Denise Mina - Garnethill

She stood stiff in his arms, trying to remember how she used to react to him when he touched her. She pressed herself into his chest and guessed. "I'm fine, Benny," she said, drawing back and looking him straight in the eye, holding his cheek with the flat of her hand. She looked at him, willing her suspicions about him away, but they refused to subside.

He squeezed her shoulders. "Good, wee hen." He grinned. "That's good. You've changed your hair. It's really nice."

"Yeah, I got it cut."

"God, is that whisky on your breath?"

"Urn, yeah."

"Maureen, watch yourself, it's only three in the afternoon."

"I'm watching myself," she said resentfully, and pulled away from him. "I'm just… I just wanted some today, that's all."

"Naw" – he pulled her back by the arm – "don't be like that." He hugged her again and she found herself more uncomfortable than the first time.

"Just see ye don't end up like me, that's all I mean," he said, and let her go. "Spending your days and nights in smoky rooms with a bunch of old alkies."

The police had phoned for her and she was to phone the Stewart Street station. He said he'd made dinner for her and left it in the oven. She shouted a cheerful cheerio after him as he shut the front door behind himself.

She slipped on the oven gloves and took out the casserole dish, feeling the warmth seeping through the cheap gloves. She lifted the lid. It was a mouthwatering cheesy pasta thing. A large portion had been sliced out of it: the fresh cliff of cheese and pasta was collapsing slowly, sliding down and filling the base of the dish. She cut herself a portion and dirtied a plate and some cutlery with it before dropping it into a plastic bag ready for the bin. She arranged the plate and fork on the draining board to look like the disregarded crockery of a happy eater. She ducked into the bedroom and checked the bottom drawer. The CD was still there, unmoved since she put it back.

Her T-shirt was covered in itchy shards of hair from the night before. She went into Benny's cupboard and found the mustard crew-neck jumper she had brought from the house. She took the jaggy T-shirt off and pulled the jumper over her head, opened her leather rucksack and lifted most of her clothes from the shelf, shoving them into the bag. Her hand hovered over the Anti Dynamos T-shirt. She took it for spite and left a pair of knickers and a T-shirt on the shelf in case Benny noticed everything was gone and got suspicious.

Joe McEwan couldn't come to the phone but the officer knew who she was and told her they wanted to see her at the station as soon as possible. He offered to send a car for her but she said it was okay, she'd make her own way down. He didn't object and she took it as a good sign. She collected the bag of food from the kitchen sink and dumped it in a street bin.

She was halfway down the road to the police station when she remembered Jim Maliano's Celtic shirt and jogging trousers sitting on the floor of the cupboard among the dirty socks. She would have to go back to Benny's at some point.

HUGH MCASKILL CAME TO collect her from the reception desk with Inness at his back. Inness had shaved off his gay-biker mustache. It may have been because she was used to seeing him with it or because the freshly shaved skin was a lighter color than the rest of his face but his top lip seemed odd and prominent. Her eyes kept straying to it of their own accord. Inness saw her looking at it and turned his head away to shake off her gaze.

They took her to an interview room on the ground floor. McAskill seemed to be in charge. He gave her a cheeky encouraging look, took a big chocolate bar out of his pocket, ripped the packaging down the middle with his thumbnail and broke the chocolate into squares. He put it down in the middle of the table, setting it on top of the wrapper like a serving suggestion. "Wire in," he said, sucking on a square.

Inness took two and Maureen took one. "Thanks," she said, and wondered why he was always so nice to her.

Inness turned on the tape recorder, told it who was present and what the time was.

"Now, Miss O'Donnell," said McAskill, swallowing his chocolate and addressing her in a formal telephone voice, "the first thing I need to ask you is whether or not you've ever seen this before."

He produced a knife from a crumpled paper bag and put it on the table. It was a new Sabatier kitchen knife with an eight-inch stainless-steel blade and a black wooden handle. She had seen them in shops. They were expensive. A paper tag was attached to it with a piece of string, a long number scrawled on it in Biro. It had been cleaned and polished, the blade flawlessly reflecting the fluorescent bulb above their heads, a pitiless slit of light sitting on the table.

Maureen wished she hadn't taken the chocolate. Her mouth was dry and the sticky paste was stuck under her tongue and up between her gums and cheeks. Her mouth began to water at the sight of the knife in a way she found disturbing.

"Is that it?" she asked, staring at it.

"Is it what?" said McAskill.

"Is that what was used on Douglas?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so. Have you seen it before?"

"No," said Maureen.

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

"Okay," he said, and handed it to Inness. Inness put it back in the bag. She thought it was a stupid way to keep a sharp knife, blade down in a paper bag.

"Where did you find it?" she asked.

"How do you mean?" said McAskill uncomfortably.

"Where was the knife? Was it out the back of the flat?"

"We found it in the house. Why?"

"I just thought you'd have asked me about it before, that's all."

"We only just found it," said Inness.

"A week and a bit afterward?" said Maureen.

"It was quite well hidden," muttered Inness, lifting another square of chocolate and putting it in his mouth.

Maureen wondered how well hidden anything could be in a flat the size of a fifty-quid note with ten men raking through it.

"Can I ask you something else?" she said, addressing McAskill this time.

"Depends what it is," he said carefully.

"Have you any idea who did this?"

"We're following a number of leads," he said, shuffling his papers.

"One more question?"

He smiled kindly. "Go on, then, try me."

"Did you talk to Carol Brady?"

"Aye," he said. "She's not your greatest fan."

"Yeah, I know that."

"She's convinced you blackmailed him for that money."

"I didn't even know it was there, honestly."

"We've seen the security video at the bank," said McAskill. "Douglas paid in the money himself."

"When?"

"First thing in the morning on the day he was killed."

Maureen could almost see the time-lag security video, blurred and gray, Douglas jolting across the floor to the teller like a bad animation.

"Can you think of a reason for him to pay that much money into your account?" asked McAskill.

"Sorry?"

"Why would he do that? It was pretty obvious the other day that you had no idea it was in there. What would he give you money for?"

"I don't know." She looked at the table and wondered, "Maybe he wanted me to pass the money on to someone else and he didn't get the chance to tell me about it."

McAskill nodded but didn't seem convinced. "Okay," he said. "We'll look into that."

"Did you find out who'd told Carol Brady where I was staying?"

"I'm afraid I can't tell you that," said McAskill stiffly, rolling his eyes and nodding at the tape recorder. Maureen didn't understand the signal. He nodded at it again. Maureen leaned across the table and pressed the Stop button on the tape recorder.

"No!" said McAskill, lurching over the table and pulling her hand away. "You have to tell us you want the tape off and we need to say we're going to, right?" He switched it on again.