the lighter to spark?’

‘Aye, well, maybe she-’

‘What, took the gloves off, set the wick, lit it, then put her gloves back on to chuck the thing?’

The reporter stared at him. ‘You’d be surprised what you get used to when you have to wear gloves all the time.’

Sigh. ‘Yes: it was all my fault and I’m sorry. Happy?’

‘I’m just-’

‘Every damn time…’ Logan reached over and poked the laptop’s ‘next’ button a couple of times, flicking through the photographs. ‘Anyway, she chucked two petrol bombs, there wasn’t time to get her gloves off and on between them.’ He flicked through to the end of the sequence, then back again.

Someone was standing next to Miss Black-and-White-Bobble-Hat in every single photograph. A young-ish man with the same curly brown hair; the same green eyes; the same snub nose; the same expression on his face.

Lynch mob, a game all the family can play.

Colin leaned forward, staring at the faces. Then gave a low whistle.

‘What?’

He pointed at the screen.

‘And?’

‘Do you lot no’ do any research?’ He tapped the young man right between the eyes. ‘That’s Ian Leadbetter. See his grandad? Supposed to be one of Knox’s earlier victims. What the hell was it…’ Colin screwed up one side of his face. ‘Seventy-six-year-old, Parkinson’s, went missin’ from a park. Cops found him six hours later on a patch of waste ground, bashed and bruised. Wouldn’t talk about it. Wouldn’t take a rape kit.’

Another poke. ‘The kids’ parents were all for keepin’ it quiet, but wee Ian here’s been shootin’ his mouth off to anyone who’ll listen. Wants Knox strung up for what he did to his grandad.’

‘Any proof?’

‘Says the old man saw Knox’s picture in the paper when he was released a couple years ago and wouldn’t come out of his room for a week. Got blootered a month later and told Ian all about it.’

‘He could still make a formal complaint.’

Colin shrugged. ‘Bit difficult when you’re sittin’ in a wee brass urn on the mantelpiece. Pneumonia, three months ago.’

Good point.

‘Can you email me a copy of the photos?’

‘Do you one better…’ Colin dug about in his jacket with his stumpy-fingered hand, and produced a little blue USB stick with ‘THE ABERDEEN EXAMINER, SERVING THE NORTH EAST SINCE 1856’ printed on the side.

Snoring rattled the windows of the CID pool car. Steel was slumped back in the passenger seat, a dead cigarette butt dangling from her open mouth, stuck to her lower lip — a slug-trail of ash tumbling away down the front of her padded jacket.

Logan tried the door handle.

Locked.

The street was almost deserted: the media hadn’t hung around after the fire engines had gone. A burning house was news. A burnt-out shell was old news. One by one they’d drifted off till all that was left was Sandy the photographer’s antique Volkswagen, and DI Steel’s pool car.

Logan tried the door again, just in case it had magically unlocked itself in the last ninety seconds.

It hadn’t.

He knocked on the passenger window. Steel jerked upright in her seat, blinking, the cigarette butt still stuck to her bottom lip.

Logan knocked again.

The inspector wiped a hand across her mouth, sending the butt tumbling into her lap, then frowned at him.

‘Come on, it’s bloody freezing out here!’

She leaned over and opened the driver’s door. Logan scrambled in behind the wheel and turned the engine over, then cranked up the heat — treadling the accelerator, trying to get it to warm up faster.

‘Was having this really… weird dream about Gloria Hunniford, and she was wearing this huge black cloak, and carrying a scythe…’

Logan held up the little USB drive Colin had given him. ‘Got the arsonist and her accomplice on film.’

‘And she had this massive red strap-on, and she wanted-’

‘You still got that Airwave handset on you?’

Steel blinked again. Then shuddered. ‘How long does it take to get hypothermia?’

‘Mobile phone’ll do.’

Steel passed over her little Nokia, and Logan punched in the number for Control, then waited for someone to pick up at the other end.

‘Yeah, I need you to run a PNC check on one Ian Leadbetter, Newcastle, late teens/early twenties. While you’re there, see if he’s got a sister, or a female cousin.’

‘Hud oan a mintie…’

He pinned the phone between his shoulder and his ear, flipped his notepad open, and pulled the lid off his biro with his teeth. ‘Uh-huh…’ Scribbling down the details as Control gave him everything the Police National Computer had on Ian and Wendy Leadbetter.

‘Right, I need you to get a lookout request on both of them.’

‘Fit for?’

‘Arson — Richard Knox’s house.’

‘Oh aye? You sure we shouldnae gie them a medal instead?’

‘Just get them picked up.’ He snapped the phone shut and handed it back.

‘Got any fags?’

‘All out.’ He clicked on the headlights and pulled away from the kerb, the Vauxhall’s wheels crunching through the snow.

‘In that case, you can drop us off at home on your way back to the station.’

Logan groaned. ‘It’s nearly eleven! I’m not going back to the-’

‘You’ve got to sign the pool car back in, you idiot. And while you’re at it, check on the search teams. I want to know what else is lurking in Gallagher and Yates’ Grotto O’Fun.’

‘But-’

‘And tell Big Gary I said to put us both down till midnight on the overtime. Got a kid on the way, after all.’

Night-time CID were all gathered around the middle set of desks in the office, drinking tins of Irn-Bru and sharing two coffee-table-sized pizzas, the smell of garlic, tomato and spicy sausage hanging in the air — Detective Inspector Bell handing out the food and telling stories of the good old days.

Logan turned down a slice, and slumped over to the DSs’ cubbyhole. Someone had stuck up a sheet of A4 on the wall, with ‘THE WEE HOOSE’ printed on it. The door was locked.

‘Oh for fuck’s…’ He closed his eyes, screwed up his face. Then placed a hand against the wood.

Know what: who cared? Steel would just have to wait for her update. It wasn’t as if she could do anything about it till the morning anyway. And at least this way he’d be home before midnight — hopefully to find Samantha still at the flat.

Logan turned on his heel, and the door clunked open behind him.

Crap.

He turned back and pushed through into the little room.

Doreen’s desk was as immaculate as ever, Mark’s was covered with dusty cardboard boxes from the archives, but Biohazard Bob’s was a disaster area. He was sitting with his back to the door, ruffling a sheath of paper into some kind of order.

Logan paused. ‘You weren’t in here playing with yourself, were you, Bob?’

The DS cleared his throat. Didn’t look around. ‘Just getting caught up on some paperwork.’

‘With the door locked?’

Shrug. He ran a hand across his face. ‘What you doing here? Thought your shift ended six hours ago.’

‘You and me both.’ Logan collapsed into his office chair, jabbed a finger at the computer’s power button. ‘Ding-Dong’s got pizza out there if you fancy it?’

Another shrug. ‘Not hungry.’

Silence. Just the whirr and bleep of the machine coming online.

‘You OK, Bob?’

Pause.

‘Yeah. Fine. Never better.’

‘OK…’ Logan logged into the crime management system and called up the Police Search Advisor’s contact details, then dug out the Airwave handset from under a pile of junk in his top drawer and punched in her warrant number.