Craig Robertson - Snapshot

‘You reckon you know what this guy is up to, right?’

‘I’ve got a fair idea, yeah.’

Winter looked him straight in the eye.

‘Is it good or bad?’

‘That’s the million-dollar question, wee man. A million dollars. It could be both.’

Addison wound his window up again and turned to direct the driver towards the waiting nurse without another word.

Jan McConachie stared at her mobile phone and tried to summon up the courage to answer it. She dreaded doing so but knew that delaying it would only make him angrier and she could imagine how incensed he was already. He was a scumbag but he did love his son and she, more than most, knew just how desperate that could make a person.

She answered.

She’d expected that he might be ranting and raving, the way he often was, but instead his voice was low and measured and that scared the shit out of her. He was anxiously trying to keep his emotions in check but she could hear the fear and the rage bubbling under the surface.

‘You better have some news for me,’ he breathed.

‘I heard about your son,’ she replied. ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘Shut it. I don’t want to hear you even mention him. I want information.’

‘We don’t know for certain but what we are hearing suggests that it is Quinn’s people that were behind it.’

‘I fucking knew it,’ he seethed. ‘That bastard Riddle organized this.’

‘We don’t know that for sure,’ she insisted.

‘Well, find out,’ he roared. ‘Do your fucking job and find out. It’s what you’re paid for. Both by the polis and by me. My wee boy is fighting for his life and I’ll have revenge for this.’

He lowered his voice again.

‘My son means the world to me. You know what that’s like, don’t you?’

Jan’s heart pounded and she could hear the blood rushing in her ears.

‘I’ll find out everything I can. You don’t need to threaten her. You know she’s done nothing wrong. She doesn’t deserve this. She’s only eight. Please.’

‘Deserve? Don’t give me that pish. My boy doesn’t deserve what’s happened to him and don’t think for one second that I won’t use whatever I can to sort this. I don’t give a fuck about your daughter but you do. So find out what I need to know and I’ll keep putting bread on your table. If you don’t then someone else will be picking her up from school soon.’

Highburgh Road was always a wee bit too west-end trendy for Winter’s liking. Sure, the rooms had all the Victorian wood panels, stained-glass windows, cornicing and character that you’d want if you were into that kind of thing. But he never really saw the point in boasting that your flat had a butler’s pantry when you couldn’t get parked within a mile of the place. There were a ton of pubs and restaurants on its doorstep but it wasn’t a whole lot of use for him seeing as they weren’t allowed to go to them together. It was like being a liver-damaged eunuch serving champagne in a bordello.

Rachel liked it, though. She’d always wanted a pad in the west end and the truth was it was much more her style than his. When she spent all day, or sometimes all night, chasing the bad guys she wanted to get home and lock herself away behind three inches of security door, pour herself a glass of Sauvignon Blanc and chill under twelve-foot high ceilings while eating Kettle Chips. He was happy to lay his hat there, so to speak, four or five times a week.

He rang the intercom and waited. He virtually lived there but he didn’t have a key. It was her flat. Her flat, her remote control, her bed, her rules. If he had a key then the next thing he’d be expecting a say in what they watched on the television and that just wouldn’t do. It took her a while to pick up the phone upstairs and, as usual, she didn’t say anything, just left him listening to the crackly line.

‘It’s me,’ he said wearily.

The buzz meant she’d pressed the entry release so he leaned against the door, went up to the second floor and through the open door into the flat where he found Rachel sitting back on the bed with a selection of newspapers spread out before her. She didn’t look up when he went into the room, just tossed a paper to the side of the bed and picked another one up. She was wearing a pair of pyjama bottoms, a vest top, a seriously pissed-off expression and was almost shaking with anger.

‘Wankers.’

‘Today’s papers or tomorrow’s?’ Winter asked.

‘Tomorrow’s chip papers,’ she scowled. ‘I don’t know what I was thinking but I went out to Queen Street station to get the morning editions.’

‘What? You’ve always said-’

‘Aye, okay. I know that, alright? Just gimme peace. I’m annoyed enough as it is. They are making this sniper out to be some kind of fucking superman. I can’t believe it. And in the middle of all this ridiculous glorifying of a killer, “Melanie” or whatever her name really is, gets ignored. I’m sick of this.’

‘I was wondering…’ he started.

She looked at him doubtfully, sensing something she wouldn’t like.

‘Go on.’

‘If you had the choice, would you rather catch the guy who’s been shooting gangsters or the one who killed your prostitute?’

‘Jesus. What kind of question is that?’

‘One I’m interested in the answer to.’

She pondered, wondering whether to give him an honest reply, even if she wasn’t sure of it herself. Against her better judgement, she did.

‘For the sake of my career, I’d rather catch the sniper. If that didn’t come into it, then for the sake of the greater good I’d rather catch Melanie’s killer.’

‘Is that not some sort of moral fuck-up? To want to catch the killer of one person rather than the killer of five?’

Narey threw a copy of the Sun across the room, kicked the other papers off the bed and glared at him.

‘So are you here to screw me or what?’ she demanded. ‘Because if you’re not then I’m not really in the mood for talking. And if you are then hurry up, I’m on early in the morning.’

‘Who said romance was dead?’

‘Is that a no?’

‘Fucksake. You are a pain in the arse. It’s a yes but think yourself lucky.’

‘Oh aye, I’m so flattered.’

With that she pulled her vest top over her head and tilted her head to one side questioningly. It was discussion over. It was hard for a man to argue with perfect tits and she knew it.

He pulled his clothes off with an attempt at a grudging look on his face but another part of his anatomy gave the lie to it. Maybe he was cursed by the fact that she never looked better than when she was angry and those nut-brown eyes blazed. He grabbed the waistband of her pyjama bottoms and hauled them off her, throwing them to the side of the room. In turn, she grabbed at him and massaged him to the desired state, pulling him down and onto her. It was fast, furious and completely lacking in any social niceties. They wrestled, grabbed, slapped, swore, stabbed and thrusted. Speed, for once, seemed to be rated way higher than subtlety or technique. He pinned one of her arms with one hand and kept a tight hold of her hair with the other. It was enough for her to be pushed and pulled over the edge, coming a good bit before he did, barely bothering about waiting for him to join her.

She was asleep two minutes later, out like a light. Winter liked the idea that he had worn her out but he knew it was someone else that had done it. He had maybe sorted out her body but her mind had been fucked by the sniper and the prostitute killer. He also knew a lot of it was down to the Cutter murders and how badly she had come out of that. It was all happening again and she felt like she was chasing a runaway train.