Stuart Macbride - Cold granite

'Yes, ma'am.'

'He tells me you're not a complete waste of skin.'

'Thank you, ma'am.' But he wasn't sure if that was really a compliment.

'Don't thank me. If you're not a fuck-up, people notice. They give you things to do.' She smiled at him through the smoke and Logan felt a small chill go down his spine. 'Inschy and me: we've been talking about you.'

'Oh?' There was something unpleasant coming: he could feel it.

'It's your lucky day, Mr Police Hero. You're going to get another chance to shine.'

Logan went straight to DI Insch. The inspector sat on the edge of a desk like a large, round vulture and listened calmly as Logan complained about DI Steel slope-shouldering the no-knees investigation onto him. He was just a detective sergeant! He couldn't carry multiple homicide investigations! Insch listened and tutted and commiserated and then told him that things were tough all over and he shouldn't be such a bloody prima donna.

'What have you got going on the bin-bag case?' asked Insch.

Logan shrugged. 'The appeal went out on the telly last night, so there's a pile of sightings to go through. There was this one old lady who said we could call off the search, because little "Tiffany" was playing in the sand pit at the foot of the garden.' He shook his head. 'Silly old bat…Anyway, I've got a dozen uniform out working their way through the list.'

'So you're basically twiddling your thumbs till something comes up, then?'

Logan blushed and admitted that yes, he was.

'So what's to stop you digging into the floater?'

'Well, nothing as such, it's just that…' He tried not to meet Insch's eyes. 'Well, there's the incident lines-'

'Get a uniform to take the calls.' Insch settled back on his large rump, arms crossed.

'And…and…' Logan stopped talking and flapped his arms a little. Somehow he couldn't get the words out: I'm terrified of screwing all this up.

'And nothing,' said Insch. 'You can have WPC Watson when she's finished in court.' He checked his watch. 'I've not factored her into any of the search teams anyway.'

Logan just slumped slightly.

'Well, what are you waiting for?' The inspector levered himself off the desk and dug out a half-eaten packet of Polo Mints, helping himself to one before winding the tinfoil shut like a silvery fuse. 'Here.' He tossed the little dynamite-shaped package to Logan. 'Call it an early Christmas bonus. Now bugger off and get to work.' When they heard that Logan had a body in the morgue that might be Geordie Stephenson, Lothian and Borders Police were delighted. But before they threw a full-blown party with cake and balloons, they wanted to make sure Logan's stiff really was Malk the Knife's favourite enforcer. So they emailed up everything they had on the man: fingerprints, criminal record, and a nice big photo that Logan had printed off in colour. Twelve copies. Geordie had a large face with heavy features, bouffant hairstyle and a porn-star moustache. Just the sort of face to go demanding money with menaces with. He looked a lot more battered and pasty now he was dead, but it was definitely the same man they'd dragged out of the harbour with his knees hacked off. And to make matters certain, the fingerprints were an exact match.

Logan phoned Lothian and Borders back to give them the news. Geordie Stephenson was now collecting debts in the great beyond. They promised to send Logan up some cake.

Now that they had a positive ID, the next thing to do was find out who killed him. And Logan was willing to bet it had something to do with Geordie's gambling habit. So that meant doing the rounds of the bookies in Aberdeen. Flash Geordie's face and see who squirmed.

Logan popped into his little incident room on the way out, just to make sure everything was still going OK. On Insch's instructions he'd commandeered an efficient-looking WPC with sandy-brown hair and thick eyebrows to woman the phones and co-ordinate the uniforms going door-to-door. She sat at the cluttered table with a phone headset on, taking down yet another possible identity for the dead girl. Then she brought him up to speed with the latest developments, which took all of three seconds – there weren't any – and promised to call him on his mobile if anything came up.

That done, all he had to do now was pick up WPC Watson from the Sheriff Court and get cracking. She was still sitting in the main courtroom, watching a huge youth with a pockmarked face giving evidence. WPC Watson looked up and smiled as Logan sat down next to her.

'How's it going?' he whispered.

'Getting there.'

The kid on the stand wasn't much more than twenty-one, and sweat made his flushed, lumpy face shine in the courtroom lights. He was massive. Not fat, just big-boned. Big jaw, big hands, long, bony arms. The grey suit the CPS had lent him to make him look more credible as a witness, was far too small, straining at the seams every time he moved. His dirty-blond hair looked as if it hadn't seen a comb for a long time and his big hands fluttered and fidgeted as he mumbled his way through his encounter with Gerald Cleaver.

An eleven-year-old boy, so badly beaten by his drunken father that he gets to spend three weeks in Aberdeen Children's Hospital. And that's where his luck goes from bad to worse. Gerald Cleaver, in charge of the wards at night, practises his own special 'bedside manner' while the kid's strapped to the bed. Making him do things that would make a porn star blush.

The prosecutor gently drew the details from him, speaking softly and reassuringly even when the tears start to flow.

Logan split his attention between the jury and the accused as the boy spoke. The fifteen men and women looked appalled at what they were hearing. But Gerald Cleaver's face remained as expressionless as a slab of butter.

The prosecutor thanked the witness for his courage and handed him over to counsel for the defence.

'Here we go.' WPC Watson's voice dripped with contempt as Slippery Sandy the Snake stood, patted his client on the shoulder and wandered over to the jury. Casually, he leaned on the rail at the front of the box and smiled at the assembled men and women. 'Martin,' he said, not looking at the trembling young man but at the jury, 'you're not exactly a stranger to this court, are you?'

The prosecutor was on his feet as if someone had run a thousand volts up his bum.

'I object. The witness's past situation has nothing to do with the case being tried.'

'Your honour, I am merely trying to establish the veracity of this witness.'

The judge looked down his nose, through his glasses and said, 'You may proceed.'

'Thank you, your honour,' said the Snake. 'Martin, you've been up before this court thirty-eight times, haven't you? Breaking and entering, criminal assault, numerous charges of possession, one of possession with intent to supply, shoplifting, arson, indecent exposure…' He paused. 'When you were fourteen you tried to have sex with a minor and when she refused you beat her so severely she required forty-three stitches to put her face back together again. She can never have children. And just yesterday you were arrested for masturbating in a ladies' changing room-'

'Your honour, I strongly object!'

And that was how it went for the next twenty minutes. Sandy the Snake calmly ripped the witness to shreds and left him a swearing, sobbing, scarlet-faced wreck. Every humiliation Gerald Cleaver had submitted him to was explained away as the disturbed fantasy of a child in desperate need of attention. Until, in the end, Martin had lunged for the lawyer, screaming, 'Fuckin' kill you!'

He was restrained.

Sandy the Snake shook his head sadly, and excused the witness.

Watson swore all the way back to the cells, but she perked up when Logan told her about his new assignment.