Stuart Macbride - Cold granite

Logan jumped to attention. He opened his mouth to ask how the night's performance had gone but DI Insch got there first. 'What the blue fucking hell do you think you're playing at, Sergeant?' He snatched off his clip-on earrings and slapped them on the desk. 'You do not-'

'Richard Erskine. We found him.'

Beneath the make-up, all the colour went out of the inspector's face. 'What?'

'He's not dead. We found him.'

'You're kidding me!'

'Nope. We've got a press conference scheduled in twenty minutes. The mother's on her way in to the station.' Logan stepped back and surveyed the deflating DI in his pantomime villain costume. 'That's going to look great on TV.' Wednesday morning started far too early. Quarter to six and the phone was ringing off the hook.

Bleary and confused, Logan fumbled his way out from beneath the duvet and tried to switch off the alarm clock. It just went clunk at him. Logan picked it up, saw what time it was, swore, and sank back into the bed, one hand trying to rub some life into his face.

The phone was still ringing.

'Bugger off!' he told it.

The phone kept on ringing.

Logan dragged himself into the lounge and snatched up the handset. 'What?'

'That's a great phone manner you've got there by the way,' said a familiar Glaswegian voice. 'Now are you goin' tae open your front door or what? I'm freezin' my nuts off out here!'

'What?'

The doorbell bing-bonged and Logan swore again.

'Hold on,' he told the phone before putting it down on the coffee table and staggered out of his flat, down the communal stairs to the building's front door. It was still pitch dark outside, but sometime during the night the rain had stopped. Now everything was coated in a crust of frost, reflecting the yellow streetlights. The reporter – Colin Miller – was standing on the doorstep, holding a mobile phone in one hand and a white plastic bag in the other. He was impeccably dressed in a dark grey suit and black overcoat.

'Jesus, it's fuckin' freezing!' The words came out in a cloud of fog. 'You lettin' me in or what?' He raised the plastic bag up to eye level. 'I brought breakfast.'

Logan squinted out into the dark. 'Do you have any idea what time it is?'

'Aye. Now open up before all this shite gets cold.'

They sat at the kitchen table, Logan slowly coming back to life, Miller helping himself to the contents of Logan's cupboards while the kettle grumbled and rattled to a boil. 'You got any proper coffee?' he asked, slamming one set of doors and moving on to the next.

'No. Instant.'

Miller sighed and shook his head. 'Bloody place is like a third world country. Never mind. I can slum it…' The reporter dug out a couple of huge mugs and spooned in dark brown granules and sugar. He suspiciously examined the carton of semi-skimmed milk lurking in the fridge, but after sniffing it once or twice thumped it down on the table along with a tub of spread-able butter.

'I wasnae sure what kind of breakfast you'd like so we've got croissants, sausage rolls, steak pies and Aberdeen rolls. Help yourself.'

Logan dug a couple of rowies out of the bag and slathered one with butter. He took a big bite and sighed happily.

'Don't know how you can eat that shite,' said Miller, handing Logan a coffee. 'You know what's in them?'

Logan nodded. 'Fat, flour and salt.'

'No, not fat: lard. Only a fuckin' Aberdonian could come up with a roll that looks like a cowpat. There's half a ton of saturated animal fat and half a ton of salt in that! No surprising you're all dropping dead of heart attacks.' He pulled the bag over and helped himself to a croissant, tearing off a chunk, spreading it with jam and butter and dipping it in his coffee.

'You can talk!' Logan watched a thin film of sparkling grease float to the surface of the reporter's mug. 'Your lot invented deep-fried pizzas!'

'Aye, touche.'

Logan watched him rip, spread and dip another chunk of croissant, waiting until the reporter's mouth was full of soggy bread before asking him why he'd come round at this ungodly hour.

'Can a friend no pop round tae have breakfast with another friend?' The words came out muffled. 'You know, nice and social…'

'And?'

Miller shrugged. 'You did good last night.' He reached into the bag and came out with another croissant and a copy of that morning's Press and Journal. The front page held a big photo of the press conference. 'POLICE HERO FINDS MISSING CHILD' said the headline in big, bold letters. 'Found that little kiddie all by your ownsome. How'd you do it?'

Logandug a steak pie out of the bag, surprised to find it was still warm from the baker's oven. He munched down on flaky pastry, coating the newspaper with crumbs as he read and ate at the same time. He had to admit: it was a good story. There wasn't much in the way of fact, but Miller had managed to weave what there was into something a lot more interesting than it should have been. It looked as if the reporter was the paper's golden boy for a reason. There was even a recap of Logan's capture of the Mastrick Monster, just so everyone would know that DS Logan McRae was worthy of the title 'Police Hero'.

I'm impressed,' Logan said, and Miller smiled. 'All the words are spelled right.'

'Cheeky bastard.'

'So why are you really here?'

Miller settled back in his seat, cradling his mug of coffee close to his chest, but not close enough to stain his nice new suit. 'You know damn fine why: I want the inside story. I want the scoop. This stuff,' he poked the photo on the paper's front page, 'it's no got a long shelf life. Today, tomorrow, an' that's yer lot. Kiddie's turned up safe and well and it was nothin' more than his dad. A domestic. No blood an' guts for the punters to get all shocked an' horrified about. If the kid was dead, it'd run for weeks. As it is, day after tomorrow no one will want to know.'

'Bit cynical.'

Miller shrugged. 'Call it like Isee it.'

'That why your colleagues don't like you?'

Miller didn't even flinch, just popped a swollen chunk of coffee-stained bread into his mouth. 'Aye, well…No one likes a smart arse, no when it makes them look bad.' He put on a passable Aberdonian accent: '"Yer nae a team player!", "That's no the way we dae things up here!", "You keep this up and you're oot!" 'He snorted. 'Aye, they don't like me, but they publish my stuff, don't they? I've had more front pages since I got here than most of them old buggers have had in their whole bloody lives!'

Logan smiled. Touched a nerve there.

'So,' Miller polished off the last of his croissant, sooking the crumbs off his fingertips, 'you goin' to tell me how you found the missing kid or what?'

'No chance! I've already had one visit from Professional Standards, looking for whoever told you we'd found David Reid's body. They'll have my arse in a sling if I go handing out information without official permission.'

'Like you did yesterday?' asked Miller innocently.

Logan just looked at him.

'OK, OK,' said the reporter, collecting up the breakfast debris. 'I get the hint. Quid pro quo: right?'

'You have to tell me who your source is.'

Miller shook his head. 'No goin' to happen. You know that.' He stuffed the milk and butter back in the fridge. 'How'd you do with that info I gave you?'

'Er…we're following it up.' Logan lied. The sodding body in the harbour! The one with no knees! After Insch chewed him out for talking to the press he'd not actually spoken to the DI in charge of the investigation. He'd been too busy sulking.

'OK, well you go an have a wee word with your DI and I'll tell you what I've found out about George Stephenson's last known whereabouts. That sound fair?' He pulled a freshly-printed business card out of his wallet and placed it on the table. 'You've got till half-four. "How Did Police Hero Find Missing Kid?" Day after tomorrow: no one cares. You give us a shout when you know.'