Craig Robertson - Snapshot

He moved the prints of the dead dealer from one folder to another. He’d had to die to achieve it but Sammy had finally moved up a league. He’d been promoted from mundane murder to headline news even if the only person who knew it was Winter. He was in six-foot deep with Caldwell and Quinn, Strathie and Sturrock, Adamson and Haddow. His mammy would be proud at long last.

Winter’s phone broke the insufferable silence with a text from Addison.

Pub @ 8. Think of somewhere or else it’s the TSB.

It would be the Station Bar because Winter couldn’t be arsed deciding on another pub. He texted back to say okay, then phoned Rachel, bracing himself for the likelihood that her detective radar was switched on and she’d see through his flimsy half-lie. As it turned out, he didn’t have much need to worry. Either she bought his story about not feeling great or more likely she was up to her ears in her own case and it suited her just fine to be alone that night. That was already three nights in a row, and he missed her. The speed with which she agreed and hung up suggested she didn’t miss him quite as much.

It was okay. He knew there was another man in her life right now and that it wasn’t one he should be jealous of. It came with the job and anyway, Winter now had another nine men in his. All dead.

He had a couple of hours before heading to Cowcaddens to meet Addison in the TSB so he decided to go online and see what he could learn about Kieran McKendrick. If there wasn’t enough there then he’d head to the Mitchell Library and go through the back copies of the papers. There were plenty of people on the force he could ask but that was a no-no for now. He wanted to keep this to himself and there wasn’t a reason for that he could come up with that didn’t scare him. No reason that wasn’t wrong, one way or another.

He booted up his laptop and googled the name, coming up with a selection of photographers, chip shops, pub landlords, football players and genealogy searches. He added ‘drugs death’ and hit enter. There were just three results. He picked the one from the Daily Record , all seven paragraphs of it. More than your average stabbing got.

‘ Teen drugs death blamed on miaow-miaow ’, ran the headline

The victim of a suspected drugs death in Glasgow has been named as Kieran McKendrick.

The 17-year-old was found dead in the entrance to a tenement block in the Dennistoun area yesterday. It is believed he was abandoned there by friends after having a reaction to the drug mephedrone.

Police say the teenager had taken mephedrone in the hours preceding his death. A full toxicology report has been called for and Strathclyde Police say they are trying to work out what role, if any, mephedrone – street name miaow-miaow – played in his death.

Kieran’s mother Rosaleen said her son was, ‘a lovely boy who never did anyone any harm.’

Detective Chief Inspector Anthony Morrison, who is leading the inquiry, said family and friends have told him that Kieran had been taking the drug on the day of his death, possibly with other substances.

DCI Morrison is asking for anyone with knowledge of Kieran’s movements on the day of his death to come forward. He is particularly keen to speak to the friends he may have been with that day.

The teen’s family, his mother, brother and younger sister, are said to be devastated by his death.

Devastated? No shit, Winter thought. What a stupid fucking line. It would have been much more of a surprise if they’d been anything other than devastated.

All very routine. Someone was taking a powerful interest in this kid’s death, though. Enough to beat the shit out of someone to get it, leaving the same mark as he did on Stevie Strathie. If Winter was right, the shooter, the man they weren’t supposed to call the Dark Angel, was very interested in how Kieran McKendrick died.

Winter went back to Google. ‘Kieran McKendrick funeral’.

The one result that showed was for the Evening Times. The local paper was the only one that gave a toss enough to cover the boy’s service. Four paragraphs.

Drug death funeral

The funeral took place today of 17-year-old Kieran McKendrick from Whitevale Street in Dennistoun who died three weeks ago of a suspected reaction to the drug mephedrone.

The teenager’s life was celebrated in a service at Lambhill Crematorium attended by a large number of family and friends.

Kieran’s mother Rosaleen, his elder brother Ryan and sister Suzanne led a cortege of over one hundred well-wishers, including a number of his present and former schoolmates from St Mungo’s Academy.

A police investigation into Kieran’s death, which was linked to the drug miaow-miaow, proved inconclusive.

That was it. Seventeen years and all the entire World Wide Web can be arsed to run to was a grand total of four paragraphs. No one batted an eyelid and the Clyde still flowed towards Dumbarton. No one gave a fuck, the rest of the place ploughed on, blissfully unaware or uncaring about the latest stain on the pavement. Walking on by, stepping over it like a Tory MP dodging tramps on the way to the opera. This time somebody cared though. Cared enough to kill.

Winter put ‘Ryan McKendrick’ into the search engine and got businessmen, social workers, librarians and jockeys. ‘Ryan McKendrick Glasgow’ scored better though. It got him a couple of Bebo and MySpace hits then it got him ‘Naval rating Ryan McKendrick’.

‘Navy Ryan Kieran McKendrick’ hit paydirt on another Bebo site. A friend of the family mentioned both of the boys in a tribute.

He found the McKendrick’s number in Whitevale Street in the phonebook and was shaking slightly as he put 141 before the number to disguise where he was calling from then dialled, not sure what he was going to say. Or why.

A woman’s voice answered, polite but tired, barely summoning up the energy to rouse herself enough to say hello.

‘Yes?’

‘Eh, hi. Could I speak to Ryan, please?’

‘Ryan? Ryan’s at sea. He has been for three weeks. Who’s calling?’

Winter panicked.

‘It’s um, it’s Tony. Okay, sorry to have bothered you. Bye.’

He ended the call before there could be any more awkward questions, appalled at himself for lying to a mother whose son had just died. Arsehole, he raged at himself, throwing his phone on to the chair in the far corner and shutting down the laptop. He needed a drink and luckily enough he knew a man who wanted one with him.

The Station Bar was on Port Dundas Road in Cowcaddens, near where the old STV studios used to stand. Just five minutes’ walk from the city centre but far enough away that it was a local bar for local people. It got its share of cops from Stewart Street and journalists as well as firemen, civil servants, brickies, workies and assorted loonies.

As Winter pushed his way through the door, he saw Addison sitting at the table next to the open fire, stewing over a Guinness. He had obviously been counting bodies.

‘Fucking eight of the bastards,’ he muttered almost as soon as Winter sat down.

Nine, Winter thought to himself.

‘So what is being looked at now?’ he asked him.

‘Anything and everything. No stone unturned. It’s the way the Temple works.’

‘Something that I shouldn’t know?’

‘Everything that you don’t need to know.’

Fuck you, he thought.

‘Fuck you,’ he said aloud.

‘You’re welcome.’

Winter decided that if Addison was only going to give him partial information then that was going to be a two-way street. The names of Sammy Ross and Kieran McKendrick were staying with him for now but he did have something he wanted to share, as much for his own purposes as the DI’s.

‘Addy, when Cat Fitzpatrick went through Strathie’s pockets at Harthill, she found his wallet and driving licence, right?